Other over Pensacola, FL

The report, as filed

Pensacola, Florida, June 7, 201,8 1:45-1:55 am I was at the intersection of US98 and S 72nd Ave, facing south at the traffic light. I saw a light behind the traffic light, and ignored it because it resembled a spot light on a helicopter, and there's much military and civilian air traffic due to nearby bases and airports. I looked again, while waiting for the green light, and noticed the distant object hadn't moved, and didn't have strobe or nav lights. I squinted to see it better and realized it was a very strange object. It was about 30° or less off of the horizon, and just west of due south from my location. I turned right instead, to get closer to the object. I pulled into a parking lot at 7575 W Hwy 98, and was directly north of the object. The area it was over was mostly wooded, I was afraid if i drove any closer I might miss it. At this point it was nearly 45-60° overhead, and was extremely bright. It was the size of a fingernail at arm's length, it was a clear sky and no reference point made it difficult to discern the size. My best guess is that it was a 1-2 thousand feet away, and appeared to be between the size of a car and a bus, but i really don't know for sure. It was "smaller" than a full moon, maybe 60% of that size. I jumped out of the car and immediately took a cell phone video, but could see the aperture was too small on the cheap camera and there wasn't enough light to see it on the screen. I tried taking several unsuccessful still shots, but it was still too dim/small, and didn't show up. I gave up after 3 shots, and focused instead on observing the object. It wobbled around, much like a top but very small movements. It also seemed tethered because it stayed in one spot while wobbling. The colors were hard to determine because of the luminosity of the surface, and also there were dark areas that seemed to indicate it was rotating. It was mostly yellow/orange/pink, the dark areas seemed blue or green, but they were distant and moving. It was shaped almost exactly like a queen's crown, it was rounded like a muffin on top, but had a ring underneath, like the headband on a crown. There may have been something on top, like a point, or it may have been light glare from the object. The dark areas were on the sides, like panels or windows. I considered it may have been a Chinese lantern, or maybe a quad copter, or some type of prank drone. It was totally silent, I have heard how noisy drones typically are. I started to shout at it after a minute or two, to see if it would do anything. Maybe a minute later, a very bright red light just appeared on the 10:00 position of the object, it was a pinpoint of intense really red light. Astonished, I began to flash my phone flashlight off and on at the object. The red light "grew" upwards into a equally bright red line, like a car antenna popping up. The line was no bigger than the object itself. It remained a line for maybe 30-60 seconds. Afterwards, it retracted upwards to return to a single point of light, now with more space between the original object and the red light, but still very close. It remained stationary, when suddenly the objects drifted south. As the objects started to move they looked like they went into a thick, invisible fog. There was no cloud, they just vanished/faded into a smoky oblivion. The entire process was about 10 minutes or less.

Held as-reported from National UFO Reporting Center (record NUFORC #141823). Witness text is preserved verbatim, including its spelling; nothing is edited beyond formatting.