Of course, the intro to Superman comes to mind — “Is it a bird, is it a plane ...?
It's definitely not a bird and it's doesn't appear to be a plane, and Superman has pretty much been ruled out.
And now the mystery appears to have been solved. It was a missile — yes, a missile!
The light in the sky south of the Cortez Airport was from a missile contrail from the U.S. Army's White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico.
A spokesman for the U.S. Army's White Sands Missile Range tells The Associated Press the contrail was from a Juno ballistic missile that was fired at 6:30 a.m. MDT Thursday from Fort Wingate near Gallup, N.M. The Juno missile was then targeted by an advanced version ofthe Patriot missile fired from White Sands.
The odd appearance in the sky had the Cortez area buzzing with intrigue.
Russ Machen, Cortez Airport manager had no idea what it was.
But he does know that the mysterious fireball in the sky did not come from the airport.
He said the light in the sky that he saw at about 6:30 a.m. adding that lights in the sky were not present when a plane departed for Denver at about 6 a.m. this morning, and the lights appeared to be two to three miles from the airport.
Machen also said the airport received calls from dispatch about explosions, but added it had nothing to do with the airport.
“Whatever it was, it was odd looking,” Machen said.
A call to the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) revealed nothing. There had been no reports or information of any strange sightings in Southwest Colorado.
The last official reported UFO sighting listed on the National UFO Reporting Center website was Aug. 18.
Calls to the Cortez Police Department, Montezuma County Sheriff's Officer and NASA were not immediately returned. The Cortez Journal will update this story when new details come available.
