Original subtitles

NARRATOR: An ancient land known for unusual phenomena.

LYNN PICKNETT: From fairies

to weird little creatures

to UFOs,

you name it, England has it.

NARRATOR: A modern-day hot spot for UFO activity.

WILLIAM HENRY: The Ministry of Defence and the Royal Air Force

are intently collecting data about strange phenomena.

NARRATOR: A royal family obsessed with the unexplained.

GIORGIO TSOUKALOS: For generations,

that family has had a high interest in UFOs.

NARRATOR: Could it be that, throughout history,

the island of Great Britain

has been a destination for extraterrestrial visitors?

NICK POPE: The U.K. is ground zero

for an awful lot of alien activity.

♪ ♪

NARRATOR: Over the course of a week,

large unidentified drones are sighted

and recorded on smartphones at multiple sites in Great Britain.

Curiously, the incidents all occur at U.S. military bases.

HENRY: From November 20 through 26, 2024,

a series of unauthorized drone activities

took place over four U.S. Air Force bases in the U.K.

These bases are critical to U.S. military operations in Europe.

And some of the drones look more like orbs.

POPE: Now, some of these...

drones or UFOs

or orbs or whatever we want to call them

were doing strange maneuvers.

And some people thought, "Could this be extraterrestrials?"

The U.K. Ministry of Defence, of course,

says there's nothing to see here.

But they did not find a definitive explanation.

NARRATOR: Great Britain is considered to be one

of the most active UFO hot spots on Earth,

but government officials have long insisted

that they are not concerned about the reports

of strange activity in the sky.

However, ufologists suggest

the British government's own files

tell a very different story,

one that came to light in 2008,

when the Ministry of Defence suddenly released its UFO files.

The treasure trove of documents

revealed that the British government

was far more interested in UFOs than it was letting on.

The MoD released 60,000 files on the subject.

Which basically backs up the assertion over the years

that they've been researching

all sorts of anomalous phenomena.

HENRY: The Ministry of Defence and the RAF, the Royal Air Force,

are intently collecting data about UFOs.

In fact, RAF personnel are directly involved.

Pilots, radar operators are sent out

to investigate these sightings,

and it's very clear that the Ministry of Defence

had taken UFOs very seriously this whole time.

NARRATOR: Today, the British Ministry of Defence

has files on military personnel encountering UFOs

going back more than eight decades.

And much like the 2024 drone sightings,

the most famous occurred at a Royal Air Force base

where American soldiers were stationed.

(birds chirping)

(owl hooting) -Shortly after midnight,

military personnel at RAF Woodbridge,

80 miles northeast of London,

detect an anomalous object on their radar.

It was seen above the nearby forest

of this air base at Woodbridge in Suffolk.

And airmen were sent out in a vehicle to investigate,

and they came across this clearing

in which was this otherworldly object surrounded with light.

This object rose up slightly

and then moved backwards and disappeared.

(indistinct transmission) -And then, over the next few nights,

more and more sightings occurred. -(beeping)

This was an amazing sighting

because, of course, it was witnessed by the military.

(indistinct transmission) -There are probably several hundred people

who are either direct witnesses to the UFO

or were involved in a more peripheral sense.

GRAHAM PHILLIPS: The whole episode was written up and recorded

by the deputy base commander,

Lieutenant Colonel Halt.

Now, that's very unusual.

NARRATOR: The Rendlesham Forest incident

is one of the most discussed UFO events on record.

But it is only one of many that have been reported

near British military bases.

In fact, two other extraordinary events

were witnessed from a base just three miles

from Rendlesham. -(crickets chirping)

On August 13, 1956,

British Royal Air Force officers stationed at RAF Bentwaters

detected 15 unidentified flying objects on their radar screen

racing along the coastline.

POPE: Military jets were scrambled to try and intercept these things.

At one point, one of the objects was recorded

at speeds of around 4,000 miles an hour.

That was way faster than anything anyone had at the time.

And reliable witnesses, the pilots,

see them. They're simultaneously tracked on radar.

At one point, these things are going in formation,

and then they appear to converge and form a single object.

NARRATOR: Just one month later, the Royal Air Force

tracked another mysterious object on radar

in the same area. -(beeping)

On September 22, 1956,

radar operators at an RAF base

picked up an 80-foot cylindrical object.

They scrambled jets to go investigate it.

When the jets arrived, the object accelerated

at extreme speeds out of sight.

POPE: This is just the tip of the iceberg.

You can dip into the archive of files,

and there's report after report after report.

NARRATOR: If the British military

has witnessed so many unexplainable events,

why has the government always professed

to have no interest in UFOs?

Ufologists say the answer can be found by examining

the earliest British military encounters on record,

which were reported during World War II.

The crew of a Lancaster Bomber based at RAF Syerston

reportedly sees a massive, torpedo-shaped object

during a bombing mission.

DAVID CLARKE: They were on a bombing raid on Turin in Italy,

and they saw what they described as an enormous object.

And it was surrounded by red lights.

It was about 200 feet in diameter.

And it seemed to sort of follow the aircraft.

And they saw it again after the bombing raid.

NARRATOR: Files released after the war

indicate that the Ministry of Defence

received numerous reports of mysterious flying objects...

...including one witnessed by an RAF reconnaissance plane in 1944

that allegedly included photographs.

HENRY: The pilot and the copilot see

this mysterious metallic object

that seems to be pacing their aircraft.

It's spherical. It's smooth.

It has no wings.

There is no obvious mechanism

for it to be moving through the air.

And they take a photograph of it.

When they get back to the base,

this photograph makes its way up to the channels

of the Ministry of Defence

all the way to the desk of Winston Churchill.

ZETTERSTROM: Files released show that Prime Minister Churchill

was being briefed on these encounters during World War II.

He was worried that any release of information

would lead to mass hysteria, public panic.

So he covered up every UFO sighting that happened.

He put a blanket secrecy ban

on reporting on UFOs for 50 years.

NARRATOR: While Winston Churchill

wanted to hide UFO sightings from the public,

he also felt it was important to study them

and initiated government-funded projects to do just that.

HENRY: During the 1950s, while the British public

is told "there's nothing to see here,"

the RAF and the Ministry of Defence

are taking proactive action.

They create the Flying Saucer Working Party

to document these sightings.

This is immediately followed by a more serious investigation,

which lasted until 1953,

which also was documenting these sightings.

DAVID CHILDRESS: This implies that the British government

was taking UFO activity very seriously.

They were studying it,

and they were keeping what they knew about it secret.

NARRATOR: While many ufologists suspect

the British government is still keeping secret

their most explosive UFO files,

civilian research groups have investigated

thousands of unexplained incidents.

And some of the most intriguing occurred in a single town

over the course of a decade.

(crickets chirping)

NARRATOR: Local resident Mildred Head is startled awake

by an unnerving noise coming from above her bedroom.

At first, it resembles tree branches

brushing against the roof tiles,

but it quickly grows more violent.

It sounded like thousands upon thousands of tiles

being ripped off and then thrown back on.

Utterly terrifying.

And, also, there was a vibration going through the house.

CHILDRESS: It was like her house was being pelted

by hailstones or something.

But when she looked outside, it was a...

you know, a clear sky.

NARRATOR: The only explanation Mildred could come up with

for the frightening event

was that the noise may have been the result

of military testing at a nearby Royal Air Force base.

That is, until her neighbor Marjorie Bye

had a strange experience of her own.

POPE: The very next day,

Marjorie Bye was going to church

when she was assaulted by a-a series of strange vibrations

that she felt reverberating through her body.

And shortly afterwards,

dozens of other witnesses

in and around Warminster reported the same thing.

It was as if some unseen force

was just taking hold of people and shaking them.

TSOUKALOS: Residents of Warminster reported hearing

humming or droning noises.

They heard whistling sounds.

They saw lights up in the sky, UFOs.

NARRATOR: Unable to explain what they were experiencing,

more than 300 residents assembled a town hall meeting

demanding answers.

The most disturbing factor is that many of our townspeople

have been frightened by unusual sounds.

If tonight we can contribute something constructive

to the explanation of these phenomena,

it might be able to assure these people

you have nothing to be alarmed about.

NARRATOR: At a loss for what to call the various phenomena,

they simply referred to them collectively as "the Thing."

Eventually, the national papers took an interest.

People started flocking to Warminster,

and they would do nightly sky watches.

And very often, they would see

these mysterious lights in the sky.

NARRATOR: Finally, in September 1965,

residents got their best glimpse of the mysterious Thing.

CLARKE: There was a classic photograph of a disc-shaped object

that was taken by Gordon Faulkner.

And the Daily Mirror immediately put it on the front page.

Big splash.

And from that point onwards,

Warminster became the place to go and see flying saucers.

It was the first sort of UFO hot spot in the British Isles.

NARRATOR: Is it possible that the frightening vibrations,

strange sounds, and unusual lights experienced in Warminster

were caused by an extraterrestrial presence?

Some researchers believe

further clues were provided roughly a decade later

when a mountain village to the north witnessed

what many suggest was an otherworldly event.

Llandrillo, Wales.

January 23, 1974.

It's a quiet evening in this rural community

when residents are suddenly shaken

by an extraordinary event.

NICK REDFERN: A number of people in the area perceived

something anomalous like a fleet of UFOs.

Now, at the same time that these strange lights were seen,

whatever they were,

there was an impact on the Berwyn Mountains.

NARRATOR: According to residents,

the police and military

showed up just minutes after the impact.

REDFERN: We have stories of convoys of military personnel in the area,

of roads being blocked off by the military and by the police.

The most controversial story of all

came from a British military officer, James Prescott.

Now, according to Prescott,

the military recovered the remains of a crashed UFO

and a number of dead alien bodies.

NARRATOR: Dead alien bodies?

Is it possible that the impact in Llandrillo

was caused by an extraterrestrial spacecraft?

And if so, does this lend further support to the notion

that the strange phenomena

experienced in the nearby town of Warminster

have an otherworldly explanation?

As far as ancient astronaut theorists are concerned,

the answer is a resounding yes.

And they claim another high-profile UFO event

provides compelling evidence that this alien presence

was well-known to the British government.

Two hikers are just outside

the small Scottish village of Calvine

when they see something unusual flying across the sky.

Amazed, they quickly grab a camera

and snap several photographs of the object.

HENRY: This photograph from the Calvine hills

in Scotland is crystal clear,

it's in color,

it shows this just magical-looking,

100-foot-long diamond-shaped craft

that is clear as a bell.

NARRATOR: The two hikers brought the photographs

to Scotland's largest newspaper, the Daily Record,

so they could share their sighting with the public.

LINDA MOULTON HOWE: They had six photographs,

and they go to the local newspaper

to have them published.

And for reasons that are still not clear to this day,

this Scotland newspaper

calls the Ministry of Defence in London,

and they are ordered to send the photos and the negatives

from the newspaper to somebody in the government.

NARRATOR: Among the people who saw the six photographs

was former Ministry of Defence UFO Investigator Nick Pope,

who was present for classified briefings regarding the images.

POPE: The photographs and the negatives

went to JARIC,

which is Joint Air Reconnaissance

and Intelligence Center.

This is part of the intelligence community

that specializes in imagery analysis.

Their opinion was that this was not a fake,

these were genuine pictures.

NARRATOR: The sensational photographs would remain hidden for decades,

until August 15, 2022,

when Newsweek magazine published one of the photographs

with the headline, "'Best' UFO Picture Ever,

the Calvine Photo, Found After 30 Years Missing."

In 2022, a former Royal Air Force press officer

named Craig Lindsay actually came forward

and said that he had in his possession

a copy of one of the Calvine UFO photos,

and he decided he wanted to release it to the public.

NARRATOR: The Warminster Thing.

The Berwyn Mountains incident.

The Calvine UFO photo.

Is it possible that otherworldly beings

are somehow attracted to the British Isles?

Perhaps further clues can be found

by examining one area of Great Britain

that experiences UFO sightings on a near-daily basis.

NARRATOR: This historic county

is the largest in the United Kingdom.

Known for medieval abbeys,

Norman castles

and stunning national parks,

the vast landscape here is also rich

with legends of strange beings,

bizarre lights in the sky

and even UFOs.

Yorkshire is in Northern England,

and it's a county that is famous

for strange events going back centuries.

Reports of little people,

mysterious lights up in the sky,

people seeing these strange, werewolf-like figures,

Bigfoot-type creatures that come and go.

It's a very strange place.

PHILLIPS: There is ancient burial mound in Yorkshire

called Willy Howe.

And back in the 1200s,

a man had been walking home one night...

...and he saw lights coming out of this mound.

And he went into the mound

where he saw strange beings.

Fairy folk, if you like.

He claimed to have seen these inside the mound.

PICKNETT: England has a very rich tradition

of fairy folk, um, going back into the mists of time.

And it's interesting, though,

that the way encounters with these fairy folk,

or whatever we might call them, the way they're expressed

is very, very similar over the years

to descriptions of encounters with aliens.

NARRATOR: Reports of mysterious phenomena in Yorkshire

are found throughout the historical record,

from ancient times right up until the present day.

In an effort to better understand

what has been happening here,

private investigator Paul Sinclair and his team

began researching and surveilling the area in 2009.

I originally spent a lot of time

on the East and North Yorkshire Wolds,

because farmers in the area

reported seeing the anomalous lights,

the structured-type crafts.

But then I got speaking to Coast Guard,

fishermen, trawlermen, people walking the coastline,

and they started reporting seeing strange anomalous lights,

UFOs, all manner of things.

Going back through the local archives of the newspapers

reveals that lots and lots of unexplained phenomena

have been seen and are reported there.

Not just in recent times,

not just since I've been researching it,

but going back decades and decades,

there's a long history of strange and anomalous phenomena.

Paul Sinclair has been researching this area

for a very, very long time

and come up with some remarkable video footage

of lights in the sky, UFOs

and everything else you could think of.

NARRATOR: Paul and his team set up cameras around the cliff tops

along the North Sea to try and document the objects

seen near the coastline.

During one night in 2020,

what they captured was particularly intriguing.

It were just a typical night by the team.

We go up there, we set up cameras

and we hope that the phenomena might present.

SINCLAIR: There! -And on this occasion, it did.

But these lights, very often, they're a bright amber color.

Or red, or-or white, and, uh,

the white ones that you can see in the film

were actually more of an amber color.

But the lights present as one light

that doesn't fly from anywhere,

and then it punches into a multiple

of four, five and six,

switches off.

So, luckily, we managed to film that little sequence of events

on "Lights Filmed Off Bempton,"

and it's quite exciting when you do actually see

these unexplained phenomena.

NARRATOR: Sinclair and his team

have not only captured strange lights above the sea

but have also documented orbs of light

submerged below the surface of the water.

I was walking along the cliff tops with my friend

and former police officer Dave Barnes.

And Dave saw the object rise out of the water.

Stopped momentarily and told me.

I had the camera in hand, started filming,

I think, soon as it started to move.

And the entire sequence of events

lasted about 90 seconds.

So-- and we estimated the speed to cover six miles in 90 seconds

was about 240 miles per hour.

Now it seems to turn in and drop into the sea.

SINCLAIR: So we've got an object that's gone below the surface,

risen from the sea, traveled six miles

and then gone below the surface.

We have footage of objects

beneath the surface of the water,

or luminous light beneath the surface,

and we've no explanation for that.

We've filmed that on three occasions.

Paul Sinclair has got, uh, videos of these UFOs

and lights, you know, going into the water.

So that makes you wonder,

is there possibly some underwater UFO base

in Yorkshire that has been there for thousands of years?

NARRATOR: Sinclair has catalogued hundreds of video recordings

featuring similar anomalous lights and craft in the area.

You have to wonder, is there something at Yorkshire

or around Yorkshire that is attracting

these sightings and making it a hot spot?

Perhaps some kind of a portal

or a gateway that leads to other locations in the stars.

NARRATOR: What can account for the abundance of strange

and perhaps extraterrestrial activity

that has been reported in Yorkshire going back centuries?

And is it possible that there is a connection

to the region's mysterious earthen mounds?

Ancient astronaut theorists suggest

that the answer can be found

in the ancient stone circles of Britain.

NARRATOR: England is home to many iconic structures

that stand testament to a once-great empire,

like Buckingham Palace,

Big Ben

and Windsor Castle.

But perhaps the most famous site in all of Great Britain

is the ancient megalithic stone circle

known as Stonehenge.

Constructed roughly 5,000 years ago,

the mysterious monument consists of massive monoliths

that each weigh over 30 tons.

It's an astonishing feat of engineering,

and exactly how it was built remains unknown.

NEWMAN: Stonehenge is unique,

it's perfectly circular,

it's designed with precision-engineered carving

and astronomical alignments,

and it really stands out

as the kind of symbol of ancient Britain.

NARRATOR: Stonehenge is one of more than 1,300

ancient stone circles

that can be found throughout the British Isles.

But why they were built remains a mystery.

Some believe the stone circles

were meant to act as calendars and track celestial events,

but some researchers suggest

they served a far more profound purpose.

In 1979, engineer Michael W. Saunders

proposed that Stonehenge is a cosmic map

that is encoded with advanced knowledge of our solar system.

TSOUKALOS: With Stonehenge, we have a representation

of our entire solar system.

Each circle corresponds with one of our planets

inside our solar system.

In fact, in the position of Pluto,

there is a stone monument there.

So, how is that possible?

The ancient astronaut theory proposes

this knowledge was given by visiting extraterrestrials

that descended from the sky in glowing orbs at that time.

NARRATOR: Do ancient stone circles like Stonehenge

have a connection to extraterrestrials?

Curiously, visitors to these mysterious sites

often report encountering otherworldly phenomena.

What we find is that these prehistoric sites

seem to be located where mysterious lights,

plasma orbs, UFOs, are seen on a regular basis.

Not just in the modern day, but historically, as well.

So, it seems very clear that places like Stonehenge

were constructed with this phenomena in mind.

In other words, the ancients may well have built

these monuments to actually connect

with this type of phenomena

and the intelligences involved with them.

NARRATOR: Could Great Britain's many megalithic stone circles

be somehow facilitating contact with otherworldly beings?

Perhaps further clues can be found

by examining other mysterious circles,

the kind that suddenly appear in fields overnight.

COLLINS: Crop circles is a subject

that is very much associated with Britain.

From the 1980s through to the present day,

hundreds of them appear across the country,

most of them focused in the area

around the stone circles of Stonehenge and also Avebury.

But this is a historical phenomenon as well.

There are accounts from the 17th century

of the so-called "devil circles" appearing.

RICHARD TAYLOR: In terms of the patterns themselves,

they've been undergoing this amazing sort of ramp-up

in sophistication.

You can find these huge, what they call pictographs,

that span hundreds of feet across a whole field

and feature multiple components,

and they're arranged with mathematical precision.

NARRATOR: While some crop circles are man-made,

many defy such a simple explanation.

NARRATOR: Ancient astronaut theorists suggest that the phenomena

reported at stone circles,

along with modern crop circle accounts,

provide evidence that Britain has long been a place

of alien visitation.

TSOUKALOS: The fact that you have Stonehenge,

you have the Warminster Thing...

TSOUKALOS: ...you have the events happening in Yorkshire,

to me, indicates that something is going on,

and it's been going on for thousands of years,

and our ancestors misinterpreted these visitors as gods.

They were not gods, they were just space travelers.

NARRATOR: Are the many modern-day reports

of UFOs and other strange anomalies in Great Britain

connected to alien contact

that first happened thousands of years ago?

Ancient astronaut theorists say yes,

and they believe further evidence lies

within the historical records

of the royal family.

NARRATOR: Thousands gather outside Westminster Abbey

to receive their newly crowned queen, Elizabeth I.

Queen Elizabeth's monarchy will be

one of the most consequential in England's history,

and mark the beginning of the British Empire.

Throughout her reign,

she will rely heavily on the counsel

of her trusted advisor who chose this coronation date,

a famous astrologer and alchemist named John Dee.

PHILLIPS: John Dee told her to build up the navy, she did.

He said that they should start to expand

into North America, which they did.

Basically, his advice to Queen Elizabeth

began the British Empire.

Now, apparently, the advice didn't come from him.

He said it came from "angels."

COLLINS: John Dee would communicate with angels

coming through and delivering messages.

And not just simple messages but a whole cipher system

of, like, this sort of angelic alphabet was brought through.

CHILDRESS: You have to wonder, were these angels

perhaps extraterrestrials?

And these extraterrestrials were encouraging Britain

to colonize the entire planet?

NARRATOR: Could it be that John Dee

received guidance from extraterrestrial beings

who were directing the course of the British Empire?

For ancient astronaut theorists, it is a compelling possibility,

especially when considering that, throughout the history

of the British royal family,

numerous otherworldly encounters were recorded,

like a curious entry found in the 19th-century diary

of Prince Albert.

Prince Albert was the consort of Queen Victoria,

probably one of the most famous British queens of all time,

and he went on the record to say that he had seen strange lights

dancing around in the skies.

We didn't have the term "UFO" then,

but it's a UFO sighting.

This is UFOs by royal appointment.

NARRATOR: Prince Albert's grandson, Prince George V,

also recorded a very unusual sighting in the sky.

POPE: On June 11, 1881,

Prince George, who would later become King George V,

saw a UFO from a Royal Navy ship,

and he actually recorded this in the ship's log.

Two other vessels also witnessed this,

and signaled across, you know,

"C-Can you see these lights as well?"

So, this was seen from multiple angles,

and it was there for some hours and then, eventually,

it disappeared.

NARRATOR: The accounts of Prince Albert and Prince George V

are just two of many strange encounters

associated with members of the British monarchy.

And the royal family has maintained an interest in UFOs

and the unexplained right up to the present day.

When Prince Philip, the husband of Queen Elizabeth II,

passed away in 2021,

it came to light that he had a lifelong fascination

with otherworldly phenomena.

POPE: Prince Philip was extremely interested in UFOs,

clearly believed in them.

He actually sent his royal equerry, Sir Peter Horsley,

to interview a number of UFO witnesses.

NARRATOR: Why has the royal family

maintained such a strong interest

in potentially extraterrestrial phenomena

for so many generations?

Perhaps further clues can be found by examining

one of the British monarchy's most mysterious traditions.

May 6, 2023.

Thousands of people line the streets of London

to watch as King Charles III

travels to Westminster Abbey for his coronation.

The private ceremony is rich with ancient traditions

dating back thousands of years,

and involves mysterious relics, like the Stone of Destiny,

believed to connect the new king

to his divinely granted authority.

PICKNETT: King Charles III was crowned

sitting on a throne that incorporated

the Stone of Destiny, or the Stone of Scone,

which is a very ancient tradition,

and all British monarchs

have been crowned sitting on-on that.

Now, there are all sorts of incredible,

mysterious, romantic rumors

about where the Stone of Scone comes from.

COLLINS: According to some accounts,

it had been brought from the Middle East,

and was originally the stone pillow

that the biblical figure Jacob

had actually rested his head on and fallen asleep

and seen the angels

moving between Earth and heaven on a ladder.

TSOUKALOS: What is this connection here?

Is it possible that this stone

was part of an event long, long ago

where a first contact scenario happened with extraterrestrials,

and this is why this stone retains such power?

And by power, I don't mean

that the stone itself is powerful

The story behind it is powerful.

NARRATOR: Could it be that this ancient stone

that has been used in coronation ceremonies

for hundreds of years

symbolizes a connection between the British royal family

and otherworldly beings?

And if so, might the rise of the British Empire

have been part of an alien agenda?

NARRATOR: Today, the United Kingdom

controls 14 small overseas territories,

in places like Bermuda and Antarctica.

But Great Britain was once the center

of history's largest empire.

POPE: The British Empire was one of the greatest,

perhaps the greatest empire the world has ever seen.

The map was largely colored red with all our colonies.

HENRY: By the 19th century,

the British Empire was so vast

and covered so many time zones

that it was always daylight somewhere.

This gave rise to this famous saying,

"The sun never sets on the British Empire."

NARRATOR: At its height in the 1920s,

the British Empire ruled over 400 million people

and had territories in 24% of the world.

Its global reach was unlike anything that had come before.

But the heart of this vast empire,

the island of Great Britain,

shares at least one thing in common

with the power centers of the ancient world:

an unusually high number of encounters with UFOs

and other strange phenomena.

It's interesting that when we look back

at the world's greatest empires--

the Egyptians, the Greeks and the Romans--

these were places where there were records of encounters

with otherworldly beings and supernatural energies.

And this is true of Great Britain as well.

Maybe it's just my bias, because I'm English,

but it does seem to be a particular hot spot

for all manner of anomalous phenomena

from fairies to ghosts

to aliens to UFOs.

You name it, England has it.

NARRATOR: Could it be more than mere coincidence

that this island that is home to so many mysteries

gave rise to an empire that spanned the globe?

Human history is about

the rise and fall of empires,

beginning with the Sumerian, the Mesopotamian empire,

running through Egypt,

Greece,

the Roman Empire,

all the way up to the British Empire.

And in all of these instances,

you find a remarkable, consistent fact:

these empires were influenced by extraterrestrials

who had a hand in the rise of the empire

and the stability of the empire.

POPE: What interest could aliens have

in establishing the British empire?

It comes back to the point that extraterrestrials

seem interested in human society.

Look at all the UFO hot spots,

all the classic encounters, and so many of them

revolve around ancient civilizations.

Not necessarily individuals, but civilizations.

As if extraterrestrials have an agenda.

TSOUKALOS: So, what is the underlying connection here?

Your guess is as good as mine.

But we definitely know

that this contact is not new.

And in the case of Britain,

it's been going on not for hundreds of years

but for thousands of years.

NARRATOR: Does Great Britain's rich history

of unexplained phenomena

reveal that it has long been a place of significance

for otherworldly visitors?

Could it be that, thousands of years ago,

Britain's ancient stone circles were built to mark sites

of contact with extraterrestrials?

And might this interaction be continuing to this very day?

Perhaps this island of ancient mysteries

and modern UFO activity

will be the place where we will one day

be reunited with our alien ancestors.

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