A mum from Northumberland thought that she was witnessing a UFO last night after spotting a bizarre light flashing around in the sky. The truth of the matter turned out to be pretty cool, even if it wasn't really aliens.
Jayne Dickinson saw that there was what appeared to be an alien spacecraft moving around in the skies last night, and it turns out that she was half right, at least.
It was a Nasa rocket, which is still exciting, albeit perhaps not quite as exciting as witnessing the moment of first contact with aliens.
The 47-year-old had gone up to Bamburgh Castle up on the North East coast of England in order to catch photos of the Northern Lights.
Instead of spotting Aurora Borealis, she saw the passing craft at around 10:30pm on Monday.
The postal worker from Morpeth said: "I'd gone in search of the Northern Lights but I couldn't see any.
"I was walking back to my car when I suddenly saw this incredibly bright shape soaring up in the sky.
"It was amazing and grabbed my camera and started taking pictures of it. I must admit I thought the aliens were landing.
"As soon as I got home I checked what it could have been and realised it was the NASA Landsat-9 satellite which had launched in California.
"It was a pretty great feeling to see it from the other side of the world."
The United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket had set off from Vandenberg Space Force Base at around 7:12pm (BST) that evening, and the 'unidentified' conical object that Jayne saw was pasts of the rocket re-entering the atmosphere of the earth.
Sightings were also reported in Leicester, Hull, Nottingham, and Swansea.
One such witness said: "It was a huge white triangle in the sky no noise at all, no planes showing up on the flight tracker, has to be something in orbit but was something I've never seen before, and to say how high it was the projected light must have been miles wide."
Another added: "It was a triangle of light moving across the sky, it was so unnatural."
The Swansea UFO Network tweeted about the sighting at around 10:30pm last night, but moved to quickly assure everyone that it wasn't spacemen, rather the US rocket delivering satellites into orbit.
They said: "Don't worry, it's the Atlas V rocket entering the atmosphere, to deliver 9 satellites to orbit!
"The rocket launched from California and was last seen heading north across the U.K."
So, if you spotted something in the skies last night and were planning to surrender, don't fret.
You can all come back out of the bunker now.
Featured Image Credit: Hull Live/WSTopics: Science, UFO, Interesting, US News, Nasa, Aliens, space
