THEY are more used to dealing with calls reporting crime and anti-social behaviour.

But Nottinghamshire Police have also experienced a number of rather other-worldly enquiries from members of the public.

New figures from the force reveal a total of 21 UFO sightings in the county were recorded in 11 calls to the force control room between November 1 in 2003 and October 31 this year.

One caller reported seven sightings in Eastwood, followed by another five from two callers in Newark.

A Notts Police spokesman said: "While we would advise the public to contact the Civil Aviation Authority to report any sightings, we do receive the occasional report of a UFO to the control room.

"In the event of a call, we would contact the East Midlands air traffic control to see if they are aware of anything that could be a UFO and report the sighting to them."

In May this year, police quashed extra-terrestrial speculation by saying a suspected UFO seen in Beeston was actually a force helicopter.

The Post reported how residents claimed to have seen a bright and stationary triangular light hovering over the town square, with a loud noise at 11.30pm on Saturday, May 10.

Further sightings were reported in Long Eaton and Ilkeston.

But a police spokesman said the helicopter had been investigating a green laser flashed at the aircraft from the ground. Officers later confiscated the laser from an unnamed youth.

The new figures on UFO sightings follow the release in August last year of a Ministry of Defence list of UFO sightings across Britain, including ten in Notts bet- ween 1999 and 2006.

They included one sighting of two lines of lights in the sky over RAF Newton in 1987, said to look like a "flying football pitch".

The information was released after a series of requests under the Freedom of Information Act.

PC Lee Roberts, of Radford Road Police Station, the leader of the Ashfield Para- normal Investigation Unit, said: "Our unit has been inundated with calls from places including Eastwood, South Normanton, Hucknall and Sutton-in-Ashfield.

"A lot have been reporting lights in the sky and unknown formations.

"I think people have become more aware of our work. We've had people contact us 12 years after they saw something they couldn't explain. They said they hadn't reported it because they didn't know who to go to."

guy.woodford@nottinghameveningpost.co.uk