The New Zealand Defense Force released 58 years of UFO files for public access through its library on Dec. 22.
The documents are not for loan, but photocopies can be made. The Defense Force asks that visitors call the library at 64-4-496-0842 in advance.
Stuff.co.nz has made the documents, from 1952 to 2009, available online at http://bit.ly/h9pVOI .
A particularly well-documented sighting was on Dec. 30, 1978, when anomalous lights were seen from an aircraft. On board that aircraft were reporter Quentin Fogarty and a film crew.
The released files included a 1979 report on the case by UFO researcher Dr. Bruce Maccabee.
“To my surprise (and delight) almost every new ‘bit’ of information I learned supported rather than contradicted the previous ‘bits,'” Maccabee wrote in the report.
“From this wealth of information I have abstracted a summary of the events which, when read in conjunction with the ‘Event Descriptions and Map Legend,’ will give the reader an overview of the N.Z. Radar-Visual UFO case.”
According to the report, the plane traveled from Wellington to Christchurch, and then to Blenheim. A cameraman obtained footage of the UFO sighting while Fogarty recorded himself describing the incident on the scene.
Apart from this footage and recording, Maccabee also inspected a recording of the conversation between the Wellington Air Traffic Control Center and the aircraft and interviewed the eight witnesses.
“As the interviews proceeded I found that the statements of the various witnesses tended to complement rather than contradict one another,” Maccabee wrote.
During the first flight, lights were seen from the plane in the direction of Kaikoura, while Wellington radar detected anomalous targets near the plane.
“One particularly interesting sequence of events involving Wellington ATC occurred just after the plane had turned toward Christchurch at a non-geographic reporting point called “Kaikoura East.” […] The plane had shifted to the Christchurch communication frequency when Wellington saw a target appear behind the plane about one or two miles,” Maccabee wrote.
“Wellington told the Christchurch controller, who asked the plane to shift back to the Wellington frequency. Wellington then told the plane that the target was about four miles behind them. About half a minute later Wellington said there was a further target about four miles to the right of the plane.
“About 45 seconds after that, Wellington told the plane that something was flying in formation with it. The plane and the unidentified target flew side by side for at least half a minute, after which the radar target reduced to that of the plane alone.”
During the second flight, a “bright yellow/white/orange light” was seen just three minutes after take-off, and later, another bright object was photographed.
“The film shows a bright light which alternates in a regular, cyclic manner from bright white to dim red and orange. It apparently travelled in a series of loops, described as ‘rolling and tumbling’ by the reporter,” Maccabee wrote.
“The landing light sequences and the cockpit sequences serve to establish that the film was taken from inside the aircraft,” he wrote.
“A study of the edge numbers of the original film (edge numbers are put on by the manufacturer) shows that they are continuous […] thus the film is not a hoax.”
