Article #6 - Close encounters in Texas 德州第三類接觸

Several dozen people - including a pilot, a county constable and business owners - in a Texas farming community insist they have seen a UFO .

Steve Allen, a freight company owner and pilot, said the object he saw last week was 1.6km long and 0.8km wide. "It was positively, absolutely nothing from these parts." While federal officials insist there is a logical explanation, locals swear that it was larger, quieter, faster and lower to the ground than an airplane. They also said the object's lights changed configuration, unlike those of a plane. People in several towns who reported seeing it over several weeks have offered similar descriptions of the object.

Machinist Ricky Sorrells said friends made fun of him when he told them he saw a flat, metallic object hovering about 90m over a pasture behind his home. "It feels good to hear that other people saw something, because that means I'm not crazy," Sorrells said.

Sorrells said he has seen the object several times. He said he watched it through his rifle's telescopic lens and described it as very large and without seams, nuts or bolts.

Major Karl Lewis, a spokesman for the 301st Fighter Wing at the Joint Reserve Base Naval Air Station in Fort Worth, said no F-16s or other aircraft from his base were in the area the night of Jan. 8, when most people reported the sighting.

Lewis said the object may have been an illusion caused by two commercial airplanes. Lights from the aircraft would seem unusually bright and may appear orange from the setting sun.

"I'm 90 percent sure this was an airliner," Lewis said. "With the sun's angle, it can play tricks on you." One man has offered a reward for a photograph or videotape of the mysterious object.