Erie, Pennsylvania - 08-25-11

My Family and I were traveling North I-79 from Grove City on Aug 25 to go camping at Virginia’s on the Beach which is a lake side camp ground on Lake Eire, PA.

My wife was driving so I was taking advantage of being a passenger and looking out the window at the sky. As we got closer to Lake Eire, I noticed that there were a few out of place, abnormally looking orange stars and commented on them.

I was trying to determine if they were planets or stars or whatever, when I saw what I thought was a shooting star and as I was about to announce it, it changed direction and stopped; which really got my attention.

We pulled off the interstate and stopped near the intersections of 79 and 90, so I could take some pictures. I took some photos, but it was really out of the reach of my 280mm lens, so nothing earth shattering came out of that.

It was near midnight at the time when those photos were taken.

We got back in the car and proceeded on. We were letting the GPS guide is to the campground which was west of Eire about half-way between Erie and Conneaut, Ohio.

As we proceeded, we ended up on West Lake Road Route 5 traveling west looking for the camp ground when I saw another shooting star-like object that just stopped dead in the air off to the southwest.

We pulled over again so I could take more photos. This time it was much closer.

My wife, step-son and step-niece and I all got out of the car to look at this thing while I grabbed my camera to photograph it.

I was facing southwest and its flight path was eastward. As I focused on this thing with my camera I thought to myself, "I’m getting way better shots, but I wish it was closer."

Before I could think another thought, in a split second, this thing was right over top of us; almost as if it read my mind.

I was caught up in the moment photographing it, but it really scared my the others with me almost to tears because it moved so weirdly and approached us like that and I freaked out later.

I was able to get some really crazy and decent photos of this thing especially for night shots of a moving object.

This thing was house-sized but the brightness of the lights made it difficult to make out the object’s outline. It made no sound per se, but what we did hear could be best described as an electrical buzzing sound; like the ones you might hear in those old Sci-Fi movies in a mad scientist laboratory.

I know that sounds like a goofy description but that is what it sounded like.

It had 3 very bright lights, no blinking lights or marking lights at all that would be on conventional aircraft. And after it slowly flew by us at about tree-top height it changed direction northward, sped up and flew off. It went very quickly and disappeared towards the direction of Lake Eire.

We ended up lost in Conneaut, Ohio and stopped at this convenience store to regroup and find the camp ground. We were talking about the event and the clerk overheard us.

She said we see that kind of stuff all the time here. If you are here for week you’ll see it at least one.

She said many people see it near the power plant by the lake along with other strange lights. Heck, most locals don’t even report them or give it a second thought it’s so normal anymore.