UFO SIGHTINGS IN THE TRI-STATE
REPORTS AND INVESTIGATIONS BY DONNIE BLESSING
SOUTHERN OHIO SECTION DIRECTOR FOR MUFON
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SIGHTINGS FOR 2004
MUFON REPORT
Portsmouth, Ohio UFO sighting
Date: 10/20/04
Time: Approx. 8PM EST
Location: Portsmouth, Ohio
County: Scioto
Witnesses: Joe and Susan R. (Names on file)
Investigator: Donnie Blessing
Organization: MUFON
Summary:
On the date and time in question Mr. and Mrs.R. drove their car to the mouth of the little Scioto River In Portsmouth, Ohio to do some night fishing. The night skies were crystal clear with stars and moon shining down on the glassy river waters. Not taking bait with them, Mr. and Mrs.R. decided to try to catch some bait for fishing that night. Both people were watching the waters for ripples that would indicate fish just below the surface. They had brought nets to scoop up the tiny fish to use for bait.
While standing totally motionless on the sandy bank so as not to scare the fish, Joe spots a light out of the corner of his eye. The light was reflected on the shiny surface of the river. The first thing that came to mind, it was a helicopter spot light. Joe turned to look west which was down river. Behind him was a train trestle. The light grew larger as it approached. Joe, still thinking it was a helicopter, became concerned. He was hoping that the helicopter would was not going to attempt to fly under the trestle.
Joe turns to his wife who is still watching for fish and asks her to look up. When she see the bright round light she first thinks it is the moon until she realizes the moon is above her and not that low to the ground. As the light approaches to within a half mile it grows in size. Joe describes the light as an orange-yellow orb the size of a house. He felt that it was a good 50 feet in diameter and no more then 50 feet above the water. It was moving along at tree top level.
The orb of light then crosses the river to the Kentucky side. The orb was then parallel to what Joe believes to be a Hopewell Indian effigy circular mound. It is called the Citadel. It is upstream from a creek that is called Tygart. At this point the orb stops and begins to do something that Joe says is hard to describe, not exactly rotate but to turn into itself. Trying to picture this I would say maybe implode while rotating? Then the object started coming back across the river to the Ohio side. It suddenly stopped in the middle of the river. Joe felt that it had spotted them watching it from the Ohio bank.
Suddenly a beam of light shoots out horizontally from the object and straight across to Joe. It came to rest at his feet. Joe said he had never seen anything like this beam. Inside this beam was what Joe described as sparkling, glittering bits of light that were white, blue and green. They danced around and sparkled like the glitter used in craft projects.
The light began to move up his leg. Joe said that he felt a strange feeling come over him. He felt as though time was slowing down and that he was in a vacuum. He could hear no sounds around him and no sound was coming from the object. When the light got to his knees the beam suddenly shut off and so did the large glowing yellow-orange orb of light.
Joe said everything then seemed to return to normal but his wife was frightened and wanted to go home immediately. Joe had asked his wife to check the time right before the beam of light hit him and then afterwards. He said they didn't have any missing time and that the whole incident had lasted only a couple of minutes.
They stayed for another 30 minutes but had no luck catching bait. All the fish seemed to have left the area. I'd like to add an interesting note. Joe told me that he was wearing bibs overalls that had a pocket down near the knees like cargo pants. He had a pocket knife in that pocket. When he got home he noticed the knife was missing. Joe does not claim that the beam of light did something to the knife. He could have lost it on the way from the river bank. He did go back to look for it but to this day has not found it. The rest of the evening was uneventful and other then the missing knife, Joe says that nothing else unusual took place.
I next interviewed his wife Susan on the phone. She told me the exact same story as Joe had described it. Jokingly saying that the disappearing pocket knife had been hers. The only difference, she felt the beam of light went out first. The object remained in the center of the river for a few seconds longer then it also disappeared. Both described the lights going out as if a light switch had been flipped off. Both were concerned that the object may still have been there only now was invisible because they did not see it fly away.