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I can see a thing going up or down or over anyway.

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It all started early this morning when Oregon State Police Trooper Thomas McCartney was

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notified by another officer after 5 a.m. in the St. Helens area that a glowing light had

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been spotted over the Columbia River.

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And I went ahead and went down to the Columbia County jail area there at the courthouse and

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we were observing it from across the Columbia River, appeared to be in Washington area.

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It was a glowing light that seemed to be about behind a hill, kind of a dome-shaped light,

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orange, diffuse.

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And at times when the fog would come across it would kind of settle down and get almost

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so you couldn't see it and then it would clear up and it was a little brighter.

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We watched it for a little while and listened to a man on his CB by the name of Lucky 13

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who indicated to us that he was right underneath it or very close to it at any rate.

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We were trying to get some information from him to find out what was going on.

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And he indicated to us that he had looked out his window and he had saw this large orange

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glowing ball coming down towards him or his home.

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And then we decided to go up to a higher vantage point which was 2nd Street.

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We went up there.

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There was about five or six of us, four or five officers and several people.

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And from that point of view we could see the ridge off the, would be the east of the courthouse

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in St. Helens, almost in the same area of Mount St. Helens.

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And then off to our immediate south towards Portland we could see another very bright orange

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look like a ball.

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It was very bright orange almost like it was on fire.

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And it was then that we realized that this Lucky 13 was describing that orange ball.

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And we watched it briefly and started looking at the hill again for the other orange light.

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And when we turned around the other ball, the very bright ball, which seemed to be over

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the river itself, was gone.

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The operator then told Trooper McCartney he thought the object had gone into the Columbia

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River.

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McCartney radioed headquarters that a plane may be down in the river.

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Portland airport officials could not verify any aircraft on radar.

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And in that area the state trooper looked again where the object supposedly went to the

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river and found nothing.

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McCartney doesn't know what it was that he saw.

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I don't really know if it was a UFO.

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I don't really know if I even believe in that kind of thing.

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But it was certainly something that I hadn't, wasn't used to seeing before.

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And I haven't been able to verify anything else about it.

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He did, however, record the sound emanating from the area where the object was spotted.

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There is some speculation that the object may have been some aircraft involved in illegal

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drug operations that just vanished from the area.

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Trooper McCartney doesn't think so.

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Well I don't know.

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It's a possibility.

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I wouldn't rule it out.

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But I would think that if you were dealing in drugs you wouldn't want to illuminate yourself

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out there at night like that.

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The Coast Guard would send a helicopter and vessel to the location.

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Also came up empty handed according to Mike Dyer.

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But we did search the area.

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An auxiliary vessel and the Coast Guard vessel with negative results.

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Quite extensive search.

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And nothing was seen whatsoever.

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So that's the story of one possibly two bright orange objects eluding Coast Guard, state

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and county police, and airport radar over the metropolitan area this morning.

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Jeff Grimes, KXL News.