Topic
Civilian, police and airline reports, from single witnesses to mass sightings seen by thousands. 305 events, newest first.
Sightings20 Sep 1977
Before dawn, residents of Petrozavodsk in Soviet Karelia reported a huge glowing object shedding beams of light for about 10 minutes, and Soviet papers carried the story. Soviet researchers later attributed it to the launch of the Kosmos-955 satellite from Plesetsk.
Photo: Antonio Bonanno from Milan (Italy), Italy, CC BY-SA 2.0
Sightings15 Aug 1977
Ohio State's Big Ear radio telescope logged a strong narrowband signal that astronomer Jerry Ehman later circled and marked 'Wow!' on the printout. It was never detected again; Ehman called its origin an open question.
Photo: Big Ear Radio Observatory and North American AstroPhysical Observatory (NAAPO), Public domain
Sightings4 Feb 1977
About 15 Broad Haven Primary pupils said they saw a silver cigar-shaped craft in a field behind the school; some described a figure in a silver suit. The MoD got their drawings but offered no explanation. An RAF officer suspected a prankster; a local man admitted a silver-suit prank in 1996.
Photo: Bob Jones, CC BY-SA 2.0
SightingsFeb 1977
Rancher Angel Maria Tonna said a very bright object descended over a corral at Estancia La Aurora in northern Uruguay, damaging fences and cutting power. The Air Force UFO commission CRIDOVNI, formed in 1979, says no element of such cases points to an extraordinary origin.
Photo: Despuesdelauna, CC BY-SA 3.0
Sightings1977
Through 1977, residents around Broad Haven and Little Haven in Pembrokeshire reported lights, craft and silver-suited figures, a flap the press called the Dyfed or Broad Haven Triangle. MoD files show an RAF Brawdy officer checked a hotelier's report; a local man later admitted a silver-suit prank.
Photo: Celuici, CC0
Sightings22 Apr 1976
Elmwood officer George Wheeler, who had reported an earlier sighting in 1975, said a large domed craft near a quarry hit his squad car with a beam; his radio went dead and he was found barely conscious. The town's sightings later drew a proposed UFO landing port that was never built.
Photo: Unknown author, Public domain
Sightings3 May 1975
Mexican private pilot Carlos Antonio de los Santos radioed Mexico City airport's control tower that three unidentified objects were flying around his light Piper aircraft and that his controls moved on their own. He landed safely. A recording said to be his call circulated widely in 2023.
Photo: Jonmallard, CC BY-SA 4.0
Sightings1975
Through spring and summer 1975 residents around Carman, Manitoba reported a recurring red light that locals nicknamed 'Charlie Redstar'. Some reports went to the RCMP and federal agencies; researcher Chris Rutkowski, who studied the wave, says most were distant lights in the night sky.
Photo: Winnipeg Photo. Co., Public domain
Sightings23 Aug 1974
John Lennon and May Pang said they saw a silent object with lights from their East 52nd Street apartment at about 9 p.m. Lennon noted the date in the 'Walls and Bridges' booklet and later wrote about it; a friend's calls reportedly found others had reported sightings.
Photo: Bob Gruen; Distributed by Capitol Records, Public domain
SightingsAug 1974
From August 1974 into 1976 the Cascade County Sheriff's Office handled more than 100 reported livestock mutilations, many investigated by deputy Keith Wolverton, amid reports of helicopters. A 1980 New Mexico review said Montana's livestock lab blamed scavengers for carcasses it examined.
Photo: Aualliso, CC BY-SA 4.0
Sightings23 Jan 1974
A loud bang and bright lights over the Berwyn Mountains in north Wales led to a fruitless search and later claims of a covered-up crash. Seismologists recorded a magnitude 3.5 earthquake near Bala that night, and MoD files released in 2010 attribute the event to the quake plus a bright meteor.
Photo: Eirian Evans, CC BY-SA 2.0
Sightings1974
Farmer Edwin Fuhr said he saw five saucer-shaped objects hovering by a slough while swathing near Langenburg, then watched them leave at speed. An RCMP report recorded five circles of flattened crop where he said they had been. No explanation was established.
Photo: Madgelake at English Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0
Sightings30 Nov 1973
Press reports said Turin-Caselle airport radar tracked an unidentified target while a private pilot and an Alitalia crew saw a bright, color-changing sphere. The airport's military commander was quoted confirming the sighting; no official explanation is on record in the loaded sources.
Photo: Paolo Cerutti, Public domain
Sightings17 Oct 1973
Falkville, Alabama police chief Jeff Greenhaw said he answered a call about a UFO in a field and found a tall figure in a foil-like suit, which he photographed before it outran his patrol car. The account rests on his word; he faced ridicule and resigned weeks later.
Photo: Brian Stansberry, CC BY 4.0
Sightings18 Sep 1973
Georgia Gov. Jimmy Carter filed a sighting report with the International UFO Bureau describing a bright, color-changing light about the size of the moon that he said he and others saw in 1969 while waiting outside a Lions Club meeting in Leary, Georgia.
Photo: Georgia Secretary of State, Public domain
Sightings1973
After several hundred calls about strange lights around Piedmont in early 1973, Southeast Missouri State physics professor Harley Rutledge led his own team to investigate. He issued a paper that year and expanded it into a 1981 book. No government inquiry took place.
Photo: Drowzy at English Wikipedia, Public domain
Sightings12 Nov 1972
After residents of Rosmead in the Karoo reported a bright light moving across the sky, scorch marks and holes were found in the tar of the local school's tennis court. Police forensic head Lothar Neethling said samples showed nothing unusual and suggested vandals with pick-axes.
Photo: Michel Huhardeaux from Brussels, Belgium, CC BY-SA 2.0
Sightings10 Aug 1972
A meteoroid perhaps the size of a small truck grazed Earth's upper atmosphere in daylight, seen from Utah to Alberta and photographed over the Tetons, then skipped back into space. It is a classic example of a natural object that can look like a craft.
Sightings4 Sep 1971
A Costa Rican government mapping aircraft at 10,000 feet photographed a disc-shaped image over Lago de Cote that no one aboard saw; the frames before and after did not show it. Researchers Richard Haines and Jacques Vallee analyzed copies in 1989 and could not identify it.
Photo: Sergio Loaiza, Public domain
SightingsMay 1971
The Belgian civilian group SOBEPS was launched in May 1971, with Lucien Clerebaut and Patrick Ferryn among its founders. During the 1989-1991 Belgian wave it organized night watches and investigated reports; it dissolved after 36 years.
