There have been many encounters between airplanes and unidentified flying objects in the United Kingdom.  Here are three examples.

In April, 2007, a veteran pilot reported a UFO over the coast, stating that it may have been a mile wide.  Captain Ray Bowyer continued on toward Aldernay.  Bowyer saw another object that looked the same as the first but was smaller.  He found the sighting to be scary.  This incident was only one of many that involved highly trained pilots.

In 1990, another encounter took place over the North Sea.  Several Royal Air Force Tornado jets were flying over that body of water when they sighted a UFO.  Veteran pilot Captain Mike D’Alton spotted the giant craft as it showed its speed and power.  The UFO was on his right side as the Tornados flew at Mach point 8, or 8 tenths the speed of sound.

It then went into their 12 o’clock position and accelerated away.  D’Alton’s crew, all of whom saw the UFO, corroborated the sighting.  He later said that because of the object’s agility and speed, he believed it was from outer space.  Although these two sightings seem pretty benign, there have been near misses between UFOs and airplanes.

During a Boeing 747’s descent into Manchester Airport, it nearly collided with a strange object.  This is one of the best documented cases of a near miss.  The pilot and his first officer sighted the UFO at almost exactly the same moment.  The first officer said he saw a dark, wedge-shaped object with a stripe down its side and, along with the pilot, denied that the UFO was a bird, balloon or kite.

The pilot and first officer drew what they had seen, and the drawings were identical.  The ensuing investigation discounted ultra lights, para gliders or hang gliders, and military activities.  The investigators came to no conclusions and the object remains unidentified.