Question:
At first Angell feared it might be an airplane crashing, but a former
military pilot himself, he said the colors weren't right. The orb was a
bluish-white and he said it moved too slowly to be a comet.
"It was a very shallow descent and a glowing flare as it went down. It
was visible for about, oh, 10-15 seconds," he explained. "Heaven only
knows what it could be, but some type of a UFO. I'm not saying an alien
but something."
Then, just as suddenly as it appeared, all who saw it said it
disappeared into the horizon without answers to what the strange sight
was.
Interestingly the National Weather Service fielded more than a dozen
calls, and of course there was no report of a downed plane, so the
strange object remains a mystery.
Answer:
For those who were outside Wednesday night, there was a local light
show of meteoric proportions.
According to witnesses from Maysville to Frankfort, a ball of flame
streaked low across the sky between 7:30-8 p.m, leaving a flickering
trail of questions across the region.
"We were on our way home from my mother's house in Maysville about 8
p.m. and were going east on the AA Highway when it came into sight,"
said Sherry Hornback of Tollesboro. "At first I thought it was a
falling star, but it looked more like a big bottle rocket that was
fired off sideways. It was dropping pretty fast."
As the image appeared to lose altitude and disappeared, Hornback
thought any remains may have come to rest south of Maysville.
"It was bright white, then it turned to red and a really green color
before it faded out," said Hornback.
In Augusta, Wic Wachs was walking his dog along Riverside Drive when he
spotted the light show.
"It was 10 times brighter than any shooting star I have ever seen,"
said Wachs. "It was so much brighter and more of a blue-white color
than I have seen in the past."
While he watched, a small piece of the core appeared to break free and
drop earthward before burning out, said Wachs.
"I watched the glare of where it went; it was very low on the horizon
when I saw it."
Those driving on Kentucky 9 near Maysville also reported seeing the
meteor pass over Maysville Community and Technical College in a north
to south direction, though Maysville 911 dispatch said it received no
calls reporting the event.
Because of the angle of the display, some witnesses believed the object
had crashed to earth near where they saw it, but because of the
numerous sightings over a long distance it is believed the object was a
meteor.
The speeding streak of flame brought alarm to Frankfort emergency
personnel when one caller reported that she observed what she thought
was a plane crash, south of Interstate 64, said Daryl Hensley, dispatch
communications director for Frankfort.
"She said she witnessed a plane crash in a ball of flames," said
Hensley. "We scrambled emergency personnel, EMS and the deputy that was
closest to the area, but they were called off when the first ones to
the scene reported finding nothing."
Hensley's crews also followed through with the Bluegrass Airport tower
supervisor, Capitol City Airport and the Federal Aeronautics
Administration to be sure all of their aircraft were safe and accounted
for.
