By Tim Binnall
Authorities in Ireland are investigating an intriguing incident from this past Friday in which multiple pilots alerted air traffic controllers about a UFO flying near them. The strangeness reportedly occurred at around 7 AM, when a pilot flying for British Airways asked the nearby ATC operator if there were military exercises taking place in the area where the airliner was flying. After being told that there weren't, the pilot explained that a very bright light had just appeared alongside the aircraft before veering to the north and disappearing "at very high speed."
Remarkably, a second pilot then joins in on the conversation to say that he had also spotted some strange objects in the sky. He speculated that it was "a meteor or another object making some kind a reentry." He went on to say that "there appears to be multiple objects following the same sort of trajectory. Very bright from where we were." Although it's hard to discern from the audio, it seems that a third pilot then indicated that they had also seen the object, quipping "glad it wasn't just me." The second pilot then marvels, "no ... yeah, very interesting that one."
In response to the incident, the Irish Aviation Authority issued a statement saying that they had filed a report on the odd sighting and that it will be "investigated under the normal confidential occurrence investigation process." We may never know exactly what the pilots witnessed, though it would not be surprising if the case, which has begun to garner significant interest in the UK, ultimately ends with the 'UFO' being classified as a meteor, since that would be a pretty safe way to make the story disappear, regardless of whether or not that was the true nature of the oddity.
The case bears a striking resemblance to a similar incident which took place this past summer over Long Island and saw a pilot vividly report seeing an unidentified flying object that did not show up on the air traffic controller's radar. And that particular incident came on the heels of yet another UFO report from a pair of pilots flying over Arizona back in February. While all of these cases remain unsolved, one can't help but wonder why they keep cropping up every few months.