'Flying Saucer' Zooms Within Feet of Airbus Passenger Jet Coming In to Land at London Gatwick

A 'flying saucer' came within a few hundred feet of an Airbus A319 passenger jet as it descended into London Gatwick, according to an official safety report from the UK Airprox Board that details one of several recent close calls between airliners and unidentified aerial objects.

Investigates near‑misses in UK airspace, released anonymised accounts from airline and military pilots who reported disc‑shaped craft and suspected drones passing alarmingly close to their aircraft. The incidents, recorded in separate locations and involving different types of jets, underline how little stands between a routine approach to a major London airport and a potentially catastrophic mid‑air collision when an unidentified object strays into the flightpath.

Flying Saucer Near Miss Recorded Over London Gatwick

The A319 was descending and turning left when the crew suddenly saw a disc‑shaped object heading straight towards them at the same altitude. The Airprox file, summarising the captain's report, states that a 'disc or 'flying saucer' type suspected drone was seen flying very close in the opposite direction, at the same level to them, past their right wing.'

The pilot estimated the 'flying saucer' passed somewhere between 100 and 300 feet from the wingtip, an uncomfortably small margin given the speed and size of the aircraft. The object, they said, appeared as a clear disc with darker markings along the rim. It looked, in their words, like a possible drone, but they could not be sure what it actually was.

No evasive manoeuvre was taken. The crew were already in a turn, which may have helped avoid any direct impact. Even so, the board later concluded that the safety of the aircraft had been 'reduced' during the encounter, as reported by The Sun, and that the uncertain nature of the object made the risk difficult to fully quantify.

There is no indication in the documents of any subsequent identification of the object. No drone operator came forward, and no debris or photographic evidence is mentioned in the report. In the absence of hard proof, officials have had to rely solely on the pilots' accounts. Nothing has been conclusively confirmed, so all interpretations of the object's true nature should be treated with a degree of caution.

Another Close Call as 'Flying Saucer' Fears Meet Drone Reality

The Gatwick near‑miss was not an isolated scare. In the same month, an Airbus A321 approaching Heathrow also reported a close encounter, this time with what the crew were confident was a drone.

According to the official report, the A321 was in a left turn on to base leg for landing at Heathrow, over the town of Marlow, when a drone flew along the left side of the aircraft. It was close enough, the pilot said, for the crew to see 'details such as the colour, shape and individual props spinning.' That level of detail suggests the drone passed extremely near the jet, though the document does not give an exact distance.

Airprox investigators did not attempt to soften their language. In their assessment, 'providence had played a major part in the incident and/or a definite risk of collision had existed.' It is the kind of phrase the board reserves for encounters that, in its view, could easily have ended very differently.

Once again, the drone's operator was not traced, at least in the publicly available summary. The gap between the sort of drone activity allowed in UK airspace and what actually appears near busy approach paths remains wide, and the accountability gap with it.

Raf Pilots Report Unidentified Craft Over North Sea

The civilian incidents were followed in the Airprox paperwork by a more unusual report from the military. Two Royal Air Force pilots, conducting an air‑to‑air refuelling mission at 16,000 feet over the North Sea off the Norfolk coast, also described an unidentified object streaking past their aircraft.

One of the pilots, inside a Voyager tanker, said he physically ducked as the object shot by at a distance he judged to be between 100 and 150 feet. At that altitude and in controlled military airspace, the presence of any unauthorised craft is striking. The Airprox summary does not label the object a drone or a 'flying saucer,' nor does it provide a shape or propulsion description, only that it was unidentified and moving very fast.

Taken together, the three episodes show how the language of flying saucers and UFOs now sits awkwardly alongside very real concerns about drones and other small craft encroaching on protected airspace. In each case the pilots were experienced, trained observers, yet even they struggled to say with confidence what they had just seen.

What is clear from the board's language is that, in all three incidents, chance and timing did much of the work usually done by layers of regulation and technology. Until the objects involved are better understood, the tension between eye‑witness reports of flying saucers and the official vocabulary of 'suspected drones' is likely to remain unresolved.