Top Story

Secret MOD files containing UFO sightings released

To Download this program click here

A lack of resources and "higher priorities" at the Ministry of Defence prevented a full-scale study of the thousands of UFO reports that have been made since the Second World War, according to official documents.

Following a 1995 internal memo from a wing commander in DI55, the branch of the Defence Intelligence Staff (DIS) which was responsible for assessing UFO reports, a limited investigation of unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP) was commissioned by the MOD.

The secret four-volume report concluded in 2000 that UFOs did not pose a threat, eventually leading to the closure of the UFO desk in 2009.

The UAP report was released to the public following a Freedom of Information request in 2006.

Photographs and sketches of UFOs, made by members of the public, are included in the files from the National Archives as well as their eyewitness reports.

The report's conclusions are summarised as "sightings can be explained as mis-reporting of man-made vehicles, natural but not unusual phenomena and natural but relatively rare and not completely understood phenomena".

The sightings are contained in the eighth batch of files to be released to The National Archives and contains 34 files covering 1985 to 2007.

The files include almost 9,000 pages of UFO sightings and incidents, photographs and drawings, RAF investigations, Freedom of Information requests, parliamentary briefings and government UFO policy documents.

Included is the first-hand testimony of retired RAF fighter controller Freddie Wimbledon and retired MoD official Ralph Noyes, on the famous 1956 UFO incident at RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk.

Mr Wimbledon remembers the RAF scrambling fighter planes to intercept a UFO seen on radar and by observers on the ground. The UFO reportedly latched onto to a fighter plane, "following its every move" before speeding off at "terrific speed".

Staff involved were sworn to secrecy, while Mr Noyes recalls being shown gun camera footage of the UFOs taken from aboard the aircraft at a special MoD screening in 1970.

Another report describes mysterious lights seen moving 300ft above the Pyramid stage at the Glastonbury Festival on June 28 2003. There are also details of a UFO sighting over a music festival at Llanfyllin, Wales, in July 2006.

A file also contains a number of sightings reported to the MoD during the summer of 2006, that describe formations of orange lights in the sky. These appear to be observations of Chinese lanterns, released at parties and public events, the experts concluded.

Other incidents include UFOs spotted by the pilot and passengers of an aircraft over the Channel Islands in 2007 and F-16s scrambled to intercept UFOs over Belgium in 1990.