Some thoughts on UFOs

 At 2pm in a cloudless sky one Sunday in June of 1973, my wife and two (then) children and I saw two stationary objects in the sky. These were approximately a quarter of a mile from us and at an altitude of about 500 feet. They presented an elliptical profile; their top surfaces appeared dull metallic and their under sides were in shadow, suggesting that they were solid.

 After about 20 seconds they began to move of, keeping perfect station, but with their leading edges inclined towards the ground, suggesting that they were not relying on our understanding of aerodynamics to stay aloft.

 They then ‘flew’ off along a valley, which overlooks a military installation, again keeping perfect station, and disappeared into the distance. We heard absolutely no sounds of any sort. It is difficult to guess at their speed, but it was considerably faster than any aircraft I had ever seen.

 Earlier this year (2000) I saw a single UFO, but this was on a dark, clear night and, beyond reporting that it had a strange configuration of lights, and that it was flying in silence at about 400 feet at a speed of no more than 20mph, I can say little about it. So for me it’s not a question of ‘believing’; I know that such things exist, and I am far from being alone in this. Not thousands, but millions of people throughout history have seen them too.

 OK, let’s say that of those millions 50% were simply mistaken, and that another 45% are attention-seekers; this still leaves us with thousands, including trained military and civilian observers, and crowds of hundreds of people, who have seen flying objects which defy the laws of physics, as we understand them, and which cannot be explained.

 A question frequently asked is “Well, if UFOs piloted, or guided, by an intelligence greater than ours are visiting us, why don’t they make contact?”

 I keep both fish and poultry. I derive pleasure from attending to the wellbeing of both, and from observing them. As yet, however, I have felt no desire to communicate with either. I mean, we have very little in common and, anyway, what would one say to a species incapable of rational thought?

 Another objection is that, even if other planets do support intelligent life, there is no possible means by which they could transport themselves to our little world. To do so would require the ability to travel at speeds faster than light and, as is well known, this simply is not possible.

 This objection pre-supposes that we are correct in our conviction that it is impossible to exceed the speed of light and ignores the possibility that no one has yet explained this limitation to the pilots of the UFOs.

 Of course, there is also another possibility, and that is that UFOs may emanate from a dimension as yet unknown to us.

 Impossible? Well, at one time not so long ago, so was the idea of radio, manned flight, television and a host of other discoveries.

 To me it seems utterly preposterous that anyone can believe that, out of literally countless billions of stars in the known universe, ours (the sun) is the only one orbited by a planet capable of sustaining what we like to think of as ‘intelligent’ life.

 All in all then, it seems to me more rational to expect that we shall be visited from elsewhere in the ‘multiverse’ than that we shall not.

 Of course, I can’t prove any of this and, frankly, don’t much care whether I’m believed or not.

 If I had a blurred photo of either of my sightings I know that it would be said that it was impossible to tell anything from it and, conversely, that if I had a really sharp and properly exposed photograph, it would be said that it was obviously a fake. One is in a ‘lose/lose’ situation here, and this is why I’ve never bothered to tell anyone but family and close friends about this before.

 All that said, however, we would be very interested to hear your views and experiences.

 Curmudgeon