Best I've seen. Please Debunk.

www.bbc.co.uk...

You need realplayer.

Taken in visual and infra-red from a police helicopter...
It has to be one of the clearest proofs--Is there anyway this can be fake?

Definitely the best I've ever seen - it looks cylindrical.

Yeah is cigar shaped but I'm not able to define the real size. I mean I've read and heard that cigar shaped ufos are huge.

Great footage btw.

[edit on 10-9-2006 by Telos]

I have no idea what that object is. Looks like a capsule. Did they estimate the size of the object? There wasn't a ton of information available.

that is some good footage, the shape of it does not point to any airplane or helicoter that I know and that type of light attached to it doesn't seem right to an aircraft that ive seen, Unless someone else can identify it as being regular terrestial aircraft. I thought I should add a direct link for a quick view of the footage.
www.bbc.co.uk...

It's an asian fire lantern. Most commonly released to celebrate a wedding. in the 2nd half of the vid, which is not infra red, you can see it is a tube structire with a candle in the bottom. Just floating along, not moving fast, although it looks like it cause the helicopter is moving.

www.giveandlive.org...

That is very good footage......from an aircraft it's the best I've seen. Just about from any other vantage point for that matter.

Looks like a cylindrical object standing upright on one of its ends.

Who knows what it was, but from the look of it in IR, I'd say it wasn't a hot air balloon.

Originally posted by sensfan
It's an asian fire lantern. Most commonly released to celebrate a wedding. in the 2nd half of the vid, which is not infra red, you can see it is a tube structire with a candle in the bottom. Just floating along, not moving fast, although it looks like it cause the helicopter is moving.

www.giveandlive.org...

Looking at the IR image, I would say that it wasn't a fire lantern. The surface of the object is acting as a blackbody emitter, radiating equally in IR across the entire surface of the object. A balloon would have cool and hot spots all over its surface, apart from the bright candle. You can see no distinction between the light at the bottom of the object and the rest of the object in IR.

That is great footage
this is a ufo since i cant id what it is
what its not is airplane helicopter ballon etc...

a quick note on the " IR cameras " fitted to UK police helicopters

as thier primary function is the fast location of missing persons , casualties and suspects

the " standard settings " for the thermal imagers they use is very high contrast

while this makes it far easier to spot a missing child in a dark wook , or locate a suspect hidden in a cold dumpster .

it does mean that its very hard to difentiate between 2 different heat sources within 20c of each other and it certainly "masks" hotshots on an object

the cameras do have *32 zoom lenses , which allow fine focus when they are targeting a tiny area .

but at the wide angle search settinfs seen in this clip -- the campea only shows " hot " or " cold " and the " hot " objects are purposly over exposed so they are instantly spotted by the onserver .

hope this helps .

I didn't watch the video because I despise Realplayer (is there some other way?), but take a look at the comments on that page. Apparently the only people who see something strange are "gullible" Americans. I always thought interest in UFOs was worldwide -- isn't this true? Does the rest of the world view the USA as gullible or overly imaginative when it comes to UFOs?

sensfan called it best. That is the best explanation as to what it is. Although there is allot of compression, the internal base light appears to glimmer as a flame would.
As noted by ignorant_ape, the camera (to me appears to be) in high zoom based on the rapid background movement in the close in shots in the tight frame shot. The object for this reason would not appear to be of significant size.

This is a very cool video.
I think the fire lanter explanation makes sense.
Although, there were several frames where I could have sworn that the colum refracted light from background lights, rather than blocked it. A paper lantern like in the picture would just blokck background light. But the video compression makes refraction and compression artefactig difficult to distinguish.

Does anyone know where we can get our hands on higher quality video of this event? (Less compression)

[edit on 11-9-2006 by Ectoterrestrial]

I think it looks very fake, but it doesn't need to be.
Could be an alien ship yes!

I looked at the footage again in slow motion, and it appears that some of the stronger street lighting is translucently shining through the column, while other weaker lights are not.

It would seem this is consistent with the idea of a Chineese paper lantern, where the paper is a lmore translucent than seen in the example photo given.

Please note the crinkly edges are a result of the blow-up. It's sides appear quite smooth in the video.

A google search Here produces many links to mainly the same story.


Is it a hoax video? The pilot was a police of 30 years, so I think we can discount that.

Is it a lantern? Being a verticle cylinder, it does bear a superficial resemblence, but I have to discount it for the following reasons:

1. At an altitude of 1000 feet, a paper lantern would be buffeted to some extent by the wind. As it is, it moves very smoothly.

2. The pilot was concerned it was another air-craft in their air-space (see video) which suggests he thought it was larger than a lantern.

3. The pilot pursued it for 10 miles and 3 minutes. That was long enough for him to recognise if it was a simple wind-borne object. Bear in mind he has 30 years experience.

The first one kind of looked like a parachute from above, but of course it wasn't (since the piolet trailed it for 10 miles).

Something I've always found funny: people misusing the term UFO.
The reporter at the end said
"Was it a UFO? nobody knows."

So what he's saying is nobody knows if the unidentified flying object was an unidentified flying object. Bit redundant, don't you think?




[edit on 12-9-2006 by Ack]

What about the other boject, the lightball? It seems to move at high speed.

interesting is that in 2003 another ufo sighting had place in Sussex:

www.rense.com...

You can make one of these yourself using light, thin film plastic (like the kind your dry cleaning comes in). Here's how: Prepare your material ahead of time during the daylight, but launch at night for effect. Tape several if the bags together together to make a longer tube if you wish. Seal the top. Make a cross of bamboo or balsa sticks and fix them to the bottom. Light some candles and drip the wax onto the cross to hold the candles in place. Blow out the candles. In the center put a small can of sterno (the candles don't add enough heat). Light the sterno and let the hot air rise and fill the cylinder - a hot air dryer or gun will speed things up. When full, replace the sterno can with a frresh can and light the candles. Release.

Where I live this will quickly land you in jail for being a potential (likely even) fire hazard - but I've seen friends do this when I was a kid to great effect and howls of laughter. It's amazing the height you can get from one of these.

The chinese lanterns mentioned earlier work on the same principal.

Not saying that's what this is, but some variation of it is a plausible explanation. With a little ingenuity and pre-fabrication, it would not be a difficult hoax to pull off...


In any event - thanks for posting it and raising our collective curiosity!