article_snippet.sent: Many of the sightings can be put down to the development of drones and new aircraft technologies, but some enthusiasts believe it is because of rise in alien activity.
article_snippet.sent: Published in the QuantBait website, it begins in 1933 with the first UFO sightings being spotted over California and Nebraska in the US, the UK and France in Europe, and locations in Japan and Australia.
article_snippet.sent: In the US, sightings documented during the 1940s include the famous Battle of Los Angeles and Roswell UFO Incident.
article_snippet.sent: On February 25 1942, radar operators spotted a UFO within 120 miles (193km)  of Los Angeles that moved at incredible speed before vanishing.
article_snippet.sent: Explanations for UFO sightings are just as vague as for aliens themselves, and could be down to the development of drones and new aircraft technologies – or a genuine rise in alien activity.
article_snippet.sent: While this could indicate ore alien activity, the CIA recently claimed that half of UFO sightings in the US were linked to half of UFO sightings in the US testing U2 spy planes (pictured) at altitudes of 60,000 ft .
article_snippet.sent: And in 1947 the Roswell Incident occurred, which is still the source of speculation today.
article_snippet.sent: While it’s possible that there were more UFO visitations during the decade, officials at the time put it down to people being nervous about World War II, and seeing objects in the sky.
article_snippet.sent: Nigel Watson, author of the UFO Investigations Manual, told MailOnline:
article_snippet.sent: ‘Sightings of strange things in the sky have been reported for centuries, though it was only with them being labelled as flying saucers or UFOs that people began to realise that this is a worldwide phenomenon.
article_snippet.sent: ‘UFO sightings often come in sudden and short-lived periods, which ufologists call flaps or waves. '
article_snippet.sent: Here, Dr H Allen Hyneck, an astrophysicist at  Northwestern University says at a press conference in 1966, that a photo claiming to show a UFO is a time exposure of the crescent moon and the planet Venus .
article_snippet.sent: It is worth noting, however, that some famous sightings are missing, such as reports of flying saucers over Washington DC in 1952.
article_snippet.sent: Last year, the CIA took credit for half of the UFO reports in the 1950s and 1960s and as sci-fi films gained popularity such as Invaders from Mars, 2001:
article_snippet.sent: the CIA the CIA said that UFO sightings were directly correlated to UFO sightings testing U2 spy planes at altitudes of 60,000 ft (18,288 metres) - a feat of engineering that was not possible before.
article_snippet.sent: Reports suggest that the CIA the CIA soon realised that UFO sightings lined up with the place and time the U-2 planes were flying, but that the U-2 planes purposefully chose not to let people know that what the U-2 planes were seeing were not aliens to keep the tests firmly under wraps.
article_snippet.sent: However, this does not explain the 1966 Westall Encounter in Australia, when some 200 students and teachers in Melbourne claim to have seen a UFO land in a suburban field, before taking off again.
article_snippet.sent: In 2008, a guard at Yeni Kent Compound in Turkey claimed to have filmed UFOs and the footage is said by some to be among the most important UFO images.
article_snippet.sent: John Wickman, Chairman of the British UFO Association (Bufora) said: 'Technology is vastly progressing and a very large number of sightings no matter where a very large number of sightings are in the world can be attributed to modern military craft that have been misidentified.'
article_snippet.sent: Just because a UFO report is made does not mean that the object originates from anywhere other than the Earth,’ a police officer cautioned.
article_snippet.sent: With or without the internet, ufologists tend to think that only five to 10 per cent of sightings are of anything exotic and worthy of further investigation.
highlights_snippet.sent: It shows 76 years of UFO sightings all over the world, with more being spotted in recent years .
  
highlights_snippet.sent: Surge in US sightings in the 1950s and 1960s may be explained by the testing of the U2 spy plane, CIA said .
  