UFO ROUNDUP Volume 3 Number 38
Volume 3
Number 38
September 21, 1998
Editor: Joseph Trainor
E-mail: Masinaigan@aol.com
BIGFOOT PHOTOGRAPHED SOUTH OF NAPLES, FLORIDA
On Tuesday, September 8, 1998, on their 6 p.m. news broadcast, WINK-TV in south Florida showed a photograph of a hairy hominid believed to be a Bigfoot or Skunk Ape, the name by which the creature is known in Florida.
According to WINK-TV, several color photographs of the Bigfoot were taken by David Shealey of Naples, Florida (population 19,505). Shealey operates the Bigfoot Research Center in Naples.
According to the report, Shealey was perched with his camera in a hunter's stand, high in a cypress tree in the Everglades. Suddenly, he spotted a Bigfoot with matted brown fur "crossing an open prairie, apparently unconcerned that it was being photographed."
Shealey reportedly told WINK-TV that there were "up to seven" Skunk Apes wandering the Big Cypress and Fakalatchee Preserves.
The Fakalatchee Preserve is just north of Florida Highway 41, also known as the Tamiami Trail, about 17 miles (28 kilometers) southeast of Naples. The city of Naples is located 117 miles (187 kilometers) west of Miami. (Many thanks to Linda S. Jacobson for this news story.)
UFOs HAUNT VILLAGES IN EASTERN FRANCE
On Tuesday, September 8, 1998, at 12:20 a.m., French ufologist Picot Sylvain and his friend Cyril were staked out on a skywatch in Villeret, a village near Chavanges, in the department of Aube, in eastern France.
"At 12:20 we heard a surprising noise that we thought was a helicopter losing engine power," Picot reported. "Immediately we localized the source. It was coming from the northeast, from Courcelles-sur- Voire."
Scanning the sky, the pair "marked the presence of an orange/yellow light that remained stationary at 500 to 600 meters above the ground over Labraux, a village situated three to four kilometers to the east-northeast."
"It (the UFO) was hovering in the clouds, which were numerous, and it became visible only when the clouds parted. The wind was coming from the west-southwest. But the object was moving slowly against the wind towards either the south or the south-southwest. The noise resembled the hum of a THT line (That's THT as in Tres Haute Tension--French for Very High Tension-- power line--J.T.) or again something like a refrigerator. The total time of our observation was one hour. Then it disappeared."
Three nights later, on Thursday, September 10, 1998, Picot returned to the area, which is located near Brienne-le-Chateau, about 150 kilometers (90 miles) east of Paris. At 11:30 p.m., he spotted "a bright red light in the west-southwest sky near Jasseines" and stopped his car.
"In Jasseines, near the church, I was looking towards the field," he reported. "Seeing the two red lights that were hovering there, I turned off my car's headlights. The two red lights were pulsating--two brief flashes per second."
Picot estimated that the lights were one kilometer (0.6 miles) away "over a plowed field. The distance that separated them was perhaps a little more than two fingers at arm's lengths, or about 62 meters at a distance of one kilometer. I stopped and watched for several minutes, then turned on my headlights again."
"Suddenly, I saw both lights rise very quickly--together-- simultaneously--to an altitude of 10 degrees above the horizon. I was persuaded that the lights were part of a vast black object, which could not be clearly seen because of the darkness of the night. Evidently the UFO was between the villages of Labraux and Jasseines, just off Chaussee (Road) D.396," the highway between Brienne-le-Chateau and Vitry-le-Francois.
Unknown to Picot, an hour earlier, a witness in the town of Pantin also saw a UFO. At 10:25 p.m., he "was walking his dog on the Rue Arago" and "his attention was attracted by the sudden startling illumination of the street. He then observed the passage of a luminous white object of rectangular form...over the village at an angle of 45 degrees to the horizon." The UFO also had an observable tail.
"The witness followed the object with his gaze for four or five seconds. Then it dislodged or fragmented into five or six precise geometric forms, going to the northeast but giving the impression of climbing through the night sky and disappearing one second later."
Thirty seconds afterward, the witness "spied a second UFO, describing it as a round luminous form with a shadow in the center." (Merci beaucoup au Franck Marie de Banque OVNI pour ces nouvelles.)
NEW ALIEN SIGHTING NEAR PERUGIA IN ITALY
On Friday, August 21, 1998, residents of Citta di Castello, a suburb of Perugia, a city in Italy's Umbria province, about 145 kilometers (87 miles) north of Rome, claimed to have seen a "flying humanoid alien."
The encounter took place in a field on the outskirts of Citta di Castello. Witnesses spotted a "small alien" in the field, "crouched like an old woman gathering herbs." When the figure failed to respond to shouts from the onlookers, the people began a cautious approach.
"When they got within 200 meters, a thing like a silver cylinder appeared." The UFO hovered "about two meters above the ground." The humanoid reportedly levitated into the hovering object, and "with that, it accelerated quickly in a vertical direction, disappearing in a couple of seconds." (See the Italian newspaper Corriere dell'Umbria for August 28, 1998. Grazie a Edoardo Russo e Simone Cumbo di Centro Italiano di Studi Ufologici, CISU, per questo rapporto.)
GLOWING UFOs SIGHTED NEAR BOURNEMOUTH, DORSET, UK
On Sunday, September 13, 1998, at 7:50 p.m., Michael S. "was in my garden, collecting tools that I had left out earlier. It was a good clear night with a vast array of lower magnitude stars visible. I paused in my collecting duties to see if I remembered any of the astronomy I had learned as a boy, and also to spot any satellites."
"My attention was drawn to the southwest, where a meteor appeared above the trees in my garden (50 degrees above ground level). As I followed the red/orange shooting star, I saw that two others were following it in a delta V formation. I still believed them to be meteorites, but then the two following objects zigzagged behind the leader."
"The leader maintained a straight course toward the northwest, heading towards Bournemouth/Hurn Airport (CAA Air Traffic Control Center). As they left my field of view, the two followers rejoined their leader. The altitude that these objects were at was very high, possibly 100,000 feet (30,000 meters), though without any idea of size, it would be hard to estimate. The speed that they were flying was about the same as fast jets at a much lower altitude, perhaps 10,000 feet. I am sure that I have seen three UFOs."
Bournemouth is on Britain's south coast, about 110 miles (176 kilometers) southwest of London. (Email Interview)
UFO SQUADRON SEEN OVER REDCLIFFE, QUEENSLAND
UFO sightings in Australia's Queensland state continued last week, with a new incident reported in Redcliffe, a city 32 kilometers (20 miles) north of Brisbane.
Four witnesses in Redcliffe "said the event occurred at 11:20 p.m." on Wednesday, September 16, 1998. They "looked up into the sky and saw a bright light. Colour was red, blue (and) green and was followed by approximately seven other smaller lights that looked like stars."
A witness "Mr D. went back inside at 11:25 p.m. and rang a friend and asked her to go outside to see if she could see them from her place."
"Mrs. Clark went outside at 11:30 p.m. and saw the seven objects. She then saw the lights start to do a number of formations (maneuvers--J.T.)."
(1) a straight line, then a V formation.
(2) a circle with a tail
(3) a wide V
(4) a V with a line through the middle.
The UFOs "remained in view for 15 to 20 minutes and then disappeared." (Many thanks to Diane Harrison of UFO Network Australasia for this news story.)
TWO BLACK HELICOPTERS FLY OVER A SYDNEY SUBURB
In late August 1998, Steven L. was "delivering a digital piano for the music store that I work for" when he had an unusual experience in St. Ives, a suburb of Sydney, Australia's largest city.
"I had missed a turn off and had to turn around in a side street," Steve reported. "As I made the turn, I glanced through the windshield of my car to see two helicopters flying in Wing Man formation."
"As I am an avid flyer myself, with 10 hours in a glider, I am particularly interested in all aircraft and am familiar with the port and starboard lights required by international law."
"The thing which struck me as strange was the fact that these two choppers were not displaying any lights. A red tail rotor light and underside strobe were not visible. They were black in colour and flew from the east to the west, towards Parramatta (in New South Wales, just west of Sydney--J.T.). The helicopters were flying at a low altitude, as best I could judge in the clear night sky, at or below 500 feet." (Email Interview)
STRANGE GLOW PUZZLES SOUTH AFRICAN TRAINMEN
On Tuesday, September 15, 1998, at 3:32 a.m., railroad engineer J.L. de Villiers "was reducing speed as my train" reached Schalkrust station. "This is near Lydenburg in South Africa. Next to the station is a flat field about three square kilometers (wide)."
"A strange orange/yellowish light was moving upward and downward in the middle of the field at a very fast speed," de Villiers reported.
""It could not have been a very large object, say, about the size of a soccer ball or a little bigger. It moved upwards at great speed, say, 60 feet or so and then returned to ground level and then go up again. After about a minute, it just vanished."
Leon Bouwer, UFO Roundup's correspondent in South Africa, reported that Lydenburg is in Mpumulanga province, formerly the East Transvaal, approximately 280 kilometers (168 miles) northeast of Johannesburg. "The East Transvaal is full of coal fields and is dotted with electrical power generating stations, and has a lot of railway lines as a result." He added that there are several abandoned coal mines burning with underground fires in the region and that the train crew may have seen a burning "gas geyser" near Schalkrust station. (Many thanks to Stig Agermose and Errol Bruce-Knapp for this news story. And thanks also to Leon Bouwer for the background information.)
TRIANGULAR UFO SIGHTED IN LONDONDERRY, NEW HAMPSHIRE
On Thursday, September 10, 1998, at 11:30 p.m., Dan H. was driving on Mammoth Road in Londonderry, New Hampshire (population 970) when he "spotted a triangular- shaped formation of three bright white lights over the trees ahead of my car."
At first, Dan thought the lights belonged to an aircraft attempting to land in nearby Manchester, N.H., but he "then realized that it was too low and in the wrong direction for the local (airport) landing pattern."
"He described the lights as consisting of two high lights and one single light down lower, giving the object the impression of tilting down in the 'front.' The object suddenly 'jumped' over to the left without turning and stopped again. The witness described the motion with a quick sweep of his hand, implying that it was nearly instantaneous. After this he lost sight of the object behind some trees." (Many thanks to Greg St. Pierre and Errol Bruce-Knapp for forwarding this report.)
TRIANGULAR UFO SEEN IN NORTHERN OHIO
On Friday, September 4, 1998, a witness was driving on Route 252 in West Medina, Ohio when he spotted "three individual lights" in the sky, arrayed in a triangular shape.
"Upon close approach, the witness observed that the lights were connected to one very large triangular or black object...The object was reportedly moving very slowly and not making any sound, as the witness drove around the top of a hill and found two other cars also watching the object, which was 150 yards overhead and slowly drifting to the east."
The witness described the other cars as "a purple-colored Saturn and the other drove a red Honda. The gentleman who had the Saturn was actually standing outside of his car, looking at the object. I pulled over next to the Honda and asked the guy if he knew what it was. He did not."
"At this point" the UFO "flashed a bright blue flash of light, similar to the flash of a camera," and the witnesses hastily beat a retreat.
When the witness reached his home on Wolff Road, he "ran into his house and called his wife outside to view the object, but it was no longer there."
On Monday, September 7, 1998, at 11:30 p.m., the witness had a second sighting of the triangular UFO, "but it was not as close" as the previous sighting.
Medina is on Ohio Routes 3 and 42 about 26 miles (41 kilometers) southwest of Cleveland. The case is being investigated by Larry Clark of New York MUFON. (Many thanks to Kenneth Young of Tri-States Advocates for Scientific Knowledge, T.A.S.K., for forwarding this news story.)
MORE UFO ACTIVITY REPORTED IN NORTHERN GEORGIA
On Saturday, September 5, 1998, a man spotted a white UFO in LaGrange, Georgia (population 25,957), a town 64 miles (102 kilometers) southwest of Atlanta. The witness reported, "The craft was seen for only a few seconds but was extremely bright white and shaped like a boomerang. It made no sound. The craft was only 60 yards away and about the size of a minivan. There was no fuselage, just the wing."
On Sunday, September 13, 1998, at 8 p.m., Elaine Belisha and her 14-year-old daughter, Marilyn Chen, had a UFO encounter in Norcross, Georgia (population 5,947), a town on Highway 23 about 21 miles (33 kilometers) northeast of Atlanta. Marilyn told her mother that she had just seen "a translucent, boomerang-shaped aircraft."
Elaine reported, "I asked her to draw a picture, thinking it might have been a Stealth bomber, but it had a very large wingspan relative to its size than the Stealth."
Later the same evening, at 10:56 p.m., witnesses in Heard County, about 10 miles (16 kilometers) north of LaGrange, observed "a large red pulsating light. The UFO was moving east-northeast, just 'bobbing' along at 1,000 feet (300 meters) altitude. The large red light dimmed and grew brighter but never went off completely. The light was an estimated two or three miles away, and had an apparent size of four times that of the planet Venus. There was also a bluish-white light that seemed steady and seemed diffused. The witness did not understand how a pilot could fly with so much light coming out of the craft. The bright light was apparently underneath, because the large light obscured" the craft. (See Filer's Files #37 for 1998. Many thanks to George A. Filer of MUFON and John C. Thompson of ISUR for these reports.)
EX-DEFENSE CHIEF CLAIMS THAT RAF FELTWELL IS BRITAIN'S AREA 51
In an interview with the UK newspaper Sunday People, Lord Hill-Norton, chief of the UK defence staff during the 1970s, claimed that the air base RAF Feltwell in Suffolk is the site where NATO forces track unidentified saucers coming in from space.
Based at RAF Feltwell is the 5th Space Surveillance Squadron, U.S. Air Force. Lord Hill-Norton told the newspaper that the squadron "is tracking UFOs that may threaten Earth."
Lord Hill-Norton said he was "puzzled" by the USAF squadron's presence at the base, adding, "I have asked a number of questions about it and never get a satisfactory answer."
"The (UK) Ministry of Defence did admit that RAF Feltwell has a special U.S. unit 'tracking man-made objects in deep space.'"
"But it refused to answer Hill-Norton's questions about how many objects 'remain unidentified and how many of these were transmitting a signal,' citing the need for secrecy."
"An MoD spokesman said, ' We are entitled to refuse certain information on topics which we consider to be sensitive.'"
"But he did admit UFOs will be tracked if they are spotted."
"'They need to catalogue everything up in space,' he added."
Lord Hill-Norton remains skeptical, however. He responded, "For a start, there are no man-made objects in interstellar space. So I want to know what they are really doing. And I want to know what the Government is doing about the UFO problem. There are things flying about in our atmosphere, and we don't know what they are, who directs them or what their purpose might be. We ought to know."
"Hill-Norton believes that UFOs are the products of 'extra-terrestrial intelligences.'" (See the newspaper Sunday People for September 13, 1998. Many thanks to John Hayes for forwarding the newspaper article.)
SOHO RESTORED TO ITS PROPER ORBIT
On Wednesday, September 16, 1998, at 2:29 p.m., ground controllers at the Goddard Spacecraft Center in Greenbelt, Maryland successfully transmitted maneuver commands to the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory, restoring the sun-watching satellite to its proper orbit.
The SOHO Flight Operations Team sent "a series of commands directing the spacecraft to fire its thrusters and turn its five solar power panels fully toward the Sun."
"The maneuver, which is called attitude recovery," will allow SOHO to repower its onboard batteries, which were severly depleted after the satellite spun out of control back on June 24.
"'It's a big step forward in our recovery plan for SOHO,' said John Credland, ESA's (European Space Agency--J.T.) head of scientific projects. 'We were never quite sure that we would manage to make the spacecraft point back at the Sun...I congratulate our joint ESA-NASA team, helped by our industrial contractors...'"
"'This is the best news we've had from SOHO in a long time,' said Dr. George Withroe, director of the Sun-Earth Connection science project at NASA headquarters in Washington, D.C. 'Despite the gloomy early days after the'" June 24 loss, "'we always stayed hopeful that our resourceful people on the team could save the day. We're not there yet--we shall have to see if the scientific instruments survived. But this gives us reason to hope.'"
During its two months as a "space derelict," floating at a Lagrangian point one million miles (1.6 million kilometers) sunward from Earth, SOHO's delicate instruments were exposed to astounding temperature variations. According to Dr. Bernhard Flock, ESA's project scientist for SOHO, the satellite's instruments were exposed "to temperatures approaching plus or minus 100 degrees Celsius (212 degrees Fahrenheit.)" (Many thanks to Steve Wilson Sr. for the NASA news release.)
(Editor's Comment: Now the race is on to get SOHO up and running before the peak period of solar activity--the highest in eleven years--begins in early 1999.)
from the UFO Files...
1978: UFO LEVITATES A RACE CAR IN ARGENTINA
Twenty years ago, on September 25, 1978, Argentinian business man Carlos Acevedo, 38, and his mechanic, Miguel Angel Moya, 28, were completing the final lap of a cross-country endurance race in Buenos Aires province, Argentina. Because of "mechanical problems," their car had to withdraw from formal competition in the 1,000- kilometer (600-mile) road race, and they were on their way back to the city of Buenos Aires.
"Acevedo was driving at about 100 km per hour (60 miles per hour). A bright yellow light approached from the rear at high speed, illuminated the interior of the car and blinded them."
"He lost control of the car and then saw that they were about two meters (6.6 feet) above the ground. The car continued to float, and their vision was restricted by the brilliant light. They lost all sense of time."
"Finally they felt a bump and noticed that their car was back on the road, a considerable distance away from the point where the encounter began. They saw a yellowish object retreating in the distance."
"When they analyzed the circumstances, they found that it had taken 2 hours and 20 minutes to travel a distance that should have taken only 1 hour and 15 minutes. They also found that their reserve gas (petrol) tank, recently filled, was now empty. They stopped at the nearest police department, in Pedro Luro, and reported the incident. (See the Argentinian newspaper Cronica for September 24 and 25, 1978. See also MUFON UFO Journal #140 for October 1979 and the book UNINVITED GUESTS by Richard Hall, Aurora Press, Santa Fe, N.M., 1988, pages 297 and 298.)
FUN UFO WEBSITES:
A quick correction on the URL for Miami UFO Reporter. The correct URL is this: http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Corridor/1341/index.html
UFO Network has had a total revamp at their site. Check it out at http://www.ufonetwork.com
For more on the recent UFO sightings in France, drop in at the CNES website. They're at this URL: http://www.cnes.fr
Don't forget to visit our parent site, UFOINFO, which boasts a wide array of UFO information. Set your browser on http://ufoinfo.com
Back issues of UFO Roundup can be accessed and downloaded at our page, which you'll find at http://ufoinfo.com/roundup/
Tomorrow is the birthday of that multi-talented British polymath Michael Faraday. Born on September 22, 1791, Faraday first made a name for himself in chemistry, discovering the molecular structure of benzene and carbon chloride. Becoming interested in electricity, Faraday switched his field to physics. Before his death on August 25, 1867, he had laid the groundwork for the practical use of electricity.
We'll be back next week with more saucer news from around the planet, brought to you by "the paper that goes home--UFO Roundup." See you then.
UFO ROUNDUP: Copyright 1998 by Masinaigan Productions, all rights reserved. Readers may post news items from UFO Roundup on their websites or in newsgroups provided that they credit the newsletter and its editor by name and list the date of issue in which the news item appeared.
