back to article UFO fleet menaces east London

The Sun has mobilised a crack team of hacks and ufologists to probe a sensational sighting of a formation of extraterrestrial vehicles swooping over the mean streets of Bethnal Green: UFO fleet seen on Street View A close-up view of the Street View UFO fleet "Baffled" expert Nick Pope, who apparently "used to …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Hmm

    Interesting how all the people in the photograph appear to be looking at the flying formation. Anyone from the area care to shed some light on what it really is?

  2. Dominic Kua

    It's a flag.

    Or possibly a banner.

    Baffling indeed.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    Slow news day?

    It has to be bad when you get this excited over a flock of birds.

  4. Vulch

    Double rotor helicopters?

    Don't think the MoD could scrape together a formation of 9 Chinooks, but it could be a US Air Force formation. It looks like they're all flying at slightly different altitudes which would make sense for keeping the rotors apart.

  5. Mihai
    Thumb Down

    How 'bout a flag instead of an UFO ?

    The white color around the "UFO's" is different from the clouds and flag-shaped. They also appear pretty close to what can be a mast...

  6. John Routledge

    My guess

    Plastic bag? I can definitely see an outline of something around the "formation".

    Any idea whose logo it might be?

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Jobs Horns

    Chinook

    Looks like a flock of Chinooks

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Black Helicopters

    Men in Black have already corrected the information.

    I see no UFO's. You must have imagined it.

  9. Nick
    Alien

    It's the Red Arrows

    The Red Arrows fly in that formation.

    They don't appear in focus probably because streetview cameras won't be set up to capture things moving that fast, or up high. (It's a similar effect to when a person blinks when taking a slow exposure of their eye -a brown eye can look blue)

    All the people in the street are watching them, or taking photos (although the Alien death ray has disrupted the photographer's legs on the corner of the road)

    I for one welcome out formation flying overlords!

  10. Sarah Bee (Written by Reg staff)

    Re: My guess

    Sometimes there's just so much... beauty in the world. I feel like I can't take it.

  11. Simon
    Stop

    Plastic bag?

    Yeah, it looks to me like a plastic bag thats being blown about in the wind. Anyone else spotted the overflowing litter bin in the picture, possibly the Invasion Mothership the "UFOs" came from.

    Why is it people always jump to the usual sane conclusion, see something in the sky "Oh noes, it's an alien invasion fleet!".

    Or see a shape in something like a tree or a piece of toast and go "Ooh looky it's the Virgin Mary, we are saved! Let's worship it!"

    *Yawn*

  12. Andrew Wren
    Black Helicopters

    Looks like the RAF to me

    The Red Arrows aren't the only ones who fly formations. There were a number of fly-pasts of Buckingham Palace last summer (Queen's Birthday and RAF Anniversary as good examples) and each used formations of planes just like that.

    As further proof, trace a line from the Palace, up the Mall, and you'll find it goes very close to that spot. Chances are it's a formation of Tornados or Typhoons on the run-in.

  13. David

    Blur

    If you look at the lamppost, it appears blurred in an upwards direction, from almost the same height as the objects

  14. Tom Sparrow

    I thought a bag...

    But when you look on streetview itself, doesn't look so much like one.

    Whatever they are, there's a guy on the other side of the road taking a photo of them. Perhaps someone could ask him.

    http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=Wolverley+Street+london&sll=37.0625,-95.677068&sspn=38.554089,63.896484&ie=UTF8&t=h&layer=c&cbll=51.527148,-0.059647&panoid=i9VCs_VnVkv00M75nrPriQ&cbp=12,189.49573882942641,,1,9.841123703597443&ll=51.527022,-0.059631&spn=0.008557,0.017488&z=16&iwloc=addr

  15. Alexander

    duh

    cough cough. i wonder what fly's in formation and mirgates anually ...no could not be birds.

    I have taken indentical pictures with my digital slr of migrating geese or ducks ..looking at the close up geese is my guess.

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Something to do with the lamp column

    Looking at the larger image it appears there's a brighter edge around the objects. I would suggest it's something to do with the column, possibly even a streetlight of some description. I've seen at least one other UFO photo where the object is probably connected to a lamp, but looks like it's flying. What would be interesting is if anyone who knows the area looks to confirm or deny it!

  17. Adam Foxton
    Thumb Down

    It may LOOK like a plastic carrier bag

    with a logo printed on it.

    It's actually a plastic Death Squadron from Pluto coming in to attack us for demoting their planet to "dwarf planet".

    On a more serious note, there's definately an outline. It's a carrier bag.

  18. Martin Lyne

    Street view + paper = mass retardation it seems.

    See title

  19. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Up

    Diamond Nine

    Red Arrows - Diamond Nine

  20. Sean O'Dea

    stringing along

    They are converging from left to right in strings of 3 - pretty obvious they're strung on lines from the pole across to a single point on the building.

  21. Zoniad

    (untitled)

    Fortunately however the bloke in question was persistent with his love of the spycar so can be found in the next shot down the road still going for it....

    http://maps.google.co.uk/?ie=UTF8&layer=c&cbll=55.94563,-3.205434&panoid=YdLhR7qbnqbXHyf9pE4eSA&cbp=12,303.0169011228897,,1,5.984602917341978&ll=55.945721,-3.205476&spn=0,359.986761&t=h&z=17

  22. JayB
    Pirate

    I know what it is.....

    Ahh, our Sarah is an aesthete and lover of "American Beauty".... good movie if just a tad depressing at the end.....

    Anyway, I've no idea why everyone is so puzzled when it's clearly a squadron of flying pigs on a special mission to justify Wacky Jacqui's latest expense claims!!!!

    Pirates... 'cos in their heyday they weren't as crooked as a Politician in Nu Britain.

  23. Richard Thomas

    Poplar?

    Noticed this in the Street View address of my old flat in Bow as well. How old is their address database?!

  24. Anonymous Coward
    Black Helicopters

    Chinese Air Force

    It's just the local Chinese Air Force Squadron out on patrol as lead by Wing Commander Whu Fli

  25. Peter Simpson
    Black Helicopters

    CH-47 Chinook helicopters?

    Would be my guess. They'd make quite a racket and the objects do look a bot dog-bone in shape...

  26. Parax
    Black Helicopters

    People opposite can see it too!!

    Theres a whole crowd of up lookers... some with cameras..

    My vote is for a fly past from the RAF... if it were UFO's we'd havwe seen those pictures in the papers already.

    I seriously doubt that many people would look up for a carrier bag...

    as for the blurred lampost that is a result of merging the horizontal and vertical camera images there are multiple images stiched together not always sucessfully..

  27. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    @SlowNewsDay

    You's slow day more like! Exactly what type of birds do you reckon they are then!? LOL.... BIRDS?

  28. dan russell

    I for one...

    deplore the over use of cliche's. But flying in formation like that we better watch out as they are about to get a lot faster as they pass from left to right over our last three defensive shields.

  29. It'sa Mea... Mario
    Alien

    Some of you need glasses/your heads read..

    And in at least one case a new camera...

    There is no species of bird that is silver and amoust perfectly round no matter the distance or how crap the camera is.

    There is no outline around the nine objects that implies a flag or carrier bag just some variation in cloud colour on one side causing your minds to create one. As a flag it would be pretty crap as nobody recognises it.

    Formation planes/helicopters would have to be above the pictured cloud height to look that small.

    Only two reasonable explainations left:-

    1 Radio Controlled UFO formation Flying team

    2 Small fleet of real (yet tiny) UFOs.

  30. It'sa Mea... Mario

    It's not the Red Arrows..

    the giveaway clue..?

    They are not red!!!

  31. Parax
    Black Helicopters

    Proof! - a Flypast

    Found more conclusive evidence...

    Another craft in precession

    http://tinyurl.com/SVFlyPast1

    and possible the same 9 from another angle:

    http://tinyurl.com/SVFlyPast2

    Seems the street view vehicle drove this street 3 times these images are from a run that was kind of out of position....

  32. Yorkshirepudding
    Black Helicopters

    swamp gas

    move along folks move along

  33. Anonymous Coward
    Alien

    I for one.. bought the Tee shirt..

    http://shop.neatorama.com/product-info.php?welcome-overlord-tshirt-pid77.html

  34. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Actaully

    "It's actually a plastic Death Squadron from Pluto coming in to attack us for demoting their planet to "dwarf planet"."

    Pluto is not a planet, don't you watch QI!

  35. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    couldn't possibly be the red arrows

    nope they didn't fly past on 20/08/08. Nothing to see here.

    http://www.london2012.com/news/media-releases/2008-08/red-arrows-to-top-off-london-s-olympic-handover-celebrations.php

    The exhaustive checks of the MoD expert clearly didn't involve spending 10 seconds on google.

  36. Anonymous Coward
    Alien

    Mothership over Edinburgh

    Head to The Mound in Edinburgh and checkout the mothership lurking in the clouds. As you get closer to the end of the google cars route you see it head from east to west.

    http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=the+mound&sll=53.800651,-4.064941&sspn=15.03761,28.300781&ie=UTF8&ll=55.950161,-3.194962&spn=0,359.944725&z=14&layer=c&cbll=55.950097,-3.194794&panoid=BN7zKdGv4ebBup-dDeB-xw&cbp=12,276.91125009711254,,0,-20.0520875183989

  37. Lloyd
    Stop

    Hold on isn't his an episode of Dr Who?

    That's the Toclafane flying in formation over London, does this mean Gordon Brown's the Master? It would certainly explain why he's trying to destroy this country.

  38. Pete

    Stratford flying club on a sortie.

    Innit

  39. Anonymous Coward
    Alien

    zoomed in too much

    An artifact of the dithering? When I zoom out a bit the blobs look more like airplanes.

    But better than blurry airplanes I like the overstuffed trashcan spilling over onto the street.

    Google's not quite up to the task of blurring faces -- about a third of them are quite clear. Better send the police around to arrest them for something.

  40. Steve Roper
    Black Helicopters

    Image has been removed

    After following the El Reg link to the photo in question, it came up black. Dragging the "Street View man" icon a little brought back the view of Bethnal Green Rd from further down. But when I clicked the arrows to move back up the road, I found quite a gap: one shot from a position right next to the "Coral" sign on the brown brick building, and the adjacent one from the middle of the Wolverley St T-junction; the one posted in the article is clearly between these two positions, and it's been removed. The 'UFOs' don't appear in either of the existing two shots, either.

    Maybe the UFOs' pilots complained about a violation of their privacy to Google?

  41. Alexander
    Thumb Down

    good story for the Sun........

    oh my god , and you asked this lot questions about I.T .......

    It is birds

    @It'sa Mea... Mario

    round? both futherest away objects in the group of nine are V shaped ? and their are no round objects in that picture.

    OH MY GOD ALIENS ARE INVADING US WITH GOOSE SHAPED UFO's!!!!

    It is the shape that gives it away V edged , it most probably the moment at which the formation realigning after a turn.

    http://www.paulnoll.com/Oregon/Birds/migrate-wind.jpg

    if you look at some of the objects (birds) in the distance they have a similar shape to your round objects.

    story -10

  42. kliff

    aagh!

    It's a formation of eurofighters on their way to a flypast at buckingham palace for last year's trooping of the colour. This can all be found online - there were 9 of them, and if you trace their path over Fairlop towards the palace, you can see it goes right over Bethnal Green.

    The large delta-wing shape of the planes, plus the blurriness of the image makes it look a bit like orbs. But look again.

  43. It'sa Mea... Mario

    @Alexander

    Lol, there are a lot rounder than they are bird, plane or V shaped..

  44. Nick Davey
    Coat

    Clearly...

    They are Tie Fighters, I for one welcome our new dark lord of the sith overlord.......

  45. Danny

    Privacy concern

    Street View is rubbish. Everytime I look at a house where I know a pretty girl lives, either the curtains are closed or the angle is too great to see in. Google should do it all again this time using Millimetre Wave cameras that can see through the walls. At the very least have higher cameras on the car too so that I can see in the top floor windows.

  46. Damien Thorn

    hmmmz

    Well they are UFO's no more, now there just planes.

    The sun reporter is unavailable but thats not unusual, after lunch the class has milk and a little nap before there parents collect them, so when he wakes up we can tell him its just an aero plane.

    Case Closed.

  47. Adam Foxton
    Stop

    @Luke

    ... fine. "It's a Death Flotilla from the former-planet-then-pluton-now-Dwarf Planet Pluto for calling their non-planet a Dwarf Planet".

    Doesn't really roll off the tongue, does it?

    And I don't watch QI anymore owing to the unfortunate beer-spill related lack of a TV. But I watched the whole story of the IAU reclassifying Pluto as it unfolded.

  48. Steve

    Nice formation

    Just go north a block to the junction of Ellsworth and Clarkson streets and look north above the scaffolding http://bethnal.notlong.com/ You'll get a much better view of all 16 aircraft in formation...

  49. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Up

    Pa!

    Looks like a carrier bag to me!

  50. Anonymous Coward
    Alert

    @Steve - Nice Formation

    Time space continuim and all that must have been an earlier/ later part of the same flypast...

    Or a different Gcar.. (unlikely but not impossible) Nice spot!

    Goes well with Parax's spottings..

    http://tinyurl.com/SVFlyPast1

    http://tinyurl.com/SVFlyPast2

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