A UFO expert has lifted the lid on some of his wildest encounters as we reveal the top five hotspots in the UK.
Nick Pope, who previously ran the British Government’s UFO Project, spoke about his experiences with extraterrestrial life in an exclusive chat with The Sun.
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For over two decades, Nick worked as a civilian employee at the MoD, with his most prominent role beginning in the early 1990s, where he ran the department’s UFO program.
Nick was at the helm of the project, an initiative that monitored and investigated reports of unidentified flying objects to assess their potential impact on national security and aviation safety.
Although the program was never formally named, it was often referred to as the “UFO desk” or “UFO program” by a number of media outlets.
When looking at the distribution of these sightings across the UK, Nick and his team discovered that the hotspots were not necessarily the rural or remote locations that many assumed.
Nick told The Sun: “It’s interesting because when we mapped out the UFO sightings, they didn’t necessarily occur in remote, rural areas.
“The hotspots were often London, Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool, and Glasgow – all the major cities and urban areas.
“The reason for this is simple – the more people there are in an area, the more likely someone is to spot something unusual in the sky.”
These cities, with their dense populations, provided more potential witnesses.
It meant that if something strange appeared in the sky, the chances of someone witnessing it were far higher.
Nick also notes that other areas, like Warminster have been known for their frequent UFO sightings.
“People used to go up Cradle Hill and Flea Hill in Warminster, and even some 1960s pop songs referenced the place,” he added.
Bonnybridge, in Scotland, saw a huge surge in UFO sightings in the 1990s, to the extent that local councillor Billy Buchanan lobbied the government for an inquiry.
“I ended up drafting the replies to Buchanan’s letters, which were sent to the Ministry of Defence,” Nick recalls.
“He wasn’t very happy with me because the government line was always to play down the significance of UFO sightings.”
Despite the official stance, Nick acknowledges that Bonnybridge was, indeed, a hotspot.
However, Nick also cautions against confirmation bias, adding: “When people go to these hotspots for sky watches, they may already be believers, which can affect how they perceive what they see.
“They may be more likely to misperceive something or to see what they expect to see.”
Another factor is the issue of light pollution in cities, which can obscure the view of the sky.
Despite this, urban areas remained UFO hotspots due to the sheer number of potential witnesses.
Even more intriguing, Nick pointed out, was the fact that UFO sightings seemed to cluster around military bases, particularly air force bases.
While some argue that these sightings are due to secret military aircraft or advanced aerospace technology, the fact remains that military bases are more heavily surveilled, and the likelihood of sightings there is higher.
From Rendlesham Forest to Cosford, Nick has worked on some of the most high-profile cases in UFO history, all while trying to navigate the Ministry’s official stance on the phenomenon.
And according to Nick, the number of UFO sightings reported in the UK was far higher than most people realise with reports representing only the tip of the iceberg.
“We’d get about 200 to 300 reports a year, and at its peak, that number went up to 700 or 800,” he recalls.
“But even that number is misleading because many sightings went unreported due to fear of ridicule or simply not knowing who to contact.”
In reality, Nick believes the actual number of UFO sightings in the UK each year could be in the tens of thousands.
The MoD had a national reporting system for UFO sightings, with people reaching out to local police stations, military bases, and airports.
However, sightings reported to the media or civilian UFO research groups were not always included in the official data.
What to do if you spot a UFO?
“If you see something, say something,” Nick advises anyone who observes a UFO.
He recommends capturing the best possible image or video, though with caution regarding the zoom feature on smartphones, which can distort images.
If the sighting occurs in the daytime, it’s vital to include some ground features in the shot.
He added: “If you’re just looking at something against the blank sky, you have no idea how far away it is, how high it is, or how big it is.
“But if you capture hills, trees, rooftops, something like that, we can triangulate. We can make those calculations.”
The Calvine Incident
Among the most compelling pieces of evidence Nick Pope encountered during his time at the MoD was the Calvine Incident.
Nick said: “I think, the best photographic evidence we had came from a case called the Calvine Incident in August of 1990.
“This was just before my posting on the UFO desk, so my predecessor would have handled the investigation, but I certainly got involved in it.”
The case involved two hikers in Scotland who captured six crystal-clear photographs of a large, diamond-shaped craft.
Nick, who inherited the investigation, recalls: “These photographs were examined by the UK’s top imagery analysts—Defence Intelligence Staff, Joint Air Reconnaissance Intelligence Centre.
“We concluded that this was the real deal. This wasn’t a hoax.”
The photos showed an object about 70 to 90 feet in diameter, with no visible means of propulsion, a detail that intrigued Nick and his colleagues.
The absence of conventional aerodynamic features, like wings or rotor blades, made the object even more mysterious.
The incident also featured a military jet circling the UFO, possibly trying to intercept it or gather data.
“This was a genuine mystery on our hands,” he adds, noting that the object in the photographs moved in ways that defied conventional aircraft design.
Nick also highlights the potential connection between the timing of the sighting and the geopolitical events unfolding in August 1990.
Reflecting on the mystery, he said: “The photographs were taken just two days after Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait, a moment that sparked preparations for military action.
“We wondered if this could have been a military prototype or reconnaissance aircraft.
“We asked both our own people and the Americans about this, but the Americans denied it.”
Despite the U.S. government’s denials, Nick and his team remained unconvinced. “Sometimes we thought, ‘This is not just next generation; this is something a generation ahead.’ And if that’s the case, where is it now?”
Nick asks. “Where is the Rendlesham UFO? Where is the Cosford UFO now? Ten years later, these should have been unveiled. We should be seeing them at the Farnborough Air Show, but we’re not.”
The question of whether UFO sightings could be attributed to advanced human technology is one that constantly resurfaced in Nick’s work.
“At any given time, there will be tech that’s 5, 10, even 15 years ahead of what the public knows,” Nick explains.
He points to historical examples, such as the U-2 spy plane and the SR-71 Blackbird, which were years ahead of their time when they were first introduced.
Cosford Mystery
A key event from Nick’s time at the MoD was the Cosford UFO sighting in March 1993.
He said: “It took place over a series of 6 hours or thereabouts on March 30, the and March 31, 1993. So that was right in the middle of my posting.
“So of course, I led the investigation into this and my case file, which is over a hundred pages of documents.”
Over many hours, several witnesses, including police officers and military personnel, saw a large, triangular-shaped craft in the sky.
One of the most detailed reports came from a meteorological officer at RAF Shawbury, who described the object as being the size of a craft somewhere between a C-130 Hercules and a Boeing 747.
It emitted a low-frequency hum, and a beam of light appeared to be scanning the ground below.
“We had dozens of witnesses to the Cosford sighting, including police and military personnel,” Nick says.
“Some people even described the object as being like ‘two Concorde aircraft glued together.’ The most intriguing part of the case was the beam of light that seemed to track back and forth, almost like it was searching for something.”
Nick’s investigation into the sighting led to some theories, including the possibility that the sighting could have been related to the re-entry of a Russian rocket. However, this theory didn’t fully explain all the reports, and Nick wasn’t convinced it was the definitive answer.
Ultimately, Nick and his team were left with more questions than answers, he said: “We couldn’t definitively explain what happened, but there were certain things that gave us pause for thought.
“The speeds and manoeuvres reported by the witnesses were orders of magnitude above anything that we had or anything that we knew our adversaries had.
“I thought, maybe, this really is the real deal. Maybe this is extraterrestrial.
“It wasn’t a firm intelligence assessment, but it was one of the theories we put forward.”
UK trailing in UFO ‘race’
When it comes to how the UK and the US are handling UFO research, Nick is critical of the UK’s lack of progress.
While the US government has made significant strides in acknowledging and investigating UFOs in recent years, the UK has been far slower to act – something Nick believes this is a dangerous oversight.
“In the 1960s, there was talk of a missile gap and a space race. Today, we have what I call a UFO gap,” he argues.
“The US is leading the way, and other countries are falling behind. Something is in our airspace, and we need to figure out what it is. If something can outpace your cutting-edge aerospace technology, it’s a threat, but it could also be an opportunity.”
Pope criticises the UK’s decision to axe its UFO programme in 2009. “I think that was a mistake,” he says.
“It leaves a gap that adversaries could exploit. We’ve seen this in recent incidents, like the Chinese spy balloon saga. If we’re not keeping an eye on UFO sightings, we could miss important intelligence.”
FAMOUS UFO INCIDENTS
The ‘Night of the UFOs’ is among many famous unexplained encounters with strange objects in the sky that have happened down the years.
Perhaps the most striking was a video known as the ‘Tic-Tac’ – which showed an unidentified object being pursued by fighter planes.
While flying off the coast of California 2004, two pilots from the USS Nimitz on a routine training mission spotted an object “shaped like a 40ft Tic Tac sweet”.
Then in 2005, a veteran pilot of an F/A – 18 fighter aircraft witnessed a raft of strange objects in the sky during a training exercise off the coast of Florida.
The two videos were sensationally released by the Pentagon in 2017.
Tragically the pursuit of UFOs has also claimed lives, notably that of US Air Force Captain Thomas Mantell.
He died after being sent to chase a mysterious object in his fighter aircraft in 1948.
Other encounters with the air force include a claim that UFOs disabled weapons at a nuclear base.
Captain Robert Salas said the bizarre incident unfolded in 1967 while he was the on-duty commander of a secret underground launch control facility at Montana’s Malmstrom Air Force Base.
US forces based in Britain also had an encounter with a strange glowing in the sky in Rendlesham Forest in Suffolk.
Two airmen, Staff Sgt Jim Penniston and Airman John Burroughs, claim they got so close to a triangular craft they actually touched it.
Earlier this year, US military documents were released showing how a warship was shadowed by two “ball of light” UFOs deepening the mystery around the case.
In contrast, the Pentagon has embraced UFO research through its All Domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), which investigates UFOs, particularly military sightings.
While the UK is peripherally involved through intelligence-sharing agreements like the Five Eyes Forum, Nick believes the UK needs to take a more proactive approach.
He claims it is time for the UK to reinstate its UFO desk and begin taking public reports again.
“Something is in our airspace. Whether it’s Russia, China, extraterrestrials, or something else, it’s making us look foolish,” Nick warns.
“We need a proper UFO research program in the UK. We have the resources — radar systems, satellites, and space tracking. What we need is the political will to use them.
“You’re not looking at huge new costs — it’s just a case of using what you have to investigate UFOs properly.”
Changing attitudes
Reflecting on his own journey, Nick admits that before he began working on the UFO desk, he hadn’t given much thought to UFOs at all.
He was sceptical, and certainly not someone who actively believed in extraterrestrial life.
But his time working in the government’s UFO desk opened his eyes to the possibility that there was something more to these sightings than misidentifications or hoaxes.
“I wasn’t a true believer,” he says, “but now I’m much more open-minded. I don’t rule anything out.”
He notes that there seems to be a consistent pattern that suggests a “core phenomenon” that might be underpinned by advanced intelligence and technology.
The potential knowledge that could be gained from a civilisation far more advanced than ours is something Nick considers too important to ignore.
For the ex-MoD man, even the possibility of such a discovery makes it worth investigating the phenomenon further.
“Sceptics have to be right every day, but believers only need to be right once,” he points out.
“If just one UFO sighting turns out to be genuine, the impact on humanity would be transformative. Whether it’s extraterrestrials, time travellers, or something else entirely, the implications would be profound.
“There’s no part of society that wouldn’t be deeply affected. If extraterrestrial life were confirmed, it would change everything—from politics and religion to science, technology, and philosophy.”
He continued: “People will look back on that day as the moment everything changed. Millions of years from now, they’ll say that’s the day it happened.”
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