73 UFO Sightings Reported In Virginia, DC During 2019 So Far

WASHINGTON, DC — UFOs and the notion that aliens from another galaxy could be sending emissaries to check things out on planet Earth have captivated Americans for decades; Virginians make dozens of reports annually of strange happenings in the sky. Navy pilots recently spoke of seeing mysterious objects — with no discernible engine or exhaust fumes — flying at hypersonic speeds, which brought the phenomenon back into the headlines.

So far, there have been 72 reports of unexplained things in the night sky over Virginia, plus one sighting in Washington, D.C., this year, according to the National UFO Reporting Center. The most recent report was made June 17 in Chesapeake by someone who "saw a good sized yellowish orb of light slowly moving across the sky at cloud level. I pulled off the road to observe. Initially, it was a solid orb of light." It then blinked on and off and disappeared completely.

President Donald Trump recently said he was briefed on UFOs. A group of Senate lawmakers received a classified briefing this week about such objects. And let’s not get started on that strange Facebook video that seems to show a creepy-looking alien doing some sort of jig down someone’s driveway.

Virginia Democratic U.S. Sen. Mark Warner wants answers on UFOs, whether it’s “weather balloons, little green men, or something else entirely,” Rachel Cohen, his spokeswoman, told CNN. And the Navy has drafted guidelines to allow pilots to report UFOs, and so that the military can track them, though the military branch prefers not to use the term “UFO.”

“So, we don’t actually use that term,” Joseph Gradisher, a spokesman for the deputy chief of naval operations for information warfare, told Patch last week. “We use ‘Unmanned Aerial System.’”

The term, shortened to UAS, refers to things like recreational flying drones people can buy at a store. For the “other” things, the Navy uses the term UAP, meaning “Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon.”

“We constitute anything unknown or unidentified in the airspace as an ‘Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon,’ no matter what it is,” he said.

In that spirit, Patch took a peek at the most recent UFO sightings in Virginia — or UAP, if you prefer — using a database compiled by the National UFO Reporting Center. Spoiler alert: So far, no little green men have been seen running around.

Here are some other recent UFO sightings logged in Virginia:

Bristow, June 4
Summary: "On June 4th, 2019, at 12:34, I recording myself playing golf. The next day when I was reviewing the video of myself playing golf I noticed what looks to be a small white dot shoot across the sky. There’s a strange sound in the video before I noticed the fast moving object in the sky. I tried to enlarge the object to see it but it looks as if it’s a fast moving small cloud."
Duration: 1.16 minutes

Arlington, Jan. 20
Summary: "The object was shaped like a doughnut with a large hole in the center, probably 3 feet wide in total, moving forward but flipping.The object was shaped like a doughnut with a large hole in the center, probably 3 feet wide in total. It moved in a forward motion but was flipping and twirling at the same time. It was flying low to the ground but above the rooftop and treetops as viewed from my window. I am a clear-headed well-educated individual, and this was viewed in daylight. My initial thought it that it was a type of drone."
Duration: 15 minutes

According to data compiled by the Center, there were nearly 500 sightings across the country in May and more than 300 in January, March and April.

The Navy seems convinced of the existence of UFOs, telling POLITICO in a statement there were reports of unauthorized and/or unidentified aircraft “entering various military-controlled ranges and designated air space in recent years.”

"For safety and security concerns, the Navy and the [U.S. Air Force] takes these reports very seriously and investigates each and every report,” the statement said.

And Ryan Graves, an F/A-18 Super Hornet pilot who reported his sightings to the Pentagon and Congress, told The New York Times last month he was one of multiple pilots who saw UFOs. The pilots began seeing the objects in 2014 and 2015 after receiving upgraded equipment.

Initially they believed they were getting bad readings. But the sightings kept happening, showing up at 30,000 feet, 20,000 feet and even at sea level. The objects could speed up, slow down and then reach hypersonic speeds.

“These things would be out there all day,” he said. “Keeping an aircraft in the air requires a significant amount of energy. With the speeds we observed, 12 hours in the air is 11 hours longer than we’d expect.”

Patch national staffer Dan Hampton contributed to this report.