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A professor at University of Missouri-Kansas City watched a "circular or sphere-shaped craft" flying low and slow across the sky," according to witness testimony from the Mutual UFO Network (MUFON) database.
"The craft looked dark but it had an orange glow around the entire thing - there were no other lights on it," the professor stated. "I tried to determine the source of the glowing light but it looked like it enveloped the entire craft. There were no lights, wings, or tail and it did not look like an airplane or helicopter."
The professor said the object was very close, and "approximately the size of a grapefruit held at arm's length."
He said he heard a "very low pitched hum" for a few minutes, but then the humming stopped. The object moved from southwest to northwest and he lost sight of it behind some trees.
The entire sighting lasted 12 minutes, enough time, he said, to attempt to use a cell phone to call his wife. But during the sighting, the cell phone kept giving him the message - "out of service area," but once the craft was gone - he was able to use the phone without problems.
He is interested to know if anyone else saw the same thing.
UMKS is located in Kansas City's Rockhill neighborhood, east of Country Club Plaza, and is part of University of Missouri.
The following is the original and unedited witness statement from MUFON.
MO, July 27, 2009 - Circular UFO with orange glow over UMKC campus. MUFON Case # 18372.
I am a professor at UMKC and was leaving my office last night when I saw a circular or sphere shaped craft in a Southwest direction right over my position at approximately 80 degrees. It looked like it was flying very slowly and very low. I've never seen anything like this and wished that there were other people around to see it with me, but there was no one in sight. I didn't have a camera with me. The craft looked dark but it had an orange glow around the entire thing - there were no other lights on it. I tried to determine the source of the glowing light but it looked like it enveloped the entire craft. There were no lights, wings, or tail and it did not look like an airplane or helicopter.
The size was approximately the size of a grapefruit held at arm's length, so it was very large and very close. I heard a very low pitched hum for a couple of minutes when I first spotted the object, then the hum stopped. The object moved very slowly from the Southwest to Northwest, then I lost sight of it behind trees. I've never seen a plane or helicopter move that slow. I watched it for some time - approximately 12 minutes total time. During this time I attempted to call my wife at home to see if she could see it, but my cell phone would not work, giving me a message of "out of service area," but after the craft was no longer visible I tried again and got through just fine. I thought that was very odd, but the entire scene was very odd. I'd be interested in finding out if anyone else saw this.
Comments
This is exactly what we had fly low over us last year
Professor, beware – UFO's are a self-marginalizing phenomenon, especially if reported! And you might want to have yourself checked for radiation exposure, too. I know you're not a physics professor, or you would have been trying to work out what was keeping the damn thing aloft! Whatever it was, it took an awful lot of energy, apparently enough to ionize the air around it, and it sounds like you were very close.
Whenever I hear of a slow floating orange glowing sphere UFO....Chinese lanterns.
how many dozens if not hundreds of reports of chinese lanterns? All exibiting the same behaviour???
Its not even worth reporting unless its doing something unexplainable.
Roger: I know it's a minor detail of the story, but they University of Missouri, Kansas City is known as "UMKC" and not "UMKC".
*the University... Sorry for my typo.
Roger, how did you find out or know it is a UMKC professor. The MUFON state director deemed the case a HOAX because no contact info was given. Maybe you could help the investigator out with this.
Here is what the director wrote in the report section.
"Without accurate contact info and the manor in which the contact info was submitted, I can only list this report as a HOAX.
Debbie Z"
There are not many options for us as investigator when the witness decides to go anonymous.I personally would have deemed in "insufficient data" but that is my judgment.
You think he would have tried to take a picture with the cell phone, not waste time calling the wife. He should check with the science labs at the university and see if they were doing any experiments. In 12 min, you think someone would have walked by and saw it too. From the description, I think I could reproduce what he saw or something similiar with chinese laterns. Also, everynight at I think 7pm CST around the world 900 weather balloons are released at the exact same time. They are in the air for two hrs. Without further infomation, its impossible to tell. A drawing would be helpful.
Morgan: I was not contacted by this witness. I got the university info from the first sentence in the public piece of his report.
No one ever said professors were of the rational type.
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