Interactive map reveals locations of UK's 900 UFO sightings in last two years - as ex-MoD alien hunter says ministers MUST take threat seriously

The former head of Britain's UFO investigation squad has accused the government and military top brass of not taking the 'threat' posed by unidentified flying objects seriously. 

Alien hunter Nick Pope, who ran the Ministry of Defence's UFO project in the 1990s before it was disbanded, said it was 'outrageous' ministers are not taking 'meaningful action' to probe unidentified anomalous phenomena (UAPs) - better known as UFOs.

The UFO expert also accused defence chiefs of 'falling back on a lazy, closed-minded "it can't be, so it isn't" mindset', meaning potential foreign threats to UK shores could be missed. 

He claimed the MoD's position of no longer investigating sightings made 'little sense' considering the stance taken by the US government, which has ramped up its investigations into the phenomena this year. 

His comments come as a map today revealed Britain's UFO hotspots, with almost 1,000 reported sightings recorded in the past two-and-a-half year. 

'If the US assessment is that UAP pose a threat to national security that requires a proper investigative response, it seems illogical for the MoD not to follow suit,' Mr Pope told MailOnline.

Have you filmed a UFO? Do you think you were abducted by aliens and want to tell your story? Email tom.cotterill@mailonline.co.uk 

'The Ministry of Defence needs to restart UAP investigations, a task force of some sort needs to be set up, and the defence committee needs to start holding the MoD to account on UAP, as the armed services committees are doing in the US Congress, in both the Senate and the House.'

The MoD closed its UFO desk in 2009 and nothing has ever replaced it, with a spokesman saying the Ministry of Defence has 'no opinion on the existence of extra-terrestrial life'.

Prior to this, it carried out what at the time was a highly-secretive and extensive UFO investigation of more than 10,000 possible sightings over several decades - many of which were by military personnel.

Known as the Project Condign report, it concluded that 80 per cent of the sightings were easily explained, 19 per cent were secret military craft and just one per cent were mysterious in origin.

'One thing that is clear, however, is that the UFO phenomenon, whatever it may be, does not recognise any international borders, therefore any such study surely must be international in scope rather than national,' said Philip Mantle, the former director of investigations at the British UFO Research Association. 

Data, compiled by experts at UFO Identified, showed that Liverpool, London and Glasgow are all hotbeds for sightings of potential extraterrestrials, with dozens of reported encounters recorded since 2021. 

Between January 2021 and May this year, the UFO spotter website documented a total of 957 sightings. That includes 410 in 2021, 494 in 2022, and 53 as of May 20 this year. 

Of all counties in the UK, more UFOs were spotted in skies of Greater Manchester than anywhere else, a total of 54 documented sightings. That was followed by Greater London (52), Cheshire (37), and West Sussex (34). 

Reported sightings included:

• A 'dark, large oblong shaped object' that was spotted from a plane flying above the city of Glasgow, Scotland, in February of last year
• And a 30ft to 40ft wide 'round saucer-like object with detailed outer rim' was observed 'hovering over a house' in Bedworth, Warwickshire in January.
• A 'long cigar-shaped craft with three or four roundish patterns on it' which was witnessed in Chester, Cheshire, for 20 minutes before it 'vanished like a light being switched off' in October last year. 

Ash Ellis, who runs UFO Identified, told MailOnline the reported sightings in Britain over the past couple of years could be the tip of the iceberg.

He added: ‘Sightings continue to be reported across the UK with close to 500 documented in our database annually. It’s estimated that only around 15 per cent of sightings are actually reported so the figure is 500 is more likely to be around 4,000 sightings a year in the UK, a huge amount that can't be ignored.'

As calls grow for Britain to relaunch its UFO probe, in the US, NASA last month released its highly-anticipated report into more than 800 potential alien sightings over a period of three decades.

The space agency's independent panel of experts stressed there was 'no reason to conclude' any were extraterrestrial in origin, but warned that mysterious flying objects were a 'self-evident' threat to American airspace. 

Mr Pope said if the US was worried about this then Britain, as an NATO ally, should be too.

He added: 'The UK can make a significant contribution to the wider search for the truth about UAP, by leveraging its world class intelligence community imagery analysis resources and capabilities... The bottom line is that we need action.' 

A spokesman for the Ministry of Defence told MailOnline: 'The MoD has no opinion on the existence of extra-terrestrial life and no longer investigates reports of sightings of Unidentified Aerial Phenomena or Unidentified Flying Objects. 

'This is because, in over 50 years no such reporting to the department indicated the existence of any military threat to the UK, and it was deemed more valuable to prioritise MoD staff resources towards other defence-related activities.' 

The news comes amid dramatic claims from a former intelligence officer who suggested that people have been murdered by the US government  as part of the conspiracy to keep UFOs a secret. 

David Grusch - a former high-ranking American intelligence official - is one of three military whistleblowers who testified under oath that they had firsthand encounters or knowledge about secret government programs involving technology that is 'non-human.'

He claimed the US has been in possession of UFOs since 'the 1930s' and has been secretly back-engineering them and carrying out a public disinformation campaign to prevent the details from leaking publicly.

At one point during the first-of-its-kind hearing in July, Representative Tim Burchett asked Grusch: 'Personally, have you heard anyone [has] been murdered?' Grusch said: 'I have to be careful answering that question. I directed people with that knowledge to the appropriate authorities.'

Grusch was sworn in along with Ryan Graves, an esteemed former pilot, and Navy veteran fighter pilot Commander David Fravor, who witnessed the 2004 'Tic Tac' UFO.

Opening the hearing, Rep Burchett promised their testimonies would be a landmark moment in uncovering 'the biggest cover-up in history.'

Grusch also claimed he had been told by multiple credible intelligence officials the US government had recovered non-human aircraft that had biological pilots inside them. 

The former US Intelligence agent also said he knows of 'multiple colleagues' who were physically injured by UFOs either after encountering them or working on them as part of these special access programs. 

While Grusch is still forbidden from disclosing certain information, per the terms of his Defense Office of Prepublication and Security Review agreement with the Pentagon, he did to clarify his statements in a later interview with the BBC in August.

'There's certain things that I have firsthand access to that I can't publicly discuss at this time,' Grusch told the BBC.

'However, myself and other colleagues interviewed 40 individuals, both current and former highly distinguished intelligence and military personnel that were specifically on these [UFO crash retrieval] programs.'

'And those that were willing I directed to the Intelligence Community Inspector General. So, the Inspector General was able to interview these people that do have direct firsthand information.'

Last month two supposed ‘alien’ mummies were presented in Mexico by Jaime Maussan, a controversial journalist who has previously made debunked claims of finding aliens and claims they are extraterrestrial.

The UFO investigator presented two allegedly 'non human' bodies to a congress full of astonished officials.

Mr Maussan, who has led investigations into alien phenomena for decades, stood with scientists to unveil the corpses in what he called a 'watershed' event.

The researchers made the extraordinary claim the corpses, presented in windowed boxes and supposedly recovered from Cusco in Peru, were not part of 'our terrestrial evolution', with 30 per cent of their genetic composition still 'unknown', according to Mexican media.

Carbon dating by the National Autonomous University of Mexico found the bodies, pictured with three-fingered hands, no teeth and stereoscopic vision, were more than 1,000 years old, Maussan claimed.

The bizarre presentation triggered a frenzy of excitement among conspiracy theorists online - but it has also drawn scepticism from the scientific community.

Speaking of the revelation, stargazing Professor Brian Cox said 'extraordinary' claims had been made, but without 'extraordinary evidence' to back it up. 

Have you filmed a UFO? Where you abducted by aliens or experienced an encounter with a UFO? Email tom.cotterill@mailonline.co.uk