Man Reports Childhood Sighting of UFOs Flying in Formation over California

An artist’s interpretation of the man’s sighting. *(Emily Wayland / Singular Fortean Society)*

The Singular Fortean Society recently received the following report from a man who said he and a crowd of fellow drive-in moviegoers witnessed several ovaloid UFOs flying in formation between California’s Morongo and Yucca Valleys in the summer of 1953.

According to the man, who asked to be anonymous, he was around six years old at the time of his sighting.

As far as I can tell this was about 1953. In later years, I was trained in [the United States Coast Guard] USCG as an aerial observer and have thought about this incident many times over the years. I was about six and we were in a convertible with my mother, dad and 2nd cousin, I think. I was sitting on the top of the back seat above everybody, looking out at the dim purple fading sunset outlining the mountains. The old drive-in movie (gone now, but site visible on GE) was pretty full, people moving around getting snacks in the last evening light before the movie could start.
Someone yelled on the other side of the area, very loud, "Flying saucers!"
There was a lot of gasping and pointing, and what we saw was (I asked my mother about this many years later … and she confirmed it in all details): five oval shapes, glowing medium bright red like red hot iron, but you could look at it so not too bright. They were less than 1/2 mile away and at an altitude of maybe 500' [above ground level] AGL. [The objects flew] low and slow [and] proceeded in vee formation above the very dark and untraveled roadway.
No noise [that] I remember. We all watched them for at least three minutes until they dwindled towards [the] Yucca Valley direction.

Despite his age at the time, he told investigator Tobias Wayland in further correspondence that he was certain he’d seen something unusual.

"Though I was a child ... I was not looking through glass, so it was not reflections, and about a hundred other people were seeing the same thing, pointing and talking," he said. "Before my mother passed on, I talked with her about that evening and her memory was the same, vee formation of red glowing oval lights cruising leisurely up the valley."

The formation of lights, he said, "moved along on a straight course, never deviating, pretty much following the road" from west to east.

A search of the National UFO Reporting Center (NUFORC) database does not show any reports from that time which match exactly what this witness described, although one report from August of 1953 does describe the sighting of a silver object that “looked like two saucers glued together with windows where they joined.”

The object was reportedly encountered by a group of 7th grade boys and their counselor at Forest Home Camp in the San Bernadino mountains, less than 40 miles to the west of Yucca Valley.

Unidentified flying objects similar to that described by the witness near Yucca Valley are not uncommon.

On June 15th, 1952, a twelve-year-old in Maywood, California—just over 100 miles west of Yucca Valley—reportedly saw seven balls of "orange moon" lights in two vee formations. The witness said they watched the lights for between three and five minutes until all seven sped off in different directions.

Anyone with more information regarding the UFO sighting near Yucca Valley is encouraged to contact the Singular Fortean Society via email at info@singularfortean.com.

To report your own encounter with the impossible, reach out to us directly at the Singular Fortean Society through our contact page.

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