(Part 1) The Phoenix Lights - Laying To Rest The Myth

a reply to: Martianlanded

Yes BoneZ made a good thread.
I knew when he/she stated on a previous thread that he/she would lay it to rest.
There are still going to be the variables.
But it was an intelligent push on the matter.

Reasonable analysis and I prefer to think this add to a strong explanation to the Phoenix lights. However if I am not wrong I remember there was a comparable analysis in some program on Discovery Channel or National Geography Channel which supported that the second lights were not similar to flares. I just cant remember the name of that program now. As to the first lights in the sky what I do believe is that no man made single craft could be that size from the very beginning and I also support that you just can't hear any sound from man made craft when it flies high enough.

originally posted by: Bigburgh
Is a stealth blimp a possibility?

The TV show "UFO Hunters" covered the Phoenix lights and had an aviation expert guest talking about the possibility of a classified "rigid hull airship" matching the description of witnesses, of the first event (not the flares).

One possible explanation for the various witness accounts is that there were not just two things going on that night, but possibly three. In addition to the two events bonez described, there could have been a third event where the object actually blocked out some stars and if that was the case all the witnesses could be right.

While I wouldn't rule out that possibility, to all the people who assign a high value to eyewitness testimony, there is lots and lots of research saying that this is not justified, where you show the same event to 20 different people and get 8 different descriptions of what happened. So while we can't rule out the possibility of maybe a third event being a stealth blimp or an alien spaceship, we can't rule pout the possibility that bonez explanation is correct and some of the witnesses were more correct about their description of events than others.

Here is an example of unreliable eyewitness testimony cited by Werner Von Braun, with the emphasis on the fact there is no malice or intent to deceive in any of these accounts, it is just that we are terrible data-taking devices and we often make the mistake of giving ourselves way too much credit for being more accurate observers than we actually are:

Wernher Von Braun on UFOs and reliability of eyewitness testimony

a lifetime spent with testing of guided missiles has taught me to be extremely careful with eye-witness accounts on rocket firings running into some in-flight trouble. Of three experienced observers questioned after a typical mishap, one swore that he clearly saw a part coming off before the rocket faltered; a second hotly denied this but claimed that the missile oscillated violently before it veered off the course; while the third trained observer saw neither a part coming off, nor an oscillation, nor anything veering off course but insisted that the rocket was flying perfectly steadily until it was
abruptly ripped apart by an internal explosion.

Such contradictions in the eyewitness accounts of old rocket men are by no means an exception; we are almost invariably confronted with this situation. Yet we are dealing here with experienced observers who not only had seen many firings, but who had the great advantage of being mentally prepared for the imminent test.

For this reason I am highly skeptical about the objective of any 'sighting' report of a fleeting,mysterious object in the sky submitted by an equally surprised and unexperienced observer.

So given a choice between a video tape and a eyewitness account, usually I'd put more weight on the video tape. That can have problems too but those are technically known and easier to recognize than faulty observation. For example I can say the eyewitness who posted in this thread is completely unreliable in stating that

"Now I'm a private pilot, and I do have some experience gauging relative altitude, and I would surmise this thing was at least - and I mean at least - 1.5 miles wide!"

This statement is completely unreliable, no matter how sincere the claim. It is possible for a trained observer to estimate the distance of a KNOWN object. If the object is UNKNOWN, any estimate of size, distance, altitude and velocity is completely unreliable. This is proven pretty easily by all the witnesses who judged this object to be a huge craft miles away, when it was only 400 feet in the air (though most would agree it doesn't look quite that big in this photo):

UFOs baffle O.C. earthlings

At 400 feet altitude, the UFO (which weighs about a pound) looks like a mammoth spacecraft miles away, dancing, diving, hovering, now flitting away.

I'm not calling anybody who thinks they know how big a UFO is a liar, because I believe that they think what they're saying is true. I am however calling them ignorant of the difficulties in making size assessments of unknown objects. Most of us shouldn't be ignorant of how easily our eyes and brains are fooled...just pick up any book of optical illusions, and stop thinking of ourselves as infallible observers...we are all pretty unreliable observers, even those of us with lots of training.

Anyway I think there should be little doubt about the flares sighting. Regarding the earlier sightings, yes witness descriptions differ. Is Bonez's explanation of the discrepancy plausible? I think so. Is it correct? Who knows, but it's too bad the only images available support the explanation by Bonez. If some of the witnesses who saw the object blocking stars had made images, we could assess those and possibly conclude there must have been a third event, but lacking such images, we are not forced to conclude there was a third event. Eyewitnesses misinterpreting things is completely plausible, and anybody who denies this needs to deny their ignorance about the observational skills of eyewitnesses by doing some research on the topic.

a reply to: Paperjacket

As pointed out. The brightness. Or magnitude of the flares.
Yes. This was addressed. Way back then. Someone compared military flares, to the claimed flares. There was a brightness difference..

Even Zaphod noted it. ( somewhat )

PTI( Pyro technic institute or Zambelli's fireworks ) can produce blinding light. And still have Chinese lanterns float away in those explosions..( no really you should see that 20 incher blow up and disperse Chinese lanterns unharmed..)

It's amazing what we can pull off.

I'm of course on the fence.. but I'm going to give it the human factor..
As a human. I believe we can pull off such a stunt.

originally posted by: _BoneZ_

originally posted by: kurthall
a reply to: combatmaster

Including the government officials, said it was "other worldly". So yeah I tend to believe that this was not flairs.

But that would be their opinion, not a fact. The Air Force, as well as independent researchers, have already proven the second event was flares.

Do you mean they didn't use the weather balloon story this time? or swamp gas? Or maybe they could have spiced it up a bit and said that it was a reflection off the stratosphere from Venus maybe?

The only reason I ask is because the highest ranking officer during the Roswell Incident came forward and signed an affidavit in 1991 claiming the whole weather balloon story was a hoax .. a cover story ... a fabrication .. of what really happened at Roswell. In other words, the explanation that was given to the public that what had happened at Roswell was really a weather balloon, was a flat out lie. But many people were led to believe that this was what actually happened since it was the "official' story that was given by the authorities.

As was pointed out earlier, even Governor Fife Symington came forward with details related to the craft that THOUSANDS (not a handful) of people saw. (I have family near Phoenix ... all of them saw it). Symington not only admitted what he saw was a craft, he also admitted that he was ordered to downplay the event by the Military.

The real question is, what does anyone lose or gain from this sighting/event? Nothing came of it, nothing ever will. Bury it and forget it I say.

a reply to: Arbitrageur

Thank you!

Never seen you here before.
I am certainly going to take that into consideration.


I don't doubt boneZ. There is certainly a corporeal means to this.

In 1984. I saw in Riverside CA. The SR-71 flying over my house... before I saw any movie relating that bird. In 1987, I saw 3 f-117 fighter's fly in formation over Reno NV.
Was awe struck!
In 2014, I bought an RC drone ( quad-prop rc ) full of LED'S and go pro provided...

Nothing is of a surprise to me anymore. But it sure gets the child in me psyched up!
I looked to this event as.. wow! What did we build now.
And am still disappointed as nothing fully came through.

a reply to: 111DPKING111

Link?
I hadn't heard that one.

originally posted by: Paperjacket
Reasonable analysis and I prefer to think this add to a strong explanation to the Phoenix lights. However if I am not wrong I remember there was a comparable analysis in some program on Discovery Channel or National Geography Channel which supported that the second lights were not similar to flares.

The so called "analysis" that you're probably thinking of was done by Jim Dilettoso, and he had no idea what he was doing. He was trying to use spectrum analysis from home video to claim that the spectrum on video didn't match flare spectrum, but home videos aren't designed to reproduce spectra accurately enough for this kind of analysis so his "analysis" saying they couldn't be flares was widely debunked. Then he claimed his critics calling him a fool were wrong because he was using "special software", but this claim to is ludicrous because it's not a software issue, rather with the raw data recorded on the video.

Phoenix Lights

UFO advocate Jim Dilettoso claimed to have performed "spectral analysis" of photographs and video imagery that proved the lights could not have been produced by a man-made source. Dilettoso claimed to have used software called "Image Pro Plus" (exact version unknown) to determine the amount of red, green and blue in the various photographic and video images and construct histograms of the data, which were then compared to several photographs known to be of flares. Several sources have pointed out, however, that it is impossible to determine the spectral signature of a light source based solely on photographic or video imagery, as film and electronics inherently alter the spectral signature of a light source by shifting hue in the visible spectrum, and experts in spectroscopy have dismissed his claims as being scientifically invalid.

I think it's pretty safe to dismiss his claims as based in incompetence.

I would say a great thread and good work, but the people I actually spoke to about it were rather convincing that it was a huge, solid craft.

One gentleman was a very skeptical, down-to-earth soul who always looks to alternative, mundane... or even unusual, but man made explanations.

He soiled his shorts when the thing flew over him near Casa Grande.

Living in AZ, I've run into others... some bad, credulous witnesses.. .some exceptional... the verdict is "likely military, but maybe not.. .either way, awe inspiring and massive" or words to that effect.

But I sure get the wanting of explanations...

a reply to: _BoneZ_

Very good information here, you almost have me totally convinced. The one thing which prevents me from completely believing this event comprised of totally natural phenomena is the way the Governor reacted at that infamous press conference where they brought out a guy in the alien suit, and then he later changed his story to say he thought it was actually an alien craft. It seems to me that if the version of events described in this thread are correct then the local government should have had an explanation very quickly, but it has taken a very long time for the supposed facts to arise.

originally posted by: _BoneZ_

originally posted by: Jay-morris
Unless you want to completely disregard what people said they saw.

Isn't that exactly what you are doing? You're disregarding the people who saw separate objects or planes, and only clinging to those who claim they saw a solid object.

What's more far-fetched? That the light formation was planes like many people saw, or a low-flying massive craft that many people think they saw?

How many people saw planes?

Like I said before, if they were low, and made to look like a huge craft, the noise would have been very loud. If the planes were high, to the point that no sound could be heard, then the formation would not have looked big.

It just does not add up.

I am not looking past anything. Logic says it was not plane formations.

I'm a believer but the lights for me were flares, plain and simple, they have been shown as flares, drop like flares and didn't blink out as originally thought but simply went behind a mountain range for those watching. People can twist it however they like, but guys and gals, get a grip that part was flares.

The spotting of the craft in the earlier event was something different though, having been a witness with my wife to a fantastic sized triangle UFO (not saying extra terrestrial) here in the UK I can without doubt say there are ships of some sort that defy what we see on a normal basis. As said many times before you could have help up a newspaper that was open at arms length and you would still be able to see a lot of this object we saw, try doing that and it gives you a clue just how massive this thing was.

Now this happened, fact, I reported it at the time, what it was I'll most likely never know but it WAS up there, it was low and it made no noise and flew at a speed that for me defied gravity.

Now if two people in the East of London can see something this strange then I'm pretty sure others have seen the same (well I know people have reported as such) so perhaps that is what they saw, craft like this have even been reported and followed by US Police, surely they are reliable witness material?

What we all saw just blew our minds, its like the heli carrier from SHIELD just appearing in our skies (only triangular), these things are out there, who owns them is another story as what I saw looked nothing like the released previously secret tech which normally looks a lot like a plane and the triangular ones are fancy but normal sized and leave a trail, what we saw was nothing like them bar being triangular.

originally posted by: _BoneZ_
a reply to: gortex

I think some people are just skimming over the evidence, instead of actually reading and taking in everything that is available.

There's more out there, but this was sort of compressed to give the facts in a nutshell.

Great job Bones. S+F. Brilliant sleuthing you did. Makes you wonder why MUFON hasn't done the same and put this case in the IFO category? Probably because leaving it unidentified is good for business....

I especially like the mention of the amateur astronomer who identified the first sighting as planes. We astronomers (especially amateurs) spend a lot of time looking up at the night sky. You would think we'd be the ones seeing all the UFOs but it is precisely because we're familiar with the night sky and how it can often make mundane objects like planes, planets, stars, satellites, even the ISS look odd at times. Scintillation, temperature inversions, etc.

We're familiar with it all which is why you seldom hear of astronomers sighting UFOs. I said it before but in my 16 years of watching the sky I have seen a total of two UFOs. Both of which were identified. The first was a rare weather phenomena called sprites the 2nd was almost certainly a plane.

originally posted by: Mclaneinc
I'm a believer but the lights for me were flares, plain and simple, they have been shown as flares, drop like flares and didn't blink out as originally thought but simply went behind a mountain range for those watching. People can twist it however they like, but guys and gals, get a grip that part was flares.

The spotting of the craft in the earlier event was something different though, having been a witness with my wife to a fantastic sized triangle UFO (not saying extra terrestrial) here in the UK I can without doubt say there are ships of some sort that defy what we see on a normal basis. As said many times before you could have help up a newspaper that was open at arms length and you would still be able to see a lot of this object we saw, try doing that and it gives you a clue just how massive this thing was.

Now this happened, fact, I reported it at the time, what it was I'll most likely never know but it WAS up there, it was low and it made no noise and flew at a speed that for me defied gravity.

It's a triangular shaped rigid airship also known as a "stealth blimp". Apparently it's used to ferry cargo like a sky-going container ship.

See this thread: UFO's of the Future

originally posted by: GeisterFahrer

originally posted by: _BoneZ_

originally posted by: kurthall
a reply to: combatmaster

Including the government officials, said it was "other worldly". So yeah I tend to believe that this was not flairs.

But that would be their opinion, not a fact. The Air Force, as well as independent researchers, have already proven the second event was flares.

Do you mean they didn't use the weather balloon story this time? or swamp gas? Or maybe they could have spiced it up a bit and said that it was a reflection off the stratosphere from Venus maybe?

Two astronomers (you know, people who actually look at the sky ALOT) identified the flares and the planes. There's no mystery here except for people who want one.

originally posted by: JadeStar

originally posted by: _BoneZ_
a reply to: gortex

I think some people are just skimming over the evidence, instead of actually reading and taking in everything that is available.

There's more out there, but this was sort of compressed to give the facts in a nutshell.

Great job Bones. S+F. Brilliant sleuthing you did. Makes you wonder why MUFON hasn't done the same and put this case in the IFO category? Probably because leaving it unidentified is good for business....

I especially like the mention of the amateur astronomer who identified the first sighting as planes. We astronomers (especially amateurs) spend a lot of time looking up at the night sky. You would think we'd be the ones seeing all the UFOs but it is precisely because we're familiar with the night sky and how it can often make mundane objects like planes, planets, stars, satellites, even the ISS look odd at times. Scintillation, temperature inversions, etc.

We're familiar with it all which is why you seldom hear of astronomers sighting UFOs. I said it before but in my 16 years of watching the sky I have seen a total of two UFOs. Both of which were identified. The first was a rare weather phenomena called sprites the 2nd was almost certainly a plane.[/quote
]

Astronomers have seen unexplained UFOs, because you have not, does not mean no astronomers have. Also, what makes you think you should see more? You are looking at stars planets, moons etc, not the Sky.

More chance of a person looking up at the sky with the naked eye and seeing a UFO, than someone looking at stars, planets moons etc

Aliens travel impossibly far across the galaxy, to come to Phoenix, and shine their lights at people. Totally plausible.

originally posted by: Shakawkaw
Aliens travel impossibly far across the galaxy, to come to Phoenix, and shine their lights at people. Totally plausible.

Not everyone is saying ET, I certainly am not. Why does it have to be ET, and not something of ours?

originally posted by: Paperjacket
Reasonable analysis and I prefer to think this add to a strong explanation to the Phoenix lights. However if I am not wrong I remember there was a comparable analysis in some program on Discovery Channel or National Geography Channel which supported that the second lights were not similar to flares. I just cant remember the name of that program now. As to the first lights in the sky what I do believe is that no man made single craft could be that size from the very beginning and I also support that you just can't hear any sound from man made craft when it flies high enough.

Hi the documentary you refer to is called UFO's over Phoenix ~ Anatomy of a Sighting. It was UFO Investigator Jim Dilettoso that did the analysis and came to the conclusion that the light spectrum signatures of the video he analysed did not match any light signatures of known flares. How accurate the analysis is, is open for debate.

In the documentary UFO researcher Richard F. Motzer disputes Dilettoso's claims saying that video tape does not have the resolution that you need, to perform those particular kind of tests.

Hope this helps.

All the best

uforn