NUFORC Sighting 108209

Occurred: 2014-03-30 14:30 Local
Reported: 2014-03-30 22:14 Pacific
Duration: 2 minutes
No of observers: 2

Location: Kings Mountain, NC, USA

Shape: Triangle

Black Triangle with Attached Object Moves Slowly Across Sky and then Disappears into Clouds

My wife and I (we are business marketing writers) were doing some yard work this afternoon around 2:30 PM, when I noticed an odd object that appeared to be drifting, like a balloon, from east to west in the southern sky. The sky was partly cloudy with good sunshine.

At first I thought it was a balloon because it was moving so slowly; but then I realized that it was drifting AGAINST the prevailing west wind. I pointed it out to my wife, who agreed it looked like a dark-colored balloon. She went into the house and brought my binoculars for a better look.

Through the binoculars, I saw a distinctly black, triangular object — it looked rather like a bat-kite, which seemed reasonable to me on a gusty day like today, and it would explain the thing moving AGAINST the west wind.

Once I tentatively identified the object as a high-flying kite, I estimated the “kite” was maybe 6 feet wide and 400 feet in altitude, which would not be out of the question for some kite enthusiasts.

However, I then noticed a dark tether hanging straight down from the black triangle attached to something like an angular, light brown box that didn’t look aerodynamic at all. The box-like object was about one-quarter the size of the black triangle. This made me question my kite theory.

Then, as I was watching it, the whole assembly disappeared into the clouds — I actually watched it go into one of the cumulous clouds that were moving west to east.

That blew me away, because it meant the craft could NOT be a mere 6 feet wide and 400 feet high...it must have been more like 5000 FEET altitude, or more, in order for it to disappear into a cloud. Which means it had to be a LOT bigger than a kite.

If the thing was actually 5,000 feet in altitude, that’s about 13 times HIGHER than I had estimated, which would mean my estimation of its physical dimensions was way off, also. It had to be much larger than I estimated.

The craft did not reappear from the clouds.

The entire sighting lasted about 2 minutes and only crossed, perhaps, 25 degrees of the sky, very slowly, from east to west. We were looking due south, probably 45 or 50 degrees above the horizon.

Posted 2014-04-04