Light over Manteca, CA
A witness account on file, unevaluated. Most of the archive rests here, and honestly so.
The report, as filed
At approx 7:50pm on 12/20/2014, I walked outside and noticed something that looked like a sort of amythest-colored, purple-pinkish light in the sky. It was completely odd and caught my attention right away. It actually looked like 2 lights side-by-side, horizontal to the ground, very close together or possibly even attached. Brighter than a star.. well, brighter than Sirius (which appears in the Eastern sky this time of year) I started watching it, completely perplexed by the color. My first thought was that it might be someone playing with a drone, but it wasn't like any drone I've ever seen (I've seen a few in my life.. my neighbor even has a large one). The light was steady and brilliant, not flashing. It didn't have the typical red/green, flashing lights that you would expect from an R/C toy or airplane. It wasn't a satellite either. I'm former military (Navy Electronic Warfare) and I can assure you that I've never seen anything in the sky with the same color light. In fact, the sky was totally overcast that night, but below the clouds it was very clear and there was good visibility. No stars were visible, nor could I see any of the usual air traffic heading into the Bay Area because of the cloud layer. When I spotted the object, it looked like it was maybe 200-300 yards to the East at less than 500 ft in altitude... essentially over my neighborhood. At first it looked stationary, like it was hovering. Then it started to slowly move East (away from me). I noticed that I couldn't hear any 'drone' sounds.. nor any other sounds from planes, etc. As I watched, it seemed to speed up a little, the all of the sudden took a 90-degree left turn (at speed) and moved a short distance before abruptly stopping. I would estimate it moved maybe 200 yds in less than one second. I literally said “#@!*%$&!*” out loud to myself!! That's when I realized I had my phone in my left hand... duh!! I immediately launched the camera and started to record some video. It's not great video... the object looks really tiny, almost invisible on my Samsung s5, but you can certainly see it when playing back on a laptop, or something with a bigger screen. It looks like a white star moving away fr! om me and unfortunately, you can't see the purple-ish color, it just looks like a white dot. By the time I got the video going it had started to move Eastward again, slowly almost wavering a bit before moving behind the trees across the street from my house and out of my view. Several minutes later I was still outside trying to play back the video and one of the typical airliners that I usually see flew overhead.. I couldn't actually see it because of the cloud cover, but I could definitely hear it. So, whatever I saw and recorded that night was flying below the clouds and not making any noise. It wasn't a plane or any other celestial object, not a drone, missile, meteor, etc.... I'm somewhat of a trained observer... I have a military background and also have a couple pilots in my immediate family. Unfortunately, the video is only a few seconds long. At one point I tried to zoom, but it went out of view, then I un-zoomed and found it again. I'd be happy to share a link to my Google drive if your interested in seeing it. Otherwise, I don't really want to post it online anywhere. Curious if anyone else has report something similar? The color was amazing hard to describe.. neon fuchsia, pinkish-purple... really really odd, but pretty.
Held as-reported from National UFO Reporting Center (record NUFORC #116208). Witness text is preserved verbatim, including its spelling; nothing is edited beyond formatting.
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Routed to: Federal Aviation Administration · records window 2014-12-17 → 2015-01-03
From the same sky
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June 25, 2023 · 4:30 AM · DISK
Manteca, CA
It was a disk, bright with blueish light surroundings, dissapearing as soon as I was able to identify it, quickly gone, no track.
June 22, 2020 · 8:59 PM · SPHERE
Manteca, CA
I had just gotten off work as a professional commercial bus driver, and was just looking up appreciating the still setting sun in tonight, even though it was near 9 p.m., or 2100 hours. There were no clouds in the sky, and the view of the crystal clear bluish-maroon sky was amazing! As I yet traveled only one eighth of a mile down Southbound Lovelace Avenue, I was still observing the sky on occasion as I was driving down this road, when I noticed appearing from my right, which would be the westbound side of Lovelace Avenue, a brilliantly lit bluish white sphere moving gracefully through the clear early evening sky. I say gracefully, because the first thing I noticed about this bluish sphere, was that it seemed to be "pulled" in the South, Southeast direction of the sky, as opposed to being propelled. I characterized this type of movement through the sky, because over 30 years ago, I had considered being an aviator in the United States Marine Corps. I've read dozens of books about aircraft since its inception when the Wright brothers flew the Kitty Hawk, so I'm quite familiar with the characteristics of aircraft of different kinds that are publicly known. Also, I have taken a few flight lessons before, so I'm pretty familiar which additional lights on aircraft, and how aircraft wood handle and performance in the sky, since I have flown propeller-driven aircraft before like the Piper Archer II. That the movement of this sphere was so graceful, I immediately started looking for typical navigational lights seen on a terrestrial aircraft that are required whenever flying in the evening into night time. I did not observe any standard navigation lights, like the red light on the left/port wing tip of a man-made terrestrial crafts, nor a green light on the right/starboard wing tip, then a white light on the aircraft tail, nor any other required position lights on a plane. As the bluish sphere traveled from my right to my left, I estimated it's altitude at approximately 800 to 1,000 ft. The illumination of the sphere reminded me of a clearly lit LED light, which never pulsated, and remained at the same light level the entire time I witnessed it. I could not discern any discernible shape within the light, and it was only one "craft" I observed. The next thing that occurred to me was to see if I could hear any sound from this sphere. Since I was driving a 2015 Ford Fusion Hybrid, I decided to drop my speed so the car would run silently on its lithium ion battery rather than the gasoline engine. Then I rolled down the driver side window so I can potentially hear any sound that could have been made in the wake of this bluish sphere, but did not hear any sounds at all, save for the ground noise made by the tires of my car. And I did not hear any other sounds around me as I was traveling on this road by myself. As I approached a stop sign at the dead end of Lovelace Avenue and Union Road and pulled to the side just before the stop sign, I continued observing the craft as much as possible until I lost view of it behind some trees and some other Man-made obstructions on the ground in the distance. Again, what really captured my attention was how this craft seem to be "pulled", rather than "pushed" (propelled) in the direction, such as a plane would, as it moved along. A very fascinating observation!
October 8, 2018 · 8:37 AM · TRIANGLE
Manteca, CA
Next came 2 more showed up in the same formation. Than a solo one showed up, forming a triangle with the 2nd set of lights. The 1st set of lights quickly disappeared. The remaining 3 that formed the triangle slowly spread, the bottom right light disappeared. The bottom left light disappeared shortly later. The top light got brighter and then rapidly disappeared.
January 11, 2018 · 10:00 PM · OTHER
Manteca, CA
I've been watching the sky's since 12/16/17, when I first started noticing something in the sky that looked like a star but it had white and red lights twinkling. But when I realized there were others who looked somewhat identical. They've even come down and posed for photos on another night. 2 nights ago I put my tablet up in sky cuz I noticed they were up there posted just hovering when I saw one moving west, I aimed tablet at it trying to record it when this report like object came down to me again but I can't see it in plain site only through Tablet camera.
November 24, 2017 · 12:10 AM
Manteca, CA
I was sleeping and I woke up because I heard a strange humming noise that was intermittent but repetitive. I have room darkening shades and light from outside cannot be seen, but a red or burnt orange light was so intense I could see the flashing from inside the room. It sounded like it was hovering nearby and then the lights and humming stopped.
May 15, 2016 · 9:00 PM · CHANGING
Manteca, CA
A flashing multi colored orb has been appearing in the horizon by my home every night for the past 3 weeks. (the first week, the multi colored orb appeared once very saturday but for the past week to two weeks its been showing it self every night) It appears at exactly 21:00 every night now and moves slowly down closer then disappears after 30 min then appears again at 3:00 am. I have also had a close encounter where I witnessed a triangular craft that came around over my neighbors home and closely on the side of my home..it craft had 2 or 3 red lights and white glowing lights all around it but it wasn't round when it came closer it was a triangular shape and it never made one sound. It came so close that I ran into the house to get my husband out of the restroom but by the time he had came outside the craft was further away and looked more like an airplane. I believe that the multicolored orb is communicating with other bright lights in the sky. I'm not a professional but I have a very strong feeling that something out there is trying to communicate with me. I am very open minded and curious about whats out there but at the same time I get very nervous with what I will see if I continue to monitor I might not come back to share what I've experienced. Witness elects to remain totally anonymous; provides no contact information. PD