But that is exactly what one man chanced upon without even realising it when he thought he was taking a picturesque photograph of the sea.
The witness had been taking a stroll in Black Head at Trenarren near St Austell, Cornwall at around 5pm on August 1, when he pulled out his camera to capture a snap of the sea.
In a strange twist, it was not until he later downloaded the photograph from his digital camera onto his computer that he noticed the mysterious 'flying object' hovering above.
The photograph of the circular object has now been unveiled at the Cornwall UFO Research Group (CUFORG), which was founded by Dave Gillham in 1995.
He said: 'The person who took the photo never saw anything in the area while taking the photo.
'It was only when he got home and downloaded it onto his computer that he saw an object - a disc shaped craft, hovering just above the sea.
'There appear to be two trails of water beneath the object which looks as though they are falling from it in to the sea.
'It could be that the object has just emerged from the sea.'
Mr Gillham could not shed any further light on the origins of the object, which has left many scratching their heads for an explanation.
Other observers have a more straight forward answer - it is merely a seagull doing to the loo mid-flight.
A spokesman for the Royal Navy air base at nearby Culdrose confirmed that no military aircraft were in the area at the time.
He said: 'Culdrose did not have any aircraft airborne after 5pm on Monday August 1 so any helicopter in the St Austell area was not one of ours.
'As the airfield was closed until approximately 19.00 when the SAR was scrambled to an incident at Newquay the radar was not manned between 17.00 and 19.00.
'It is always possible of course that a civilian helicopter could have been in the vicinity of St Austell around 17.14.'