Triangle over Alexandria, VA
A witness account on file, unevaluated. Most of the archive rests here, and honestly so.
The report, as filed
I was coming from Maryland on I-495 at about 8:40PM or 20:40, heading towards the Virginia metro area to visit my sister. The sky wasn't completely dark yet, but it was pretty close. It was around the moment National Harbor came into my view that I noticed some strange lights over the center of the bridge. Three small white lights seemed to be slowly following one another about 50-100 feet above the bridge, right below the landing path for Reagan National Airport. I actually thought two or more planes were about to crash in midair before I realized all the lights were apart of the same moving craft. Instead of going towards Reagan to land, it drifted lazily from one side of the bridge to the other, and eventually began heading towards the VA end of the bridge following I-95, same direction I was going. I actually got pretty close to it (not right under it, but pretty darn close), and could make out a dark triangular silhouette above the bridges street lamps. The craft had a light on each vertex/tip and was about the same size as two SUVs side by side. It was around this time my sister called me to get an ETA, that's how I'm still able to timestamp this whole thing. I explain to her what I'm seeing and stay on the phone until I eventually lose sight of the craft around 8:46PM or 20:46 when it seems to take an interest in a different road along I-95 and I pass it. I was too busy driving to get a picture. Other Details: The Triangle (|>) moved "base" first (|) with it's third "vertex" tailing behind it (>). I couldn't see any features like helicopter blades, airplane wings, or a cabin/fuselage. I rolled down my window and couldn't hear any aircraft engines either. At one point the front "base" lifted as the craft gained some altitude (a meter or two maybe) and the back "vertex" dipped down before leveling out with the front, giving me a partial view of the top of the craft and an idea about its dimensions, and it almost seemed flat. Average speed I followed at was 60-70MPH, but the craft was going way slower when I first spotted it. Not to mention, it was in some pretty strict airspace with Reagan, Andrews, and D.C. all right there. Not sure what kind of pilot would have the jurisdiction to fly the way this thing did in such a sensitive area. 2020 was weird.
Held as-reported from National UFO Reporting Center (record NUFORC #161610). Witness text is preserved verbatim, including its spelling; nothing is edited beyond formatting.
Ask for the records
What would the paper say?
For a dated, located U.S. sighting, FAA radar data and ATC communications are the records most likely to exist. Through Aletheca, the house instrument, anyone can commission the request — filed, chased, and published in the open, refusals included. The draft goes over already written: the records sought, and the date window they would live in.
Routed to: Federal Aviation Administration · records window 2020-09-20 → 2020-10-07
From the same sky
Related entries
December 11, 2023 · 10:36 PM · SPHERE
Alexandria, VA
I saw one fast light fly over my house a half an hour later got video of a light in my woods scanning the forest
October 19, 2023 · 7:00 PM · UNKNOWN
Alexandria, VA
October 19, 2023, 7pm. While driving home in the evening I saw an orange glowing object flying low. I initially thought it was a drone on fire. I parked in my driveway to get out and get a better look. I saw multiple silent orange objects flying northwards in a staggered line, possibly about a dozen. A neighbor walking his dog stopped to watch and my wife came out to look. I went back indoors and didn’t have a good count of the total number of objects. Videos attached from iPhone 15 Pro. Living near DC, I can only assume the objects might be military?
September 11, 2023 · 11:03 PM · SPHERE
Alexandria, VA
On the evening of September 11, 2023, at approximately 11:03pm, two adults (ages 28 and 26), witnessed a circular orb (the size of a quarter, if you were to point the quarter to the sky), as bright as the moon quickly slingshotted into space faster than any aircraft, meteor or shooting star both participants have ever seen. The two participants were on the patio of their 4th floor apartment, stargazing, when they noticed the orb shoot through the sky. Since the orb shot through very fast there was no way to document the incident through phones, however, minutes after, we decided to jot down notes and draw out what we saw. We are more than happy to send over a copy of those drawings and information. The orb was seen from the corner of one of the participants eyes and its light, speed and direction commanded the night sky and was highly visible. It's trajectory was that of a slingshot. The orb appeared as if it had entered a dimension (it slingshotted through space and disappeared in less than a second). One participant said the orb had moved so fast that it looked as though it was going through stages. The participant said they saw the orb and then morphed versions of the orb as if it was moving through space at speeds far faster than any aircraft. It is important to note the area in which we saw this orb is heavily accessible by military helicopters and military aircrafts that routinely fly over the area, however, where the orb appeared was further, brighter and faster than any military aircraft that has ever flown past. There is 100% no way this was a military aircraft - there were no blinking lights. It was first seen peering through the clouds and shot through them, moving outside of the Earth's atmosphere. It did not move like a meteor across the sky, but instead moved upward toward space. The two adults are regular stargazers and are incredibly familiar with normal sightings in the sky (planets, stars, airplanes, missile launches, and meteors); this was completely abnormal.
February 10, 2023 · 7:10 AM · OVAL
Alexandria, VA
I was talking my daughter to the bus stop this morning and we were looking up at the moon. I saw two white oval like objects up in the sky. I said „I wonder what those are“ and my daughter replied „They’re probably just planes.“ They looked way too high up to be a plane. When we first spotted them they were flying close together and then they began moving in various directions. One moved in a circle like motion the other more erratically and covered more distance very quickly. I was able to snap one photo and when I looked up to take another one they both had disappeared. Shortly after they disappeared I saw a plane fly over and it confirmed the previous two objects were much too high to have been planes.
November 7, 2022 · 5:30 AM · SPHERE
Alexandria, VA
I was leaving my house at 530am, i had just pulled out of my driveway, reaching the end of the street at my cul de sac, when i stopped to let a runner cross the street in front of me, otherwise i would have kept going as i usually would, and as i waited i looked up at the very dark barely blue pre sunrise sky and noticed a smallish cloud oddly lit up around its edges, no other clouds around were that way, this was a mostly clear morning but for two or three little clouds, that was when i first noticed this odd light dancing in and out of that cloud and zooming all around it playfully, i could even see it bouncing around inside the cloud quickly changing direction and making all sorts of erratic patterns. I watched it play around and in and out of that cloud for about a minute, when i decide to drive off somewhat perplexed… i had to catch the train to work. I get to the train station, i get onboard, and as the train is pulling off, i look to the sky in the direction i saw the dancing light, when i noticed the cloud it was playing in had a lit up silver lining, and what looked like trails of condensation in the sky all around that cloud in all sorts of odd patterns… i realized immediately that they were left by whatever was up there playing in that cloud. There were no planes in the sky yet as it was still too early for commercial flights, no helicopters, nothing. The sun hadn’t even risen yet, and no sight of the light, it was gone. In summary the light behaved like a playful hummingbird completely uninhibited and frivolous and unthreatened in anyway. What made it even more bizarre is that i live less than 10 miles from the capital in DC, and nothing flys like that around here, not even military planes. This was unique, and oh yes one last thing gravity mattered not to it, it moved in any direction effortlessly.
December 7, 2021 · 8:00 AM · CIRCLE
Alexandria, VA
While admiring the beauty of the clouds this morning, a UAP appeared directly in my field of vision. I starte at it the whole time it, trying to detect and determine the nature of what I was viewing. It looked similar to a headlamp on a train and too bright to be a planet. I checked and there are no planets anywhere near this part of the sky at this time. It did not appear to move in any direction and the shape and intensity of light suggested some sort of in-place motion such as spinning or oscillating. After about 30 seconds or so it vanished. Morning sky was lightly cloudy and the light appeared to somehow be punching through the clouds. The sky lighting and color was in very high contrast to the object viewed. The spot was way too bright to be a planet, but the distance and size light intensity was wrong for it to be any kind of naturally occurring reflection of the sun. Since the sightline is in the general direction of the US White House, I was curious and used a compass to get the direction of the sighting and plotted a rough trajectory to see where the vector would fall on Google Maps. My best guess about where I think the object may have been hovering based on what I saw, is indicated by the bold red arrow on the UAP_map_vector_2021-12-07_8-22-06.png image uploaded. The area highlighted is between the White House and Andrews Air Force Base. I worked as a lighting design engineer in a previous career which developed advanced knowledge of human vision, perception and psychology of seeing. I don't seek out UAPs and this is the first time I have reported one. I am reporting it primarily because of perceived proximity to important Federal institutions.