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CHAPTER 24 On March 13,1997, a decade after the Hudson Valley UFO wave had quieted down, multiple triangular and V-shaped UFOs made a series of brazen new appearances, this time over the western United States. 1 1 aaa 1 It was a pleasant spring evening in Arizona, clear and still, and countless families were outside in larger than usual numbers gazing at the sky, because Comet Hale-Bopp was to be visible that night. Instead, beginning at about 8:00 p.m., they were provided with an even more astounding aerial spectacle: a series of massive, eerily silent craft gliding overhead like nothing they had ever seen before. One central object moved from the north, southeast across the state, traveling about 200 miles from Paulden to Tucson, passing near Phoenix and surrounding communities. It was on display between 8:15 and 9:30 p.m. Many hundreds—more likely Police department phone lines were jammed and the local air force installation, Luke Air Force Base, was overwhelmed with calls. Reports of sightings from around the state flooded the lines at the National UFO Reporting Center (NUFORC)—the well-known repository for UFO reports cited in the FAA manual—based in Seattle, Washington. Even so, air traffic controllers apparently did not register the strange objects on radar. Although descriptions of the array of lights differed, one overriding characteristic prevailed: the craft was massive; it was a solid object, not merely lights; and it often appeared to be very low in the sky, blocking out the stars behind it. A younger witness said he could clearly see the underside of the craft, and thought if he had thrown a stone, he could have hit it. According to eyewitness reports in the NUFORC files, which received its first report at 6:55 p.m. from Henderson, Nevada, one group of three said it blocked out most of the sky, while another family of five described looking out the automobile windows while driving at eighty miles an hour and observing the incredibly huge craft passing above their car. It was the size of multiple football fields and up to a mile long, many said. A little league game had to stop as the massive object passed over the heads of moms, dads, kids, and coaches staring in disbelief. Some people described its color as a dark gun-metal gray, and many people were awestruck by the silence of the object, given its size, especially when watching it take off in the blink of an eye. [1] It was difficult to determine how many objects were present, because reports varied in terms of the number of lights, colors of lights, and movements. The speed of the craft, or crafts, varied from motionless to speeding away in an instant. Calls came rapidly into NUFORC from many communities at different locations, suggesting the likelihood that multiple GOVERNOR FIFE SYMINGTON AND MOVEMENT TOWARD CHANGE thousands—saw it.