NZDF declassified RNZAF UFO files

# First Flying Saucers Of New Year

The flying saucer season is with us again. To-day the 'Star' had two reports of "visitations" at the week-end. The first was from Wakari where a school teacher said he was awakened early on Saturday morning by a noise and a light which penetrated his bedroom. From Mosgiel a group of six people reported that they watched a glowing object for an hour.

The school teacher said he leapt out of bed when something "swished" over the house at a "terrific rate" and illuminated his bedroom. He went outside and was in the act of rolling a cigarette when "the thing" came back over the same route and was gone in a few seconds. About a minute elapsed between the time he heard the first noise and the time he saw the object vanish in the distance.

He described the "saucer" as being of a greenish colour. At first he thought it might have been a jet plane, but on reflection came to the conclusion that a jet could not have made such a quick turn. The object, he said, was travelling at a very low altitude.

He has seen other objects at different times, but would not describe them as flying saucers.

Another report of a "saucer" sighting was received from Mosgiel. For almost an hour, from 10.40 last night, a group of six people watched a glowing object circling the sky over the Taieri Valley at "terrific speed." It was not, they emphasised, a meteorological balloon from the Taieri aerodrome, for while they were watching the "saucer," they noticed a balloon being launched from the aerodrome. They insisted that it

was entirely different from the object they were watching.

Visibility was excellent when they sighted the object, which appeared to have two beams of light coming from it—fore and aft. The lights would shine brightly, then fade slowly until they were completely out. A moment later they would once again shine brightly.

The object, they said, would travel across the sky at a rapid pace, then stop completely, and hang motionless for some minutes before travelling on. It was flying a straight and level course, and was still in the area when the six watchers decided to go indoors.

# Flying Saucer Sighted Over Bluff?

Yesterday five Bluff men saw what they believed to be a flying saucer high over Ocean Beach. Much bigger than a star, it remained stationary for 60 minutes from noon to 1 p.m.

The men described the object as "a bright, shining, silver disc", after looking at it through strong binoculars. They could see no markings or apertures on the disc.

The saucer was first sighted at noon by a Bluff resident who wishes to remain anonymous. He summoned Mr E. Wixon, J.P., Mr J. P. Wyatt, Labour Party candidate for Awarua at the recent election, and two others, and they all observed the object at a high altitude over the west end of Bluff.

# "Be Kind to Flying Saucers,

Air-Marshal Lord Dowding, Chief of the Royal Air Force Fighter Command during the Battle of Britain, has advised his fellow-Earthians to be kind to flying saucers. Said he with all the wisdom of many years in aviation: "It's rude to fire A.A. guns and send fighters to shoot them down. Besides, you never know what they could do to you . . . There is no material we know of that could travel at 9,000 miles an hour — the recorded radar speed of one saucer—without becoming white-hot."

Well, that counsel makes sense-if there really are flying saucers. Lord Dowding, for one, seems to be serious in his belief that these visitors to our skies come from planets ahead of our world in scientific knowledge. Or, since he was addressing the Flying Saucer Research Society in London, was he making a diplomatic effort to tell his audience what they wanted to hear?

Let us suppose for a moment, even against the opinions of many astronomers and the more ordinary run of sceptics, that the former air chief had sound basis for his statements. It would certainly follow that we of this world would be incredibly foolish to pit our wits and our armaments against people from space who can now accomplish what our own engineer-scientists are merely planning with no great confidence in early success. To rouse flying-saucer crews into a spirit of retaliation might create a terrible impact on humanity. As Dr.Jung, a leading psychiatrist, once remarked: "Should the origin of the phenomenon turn out to be an extra-terrestrial one it would prove an intelligent inter-planetary link. Our sciences and technology would go to the junk pile. Our world could roll up its Iron Curtain and use it for scrap. This might not be so bad. But we would have been discovered and colonised."

The brighter side to the invasion picture, however, is that the beings from a possible flying-saucer world do not seem in the least aggressive. In one case of a reported landing all that is said to have happened was the scorching of some grass around the machine. It requires little imagination to believe that such ingenious visitors on trouble bent could, if they wished, adopt a full-scale scorched-earth policy. It can safely be assumed, therefore, that the spacemen we have been hearing about are friendly fellows—not Martian overlords as grimly defined in most fiction. In such circumstances it would be a pity to goad them into atomic fury or something worse. By all means let us be kind to them if they ever come within cooee. Whether Lord Dowding is right or wrong in his apparent acceptance of the flying-saucer theory may be open to dispute until we actually come face to face with a representative selection of them. So if they wish to convince the world of their substance they should come right down and see us some time.