A LIFEBOAT crew’s excitement at the chance to be the first to make contact with aliens turned out to be less dramatic than hoped for.

The volunteers of New Brighton Lifeboat Station were called up by HM Coastguard Liverpool to investigate reports of a silver object seen to fall from the sky into the sea.

With weather conditions good, the lifeboat Charles Dibdin was dispatched to investigate to the site where the mystery object had fallen, in the River Mersey between Fort Perch Rock, in New Brighton, and the coastguard station in Crosby.

Cliff Downing, lifeboat operations manager, said: “Our volunteer crew were excited at the possibility of being the first RNLI unit to make contact with extra-terrestrial life and launched the boat in record time.

“When they reached the scene, the object was still floating – it seemed to have several components to it like a huge silver jellyfish.

“Close examination revealed that this was not something from the outer solar system, but a series of balloons tied together, presumably from a wedding or birthday celebration.

“We recovered the item because it would have been a hazard had it wrapped around a ship propeller.”