The mystery of blue flying objects reported hovering over Hinckley may have been solved.
Dozens of people said they saw the objects on August 23.
Their reports reached the town branch of the Leicestershire UFO Research Society which immediately carried out investigations.
The society, which has been logging sightings since 1971, put the latest ones down to a remote controlled four-rotor "quadcopter".
The society's spokesman Graham Hall, who lives in the town, said that, after considering evidence from 35 witnesses, he was fairly convinced the sightings could be explained by people using quadcopters.
He said: "It's becoming clear that what was spotted in the skies that night was something quite explainable.
"We are reliably informed the object that caused all the fuss on this occasion was a large model quadcopter.
"They are relatively new but basically they're model helicopters with four small rotor supports arranged in a cross shape.
"They can have bright lights attached to them and can look very strange as they hover and circle in the night sky."
He did not think the operators of the quadcopter were trying to set up any kind of UFO hoax.
Graham said: "There were 35 witnesses who saw the objects and we think there could have been two lots of people flying two separate quadcopters in different parks, but it all sounds like a coincidence rather than a calculated hoax."
The society, which has 28 members from Loughborough to Nuneaton, has extensive reports from the past four decades. A new online archive has been set up by the members.
The files online contain details of recorded sightings from the past 50 years, as well as a handful from before the 20th century.
The earliest is from September 1706 and describes "a bright white and yellow ball moving downwards towards the male witness at great speed in many different directions" in Hinckley. Strange phenomena seen by lots of people at the same time include a "cigar cloud" seen over Leicestershire by at least 49 people in October 1977, a delta-shaped UFO seen by a number of people the following year and six sightings of UFOs over two days in November 1980.
Graham said: "We still receive many reports and try to solve them."
To view the online archive, visit:
http://lufoinregister. angelfire.com/