by UFO History Buff & Author, Charles Lear
Amidst the reports of drone incursions over military bases and northern New Jersey, there was a story that made the news involving video footage reportedly taken by a co-pilot of an unidentified object in the sky above Manchester Airport in England, along with still shots of what was said to be the same object, seen to be a blue sphere, hovering over the tarmac. As is typical of UFO coverage in the news these days, when it’s not about what government officials think about the phenomenon, the origin of the story was a post on social media with no real names provided for the poster or the source. All that was left for those with an interest in the case was to conduct some rather imaginative analysis of the footage and argue back and forth over the possible alien origin of the object.
The Daily Star picked up the story, and an article by Joe Faretra headlined “UFO allegedly shot at Manchester Airport causes theory frenzy on Reddit with alien fans” was posted on November 28, 2024. According to the article, footage of a sphere hovering over the runway at Manchester Airport was “allegedly” taken by a co-pilot in June of this year. Included is a picture of the blue sphere, video of an object in the sky clearly taken from the cockpit of a plane on the runway, and a still from the video. In the still of the blue sphere and the video footage, four planes are seen up ahead in what appears to be taxi formation prior to takeoff.
The footage is said to have been originally posted on X and shared by followers after the original account was deleted. According to the article, the poster created a Reddit account and answered some questions before deleting it. After some comments from the original poster and some Reddit users, there is this exchange:
Reddit user: The vid looks just like the other metal sphere ufo/uaps reparted [sic] wayy [sic] up in the sky but just in HD.
OP: It’s actually the same UAP. The pilot says when they got close it shot straight up. The orientation in the pic seems to be accurate.
Comments from X are included with speculation that the object is a balloon.
A follow-up article by Joe Faretra headlined “Manchester Airport orb ‘definitely’ UFO as expert says aliens are monitoring airbases” was posted on the Star website on November 28, 2024. The “expert” is Mark Christopher Lee, and there is a picture of him smiling and holding up a book he has for sale. He is quoted:
This blue orb sighting reminds me of UK researcher Timothy Good who wrote about the Australian government capturing an alien sphere in 1957 – it was made of an unknown substance and had no visible means of levitation.
It was captured at the Nuclear test facility in Woomera, Australia, and eventually was transported to Wright-Patterson Airforce Base in the United States.
Lee weighs in on drone incursions reported over military bases in the U.K. and discounts the idea that they were Russian drones because they were reported to have moved very slowly, and he asks “Have they flown all this way at such a slow speed?”
According to the article, with World tensions running high, Lee “believes the alien presence has ramped up it’s surveillance and is using AI drones to monitor the situation.”
Contradicting Lee is a “Manchester Airport spokesperson” (no name here, either) who is reported to have said that a weather or helium balloon is the most likely explanation and to have disputed the legitimacy of the photo of the blue sphere. He is quoted as saying “We have systems that pick up anything that could be a threat to aviation. Anything that gives off a signal we would know about.” He added that if anything like the object depicted was seen on the airfield, it would have caused a major disruption and that none had occurred.
The most obvious problem with this report (and most others that have social media as their origin) is that the source is unnamed, and with the original account deleted, commenting on it is especially difficult. However, the host of the Youtube site The Sneezing Monkey reports in his December 2, post that he was fortunate enough to see the original X post, and he provides screen shots of it and some of the original tweets.
One can see that the original poster went by the name CaptainBiggalow, and the post was titled “Manchester Airport UAP sighting from inside the cockpit” with #UAP, #uaphearing, #UFO, #disclosure, and #Orb after it. CB explained that the footage was shot within the last few months by a colleague who shared it with him via Airdrop. The Sneezing Monkey host says that some people had suggested it had been shot in June judging by the weather seen in the images.
The host gives his opinion that the video footage seems to be real but that there seems to be “something off” about the image of the blue sphere. He points out that the X account was only days old and seemed to have been created solely to post the images.
Then at 6:06, a screen shot of a tweet by CB replying to a question is shown:
The object descended vertically in 15kts of wind. Was the size of a small car. It hovered perfectly stationary a few feet off the ground. ATC sent out an Ops vehicle. As the vehicle approached the object it took off vertically.
The Sneezing Monkey host questions the fact that there’s no footage of this, and it seems to this writer that this would have caused a major disruption.
People with an interest in the case spent a good deal of time analyzing the photos (there were two, apparently) of the sphere and posted their results on sites such as Metabunk. There was a follow-up posting on The Sneezing Monkey on December 3, where some of the results were presented including Mick West’s assessment that the sphere was 18” in diameter, one person’s creative interpretive illustration of a craft with fins and a camera lens-like aperture, and a rolled-up Sonic the Hedgehog.