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This is Volume 2 of the Ministry of Defence report 'Unidentified Aerial Phenomena in the UK Air Defence Region', Defence Intelligence Staff Scientific and Technical Memorandum 55/2/00, dated February 2000 and received 7 December 2000. It gathers 25 working papers on natural and man-made phenomena, meant as a reference for analysing UAP reports. The papers cover ball lightning, radar detection, balloons, satellites, mirages, plasma and similar subjects. One paper compares magnetic field experiments on human volunteers with close encounter reports. It concludes that effects from such fields are 'uncannily similar' to what witnesses describe.
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# UNCLASSIFIED UK RESTRICTED - Exploded (after which they disappear either with a pop, a mild bang or a significant explosion) - Possibly imploded - Buzzed or 'fluttered' - Sparked (when colliding with foliage, objects) - Crackled. These sounds occur quite separately from thunder or precipitation - in fact there may be no storm present. Termination often occurs after a colour change (see para. 15 below). Sometimes a residue is left after an explosion (no further information). ## DURATION 13. The duration of ball lightening varies from a few seconds to several minutes. However, most seem to last for up to five seconds, with the longest on record as 15 minutes. ## RADIATION - HEAT AND LIGHT 14. Almost all ball lightning reports are visual in the first instance. After they have disappeared (either peacefully or explosively), the observers recall the added features of sound (paragraph 12, above) and any damage caused which is dealt with below at paras 20 to 22. 15. Light Attention is drawn to the phenomena visually, and although there are variations, most sightings fall into the categories of. - Blue or blue/green - Red (or pink/rose-pink) - Red changing to white - Violet changing to white - Yellow - Yellow changing to white - White to red (observation on one occasion for 65 seconds) colour change. Some structures seem to favour certain colours. The main attributes are: - Rod structures are often purple/violet Most sightings fall in the red or red/yellow category. They often disappear noisily after a - Solid types (see para. 9) often appear as green/violet - Rotating types can have a combination of colours - Burning types are mostly red or red/yellow in appearance - Colours described and classed as atmospheric luminescence - Hovering or horizontal motion types are often red or red/yellow - Predominantly red if 'floating' - Blue or blue/white occurs on only 5% of reports - Red or yellow types occur on 60% of reports, sometimes reported as being in a bluish envelope - Less than 1% change colour - Can emit sparks, fireworks-like - Can leave behind smoke-colour trial - Emit, on occasions, bright flashes - Reported blue or white hollow - Leave behind a mist (seen as direct light) or blue or white (in reflected light) in moist air - Smelly types leave behind a brown mist - Colours may be pulsating. 16. Heat Reports both of intense heat and of no apparent heat can be found. The attributes reported are: - Apparent colour on the surface and a hot core - "Ball fell into water tank and boiled the water" - Absence of heat, despite intense light - ~1% (of those closer than 15m) were reported to emit heat
Document, cited by the archive. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. The text was read from the page images by GLM-OCR; expect the odd misread word. 258 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.