flying saucer

From an interview given by amateur pilot Kenneth Arnold who described seeing nine flying objects that were "moving like saucers being skimmed across a lake". The description was not meant to describe the shape of the objects, only how they maneuvered, yet the misinterpretation took hold and gained popularity.

flying saucer (plural flying saucers)

1. (informal) A disc-shaped unidentified flying object or UFO; originally in reference to sightings by aviator Kenneth Arnold in Washington in 1947.

   Some connect the recent spate of flying saucer sightings with a rumored top-secret military aviation project.

   • 1950 December 6, The Sydney Morning Herald, page 3, column 5:

     An engram is NOT [...] One of the little green men Americans claim have crashed in flying saucers.

2. (science fiction) An alien interplanetary vessel, typically disc-shaped and of metallic construction.
3. A form of confectionery, a small spheroidal capsule of rice paper filled with sherbet.

• (flying craft): saucercraft

• flying saucer group