Lights in the sky over NI

The Guardian had a piece the other day about reported sightings of UFOs in the North in the last year. Apparently sightings were on the up.

Police received eight sightings in Northern Ireland during 2021, an increase from six such reports in 2020 and four in 2019.

These included a report of a spaceship and flashing lights in the Downpatrick area on 17 January.

Would be interesting to dig deeper into some of them, such as the first one here.

In May police received two sightings reports, one of white lights after a helicopter in the Maghaberry area and an odd disc seen in the sky in the Slemish area of County Antrim at the end of the month.

Tellingly, and I’m a sceptic about any non-terrestrial explanation of these phenomena:

The final report of the year was of “unusual bright lights in the sky” in November.

UFO sighting reports on the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) database include unidentified flying objects (UFOs); aerial phenomena; unidentified aerial phenomena; lights in the sky; and aliens and extraterrestrials.

A PSNI spokesperson said no investigations had been carried out in relation to these incidents.

What always strikes me is how given society is now saturated with people wielding cameras on smartphones there’s not any great sense of better photos of these sort of things. Indeed evidence, tangible evidence, remains as scant as it ever has. Which doesn’t make this any less fascinating, indeed in some ways – well, for me at least, I find it more so.