Police officers miles apart from each other reported seeing and videotaping “strange rotating red, blue, green and white flashing lights in the sky” at the same time the Royal Air Force detected an “unidentified blip” on their radar screens.

This 1996 incident is a part more than 6,000 pages of documents and sketches released by the British government documenting UFO reports between 1994 and 2000.

The documents were made public today and mark the fifth time that the Brits have released collections of UFO reports.  The ministry of Defence and the National Archives released the documents as part of a project meant to open the reports up to the world.

The latest release documents how reports of unidentified flying objects have evolved and changed shape over the past fifty years.  Newer reports describe UFOs as being black and triangular in shape, while reports that date back to the 40’s and 50’s describe saucer-like objects.

“Our only concern is to establish whether or not they pose a threat to the security of the United Kingdom,” stated a letter by the Ministry of Defence dated 1994.