23/05/2023 – Druids Heath, Birmingham – Dark Brown UFO Photograph

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Birmingham UFO Group Case Report

Author: Dave Hodrien

Release Year: 2024

Last Updated: 08/10/2026

In February 2024 I was contacted by Paul Humphries from Druids Heath, Birmingham to discuss our planned summer-time camping trip to Rendlesham Forest. During our conversation he also mentioned that he had had two UFO sightings over recent years. This report covers details of the second sighting, which he believes he may have captured on camera.

Sighting Details

At 8.55pm on 23^rd May 2023 Paul was in the living room of his house on Mannifold Road. It was a beautiful sunny evening, and due to the time of year there was still a lot of light in the sky.

He looked out of the front window and noticed some picturesque plane contrails to the West. He decided to take a photograph of them on his smartphone.

He then noticed something else in the sky off to his left. At an elevation of about 35 degrees he saw a dark coloured unusual-shaped object. It did not appear particularly large in size, perhaps 4 feet across. It seemed to be at an altitude of between 200-300 feet and over the houses towards the bottom end of the nearby estate, certainly within a mile of his location.

Photograph from Manningford Road in the direction the UFO was seen

The object had curved edges but it was hard to see its precise shape. It was moving slowly to the North on a straight path. As it moved it seemed to fade in and out of view. He did not think about attempting to photograph it, he was too busy watching. After about 10 seconds it faded out and vanished from sight. Paul was surprised at what he had just seen. He waited to see if it would re-appear but it did not.

The following month he was showing a friend the picture he had taken of the contrails. He then noticed a dark object towards the upper left of the image:

At first he thought it must be dirt on the photograph, but after zooming in believes that he had unwittingly managed to capture the object he saw.

Photograph Analysis

Below is the picture Paul took of the contrails, with the dark object ringed in red:

Here is a zoomed view of the object:

Here is a zoomed view of the object with edge find:

I have no reason to doubt the authenticity of the photograph, but in order to confirm this I decided to perform metadata analysis of the image. Metadata is a lot of hidden information which exists behind photographic images. When images are tampered with using image editing software, some of the metadata changes. Examination of the metadata can confirm whether or not any manipulation has taken place. Below is the extracted metadata with important values highlighted:

Camera Info, Creator Software, Make, Model and Software confirm that the photo was taken on a Samsung SM-G977B smartphone and has not been modified using image editing software. The TimeStamp, CreateDate and ModifyDate confirm that the photo was taken at 8:55pm on 23^rd May 2023. Although it is possible to modify metadata, most people do not even know metadata exists, let alone that it is possible to modify it.

The object captured looks nothing like a distant aircraft or helicopter, and Flight Radar 24 confirms that there were no tracked aircraft in the vicinity at the time:

At the distance it appeared to be at, if the object captured was a drone then I’d expect more obvious structure would be visible. The possibility of it being a novelty balloon partially sillouetted against the sky cannot be ruled out.

However there is another possibility that seems even more probable. Could the “object” actually be just a smudge of dirt on the glass which Paul did not notice at the time? In addition to the area of interest, there are other less pronounced dirt smudges elsewhere on the window, as indicated below:

I did ask Paul to send me a new photograph of the window but he is yet to do so. And it is of course possible that he has washed the window since the date of the incident so this will not necessarily disprove this theory.

Conclusion

The object which Paul reported seeing remains anomalous. Due to the fact there were no tracked aircraft in the area at the time, the apparent small size of the object, and the observed manouvers, I feel that it may potentially have been a drifting balloon just on the edge of visible range. This would have led to it seeming to fade in and out and finally vanishing entirely, just as was reported.

It is impossible to confirm whether or not the dark shape in the photograph is the object Paul saw with his naked eye or not. It is impossible to tell from the photograph exactly how far from the camera it is, and due to the presence of dirt smudges at other parts of the window there is certainly the possibility that the “object” is also dirt on the glass, and it was just the similar positioning which led Paul to believe it was the object he had seen.

At present this seems the most probable explanation for the photo, although it obviously doesn’t explain what Paul actually witnessed.

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