South Island UFO

Jonny Grady, a long-time committee member, sent an image he'd taken of a “UFO” to the committee last week:

Sadly he accompanied the image with a link offering a mundane explanation for this celestial orb:

https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/488041/nasa-s-balloon-launches-from-wanaka

You don't even need to click that link to see that this was, apparently, a NASA weather balloon that had been launched from Wanaka.

Interestingly, Stuff reported that rather than UFO being suggested as an explanation, they had seen “Chinese weather balloon” being mentioned. Given the recent “weather” balloon kerfuffle between the United States and China, I figure that this guess is a lot more down to earth (I'm seriously sorry for this pun, I promise it happened accidentally) than suggesting it's aliens. Weirdly, the lack of anyone mentioning aliens didn't stop Stuff from putting the word UFO in their headline:

What is that white saggy balloon in the sky? Cantabrians mind blown after spotting UFO

Finally, one thing the article did have which I really liked was a picture of the balloon still on the ground, being prepped for launch. Yay for science!