THE most celebrated case of UFO Sightings remains the Roswell Incident, involving the alleged crashing to Earth of a spaceship.

Despite repeated attempts to close the book on the mystery, which originated in the New Mexico desert in 1947, it continues to fascinate. A former army major who was involved in the clean-up operation claimed debris found “looked like nothing on Earth”. Witnesses came forward, claiming to have seen strange bodies and alleging that they had been intimidated for years to force them to keep quiet.

Britain’s equivalent of Roswell is the Rendlesham Forest incident in 1980 when a UFO was reported to have crashed near an air base in Suffolk.

Servicemen initially thought they were dealing with an air crash but later reported seeing a series of strange lights moving around the forest. Radiation levels at the forest were later found to be higher than normal.

In 1979 a council worker claimed to have encountered aliens in a forest near Livingston, Scotland. Robert Taylor, a credible witness, described how he was surrounded by small spheres and attacked, though police could find no explanation.

In 1990 military personnel and police officers reported a UFO travelling at high speed with no engine noise over RAF Cosford in Shropshire. The MoD file on the incident runs to 105 pages but is unable to give an explanation.

Recent UFO sightings include a police helicopter being forced to bank sharply to avoid a “flying saucer-shaped” aircraft above St Athan, near Cardiff.