Former US astronaut Dr Edgar Mitchell ignites the debate about aliens making contact on earth.

Dr Mitchell, a veteran of the Apollo 14 mission, who, along with commander Alan Shepard holds the record for the longest-ever moon walk during the 1971 mission, said yesterday that extra-terrestrials had paid repeated visits to our planet but the encounters were kept secret by government agencies.

NASA officials were quick to dismiss the suggestion of a cover-up.

Dr Mitchell has made similar claims previously and is a self-proclaimed devotee of paranormal phenomena.

"I happen to have been privileged enough to be in on the fact that we've been visited on this planet and the UFO phenomena is real," Dr Mitchell said.

"It's been covered up by all our governments for the last 60 years or so, but slowly it's leaked out and some of us have been privileged to have been briefed on some of it.

"I've been in military and intelligence circles, who know that beneath the surface of what has been public knowledge, yes - we have been visited."

He said the aliens were similar to the traditional image, having a small frame, large eyes and head.

He claimed our technology was "not as sophisticated" as theirs and "had they been hostile we would be been gone by now".

UFO Sighting Reported for 2008....thus far

On the 17th of March, a school teacher was walking her dogs along the shore of Lake Wallace near Lithgow. It was 6am in the morning and still dark enough to see the stars. She saw what she thought was a shooting star, but it suddenly stopped and made a right hand turn. She described the object as very high in altitude travelling south and suddenly turning west.

Bankstown - 24th February. J was sitting on the back veranda with his wife when he noticed a white light moving across the sky. Whilst he was trying to determine which type of object it could be, it stopped dead and then disappeared without making a sound. He believed that such a small light was probably quite distant from him, but that nothing could explain this disappearing trick. This sighting actually turned out to be a daytime one in which the time of the event was late AM. The object moved easterly, that is, from left to right in front of the witness. He even called his wife back after it suddenly stopped. It wasn't so much the type of light in the day that would bring much attention, it was the fact that it was moving too fast and then stopped too suddenly - and after all of that, it suddenly vanished. After gnawing over it for a while, he felt he had no choice but to try and tell someone. He rang 12455 and was given the UFO hotline details.

Newcastle - 11th April 6.55pm. S and her husband were sitting outside when they noticed two 'stars', one above the other and as they watched, the bottom one ascended slowly and 'merged' with the other. It took about 10 minutes for this to happen. They were hovering and then they faded out. She rang the Williamtown air base who said that they 'don't do UFO reports' and gave her the hotline number. They were looking towards East Maitland, in the easterly sky. She descried the objects as starlike.

Eastwood - 28th April 21.00. It was a shiny blue fluorescent ball of light. First thought it to be a plane as it was traveling around plane height. We noticed it because it was very bright, unusually bright for a plane. Me and my fiance were checking it out and talking. After a couple of seconds it sped up, left a light trail and disappeared.

Glenreagh - 26th June 5.30pm. I was loading firewood at the back door just on dark and noticed a bigger than normal bright light moving across the sky. It was very bright which made it hard to determine the exact shape. The object was about 10-times larger than a star and brighter. It seemed to be only a couple of kilometres away and moving at a slow, even pace in a straight line. It was too close for a satellite. It was not a plane as it was silent and flying much lower. It can only be described as a 'ball of light'. It was a very still and quiet night and there was no sound of any aircraft motor, though once it started getting further away we both thought we could hear a slight humming sound. A few minutes later an aeroplane flew past and it was a lot further away than the object and we could easily hear the noise of its motor and see its flashing lights, even though it was a lot further away.

Note by agent: There was an Iridium satellite with a possible flare at 5.48pm. The path, however, was SSE - NNW. The unknown in the report was travelling on an opposite flight path.

Nowra - 30th June 11:30am. Flying low and slow over golf course Nowra, Greenwell Point Road and flying west east. I was halted at an intersection at Worrigee facing north towards Terrara. In front of me was a military helicopter following another craft about two lengths behind. The front craft was a rounded triangle shape, about the size of the helicopter without tail or rotor blades. I sat for a while trying to work out what I was looking at. The bottom half of craft was grey/blackish and silverish on top. Many aircrafts fly over our area and my home but have never seen anything like it. For this past year there has been many 'unusual' aircrafts 'buzzing' our neighbourhood.