By Natalie Pearce
Way back in June 1947, the term ‘Flying Saucer’ was created. This was on the back of the sighting made by Kenneth Arnold when flying close to Mt. Rainier when he witnessed a fleet of strange craft which he likened to moving like a saucer skipping on water. The media took this and coined the term ‘flying saucer’. Prior to this nobody really knew what to refer to these strange objects as – mystery airships, ghost rockers and Foo Fighters were just some of the names used to describe the phenomenon.
So are these strange objects that we come into contact with saucers? Well perhaps some can be described as saucer-shaped, but in truth UAPs come in all shapes and sizes. In this article we will take a look at some of the most interesting.
Box Shaped
Cube and square shaped objects are not known for their aerodynamic qualities, however over the years many people have had sightings with craft that are cube shaped. In 1966 in Hampton Falls, New Hampshire USA a ten year old boy was out walking his dog around 4pm. He saw a box shaped object which appeared to be sitting on top of a ridge close by, silver in colour. He noticed an antenna like probe protruding from the box which suddenly retracted. Curious he walked towards the silver craft and saw it was sitting on top of three legs.
Suddenly strange noises came out of the craft and it lifted around 12 inches off the ground. From here the boy could see the craft was more like an L shape, 60 inches in length and around 40 inches tall. He noticed the texture of the craft was like cork and was not highly polished. Under the craft a dish-shaped appendage could be seen. The craft made a number of movements and electrical pulse sounds before shooting into the sky at high velocity.
In late 2021, a number of sightings of box-shaped craft were spotted in Nevada, some very close to the famed ‘Area 51’ base.
The eyewitness who took the above photograph in Nevada stated, “it was no plane, drone or helicopter”.
Triangular Shaped
Triangular crafts, mostly black in colour and usually large in size, are often witnessed. According to David Marler, UFO researcher and author, he alone has reviewed more than 17,000 cases of triangular UAPs. Often dismissed as experimental military craft, they are usually reported as very slow moving as if assessing the landscape below them.
In 1990, black triangle craft were noticed in the airspace around Belgium. Many people witnessed their presence and in March of that year, following being captured on ground radar, F-16 fighter jets were sent to investigate. Whilst the pilots were unable to locate anything strange in the skies visually, their weapons systems were easily able to lock onto them. Suddenly, once locked the crafts shot off upward in hypersonic speed. It is thought over 13,000 people witnessed the triangles and the Belgian Air force made a statement stating they had no explanation for what had happened.
The above image of a triangular shaped craft was taken in Houston, Texas on 1st Jan 2020. The witness who took the photo stated that the lights were evenly spaced apart and remained in a perfect triangular formation. The video that was also taken was released online as the witness tried to make sense of what he had observed.
Cylindrical Shaped
Spotted in Italy on June 18 1979, Italian Air Force officer Giancarlo Cecconi was returning to his air base around 11:30am. He was contacted by the tower at St Angelo Military base radar team who had spotted a low flying object in the sky. Cecconi immediately flew his Fiat G.91 bomber complete with its three on board cameras. He located the object at a distance of 80 meters and took close to 100o pictures including the one above. He estimated the craft at 8 meters tall by 3 meters wide.
Crew on the ground radioed Cecconi to warn him of a blueish almost gas-like omission coming from the craft. As he approached for a closer look, the craft simply dematerialised and vanished.
In 2019 witnesses took the above photograph in California. The cylindrical object was seen in broad day light from a busy road above a set of traffic lights where witnesses noticed it as they were stationary in their cars. Witnesses describe it as a long cigar shaped object that appeared metallic and simply disappeared out of sight in a fading type motion.
Saucer shaped
Taken in Albuquerque, New Mexico in April 1962, these images capture a traditional saucer shaped UAP. The gentleman in the pictures was described a credible witness as he had been a captain in the US Air Force, being stationed in Albuquerque from 1961-1965.
The above saucer was taken as a still from a live TV report in October 2005. The film was captured during taping for a news report in Sarajevo. Footage was also captured of people screaming and pointing at it when it appeared. It was also reported that burn marks were found a short distance away which many believe are connected to the craft sighting having appeared around the same time.
Captured in Devon, UK in January 2016 this disc like object below was seen.
The witness stated “I had an incredible sighting on the 19th of January 2016 of a flying saucer. I was sky watching when I noticed a black object far off in the distance in the direction I was looking. The black object got bigger as it got closer. I could clearly see that the object was in fact a flying saucer and I could see a dome on the top of the saucer. The flying saucer turned back in the direction from where it had come from and then disappeared off into the distance and out of sight. I got a very good look at this alien craft and all I can say is WOW!”
“I also managed to take 20 photographs of this amazing mechanical saucer. The photographs were taken on the 19th of January 2016 the time was approximately 1:10 PM at Newton Abbot, Devon UK.”
Boomerang shaped
On 24th January 2015, a retired police officer and army vet. witnessed a low flying boomerang-shaped UAP flying close to his home in Turlock, California. At around 7pm, he was in his car with his wife on their way home.
The witness spotted a number of lights around 100ft above his car. At first due to it being foggy it was difficult to make out. Gradually he became aware of a huge object moving silently at a slow pace. Suddenly it accelerated at speed and disappeared into the fog. What he saw that night he drew in the below sketch.
Probably the most famous boomerang shaped craft was spotted in Phoenix, Arizona on March 9th 1997.
The famous case of the ‘Phoenix Lights’ mass UFO sighting will be a story told for many years to come. A significant number of people saw a V shaped bank of lights appear out of nowhere, moving slowly, all equidistant that seemed to belong to one larger craft. There still remains much debate over this case, but what was recorded for sure was the shape that people identified.
Spherical shaped
Round crafts first gained notoriety around the time of WW2. Initially thought to be enemy weapons, pilots soon realised they faced something more terrifying. Spherical crafts have been reported to disable aircraft instruments and make seemingly impossible manoeuvres, often at very high speed.
The above image was taken in Sevastopol, Russia.
It was taken in 2015 by a witness using their old camera dated from around 1960. The sphere was flying around 50 meters above the water and appeared to be metallic, perhaps even copper. It was witnessed by a whole family group who were out on a day out at the time.
A spherical UFO was captured on film in 2017 at Washington Skyfest Airshow during the Thunderbird performance. The sphere passes in front of the jet which is flying at 500 mph and the sphere makes the jet look slow. It appears white in colour. John Whichelow who filmed the sighting stated it was most definitely not a bird, drone or bug. When he reviewed the footage later, he was flabbergasted to see a second spherical object, this time black fly at the same supersonic speed directly after the second Thunderbird had passed its audience.
Strange shapes
Imagine taking a yoga class up in the mountains and seeing this hovering above you. Captured on July 14 2014 at the top of Stevens trail in Aubern, California, a group of yogis trekked up the trail to do a midday yoga class outside in nature. Witnesses described the hovering object as “like a jelly fish”.
The photo was taken from a rock that protrudes the mountains and overlooks the canyon and river below. The image was captured on an iPhone 4. The image only appeared in one of the several shots taken in quick succession. Once the group had spotted the object on their pictures, they went further up the trail to see if they could see it again. Sadly, they didn’t. The group reported that there was no breeze on that day and no plane or audible noise around them at the time.
This strange diamond-shaped UFO was spotted in Bridgewater, New Jersey. This location has been a hot spot for strange shaped craft on a number of occasions. It even coined the phrase the Bridgewater Triangle as place for regular sightings of crafts and even Bigfoot himself.
The photo was taken in October 2015 and at first wasn’t noticed until someone else pointed it out. The lady who took the photo did so as she could see balls of light flashing in the sky moving up and down.
A very similar diamond-shaped craft was seen just a few miles away in 2014 by a man walking his dog.
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So, if we think about the evolution of our own earth-bound aircraft, these have changed and developed over the years that aviation has advanced. Maybe this is the same for our visitors’ ships? Or could it simply be the different shapes indicate different races? Or how they travel to us from their home planets?
Just at the moment we certainly don’t have a definitive answer, but we have a mammoth amount of evidence at our fingertips both anecdotal and pictorial that prove the once-coined ‘flying saucers’ really do come in all different shapes and sizes.
[Editors note: In updating our UK UFO Database, we come across a whole HOST of weird and unusual shapes being described. For ease of recording we try to liken shapes into one category (eg. ‘Tic-Tac’ and ‘cigar’ shapes would be classified as a ‘cylinder’ for the purpose of the database) otherwise the list would go on and on! As Natalie’s article shows, there are all sorts of weird things being seen in our skies, so don’t stop looking!]
