Oliver Rowlands, who lives near Stoke-on-Trent in Staffordshire, claims he was surrounded by glowing "orbs" before a "mothership" the size of a football field repeatedly flew over his head.

Oliver returned to the well-known UFO hotspot to record a second encounter on a mobile phone, and now believes he is able to attract the mysterious craft using torch signals.

Oliver's first paranormal experience since a sighting in Dovedale in 1993 came on a Sunday evening around six weeks ago.

He was heading towards Bonsall from the Tissington area with a friend at around 1.30am when the pair spotted something in the sky.

"We saw two stars – or at least they looked like stars, but they were moving about a bit.

"I gave them a flash with my torch and they started coming down towards us."

Oliver said he and his colleague were soon surrounded by orange and yellow orbs that even seemed to be emitting laser beams.

The most amazing sight was yet to come as what he described as "a mothership" appeared.

"It was the size of a football pitch but it was made up of pure, white light. It was amazing, though the light almost blinded us."

Oliver returned to the area a few weeks later with a different friend and claims he was again able to attract the orbs using a torch.

"Before we knew it there were hundreds of them swarming around us.

"We just tried to film it the best we could.

"It's fascinating – there's definitely something going on up there."

Oliver is currently transferring the footage from his mobile phone onto a DVD so that he can get a better look at it.

Bonsall has been linked with unidentified flying objects since at least 2001 when a woman captured six minutes of video footage that was hailed by some experts as "the best UFO video ever".

The film was sold to an American television station.

Story by Jim Taylor

To comment email us at news@matlockmercury.co.uk