Black Sphere Hovers Over Trees During Snow Storm in Fayette County, PA
This report was submitted by Researcher Jim Brown and was used with his permission.
Report was received at 11:00 AM, 24 Jan, 2019.
Witness contacted me via e-mail.
Location of sighting: near Hopwood, Pa.
Time of sighting: 9:30 AM
Point of observation: Outdoors while clearing snow from porch steps.
Weather conditions: Snowing moderately
Description of event as derived from both initial report and phone
conversation:
e-mail: I was clearing the snow from my front steps and noticed what
looked to be a black ball hovering in the sky. It was over the trees in
front of the house and just seemed to be floating there. What was
strange was that it was growing larger but not moving closer.
It just sat there in the sky for about 2 minutes. I tried to take a picture
with my phone but as soon as I got the phone out snow had hit the camera
lens and the picture blurred out. The ball then slowly began moving away
and also was shrinking in size. It hadn’t gone very far then it just shrank out of
sight. That was the last I saw of it. I watched it for no more than
about 5 minutes.
Additional details obtained by questioning on the phone: 24 Jan, 2019, 2:00 PM
The witness describes the object as a very black ball or sphere with no
other details observed. It was about twice the apparent size of a full
moon when at its largest size. When asked what drew his attention to it
he said it was just there when he looked up. He could not say if it was
there prior to his first seeing it since he had just gone outside. He
could not say how it first appeared in the sky.
I asked about how far away it was and based on the fact it was snowing
moderately at the time and the witness statement that the object was
clearly visible it was determined that it was within about 300 feet of
his point of observation. Beyond that the snow would have obscured his
view.
There was no sound associated with the sighting. The attempt to
photograph the object was prevented likely by a snowflake hitting the
camera lens and causing the image to be blocked. He described the
picture he did obtain and said it was streaked / blurred and nothing could be
identified. (Witness will make the picture available and I will attempt
to verify the snowflake hypothesis as to why it failed to show.)
He said the object remained motionless for about two minutes then very
slowly moved about 45 degrees horizontally above the trees, remaining
visible the entire time. It should be noted that assuming the distance
of 300 feet and the distance covered by the motion of the object, its speed
would have been a matter of a few feet per second. However at that speed
the size reduction could not be accounted for based on distance, and
had the motion been away from the point of observation, snow falling would
have obscured visibility before the object was out of sight. Thus it is
apparent the actual size of the object was changing until it was too
small to be seen, not a factor of it moving away from the observer.
The witness reported no other effects, and no negative or positive
emotional aspects. He had no inclination as to what it was, and made no
claims of UFO or other speculations. He did go out and investigate
around the trees, nothing physical was found. At his location it would not be
expected any other witnesses would have also observed it, however he
will check with neighbors and if they too saw something. He will pass
along my contact information.
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Update 28 January, 2019 . I did receive the image he made and nothing
Is visible. I can concur with what we determined earlier though, the image
is distorted as a result of what appears to be water on the lens. One
can only see varied blotches of light and dark to the extent the trees
appear as dark areas on the lower portion of the image. There is no sign of
the object nor any detail of anything that might be in the area above the
trees.
No further work expected on this case unless additional data is received.