Idaho tops a list of the nation’s states with the most reported sightings of unidentified flying objects per capita leading into this year’s annual UFO Awareness Day on Thursday.
Texas rounds out the rankings, meanwhile, which were calculated using state population data and statistics from the National UFO Reporting Center, or NUFORC.
Founded in 1975, the NUFORC has logged tens of thousands of supposed UFO sightings during the subsequent decades, including 3,808 within just the first six months of 2020.
Another group known as the World UFO Day Organization has for several years held the annual awareness day on July 2 “to celebrate the fact that there is more out there.”
Web company Satellite Internet determined the states with the most and least UFO sightings per capita and published its findings ahead of this year’s awareness day.
At least 164 UFO sightings have been reported this year in Iowa, or around 9.18 sightings for every 100,000 residents, making it the states with the most sightings per capita, according to the company. Montana, New Hampshire, Maine and New Mexico trailed Iowa to round out the top five, respectively.
Yet while Texas has been home to more than double the number of supposed UFO sightings in 2020 compared to Iowa — 375 as of June — that translates to only 1.29 sightings per 100,000 residents, according to Satellite’s data, making it last on the list of states with the most UFO sightings per capita. Other states low in the list include Louisiana in second-to-last place and New York, Maryland and Illinois.
Overall, the total number of UFO sightings reported to NUFORC has recently been on the rise, Satellite added. The number of sightings logged by the organization went up from 3,456 in 2018 to 6,340 in 2019, and it was already up 112% during the first three months of 2020 compared to the year before, according to its report.
