“They were flying over the centre from all sorts of directions”

A Bristol man filmed what appears to be a fleet of drones hovering and flying over the city centre before dawn this week. Mystery surrounds what the blinking lights in the sky were and where they came from, but it is the first time a phenomenon that has sparked conspiracy theories across the world has been captured on film in Bristol.

The man, who is from South Bristol and doesn’t want to be identified, said he was standing near Cabot Circus car park at 5.30am on the morning of Wednesday, January 14, when he saw one drone and then realised it was being joined by up to seven others.

The video he recorded on his phone shows one small craft with a number of flashing lights lit up against the pre-dawn night sky, as the man exclaims: “What the f- is that?!” He then realises there are others, and the sky above him is actually full of similar craft.

“They were flying over the centre from all sorts of directions and heading towards Kingswood way,” he told Bristol Live.

“I saw two that came from what looked like the South of Bristol and were heading towards Kingswood way, that’s where I lost them. I must have seen around 8. They all headed in the same direction from their various points,” he added.

At one point in the video, when he realises there are many more than the original one he saw, the man joked: “We’re being invaded!”

The man is adamant they were not aeroplanes, and Bristol Live research appears to confirm this. According to air traffic control data, at 5.30am on Wednesday, there were just two planes in the sky high anywhere near Bristol, as transatlantic flights begin to arrive on their flight path to London’s airports.

READ MORE: Man calls police about ‘UFO’ over BristolREAD MORE: UFO captured flying over south Bristol in video

All flights that morning took a course to the south of the city, flying directly over Nailsea, Whitchurch and Keynsham – not over the city centre.

The first flight that might possibly have been visible was a flight from Toronto to Heathrow which was at 23,000ft and was already over Bath at 5.30am, while a second flight from New York still hadn’t yet reached Bristol – it was directly over Backwell at 5.30am, again at a height of 23,000ft.

The video filmed from Cabot Circus show lights that were much lower, hovered and then moved- and there were as many as eight of them.

“Other people must have seen them too,” the man told Bristol Live..”