UFO reports

Prior to the 1960s, the Ministry of Defence (MOD) destroyed UFO material after five years. After an increase in public interest, reports of sightings were retained.

The earliest of these were mainly letters or phone calls from the public, but some also came from military sources. Kept with these reports of sightings are letters and replies with possible explanations for them. These include the planet Venus, high-altitude aircraft, weather balloons and satellites.

Later files usually contain one-off sightings, but occasional events attracted multiple reports. For example, Virgin lightships (airships used for advertising) and satellite re-entries have both been reported in large numbers. Most reports refer to lights being spotted, rather than an actual ship or craft.

Perhaps Britain’s most well-known UFO event happened in December 1980 at a Royal Air Force (RAF) base in Suffolk. The United States Air Commanding Officer at RAF Woodbridge, Lieutenant Colonel Charles Halt, reported seeing lights near the rear gate. Servicemen investigated an area of Rendlesham Forest on two separate nights.

The event was discussed in the House of Commons, and the press and public continue to request further information about it. A note in response to a Parliamentary Question confirmed that there was nothing of defence interest in the alleged sighting. The MOD continued to state there was no threat to UK airspace or national security, and no further records or investigations took place.

A single sheet report is the only record of the event itself held by The National Archives, though we hold various files concerning it, which are mostly enquiries from the public and press.

Sightings of V-shaped patterns mainly occur from the 1980s. Enquiries from the public asked if they were attributed to the United States Air Force – specifically the F-117A stealth fighters or B-2 stealth bombers stationed around England, including RAF Mildenhall and Lakenheath in Suffolk.

A major event occurred in Belgium in March 1990. The UK was not informed at the time, as there was no evidence of any threat, but the MOD received numerous questions on the reported sighting. There were no reports or investigations by the Ministry, although enquiries continued, including a Parliamentary Question in September 1996 about the sightings and the MOD response.

The MOD’s UFO files contain correspondence on reported interactions with extraterrestrial creatures. They vary greatly in content.

One letter requests information on a crashed UFO retrieved by the military during the Second World War. The correspondent claims to be from another planet, and to have been on the crashed vehicle, in which she was brought to Earth against her will. She includes sketches of herself and her alien abductors.

Further letters include encounters with ‘Men in Black’ on a railway line in London, an imminent landing of peaceful telepathic aliens, and events around a sighting near Southport that involved time appearing to stand still.

This example UFO report was submitted to the Civil Aviation Authority, who then passed it on to the MOD.

These reports provide the location as well as many other details of each sighting, including the UFO's distance away, its movements, and what the weather conditions were like at the time (for example if mist was present). Personal information in the reports is redacted.

They generally give no indication of the reason for the sighting, although occasionally annotations state events in the area, such as a music concert, or an airship nearby.