The Phoenix Lights

Record summary

A large formation of lights reported over Arizona in March 1997 became one of the most prominent late-twentieth-century UFO stories in North America. Witnesses described different objects and formations, while officials and later investigators discussed military flares, aircraft, atmospheric effects, and possible misidentification. The event matters as a case of media consolidation: diverse observations were increasingly remembered as one extraordinary episode. The documentary record includes contemporary reports, later interviews, and disputed reconstructions, so the timing and physical identity of each sighting should not be assumed to be uniform.