NUFORC Sighting 58665

Occurred: 2007-09-09 17:00 Local
Reported: 2007-09-10 15:33 Pacific
Duration: 10-15 minutes
No of observers: 3

Location: Austin, TX, USA

Shape: Sphere
Characteristics: Emitted other objects, Aircraft nearby

Afternoon sighting of stationary white spherical object

Late in the afternoon of a bright and clear day, my daughters and I were taking a walk along what is known as Auditorium Shores in downtown Austin Texas. The Colorado River (or Town Lake as it is called) runs through the city of Austin and there is a green belt, with hike and bike trails running parallel to the river on both sides. I was looking up at the sky, which was particularly blue with beautiful cumulous nimbus cloud formations, when I spotted a small white circular object almost directly above us. The object appeared to be stationary and was positioned very high in the sky. I was very surprised and I pointed it out to my two (almost) teenage daughters. I tried to recognize it as possibly a planet, or a balloon or even a strange and bright star but could not say it was any of those things. It was the same color as the beautiful cumulous nimbus clouds but of apparent solid structure with a definitive circumference. We stopped walking and began to only observe the object. Like I mentioned it appeared to be stationary, white in color and circular in shape. While observing the object a large plane, which I recognized as a commercial airliner, flew near it and I was able to compare the object to the plane. The object appeared to be higher in the atmosphere than the plane which looked pretty small. The plane was at an angle as if it was climbing to cruising altitude. The airliner cruised on by the object, strengthening my conviction that the object was not traveling in the sky, but was stationary. I looked around often to observe the people out walking, running, biking and fishing along Town Lake. No one appeared to be aware of the object. We began walking again and periodically looking back up at the object. After a few moments, my daughter started exclaiming that the object was breaking into two pieces! I looked up again, refocused my gaze. I too observed what appeared to now be two circular objects; however their sides appeared to still be touching. I readjuste! d my eye s for several different looks as I know that an object at a distance can appear to be two due to a trick of our eyes. No matter how I readjusted my gaze the object did appear to be morphing into two circular objects. After only a few moments, it appeared to morph back into one object again. My daughter and I where exasperated and excited by the strange behavior! A few minutes later, we came upon a man fishing and we stopped to point out the object to him. Due to his confinement in a wheel chair and apparent poor eye sight he never was able to see the object. He could not position his head to look almost directly above us to see the object. The man felt it might be a planet and politely dismissed us. Not wanting to appear strange I quickly agreed with him. About that time a cloud began to move in front of the object. I could still see it through the cloud cover for several more minutes but by this point the novelty was wearing off and we resumed our hike. Even if it is a UFO, I thought to myself, it is positioned too far off and people where not even noticing it. Nevertheless, I looked diligently in that area of the sky for the remainder of the hike and did not see the object again even though the cloud had moved on. I took the man’s assumption that it was probably a planet to heart. I felt that if it was a planet I would be able to see it when the clouds moved on, but I never saw it again during the rest of the day. I scanned the whole sky looking for the object but it was gone. So upon returning home I looked on the internet to see what planet might be visible to the naked eye during daylight hours at this time of year and at our location. I could not find any information pertaining to a day time planet visibility for our area or anywhere near us for that matter. I am baffled as to the odd behavior of the object and felt that if it was a planet it would not have apparently morphed into two objects nor would it disappear from view. A planet would have remained on its path thro! ugh the sky.

Posted 2007-10-08