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This is a New Zealand Defence Force public release of RNZAF file AIR 39/3/3, "Flying Saucers," which covers 1952 to 1955 and was declassified in September 2010 under the Official Information Act. It collects sighting reports from the public and military personnel, press clippings, and a table of 1952 sightings. It also holds Carter Observatory opinions attributing some reports to meteors. A large part covers the inquiry into lights seen from National Airways Corporation Flight 108 on 31 October 1955, which the RNZAF could not fully explain as Venus.
“The Advance”22 pages
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## Page 25 MATADOR B.61, the Northrop SHARK B.62, the Saenger Project, the Dornberger Project, the I.B.M., etc - do not fit the observed details! The Swedish Staff statement that about 80% of the total reports were unreliable implies that the remaining 20% WERE reliable; these amount to either 200 or 400 - depending on whether the total is taken as 1,000 or 2,000. This statement attempting to explain away the sightings as natural phenomena et cetera, anticipated the similar line taken more recently by the United States Airforce. The entire episode of the UFO's bore a strong resemblance to the American position just a year later. This main German centre for rocket development was partly wrecked by the R.A.F. in 1943. Russian activity there from the spring of 1945 onwards is uncertain; rumours told of the resumption of rocket work. However, in May, 1947, British newspaper reporters toured the site and found that the Russians had completed the R.A.F destruction by extensive demolitions. In the words of one reporter, "... I can report that Peenemuende has ceased to exist as a military or research centre." SAUCER COMPARISONS: In contrast to the above negative findings, there is a very close similarity between the Swedish "Ghost Rocket" and one of the less-frequent "Saucer" varieties. This is what is known as the "smaller rocket type" or Keyhoe's TYPE THREE, which has been seen occasionally in the U.S.A. and elsewhere from 1947 onwards. One well authenticated case was the Chiles-Whitted sighting at Montgomery, Alabama, 24th July, 1948. Following is a summary of the observed points of this machine:- (1) Cigar-shaped. (2) No wings. (3) A flame about 50 ft. long at the rear, orange-coloured merging into yellow. (4) Brilliant white light in nose. (5) Trajectory horizontal most of the time. (6) Speed subsonic - 500/700 mph. with estimated maximum of 1500 mph. (7) Altitude "fairly low" - the same as the airliner, a few thousand feet. (8) Size about 100 ft. long - twice the diameter of a B.29. (9) Sound not reported. (10) Range not reported. (11) Other points: Intense blue glow along the sides. Colour metallic silver. Two rows of "windows". By April 1949, Project Saucer had found no answer to the problem of the UFO identity. Comparison of these details with the Swedish UFOs shows excellent agreement, for points 1-7. The remainder cannot be cross-checked, but they do not weaken the agreement, which is much closer than with any guided missile. CONCLUSION: All the available evidence indicates that the Swedish UFOs were not guided missiles, Russian or otherwise. If they had appeared in 1947 or later they would undoubtedly have been put in the "Saucer" category, and that is where they must go now. They add several hundreds sightings to the Great Saucer Mystery, they put back the start of large-scale sightings by a year, and they offer valuable confirmation of an infrequently seen type of UFO. REFERENCES: (2) The Times - 26/7/46. (1) The Times - 12/7/46. (3) " " - 7/8/46. (4) The Times - 11/10/46. (5) Daily Telegraph - 29/7/46. (6) Daily Telegraph - 7/8/46. (7) " " - 27/8/46. (8) " " - 6/9/46. (9) Daily Mail - 3/9/46. (10) News-week - 26/8/46. (11) Keesing's Contemporry (12) "V.2" - Dornberger, 1954. (13) Development of the Guided Missile - Gatland, 1954. (14) Guided Missiles - Weyl, 1949. (15) Rockets, Missiles, etc. - Ley, 1951. (16) Stalin Means War - Tokaev, 1951. (17) Russia's Jets - Green & Wood, 1951.
Document, cited by the archive. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. The text was read from the page images by GLM-OCR; expect the odd misread word. 445 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.