Are aliens landing? Sun streams through the clouds like a scene from Close Encounters (and there's also a 'magic carpet' flying through the air in Exeter)
- Photographer Adrian Campfield captured the image at Beachy Head, Sussex
- He compared the sighting to something from alien movie Close Encounters
- Meanwhile an Exeter resident took a photo of what looks like a flying carpet
- But Met Office said it's just a rhombus-shaped cloud formed by jet exhaust
While parts of Britain are mopping up after flash floods and others are basking in warm weather, stranger things appear to be happening in the sky.
One photographer captured sun streaming through the clouds which looked like a spaceship was about to land or something out of 70’s movie Close Encounters of the Third Kind, while another snapped a cloud in Exeter in the shape of a magic carpet.
Photographer Adrian Campfield was having dinner with his wife Louise at a restaurant at Beachy Head, East Sussex, when the eery rays suddenly appeared from between the clouds and beamed onto the water.
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Paranormal activity: Photographer Adrian Campfield took this image at Beachy Head in Sussex and said it looked like 'something from Close Encounters of a Third Kind'
Mr Campfield said the eery lights were changing for about 15 minutes at Beachy Head in Sussex
The 59-year-old rushed outside onto the 535ft high cliffs to watch the spectacle unfold.
Mr Campfield, a former graphic designer, from Bexley, Kent, said the light was changing for more than 15 minutes.
He said: ‘I have taken pictures of rays before but never quite like this. It brought to mind the sequences from the film 'Close Encounters of the Third Kind'.
‘I was pleasantly shocked and stunned because you never expect to witness anything like this. This was an outstanding sight and I was very lucky to be in the right place at the right time.’
Mr Campfield took more than 50 photos, including his favourite of a gull standing on the rocky cliff edge.
The rays looked similar to a scene from Spielberg's 1977 sci-fi film Close Encounters of the Third Kind
A message from outer space? A seagull watches the bizarre light shining through the clouds at Beachy Head
He said: ‘We looked out of the restaurant window and saw those rays starting to appear over the sea. Once outside, the height of the cliffs was ideal because my eye level was above the horizon, giving me much more dramatic angles and perspectives.
‘I had to work fast because the light and rays were changing all the time and the atmosphere and moods were fantastic.’
Meanwhile residents in Exeter, Devon, were amazed when they spotted what looks like a flying carpet in the sky.
Magic carpet ride? Residents in Exeter, Devon, took this incredible shot of a cloud in the shape of a rectangle
Unsurprisingly Met Office experts rubbished claims this could be a close encounter of the third kind and explained the cloud was caused by a jet engine moving through a pocket of air
But officials at the Met Office was quick to dismiss the possibility of an encounter of the third kind.
Met Office employee Laura Gilchrist tweeted the image on July 26: ‘So this evening, over Exeter, there was a rhombus-shaped cloud’.
A spokesman for the Met Office said the cloud had been formed by a jet engine moving through a pocket of air with the ‘right conditions’.
He said: ‘This cloud has been formed from the exhaust of a jet engine - known as a contrail.
‘In this case an aircraft has moved through a pocket of air with the right conditions for the contrail to form, meaning there is just a short section.
‘The wind is blowing across the contrail, and due to the right atmospheric conditions this is causing the ice crystals in that trail to spread outwards - creating this rectangular shaped cloud.
‘It’s unusual to see the cloud edges quite so well-defined as in this example but the processes involved are very common.’
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