Nineteen UFO sightings were recorded in Nottinghamshire in the past three years – seven of them in both 2023 and 2022 and the other five in 2021. Eight of them were reported over Nottingham itself and varied in shape, size and lighting with one said to be «a large blob of light with a bright white centre».
The Nottinghamshire sightings are part of nearly 2,000 recorded UFOs spotted over the UK between 2020 and 2023. In its annual report, the research group UFO Identified documented 395 sightings in the UK in 2023 – a 20% drop from 497 sightings in 2022 and lower than in 2021 (413) and 2020 (484). This adds up to 1,789 sightings in four years.
These are the latest local sightings from 2023:
November 10, 12.30am, in Sherwood: Single blue light that then changed shape and colour to a purple and then to a green dome shape
September 26, 6.10am, in Ashfield: Three bright lights, stationary not moving and apart but near each other. Too low down in the sky to be stars or satellites
August 30, 3.28pm, in Newark: Two cigar-shaped objects flying past each other. They had no wings and were completely white
August 22, 10.35pm, in Nottingham: High altitude object looked like a rod, glowing white and moving slowly. Well over the length of a couple of hundred planes
August 19, 4.30pm, in Nottingham: Large blob of light with a bright white centre and an oval corona in blue surrounding it, object quickly disappeared
August 16, 5pm, in Nottingham: Metallic object twice the size of a plane flashing in the sky and spinning rapidly. Hovered in place for thirty minutes then vanished
July 29, 12.20am, in Worksop: Flying saucer illuminated by varying red glowing spheres. Body of the saucer was black and the lights were bright and pulsing
These are the local sightings from 2021 and 2022
April 22, 2021, 5am, in Nottingham: Bright white oval shaped light hovering 1000ft above the city
June 22, 2021, 2.30am, in Newthorpe: Yellow ball of light size of a football very near to the houses, changing directions
July 10, 2021, 7.05pm, in Hucknall: A number of small, triangular metal objects came into view, vanished into a cloud
July 17, 2021, 9.43pm, in Newark: Object approached the moon then moved away following a curved path and away
August 15, 2021, 10.30pm, in Nottingham: Strange shaped white object descended and then disappeared
January 9, 2022, 11.30am, in Nottingham: Circular illuminated white craft flying slowly from North to North East
January 13, 2022, 2.40pm, in Ashfield: White-silvery sphere high in the sky, moved approx 50 miles in a short time and now stationary
January 26, 2022, 6.15am, in Shirebrook: Low and quite large orange sphere with an aura or haze around it just hovering in the sky
February 16, 2022, no time given, in Strelley: Mysterious small red light hovering in the dark sky above Strelley, brighter when zoomed in
May 8, 2022, 9.42pm, in Mansfield: Cigar shape object with pulsating lights changing colours, moving and hovering in the sky
November 5, 2022, 9.32pm, in Nottingham: Round orange object moving at speed East to West then turns 45 deg without banking or slowing
November 9, 2022, 1.06pm, in Nottingham: Disc hovering for a few minutes before moving to other location, hovering in place and then gone.
Information was taken from social media, newspaper reports, and over 50 Freedom of Information requests, as well as from reports made directly to UFO spotter groups around the UK.
According to the report, people in the North West had the best chance of seeing a UFO last year, with 41 sightings across the region, followed by the South East (40) and then the South West (39).
That is broadly similar to the location of sightings in 2022 and 2021. Over the four years UFO Identified has documented the phenomenon, the highest number of sightings have been seen in the South East (233), followed by the North West (218) and then the South West (193). The lowest number of sightings have been reported in Northern Ireland (30), and the North East of England (63).
Sightings documented nationally last year include around 40 orbs seen moving in a “cross formation” over Greater Manchester, led by one very bright orb. Multiple orbs were also seen over Mildenhall in Suffolk, also led by one “abnormally bright” object. But these UFOs appeared to disrupt car radios and a dark and silent “squashed triangle” was seen gliding over Point Clear in Essex
The data shows that the best time to see a UFO last year was on a Monday evening between 9pm and 10pm. The most common sighting was a “star-like” UFO, followed by an orb – with several different witnesses reporting clusters of orbs in the skies across different locations.
Ash Ellis of UFO Identified said: “Overall, it’s disappointing to see such a big decrease in reports this year, especially after the bumper year of 2022. This time last year we were hoping that a reduction in the stigma surrounding the topic would lead to more reports being filed, but this clearly hasn’t been the case.
“Hopefully, as we and other groups around the country continue giving people space and a platform to talk about their experiences that will help more people come forward and be confident to stand up and tell their story.
“Despite the reduced number of reports, we continue to see the same trends across different datasets. Whether that’s the area in which sightings are being made, the time of day, the described shape of UFOs, and so on, these have all been consistent over the past four years.
«This, to me, tells us that there are areas which are more prone to seeing UFOs and we will be using this data to forecast areas of interest over the coming years.”
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