Everyone knows what a UFO is – it’s an unidentified flying object – but few people are familiar with its sister phenomenon the USO – the unidentified submerged object. USOs are reported far less frequently than its relative, as so few people have access to underwater sightings. The encounters do happen however.

One sighting comes from an area just 20 miles south of Malta, where some men were fishing from their own small ship, Hecklerspray.com reports. They saw what they first took to be a monster (which they later described as looking a bit like a black submarine) floating on the water’s surface, and panicked. They brought in their nets and started the engine when a bright light flashed from the craft. When it did, several creatures were seen running around on its deck. The men said the creatures were about the size of a 10-year-old boy, and had an apparatus around their waists that could only be seen during the ship’s periodic flashes of light. When the small creatures clambered back into their craft, it glowed so brightly it couldn’t be looked at, and went under water.