No more UFOs for Britain: Ministry of Defense releases last of its alien-tracking files

July 30, 2016

By Talia Ralph

Britain's Ministry of Defense is saying goodbye to its UFO-hunting habit once and for all, releasing the last of its files after closing its alien-tracking office in November 2009.

At the time, the closing inspired a rush of reported sightings: 643, to be exact, triple the number reported in 2008.

The government shut down its UFO operations because they served "no defense purpose" and were taking staff away from "more valuable defense-related activities," according to 25 files from the National Archives cited by Sky News.

The previously confidential files were released on Friday, and the Telegraph has rounded up some of the highlights. They include:

– A caller to MoD UFO hotline reports that he has been “living with an alien” in Carlisle for some time
– A Cardiff man claimed a UFO abducted his dog, car and tent whilst he was camping with friends.
– A report of UFO sighting during the Second World War (1943 or 1944) – was lodged with the MoD in 2008. The member of the public – then aged 15 or 16 (he could not recall exactly) – reported seeing a “large saucer shaped object (with colored lights all round its side) spinning around and hovering above Barking Station before speedily floating and spinning away” towards Dagenham.

And then, of course, there's the adorable little girl from Cheshire, who wrote the RAF in January 2009 asking "if living things live outside our planet" because she and her father had "seen 2 little lights dancing around each other in the sky."

A defense officer replied that they were "totally open-minded about it, but we don’t know of any evidence to prove that life exists in outer space."