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Community Corner

'Tinley Park Lights' Still A Southland Mystery

Years later, eyewitnesses still wonder if the well-documented lights are an elaborate prank or unknown phenomenon.

This summer, some Tinley Park residents will be watching the night sky for Unexplained Flying Objects, and say others in the Southland should too.  

After all, the communities of , Orland Park, Frankfort, Oak Forest and Mokena hold bragging rights for one of the most well-documented, unexplained UFO events in the nation: the "Tinley Park Lights."

Tinley Park Patch interviewed local eyewitnesses and experts about this phenomenon, which includes several sightings of three lights in a triangular pattern, dating from Aug. 21, 2004.

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Sam Maranto, State Director of Illinois MUFON, said the first in the series of the Tinley Park Lights events had optimum conditions for eyewitnesses.

"The night of the 21st was beautiful, people were outside, there were parties all over," said Maranto, who lives near Orland Park.

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Traffic was jammed up outside Tinley's Tweeter Center (now known as First Midwest Bank Amphitheatre) where Ozzfest had just ended, and thousands of concertgoers were headed home.

"There were a lot of people outside that night, hundreds if not thousands," said Maranto. "People were able to see and record what was going on."

Tinley resident Bill Dooley, 48, said he recalls that evening vividly. He's the former owner of Alsip-based Fine Oak Furniture.

From Bears Game to Sky Show

"It was a great August evening, with a lot of people who were out in my neighborhood; we were watching the Bears preseason game on tv," Dooley said, noting that it was about 10 p.m. "My neighbor yelled to look up."

Dooley pulled his attention away from the game, and said he was stunned by what he saw. "If you can imagine three bright lights coming at you, in single file, for about 20 minutes."

Dooley said he and several others living near the Tinley Downs Shopping Center watched the mystery lights hover together in one place despite the wind, and made no audible sound. 

"Our houses are backed up to each other, and they were coming right down the middle," he said. "They seemed to have stopped, they went to a single-file line to stacked up on top of each other, then they went into a triangle form," said Dooley.

"There was absolutely no sound. They formed their triangle and started to move away again, stacked on top of each other, they turned white and were gone," he said.

After they disappeared, about 45 minutes later, a single very bright light came by itself, said Dooley.

"Once they were gone, everybody was trying to figure out what we just saw," he said. "A red light came down the same path and did the same thing."

"It made no noise, it floated very slowly right over the tops of all our houses," Dooley said. "It appeared to stop and start again, turned right and disappeared."

Surprise and awe on Dorothy Lane

Eyewitness T.J. Japcon said he and his two young sons, Justin and Jake, were at a neighborhood block party that night on Dorothy Lane, not far from the 174th and Harlem intersection. 

Justin, then 8, urged everyone to look up, recalled Japcon. 

"I was just in awe, you've never seen anything like it before," he said. "It shuts you up. You know it's not a helicopter, you know it's not an airplane.

Like Dooley, Japcon recalled the event as quiet and still.

"You could hear dogs barking," he said. "There were three lights out of the southwest, moved northeast, stopped literally right above us in a triangle pattern," Japcon said.

At one point, a officer in a marked squad drove by, and neighbors asked him about the lights, recalled Japcon. 

"He just said he didn't know what was going on, but he was keeping his radio open because dispatch was getting calls," he said. 

Japcon ran inside and grabbed his Samsung camcorder. The footage he shot that night would be shared with Sam Maranto of MUFON, and eventually featured on the History Channel in episode 201 of UFO Hunters: "Invasion Illinois."

Second Sighting that Halloween

Yet, the sightings weren't over.

About two months later on Halloween night, 2004, Japcon again saw the same set of lights, which were once again witnessed by many residents, from parents running errands to tardy trick-or-treaters.

"I thought it was pretty cool, it was something you thought you were never going to see it again, and all of a sudden, they're back," recalled Japcon. 

As time goes by, this interesting chapter in Southland history is fading for some, said Japcon.

"It's falling through the cracks, just like all other sightings, it just fades like a ripple on  a pond," said Japcon. "It's probably the neatest thing I've seen."

Theories: Model Aircraft, Balloon Hoax & Military Aircraft

Theories abound as to who or what is responsible for the Tinley Park Lights.

"I honestly can't tell you what it was," admitted Japcon.

But he argues, he can tell you what it was not.

"Was it an airplane, a helicopter, flare gun, the planet Venus? Oh my God, no."

Could the Tinley Park Lights be caused by a model aircraft?

"Not a chance," said Dooley.

"There was no noise associated with it. It didn't move like any model airplane I ever saw."

"I'm not sure if it's an elaborate hoax, or what we're seeing," reflected Dooley. "I feel somewhere in our universe there's life, but I feel this isn't it."

Many have pointed out that the annual Chicago Air and Water Show was held on Aug. 21, 2004, and that the Southland is a high air-traffic area, with many flights en route to Chicago's O'Hare and Midway airports.

Maranto, who is currently writing a book about the Tinley Park Lights, is adamant that the phenomenon will not ultimately be attributable to a top-secret, high performance aircraft, as other UFO reports have been.

"These same lights were seen in Melbourne, Australia, a short time later," he said. "Is the U.S. government violating the airspace of a sovereign nation?"

Another popular theory is that the Tinley Park Lights are an elaborate hoax using flares and balloons. Dooley said that in his opinion, UFO Hunters producers Bill Birnes and Pat Uskert did a good job of debunking this theory, in the 'Illinois Invasion" episode.

"It was fun," said Dooley. "We went to Indiana and tried to create it using flares and balloons. But it looked very different."

The show's forensic experts concluded that the lights were likely affixed in a triangular pattern, which could appear as a straight line to witnesses, depending on their perspective.

Using a helicopter captured in one of the images as a reference point for scale, the History Channel experts concluded the unknown object would be an amazing 1,500 feet apart end to end, or the width of six Boeing 757 jet aircraft.

In the end, all Dooley can say is that the lights remain unexplained.

"We never came out and said it was an alien spacecraft," said Dooley. " ... I just saw three lights. They were doing unusual things. Very entertaining. You look up long enough, you're going to see something."

Interested in hearing more about area UFO reports? Mufon is inviting the public to its Southland regional meeting June 25 from 10:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m., at the Orland Park Public Library at 14921 Ravinia. The event is free.

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