What were the Phoenix Lights?
The Guard’s account that the 10 pm lights were flares is backed by independent checks. The 8:30 pm V was seen as separate lights and, by one astronomer, as planes, but no record names them; that it was one giant craft is unverified.
- LikelyJun 1997The Air National Guard says Maryland A-10s dropped flares at 10 pm
- ✓ Confirmed5 Mar 1998Phoenix New Times reports the V was separate lights, and the Guard denies flying it
- UnverifiedTheoryThe V was a single craft of non-human origin
- UnverifiedTheoryThe 10 pm lights were not flares
On 13 March 1997 a V of lights crossed Arizona and, later, a row of lights hung over Phoenix. One has an official explanation; the other has never been named.
The question What were the lights seen over Arizona on 13 March 1997, and what do the records show?
What the records say
The documented story holds up: 8 of 12 timeline steps are Confirmed by the records (score 92).
3 theories checked: 3 unverified. A theory is rated by its key claim.
Two sceptics say both events were Maryland Guard A-10s
confirmedConfirmed as a record of what this document says, not that it is true. See the step
Down the rabbit hole
The ground line is the documented timeline. Each tunnel is a theory that branches off it; every chamber is a step, coloured by how well the records support it. The deepest chamber is the theory’s key claim. Tap one to open it.
Main timeline
Oldest first- 13 Mar 1997confirmed
About 8:30 pm, a V of lights crosses Arizona from north to south
New Times put it over Prescott about 8:15, over Phoenix about 8:30 and south of Tucson at 8:45, roughly 200 miles in 30 minutes. Hundreds of people saw it, on a night many were outside to watch Comet Hale-Bopp.
- 13 Mar 1997confirmed
Some witnesses, such as the Ley family, describe one giant, silent craft
Tim Ley told CNN that what “appeared to be a giant V-shaped craft” passed over his family’s home in silence. Other witnesses, including two New Times writers, disagreed on whether the lights were joined.
- 13 Mar 1997confirmed
Amateur astronomer Mitch Stanley says his telescope showed planes
He told New Times that under magnification “each light split into pairs, one each on the tips of squarish wings.” New Times first reported his account in June 1997.
- 13 Mar 1997likely
About 10 pm, a row of up to nine lights hangs southwest of Phoenix, then goes out
Several people filmed it, among them Mike Krzyston from his yard in Moon Valley. The lights disappeared in the direction of the Sierra Estrella mountains.
- Mar 1997likely
Davis-Monthan Air Force Base first says it had no planes in the air
New Times asked why the base, “where the Maryland Air National Guard’s A-10s returned that night”, at first said it had no planes up. Skeptical Inquirer later wrote that on rechecking, the base said a Maryland Guard A-10 squadron was there.
- Jun 1997likely
The Air National Guard says Maryland A-10s dropped flares at 10 pm
After a TV station filmed a military flare drop that looked like the 10 pm lights, an Arizona National Guard information officer said the flares were dropped at 10 pm over a range 30 miles southwest of Phoenix, at an unusually high 15,000 feet. This is the military’s own account, reported by one newspaper.
- 1997confirmed
Governor Fife Symington mocks the uproar with an aide in an alien suit
At a news conference months after the sightings he brought out his chief of staff, Jay Heiler, in an alien costume.
- 1997likely
A Phoenix councilwoman asks for an inquiry; no official investigation follows
Frances Emma Barwood asked the city to look into the sightings. In 2024 Phoenix New Times wrote that “no official investigation has ever occurred”.
- 5 Mar 1998confirmed
Phoenix New Times reports the V was separate lights, and the Guard denies flying it
On the one home video of the V it found “The lights clearly move in relation to each other”. A Maryland Guard spokesman said its A-10s “never went north of Phoenix”, so who flew the V was not disclosed.
- Mar 2007confirmed
Symington says he saw the craft himself
Ten years on, the former governor and Air Force captain said: “It was bigger than anything that I’ve ever seen. It remains a great mystery.”
- 9 Nov 2007confirmed
Symington writes that it was “certainly not high-altitude flares”
In a CNN commentary he called the Air Force’s explanation “silly” and wrote that “flares don’t fly in formation”. He was about to moderate a National Press Club event on UFOs.
- Mar 2015confirmed
Two sceptics say both events were Maryland Guard A-10s
James McGaha and Joe Nickell wrote in Skeptical Inquirer that the V was a five-plane formation flying from Nellis Air Force Base to Tucson, and that McGaha spoke to the flight leader of the flare drop.
Sources disagreeIn 1998 a Maryland Guard spokesman told New Times its A-10s never went north of Phoenix, which would rule them out for the V.
Branches
Go down oneA branch is only as strong as its weakest step so far. The count is how many sources back each step.
One giant craft
Was the 8:30 pm V one enormous craft, not made by people?
From witnesses on the night. By June 1997 national news carried accounts like the Ley family’s of “a giant V-shaped craft”.
- 984,027 YouTube views of “The Phoenix Lights: What They Don’t Want You To Know” (So Weird) as of 17 Oct 2026 T3YouTube: So Weird, “What They Don’t Want You To Know”
Hundreds of people saw it, a governor and pilot among them
Symington: “this craft did not resemble any man-made object I’d ever seen.”
The premise: confirmedTrue that hundreds saw the lights: CNN and New Times both say so. Whether they saw one craft is the question the evidence does not support.
It passed over in total silence
The Ley family said it went directly overhead “in complete silence”.
The premise: unverifiedA witness account, and a common one: the New Times writers who saw the V also heard no sound. Silence alone does not say what the lights were.
Nobody has ever said whose planes they were
Symington accepts there may have been flares that night but says “what I and hundreds of others saw had nothing to do with that.”
The premise: likelyCorrect on the records read: the Maryland Guard denied flying north of Phoenix and New Times found it “never was disclosed who was flying those planes”. Sceptics’ five-A-10 account rests on their own interviews.
- confirmed
Witnesses and the former governor describe one huge, silent craft
Tim Ley described “a giant V-shaped craft” to CNN; Symington later said it was “bigger than anything that I’ve ever seen.”
StartStrength so far:confirmed· 2 sources on this step - confirmed
New Times found the lights on the one home video moved apart
It reported the lights “represent five separate objects, rather than a solid body.”
= HoldsStrength so far:confirmed· 1 source on this step - confirmed
An astronomer with a telescope says he saw planes
Carried over from the main timeline (step 3).
= HoldsStrength so far:confirmed· 1 source on this step - unverified
Key claim: the V was a single craft of non-human origin
Witness accounts are its only support. Against it are one newspaper’s analysis of a home video and one telescope witness. No record names the planes either: the Maryland Guard said its A-10s never went north of Phoenix.
▼ WeakerStrength so far:unverified· 2 sources on this step
Bullshit meter
- Key claim: the V was a single craft of non-human origin. Unverified.
- Key claim contradicted by tier 1? Partly. No tier-1 record addresses it, but an independent 1998 video analysis and a telescope witness point to separate lights on planes; no record names the planes, so the formation is still unexplained.
Fluff meter: possibly planted
- Can’t be traced to an original record. Present: no record or footage shows a single craft.
- First appeared from new or anonymous accounts. Absent: the accounts come from named witnesses.
- Coordinated identical wording. Not measured.
- Cited source doesn’t exist. Absent.
- Later contradicted. Present: New Times’ 1998 look at the home video found separate lights.
● present · ○ absent · – not measured. Lists signals only. It never accuses anyone.
Personal interest meter
- Fife Symington, who says he saw the craft, said in a 2021 TV programme that he kept quiet in 1997 because he was then under federal indictment, Phoenix New Times reports. T2Phoenix New Times, 3 Jun 2024
“Has a documented interest” only, each one sourced. Never an implication of guilt.
Correlation meter
Links to other cases appear once those cases exist.
Who worked on this
This case was assembled by the site from public records. Contributions are not open yet. Nothing here is invented, so the counts are zero.
This is the first published version of the case.
Sources
- T2Tony Ortega, “The Hack and the Quack”, Phoenix New Times, 5 Mar 1998. www.phoenixnewtimes.com
- T2Matthew Hendley, “The 1997 ‘Phoenix Lights’ are no mystery”, Phoenix New Times, 14 Mar 2014 (a summary of the 1998 article). www.phoenixnewtimes.com
- T2Benjamin Leatherman, “Phoenix Lights explained: Everything to know about the legendary UFO sighting”, Phoenix New Times, 3 Jun 2024. www.phoenixnewtimes.com
- T2“What were those lights in the Phoenix sky?”, CNN, 19 Jun 1997 (with reporting by KSAZ’s John Hook). www.cnn.com
- T2“Former Ariz. governor boosts UFO claims”, NBC News, 23 Mar 2007. www.nbcnews.com
- T3Fife Symington, “Symington: I saw a UFO in the Arizona sky”, commentary, CNN.com, 9 Nov 2007 (the claimant’s own words). www.cnn.com
- T3James McGaha and Joe Nickell, “Alien Lights? At Phoenix, Stephenville, and Elsewhere: A Postmortem”, Skeptical Inquirer, March/April 2015. skepticalinquirer.org
- T3“The Phoenix Lights: What They Don’t Want You To Know”, So Weird w/ Patrick James, YouTube, 5 Apr 2025. www.youtube.com
- T3“Flare Theory Debunked”, ThePhoenixLights channel (Steve Lantz, co-producer of “The Phoenix Lights” documentary), YouTube, 25 Jan 2010. www.youtube.com
- T3“Man behind famous ‘Phoenix Lights’ footage still mystified, 26 years later”, KGUN 9 report (aired 18 Dec 2022), Ryan Fish channel, YouTube, 13 Mar 2023. www.youtube.com