The Incident
At 8:15 p.m. on Saturday, March 8, 2003, a couple who lived near Greenbelt, Maryland, were getting ready to leave home. As the porch light went out, they noticed a broad wing with no visible fuselage passing overhead at an angle of about 20 degrees east of true north. By their rough estimate, the wing spanned two degrees of arc, or 120 arcminutes, far more than the half-full moon visible to the observer’s left.
The object, which the witnesses called an “anomalous aerial object” (AAO), appeared to be moving away at an altitude of 600–1,200 feet. Its maximum height was limited by a thin layer of clouds. Although the clouds were thin and scattered, the object remained visible, surrounded by a flickering glow that pulsed at about 10 Hz.
At each wingtip, the witnesses saw a glowing white “ball,” sharply defined and pure white, markedly different from the white lights on ordinary aircraft. A small red light appeared at the center of the wing, at its apex; its brightness shifted between a blink and a pulse.
The most striking feature was the silence: the object passed without a sound, unlike a commercial aircraft visible at the same time, whose engines could be heard clearly. The witnesses also saw no aircraft fuselage, only the wing and the lights around it. They found the sight frightening. Although the local airfield, College Park Airport, was closed to civilian flights, they thought the object might have taken off from there. A later check, however, found no activity at the time of the incident.
Context and Documentation
The report was entered in the NUFORC database under case number 28309, but it was not sent to a sighting research club at the time because the witnesses received advice from an unidentified source to wait. Many years later, they decided to make the information public, fearing the incident would be lost among other reports in the media.
The incident is documented as one of several sightings in the Washington area during that period. Residents reported similar objects: wings with no fuselage, white and red lights, and no engine noise. Although the report has not been verified, it gives a detailed account of physical characteristics, including size, color, and movement, as well as an electromagnetic effect described as a trembling light. This raises questions about the possibility of an atmospheric phenomenon or experimental technology.
Why It’s Interesting
