As UFOs ‘Arrive’ In News, See Latest Pittsburgh Sightings

UFO sightings never really left the news, but they’ve arguably never been more prevalent. Navy pilots recently spoke of seeing mysterious objects — with no discernible engine or exhaust fumes — flying at hypersonic speeds.

President Donald Trump recently said he was briefed on UFOs. A group of Senate lawmakers received a classified briefing this week about such objects. And let’s not get started on that strange Facebook video that seems to show a creepy-looking alien doing some sort of jig down someone’s driveway.

Virginia Democratic U.S. Sen. Mark Warner wants answers on UFOs, whether it’s “weather balloons, little green men, or something else entirely,” Rachel Cohen, his spokeswoman, told CNN. And the Navy has drafted guidelines to allow pilots to report UFOs, and so that the military can track them, though the military branch prefers not to use the term “UFO.”

“So, we don’t actually use that term,” Joseph Gradisher, a spokesman for the deputy chief of naval operations for information warfare, told Patch this week. “We use ‘Unmanned Aerial System.’”

The term, shortened to UAS, refers to things like recreational flying drones people can buy at a store. For the “other” things, the Navy uses the term UAP, meaning “Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon.”

“We constitute anything unknown or unidentified in the airspace as an ‘Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon,’ no matter what it is,” he said.

In that spirit, Patch took a peek at the most recent UFO sighting in the Pittsburgh area using a database compiled by the National UFO Reporting Center. Spoiler alert: So far, no little green men have been seen running around.

• May 31, Pittsburgh: Oval
  

"Was on my back patio enjoying the evening when my mother said to look at the two strange objects in the sky. I looked and noticed the objects were gaining height and glowing orange. Next thing, the one object drops out of sight while the other gained height and vanished. A couple minutes later two more objects appear doing the same thing and then vanish."

• May 18, Bethel Park: Rectangle

"I was sitting on my deck in the late afternoon when I noticed an extremely bright white object stationary in the sky above. There were scattered cumulus clouds and the sky was bright blue. I watched the object for about a minute and became very curious when it seemed to not be moving. It appeared to be higher than aircraft coming in to land at the Pittsburgh airport and above the cloud deck. The object was east/northeast of Bethel Park, my deck faces east.

"I went inside and retrieved a pair of binoculars which I keep handy for bird watching. I was able to observe the object for about five seconds. It appeared to be rectangular and highly reflective white / silver. Immediately after that, it was obscured by a cloud which passed in front of it. Once the cloud passed, the object was gone."

• April 14, Pittsburgh: Oval

"It was in the evening. My friend and I were waiting outside and we see an oval type object that was metallic and was shining bright reflecting the sun as it set. It came from the horizon and floated/flew behind a set of tree’s slowly and we couldn’t see it after that. There was no clouds
that day and we’re 100% sure it was not a plane, blimp, or helicopter."

• March 10, Pittsburgh: Flash

"I was driving home when the sky in front of me lit up bright orange and red. It look as though someone had set an ICBM off right above the city of Pittsburgh. It lasted for about 10 minutes, and it lingered as a massive explosion would, I am a vet so as soon as I saw it I braced for the boom, but there was never a peep."

• March 7, Elizabeth Township: Diamond.

"Standing on my deck noticed a diamond shaped object at first thought it was a star until I noticed 4 red lights in the shape of a triangle. It did not move nor did it make a sound. Then it omitted an identical craft that came out of it somehow. So now there are 2 just sitting there. This is the second night in a row. I go in to get my phone and it is gone then reappears in a different area in the sky over a rural area. It is not aplane!!! Kinda spooky. My husband has also seen the same thing on a
separate occasion. We are both Security officers trained to observe and have an eye for detail. This happened in Elizabeth Township area, facing south."

• March 2, Pittsburgh: Light

"I saw a bright, twinkling light out of my bedroom window, which looked like a bright star, but too bright for an overcast night, so I went to the window to watch it, and after a few minutes, it began to move side to side, then up and down. It also appeared to have a blue halo, but that
could've been due to the weather conditions. The movement looked like a drone, but I watched it for 40 minutes, and it first moved a distance away and kind of repeated the back and forth motion, then went further away until I could no longer see it, but it was ascending, not descending, so I don't think it could be a drone. As it moved away, it also appeared that the light was rotating because I would think it was too far away to see, then I would see a glimmer of light every few
seconds."

• Feb. 2, Pittsburgh: Triangle.

"A series of red lights of dots passed over our heads between 7:18-7:21 pm. Over 20 consecutive red dots of light went by very slow and low. There was no erratic movement."