'Look, there's one with birds in it," I say excitedly into my microphone. Only as the helicopter whirrs closer do I see that the specks of colour dotting the shape in the cornfield below are not avian, but human figures in rainwear. Perhaps it is an angel with fanning wings, perhaps it is a cup and ball on a stick; the form is certainly new. Like all crop circles, it appeared, without warning or explanation, during the night; suddenly, this very morning, it was there.

The sun may have only just burst from behind the rain clouds to rake the tableland of the Marlborough Downs, but the people who have come to see these elaborate patterns are oblivious to the damp: they're lying down, head to head, their bodies radiating like the spokes of a wheel. The energies, I'm told, are still fresh. And we mustn't knock the rain. This month's bad weather has helped crop-circle aficionados by delaying the harvest.

Farmers in Wiltshire are wearily used to their corn being flattened into geometrical shapes. One of them has put an honesty box on top of an oil drum, in the hope that visitors will enable him to recoup some of the money he has lost from the crop. I notice that it is an old box. Crop circles are like truffles, mysterious but geographically specific, and they appear year after year.

We take off from a field near Alton Barnes, the centre of the phenomenon. Obviously the best vehicle for viewing crop circles would be a spaceship. But this helicopter, laid on as part of the Wiltshire Crop Circle Study Group's summer conference, which took place last weekend, is the next best thing, whisking me into a magical space where Silbury Hill looks like a suet pudding on a plate, and you spy on the gardens of manor houses that are invisible from the road.

Russian fishermen are demanding a probe into a creature resembling the Loch Ness monster in a remote Siberian lake.

Locals say that 'Nesski' has devoured anglers who have been pulled into the murky waters of Lake Chany from their boats.

Those claiming to have glimpsed the creature say it resembles the classic long-necked image of Scotland's fabled monster. It has also been called 'snake-like', while other accounts suggest a large fin and huge tail.

The latest mysterious death of a 59-year-old man last week has fuelled demands for a proper probe into what lurks beneath the surface of Chany, one of Russia's largest freshwater lakes.

A bizarre animal corpse has washed up on a Canadian beach, reviving memories of the infamous "Montauk monster" that was discovered in 2008

Locals in a small Canadian town have been stumped by the appearance of a bizarre creature, which was dragged from a lake.

The animal, which has a long hairy body with bald skin on its head, feet and face, has prompted wild internet speculation that it is a more evolved version of the famous 'Montauk monster'. Original story

The creature was discovered by two nurses in the town of Kitchenuhmaykoosib in Ontario, Canada, while out on a walk with their dog.

Posted: August 16, 2010

Location of Sighting: Briton Ferry, Neath, South Wales
Date of Sighting: 16/08/2010
Time: 4.00 a.m

Witness Statement: My son called me out of bed. There was an unusual object hovering in the sky above my rear garden. I could see it was round in shape, had white lights illuminating it and red lights on the underside. As it moved away, I could not see the lights, but the shape of the object, a semicircle, the flat side being the underside. It became clear a smaller object of the same shape etc was following close by.

Posted: August 16, 2010

Location of Sighting: Redhill Surrey
Date of Sighting: 15th August 2010
Time: 21:20
Witness Statement: My wife and I live under the approach circuit to Gatwick Airport, and as such regularly witness planes at low level either on final approach to Gatwick, or dependent on weather conditions, having taken off.

Looking from our lounge into the night sky, my wife commented on an unusual light moving quite quickly from west to east, at a height I would guesstimate to be 3,000 ft. her initial thought was; 'helicopter' however this theory was quickly eliminated given the speed of the object and the complete silence.

Posted: August 16, 2010

Location of Sighting: Westhoughton, Bolton, Manchester
Date of Sighting: Friday 13th August
Time: About 22:00 for 10/15 mins.

Witness Statement: I was sat watching Peter Versus Life on TV with my girlfriend when she shouted out what's that and ran outside. I followed....

Outside there was an orange bright light flying above in the sky. It definitely wasn't a plane as occasionally there would be lines of light coming out of the circular centre, maybe about 10 straight lines coming out in all different directions.

Posted: August 16, 2010

Location of Sighting: North of Tehran
Date of Sighting: 15-8-2010
Time: about midnight

Witness Statement: My aunt and I were laying down on my bed next to the window. We were both looking at the sky, then she said, "Look at these clouds." I moved closer and saw four cloud shaped lines in the sky, they were very straight and parallel. What was amazing was that they weren't moving like normal clouds, they were vary stable. After a few mins she said, "Hey look ." I looked again and I couldn't believe what I saw, 'cause there was a light glowing from behind one of the cloud shaped lines. The light was moving backward and forward in the same direction. At the same time, I noticed that the the highest line started to get longer. I mean it began to grow longer from the end point moving down kinda touching the lower line .

Two new California cases from the Mutual UFO Network (MUFON) witness reporting database describe what appears to be the same silent, black, triangle UFO on August 12, 2010, according to recent testimony.

A frequent comment when witnesses report the black triangle-shaped UFO is that if you weren't looking for it, most people on the ground would never notice the object hovering above. Like many others, the second witness makes the same case.

In MUFON Case # 25082, the witness reports a "huge triangle of 5 lights with one additional light in front. The lights were faint, and did not flash. The object seemed to be moving quickly, and after a few seconds, was lost from sight. While the sighting did not last long, the witness made an attempt to sketch the object, and to determine size - estimating that it was three-quarter of an inch to one inch wide - and an inch to an inch and-a-half long.

Not every Ozzy Osbourne fan was watching the stage while the entertainer sang "Suicide Solution" in Devore, CA, August 14, 2010, according to testimony from the Mutual UFO Network (MUFON) witness reporting database.

One fan looked toward the Little Dipper and watched a triangle UFO flying "higher than any conventional aircraft."

"The shape was triangular with rounded tips," the witness stated.

"The color of the craft was a pale gray. The middle looking on edgewise was slightly rounded and thicker in the middle, which held 3 round lights in a line strobe-like. Colors were green, yellow and pinkish purple. The lights were like a strobe that blinked and flashed 3-5 times before it disappeared behind a tree that it fit behind."

Multiple UFO sightings from the same encounter continue to dot the Mutual UFO Network (MUFON) witness reporting database landscape.

Case # 25109 from Utah [see below] on August 15, 2010, is another case in point.

Typical of many reports, they are classified as a CE-1 - an object seen at a distance higher than 500 feet. The witness describes movement and lighting that does not seem to match stars, planets, or other known man made or natural objects.

In this particular case, the three witnesses watch multiple objects in the sky of different colors at a guestimate of 15,000 feet. The entire sighting lasted about 10 minutes.