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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.
“Open Minds”13 pages
Just after 8.30 p.m. on 16th October 1952 I was outside my fré door (upper part of Messines Road, Karori, Wellington) facing East, admiring the clear sky and stars, when I saw what for a moment I took for a meteor. My next reaction was that this was a very large meteor about to land uncommonly close. Then, "no, it is not a meteor, it is a flying saucer". The object was flying from East to West, at a guess about mid-way between Eastbourne and the Heads. It went very fast, some three, four or five (?) times as fast as a fast plane. Its appearance was like the reflection of a searchlight on the bottom of a cloud, but its course, from my angle, took it well clear of the two or three small clouds in the sky, which lay to the South of its course. It became obscured by some small trees, and I rushed forward to try to follow its course to the West, but I could not see it again. It did not seem to be travelling at a very great height, perhaps 10,000 feet, but this was very difficult to judge, as was its size. There was no sign of searchlight activity, or a searchlight cone. A "saucer" seemed to be quite a good description of the object.
I went indoors, and said to my wife "guess what I have seen". "A flying saucer" she replied. "Yes". "Why didn't you call me?" "It went far too quickly". ('There was a cartoon in the Evening Post depicting various flying kitchen utensils). My strongest drink had been milk. Having had this experience, I think I should report it, at any rate within my Department of Scientific and Industrial Research.
47. 258 Ex 716 FILE. 43 OCT 1952 Document, cited by the archive. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is under it. The text was read from the page images by an OCR model; expect the odd misread word. 445 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.