Michael Strainic, the group's national director, said a number of the sightings could be astronomical objects - the planet Venus and the star Sirius - but MUFON is convinced a large number of sightings are completely different. "Too many people are seeing something move away at great speed and that's just not compatible with a star or planet sighting," said Strainic. His group, which consists of a network of scientists across the globe, is working on two theories. The first theory is that the mysterious lights belong to an American military gadget which is being tested in the North. The second theory is that the lights are unexplainable. MUFON is the same group which investigated a number of daylight UFO sightings in British Columbia last year.

Meanwhile, in Fort Resolution where the mysterious lights first gained notoriety earlier this year, trappers and motorists are now saying the lights have begun to follow them. A Fort Resolution resident who was a guest on a national talk show last week said lights have flown overhead of vehicles, causing their engines to mysteriously go dead. When the lights leave, the vehicle engines roar back to life. "Unsettling" is a word used by many UFO investigators who believe that something out of this world is out there. But answers are few and far between, as we've seen here over the last few weeks.

While the Canadian military, an Alberta UFO watchdog group and now MUFON investigate the sightings, Northern residents can't help but be a little perplexed themselves. Questions come to mind like: why would aliens be looking at the South Slave region? Are they entranced by the Northern lights? What could they possibly want with the people of Fort Resolution or other South Slave and Deh Cho communities? Skeptics, of course, will never concede that alien space ships could actually be the reason for the lights and mysterious engine failures. They will continue to buy into alternate, feet-on-the-ground theories of American military gadgets and renegade stars. But somewhere in the back of every mind is a bit of lingering doubt. What would we do and how would we react if the lights really were spacecraft from another world trying to make contact with the human race? Perhaps we'd invite them in for bannock and tea and a little chat about how the European fur ban would destroy the Northern economy.