Birmingham UFO Group Case Report
Author: Dave Hodrien
Release Date: 16/08/2022
At 2pm on 9th August 2022 I was contacted by a man named Ash on Facebook Messenger. He reported that he had both spotted and filmed two UFOs two hours earlier from outside of his work place in Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent. This report covers the details of the incident and provides an analysis of the photograph and video recording.
Sighting Details
At mid-day on 9th August Ash was standing outside in the vicinity ofHobson Street, Burslem.
As it was a clear sunny day he looked up into the sky. He noticed two high altitude commercial jets heading in roughly the same direction to the South South East leaving contrails behind them. It was now that he noticed a smaller (possibly more distant) white cigar-shaped object following along behind the jets without any contrail visible. The sunlight was reflecting off its surface. No wings or tail could be made out.
He grabbed his mobile phone, zoomed in and attempted to record the jets and object on video, but could not stabilize the camera well enough with to get a clear shot.
The white cigar-shaped object appeared to be gaining on the jets. As it got close to them it seemed to increase in speed. It was now that Ash noticed a second black or dark-coloured object up and to the left in the sky, but still situated between the two jets. It also appeared to be travelling in the same direction at about the same speed.
Although the objects were both quite distant Ash decided to take a photograph of them. As soon as he had done so, the white object suddenly massively increased in speed. It shot between the two jets and vanished into the distance in less than a second! A moment later the black object then also suddenly moved, shooting off diagonally away and upward, again vanishing without trace. The two jets continued their course across the sky.
One of Ash’s work colleagues also happened to be out in the yard at the time. He went over and asked him whether he had seen it too, but he had not spotted them.
Sighting Analysis
The objects seen by Ash were clearly at quite high altitude, and so it is not possible to really confirm their size or shape. However the most important aspect of this sighting is the extreme flight manoeuvres they performed.
Below is a link to the video footage Ash took of the white object following the jets:
Although slightly wobbly in places, it is possible to see the white object between the two jets. It just looks like a thin white line. The darker object does not appear to be present at this time, meaning that it only appeared briefly. It is a shame that Ash did not keep the video running for longer and manage to film the extreme increase in acceleration of the object, as this is the most impressive aspect of the incident. He informed me that he stopped filming because he was finding it too hard to focus on the object.
Below is the photograph Ash took soon afterwards which shows both the objects:
Zoomed view of the white UFO:
Zoomed view of the dark UFO:
Ash confirmed that the dark UFO was seen by his own eyes for a number of seconds, so a passing bird/insect or drifting debris close to the camera lens can be ruled out
If there was just the video and photograph to go on I would have suggested that the white object was merely a third aeroplane at a higher altitude, one which did not happen to be leaving a contrail in its wake. At great distance and in sunlight it is sometimes not possible to see the wings or tail, making the aircraft appear like a white line, exactly as the video shows.
Flight Radar 24 confirmed that there were no other tracked aircraft in the vicinity at the time besides the two commercial jets:
Not all aircraft are tracked, but 360 Radar confirms that the area lies within controlled airspace, and does not fall within an airway for an airport, so the chances of it being an untracked aircraft are reduced:
Either way, the massive increase in acceleration observed by the witness puts the idea of the white UFO being an aircraft completely out of the question. Ash confirmed that he saw this acceleration with his own eyes, the object did not simply vanish without trace, it actually shot between the two commercial jets and away into the distance!
When I asked him about this manoeuvre he said “Literally as it got in line with the back end of the jets it just went in the blink of an eye and shot off. Whether it was the sun or some kind of build I'm not sure, but there was a flash like it had glinted the sun and then it just went. It was so fast it was like a stagger. Hard to explain. Only comparison i can make is like an F1 car taking it steady to within a second flooring it.”
The speed of this manoeuvre also means that the object cannot have been a blimp or balloon of any kind. A drone can make a sudden darting manoeuvre, but from the video this object was clearly at very high altitude, and at that height a drone would not have been visible at all. Obviously it cannot have been a daylight meteorite as this would have shot right across the sky at a constant speed.
Like the white object, it is impossible to accurately see the shape of the dark object due to the distance. The fast manoeuvre it performed rules out a drifting balloon, and its movements were too direct to be a bird. Although a drone cannot entirely be ruled out, the witness stated that it shot away extremely fast and vanished from sight due to the altitude. It is also interesting that it performed this manoeuvre immediately after the white object departed, possibly suggesting that the two were related in some way.
Conclusion
As with many UFO sightings the explanation for this incident remains elusive. How you view it will largely depend on whether you trust the testimony of the witness or not. It’s a shame that Ash did not manage to record the extreme manoeuvres of the objects, arguably the most interesting aspect of the incident.
The appearance of the white object does resemble a distant third aircraft at very high altitude, and an untracked aircraft in the vicinity cannot be ruled out. However the witness answered all of my questions without hesitation and I do not feel he was trying to embellish the sighting in any way. If you have any further information on what took place please get in touch.
Copyright Dave Hodrien 2022
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