From: James Easton <pulsar@compuserve.com>
Date: Mon, 17 Mar 1997 20:46:01 -0500
Fwd Date: Tue, 18 Mar 1997 09:01:38 -0500
Subject: Re: EL/TST

Regarding...

>Date: Sat, 15 Mar 1997 12:04:28 -0500
>From: Greg Sandow <"Greg Sandow"@prodigy.net>
>Subject: Re: UFO UpDate: Re: EL/TST

Greg wrote:

>I respect Paul Devereux's earthlight research, as well as his
>skepticism -- or is it just caution? -- about an alien explanation
>for UFOs.


Greg,

Likewise. "Abduction" reports aside, there are very few cases where
you can conclude that if it's a real event, it _must_ involve a non
terrestrial element.

>However, in one case he cites, I'm sure he goes too far.

This wouldn't be the Hudson Valley case...

>He writes, about some of the Hudson Valley sightings:

Ah, thought it might!

Skepticism should be a double-edged sword and although the "microlite
funsters" and light aircraft formations may have played a part,
there's no evidence I'm aware of which shows they were responsible for
all of the reports. I've not actually seen any proof that formations
of flyers were responsible for one relevant report".

As R. Perry Collins commented, "Witnesses agree, no matter what may
have been aloft, the object they saw was not a formation of light
planes. Many witnesses have seen both the object and a group of light
aircraft in formation over their areas (not at the same time). These
witnesses, some being pilots themselves, agree that there was no
confusing the two. Again, the object was huge, displayed multicolored
lights (which changed color and intensity), flew below 1000 feet,
hovered, moved at very low speeds, turned on its own axis, accelerated
very rapidly, cast unusual light beams to the ground.

No formation of light planes, or other conventional aircraft, can do
all these things".


>I've spoken extensively with two people who encountered a huge craft
>-- they described it as the approximate size of the convention center
>in New York city -- passing directly over their car near Middletown,
>NY in August, 1984. They felt it was no more than ten feet or so
>above them, though of course there's no way they could check that.
>They thought they could hit it with a stone if they'd thrown one.

"A person with a good throwing arm could have hit them with a rock",
is a comment attributed to a witness who reportedly saw in December
1994, three black, "triangular" shaped objects, "with articulating
structures on their noses, from which the blinding lights were
radiating", according to the National UFO Reporting Center. The report
with accompanying sketch is on the WWW at:

http://www.nwlink.com/~ufocntr/CB941229.html


Low altitude is one of the consistent features in a number of reported
encounters with "triangular" and "flying wing" UFOs. Another example
- an extract from a reported 1994 encounter near Edwards Air Force
Base which I documented; "I'd say the shape was - triangular, a
regular triangle. And it was very close to me, so close that I had a
hard time keeping my eyes open because of the pressure it caused in
the air. The eerie part was the silence for a craft hovering so close.
I'm not a very good judge of measurements so I can't say for sure how
high above me it actually was, but it seemed rather close, I'd guess
about 25 feet".


>It blotted out the night sky, and was absolutely silent...

"Meanwhile, several Antelope Valley residents say they've seen a craft
that simply strains credulity.

According to reports over the past two years, a vast black flying
wing, estimated at between 600 and 800 ft. in width, has passed
silently over city streets, empty desert and rural freeways. The craft
moved so slowly one observer said he could jog along with it.

A pattern of seemingly random white lights on the vehicle's black
underside provided "constellation camouflage" against the starry sky.
Observers who followed the craft long enough detailed unlikely
maneuvers in which the vehicle stopped, rotated in place and hovered
vertically, presenting a thin trailing edge to the ground".

From, "America's New Secret Aircraft", Popular Mechanics, December
1991.

Strictly, the title should have a question mark at the end.


The point being, there's maybe a lot more to this whole issue than
some microlite hoaxers.


In addition to the August, 1984 report you mention from Middletown,
NY, there were further reports of structured craft. In "Night Siege
Update: UFOs Over Central Connecticut", Philip J. Imbrogno writes of
a reported sighting dated 9 January, 1986:

"The UFO did not disappear, it continued to head south and was seen
over New Britain. Here many people ran out of their homes to see the
giant UFO pass overhead. The time was about 9:15 pm.

One witness told us that he stood and watched it pass over his street.
He reported that the underside was a dark grey like structure with all
kinds of tubes and grids connecting the bottom. He said that the
lights were flashing and were all white with a red one in the middle.
He also said that the lights were in a boomerang shape but he could
also make out a dark structure that extended toward the rear that made
it look kite shaped. He and his neighbors just stood in awe as it
passed over their homes without a sound.

The UFO was seen then heading north-west and at about 9;30 pm it was
reported over Torrington Connecticut which is about 15 miles west of
Hartford. One woman who lives in the surrounding area of the city of
Torrington told police that she looked out the window and saw these
lights approaching her home. At first she thought it was a jet going
to crash. She then  alerted the entire family who all watched the UFO
approach. As it approached she said it seemed to be losing altitude
and started to slow down. The UFO then hovered directly over their
home and engulfed the entire house in a beam of white light.

As the object continued to move to the west it was witnesses by a Mr.
Arnold Springster his wife and their friends near Whist Pond just off
of Route 4 about ten miles west of Torrington. Below is Mr.
Springster's sighting account as related to me.

"It was moving very slow. I knew that no aircraft could possibly keep
that altitude and go so slow, plus it was dead quiet. I opened the
door and got out of the car and looked up as the thing passed over the
car. It was so huge it seemed like it took a long time to pass over.
Everyone at this time started to get a little worried, I mean here we
were on this road with no other traffic, it could have easily did
whatever it wanted to do to us. I looked up at it, it was directly
overhead and about two hundred feet above the car. At that point all
the white lights went out and I saw ten red lights very small
surrounding a triangular shaped object with one red light in the
middle. This was weird since when the white lights were on and it was
approaching the object looked like a boomerang or half circle. I
looked up and saw this structure. There were parts that looked like
they were soldered together, but very smoothly. It was made up of some
type of dark greyish material that had a very low reflectability.

[...]

I saw this large object that blacked out the entire sky above me, it
was easily as large as a football field. I noticed that the underside
was criss-crossed by a network of tubes and grill like work. It looked
like some type of modern art. At that point the circular red light in
the middle of this thing detached itself and flew ahead of the thing
at great speed. The red light then circled the object three times then
went back to its original position in the middle of the underside. It
just reattached itself to the same place. By this time the UFO or
whatever it was passed over the car and made a very sharp turn toward
the south".


Regarding the August 1994 report you referred to, interesting to see
you also mention, "It was close enough for them to see detail on it,
a tracery of what looked like pipes".

I discussed the structural details mentioned by Imbrognio's update
with a learned French gentleman called Jean-Pierre Pharabod and he
noted:

"Maybe this Mr. Springster was joking, but this was January 1986.
Then, how can it be that similar (and sometimes strange) details
have been reported in Belgium 4 years later ?
1) "dark greyish material" (this is not strange, especially during
night):
   Athus, November 27, 1989, 19h00 - 1 witness
   Liege, November 29, 1989, 19h15 - 1 witness
   Liege, December 5,  1989, 17h35 - 1 witness
   Saive, February 7,  1990, 20h00 - 2 witnesses
   Brussels, March 10, 1990, 02h05 - 1 witness
   Waret-la-Chaussee, April 4, 1991, 00h20 - 3 witnesses
   Lixhe, November 26, 1991, 18h45 - 2 witnesses
2) Tubes, grill like work, or other structures underside:
   Liege, November 29, 1989, 19h15 - 1 witness - ribs, sheets
   Liege, December 5,  1989, 17h35 - 1 witness - stairs-looking
   modules
   Hanoir, April 17, 1990, 20h00-24h00 - 1 witness - many rectangles
3) Autonomous flight of the central circular red light [often said
   spherical instead of circular in Belgium] (very strange):
   Henri-Chapelle, November 29, 1989, 19h30 - 2 witnesses (gendarmes!)
   Jemeppe-sur-Sambre, December 11, 1989, 18h25 - 2 witnesses
   (extremely strange testimony)".


Steve Johnson is an accomplished artist and was recently commissioned
to paint the representation of a November, 1985 encounter with a
triangular shaped object, a case publicised at the time. The painting
will shortly be available as a postcard which explains:

"Artists interpretation of a black triangular shaped Unidentified
Flying Object, witnessed on 22 November 1985 by a Wisconsin state
employee. He observed the object glide slowly, too slow to be flying
aerodynamically, as it crossed Highway CV, located approximately 15
miles NW of Madison, WI. The sighting occurred around 5.00 PM, dusk.
The object was later estimated to have been about 40 feet across,
perhaps wider, and possibly 90 feet in length. The UFO silently passed
a few feet above a row of power lines running parallel to the highway.
The witness recalled that the underside of the craft reminded him of
"the back of a refrigerator" ...like a collection of condensation
pipes than ran back and forth from top to base. After passing directly
above the observer's car, the black object suddenly accelerated into
the evening sky at a tremendous speed. Within seconds, it disappeared.

The observer speculated that if he had been on board the craft during
its abrupt acceleration he would have been squashed "flatter than a
pancake". The object remained silent during the entire observation".


It's quite possible that all of the reports are misidentifications,
elaborations, or just fabrications, but there's a question mark over
the consistency with some of the features commonly described. For
example:

"My daughter and I saw a triangular-shaped craft fly very low over our
yard.

It had rounded corners and lights in the corners and though it just
skimmed the trees it made no engine sound - only a "whoooosh"-like
noise. It was not flying fast and there were one or two others in the
area at the same time but not as close. It almost seemed as if they
were surveying the area. There were newspaper reports soon after that
confirmed our sighting but we never reported it".

__________

Not only did it break out of the pattern by spending so much time in
the area, it broke out of character for UFOs by clinging close to the
ground much of the time of its visit...

"I saw the object hovering about 50 feet over the town's water tank,"
said officer Phil Stanton, one of the policemen who received calls...

"It seemed to be triangular or vee-shaped...

The strange thing was that there was no sound at all. It appeared to
have a solid hull and one big spotlight."

...security guard John McPherson and officer Tom Hagens chased the
triangular mystery in a patrol ear.

"There it was again ... it seemed to be triangular, maybe vee-shaped,
with blue lights all around the edges and a big pulsating ball of red
light in the center. There were two big beams like searchlights. The
next thing I knew, it took off at terrific speed--without a sound".

__________

He saw a triangular shape hovering over the electric wires. It would
go for a few yards, stop, and go again.

As he stared the object stopped, reversed direction and started again,
now in the direction he was standing. What he had thought was a
helicopter had now moved about 200 feet toward him going "backwards".

He described it as 20 ft/side equilateral triangle made of some dark
material. It looked rounded at the edges and had 3 red lights, one at
each corner.

He also said the thing moved very slowly - he thought 3 to 5 mph".

__________

The mother was the first to see two lights beaming straight down at
them at a 45-degree angle. The object bearing these lights slowed
down, but the driver, fearing it might crash, pulled to the right side
of the road. The object stopped above the road, almost directly
overhead. The driver switched off the engine, lowered the window and
looked out. She saw a large  triangular object, absolutely stationary
and noiseless, at rooftop height. From other reference points it was
possible to determine that  the sides of the triangle measured about
20 meters.

Three milky, yellowish-white lights were at the corners of the
triangle. They were bright but not blinding. In the center of the
triangle was a much larger light. Its color was changing but the
prevailing hue was grey-blue.

The object had a metallic appearance. It was dark-gray and colorless,
with solid and sharp outlines.

The object stayed overhead for two or three minutes then departed
suddenly in the direction of the houses. The driver of the car felt
a breeze through her rolled-down window. The object accelerated and
disappeared from view in less than a second.

__________

"Suddenly I saw a white light in the sky ahead of me. It came down
lower and lower and I thought it was an airplane in an emergency. But
when it came closer still, and became bigger, I saw that it was a
flying triangle".

Each side was 75 to 90 feet long. It was dark in colour and had yellow
lights along the edges and a red light at the centre of the bottom.

"For 15 minutes I saw it hover over the trees, powerful and strange".

__________

"Through the windscreen, he spotted a small white light moving slowly
in the south. Moments later, the light stopped abruptly, and made
several acute right-angle turns.

Satoshi reduced speed to a crawl, and by doing so, could now make out
a set of three lights, one of which was red and flashing
intermittently.

The three lights suddenly quickened in speed and descended right over
his vehicle.

Almost immediately, it was bathed in an intense bright light, and
Satoshi, tense with fear, gripped the steering wheel and rammed hard
down on the accelerator pedal in an attempt to put as much distance
between him and the light as possible. He succeeded. Instinctively
though, he checked his rear-view mirrors and saw lights bombarding the
road several hundred yards behind, illuminating huge areas.

...Satoshi revealed that moments before his vehicle was bathed by the
lights, he saw a distinct, black, triangular-shaped object overhead.

No audible sound was detected.

__________

He suddenly noticed a very bright white light in the sky which seemed
to be heading directly towards him. He stopped the car and got out,
intently watching the object which was now some 50 to 60 yards from
him.

He was now clearly able to see three bright white lights, one on each
corner of a large triangular craft. On the centre of the underside,
was a bright pulsating red light...

Despite the object being so close, Mr Jackson ...heard no sound
whatsoever as he watched the object slowly manoeuvre above and then
move away...

__________

He then noticed a very bright light in the sky, forward of his
position... He continued to drive slowly along the road, saw that the
object was getting closer and apparently descending, so opened the
side window of his car and slowed right down in order to obtain a
better view.

Mr Black noticed that a minibus and two cars ahead of him had also
reduced speed - obviously to watch the same event. As they closed on
the object, it appeared to be either hovering or moving extremely
slowly. No sound whatsoever could be heard from the craft.

Now able to see the craft in detail, he described it as triangular in
shape and between 70 and 80 feet in length. It had a hemispherical
bright red light in the centre of the underside, which he said was
approximately 15 feet in diameter. On each corner, were very bright
white lights...
[End]



These are extracts from only a few of the comparative reports I know
of and presumably there are many more I'm not aware of.

These extracts have no direct relationship to Hudson Valley or even
some of the 1989/90 descriptions from Belgium, despite their
similarity to the latter. What those extracts do relate to, in
sequence, are the following accounts:

Indiana, "early 70s".

North Carolina, April 1975 and reported in the press.

Maryland, 1982.

Karthause, Germany, February, 1990,

Jamtland, Sweden, March 1991.

Fujitsugen, Japan, January, 1994.

Matlock, England, August 1995.

Fraserburgh, Scotland, January 1996.



If Paul asks the question, just how much data is there which remains
unexplained, or isn't conceivably explainable in conventional terms,
there's perhaps something here which indicates there's still more
questions than answers.

There's no significant evidence that one or more classified aircraft
might be responsible for these reports. Conversely, there's no
tangible evidence that any such reports relate to non-terrestrial
craft, and they largely remain an enigma.


Perhaps all we can really conclude is that some of the reported
characteristics - the claimed low altitude, silent, slow moving,
hovering capabilities - remain relatively consistent with a
considerable number of "flying wing" and "triangle" reports, that this
has been the case for many years and the reports are not exclusive to
the US.

I would have thought this was exactly the kind of data which might
indicate that what was being reported did - in some cases -
conceivably exist, whatever its origins.

There's not much in the way of material evidence to support any of the
accounts - the well known Petit-Rechain "triangular" craft photograph
is probably the most notable - but if Paul, or anyone, has a theory
which might explain these consistently reported characteristics, it
would be welcome.



James.
E-mail: pulsar@compuserve.com