REDBRIDGE: Bizarre details of UFO sightings over Redbridge have been released in newly published Ministry of Defence files (From East London and West Essex Guardian Series)

REDBRIDGE: Bizarre details of UFO sightings over Redbridge have been released in newly published Ministry of Defence files

1:40pm Tuesday 18th August 2009 in

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ZIG-zagging lights, flashing sausage-shaped space craft and shiny tennis ball-sized flying objects were just some of the bizarre details of UFO sightings over Redbridge contained in secret Ministry of Defence files released this week.

More than 800 reports of extraterrestrial activity from across the UK between 1993 and 1996 were published by the National Archives on Monday - with four of these from people claiming to have seen mysterious objects in the skies above the borough.

During one sighting, in September 1995 a star-shaped craft was seen flying over Woodford Green for up to ten minutes, while in another incident in March 1993 a large flashing ‘sausage-shaped’ object - up to three times the size of a passenger aircraft - was spotted in the sky above Barkingside.

A smaller, tennis ball-sized craft was seen floating through the air in South Woodford in May 1994, while a large, round UFO was reported hovering above Ilford in March 1993.

The reports come as no surprise to Bradley Gross, who appeared in the Guardian last year after spotting a jelly fish-like object descending from the sky over Charlie Brown’s roundabout - from his home in Baddow Close, Woodford Green.

The father-of-one said: “It doesn’t surprise me at all that there have been lots of other sightings around here.

“I suppose it might be something to do with the fact that we are right next to Epping Forest and the River Roding which may help guide these craft.

“I can’t believe that some people still believe we’re the only life in the universe.”

These views were echoed by father-of-three Simon Brody, joint owner of Mr Simms Olde Sweet Shoppe in George Lane, South Woodford.

He said: “This shows that people really do see these things. We do not make them up.”