Sunday, June 27 @ 20:20:03 PDT

 Some people are reporting a mysterious sighting of a string of lights in Valley skies last week. A NewsChannel 3 photographer spotted them, turned on his camera and captured on film the so-called "Estrella lights." "We watched them for about 2-1/2 hours," said Sheila Jones-Vega, who said the lights moved back and forth. She and her husband, Frank, said they could hardly believe their eyes while on a drive to the Estrella Mountains where they're building a home. The Goodyear couple considered the possibility that pilots from nearby Luke Air Force Base were dropping flares. "I would think a flare would kind of burn and then fizzle out. These things turned back on," she said. Jones-Vega was right... (read more to see video)


... about the flare activity, says Jim Dilettoso, a professional film analyst. But his analysis came with a word of caution.

"But I don't jump to conclusions. I don't hold a vial of lab blood up to the window and say, 'Well looks OK to me.' You know, there's testing that has to be done, extract the data, compare it to normals. Well now, I have found that it is not flares that I am familiar with in my database," he said.

A spokeswoman at Luke Air Force Base said U.S. pilots there drop flares almost every night of the week, but said the Estrella lights did not originate from the base.

After their impressive view June 14, Jones-Vega and her husband said they spent the next night watching the skies from their second-story bedroom window. They said they saw the fighter jets and the Estrella lights not only on the 15th, but again this week.

"We saw jets come up from the airport, numerous jets come up, and it seemed as though the jets would approach the lights. The lights would turn off," she said. "It wasn't as though the jet was dropping something and the light turned on. The lights were already there and the jets came up near them and the lights turned off. I'm a little embarrassed that people will think I'm crazy, but I know what I saw." Watching the lights blink out one by one, the couple is pretty sure they'll be back.

The couple said they will be watching and wondering if the truth is out there. After all, their new home is out there too. "Like I said, I don't want to be living on a landing pad out there for something," she said.

Many people are comparing the Estrella sighting to the Phoenix lights of 1997. Dilettoso said there are similarities but also significant differences.



Luke Air Force Base said pilots reported nothing unusual over the past two weeks. And there were no other reports of other military or private organizations admitting to flying in that area.



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By Scott Davis
www.fox11az.com
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 Watch Estrella U.F.O Lights Video Report
(Windows Media Player, good quality, 4 Mb)

June 14th 2004 Phoenix Lights II?  This is my personal footage and I have not seen anything like this before.  I am an avid sky watcher and this was quite an unusual sighting.  My initial theory is perhaps military flares, however the Goldwater range is  85 miles away, which would put the altitude of the flares unusually high.  In addition,  the multiple colors of the lights are not consistent with flares.  Anyone who may have an explanation or more information on these, please contact me, as I would like to know the origin of these lights.

* The number of eyewitness accounts is well over a hundred for the June 14th event.
* There were two formations of lights on the June 14th date.
* The majority of accounts attribute little to no movement of the lights and the spacing of the
   lights is described as unwavering.
* Majority of the light analysis is consistent with light emitting from flares.  The balance can be
   described as having properties different from known flare chemistry.
* There is no data that we have seen to connect the lights to The Palo Verde Shutdown.
* Luke AFB can be ruled out as a source of the flares.(for 13th and 14th dates)
* Reports of the lights cover a range of dates from the 12th-16th, 18th and 21st-23rd of June.
* Sightings seem to be clustered around 8:45 P.M. or 11:00 P.M.
* The lights seem to be originating from the Goldwater Bombing Range.
* The lights are usually described as quickly brightening into view and fading somewhat slower
   from view.  That is there seems to be no movement involved in their appearance or
  disappearance.  However, reports from some of the witnesses furthest to the south attribute
  some motion to these events.
* The time duration of sightings varies from 30 seconds to 45 minutes.  Flare life for the known
  types of military flares can be 20-25 minutes.  (Note: It is certainly possible that the military
  has longer lasting flares for which we have no data)
* The lights were filmed by two different individuals, some 30 miles apart.