A video (still image below) of what appears to be a UFO being escorted by two fighter jets across a rural landscape during the day is spreading across the Internet with the assertion that the government are trying to delete it from Facebook.
collected September 2014
Videos purporting to show alien spacecraft have been widespread for decades, ever since the invention of the video camera itself. Videos from tape cassettes and VHS would spread across communities claiming to show the latest evidence of the existence of extra-terrestrials. Then with the evolution of digital media and cameras becoming the everyday household item the frequency of these videos has only increased.
And whilst these videos would often show strange objects over a skyline, the latest trend – very much in line with the popular belief that governments across the world are covering up the existence of aliens – is to show these “alien craft” coupled with military fighter planes, with the implication being that the UFO is being escorted, possibly to some secret military base.
Of course, keeping with tradition, most of the videos end up getting proved as fakes, either by experts in the field or via the confession of the original uploader themselves. In the case of this video, it is the latter (kind of).
Internet sleuths from various forums have picked up on many “abnormalities” in the video, including the speed, angle and the noises of the jets, as well as questioning the convenience of having your camera activated before the UFO appears as well as the logic of having an aircraft you want to keep secret fly so low in an area almost certainly populated by people (with cameras!)
For us however two key aspects of the video almost certainly retire this video into the archive of the fake. Firstly the apparent “edging” present in the video which is visible at certain, albeit brief, moments. This is where straight edges surrounding an object can be seen, suggesting the object has been overlaid onto a video backdrop. In this still image below you can see a faint rectangle shape around the UFO object. The same edges appear at moments on the fighter jets as well.
However if that wasn’t proof enough then one needs to look no further than the source of the video, which appears to be a YouTube user by the handle of Oondyla who uploaded the video on August 14th 2011. Oondyla, judging by his other videos, appears to be some kind of video manipulation enthusiast as many of his videos contain more obvious special effects, such as flying ships and planes coming out of nowhere. He also has other videos purporting to show the existence of aliens.
However, just like many video manipulation aficionados out there, Oondyla often “signs” his work by hiding his name in the video itself. In the case of this UFO video, his YouTube handle is visible on what appears to be a brick wall at the background of the video during it’s latter half (see image below) – the bottom image has been enhanced.
Thus proving, as much as one can prove, that this video is another forgery. The full video uploaded by Oondyla can be seen here.
