Coincidence? "UFO” Spotted in Tassie as Blink-182's Tom DeLonge Named UFO Researcher of the Year

Guys, they’re making contact. (Kinda, not really, maybe.)

Facebook users were seriously convinced alien life had made it to Tasmania after a fireball was spotted crossing the skyline. Sorry to burst any bubbles, but the myths have already been debunked.

The federal government’s air navigation services provider—Airservices Australia—confirmed the fiery object was nothing more than an aircraft “as it passed over Australian airspace”.

The statement certainly wasn't enough to curb people’s suspicions though. After all, striking footage was caught on hundreds of mobile phones.

“It was very slow moving,” said Tasmanian resident Lee-Anne Peters told the ABC. “Not like the high jets I’ve seen before.” She got her binoculars out because she figured it was a meteorite, or something of the sort.

One expert, John Dickey, who heads the School of Physical Sciences at the University of Tasmania, said the object could be a “piece of space junk” re-entering the atmosphere.

He explained it could be a piece of an old spacecraft that had broken-off an upper stage of a rocket. “High cloud, backlit by the rising sun,” might be an explanation for the brightly-lit trail.

Okay, to be fair, it’s not the first time people have speculated about intelligent extraterrestrial life in the skies over Tasmania. In fact, an entire drama series The Kettering Incident was based on the story of a pilot who disappeared over Bass Strait in 1978 after reporting a UFO sighting.

In other (kinda related) news, Blink-182’s former member Tom DeLonge has received an unlikely award: UFO Researcher of the Year.




DeLonge was awarded the title by Open Minds Productions for his efforts got expose “a vast UFO cover-up within the government”. He wrote a book called Sekret Machines: Chasing Shadows, and it’s entirely based on information he’d allegedly received from sources in the Department of Defence and NASA.

“There’s a lot that I can’t say, but there’s some that I can,” he said, in what could be the vaguest possible line ever, in his acceptance speech video. “I spent 20 years up all night, reading about Roswell, Dulce, Serpo, Churchill, the crashes here, Nazis building craft there, Antarctica, and what’s on Mars, and what’s on the back of the moon, and structures.”

He added, “I’ve done it all. I know it all.”

Maybe DeLonge is the hero local conspiracists in Tassie need right now.

Photo: Facebook (@9News) and YouTube (@openmindstv)