Denis Plunkett is a 77-year-old retired civil servant who enjoys nothing better than playing skittles with his friends in Winterbourne, spending time with his nine grandchildren or doing a spot of DIY.But Denis is also one of the world's leading ufologists. He is the founder and chairman of the British Flying Saucer Bureau (BFSB) and for 60 years has been documenting UFO sightings, which he believes shows that extraterrestrials are documenting us in preparation for them to one day land on Earth.
His interest in the subject began when he was in the RAF during the Second World War, but his research really took off after the mysterious death of his cousin, whose plane disappeared over Chile in 1947, following reports of UFOs by astronomers in the area.
Sitting on a comfy chair in the living room of the small home which he shares with his wife ("she tolerates me"), Denis explained that belief in UFOs and extraterrestrial life has gone up from 10 per cent of the population to 80 per cent over the 50-plus years the BFSB has existed.
"Some of the stories I hear are out of this world," Denis said, with not a hint of irony. "And now, with radar and more advanced cameras, sightings can be corroborated by non-human means to support the story you have told."
However, while the BFSB once thrived, with monthly meetings in Bristol and regular moonlit walks in the countryside on the lookout for unexplained lights in the sky, it is currently in a period of stasis.
Most ufologists these days prefer to get the latest information from the internet rather than in a photocopied newsletter or slide show in a community centre on Gloucester Road.
This could spell doom for fans of little green men but Denis is not disheartened. While the BFSB might soon be forced to wind down, Bristol has in recent months become a hotbed of UFO activity with sightings this year reported in Longwell Green, Lawrence Weston and Shirehampton.
In all his years as a UFO devotee, Denis has only seen a UFO once. It happened in 1966 soon after he moved into his new home on Branksome Drive, where he still lives.
Denis remembers it well. "It was so brilliant. When you get a sighting, you remember it for ever.
"My wife and I saw nine objects in a small area of the sky from our back garden. They hung around for about half an hour. During all that time, eight of them stayed where they were and the other one went in the direction of Frampton Cottrell. We watched them enthralled.
"We went through a mental checklist. They were not helicopters. It was not night refuelling. There was total silence as they moved around in the night sky and then they suddenly disappeared. It was in the Post the next day."
Denis's firm belief in the existence of UFOs is based on testimony from eyewitnesses and also the fact that no human machine could do what this "out of this world technology" has been seen to do, for example travelling at one-and-a-half times the speed of sound and dropping and rising thousands of feet in seconds, all in total silence.
Denis believes that his belief in the existence of UFOs cost him promotions at work, but for almost 60 years that belief has been unwavering and is something his friends and family have learned to accept as part of who he is.
"It all sounds unbelievable, I know," Denis said. "But what I say to people is if I'm wrong, what's the explanation for all these sightings that have taken place. And it's not just in Winterbourne. It's all over the world.
"My wife tolerates me, as do all my family and friends. I have been like this for 60 years. They know how I feel. The die is cast. I'm not going to change.
"I think I have been taken over in the nicest possible way. I'm convinced in my diagnosis of all these sightings."
Will the culmination of this extraterrestrial documentation mean that aliens will one day land on Earth? Denis was, for once, unwilling to go into much detail.
"I have got a human mind, and the human mind can only visualise so much. I do not want to tell certain things to other people because that might alarm them. I would rather that people become interested like I am and follow what I do in a normal way."
(Original headline: 60 YEARS OF LOOKING FOR ALIENS )
