On this page you will find some of our very favorite UFO photos taken over the years. We have made an effort to distinguish those photos that are as close to undisputable evidence as possible from those that may have more rational explanations or potential hoaxes. We hope you'll enjoy it and that it provokes some serious thought about the UFO/USO phenomenon.

MT. WASHINGTON, NEW HAMPSHIRE

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

DATE: 1870

TAKEN BY: Unknown

BACKGROUND: Originally a "stereo" photograph;  purchased on eBay in 2002 by Samuel M. Sherman, president of Independent International Pictures;  an enhanced version of the photo appears to show "fins" and what looks strangely like a swastika on its side, yet no man-made flying machines had been invented at the time of this photo

COMMENT: The really interesting thing about this picture is what appears to be a reflection in the upper left-hand corner of the object. This would suggest a metallic quality to the "craft". I feel the "swastika" is a matrixing issue, but pretty strange nonetheless.

 

 

 

ST. PARIS, OHIO

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

DATE: May, 1932

SUBJECT IN PHOTO: Mr. George Sutton

BACKGROUND: Street lamps, power lines or telephone poles have been ruled out as none either existed or were present in the photo.

COMMENT: My only question is unless what we see is only a portion of a bigger photo, then the human subject appears to be off-center. Whether it was purposely done that way to show the object, a cropped picture or just an unsteady hand is speculative at best. Given the year (which is determined by the license plate) of the picture, it remains an interesting shot.

LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

DATE: February 25, 1942

TAKEN BY: Unknown

BACKGROUND: As air-raid sirens went off all over the city, residents of Culver City and Santa Monica were told by air wardens put out their lights and thousands watched as anti-aircraft guns fired 2,000 rounds of 12 lb. shells at an object that was first thought to be a Japanese aircraft;  floodlights illuminated the object as it was fired upon; the photo above is from the original LA Times negative of the event;  renowned photo analyst Dr. Bruce Maccabee has declared the picture valid

COMMENT: What we see here is taken from the negative of the original picture, which creates a more sharply defined image. Negatives will also help determine whether or not we are looking at a solid object. This incident took place at a time when paranoia of foreign attack was at its peak in the post-Pearl Harbor bombing. This is why civilians on (especially) the West Coast were trained to fire AA guns. Bottom line:

something solid was in the air that night and was not harmed in any way by the guns.

PHOENIX, ARIZONA

DATE: July 7, 1947

TAKEN BY: William Rhodes who took two photographs of an object circling his home

BACKGROUND: Experts say these photographs do not show imperfections either in the subject or the camera used;  allegedly, this object closely resembles that which crashed in Roswell, N.M. in the same year; object spiraled down from 5,000 to 2,000 feet and then rose at a 45 degree angle; speed was estimated to be 400-600 mph; the size of the object was estimated at 20-30 feet across; part of the famous UFO wave of 1947.

COMMENT: Interesting comments about the similarity to the Roswell craft. I had seen artists' rendering that alleged craft, but viewing this picture gives me a better understanding of at least the source.

CZAPLINEK, CZECHSLOVAKIA

DATE: 1947

TAKEN BY: Unknown

BACKGROUND: Photo taken by subject who was looking over a mountain; photo manipulation would be extremely difficult in 1947. 

COMMENT: Pictures taken many years ago in foreign countries are always fascinating, especially in Communist-controlled areas as flights of fancy and creativity were not a big part of the socialist doctrine. Assuming this was taken by a common person not connected with the military or science fields (where all of the more advanced methods of photo technology were directed), it would be hard to fake this.

MORRISTOWN, N.J.

DATE: July 10, 1947

TAKEN BY: John H. Janssen, editor of the Daily Record (an American aviation journal) who was flying his own plane from Morristown Airport in New Jersey.

BACKGROUND: Janssen saw six glowing objects with hazy rings around them flying above him in a formation; he grabbed his camera and shot four of the six objects he saw; two weeks later, he encountered a similar group of objects and reported his plane sputtered and stopped running, but did not plummet to the ground - instead it seemed to float suspended in mid-air.

COMMENT: One has to be dubious of the "tractor beam" story that Janssen tells later, but research shows this particular photo cannot be debunked by experts.

McMINNVILLE, OREGON

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

DATE: May 11, 1950

TAKEN BY: Paul A. Trent

BACKGROUND: Mrs. Trent was tending to her rabbits outside when she noticed the object approaching from the northeast; she called to her husband Paul who got his box camera and snapped off three shots of the object; it took several minutes to get all the shots because box cameras in the 50's had to be wound which took considerable time; for over 50 years, no expert in the field of film analysis has been able to explain the photos; the story and the pictures were featured in the June 26, 1950 issue of Life magazine.

COMMENT: Also one of the most controversial UFO photos ever taken. Bruce Maccabee came under great criticism by those in the skeptical world who were adamant this was too good to be true, especially Philip Klass, but evidence demonstrates that these simple farm people taking this picture knew nothing of UFOs at the time they witnessed this.

GREAT FALLS, MONTANA

DATE: August 15, 1950

TAKEN BY: Nicholas Mariana, GM of the Great Falls Selectrics baseball team. BACKGROUND:  This is actually a film capture from a 16mm movie shot by Mariana; the film at one time was listed as top secret; objects were about 50 feet across and 50 yards apart; Mariana took the film to the USAF, who declared the film "too dark (?) to distinguish any recognizable objects."; there is also evidence that the Air Force tampered with the film while it was in their possession, taking out some truly compelling footage early in the film.

COMMENT: Did a lot of reading up on this film footage and am convinced that the Air Force bumbled this in a big way. It becomes more apparent that 2-3 feet of film were cut out of the beginning of the original footage. More noteworthy is that between 1952 and 1976, even more frames were removed. This was concluded after an interview with Mr. Mariana and comparisons to what had been documented in the National Archives. This sighting was subsequently declared "unknown" in the Condon Report and by Col. Edward Ruppelt, director of Project Blue Book.

LUBBOCK, TEXAS

DATE: August 30, 1951

TAKEN BY: Carl Hart Jr., 18 years old

BACKGROUND: Three Texas Technological College professors, Dr. W. I. Robinson, Dr. A. G. Oberg, and W. L. Ducker were talking in Robinson's backyard at 9:10 PM, August 25. when they all saw a number of lights fly across the night sky;  Hart's photographs show 30 objects in a formation in the sky a few nights later; these objects were also witnessed by dozens others who were watching the skies nightly after the initial sighting took place;  one "official" explanation that these were plover birds was dismissed by game wardens who said plovers never flew in groups more than three   These sightings would become known simply as "The Lubbock Lights".

COMMENT: While the physics laboratory at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base declared the photo to be genuine, you 'gotta love the explanation by Col. Ruppelt who eventually rejected the plover explanation, but stated that the lights were actually an explainable natural phenomena. What he could not disclose was who had hit on that answer and what they actually were because the man who figured it out had requested complete anonymity and by telling us we would easily figure out who it was. What??

 

 

 

 

LAC CHAUVET, FRANCE

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

DATE: July 18, 1952

TAKEN BY: André Fregnale - engineer and photographer

BACKGROUND: Pictures taken by Fregnale while walking around Lake Chauvet; film was first analyzed by  Claude Poher, director of the GEPAN, and he deemed that the photograph was not a fraud but a genuine UFO;  in 1994 the photos were developed and analyzed by Pierre Guerin, a well respected astronomer and confirmed the UFO object as real. The photographs have been scrutinized by many experts and all have found them to be real shots of a real UFO.

 

SALEM, MA. COAST GUARD STATION

 

 

DATE: July 16, 1952

TAKEN BY: Coast Guard Officer Shell R. Alpert

BACKGROUND: Picture was taken at 9:35 a.m.; Alpert was in a lab when he saw the lights and called for Coastguardsman Thomas Flaherty who was in a sick bay close by to confirm what he was seeing; lights dimmed, then got brighter, so Alpert grabbed a camera and shot this photo.

COMMENT: First impressions dictate that you are looking at a reflection of interior lights off a window that Alpert shot this picture through, but it was determined that this photo was shot through a screen window, not glass. It would also stand to reason that a light reflection would be noticeable on a daily basis and would not be a surprise to anyone.

 

 

 

TRINIDADE ISLAND, BRAZIL

 

 

 

 

DATE: January 16, 1957

TAKEN BY: Almiro Barauna, free-lance photographer and specialist in submarine photography

BACKGROUND: Trinidade Island was a base for US and Brazilian warships during WWII; an oceanographic and meteorological station was planned and the Brazilian Navy was prepping the location by doing studies aboard the Almirante Saldanha; crew members spotted the object moving toward the island at about 12:15 p.m. and summoned Barauna to snap pictures; 50 witnesses observed the object as it flew past the island and off to sea; the photos were authenticated by the Brazilian Navy and released to the public by President Joscelino Kubitschek.

COMMENT: I was just a youngster interested in UFOs when I first saw this picture in a magazine. Considering the credibility and background of the witnesses and the failure by photographic experts to ever explain away the picture as a hoax or something else, this is arguably to this day the best photographic evidence of an extraterrestrial visitation.

 

 

LAKE ISABELLA, CALIFORNIA

 

credit: Robert Stanley @ Unicus

DATE: 1957

TAKEN BY: B.C. (subject's full name unknown)

BACKGROUND: Deemed authentic by Kodak labs; photograph was taken by photographer and his fiancee who were riding their Harley through the southern Sierra Nevada's, in an area in what is now Lake Isabella, California;  while taking random pictures, this showed up on one of the prints; the object was not visible to them when the photo was taken.

COMMENT: This sparked an interesting discussion of the theory of objects, while being hidden to the naked eye, showing up in photographs. This suggested these craft were traveling through dimensions and portals and appearing and disappearing at will.

 

 

EDWARDS AFB

 

 

 

 

DATE: September, 1957

TAKEN BY: USAF test pilot (name unknown)

BACKGROUND: The UFO is following a B-57 twin jet; it was not discovered until the photograph was developed;  An excellent photo for that time period.

COMMENT: A very intriguing photo. Seems almost too good to be true, but given the metallic composition of the object and the fact it was submitted by the military gives it more credibility than most. If this is real, it must have caused quite a stir in military circles.

 

DATE: May 24, 1964

TAKEN BY: Jim Templeton, former fireman from Carlisle

BACKGROUND: Here's a bizarre photo that we'll call UFO-related. Templeton took his young daughter out to the marshes overlooking the Solway Firth to take some photographs; upon processing a few days later, an employee of the drug store mentioned it was a shame that someone walked by and spoiled the shot;  Templeton said there was nobody else there except his wife and daughter; the case was brought to the Kodak company who, unable to solve the mystery, offered free film for life to anyone who could explain the photograph - to date, no one has. Templeton eventually was visited by two men (MIBs?) who suggested he tell everyone that someone had walked by - he refused.

COMMENT: A very famous photo that made the rounds for years and is still a big question mark to this day. The first impression is that these folks have to be making this up, but as double-exposures and photographic overlays have definitely been ruled out, one only has their word to base an opinion on. For what it's worth, figures similar to this were reported being captured on film at the Woomera Testing Range in Australia during a "Blue Streak" missile test. Those missiles were manufactured in Spadeadam, UK, just a few miles from Solway Firth.

 

 

 

 

HILLSDALE, MICHIGAN AND THE SWAMP GAS CASE

 

 

DATE(S): March 20, 1966 (L); March 21, 1966 (R)

TAKEN BY: Unknown

BACKGROUND: Over a 6-7 day period in March of 1966, Michigan residents from Washtenaw to Hillsdale witnessed a huge UFO flap. Washtenaw County residents Frank Mannor and his son reported to the Sheriff's Department that they had seen a flying saucer land in a nearby swamp. Following the object into the bog, they saw the brightly lit object raise up and move directly over their heads. Soon it disappeared into the night sky. Shortly thereafter, Patrolman Robert Hunawill of the Dexter Village Police saw the same object, or another just like it, hover over his patrol car. Soon it was joined by three other UFOs. There were several photographs taken of the object before the sightings ended; one a classic photo of the UFO sitting on the road. (See photo on left).

There were numerous sightings during the Michigan wave of 1966. The case itself is very memorable for another important event that occurred. Project Blue Book sent Dr. J. Allen Hynek to investigate the sighting reports. At first, Hynek agreed that there was something going on in the Michigan skies. But after consulting with the Blue Book headquarters, he changed his mind, and said that the sightings were nothing more than "swamp gas."

The case that prompted his conversion occurred in Hillsdale County, Michigan, on March 21, 1966, and involves the photo shown here. At about 10:30 pm a resident of the women's dormitory at Hillsdale College reported a strange object in the sky. County Civil Defense director William E. Van Horn responded and confirmed that a bright glowing object was indeed bouncing across a nearby hollow and then became airborne. Hynek, who died in 1986, dismissed the Hillsdale sighting as "swamp gas." Within two weeks, however, he changed not only his opinion about the sighting, but also sides in the UFO debate. (ufologie.net)
 

 

 

 

ROARING RIVER, MISSOURI

 

 

DATE: November 22, 1966

TAKEN BY: Unknown hunter

BACKGROUND: Two hunters on a camping/deer hunting trip were startled to see smoke coming from where they had set up their tents;  when they bolted back to their campsite, they saw their tent and its contents had been burned (L) and the tops of trees broken and badly singed (C); one of them then snapped a picture of an object they saw rising out of a nearby valley and came to within 300 feet of them (R).

 

CALGARY, ALBERTA

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

DATE: July 3, 1967

TAKEN BY: Warren Smith

BACKGROUND:  Dr. J. Allen Hynek stated: "best daylight disc photograph I have personally investigated.";  Smith and two of his friends were returning from a weekend prospecting trip when they spotted the object; Smith grabbed the camera, and took two photos of the object;  it was also stated by the witnesses that the UFO dropped some type of liquid material; the object was about 40-50 feet in diameter.

 

 

 

PIGEON LAKE, ALBERTA 

 

 

DATE: July 3, 1967

TAKEN BY: Douglas Dennis

BACKGROUND: Mr. Dennis, fishing at Pigeon Lake, near Buckhorn, Alberta, was amazed by the appearance of a soft, orange colored ball of light in the sky above him. It descended quite low, and Mr. Dennis took his camera and snapped a color picture of the brightly luminous mass hovering in the air. This remarkable night photograph clearly shows a round luminous object directly overhead. Others present observed the object and
Mr. Dennis photographing it.  Coincidentally taken the same night in the same province as the photo above it in Calgary. (ufologie.net)
 

 

CLUJ, ROMANIA 

 

 

 

DATE: August 18, 1968

TAKEN BY: Emil Barnea

BACKGROUND: Emil Barnea and his girlfriend Miss Matea walked in the forest with a couple of friends. His friend shouted that she sees "something," and when he joined her he also saw a large round object, of metallic appearance and shining in the sun in the sky above the top of the trees. Amazed, Barnea remembered all the same that he had his camera and while the UFO advanced slowly changing direction and increasing its luminosity, then suddenly accelerating until it disappeared at the horizon. He had time to shoot four photographs.

The negative were examined to see whether they were tampered with by a photographer reporter of Cluj, and then by a specialist in photography of the Ager Press agency in Bucharest. Both concluded that there were no trace of any trickery. The film was again examined by a commercial photo laboratory which also considered it perfectly normal, without traces of falsification. Neither Barnea nor his friend Miss Mattea knew much about flying saucers and UFOs, this was only normal since in Romania in 1968, books about UFOs weren't sold. (ufologie.net)

 

STYRIA, AUSTRIA

 

DATE: May 23, 1971

TAKEN BY: Rudi Nagora, German musician

BACKGROUND: Nagora and his wife were vacationing in Styria and after parking their car for a look around he heard a "whizzing" sound from above him. Looking up, he saw a shiny, disc which was silhouetted against the clouds. After running to tell his wife, he grabbed his camera and took 12 photographs of the object. His photos have been declared legitimate by a host of experts, and they have never been debunked.

 

FLORADAD, URUGUAY

 

DATE: July 11, 1971

TAKEN BY: Hector Delgado

BACKGROUND: Delgado, a horticulturist, was working in his greenhouse at the rear of his home in Florida, Uruguay. Suddenly, he heard a high pitched humming sound, that increased and decreased in volume and tone over a period of time. He laid down the tools he was using and went to the doorway to look out. He saw, some 200m from his position and no more than 50m above the ground, a silver disc-shaped object moving smoothly, suspended in the air. After a few moments of indecision, Rufino ran to the house to get his camera and raced back, fearing the strange object might leave. "When I took the first photograph the UFO was still moving very slowly toward the south, but I had barely snapped it when the object drastically altered its velocity and trajectory and commenced some climbing maneuvers as it increased its elevation above the ground," declared the witness. (ufologie)

 

LAGO DE COTE, COSTA RICA

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

DATE: September 4, 1971

TAKEN BY: Costa Rican government

BACKGROUND: The photo above (cropped and enlarged) was taken by a Costa Rican government mapping plane during an aerial mapping mission. This UFO photograph is unique for several reasons. 1) The photograph was taken by a high-quality, professional camera. 2) The unidentified object is plainly visible against the uniformly dark background of the lake and appears in sharp focus. 3) The camera was aimed downward and the plane was flying at a known, fixed altitude (10,000 feet), which makes it easy to calculate a maximum size for the object (683 feet).
The plane carried a crew of four; a specialist in aerial photography, a geographer, a topographer, and the pilot. No member of the crew stated that they saw anything unusual during the routine flight. (ufoevidence.com)
 

 

LOUISVILLE, KENTUCKY

 

DATE: October 3, 1973

TAKEN BY: Unknown

BACKGROUND: "It was about 2:00 pm I'd guess. I didn't hear anything. I had just seen two chipmunks scampering around the base of a Sycamore tree. Then I looked up and, by God, there it was...this round flying saucer. That's all I know to call it," reported an electronics technician from Louisville. The man took six pictures in all, two of which were blurred because of the object's rapid departure. The pictures and negatives were examined by the COURIER-JOURNAL photo staff, and if the photos were faked, they were fakes of the highest quality. There were no other sightings in this area at this time. (ufoevidence)

 

 

ONTARIO, CANADA 

 

 

DATE: 1973

TAKEN BY: Unknown

BACKGROUND: The witness took a series of photographs of the object. The circular object is clearly seen moving about a clump of trees. The photos have been deemed authentic by various photographic experts. A good, clear image for the time period. (ufocasefiles)

 

 

CANARY ISLANDS, SPAIN  

 

 

DATE: June 22, 1976

TAKEN BY: Unknown tourist

BACKGROUND: A large unidentified luminous phenomenon was observed throughout the Spanish Canary Islands. Newspaper headlines proclaimed the following day that "thousands of people" had seen a "spectacular  luminous phenomena" which "lasted twenty minutes and was observed from Tenerife, La Palma and La Gomera." The most sensational aspect was the experience of a medical doctor and his taxi driver, who reported a transparent sphere with two tall entities inside. The Spanish Air Force assigned an investigative adjutant to review the case:

"Then, numerous witnesses belonging to different positions and cultural strata, saw it with similar characteristics in the Grand Canary island. Therefore, the fact that a very strange and peculiar aerial phenomenon occurred on the night of 22 June is a true and proven fact, as incredible as its behavior and conditions may seem."

"If we study as a whole the three reports issued up to the present (1/75, 1/76, and 2/76), we should have to think seriously of the necessity of considering the possibility of accepting the hypothesis that a craft of unknown origin, propelled by an equally unknown energy, is moving freely over the skies in the Canaries."

 

SOUTH HERWANG, INDONESIA

 

 

DATE: November 11, 1976

TAKEN BY: Tony Hartono

BACKGROUND: At 2:00pm in November of 1976, Mr. Tony Hartono, an engineer, had taken photographs of the off- shore oil rig his company ARCO Indonesia was building in order to illustrate his progress report. He had one left and was standing on a platform facing the sea, wondering what else he could shoot to finish the film roll. Suddenly his attention was attracted to a little dark speck in the sky which was growing larger as it approached. It became a yellowish color as it continued its approach and came quite near the launch he was in. He used his last shot to capture this object on film. (ufoevidence)

 

 

 

 

COLFAX, WISCONSIN

DATE: April 19, 1978

TAKEN BY: Officer Mark Coltrane

BACKGROUND: Officer Coltrane was on patrol in the vicinity of Colfax, a small town with a thousands of inhabitants in Wisconsin, USA. At midday, he decided to stop the car to eat something, in a small isolated area. He noted that his radio was emitting crackles. He then noticed a metallic looking disc raising towards the the sky at a short distance from the parking space. While the object seemed to move towards him, Coltrane picked up his Polaroid camera, came out of the car and snapped some photographs. The object was so close in one of the images that it is possible to notice some details of its lower surface. In [the second] photograph the object is starting to move away. The total observation lasted a few minutes, the object being being lost from his sight when it accelerated and fled in the distance. Coltrane, shocked by the sighting, remained in amazement for two hours without saying anything, by fear of being ridiculed when he would have to submit his report to his chiefs.
 

 

MOTONAU, NEW ZEALAND

 

DATE: October 27, 1979

TAKEN BY: Unknown

BACKGROUND: Two former Air Force photographic analysts called this picture, "inscrutable." In other words, a mystery. This one photo is from a series of photos, none of the others had an unknown in it. The object was not seen nor heard at the time.

 

 

AJUSCO PARK, MEXICO

 

DATE: January 1981

TAKEN BY: Carlos Diaz

BACKGROUND: Mexican photographer Carlos Diaz pulled into a deserted car park at Ajusco Park near Mexico City. He was on an assignment for a magazine, and had arranged to meet a journalist who was yet to arrive. Diaz sat in his car, preparing his camera for the job ahead. Impatiently, Diaz began to look at his watch. Suddenly, his attention was caught by a strange yellow glow coming from the valley below him. At first he thought it was a forest fire, but, an instant later, the source of light revealed itself to be a large, orange, oval-shaped UFO, slowly hovering about 30 meters from his car. This was to be the beginning of one of the most compelling continuous contact cases in UFO history as Diaz reports he is contacted by the same beings to this day and has delivered a strong environmental message from these beings. Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, John Mack. Mack has a long history of dealing with abductees and contactees and believes that the Diaz case is among the most convincing he has come across.

Interestingly, the photographs were also analyzed by Dr Robert Nathan at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California. Nathan, a notorious UFO skeptic, stated that he could find no evidence of a fake. Certainly, for many who have examined the three images, the first shot is the most impressive. In it, the orange glowing craft can be seen through the windshield of the car, and light from the object is reflected both off the car's bonnet and off the metal guard rail by the side of the road. These, in particular, are details that experts claim are extremely difficult to fake.

 

 

VANCOUVER, CANADA

 

 

 

DATE: October 8, 1981

TAKEN BY: Hannah McRoberts

BACKGROUND: At about 11:00 A.M., McRoberts is with her husband and their daughter on a service area close to Kelsey Bay, on the East coast of the Vancouver Island. During their pause they notice a cloud which passes on the top of a mountainous peak and makes the impression of an erupting volcano spitting a huge vapor blast. They find the scene rather amusing and worth a picture. Several days afterwards, when the photographs are developed, they notice on one of the photograph that there is a disc-type object in the sky. They are surprised, as they do not remember noticing anything in the sky at the time when they shot the photograph. They contact David Dodge, director of the of Vancouver planetarium. He examines the picture and remains disturbed by this singular photograph. He contacts ufologist, David Powell, who analyzes the pictures and cannot find any evidence of tampering. Richard F. Haines, a retired NASA scientist who became a famous ufologist, becomes interested in the Vancouver case. He carries out a thorough analysis of the negative and cannot discover any tampering either. His analysis is inserted in the scientific report of the Sturrock Panel.