A mysterious low-flying object spotted in the skies above Sooke has got imaginations running wild.
Sightings of the unidentified object were made around 4 p.m. on Wednesday Jan. 8, with speculation of its identity ranging from a military drone, a private jet, right through to an alien invasion.
Alexandra Cottingham was first to raise the alarm, sharing on social media she had seen a “massive drone, the size of a small car, silently flying above” her as she drove her car on Grant Road, heading west.
“At first I thought it was a plane, but it was flying too low and was at hydro-line height,” Cottingham told Sooke News Mirror. “It looked very similar to a military unmanned aerial vehicle."
Cottingham describes the unidentified aircraft as slow moving, dark grey or black in colour, with no flashing lights or visible markings.
“I felt really creeped out and astonished, because it instantly reminded me of all the drone and orb activity in New Jersey and all over the world."
“It was about the size of a sedan,” she added.
An online live flight tracker showed only a passenger plane flying from Seattle to Anchorage in the sky around the time Cottingham saw the mysterious drone.
“But that plane wasn't travelling in the direction I saw the drone,” she said.
Other Sooke witnesses shared their sightings in response to Cottingham’s social media post, some describing a “decent-sized plane flying low.”
“Never seen that size of plane flying that low,” said one Sooke local.
“It's Trump surveying Vancouver Island to see what sections of the island he wants to take over,” said another, in reference to U.S. President-elect Donald Trump's recent comments that Canada should become the 51st state.
This is not the first time a UFO has caught the attention of the Sooke community. In 2017, two UFO sightings in as many weeks were made in the vicinity over the Sooke Basin.
Prohibited from releasing third-party information regarding specific airspace users, NAV Canada was unable to confirm the presence of the low-flying object on Jan. 8, nor confirm its identity.
“However, we checked with our regional team, and they have nothing in their logs to indicate anything unusual,” said a spokesperson.
Maritime Forces Pacific – a branch of the Canadian Armed Forces based in Esquimalt – said in an emailed statement they do not have drones matching the description of the one seen in Sooke, and were not conducting any flight activities (drone or otherwise) at that time.
