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O'Hare UFO and the Phoenix Lights: The Difference May be Video

Jan 5, 2007

Ten years ago in March, an event occurred in Arizona that has been dubbed 'The Phoenix Lights.' It was a sighting that was so huge it was caught on video by several area residents and has been the subject of several different television specials.

That event happened on March 13, 1997. The videos still run on Discovery Channel and MSNBC specials and we will likely see them again soon, as the ten year anniversary nears. There is even a Hollywood film that appears to be set for release this year called 'Night Skies' on the event.

O'Hare UFO and the Phoenix Lights: The Difference May be Video
O'Hare UFO and the Phoenix Lights: The Difference May be Video

There were several credible witnesses that definitely saw something, and though the 'officialexplanation' of the Phoenix Lights changed several times, it was finally deemed as flares dumped by something called 'Operation Snowbird' over the Barry Goldwater gunnery range some 100 miles southwest of the city.

Few witnesses seemed to buy that explanation in the interviews that I saw on various channels.

***

Enter November 7, 2006. In Chicago at the O'Hare Airport according to reports, several eyewitnesses (including pilots and other credible personnel) watched a classic disc-shaped UFO hover over the airport before it shot straight up into the air at a very high rate of speed and disappeared into the clouds.

But unfortunately there is no video yet of the event. Even so transportation writer Jon Hilkevitch has so many witnesses in a story for the tribune it is very hard to ignore. According to the story from the Tribune, a United manager said he ran outside his office in Concourse B after hearing the report about the sighting on an internal airline radio frequency.

"I stood outside in the gate area not knowing what to think, just trying to figure out what it was," he said. "I knew no one would make a false call like that. But if somebody was bouncing a weather balloon or something else over O'Hare, we had to stop it because it was in very close proximity to our flight operations."

***

There are several more first hand witnesses here. FAA spokeswoman Elizabeth Isham Cory said, "The FAA is not conducting a further investigation, - theory is the sighting was caused by a "weather phenomenon," she said.

That led Keith Walters Jones to joke in an article here that it was like a scene out of the popular film 'Men in Black.' Art imitates life, or vice versa. These were credible folks (around a dozen) that saw the saucer like object in broad daylight.

It is basically the same thing that happened in Phoenix nearly ten years ago. Credible witnesses and loads of questions, but no credible answers. In Phoenix, there was also a lot of video and that may be the difference that leaves the O'Hare sighting struggling to maintain a buzz.

Let's hope not.

There is a video of reporter Jon Hilkevitch discussing the event here.

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