Pentagon officials baffled as 8,000 mysterious orbs are spotted hovering above US military bases.
The search for extraterrestrial life has undoubtedly become one of humanity's most crazed obsessions. Most unexplained events eventually reach rational explanations, but every so often, something happens that leaves even experts wondering if we might be witnessing genuine contact from beyond our world.
Pentagon officials are now scrambling to identify an invasion of UFOs after small metallic orbs were spotted around over the US for years.
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A new analysis from Enigma, a platform for people to report UFO sightings, has compiled data showing more than 8,000 mysterious object sightings between December 2022 and June 2025.
Out of these, 422 specifically describe metallic orbs floating around military bases.
The patterns are eerily consistent too, with most sightings occurring between 1 am and 4 am, and the hotspots being around military facilities in New York, California and Arizona.
Many eyewitnesses, including civilians, pilots, and military personnel, have described seeing silent metallic spheres hovering before zooming off, leaving no trace of their departure.
Enigma's website noted: "Orbs and spheres continue to be one of our most commonly reported UAP [Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena] shapes."
Numerous cases have recorded people' personal accounts of the spherical sightings.
After spotting the orbs over Brooklyn's Fort Hamilton in June 2024, one witness recalled: "I was walking into work when I looked up and saw two metallic liquid-like objects hovering for about two minutes."
Another observer wrote: "I saw this kind of silver thing in the sky but it was way too high to be a plane and it kept on going higher and higher and higher until it actually kind of just vanished."
The Pentagon's All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) has the job of investigating these UFO claims, they've managed to dismiss many sightings as birds, regular aircraft, drones, balloons or other objects.
But some cases remain a mystery.
In their latest annual report covering 757 UFO incidents between May 2023 and June 2024, AARO had to classify 21 cases as genuinely unresolved due to lack of data. Meanwhile, similar orbs have been documented in other parts of the world including Puerto Rico and the Middle East.
One of the most compelling pieces of footage came from Dr. Sean Kirkpatrick, former AARO director, who showed one of these orbs in action from a military MQ-9 Reaper drone in the Middle East in 2022.
According to the former head of Pentagon's UFO office, if aliens aren't behind these sightings, then they're evidence that a rival foreign power could be 'doing stuff in our backyard.'
Some theories suggest these orbs could be advanced surveillance devices deployed by countries like China or Russia, while government analysts speculated they might be next-generation, radar-avoiding drones.