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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
## FLYING SAUCERS PAGE 10 He told the Times-Herald he will continue to make his claims in print and on Television, and will challenge the Air Force to deny them. If any official, after reading the final analysis on the Utah film, says that it did not rule out birds, Known aircraft or conventional objects as the cause of those objects, I will call him a liar to his face. I do not like to use such terms, but after all, the Air Force,has, in effect, been calling me a liar and I'm getting tired of it. Regardless of the charges and counter charges, so long as the Air Force has unsolved sightings in its files----and until it is definately known what the flying saucers are----the average person is bound to wonder ... Are the flying saucers real ?, if so,what are they ?. The final chapter is yet to be written in this strange drama. The answer is not yet available to us. ## LOOKING AT ## AUSTRALIA Since 1st Jan this year, Australia, the State of Victoria in particular has been the scene of numerous reports of Flying Saucers. To give all the details of these sightings and subsequent newspaper articles would full a book. If it were possible at this stage C.S.I. would gladly pass on all available data, but we are definitely limited in this aspect by major considerations such as ,Time , Finance and available space in this Review. However here is a brief survey of the recent Australian enigma. Jan 1st 1954 Capt. Douglas Barker (A.N.A. pilot) sighted flying object shaped like Mushroom, at approx 2000ft over the Yarra Valley. He told the Civil Aviation Dept that he saw a semi-transparent object shaped like a mushroom with a stalk, over the Templestowe brickworks at 10.15 A.M. --- I was sitting on the edge on the dining table in my home at East Kew when I noticed the clear-plastic-like out-size mushroom oscillating rapidly in and out of the thick cloud. The object which was flying well below the safety level in that area was travelling faster than any jet I have seen and was roughly four times the size of a DC4 seen side on. It appeared to have something trailing beneath it like a thick stalk and a smaller construction at the bottom end which could have been and observation car. Capt Barker said that he was not trying to impress any one and had not been celebrating the New Year, having retired early the evening previous. I have been flying since 1937 and served for three years with the R.A.A.F., so there is no question of confusion. (CAD tried to convince Capt Barker that he had probably seen a Convair airliner that was test flying in the area at the time.) Capt Barker is convinced that that what he saw was not a plane nor an optical illusion. The object would fly into the clouds for a second and then sink down to the clear sky. Its colour seemed to be changing from clear plastic to sky blue. Capt Barker said that he had expected his crewmates and colleagues at Essendon sceptical, but he had been surprised, two or three senior pilots had had strange experiences in the air with flying saucer-like objects but were afraid to mention it for fear of ridicule. At the time the object was seen, the sky was completely overcast, Capt Barkers sketch was published and there was much follow up argument and discussion on this sighting in the Australian Sydney Herald and Sun between Jan 1st and 6th.
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