Above: Original photo marked; please click for unmarked image
01-06-1987: Interesting UFO Captured Over Ilfracombe, Devon, UK
Witness statement:
12:00AM:
UFO hovering near cliff - seen by many - long time ago
"My then girl friend and I used to
visit the sea side town of Ilfracombe, in Devon UK a lot for our
holidays. The year I've put would be an estimate gauged by my age at
the time. Could easily be two years either way. We went to the see
front and there was a car park there near some cliffs. On this day, we
noticed some people all looking out of the cove and looked to see what
they were seeing. A hovering object was seen across the water.
It was one of those things where it didn't seem at all like it would be a UFO (at the time, they had a public disc shaped image and this was nothing like it). At first I thought it would be a hot air balloon. At the time, I had been forced to go plane spotting with my parents a few years in the past and they often had weird shapes in the 80s. The fact it hovered there backed this up. But there was no basket, just the shape.
I still can't describe what it looks like to me. I've seen many UFO programs on TV and not really seen one of these. If anything it looks like a flying dustbin?
So we're looking at this object and watching, still many people looking and pointing at it. The people seeing it and pointing (ie their gaze at it) must have been around 50.
I took one photo of it in a point and click crappy 80s camera, so the picture I have is awful, not zoomed or anything, but it does show the object and its shape and that it is hovering over the water near the cliff.
I think I looked to my girl friend and was saying something to her and then look again and it was not there. Again, kind of knocks out the hot air balloon thoughts.
Maximum enlargement of object (click)
As I was young, around 20, I think we just got on with our day and didn't think much more of it. Showed parents the picture when developed and got the usual reaction of it must have been something else.
Anyway, in recent times I started to try and scan in some older photos and found the picture and it brought back the memories and as I saw a program that had MUFON on it, I found your site and thought I'd mention it. I'd just really like some feedback and totally happy for someone to say what it really is. Or if anyone has seen such a thing themselves.
Map of location
This
was a basic crappy camera. I can't recall its make or name. Looked on
Ebay as I type and nearest thing is a Kodak 400 compact 110 film
camera. I have a load of negatives from that time, and I hope the
negative of this is there somewhere but they were tiny in those days
and I had a lot of them. Only worth checking further if this is
something.
I know
it would be easy to fake the image I have, but honestly, I could do it
better if I wanted to. I've attached pics including a screen grab of
the Google street view of the area today.
It's changed a bit now,
(had a holiday there a couple of years ago too) but you can kind of get a
bearing for where it would be and how weird it is to have anything out
there."
