OT: What's In Your Night Sky?

[RAF_Louvert 101]

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Greetings All,

 

About four years ago my youngest daughter, (who was a junior in high school then), and I were out in the backyard around this same time of year, looking at the stars. It was just before 11:00 pm and it was a clear moonless night and we were watching for meteors, when we each saw the same thing. Actually, it would be more accurate to say that we each "sensed" the same thing, as the object we each thought we saw was only a shade or two darker than the sky it moved against. As best we could make out, (using the stars behind it as a gauge), it was a large boomerang-shaped craft with the faintest dark amber glow at each tip. It slipped dead silent overhead, traveling from east to west. It was impossible to judge how large it was or how high it was, there was simply no point of reference. We both doubted what we had just seen, but we had each seen exactly the same thing. We still talk about it, and both assume it is some secret government project no one is supposed to know about.

 

A week ago, I saw it again, at about the same time but coming from the southeast and heading northwest. It moved just as silently and eerily as it had the last time I'd seen it. I created the following image to give you all a better idea of what this thing looks like.

 

 

 

I know there have been reports of similar sightings from around the country over the last several years, and from what I know during my top secret time in the USAF our government has a whole lot of things that are ultra hush-hush. I am relatively sure this is one of those.

 

Anyone else here ever seen such phenomenon in the skies above them? And if so, any theories on what they might be?

 

Cheers!

 

Lou

 

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[Hasse Wind 46]

The Martians, obviously. They are coming!

 

An interesting sighting, definitely. Although I've been an amateur astronomer since the 1980's and have spent quite a lot of time looking at the sky, with and without my telescope, I've never seen anything like that anywhere. Must be some kind of a special aircraft. You Americans have the most advanced aviation techonology, so the best place to see something like that is in the States.

 

I've never seen anything unexlainable in the sky. Meteors, satellites, aircraft, bright planets (like Venus), even clouds and auroras, are responsible for many UFO sightings, but that boomerang is something else.

 

It's good that the Sun is again becoming more active, as now I can see beautiful auroras more often. It's really a special event to see the sky painted with rapidly shifting, sometimes very brightly coloured shapes. Something that everybody should see at least once in their lives. And one of the rare benefits of living in the far north.

Edited March 14, 2011 by Hasse Wind

[Lewie 7]

I would have to say that it would be arrogant for us to think we're the only smart creatures in the near galaxy. And who's to say that what makes up our world, our science, maybe even our periodic table of elements and perceptions of what is called 'living' are the only way it is in the universe?

 

My wife and I saw something in the 90's, in the early evening night sky, at friend's house, that we both still can't explain. Oddly enough no-one else saw it, but they were all inside at the time and we were both chided for having too much to drink.

[Von Paulus 8]

It's good that the Sun is again becoming more active, as now I can see beautiful auroras more often. It's really a special event to see the sky painted with rapidly shifting, sometimes very brightly coloured shapes. Something that everybody should see at least once in their lives. And one of the rare benefits of living in the far north.

I've read that the next solar maximum is only in 2013 and not 2011/12.

[Hasse Wind 46]

Yes, it should happen in July 2013, though the predictions are not always so accurate in the end. But the activity has already increased. We've been seeing more and brighter auroras recently, and they will only get better as the activity increases. The auroras are an excellent indicator of solar activity, and can be observed much more easily than sunspots or anything else.

[Olham 164]

Looks like they have finally built something like the Horten Ho IX, maybe with silent jet engines.

[Hasse Wind 46]

That design was literally decades ahead of its time. I couldn't believe my eyes when I first saw a picture of it years ago. Truly a radical change in design when you compare it to the typical piston engine aircraft of the era!

[tranquillo 10]

It was the new Stealth Boomerang from Aussie land.

[RAF_Louvert 101]

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I KNEW IT! The Aussies are planning a sneak attack on the US! I thought I smelled shrimp on the barbie.

 

 

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[Olham 164]

Lou, I have once witnessed a big object, chasing across the sky over Norden (my hometown) burning.

I was in Ostfriesland, where there are no big cities, and so the sky is very clear at night.

My dad and I strolled along a wide patch of green, so we were not even blinded by the lights of houses.

Then a long flame appeared from northwesterly direction.

First I thought of a comet, but then I saw, that the whole object, which was long, like a big pen, was turning.

When it stood upright, the flames formed a wide band.

The object, compared to it's speed, must have had the size of two or three passenger train waggons.

It was turning with equal speed, forming a narrow, then a wide band of flames, while it crossed the sky

and disappeared in the southeast, without crashing.

 

I guess it was a large rocket stage. And I hoped, it was no satelite - cause they use nuclear power.

We searched the news and the morning papers, but nothing.

[Von Paulus 8]

 

[Olham 164]

I knew this would happen...

[Von Paulus 8]

You knew and above all you were wishing for it after the last post.

[Lewie 7]

There's good evidence that our local group of stars have planets orbiting them. It's not too big of a stretch to figure that there might be earth-like worlds or probably more likely that there are life processes we haven't considered on planets we'd consider not life sustaining. . A lot of big "if's" in the whole schema. Most of our local star group are part of another small star cluster that the Milky Way 'collided' with and scavenged, many hundreds of millions of years ago. What those early Earth night skies looked like would probably astound us today, as what we see is very little of the Milky Way's light, as it's filtered by a lot of stellar dust and gas clouds.

[FastCargo 412]

Where in Minnesota do you live (approximately...I'm not looking to send black helos your way)? I have an inkling what it is.

 

FC

[Olham 164]

Look into our OFF Forum Pilots maps, FastCargo - in the "Sticky Threads".

[JFM 18]

Without getting deep into it I will state that I believe there is intelligent life elsewhere in the universe. However, I do not believe alien life is visiting Earth.

 

Now, I’m bound by the constraints of my human mind and its knowledge being based on principles and conditions as we know them on Earth. However, regardless of what kind of intelligent life there is outside our solar system and regardless of how they think and live, I believe it safe to say that space travel across light year distances is a purposeful and organized endeavor and event. It doesn’t just happen randomly. Doubtless a long series of progressive learning and technological evolutions must occur within an alien species on some distant planet for them to attain the ability to construct space ships that can sustain the life of its occupants during journeys across billions of miles and back (in this regard they are far in advance of our abilities). Safe to say these things require organized societal planning and execution; i.e., a space ship doesn’t just build itself. They must be conceived, designed, constructed, tested, flown, revised, upgraded, improved, etc, the result of intelligent beings working in concert. Not a stretch to suggest that even in an alien world these projects must be financed by some form of labor compensation; i.e., somebody has to go before the Queen and request funds to go to the New World, if you will. Are funds appropriated from their form of Congress for their form of NASA? Not a stretch to ponder such a thing. And then after said funds are procured and the technology realized and executed and the space ship conceived and its crew trained and the billion mile journey is survived and the space ships—despite the (for all intents and purposes) infinite distance of space in every direction—head for Earth time and again; after all of that, the only thing these superior beings do once they get here is turn their lights on over Arizona or kill some cattle and sheep in Montana or flatten grass into circles in England?

 

Look at the Herculean effort and cost just to get a Space Shuttle into a near-earth orbit for a week and back. Now, imagine if NASA went before Congress and said they wanted to build a space ship that could travel to and from, for instance, let’s just say, Pluto (I know it’s no longer classified as a planet but it is distant and solid). Ridiculously close compared to planets discovered outside our solar system which are too distant to determine if inhabited by intelligent life. Still, think of the incredible overhead and man-hours just to design a ship that could travel to Pluto and back and sustain its crew for the years of space travel that trip would take. Now, consider the Congressional reaction when they ask the purpose of such a visit to Pluto and NASA tells them, “Well, we just want to make cool-looking circles in the Plutonian dust, then maybe zoom around at really low altitude and then turn the exterior lights on and off a lot. Oh, and for good measure, lets throw in an anal probe or two on any life we find there.” Think NASA would get their mission? Nope. Yet alien civilizations conceive/pitch/receive funding/design/train/prepare/execute similarly worthless missions across tens/hundreds/thousands of light years? To make a crop circle? Again, I’m bound by my earthly knowledge and have no idea how an alien civilization thinks/conceives/executes, but I’m sorry I just don’t buy it. I’m not saying people don’t see things in the sky they describe as “UFOs”—even some of my dearest friends have—but respectfully I do not believe their origins are of extraterrestrial intelligence.

 

I am not trying to convince anybody otherwise and have no explanation for any nocturnal Minnesota boomerangs; just offering my two cents.

[RAF_Louvert 101]

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FC, I live west of the Twin Cities about an hour, in McLeod County. Our area has been used as a training fly-over by the USAF for a good number of years on and off, and I've seen numerous different military aircraft coming over, alone and in formation. I know what my daughter and I saw wasn't: It wasn't an F-117, and it wasn't a B2. I would very much like to know what it was. BTW, it did not appear to move at a speed fast enough to keep it in the air, in terms of "normal" aerodynamics. But as I noted earlier, it was impossible to sort out how large it was or how high up it was, so it's true speed could well have been much faster than it appeared from our perspective.

 

As to the black helos...well...I can't talk about those.

 

 

 

JFM, your two cents seem very noteworthy Sir. I will add, "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,

than are dreamt of in your philosophy."

 

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[FastCargo 412]

Well, according to this map, like you said, you live right under an MTR:

 

 

Specifically, an SR MTR, which means the training is done at a max of 250 kts and 1500 feet. So that would explain the slow speed and quite possibly the quietness (low throttle setting). Also, the MTR is multi-directional in that area, which explains the different directions you saw the aircraft flying.

 

Also, if something is truly clandestine, you wouldn't want to run with lights on (like you said the target had) or near a major airport (KMSP).

 

My opinion is you saw a conventional training sortie of something like a B-2 or a C-17.

 

Yea, I know, you said it wasn't those aircraft. I'm not disputing what you saw...I'm just saying what the probabilities are based on Occam's razor.

 

FC

[RAF_Louvert 101]

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FC, I agree entirely about the probabilities, and until I saw it next I was relatively certain it was one of the two aircraft mentioned. But when I saw it the second time and it again appeared to be "sans tail" I began to think it may be something else. Also, as I mentioned, the lights at the tips were so faint as to be almost invisible, (the image I posted actually shows them brighter than they really appeared, which I did in order for them to be seen at all in the picture). I was wondering if they weren't just that way so as not to be noticed from the ground, but were more visible to other craft in the flight, (though I saw no other such craft). It is a puzzler.

 

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[UK_Widowmaker 571]

It was the new Stealth Boomerang from Aussie land.

 

Proof that God is an Aussie!

[ConradB 0]

I was fishing one night out in the country, for catfish, and snappin' turtles, and I decided since fishing was slow, to lay back on the river bank, and I noticed a solid bright light that I first thought was a plane flying at high alttitude, until I noticed no flashing lights. Just as it passed overhead, it made 2 perfect right angle 90 degree turns and shot off to the west like a flash.

 

What it was, I have no clue. Since I left my field glasses in the car 1/2 a mile back in the car, I couldn't get a closer look.

 

Pretty cool to se though! Whether it was terrestrial or not.

[Hauksbee 103]

That design was literally decades ahead of its time. I couldn't believe my eyes when I first saw a picture of it years ago. Truly a radical change in design when you compare it to the typical piston engine aircraft of the era!

As was Jack Northrup and his flying wings. I was shocked when I discovered that the fascinating airplane in "Raiders of the Lost Ark" was a Northrup design. Spielberg added a more robust landing gear, and a a MG turret in the 'nose', but other than that...