A strange light in the Payson sky – Payson Roundup

It all started when she and her beau, Harold Coleman, left Cardo’s after a dinner date only to have a strange light follow them down the highway.

“It was either March 3 or 10,” said Javens, “Harold and I were coming back from dinner at Cardo’s sometime around 8:30 or 9.”

As the two waited at the light to turn left on Highway 260, Javens looked down 260 toward Longhorn to see a light hovering above the hill behind the high school that caught her eye.

“I looked over at the high school. It looked like it was on the hill,” she said.

At the 87/260 intersection light, Javens and Coleman again got stuck waiting — and the light again caught Javens’ eye.

“I looked at him and said, ‘That’s not a star,’” said Javens. “‘It’s 100 times brighter than the stars.’”

Coleman told Javens it was probably a helicopter.

“If it’s a helicopter, where are the blinking lights?” Javens asked Coleman.

Then the light hovered down to their level.

As they turned to go north on 87, they say the light followed them.

“When we went faster it went faster,” said Javens. “We got another red light at Walmart and it stopped. I thought, ‘OK, it likes me.’”

Meanwhile, Coleman watched in fascination as the light continued to float along next to the car so he asked Javens to pull into the Maverik station off of Forest.

She did, promptly pulling out her Canon video camera she always carries. (It’s a VIXIA HF R52).

“I’m fascinated with clouds — I’m always looking up — and … If we see elk, I’ll stop and film them … if it’s storming — I video everything,” said Javens.

Problem is, the light was too far away to look like more than someone with a flashlight playing in the sky.

“It wouldn’t let me get any closer,” said Javens.

So, she got into the car and started driving again.

Coleman made her stop at the Quality Inn parking lot saying, “I don’t know what the hell this thing is and I don’t want to find out,” he said.

“Really, where is your sense of adventure?” Javens ribbed him.

As Javens filmed the light, it came in closer, dancing in her camera to shimmer and pulse from a bright white light to a red color and then faded in and out.

The light came close and then backed away as Javens filmed.

“Why don’t we go out to Shoofly and see if this follows us?” Javens asked Coleman.

“No, I’m not going out there where something could land,” said Coleman, refusing to go.

Tired of filming, Javens shut her camera down and the two resumed driving north on 87 where the light took off.

“It followed us as far as Sherwood,” said Javens.

But, Javens said this isn’t the first time she has experienced a UFO.

As a child in Ohio, she and her parents were driving down the road when a ship of some sort hovered over the highway ahead of them.

“It was about a football field away,” she said.

Javens said her father stopped the car and asked everyone if he should just drive under it.

They all agreed to do that.

“When Dad started to move, the whole inside of the car turned green and the car shut off and wouldn’t start,” said Javens.