| The unknown percentages for discoidal and spherical objects are also close, considering that both spheres and discs are sometimes reported as circular UFOs, which occupy a separate slice of the chart. Combined, the latter three shape categories account for 42.4% and 56.3%, respectively, of the U.S. and non-U.S. unknowns.
I was a bit surprised the non-U.S. slate of unknowns didn’t include a single square or rectangular UFO, a category normally boasting a small, yet persistent number of U.S. entrants year after year. But the 3.2% of U.S. square/rectangular cases reflects only eight cases out of 250 unknowns, however, so they’re not common sights by any means. On the other hand, use of the trademark “Tic Tac” to refer to UFOs having the peculiar shape of the iconic mint seems to be confined to the U.S., thanks to David Fravor’s use of this term to describe the object he saw in 2004 over the Pacific. Since 2017, when his case received nationwide publicity, U.S. witnesses routinely pronounce stubby-cylindrical or tablet-shaped UFOs as tic tacs. In the world outside the U.S., however, they’re still cylinders. |
