By Tim Binnall
In a worrisome incident that unfolded in the skies over England, a Boeing 737 nearly collided with an unidentified flying object that came within ten feet of the airliner. The troubling event occurred back in September and came to light this week by way of a report issued by the UK Airprox Board, which is a government organization that investigates aircraft near-miss cases. According to their filing, the strangeness began when the airliner was approaching Leeds Bradford Airport and "both pilots suddenly saw a bright light and an object which appeared to be moving toward the aircraft, almost head on, slightly up and to the left."
Chillingly, the report goes on to state that "the object appeared without warning and there was no time to act." As luck would have it, the airliner managed to avoid colliding with the UFO, which passed the craft by a mere 10 feet. The pilots promptly reported the incident and subsequently safely landed without any further weirdness. Upon their arrival, air traffic controllers informed them that a police helicopter had previously reported seeing lanterns in the area. However, intriguingly, "neither of the pilots believed what they saw was a lantern."
Although the board conceded that they could not make a determination as to what the object could have been, they did classify the case as an 'A-level' event, which is the highest risk assessment possible. They also mused that it was "a situation where providence had played a major part in the incident" and that a disastrous collision very well could have occurred had circumstances only been slightly different. While UFO enthusiasts may wonder if an alien craft could have been to blame for the near-miss, a more plausible explanation would seem to be that it was a drone encounter as the Airprox filing for that month features a whopping seven such instances of pilots reporting UAV sightings while flying.