Encounters
The famous cases, told straight: what the witnesses reported, when and where, which beings they described, and what investigators and sceptics have made of it since. Each case links to the species people saw.
- 1947Roswell
- 1952Flatwoods
- 1952Adamski
- 1955Kelly–Hopkinsville
- 1957Villas Boas
- 1957Levelland
- 1961Betty and Barney Hill
- 1964Socorro
- 1965Valensole
- 1965Kecksburg
- 1966Point Pleasant
- 1966Westall
- 1967Shag Harbour
- 1973Pascagoula
- 1975Travis Walton
- 1976Allagash
- 1976Tehran 1976
- 1978Zanfretta
- 1980Rendlesham Forest
- 1980Cash-Landrum
- 1985Strieber
- 1989Belgian wave
- 1994Ariel School
- 1996Varginha
- 1997Phoenix Lights
- 2004Nimitz Tic Tac
- 2023Grusch hearing
- 2023Nazca mummies
- 2023Las Vegas backyard
- 2024New Jersey drones
- 2024Miami mall
- 2024Jellyfish UAP
1947Roswell
Foster ranch, near Roswell, New Mexico, USA
A rancher found strange debris; the Army announced it had recovered a 'flying disc', then said it was a weather balloon. Decades later the story acquired crashed craft, bodies and a cover-up. The debris was a classified balloon project; the bodies came later.
Conventionally explainedGrey
1952Flatwoods
Flatwoods, Braxton County, West Virginia, USA
A group followed a bright object to a hilltop at night and fled from a ten-foot hooded figure with glowing eyes. A meteor, a barn owl and fear are the accepted explanation, and the town has made the monster its emblem.
Conventionally explainedFlatwoods Monster
1952Adamski
Near Desert Center, California, USA
The founding contactee encounter. Adamski walked alone into the desert and returned saying he had met a fair-haired man from Venus who warned of nuclear danger. His book sold widely, and the fair visitor became the Nordic.
DisputedVenusianNordic
1955Kelly–Hopkinsville
Kelly, near Hopkinsville, Kentucky, USA
Eleven people at a farmhouse said small silver creatures with huge ears and glowing eyes besieged them for hours, floating and shrugging off gunfire. Police found a terrified family and shot-out screens, and nothing else.
DisputedHopkinsville Goblin
1957Villas Boas
Near São Francisco de Sales, Minas Gerais, Brazil
A Brazilian farmer said he was taken from his tractor at night by small beings in helmets and, aboard their craft, had an encounter with a female humanoid. Reported four years before the Hill case, it is the earliest detailed abduction account.
UnresolvedGreyHybrid
1957Levelland
Levelland, Texas, USA
Over a few hours one November night, drivers around a small Texas town reported a glowing, egg-shaped object on or near the road that stalled their engines and dimmed their headlights, then let them restart when it left. Project Blue Book blamed ball lightning.
Disputed
1961Betty and Barney Hill
US Route 3, White Mountains, New Hampshire, USA
The first widely publicised alien abduction. A New Hampshire couple driving home at night saw a light that followed their car, lost two hours of time, and under hypnosis in 1964 described being taken aboard a craft and examined by small grey beings.
DisputedGrey
1964Socorro
Socorro, New Mexico, USA
A police officer chasing a speeding car saw a flame in the sky, drove toward it, and found an egg-shaped craft on legs with two small figures beside it. It rose with a roar and left burn marks and landing impressions that were photographed within hours.
Unresolved
1965Valensole
Valensole, Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, France
A lavender farmer in Provence said he found an egg-shaped craft in his field at dawn, with two small beings beside it who paralysed him with a device and then flew off. Traces in the field and the farmer's reputation made it France's best-known close encounter.
UnresolvedGrey
1965Kecksburg
Kecksburg, Pennsylvania, USA
A fireball seen across the north-eastern United States ended, some residents said, with an acorn-shaped object in the woods outside a Pennsylvania village and a military cordon that removed it by truck. The official account was a meteor and nothing found.
Disputed
1966Point Pleasant
Point Pleasant, West Virginia, USA
For thirteen months, residents reported a tall winged figure with glowing red eyes near an old munitions works. The sightings ended with the Silver Bridge collapse, and John Keel's book made the creature an omen.
Conventionally explainedMothmanoid
1966Westall
Westall, Clayton South, Melbourne, Australia
On a school morning in Melbourne, more than two hundred students and teachers watched a grey, saucer-shaped object descend behind trees near the school, rest for minutes, then rise and fly off, followed by light aircraft. The witnesses were told not to talk about it.
Unresolved
1967Shag Harbour
Shag Harbour, Nova Scotia, Canada
Residents of a Nova Scotia fishing village watched an object with flashing lights descend into the water and float, glowing, before it sank. Police, fishermen and Navy divers searched. Canada's official file lists it as an unidentified object, and it is Canada's best-known case.
Unresolved
1973Pascagoula
Pascagoula River, Mississippi, USA
Two shipyard workers fishing at night said three wrinkled, clawed beings floated them into an oval craft. A hidden police recording of the men, made when they believed they were alone, is the case's best-known evidence.
UnresolvedPascagoula Being
1975Travis Walton
Apache-Sitgreaves National Forest, near Snowflake, Arizona, USA
A logger vanished for five days after his crew watched him approach a glowing craft and fall under a beam of light. His return, his polygraph results and the crew's tests made the case a national controversy and, later, a film.
DisputedGreyNordic
1976Allagash
Eagle Lake, Allagash Wilderness Waterway, Maine, USA
Four art students on a canoe trip saw a bright object over the lake and lost time. Twelve years later, under hypnosis, they described being taken aboard and examined. One of the four later said the abduction part was invented.
Hoax claimedGrey
1976Tehran 1976
Tehran, Iran
Two Iranian Air Force F-4 Phantoms were sent to intercept a brilliant object over Tehran. Both reported instrument and communication failures as they closed on it, and one pilot said a smaller object was launched toward him. A US Defense Intelligence Agency report called the case outstanding.
Disputed
1978Zanfretta
Torriglia, near Genoa, Italy
An Italian night watchman said he was taken by ten-foot, green, scaled beings at a villa near Genoa; his colleagues found him in shock. Under hypnosis he described several abductions over the following years. It is Europe's best-known reptilian case.
UnresolvedReptilian
1980Rendlesham Forest
Rendlesham Forest, Suffolk, England
American airmen at a British base reported lights and a craft in the forest over three nights. A deputy base commander's memo and tape recording made it Britain's best-known case. No beings were seen; a lighthouse is the usual explanation.
Disputed
1980Cash-Landrum
Near Huffman, Texas, USA
Two women and a boy on a Texas back road said a diamond-shaped object spewing flame hovered over the road, surrounded by military helicopters. All three fell ill afterward with symptoms resembling radiation exposure. Their lawsuit against the US government failed.
Unresolved
1985Strieber
A cabin in upstate New York, USA
A horror novelist described being taken from his cabin by small beings and examined. His 1987 memoir Communion, with a Grey face on the cover, became a bestseller and put the image in every bookshop in the world.
UnresolvedGrey
1989Belgian wave
Eupen and the Belgian Ardennes, Belgium
Over five months, hundreds of Belgians, including police officers, reported large, silent, dark triangles with lights at the corners. The Belgian Air Force tracked radar targets and scrambled F-16s. The most famous photograph was later confessed as a hoax.
Disputed
1994Ariel School
Ruwa, near Harare, Zimbabwe
During a morning break, dozens of schoolchildren said a craft landed beyond the playground and small beings with large eyes approached them. Their drawings and interviews, recorded within days, make it the largest child-witness case on record.
UnresolvedGrey
1996Varginha
Varginha, Minas Gerais, Brazil
Three young women reported a crouched, red-eyed creature in a vacant lot; rumours of a crash and a military capture followed. The army says the women saw a disabled man. Brazil's most famous case remains open.
DisputedVarginha Creature
1997Phoenix Lights
Phoenix and the Sonoran Desert, Arizona, USA
On one evening in March 1997 thousands of people watched a V-shaped formation of lights cross Arizona, and later a row of lights hang over Phoenix. The second event was explained as military flares; the first is still argued over.
Disputed
2004Nimitz Tic Tac
Pacific Ocean off San Diego, California, USA
Navy pilots from the USS Nimitz carrier group were sent to check a radar contact and found a white, wingless object the shape of a Tic Tac moving over a disturbance in the sea. It responded to their approach and vanished. The infrared video and testimony became public in 2017 and reset the official debate.
Unresolved
2023Grusch hearing
US House of Representatives, Washington, D.C., USA
A former intelligence officer told Congress under oath that the United States held recovered 'non-human' craft and biological remains, based on what he said colleagues had told him. Two Navy pilots testified about their own sightings. The Pentagon said it had found no evidence for the crash-retrieval claim.
Disputed
2023Nazca mummies
Congress of Mexico, Mexico City; specimens from Nazca, Peru
Two small, three-fingered, elongated-skulled bodies in glass cases were shown to Mexico's congress as 'non-human' beings a thousand years old. Peruvian forensic scientists and the country's culture ministry concluded that the figures were assembled from human and animal bones, paper and glue.
Hoax claimed
2023Las Vegas backyard
North Las Vegas, Nevada, USA
Minutes after a green fireball crossed the sky over Nevada, a family called 911 to say two tall creatures 'not human' were in their backyard. A police body camera had recorded the fireball. Officers found nothing; the family's story became one of the most shared of the decade.
Disputed
2024New Jersey drones
Northern New Jersey and the north-eastern United States
For six weeks in late 2024, residents across New Jersey reported large drones with bright lights over homes, reservoirs and a military arsenal at night. Governors and members of Congress demanded answers. Federal agencies concluded the reports were mostly lawful drones, aircraft, and stars.
Conventionally explained
2024Miami mall
Bayside Marketplace, Miami, Florida, USA
A large police response to a brawl at a Miami shopping centre on New Year's Day was recast online as a cover-up of ten-foot 'shadow aliens' seen in the crowd. Police said it was a fight among teenagers; no creature was ever shown.
Conventionally explained
2024Jellyfish UAP
A US military base in Iraq
A thermal video from a US base in Iraq shows a dark, trailing shape that drifts over the base, hovers over a body of water for seventeen minutes, and rises away. Published in 2024, it was quickly explained by analysts as a cluster of balloons, though the military has not said so on the record.
Disputed