Close encounters

Wolfe Tone

First

A sighting of one or more unidentified flying objects:

• Flying Saucers
• Odd lights
• Aerial objects that are not attributable to known human technology

Second

An observation of a UFO, and associated physical effects from the UFO, including:

• Heat or radiation
• Damage to terrain
• Crop circles
• Human paralysis (Catalepsy
• Frightened animals
• Interference with engines or TV or radio reception.
• Lost Time: a gap in one's memory associated with a UFO encounter

Third

An observation of what Hynek termed "animate beings" observed in association with a UFO sighting. Hynek deliberately chose the somewhat vague term "animate beings" to describe beings associated with UFOs without making any unfounded assumptions regarding the beings' origins or nature. Hynek did not necessarily regard these beings as "extraterrestrials" or "aliens." Additionally, Hynek further expressed discomfort with such reports, but felt a scientific obligation to include them, at the very least because they represented a sizable minority of claimed UFO encounters.

More types of close encounters detailed here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Close_encounter



Have you ever experienced a close encounter? (or at least what you thought was one) What happened? Would you like to experience one?

I haven't, maybe one day...

Would never want to experience anything beyond a close encounter of the third kind tbh (abductions etc).

Red Hand

Close encounters with fairies/goblins/ghosts have all been experienced throughout history. Aliens are just the latest version of this which fits in with our expectations.

1saddude

I never liked when people used to word UFO, call it an ALIEN SPACE SHIP.

Star Lord

1saddude wrote: »

I never liked when people used to word UFO, call it an ALIEN SPACE SHIP.

UFO is used because it is an UNIDENTIFIED Flying Object, unless you can prove that it is an ALIEN SPACE SHIP, then it's a UFO.

1saddude

DamoElDiablo wrote: »

UFO is used because it is an UNIDENTIFIED Flying Object, unless you can prove that it is an ALIEN SPACE SHIP, then it's a UFO.

But they're all definitely definitely alien space ships.

tony 2 tone

1saddude wrote: »

But they're all definitely definitely alien space ships.

:rolleyes: I think you'll find they were actually weather balloons.

Star Lord

1saddude wrote: »

But they're all definitely definitely alien space ships.

I want to believe...


but I see no proof! Hell they may not have been extra-terrestrial at all, maybe from some sub-aquatic species that started to explore the sky...

tallaghtmick

Whats the story with all the ufo/conspiracy stuff on boards lately?are the admins working in collusion with the reverse vampires?

Star Lord

tallaghtmick wrote: »

Whats the story with all the ufo/conspiracy stuff on boards lately?are the admins working in collusion with the reverse vampires?

The mods are in on it too I tells ya! :mad:

I dunno, I think the CT style cover-up style stuff should stay in CT, this is more an experiences/stories based forum IMHO.

ger vallely

Myself and the big sis had a visual of a U.F.O way back in the 80s'. Sis was in the garden taking in the washing,it was late evening and I was looking out the upstairs bedroom window, chatting to her. I saw it and told her to look. What we saw was as follows: a bronze w shaped object. Lights on each angle. It stayed put in one area of sky for perhaps 3-5 seconds. Then it quickly moved back a little and then shot off faster than we could track. We often stayed awake late before that, looking out the window tracking satellites as they moved,plus we lived nearish to an airport so we were quite familiar with various types of aircraft. I have not seen anything similar to this since. So, to me it is a U.F.O,not sure if it was alien or not though!

tallaghtmick

ger vallely wrote: »

Myself and the big sis had a visual of a U.F.O way back in the 80s'. Sis was in the garden taking in the washing,it was late evening and I was looking out the upstairs bedroom window, chatting to her. I saw it and told her to look. What we saw was as follows: a bronze w shaped object. Lights on each angle. It stayed put in one area of sky for perhaps 3-5 seconds. Then it quickly moved back a little and then shot off faster than we could track. We often stayed awake late before that, looking out the window tracking satellites as they moved,plus we lived nearish to an airport so we were quite familiar with various types of aircraft. I have not seen anything similar to this since. So, to me it is a U.F.O,not sure if it was alien or not though!

A late evening sun would make that look bronze,although I couldnt tell you why a stealth bomber would be above Ireland.

ger vallely

Hmm,well it was Finglas,so it's possible!!Not sure about their hovering capabilities and 0-200 in 1.1 second..but it's an option alright.

Star Lord

Only one I ever experienced was what looked at first glance to be a star, but it was not moving with the rest of the stars, rather, seemed to be moving along keeping pace with us, and it was more like a cross, + shape of light in the sky. It didn't seem to be a plane, as there was no jetstream, whereas there were a couple of other jetstreams in the sky, and there were no flashing beacons. Still have no idea what it was!

1saddude

DamoElDiablo wrote: »

I want to believe...


but I see no proof! Hell they may not have been extra-terrestrial at all, maybe from some sub-aquatic species that started to explore the sky...

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/joke

Star Lord

:rolleyes: You've obviously not been reading my posts in the way they were intended if you think you need to post that.

Wolfe Tone

DamoElDiablo wrote: »

Only one I ever experienced was what looked at first glance to be a star, but it was not moving with the rest of the stars, rather, seemed to be moving along keeping pace with us, and it was more like a cross, + shape of light in the sky. It didn't seem to be a plane, as there was no jetstream, whereas there were a couple of other jetstreams in the sky, and there were no flashing beacons. Still have no idea what it was!

Did it freak you out a bit? I saw something like that myself a year or so ago, felt very unnerving.

Star Lord

Wolfe Tone wrote: »

Did it freak you out a bit? I saw something like that myself a year or so ago, felt very unnerving.

Yeah very much so! I couldn't look away though!

Ziycon

The term UFO has kinda of lost its meaning over the years mainly due to Hollywood. The first thing that people think of when they hear the term UFO is 'Aliens' when this is far from the truth. The term UFO is used to class anything that is seen by an observer that is unidentified, it may come to light in the future as to what the object was and be 100% explainable but there and then in that moment its classed as a UFO as the observer can't identify the object.

The term being more widely used nowadays to get away from the stigma associated with the word 'UFO' is 'UAP' (Unidentified Aerial Phenomena).

maninasia

Wolfe Tone wrote: »

Did it freak you out a bit? I saw something like that myself a year or so ago, felt very unnerving.

Maybe the international space station or times when it was docked with the space shuttle when it would appear even more obvious.

krd

tallaghtmick wrote: »

A late evening sun would make that look bronze,although I couldnt tell you why a stealth bomber would be above Ireland.

If you live anywhere near Shannon. You can get to see lots of different kinds of American military aircraft.

I've seen American fighter jets in formation a few times.

Deki

I saw something a few years back. Flying low and at night only 3 lights that seemed at first glance to be stars but on closer look you could see a triangle shape moving slow and blotting out the stars as it went. There was no sound. I believe it was something the military were moving. Wasn't the stealth bomber but I think they do stuff like that all the time and take them over rural areas as much as they can. There are a couple of air bases around here and a good bit of government reserve lands. Experimental stuff they aren't ready to let the public in on.

krd

Deki wrote: »

I saw something a few years back. Flying low and at night only 3 lights that seemed at first glance to be stars but on closer look you could see a triangle shape moving slow and blotting out the stars as it went. There was no sound. I believe it was something the military were moving. Wasn't the stealth bomber but I think they do stuff like that all the time and take them over rural areas as much as they can. There are a couple of air bases around here and a good bit of government reserve lands. Experimental stuff they aren't ready to let the public in on.

Sounds like an American bomber. There were a lot of them around during the Gulf war. I think the American's were also training their pilots.

Deki

They do train around here (supposed to do their maneuvers over the government owned land but they like to fly over small towns and show off) those planes are very recognizable -and loud. This was something I hadn't seen before and haven't seen since. I think it was a design that they want to be kept secret or it just didn't work out. It flew just above the roof tops. It was impressive, nearly invisible and so quiet.

Cokeistan

I experienced one a few months back. I was walking with my friend at around 9pm, it was pitch black outside. While my friend is talking to me I decide to look in the direction of the sky on his side. Next thing I see this flash in the sky that was like lightening, but it only covered a really small area of the sky. The flash lasted half a second and out of the flash this bright blue dot appeared and shot away at incredible speed. My friend wasn't looking in the same direction so not only did he fail to see the flash but also the blue dot flying away. This all happened in the space of about 2 seconds, really strange!

CiaranMcDCFC

I remember when I was a kid, probably about ten and was outside playing in the middle of a gathering storm. Was quite windy but do not think it was raining otherwise I would not have been out. I looked up in the sky and could see a round object moving back and forth as if bouncing off clouds. Was visible for a minute of two as I recall. I remember commenting to the guy I was with that it could be the eye of a storm. Never occured to me at the time that it may have been a UFO but looking back on it, it's possible. Cannot remember if it looked like a physical metallic type object or more weather related. I would think the latter but would hope for UFO. Although why a UFO might be in North Donegal in the early eighties is beyond me.!

maninasia

Cokeistan wrote: »

I experienced one a few months back. I was walking with my friend at around 9pm, it was pitch black outside. While my friend is talking to me I decide to look in the direction of the sky on his side. Next thing I see this flash in the sky that was like lightening, but it only covered a really small area of the sky. The flash lasted half a second and out of the flash this bright blue dot appeared and shot away at incredible speed. My friend wasn't looking in the same direction so not only did he fail to see the flash but also the blue dot flying away. This all happened in the space of about 2 seconds, really strange!

It may have been a blue sprite or ball lightning, look them up.

Cokeistan

maninasia wrote: »

It may have been a blue sprite or ball lightning, look them up.

Just checked up a decent amount of images of these but the thing I saw looked completely different to both of them. I've tried looking up what I saw before and I don't seem to be able to find much on it

Deki

krd wrote: »

Sounds like an American bomber. There were a lot of them around during the Gulf war. I think the American's were also training their pilots.

I think it was some sort of military thing. I think my government moves things about at night to avoid notice. I can't explain the absence of engines though, but that doesn't mean there isn't one. I believe they might have been returning to Dayton air base. They do a lot of practice runs over federal land, near here. I've seen bomber jets though, it wasn't one of those, they are fairly common sights around here. This was so slow and nearly invisible, and low. I wouldn't have noticed it at all if it hadn't been for it blinking out the stars as it came between them and me. Sort of like turning them off as it passed over. Then I took a better look.:)

Star Lord

With no engine noise, could it have been some sort of glider?

maninasia

They are called black triangles, probably some type of advanced lighter than air military vehicle. They been seen all over the US and also in the UK, often near air bases.

mrmorgan

Cokeistan wrote: »

I experienced one a few months back. I was walking with my friend at around 9pm, it was pitch black outside. While my friend is talking to me I decide to look in the direction of the sky on his side. Next thing I see this flash in the sky that was like lightening, but it only covered a really small area of the sky. The flash lasted half a second and out of the flash this bright blue dot appeared and shot away at incredible speed. My friend wasn't looking in the same direction so not only did he fail to see the flash but also the blue dot flying away. This all happened in the space of about 2 seconds, really strange!

I saw the exact same one time only mine was a red dot instead of a blue dot

cocoshovel

Im usually not one for these kind of crazy things and find that 99% of the time the people who rant on about these kind of things are either ignorant or just plain stupid, and to be honest several of the posts on this forum have made me facepalm or laugh at how blatantly unaware people are or things.

Howver, I have seen 1 or 2 things which I cannot explain. Now before I get started, A: Im very well aware of what chinese lanternes look like and B: Im very interested in Aviation, so I can assure you I will know what an aircraft looks like when I see one regardless of how far away it is, I also have a mild understanding of weather.

Anyway, the most recent one I saw was around January 2011, I was driving home from town in the late evening and it was pitch black. I saw something come from the right hand side of the road, abotu 10-20ft high in the air and it was moving very fast. Like there was an extremely strong wind and there was a bag being thrashed about in it.
It moved from right to left over the road and appeared to move like a bird flying. Except it was glowing bright orange.... This is one thing I cannot explain at all. Definitely wasnt a chinese lantern because they do not move at the speed of rockets and move like birds.

The only possible thing I can think of was that there was a chimney fire or something alight on a house across the field (the closest one that side of the road was a good 200m away) and an large ember got caught in the wind. Ball lightening isnt really possible on very cold wet winter nights, as far as Im aware.

It was also about the size of a large crow if I remember correctly. Very strange whatever it was.


The second one was back when I was younger I was sitting in the car as a passenger. In the distance (a good 50+ miles) there was large plume of clouds. I could make out a silver ball move in a strange manner from behind the clouds and back out. It was moving straight up, straight down, left, right horizontally. Not moving like any Aircraft or Helicopter I have ever seen. It was just too precise and odd. It dont think it was ball lightening either as it wasnt the right type of weather at the time, but hey I could be wrong. It seemed to be a good altitude too. Id say at least 10,000ft, probably double or triple that. It was silver, and metallic and moved very precisely.

I actually saw the exact same thing on one of those stupid UFO shows on TV a few years back and it sent shivers up my spine.

Ziycon

cocoshovel wrote: »

Im usually not one for these kind of crazy things and find that 99% of the time the people who rant on about these kind of things are either ignorant or just plain stupid, and to be honest several of the posts on this forum have made me facepalm or laugh at how blatantly unaware people are or things.

Howver, I have seen 1 or 2 things which I cannot explain. Now before I get started, A: Im very well aware of what chinese lanternes look like and B: Im very interested in Aviation, so I can assure you I will know what an aircraft looks like when I see one regardless of how far away it is, I also have a mild understanding of weather.

Anyway, the most recent one I saw was around January 2011, I was driving home from town in the late evening and it was pitch black. I saw something come from the right hand side of the road, abotu 10-20ft high in the air and it was moving very fast. Like there was an extremely strong wind and there was a bag being thrashed about in it.
It moved from right to left over the road and appeared to move like a bird flying. Except it was glowing bright orange.... This is one thing I cannot explain at all. Definitely wasnt a chinese lantern because they do not move at the speed of rockets and move like birds.

The only possible thing I can think of was that there was a chimney fire or something alight on a house across the field (the closest one that side of the road was a good 200m away) and an large ember got caught in the wind. Ball lightening isnt really possible on very cold wet winter nights, as far as Im aware.

It was also about the size of a large crow if I remember correctly. Very strange whatever it was.


The second one was back when I was younger I was sitting in the car as a passenger. In the distance (a good 50+ miles) there was large plume of clouds. I could make out a silver ball move in a strange manner from behind the clouds and back out. It was moving straight up, straight down, left, right horizontally. Not moving like any Aircraft or Helicopter I have ever seen. It was just too precise and odd. It dont think it was ball lightening either as it wasnt the right type of weather at the time, but hey I could be wrong. It seemed to be a good altitude too. Id say at least 10,000ft, probably double or triple that. It was silver, and metallic and moved very precisely.

I actually saw the exact same thing on one of those stupid UFO shows on TV a few years back and it sent shivers up my spine.

If you haven't already you can report your sighting here, http://www.ufoi.org/report-an-incident.htm

chrishaaansen

Cokeistan wrote: »

I experienced one a few months back. I was walking with my friend at around 9pm, it was pitch black outside. While my friend is talking to me I decide to look in the direction of the sky on his side. Next thing I see this flash in the sky that was like lightening, but it only covered a really small area of the sky. The flash lasted half a second and out of the flash this bright blue dot appeared and shot away at incredible speed. My friend wasn't looking in the same direction so not only did he fail to see the flash but also the blue dot flying away. This all happened in the space of about 2 seconds, really strange!

I experienced something similar about 18 months ago with two friends in the north west. We were walking to a friends house around 11:30pm, when we decided to stop for a cigarette. While talking a giant blue orb appeared in the horizon over a house as if it came up from the ground. It hovered there for about a second or two and exploded outwards and disappeared lighting up the sky in the process. It stopped the three of us mid sentence and we nearly wet out ourself on the spot! Having looked at numerous pictures and descriptions of ball lightning and blue sprites I am positive it wasn't either of them. Any one have any other suggestions?

H3llR4iser

A couple of times, many years ago. The first one was when I was 13 or 14, in middle school (I am from Italy). Last hour of lesson, very "interesting" as I was absolutely looking of the window. All of a sudden, a peculiar "craft" catches my attention; Imagine it as a teardrop-shaped orange blob, with two similarly shaped "pods" attached at each side of it, at the bottom. The general shape & size was that on an helicopter, but there was no sound nor any visible rotors. It also flew more like a plane - straight, stable and very fast. One of my classmates blurted, mid lesson, "what the hell is that thing?"
Never saw any pictures of anything even similar, might very well have been some RC toy (although it was 1992-1993 and they weren't that popular) or an old light plane (there were some made in odd shapes in the past).

Second one, it was 1999. August evening, I was hanging out with some friends. All of a sudden one of them goes "hey, is that an UFO?". We all laughed at him because he had a reputation as a prankster. He kept insisting that we took a look, that he wasn't kidding - and he looked scared. So we do, and there is indeed a bright light in the sky, just visible off the top of a building. "Helicopter" we dismiss it, but it starts moving towards the right of our FOV - wavy and very fast movement - only to come to a sudden halt. Then it struck us that we couldn't hear a sound - it was no chopper. It finally started moving away from where we were, I tried to get my friends to go in the street so we could see better, but then I realized they were all absolutely taken over by fright. The object accelerated to a what looked like a very high speed and disappeared in the distance.
Now, back then there was the Balcan crisis and, being in Naples, I was used at seeing all types of military craft movements - including a spectacular formation of 15 Apache Gunships flying over the city and to the airport. The object I saw could have been an experimental aircraft - however, are we so sure that the concept of an experimental, gravity defying, physics bending military aircraft is any more believable than the "not terrestrial" explanation?