Mysterious Britain Forums

Subject: A Brief Introduction To UFO's Sat 08 Sep 2007, 5:55 pm

recently I had to give a short presentation on UFO's as part of a training course - so I'll post it here for anyone to read as a brief introduction to the subject of UFO's.

'The subject of my presentation today is UFO's, commonly called 'Flying Saucers'.

I'll start with a brief history of the subject and then some details on sightings.

Throughout history, people from around the world have reported seeing strange things in the sky - one of the earliest recorded reports is of balls of light in the skies over Kyoto, Japan in 1235AD.

The modern era of 'Flying Saucer' stories began in June 1947, when businessman Kenneth Arnold reported seeing nine bright crescent-shaped objects flying at high speed past his airplane, near Mount Ranier, Washington USA.

He was quoted as saying, "the objects flew like saucers would if you skipped them across the water". The headline writers however, misquoted him and coined the term 'Flying Saucer' to describe what he had seen, firing the publics imagination for ever more amazing stories.

Also in 1947, the US Airforce began official investigations, but soon felt the term 'Flying Saucer' did not reflect the diversity of reported sightings.
In 1952 the term 'Unidentified Flying Object' was introduced.

A U.F.O was defined as anything seen in the air, or briefly on the ground, that cannot be identified after the report has been studied by scientifically qualified persons.

In Britain the the RAF preferred to use the term 'Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon' to avoid any extra-terrestrial connections.

Until 1970, most official UFO reports were classified. Now, under the Freedom of Information Act, many secret reports have been made public. In Britain, the Ministry of Defence has published on it's own website 11,000 reports that it has collected since 1967.

Hundreds of other independent UFO investigation groups exist worldwide. One of the oldest is the British Unidentified Flying Object Research Association, or BUFORA, founded in London 1964.

I'll now talk about the number of sightings reported and some of the descriptions.

Over the years, all of the UFO groups have recorded millions of sightings in total. Of these, over 90% have explanations, ranging from misidentification of natural or man-made objects, to hallucinations and deliberate hoaxes.

This leaves only about 10% of all sightings as unexplained, but in America alone that is equivalent to about 3 million unexplained sightings!

Further study has revealed many corroborating details between multiple reports - from matching times, dates or locations indicating multiple witnesses, to similar physical descriptions indicating some kind of coherency to the UFO phenomenon.

Many reports simply cover sightings of unkown lights in the sky - these are known as Close Encounters of the First Kind. Other sightings are closer, and descriptions have been of disk or cigar shaped objects. Some witnesses have experienced physical effects during such sightings, like car batteries dying, bussing noises or headaches. Such sightings are categorised as Close Encounters of the Second Kind.

Close Encounters of the Third Kind are far less common, but far more disturbing. Witnesses in such cases have seen creatures inside the UFO - alien beings who are described as short, grey almond eyed creatures or tall blonde humanoids, amongst many other types.

Further stories exist of people being abducted by such creatures - such as Betty and Barney Hill in New Hampshire 1961, or alien bodies being found in crashed flying saucers as in the stories from Roswell, New Mexico in 1947.

Sceptics rightly question such tales - many sightings are reported years after they occured and numerous seperate and quite normal events can merge into one extraordinary tale, as happened with the story of a saucer crash in the Berwyn Mountains, North Wales in 1974.

But other stories involve police, pilots, the armed forces, or, as in the case of the UFO landing near the joint RAF/USAF base at Woodbridge, Suffolk in 1980, all three. With so many reports involving such qualified witnesses, maybe it is true that 'we are not alone'.

In conclusion - UFO's have been seen for hundreds of years - only a small percentage remain unexplained, but over the years that means thousands, if not millions, of sightings remain unexplained.

Reporting every sighting can only help to uncover what the explanations might be, and might help a few more people realise they are not alone in what they have seen

that ends my presentation, but if you believe you have seen anything unusual I'll be happy to talk to you about it.

Subject: Re: A Brief Introduction To UFO's Mon 10 Sep 2007, 9:33 pm

Thats a good basic introduction to UFO's Stephen, thanks. It's not a subject I have looked into in any depth but some parts of it do intrigue me.

Subject: Re: A Brief Introduction To UFO's Wed 03 Oct 2007, 6:55 am

Thanks for the intro, it's very interesting stuff. Very Happy

Subject: Re: A Brief Introduction To UFO's Wed 03 Oct 2007, 6:49 pm

my pleasure - if you have any questions just ask - I'll reply or offer the title of a good book to read

Subject: Re: A Brief Introduction To UFO's Fri 12 Oct 2007, 11:03 am

That was great Very Happy

Out of interest, is there a book, or any information on actual alien sightings, and a description of each different type seen? I suppose things like the "Flatwoods monster" (probably a hoax, but who knows), the hopkinsville goblins, dover demon, and all this Reticulan stuff as well?
_________________
Seek for answers in the mundane, with hope for answers in the fantastic

the resident uruisge

www.swt.org.uk

Subject: Re: A Brief Introduction To UFO's Fri 12 Oct 2007, 12:04 pm

I'll amend the post if I'm wrong but a good book that covers pretty much everything, extremely well (usually written by first hand sources) is the Mammoth encyclopedia of Alien Encounters - big book, great read and very cheap!

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Mammoth-Encyclopedia-Extraterrestrial-Encounters/dp/1841196134

Also look out for the Mammoth book of UFO's by Lynn pickett
excellent stuff in a cheap paperback format.

Both are around 2002 so quite up to date in theories and proved hoaxes etc

Subject: Re: A Brief Introduction To UFO's Sat 13 Oct 2007, 1:31 pm

That's a good price, Stephen, thanks for the info Smile

They sound pretty comprehensive.
_________________
Seek for answers in the mundane, with hope for answers in the fantastic

the resident uruisge

www.swt.org.uk