The Irish Aviation Authority (IAA) is investigating several reports of bright lights and unidentified flying objects (UFOs) that were seen by commercial airline pilots last Friday off the south-west coast of Ireland.
A British Airways pilot contacted Shannon air traffic control on November 5, asking if there were military exercises being carried out in the area as there was something "moving so fast" but she was told there were none, according to a record of the conversation published on Airlive, a website for plane enthusiasts.
Flying from Montreal to Heathrow airport in England, the pilot of the Boeing 787 said there was a "very bright light" and the object had come up along the left side of the aircraft before it "rapidly veered to the north" and the "disappeared at a very high speed." She said there was no likely collision with the object.
Air traffic controllers said there was nothing showing on their radars.
Shortly afterwards, another pilot from a Virgin plane also reported "multiple objects following the same sort of trajectory" and that they were very bright. He described it as a "meteor or another object making some kind of re-entry."
Airlive said another pilot also reported a sighting.
The IAA told CNBC on Tuesday that it had filed a report on the matter:
"Following reports from a small number of aircraft on Friday 9th November of unusual air activity the IAA has filed a report. This report will be investigated under the normal confidential occurrence investigation process," it said.