Aurora, Texas, UFO incident

The Aurora, Texas, UFO incident reportedly occurred on April 17, 1897 when, according to locals, a UFO crashed on a farm near Aurora, Texas. The incident (similar to the more famous Roswell UFO incident 50 years later) is claimed to have resulted in a fatality of the pilot. The pilot was "not of this world" and was said to be an alien. The pilot was buried at the Aurora cemetery. A stone was placed as a marker for the grave, but has since been removed.Reportedly, wreckage from the crash site was dumped into a nearby well located under the damaged windmill, while some ended up with the alien in the grave. Adding to the mystery was the story of Mr. Brawley Oates, who purchased Judge Proctor's property around 1935. Oates cleaned out the debris from the well in order to use it as a water source, but later developed an extremely severe case of arthritis, which he claimed to be the result of contaminated water from the wreckage dumped into the well. As a result, Oates sealed up the well with a concrete slab and placed an outbuilding atop the slab. (According to writing on the slab, this was done in 1945.The hoax theory is primarily based on a 1980 Time magazine interviewed Etta Pegues, an 86 year old Aurora resident who claimed that Haydon had fabricated the entire story, stating that Haydon "wrote it as a joke and to bring interest to Aurora. The railroad bypassed us, and the town was dying." Pegues further claimed that Judge Proctor never operated a windmill on his property, a statement later refuted as part of the UFO Hunters episode, which found the base of a wooden water pump tower constructed around the well.

On December 19, 2005, UFO Files first aired an episode related to this incident, titled "Texas' Roswell". The episode featured a 1973 investigation led by Bill Case, an aviation writer for the Dallas Times Herald and the Texas state director of Mutual UFO Network (MUFON).

MUFON uncovered two new eyewitnesses to the crash. Mary Evans, who was 15 at the time, told of how her parents went to the crash site (they forbade her from going) and the discovery of the alien body. Charlie Stephens, who was age 10, told how he saw the airship trailing smoke as it headed north toward Aurora. He wanted to see what happened, but his father made him finish his chores; later, he told how his father went to town the next day and saw wreckage from the crash.

MUFON then investigated the Aurora Cemetery and uncovered a grave marker that appeared to show a flying saucer of some sort, as well as readings from its metal detector. MUFON asked for permission to exhume the site, but the cemetery association declined permission. After the MUFON investigation, the marker mysteriously disappeared from the cemetery and a three-inch pipe was placed into the ground; MUFON's metal detector no longer picked up metal readings from the grave, thus it was presumed that the metal was removed from the grave.

MUFON's report eventually stated that the evidence was inconclusive, but did not rule out the possibility of a hoax. The episode featured an interview with Mayor Brammer who discussed the town's tragic history.

Height 611 UFO incident

Height 611 UFO incident refers to an alleged UFO crash in Dalnegorsk, Primorsky Krai, Soviet Union, on January 29, 1986. Height 611 (also known as Mount Izvestkovaya) is a hill located on the territory of the town.

A reddish ball was noticed by the inhabitants of the town at around 8 PM on that date. Eyewitnesses say that the ball appeared to be the size of half of the moon's disc. The ball was flying parallel to the ground; there were no sounds accompanying the flight.It was later determined that the speed of the object was approximately 15 m/s (34 mph), and that it was flying about 700–800 meters above the ground. When the object reached Height 611, it started to descend and then crashed into the hill. All witnesses but one say there was no sound when the object reached the ground.

The process of the descent was described differently by eyewitnesses. Some said the object fell down with a flash and was not visible after that; others claimed it oscillated in altitude above the hill, radiating light of varying intensity as it went up and down. The light given off by the object was described by some like a forest fire, which lasted for approximately one hour.

Some rocks at the impact site had drops of silvery metal, which were later determined to be lead. The type of lead found on Height 611 was different from the lead found in local lead deposits. Also, black, glassy, drop-shaped beads and mesh fragments were found at the site. In all, approximately 70 g of lead, 5 g of mesh fragments, and 40 g of beads were discovered. The radiation level of the landing ground was normal. The group took pictures of the site using two different cameras; however, the film later developed as blank.

Chemical analyses of the beads showed they were mostly composed of lead, silicon, and iron. Some of the drops contained significant amounts of zinc, bismuth, and rare earth elements. An analysis of the soil, rocks, and burnt wood taken from the landing ground was also performed. It was noted that the chemical composition was similar to the composition of similar samples taken from the site of the Tunguska event.

The mesh fragments were also analyzed. The material of which the fragments were composed did not dissolve in strong acids and organic solvents, even when exposed to high temperatures for prolonged periods of time. One of the mesh fragments was discovered to be composed of scandium, gold, lanthanum, sodium, and samarium. An analysis of another mesh fragment showed gold, silver, and nickel. After that fragment was heated in a vacuum, the analysis no longer showed these elements; however, molybdenum and rhenium were detected.

The concentration of gold detected in one of the mesh fragments was equivalent to 1,100 g per metric ton. This is much higher than gold deposits in the region, which become economic to extract when the concentration of gold reaches 4 g per metric ton. There are no gold deposits in Dalnegorsk that contain gold at concentrations high enough to extract.

Similar flying balls were detected over the territory of Dalnegorsky, Kavalerovsky District, Olginsky, and Terneysky District of Primorsky Krai in November 1987. One of the balls was noticed above Height 611 illuminating the ground on the peak of the hill. The descriptions of these balls given by witnesses match the descriptions of the UFO that crashed on Height 611 in 1986.

A claim of a UFO landing on Height 611 was also made in 1989.

Kecksburg UFO incident

The Kecksburg UFO incident occurred on December 9, 1965, at Kecksburg, Pennsylvania, United States in North America, when a fireball was reported by citizens of six U.S. states and Canada over Detroit, Michigan and Windsor, Canada. Astronomers said it was likely a meteor bolide burning up in the atmosphere and descending at a steep angle. NASA released a statement in 2005 reporting that experts had examined fragments from the area and determined they were from a Soviet satellite, but records of their findings were lost in the 1990s. NASA responded to court orders and Freedom of Information Act requests to search for the records. The incident gained wide notoriety in popular culture and UFOlogy, with speculations ranging from alien craft to debris from the Soviet space probe Kosmos 96, and is often referred to as "Pennsylvania's Roswell".

On the evening of December 9, 1965, a large, brilliant fireball was seen by thousands in at least six U.S. states and Ontario, Canada. It streaked over the Detroit, Michigan – Windsor, Canada area. Reports of hot metal debris over Michigan and northern Ohio, grass fires. and sonic booms in the Pittsburgh metropolitan area were attributed to the fireball. Some people in the village of Kecksburg, about 30 miles (48 km) southeast of Pittsburgh, reported something crashing in the woods, wisps of blue smoke, vibrations, and a "thump".

According to an initial story in the Greensburg Tribune-Review:

"The area where the object landed was immediately sealed off on the order of U.S. Army and State Police officials, reportedly in anticipation of a 'close inspection' of whatever may have fallen ... State Police officials there ordered the area roped off to await the expected arrival of both U.S. Army engineers and possibly, civilian scientists."

When State troopers and Air Force personnel searched the woods, they reportedly found "absolutely nothing" A subsequent edition in the Tribune-Review bore the headline "Searchers Fail To Find Object".

Authorities discounted proposed explanations such as a plane crash, errant missile test, or reentering satellite debris and generally assumed it to be a meteor. Astronomer Paul Annear said the fireball was likely a meteor entering the Earth's atmosphere. Geophysicist George Wetherilo discounted speculations that it was debris from a satellite and agreed the reports were probably due to a meteor. Astronomers William P. Bidelman and Fred Hess said it undoubtedly was a meteor bolide. A spokesman for the Defense Department in Washington said first reports indicated the reported fireball was a natural phenomenon

Several articles were written about the fireball in science journals. The February 1966 issueof Sky & Telescope reported that the fireball was seen over the Detroit-Windsor area at about 4:44 p.m. EST. The Federal Aviation Administration had received 23 reports from aircraft pilots, the first starting at 4:44 p.m. A seismograph 25 miles southwest of Detroit had recorded the shock waves created by the fireball as it passed through the atmosphere. The Sky & Telescope article concluded that "the path of the fireball extended roughly from northwest to southeast" and ended "in or near the western part of Lake Erie".

Journal of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada

A 1967 article by two astronomers in the Journal of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada (JRASC) used the seismographic record to pinpoint the time of passage over the Detroit area to 4:43 p.m. In addition, they used photographs of the trail taken north of Detroit at two different locations to triangulate the trajectory of the object. They concluded that the fireball was descending at a steep angle, moving from the southwest to the northeast, and likely impacted on the northwestern shore of Lake Erie near Windsor, Ontario.

In December 2005, just before the 40th anniversary of the Kecksburg incident, NASA released a statement reporting that experts had examined metallic fragments from the area and determined they were from a Russian satellite that re-entered the atmosphere and broke up, but records of their findings were lost in the 1990s.

Leslie Kean, described as "an investigative reporter backed by the Sci-Fi Channel", reportedly "sued NASA under the Freedom of Information Act" for the lost NASA records. On October 26, 2007, NASA agreed to search for those records after being ordered by a court. During the hearing, Steve McConnell, NASA's public liaison officer, testified that two boxes of papers from the time of the Kecksburg incident were missing.Loss of records is not a unique case for NASA; for example, the original tapes recorded during the televised Apollo 11 Moon landing were misplaced or reused.

In 2008, space writer James Oberg suggested that NASA was unlikely to possess any such documents since, in his view, it was highly likely that the supposed NASA team that investigated the site were in fact Air Force personnel who identified themselves as NASA personnel, something regularly done by military personnel in civilian clothes during the 1960s. He further suggested that Kean's action was no more than a "publicity stunt" for the benefit of Kean's employers.

According to John Ventre of MUFON and Shafton native Owen Eichler, their recent investigations have led them to speculate the object that reportedly landed in Kecksburg was "a General Electric Mark 2 Re-entry Vehicle that had been launched by the Air Force as a spy satellite, but fell out of orbit", however, “we need confirmation from NASA or the Air Force".

More recent comments by NASA are less supportive of a link to a Russian satellite:

There is some speculation that the reentry of the Cosmos 96/Venera-type spacecraft was responsible for a fireball which was seen over southwestern Ontario, Canada and at least eight states from Michigan to New York at 4:43 p.m. EST (21:43 UT) on 9 December 1965. Investigations of photographs and sightings of the fireball indicated its path through the atmosphere was probably too steep to be consistent with a spacecraft re-entering from Earth orbit and was more likely a meteor in a prograde orbit from the vicinity of the asteroid belt, and probably ended its flight over western Lake Erie. U.S. Air Force tracking data on Cosmos 96 also indicate the spacecraft orbit decayed earlier than 21:43 UT on 9 December. Other unconfirmed reports state the fireball subsequently landed in Pennsylvania southeast of Pittsburgh near the town of Kecksburg (40.2 N, 79.5 W) at 4:46 p.m. EST (although estimating the impact point of fireballs from eyewitness accounts is notoriously inaccurate). Uncertainties in the orbital information and reentry coordinates and time make it difficult to determine definitively if the fireball could have been the Cosmos 96 spacecraft.

Rendlesham Forest incident

In late December 1980, there was a series of reported sightings of unexplained lights near Rendlesham Forest, Suffolk, England, which have become linked with claims of UFO landings. The events occurred just outside RAF Woodbridge, which was used at the time by the United States Air Force (USAF). USAF personnel, including deputy base commander Lieutenant Colonel Charles I. Halt, claimed to see things they described as a UFO sighting.

The occurrence is the most famous of claimed UFO events to have happened in the United Kingdom,ranking among the best-known reported UFO events worldwide. It has been compared to the Roswell UFO incident in the United States and is sometimes referred to as "Britain's Roswell".

The UK Ministry of Defence stated the event posed no threat to national security, and it therefore never was investigated as a security matter. Skeptics have explained the sightings as a misinterpretation of a series of nocturnal lights: a fireball, the Orfordness Lighthouse and bright stars.

26 December

Around 3:00 a.m. on 26 December 1980 (reported as the 27th by Halt in his memo to the UK Ministry of Defence – see below) a security patrol near the east gate of RAF Woodbridge saw lights apparently descending into nearby Rendlesham Forest. These lights have been attributed by astronomers to a piece of natural debris seen burning up as a fireball over southern England at that time.Servicemen initially thought it was a downed aircraft but, upon entering the forest to investigate they saw, according to Halt's memo, what they described as a glowing object, metallic in appearance, with coloured lights. As they attempted to approach the object, it appeared to move through the trees, and "the animals on a nearby farm went into a frenzy". One of the servicemen, Sergeant Jim Penniston, later claimed to have encountered a "craft of unknown origin" while in the forest, although there was no publicised mention of this at the time and there is no corroboration from other witnesses.

Shortly after 4:00 a.m. local police were called to the scene but reported that the only lights they could see were those from the Orford Ness lighthouse, some miles away on the coast.

After daybreak on the morning of 26 December, servicemen returned to a small clearing near the eastern edge of the forest and found three small impressions on the ground in a triangular pattern, as well as burn marks and broken branches on nearby trees. At 10:30 a.m. the local police were called out again, this time to see the impressions, which they thought could have been made by an animal. Georgina Bruni, in her book You Can't Tell the People, published a photograph of the supposed landing site taken on the morning after the first sighting.

28 December

The deputy base commander, Lieutenant Colonel Charles Halt, visited the site with several servicemen in the early hours of 28 December 1980 (reported as the 29th by Halt). They took radiation readings in the triangle of depressions and in the surrounding area using an AN/PDR-27, a standard U.S. military radiation survey meter. Although they recorded 0.07 milliroentgens per hour, in other regions they detected 0.03 to 0.04 milliroentgens per hour, around the background level. Furthermore, they detected a similar small 'burst' over half a mile away from the landing site.Halt recorded the events on a micro-cassette recorder (see § The Halt Tape, below).

It was during this investigation that a flashing light was seen across the field to the east, almost in line with a farmhouse, as the witnesses had seen on the first night. The Orford Ness lighthouse is visible further to the east in the same line of sight (see below).

Later, according to Halt's memo, three star-like lights were seen in the sky, two to the north and one to the south, about 10 degrees above the horizon. Halt said that the brightest of these hovered for two to three hours and seemed to beam down a stream of light from time to time. Astronomers have explained these star-like lights as bright stars.

Rendlesham Forest is owned by the Forestry Commission and consists of about 5.8 square miles (15 km²) of coniferous plantations, interspersed with broadleaved belts, heathland and wetland areas. It is located in the county of Suffolk, about 8 miles (13 km) east of the town of Ipswich.

Map of local area

The incident occurred in the vicinity of two former military bases: RAF Bentwaters, which is just to the north of the forest, and RAF Woodbridge which extends into the forest from the west and is bounded by the forest on its northern and eastern edges. At the time, both were being used by the United States Air Force and were under the command of wing commander Colonel Gordon E. Williams. The base commander was Colonel Ted Conrad, and his deputy was Lieutenant Colonel Charles I. Halt.

The main events of the incident, including the supposed landing or landings, took place in the forest, which starts at the east end of the base runway or about 0.3 miles (0.5 km) to the east of the East Gate of RAF Woodbridge, from where security guards first noticed mysterious lights appearing to descend into the forest. The forest extends east about one mile (1.6 km) beyond East Gate, ending at a farmer's field at Capel Green, where additional events allegedly took place.

Orfordness Lighthouse, which sceptics identify as the flashing light seen off to the coast by the airmen, is along the same line of sight about 5 miles (8.0 km) further east of the forest's edge. At that time it was one of the brightest lighthouses in the UK.

The Halt memo

The first piece of primary evidence to be made available to the public was a memorandum written by the deputy base commander, Lieutenant Colonel Charles I. Halt, to the Ministry of Defence (MoD). Known as the "Halt memo", this was made publicly available in the United States under the U.S. Freedom of Information Act in 1983. The memorandum, was dated "13 Jan 1981" under the title "Unexplained Lights". The two-week delay between the incident and the report might account for errors in the dates and times given. The memo was not classified in any way. Dr. David Clarke, a consultant to the National Archives, has investigated the background of this memo and the reaction to it at the MoD. His interviews with the personnel involved confirmed the cursory nature of the investigation made by the MoD, and failed to find any evidence for any other reports on the incident made by the USAF or UK apart from the Halt memo. Halt has since gone on record as saying he believes that he witnessed an extraterrestrial event that was then covered up.

Suffolk police log

Suffolk police were called to the scene on the night of the initial sighting and again the following morning but found nothing unusual. On the night of the initial incident they reported that the only lights visible were from the Orford lighthouse. They attributed the indentations in the ground to animals. The Suffolk constabulary file on the case was released in 2005 under the UK’s Freedom of Information Act and can be accessed on their website. It includes a letter dated 28 July 1999 written by Inspector Mike Topliss who notes that one of the police constables who attended the scene on the first night returned to the site in daylight in case he had missed something. "There was nothing to be seen and he remains unconvinced that the occurrence was genuine," wrote Topliss. "The immediate area was swept by powerful light beams from a landing beacon at RAF Bentwaters and the Orfordness lighthouse. I know from personal experience that at night, in certain weather and cloud conditions, these beams were very pronounced and certainly caused strange visual effects.

Ministry of Defence file

Evidence of a substantial MoD file on the subject led to claims of a cover-up; some interpreted this as part of a larger pattern of information suppression concerning the true nature of unidentified flying objects, by both the United States and British governments. However, when the file was released in 2001 it turned out to consist mostly of internal correspondence and responses to inquiries from the public. The lack of any in-depth investigation in the publicly released documents is consistent with the MoD's earlier statement that they never took the case seriously.Included in the released files is an explanation given by defence minister Lord Trefgarne as to why the MoD did not investigate further. In 2005, the Forestry Commission used Lottery proceeds to create a trail in Rendlesham Forest because of public interest and nicknamed it the UFO Trail. In 2014, the Forestry Service commissioned an artist to create a work which has been installed at the end of the trail. The artist states the piece is modelled on sketches that purportedly represent some versions of the UFO claimed to have been seen at Rendlesham.In 2010, Jenny Randles, who first reported the case in the London Evening Standard in 1981 and co-authored with the local researchers who uncovered the events, the first book on the case in 1984 - Sky Crash: A Cosmic Conspiracy,emphasised her previously expressed doubts that the incident was caused by extraterrestrial visitors. Whilst suggesting that a UAP, an unidentified atmospheric phenomenon of unknown origin, might have caused parts of the case, she noted: "Whilst some puzzles remain, we can probably say that no unearthly craft were seen in Rendlesham Forest. We can also argue with confidence that the main focus of the events was a series of misperceptions of everyday things encountered in less than everyday circumstances.“ ....as December approached, lights and coloured flares were rigged in the woods. Black helium balloons were also coupled to remote-controlled kites to carry suspended materials into the sky, activated by radio-controls

Shag Harbour UFO incident

The Shag Harbour UFO incident was the reported impact of an unknown large object into waters near Shag Harbour, Nova Scotia, a tiny fishing village on the Atlantic coast, on October 4, 1967. The reports were investigated by various civilian (RCMP and Canadian Coast Guard) and military (Canadian Forces navy and air force) and the U.S. Condon Committee.

Air Canada flight 305

En route to Toronto while flying over Sherbrooke and Saint-Jean, Quebec at 3658 m, from the Halifax International airport, Air Canada Capt. Pierre Charbonneau on Flight 305 pointed out to co-pilot Bob Ralphington that there was something strange out the left side of the aircraft at 7:15PM. In his report the captain reported an object tracking along on a parallel course a few miles away. He describes it as a brilliantly lit, rectangular object with a string of smaller lights trailing the object. At 7:19, the pilots noticed a sizeable silent explosion near the large object; two minutes later, a second explosion occurred which faded to a blue cloud around the object.

Yellow object

Darrel Dorey, his sister Annette, and his mother were sitting on their front porch in Mahone Bay, when they noticed a large object manoeuvring above the southwestern horizon. The next day Darrell wrote a letter to RCAF Greenwood Base Commander asking what was flying over the water that evening, as he had never seen anything like it.

RCMP 67-400-23-X

While standing at the wheelhouse of his vessel, Capt. Leo Howard "No Mercy" Mersey was looking at four blips on his Decca radar that were stationary. When he looked up about 28 km from the vessel's windows he could see the four bright objects situated in a roughly rectangular formation. The entire crew of nearly twenty fishermen stood on deck and watched the object in the northeastern sky. Mersey radioed the rescue coordination centre and the harbour master in Halifax asking for an explanation, and filed a report with the Lunenburg RCMP outlining his sighting when they arrived in port.

Halifax Harbour sightings

The Chronicle-Herald and local radio stations reported a glowing object that had been seen by many people who had called their newsroom. They reported witnessing strange glowing objects flying around Halifax at around 10:00 PM.On the night of October 4, 1967, at about 11:20 p.m. Atlantic Daylight Time, it was reported that something had crashed into the waters of Shag Harbour. At least eleven people saw a low-flying lit object head towards the harbour. Multiple witnesses reported hearing a whistling sound "like a bomb," then a "whoosh," and finally a loud bang. The object was never officially identified, and was therefore referred to as an unidentified flying object (UFO) in Government of Canada documents. The Canadian military became involved in a subsequent rescue/recovery effort. The initial report was made by local resident Laurie Wickens and four of his friends. Driving through Shag Harbour, on Highway 3, they spotted a large object descending into the waters off the harbour. Attaining a better vantage point, Wickens and his friends saw an object floating 250 to 300 m (820 to 980 ft) offshore in the waters of Shag Harbour. Wickens contacted the RCMP detachment in Barrington Passage and reported he had seen a large airplane or small airliner crash into the waters off Shag Harbour.

Assuming an aircraft had crashed, within about 15 minutes, 2 RCMP officers arrived at the scene. Concerned for survivors, the RCMP detachment contacted the Rescue Coordination Centre (RCC) in Halifax to advise them of the situation, and ask if any aircraft were missing. Before any attempt at rescue could be made, the object started to sink and disappeared from view.

A rescue mission was quickly assembled. Within half an hour of the crash, local fishing boats went out to the crash site in the waters of the Gulf of Maine off Shag Harbour to look for survivors. No survivors, bodies or debris were taken, either by the fishermen or by a Canadian Coast Guard search and rescue cutter, which arrived about an hour later from nearby Clark's Harbour.

By the next morning, RCC Halifax had determined that no aircraft were missing. While still tasked with the search, the captain of the Canadian Coast Guard cutter received a radio message from RCC Halifax that all commercial, private and military aircraft were accounted for along the eastern seaboard, in both Atlantic provinces and New England.

The same morning, RCC Halifax also sent a priority telex to the "Air Desk" at air force headquarters in Ottawa, which handled all civilian and military UFO sightings, informing them of the crash and that all conventional explanations such as aircraft, flares, etc. had been dismissed. Therefore, this was labeled a "UFO Report." The head of the Air Desk then sent another priority telex to the navy headquarters concerning the "UFO Report" and recommended an underwater search be mounted. The navy, in turn, sent another priority telex tasking Fleet Diving Unit Atlantic with carrying out the search.

Two days after the incident had been observed, a detachment of navy divers from Fleet Diving Unit Atlantic was assembled and for the next three days they combed the seafloor of the Gulf of Maine off Shag Harbor looking for an object. The final report said no trace of an object was found.

The Shag Harbour reports received extensive front page coverage in the Halifax Chronicle-Herald. The paper ran a headline story on October 7 titled, "Could Be Something Concrete in Shag Harbor UFO — RCAF."The article, by Ray MacLeod, included witness descriptions of an alleged object and crash, the air force's search and rescue effort, and the navy's underwater search that was underway, including three additional divers from Fleet Diving Unit Atlantic.

The UFO Gazebo and picnic site can be found about 3 minutes up the road from the Shag Harbour Museum Centre, where visitors can look out on the ocean to the location the object crashed in 1967

The head of the air force's "Air Desk" in Ottawa, Squadron Leader Bain, who recommended the navy undertake an underwater search, was also quoted, saying the air force was “very interested” in the matter. “We get hundreds of reports every week, but the Shag Harbor incident is one of the few where we may get something concrete on it.”

The article also mentioned UFO reports that immediately preceded the incident, including one from a woman in Halifax around 10:00 p.m.

The Chronicle-Herald ran another story on October 9 titled "UFO Search Called Off," stating that the navy had ended "an intensive undersea search for the mysterious unidentified flying object that disappeared into the ocean here Wednesday night." As to what was found, the navy stated, "Not a trace... not a clue... not a bit of anything." The story of the search being called off for an alleged "mysterious" "dark object" was also carried by The Canadian Press in other newspapers.

UFO Crashes