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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.
“Hill”41 pages
# Pilots See Strange Objects in Sky Over East Taranaki Strange objects flying in the sky over eastern Taranaki at daybreak yesterday were seen by three Taranaki aerial topdressing pilots. At 6.50 a.m. yesterday the three men, Messrs. F. Ferrel, D. L. Falwasser and N. Nodder, all of New Plymouth, left Bell Block airport in a Cessna high-wing monoplane... for an airstrip at Tahora, where they were operating. They had not long left the field when all three saw three strange objects to the east in the direction of Taumarunuf. They were then between Urutl and Tahora and flying at about 3000 feet. The sky was cloudless and visibility was excellent. The pilots, first could not believe their eyes. The three objects seemed to be hovering about 7000 feet above them, but as they were flying at about 135 miles per hour it was hard to estimate whether or not they were moving. They were oval in shape and looked like giant discs. They seemed to be red-orange in colour with a reddish flame coming from them. The pilots flew in the same direction for another three minutes and saw a number of other objects. It appeared to the men at this stage that the objects were flying in line-ahead formation. Suddenly all the objects climbed away steeply at great speed and disappeared. The three men are all experienced pilots and have been engaged in aerial top-dressing for four years. They are used to flying in the early morning and this is the first time that they have sighted any strange objects in the air. They know that there were none of their firm's planes in the area and they were not conventional aircraft. They have all seen the most modern aircraft flying in New Zealand today and many flying overseas and say that these objects were unlike any of them. Flying Saucer Reports Within 24 hours 14 persons living in Melbourne suburbs have reported having seen an object like a flying saucer just over the rooftops of suburban homes. # E.P. 31412 # THE SAUCER AGAIN MELBOURNE, May 31 (Rec. noon) Within the past 24 hours 14 persons living in Melbourne suburbs have reported having seen an object like a flying saucer just over the rooftops of suburban homes. One man said he was talking at his gate early yesterday with five friends when an 'royal-shaped thing as big as a railway carriage' shot over the house. It was about 70 feet in the air and about 60 feet away, he said. They saw it clearly for about five seconds. A loud buzzing sound had first made them look up, 'I could distinctly see dark shapes like 'busts' in the object. If I had seen the same shapes in an aeroplane I would say they were people,' one man said. Another man reported that a saucer flew over his house at about 70 feet and climbed at a fantastic speed. In another suburb seven people said they had watched what appeared to be a flying saucer. They were able to see it for 25 minutes while it "hovered and then dashed sideways." # Random # Flying Saucery Again And Its Repairs Spee WHEN Air Chief Marshal Lord Dowding says that he believes that flying saucers exist he is, of course, stating only his own opinion. In contrast, Major General Roger M. Ramey, U.S.A. Air Force Director of Operations, stated two years ago that flying saucers were not solid objects. General Hoyt Vandenberg went so far as to say at about the same time that there were no such things as flying saucers. Well, it is anybody's guess. But the fact remains that flying saucers are no new thing. The first authentic report of one dates back in Britain to the 18th century. An account of a round flat object stated that it flew over Hyland Abbey, causing panic among the monks. In 1902 reports of flying saucers came in from Adelaide in the Southern Hemisphere. Between the two dates a whole host of responsible persons had reported flying saucers, if not by name, although said that they could be recognised. From the U.S.S. Supply at sea it was reported at 6.10 p.m. on February 28, 1904, that an egg-shaped object had been observed in the sky covering an area of about six suns. It was accompanied by others travelling in colony. Earlier still an astronomer, Ella Walter Maunder, described in the periodical Observatory a strange celestial visitor viewed by thousands in England on the night of November 17, 1882. 29/5/54. Maunder was at the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, when he suddenly saw a great circular disc of greenish light appear in the E.N.E." It moved smoothly from horizon to horizon, taking about two minutes in transit, he said. When it crossed the meridian and passed just above the moon, its form was almost that of an elongated ellipse. It was estimated at 133 miles above the earth travelling at 10 miles a second.
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