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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.
“Sea”47 pages
The threads, he said, looked like spider web, but were more ashy and white in colour. This report in the Press was followed by a letter to the Editor by a Mr. XD. Mr. XD. reported that shortly after the Hastings incident, he had been motoring near Marton and Rata, and had seen a large amount of this threadlike substance over fences, etc. "It looked like long chains of small Thistle-down, or spider webs of huge size," he said. I was recently given the brief details of a similar case in Australia. A Melbourne observer of the Australian Flying Saucer Bureau, reported to Mr. Jarrold, the Bureau's President - "I was cycling home when I noticed what seemed to be threads of long, cobweb-like substance hanging on a tree, and on adjacent telephone wires. I took it in my hands, but it did not disappear until I rubbed it. I took some home and put it on an ink bottle on my desk. About an hour later it had quite disappeared." I note in this case, that the substance did not vapourise or disappear on being handled. ## MYSTERY EXPLOSIONS: There have been many mysterious violent explosions all over the World, dating back to the earliest reports of the Flying Saucers. These explosions have caused much investigation and alarm from the Authorities from time to time, but the cause of many have remained unsolved. Some of these aerial explosions, occasionally accompanied by a vivid Blue flash, have been reported simultaneously with the sightings of strange objects. When the major flurries of Saucers are in the news, so are the greater frequence of these explosions. On the C.S.I. files there are cases from France, England, America, Australia, and New Zealand. I will quote some recent Australian and New Zealand cases. This report, which I have abbreviated, appeared in the Dunedin "Evening Star" in October, 1952. "MYSTERY EXPLOSION HEARD IN CITY: What was the mysterious explosion and flash of light seen and heard in Dunedin at 10.50 last night? Many people from all parts of the city reported seeing the vivid flash in the sky, shortly after followed by a loud explosion. It was most unlike thunder. All efforts to find the cause of the explosion have failed, and the Weather Office considers that it may have been a thunderbolt, but few are satisfied with this explanation." MELBOURNE, VICTORIA, July 5th, 1953. Six loud, mysterious explosions rocked Ivanhoe, Heidelburg, North Balwyn, and East Kew at 9.00 p.m., apparently centring about Ivanhoe Golf Course. Hundreds of people dashed hurriedly from their residences, as the blasts reverberated through homes five times in swift succession, vibrating windows and rattling crockery. Two more followed after a short interval. No light flashes were seen, and Police said afterwards that it could have been the work of schoolboys, with home-made bombs or safe-crackers. WAIKATO TIMES, 9th November, 1953. Mysterious explosion shatters night calm. A loud explosion of sufficient force to awaken a number of people in many parts of Hamilton (N.Z.), and to shake houses as far apart as Hamilton East, Hillcrest, Whitiora, Maeroa, and which occurred right on midnight on Saturday 7th, is still something of a mystery. Numerous telephone calls to the Waikato Times, seeking the source of the explosion, prompted widespread enquiries, which included calls to the Police, Hospital, Fire Brigade, Army Camps, Railways, Gasworks, and the St. John Ambulance, but the source of the explosion could not be located. C.S.I. has an "Honorary Observer" in Hamilton, and he reports: "I heard the explosion, it was not a bit like thunder. I am at present investigating a sighting of a Flying Saucer which was reported by a local resident at 9.30 p.m. on Saturday evening. The only explanation offered by the Press was indeed most amazing. They said that a single loud clap of thunder heard today, Sunday, was a likely clue as to the explosion at midnight on Saturday. On the night of the explosion there was not even a cloud on the horizon."
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