A recent report suggesting Pennsylvania has more UFO sightings than many other states has one local UFO researcher saying it makes sense to him.
The Weekender reached out to Shane Butler, founder and executive director of the UF BROS, a Lackawanna County-based extraterrestrial research group after a report from data analysis outlet Thortful that suggests Pennsylvania is ranked seventh in terms of overall number of reported UFO sightings over the past 20 years.
Thortful compiled the information from reports made to the National UFO Reporting Center, one of the largest extraterrestrial research groups in the nation. According to the center, a total of 3,982 reported UFO sightings were reported to the organization between 1998 and 2019.
The nearly 4,000 reports rank Pennsylvania the state with the seventh most sightings in the 20 year period. However, the Pennsylvania sightings are dwarfed by California, the state with the most total sightings, with 13,767 reports coming out of the west coast state.
According to Butler, it makes perfect sense that there are more sightings in Pennsylvania than many other states — and a lot of his reasoning has nothing to do with aliens at all.
Butler, 27, of Carbondale, said a big part of what makes sightings so common in Pennsylvania is the state’s large swaths of rural areas.
“Geographically, we don’t have much light pollution, so you’re more likely to see things,” Butler said.
While Butler is himself a firm believer that extraterrestrial life has visited humanity, he thinks that “99.9 percent” of sightings are probably just people misidentifying human-made crafts, especially experimental crafts that could be heading to or from numerous U.S. Air Force bases around the state and its neighbors.
It’s also worth noting that, of the top 10 states in terms of UFO sightings, eight of them are in the top 10 most populated list. Butler agrees that it stands to reason that more people could logically lead to more sightings.
For him personally, Butler believes “100 percent” that first contact has been made.
“There’s a small circle of people who know that,” he alleged, suggesting that that circle is made up of government leaders. He believes there was some kind of exchange in technology, which led to the rapid explosion of technology over the past 100 years, specifically citing the short period of time between the Wright Brothers and space travel.
“It’s borderline impossible,” he said.
Butler said that he, along with the rest of the UF BROS, are working to investigate local reports of UFO sightings.
On their Facebook page, there is a documentary the group produced about a crash in Carbondale in 1974 that many locally have branded as a UFO crash. What’s not disputed is that something crashed in the forests around the Lackawanna County city that year, and that it was transported away by the military. Butler personally believes it was likely a Soviet satellite, and not an otherwordly object.
Butler said that if you’ve seen a UFO, the UF BROS would like to speak to you. You can get in contact with them either by finding their Facebook page, simply called UFBROS, or calling Butler at 570-780-4988.
