Unveiling the Mysteries Above: Exploring UFO Sightings in the United States

STA/ISS 313 - Spring 2024 - Project 1

gggang

Where are the UFOs?

UFOs by Region

A grouped bar plot, grouped by the four US geographical regions. The y-axis corresponds to the number of UFO sightings from US since 1995. The x-axis corrsponds to the categorical variable region. The bars in the plot has different colors that correspond to the five most common types of shapes of the UFOs reported. The number of UFO sightings is highest overall in the West --- with a total of over 25000 sightings, followed by the South, the Midwest, and Northeast, the last of which has only approximately 12500 sightings. The highest number by shape is other or unknown, which accounts for approximately 15000 of sightings in the West region, over 12500 sightings in the South region, over 7500 sightings in the Midwest, and approximately 6500 sightings in the Northeast. Light, triangle, circle, and fireball are the second, third, fourth, and fifth most common shapes.

UFOs by Place

This is a map of the United States, with various cities shaded according to the number of UFO sightings recorded and their population density. The map is sparse, suggesting that most places have never experienced a UFO sighting. In general, there are a lot of UFO sightings in areas of high population (such as big cities), which are mostly colored as "UFOs follow Population" (high sightings, high density). Much of the northeast and midwest is colored as "Sightings Relatively Rare" (low sightings, high density), while much of the west is colored as "UFOs Galore" (high sightings, low population density).

When do people see UFOs?

This figure is a line plot that shows the total number of UFO sightings throughout the year - i.e., from January 1st to December 31st. These numbers are accumulated over the span 1995-2023. The plot is broken down by parts of the day when the UFO was seen - night, astronomical, nautical, or civil dawn, morning, afternoon, or civil, nautical, or astronomical dusk. There are three clear features in this plot: first, that more UFOs tend to be seen at night or at dusk; second, that more UFOs tend to be seen during the summer than during the winter; third, that every year there are a massively disproportionate number of UFOs sighted on the 4th of July (and overnight on New Year's Eve).

This figure is almost the same as the figure on the previous tab, except there is a discontinuity for July 4th-5th. Without this outlier present, it is much easier to see that UFO sightings pick up massively in the summer and fall off in the winter, especially at dusk.

A time series plot showing the counts of UFO sightings and meteor showers aligned over multiple years. The plot consists of filled rectangles representing the duration of meteor showers, overlaid with a line plot depicting the count of UFO sightings over time. The x-axis represents months of the year, while the y-axis shows the count of sightings. Each panel represents a different year, allowing for comparison of sightings across years.