Maybe It’s The Space Needle

Washington residents are known for their love of nature, their ability to withstand long rainy seasons and now for reporting more unidentified flying objects than people living in any other state, the National UFO Reporting Center says.

Of course, it could be because the center is based here.

Center records from 1995 and the first four months of 1996 show that Washingtonians had reported 263 UFO sightings. California was second with 168 sightings, while Oregon had 67, Florida 41 and Minnesota 38. Washington, D.C., residents reported none at all.

UFO sightings were reported in 36 of the 50 states during the reporting period.

Nine UFO sightings were reported in the first quarter of the year in Seattle, the only major city to report any in that period. The most recent was at 9 p.m. Aug. 20, when witnesses from Seattle, Raymond and Bainbridge Island reported “an olive-green disk streaking from north to south.”

“Maybe the UFOs like Boeing or Microsoft. Or maybe the coffee,” said center director Peter Davenport.

Davenport admits it’s unlikely the state gets more UFO visits. Because the group is based here, more residents are aware of the center’s hotline number.

The hotline also is well-known to law-enforcement agencies and other agencies, who usually direct calls regarding UFO sightings to the number.

Sightings also can be reported via the World Wide Web at http://www.nwlink.com:88/ufocntr/.