NUFORC Sighting 51213

Occurred: 2006-07-04 02:37 Local
Reported: 2006-07-04 13:59 Pacific
Duration: At least 10 minutes
No of observers: 2

Location: Osteen, FL, USA

Shape: Sphere
Characteristics: Aircraft nearby

Round black object hovering in and out of clouds during and after space shuttle launch.

I always try to watch all of the rockets, especially the space shuttles launch from Cape Canaveral. On July 4, 2006, the space shuttle Discovery took off at 2:37 PM. I wasn't in a good spot to see the launch (trees in the way), so about ten minutes before the shuttle took off, I started driving from Deltona looking for a unobstructed view of the east. I was hoping to get to the St. Johns River bridge along 415 and pull over there to watch the shuttle since there would be no obstructions over the river. I didn't make it that far, and at 2:37 I pulled over into a church parking lot in Osteen that had an open field behind it. By the time I got my camera out, the shuttle was probably about 30 seconds into it's launch. I started taping the launch, and once the shuttle was no longer visible, I noticed something else in the sky.

It was round black object up in the sky off in the distance in the same direction that the shuttle took off from. Judging from the clouds that the shuttle passed behind, and what the object was in front of, the black object was closer than the shuttle, but it was hard for me to estimate a size. My initial though was that somebody released a balloon that was rising. After watching the object a bit, I realized it wasn't moving correctly to be a balloon. For example, it would be at one spot in the sky, and then would move back and forth horizontally. Another time it started getting low in the sky rather quickly compared to the speed that it was drifting at at other times. It also appeared to be just barely entering clouds at times. It would fade behind a cloud, but never actually disappear totally.

I watched (and video taped) the object for about 10 minutes until I finally left. About 5 minutes later, I was able to look past the trees after driving along 415 in the direction of Sanford and still see the object.

Later on, as I am writing this, I looked at the video that I took of the object and the shuttle launch. At one point I am not paying attention, and move the camera off of the shuttle, and the object shows up there showing that the object was in the sky before I noticed it too.

I have video footage, along with still frames that I took from the video that I will send to you. With so many people watching the shuttle launch, I wonder if anyone else saw something similar?

Posted 2006-07-16