It was 60 years ago this month that a mysterious aircraft crash outside the small town of Roswell in New Mexico set conspiracy theorists' tongues wagging. It's fair to say that they haven't stopped since. In July 1947, materials were recovered from Roswell by the US military that, to this day, the US government insist were the remains of a top-secret research balloon. However, UFO enthusiasts are convinced that what was recovered was in fact an alien spacecraft, and that the government tried to cover up the incident. Roswell has since become synonymous with all things UFO-related, and is a cult tourist destination, with thousands fans descending upon the town this month for the anniversary celebrations. That Roswell might have anything at all in common with Bonnybridge, a small town in Scotland's central belt, seems unlikely. However, while the former is famous for its otherworldly visitors, Bonnybridge can boast of being the world's No1 hotspot for UFO sightings.

Part of the "Falkirk Triangle", whose other two points are formed by Stirling and Fife, Bonnybridge averages 300 sightings a year and more than one in three residents claims to have seen something unexpected in the night skies there. Local believer Craig Malcolm, 37, says he has seen around 180 UFOs over the past 15 years, and has 18 hours of video footage that he believes proves there is something going on in the skies above the Falkirk area. "I first saw a UFO in 1991, right above my house. It was a disc-shaped object hovering silently and it hung around for a good five minutes," he says. "Since then I've seen triangles, tubes, spheres, cigar-shaped objects, lights and colours. A couple of years ago I was in the car with my dad and we both saw a cigar-shaped object hovering nearby. Suddenly, two balls of light came from it and moved towards us. I just thought, 'I'm out of here!'"

View: Full Article | Source: The Scotsman