Within Duplicates
How One Sighting Turns Into Many Records
One sighting can multiply across witness forms, newspapers, investigators and later catalogues without becoming several separate events.
On this page
- Separate witnesses and separate submissions
- Copied accounts across newspapers and catalogues
- How row counts exaggerate event frequency
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Introduction
A UFO database can contain several records for what was, in reality, a single sighting. That multiplication happens because databases often preserve every witness statement, newspaper article, investigator summary and later catalogue entry connected to an incident. The result is a chain of reports rather than a clean count of unique events.
This distinction matters whenever people cite large UFO totals. A database may contain tens of thousands of records, but those records do not necessarily represent tens of thousands of separate aerial incidents. In many catalogues, the basic unit being stored is the report itself, not a fully deduplicated event. The Centre for UFO Studies (CUFOS) has explicitly acknowledged this issue in its UFOCAT system, noting that records often reflect a witness or group of witnesses reporting one event through one source, while witnesses, events and sources are not always cleanly separable. [Center for UFO Studies]cufos.orgUFOCAT Codebook 2023Center for UFO StudiesUFOCAT 2023June 6, 2024 — Typically, each record for a UFO event reflects the input of one witness or group of witn…
Separate Witnesses Create Separate Records
The simplest form of duplication occurs when several people observe the same object.
Imagine a bright light crossing the sky above a town. One witness files a report with the National UFO Reporting Center (NUFORC). Another sends an email to a local investigator. A third speaks to a newspaper. A police officer writes an incident log. All four descriptions may ultimately enter UFO archives.
From a database perspective, these are separate pieces of evidence. Each has its own wording, time estimate, location description and witness background. Researchers often preserve them individually because combining them too early can erase useful information about what different people actually claimed to see.
CUFOS’s UFOCAT was designed with this problem in mind. Its documentation explains that records generally correspond to a witness or witness group, an event and a source, but also warns that these categories become blurred in practice. The same incident can therefore generate multiple catalogue entries linked through source relationships rather than being collapsed into a single row. [Center for UFO Studies]cufos.orgUFOCAT Codebook 2023Center for UFO StudiesUFOCAT 2023June 6, 2024 — Typically, each record for a UFO event reflects the input of one witness or group of witn…
Why Investigators Keep Witnesses Separate
Keeping witness accounts separate is not necessarily a mistake.
Different witnesses may:
- Observe the object from different positions.
- Report different durations.
- Notice different colours or movements.
- Contradict each other on important details.
- Add information that was absent from earlier reports.
For historical research, preserving those differences can be more valuable than forcing all accounts into one standardised summary. The downside is that exported datasets can make one event appear numerically larger than it was.
A dramatic sighting with twenty independent witnesses may generate twenty records even though only one aerial event is being described.
One Witness Can Submit More Than Once
Duplication does not require multiple observers.
A single witness may submit:
- An initial online report.
- A corrected version later.
- A longer statement to an investigator.
- A follow-up interview.
- A retrospective account years afterwards.
Each submission can enter a different archive.
The problem becomes even harder when details change slightly between versions. A witness may initially estimate a sighting at 9:00 pm and later revise it to 9:15 pm. A location may be described as a nearby city in one account and a specific suburb in another. Automated systems often struggle to recognise that both records refer to the same occurrence.
Modern reporting databases such as NUFORC maintain large archives of witness submissions organised by date, location and other categories. Those archives are valuable resources, but their size alone does not prove that every record represents a unique event. [NUFORC]nuforc.orgData Bank | NUFORCNUFORCData Bank | NUFORC - Latest UFO SightingsThe NUFORC Databank is the largest independently collected set of UFO / UAP sighting repor…
How Newspapers Multiply a Sighting
Historical UFO cases often expand through media coverage.
A local newspaper may publish the original story. Regional newspapers then copy it. National publications summarise the reports. UFO newsletters reproduce those summaries. Later books quote the newsletters. Modern databases import material from the books.
By the time researchers encounter the case decades later, there may be many apparently independent references that all trace back to the same original sighting.
The Source Chain Problem
A typical chain can look like this:
- Witness sees an unusual object.
- Local newspaper publishes an article.
- A UFO organisation clips and archives the article.
- A researcher cites the clipping in a catalogue.
- Another catalogue imports the researcher’s summary.
- A modern database digitises the catalogue.
If each stage becomes its own record, one event acquires a long documentary trail.
For historians, that trail is useful because it reveals how information spread. For statistical counting, however, it can be misleading. Ten records may represent one incident reported ten different ways rather than ten separate sightings.
When Databases Import Other Databases
Large UFO catalogues are often built by merging older collections.
This creates another route to duplication. A famous sighting may already exist in several archives before a new database imports all of them. Unless extensive matching is performed, the same event can appear repeatedly under slightly different dates, spellings or descriptions.
The challenge becomes larger as datasets grow. Modern enthusiasts and data analysts routinely combine records from sources such as NUFORC, MUFON-derived collections, historical catalogues and public archives into large unified datasets containing hundreds of thousands of entries. Researchers working with these merged collections frequently discuss the need for cleaning, standardisation and event matching because multiple source databases may contain overlapping reports. [Reddit]reddit.comI'm releasing a cleaned + enriched UFO dataset (327kWhat this is: It's a 327,000-row dataset of UFO sightings from multiple public sources…Read more…
A merged catalogue can therefore become a catalogue of source records rather than a catalogue of unique sightings.
Famous Cases Generate Report Cascades
Well-known incidents are especially prone to multiplication.
A highly publicised event may produce:
- Witness statements.
- Police reports.
- Military communications.
- Newspaper stories.
- Television coverage.
- Investigator interviews.
- Book chapters.
- Database entries.
- Later retrospective analyses.
Project Blue Book illustrates how large investigative systems accumulated reports from many channels over long periods. The project collected and investigated thousands of UFO reports between 1947 and 1969, creating extensive documentary files rather than a simple list of isolated observations. [U.S. Air Force]archives.govdo records show proof of ufos?Feb 9, 2018 — According to a U.S. Air Force Fact Sheet, a total of 12,618 sightings were reported to Project Blue Book during this time…
The more famous a case becomes, the more records it tends to generate. That growth often reflects attention and documentation rather than an increase in the number of objects seen.
Why Row Counts Can Exaggerate Event Frequency
The most common misunderstanding occurs when database rows are treated as events.
A report count answers the question:
How many records are stored?
An event count answers a different question:
How many distinct incidents occurred?
Those numbers may differ substantially.
A database containing 100,000 records does not automatically represent 100,000 unique sightings. Some records may be duplicates, follow-ups, newspaper reproductions, investigator summaries or parallel witness accounts of the same event.
CUFOS recognised this issue by including methods for linking related records and identifying connections between entries that refer to the same incident. The system was designed as a research catalogue that preserves provenance rather than as a perfectly deduplicated event list. [Center for UFO Studies]cufos.orgUFOCAT Codebook 2023Center for UFO StudiesUFOCAT 2023June 6, 2024 — Typically, each record for a UFO event reflects the input of one witness or group of witn…
Why Researchers Often Keep the Duplicates
The obvious solution might seem to be deleting duplicates. In practice, that can damage the historical record.
Removing all apparent duplicates risks losing:
- Independent witness testimony.
- Corrections to earlier reports.
- Evidence about how a story changed over time.
- Information about which source published which version.
Many catalogues therefore preserve the full reporting chain while relying on researchers to distinguish between source records and underlying events.
That design choice is useful for archival work but creates a recurring problem in public discussions. Large UFO databases are often cited as if every row represents a separate unexplained object in the sky. In reality, part of the total may simply reflect how many times the same sighting was recorded, copied, investigated and catalogued.
The Key Question Is Not “How Many Reports?”
When evaluating UFO databases, the most informative question is often not how many reports exist but how many unique incidents those reports represent.
A catalogue may be doing exactly what it was designed to do: preserving every available source trail. The apparent inflation appears when readers mistake those source trails for separate events. One sighting can become many records through multiple witnesses, repeated submissions, newspaper copying, investigator files and database imports. The growth in records is real, but it does not automatically mean the sky contained an equal number of separate UFO events.
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Endnotes
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Source: cufos.org
Title: UFOCAT Codebook 2023
Link: https://cufos.org/PDFs/UFOCAT%20Codebook%202023.pdfSource snippet
Center for UFO StudiesUFOCAT 2023June 6, 2024 — Typically, each record for a UFO event reflects the input of one witness or group of witn...
Published: June 6, 2024
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Source: nuforc.org
Title: Data Bank | NUFORC
Link: https://nuforc.org/databank/Source snippet
NUFORCData Bank | NUFORC - Latest UFO SightingsThe NUFORC Databank is the largest independently collected set of UFO / UAP sighting repor...
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Source: nuforc.org
Title: Reports by Location NUFORC Reports by Location; USA
Link: https://nuforc.org/ndx/?id=locSource snippet
NUFORC Reports by LocationNUFORC Reports by Location; USA - Alabama, 1529; USA - Arkansas, 1367; USA - Arizona, 5349; USA - Californi...
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Source: reddit.com
Title: I’m releasing a cleaned + enriched UFO dataset (327k
Link: https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1oz3i0h/im_releasing_a_cleaned_enriched_ufo_dataset_327k/Source snippet
What this is: It's a 327,000-row dataset of UFO sightings from multiple public sources...Read more...
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Source: af.mil
Title: unidentified flying objects and air force project blue book
Link: https://www.af.mil/About-Us/Fact-Sheets/Display/Article/104590/unidentified-flying-objects-and-air-force-project-blue-book/Source snippet
Air ForceUnidentified Flying Objects and Air Force Project Blue BookOf a total of 12,618 sightings reported to Project Blue Book, 701 rem...
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Source: archives.gov
Title: [National Archives]({{ ‘archives/’ | relative_url }}) Project BLUE BOOK
Link: https://www.archives.gov/research/military/air-force/ufosSource snippet
National ArchivesProject BLUE BOOK - Unidentified Flying ObjectsProject BLUE BOOK has been declassified and the records are available for...
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Source: nuforc.org
Link: https://nuforc.org/ndx/?id=shapeSource snippet
NUFORC Reports by ShapeNUFORC Reports by Shape; Chevron, 1911; Cigar, 4164; Circle, 15854; Cone, 675.Read more...
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Source: nuforc.org
Link: https://nuforc.org/ndx/?id=eventSource snippet
NUFORC Reports by MonthSIGHTING YEAR/MONTH, REPORT COUNT. 2026/05, 160. 2026/04, 212. 2026/03, 200. 2026/02, 178. 2026/01, 283. 2025/12...
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Source: nuforc.org
Title: Browse reports, images, videos, maps and more
Link: https://nuforc.org/Source snippet
National UFO Reporting Center | Report a UFO | Report a UAPThe most trustworthy, transparent and respectful organization for UFO/UAP witn...
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Source: archives.gov
Title: do records show proof of ufos
Link: https://www.archives.gov/news/articles/do-records-show-proof-of-ufosSource snippet
?Feb 9, 2018 — According to a U.S. Air Force Fact Sheet, a total of 12,618 sightings were reported to Project Blue Book during this time...
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Source: reddit.com
Link: https://www.reddit.com/r/aliens/comments/155y83z/part_2_i_analyzed_80000_ufo_sightings_from_the/Source snippet
I analyzed 80000 UFO sightings from the NUFORC databaseIt is the NUFORC database. I realized I needed to find a stable population since s...
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Source: reddit.com
Title: i analyzed 80000 ufo sightings from the nuforc
Link: https://www.reddit.com/r/aliens/comments/14w522g/i_analyzed_80000_ufo_sightings_from_the_nuforc/Source snippet
databaseI analyzed the comments (free text fields) that captured the witness accounts in the NUFORC database of over 80000 sightings...
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Source: archive.org
Link: https://archive.org/download/UFO_Commentary_vol_2_no_4/UFO_Commentary_vol_2_no_4.pdf -
Source: ada-nuforc-analysis.github.io
Link: https://ada-nuforc-analysis.github.io/Source snippet
NUFORC Report AnalysisThe NUFORC checks each reports for fakes or hoax and comments them accordingly. The reports are classified by their...
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Source: Wikipedia
Title: Project Blue Book
Link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Blue_BookSource snippet
Project Blue BookBy the time Project Blue Book ended, it had collected 12,618 UFO reports, and concluded that most of them were miside...
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Source: britannica.com
Link: https://www.britannica.com/topic/Project-Blue-BookSource snippet
Project Blue Book | Definition, History, Aliens, UFOs, & Facts4 days ago — From 1947 to 1969, 12,618 sightings were recorded; of these, 7...
-
Source: metabunk.org
Title: Reporting UFOs
Link: https://www.metabunk.org/threads/nuforc-sightings-categorized-by-decade-and-shape.14610/Source snippet
NUFORC sightings categorized by decade and shape1 Dec 2025 — The NUFORC database is completely based on self-reporting, and sighting records...
Additional References
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Source: neurosciarchive.byethost12.com
Link: https://neurosciarchive.byethost12.com/1984-Persinger-and-Derr-PMS-Geophysical-variables-and-human-behavior–XIX-strong-temporal-relationships-between-inclusive-seismic-meas.pdfSource snippet
VARIABLES AND HUMAN BEHAVIOR: XIX.They in- cluded the following perceptual characteristics: "the UFO moved in a non- continuous trajector...
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Source: observablehq.com
Link: https://observablehq.com/%407a596ea349ab5d1c/ufo-sightings -
Source: nsa.gov
Link: https://www.nsa.gov/portals/75/documents/news-features/declassified-documents/ufo/usaf_fact_sheet_95_03.pdfSource snippet
Blue Book, 701 remained "unidentified." The decision to discontinue UFO investigations was based on an...
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Source: abc30.com
Title: the black vault project blue book declassified freedom of information act
Link: https://abc30.com/post/the-black-vault-project-blue-book-declassified-freedom-of-information-act/483352/Source snippet
UFO enthusiast releases 130K pages of Air Force docs...20 Jan 2015 — According to the National Archives, 12,618 UFO sightings were repor...
-
Source: abc7ny.com
Title: the black vault project blue book declassified freedom of information act
Link: https://abc7ny.com/post/the-black-vault-project-blue-book-declassified-freedom-of-information-act/483352/Source snippet
UFO enthusiast releases 130K pages of Air Force docs...20 Jan 2015 — According to the National Archives, 12,618 UFO sightings were repor...
-
Source: esd.whs.mil
Link: https://www.esd.whs.mil/Portals/54/Documents/FOID/Reading%20Room/UFOsandUAPs/2d_af_1.pdfSource snippet
Air Force investigation of UFO's began in 1948 and...Between 1948 and 1969 we investi- gated 12,618 reported sightings...
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Source: academia.edu
Link: https://www.academia.edu/44630124/A_SEARCH_FOR_POSSIBLE_CAUSAL_ASSOCIATIONS_BETWEEN_UFOs_and_PERTURBATIONS_IN_RECORDED_GEOPHYSICAL_DATASource snippet
A SEARCH FOR POSSIBLE CAUSAL ASSOCIATIONS...29 Nov 2024 — The number of witnesses to UFOCAT type 5 and largest number for any one month...
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Source: rotel.pressbooks.pub
Title: pub Principle: Consider Context – The Data Renaissance
Link: https://rotel.pressbooks.pub/datarenaissance1/chapter/principle-consider-context/Source snippet
pressbooks.pubPrinciple: Consider Context – The Data Renaissance - rotelIt collects news reports about events around the world and parses...
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Source: github.com
Link: https://github.com/timothyrenner/nuforc_sightings_dataSource snippet
100,000 UFO sightings including city, shape, and a text description.Read more...
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Source: medium.com
Title: the ufo uap report for february 2026 1957560a454f
Link: https://medium.com/%40pauljones_85805/the-ufo-uap-report-for-february-2026-1957560a454fSource snippet
The UFO/UAP report for February 2026 | by Paul Jones - MediumMarch 1, 2026 — The National UFO Reporting Center (NUFORC) logged 68 sightin...
Published: february 2026
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