Cigar over Elk, CA

The report, as filed

After spotting the anomaly in 8 pix I blew up the photos, revealing groups of lights. Thought maybe a 2 stage missile, but the arrangement of the light spots did not look like any missile motor nozzle arrangement. And there were no contrails. The anomaly just showed up and disappeared over 2 minutes. So examining the close up of the anomaly, there are a few frames that the light arrangement looks different. The anomaly showed up in the photo, went up vertically , maybe 15-20 miles offshore, then back down, then up again and a couple of zig zags and disappeared. I have seen Vandenburg's launches, and this was different. Backlit, I would have seen a ship or sub launch, and this would have been a Large Rocket, so sub, ship or platform was not possible. No aircraft in the sky, and I dont know of any aircraft dropping 2 stage missiles. It was a UFO. I did not notice it live, but 2 days later scanning through photos. (Our sunsets are very pretty, so when it is clear I am shooting.). After blowing up the anomaly it does not look man made. The pictures were taken with a Samsung S7+ tablet, on an open hillside on our property. Not through a window. This was not a flare or reflection. The video is me shuttling through the 8 pictures, back and forth. I have never witnessed a UFO previously, I have seen rockets and high altitude balloons, this was neither. Pix taken 39.185203552246094, -123.75308227539062 I have a video sequence of the pictures there are 8..

Held as-reported from National UFO Reporting Center (record NUFORC #166146). Witness text is preserved verbatim, including its spelling; nothing is edited beyond formatting.