By Abram Katz, Register Science Editor

Confused by the lights: UFO sightings plentiful, but why would aliens visit Stratford?

The aliens traveled from a distant galaxy recently to spend a few hours watching the Connecticut shoreline from a set of three silent orbs.

So believe a few who say they observed and photographed the airborne shapes. Something about the Nutmeg State appears to be a cosmic draw.

Loretta Parisi of Meriden saw five dots in formation leaving clouds of smoke. "This is one of the strangest things I’ve ever seen," she said.

Others saw planes skywriting a promotion for a casino. That could clear up one mystery, perhaps.

Parisi said she never saw airplanes. Just lines of smoke.

Did anyone get a clear photo of extraterrestrial aerospace design? No.

A review of UFO reports past reveals many blobs of light, featureless dots and other photos that show funny looking clouds. The clouds are usually in focus, but the blobs and dots rarely are.

They also are photographed and videotaped, for the most part, with hand-held cameras, since their schedules are erratic. You just never know when an intelligent object from light-years away will arrive to check out Milford waterfront property, or leave trails of smoke, or hover around Earth for some inexplicable reason.

Hence, there are hundreds of unfocused, shaky images of undefined blobs posted all over the Internet — hardly convincing evidence of visitors from outer space.

"This kind of stuff doesn’t impress me in the least. You can create your own photos with layer upon layer and you can make anything look real," said James Fulmer, earth scientist and astronomer at Southern Connecticut State University.

Recently, an Orange resident wrote of seeing odd orbs of lights off beaches in Milford and Stratford and that, to be "honest, (he’s) not sure what any of us saw, but we know it wasn’t normal."

Many UFO sightings come from a planet, but not from another planet.

Venus, always one of the brightest objects in the sky, is often mistaken for a "mother ship."

Many of these reports are result of a physiological phenomenon called autokinesis, which does not involve bending spoons or flying. Autokinesis occurs on dark nights when few objects are visible to provide comparisons.

A fixed light watched for a prolonged period can appear to move. It’s an illusion, but explains many UFO reports.

Look at the red blinking light atop an antenna tower, and after a while it will start to travel. A light bulb turns into a visitor from Alpha Centauri.

Autostasis is just the opposite. A moving object seems to stand still. That would explain the sudden starting and stopping of blobs or ships.

Another common optical illusion is mistaking the motion of a car or train for the apparent motion of an object in the sky. This is why the moon seems to chase you occasionally.

Marc D’Addio, the local Earthling who saw the lights over Long Island Sound off Milford, is not convinced by mundane explanations.

"I have five other people who were with me to confirm (what we saw) as well as a friend who saw them from a different locations the same night. We have no idea what they were. ... There’s no way they’re any airplane or helicopter. They’re virtually silent," D’Addio wrote in an e-mail.

Silent, however, just means sound waves didn’t reach ears, Fulmer said. A passenger jet that passes at high altitude is also inaudible, but it’s making a lot of noise.

Which brings us to small objects that are close but appear to be far away, and distant large objects that seem close, such as Venus.

What else could be at work? Kites, balloons, airplanes, model airplanes, blimps, lenticular clouds, reflections, mirages, fireworks, birds, insects, parachute spiders, planes flying in formation, helicopters, meteors, ball lightning, hoaxes, doctored photos — and none of the above, which no one can explain.

Even trained observers are notoriously bad at estimating speed, size and altitude. Over the years, reports have included observational conclusions unquestioningly.

For example, in March 1985, some unidentified people in Derby and Ansonia reported seeing a brightly lit aircraft with four or five white lights making an "X." What they really saw was four or five lights, which they assumed must be a flying machine.

A "diamond-shaped craft" delineated by lights, could be an airplane, ultralight plane or four bright stars.

"You need a report from someone who can’t afford to look like a fool," Fulmer said. Few people want to appear foolish, so almost all reports are made by unidentified people.

"There are aliens out there," Fulmer said. "But we’re a grain of sand on a beach," one of countless unexceptional solar systems in the Milky Way galaxy.

How and why aliens would select one grain of sand over another, we don’t know.

Abram Katz can be reached at akatz@nhregister.com or 789-5719.

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