The Ariel School UFO Encounter [Ruwa, Zimbabwe, 1994]

[Kingsize Wombat]

Here's an interview with Salma Siddick, one of the witnesses, as an adult:
https://theunexplained.tv/episodes/edition-317-zimbabwe-et-contact-case

 

[dr wu]

I think it's clear that the children saw something unusual. To me this is not a group hallucination or some psychosocial event....having said that I won't rule out the possibility that some kind of bizarre natural phenomenon caused them to think they saw a craft and being.
But I have no idea what that could have been.

 

[Paul_Exeter]

*bump*

Came across this by Brian Dunning:

https://skeptoid.com/episodes/4760

"Hind's own interviews were even worse. She interviewed the children in groups of four to six, while the other children were allowed to watch and listen to each group. Every single child's story was necessarily cross contaminated with the others. There is little wonder that she always reported that all the students told exactly the same story."

Sadly this article shows this now much-vaunted UFO event in a new light, and its beginning to look rather suspect:

"Maybe an alien spaceship did land there that day and communicate telepathically to this handful of children. Or, maybe a couple of strangers strolled through the nearby field, and maybe a stray party balloon floated past. We'll never really have any good idea of what did or didn't happen on that day, if anything happened at all — keeping in mind that "nothing at all" is what three quarters of the students reported. The actual events are buried under a nationwide UFO frenzy triggered by the rocket re-entry, under the hopelessly incompetent story sharing sessions of Cynthia Hind, and under the skilled promptings of Harvard University's resident expert in persuading people that they had an actual alien encounter. As far as serving as evidence of alien visitation, the 1994 Ruwa, Zimbabwe encounter falls just a little bit short."

 

[dr wu]

After reading that piece I didn't get the take away that the case was disproven as being genuine. Genuine in the sense that they saw something stranger than balloons and some men walk by. Of course that doesn't mean it was space aliens either.

 

[Paul_Exeter]

After reading that piece I didn't get the take away that the case was disproven as being genuine. Genuine in the sense that they saw something stranger than balloons and some men walk by. Of course that doesn't mean it was space aliens either.

if you google the Ariel schoolchildren's drawings there are marked differences in the craft's size, shape and colour. Some show multiple windows, some a single window and at least one has no window. Makes me think that they did indeed see an object but then added their own embellishments (as children are prone to do).

 

[Comfortably Numb]

I am familiar with this case and have found in my archives, Cynthia Hind's original published account.

If of further interest, there are a number of YouTube videos featuring both the late Cynthia Hind and the late John Mack's investigations.

Preliminary report of a possible CE3K event at Ruwa, Zimbabwe, on September 16, 1994.

THE CHILDREN OF ARIEL SCHOOL - Case No. #96. Ruwa, Zimbabwe
By Cynthia Hind

On Friday 16th September, at approximately 10:15, 62 children from Ariel School, a private primary school in Ruwa (about 20 km from Harare) were in their playing field for the mid-morning break.

Suddenly, they saw three silver balls in the sky over the school. These disappeared with a flash of light and then re-appeared elsewhere. This happened three times and then they started to move down towards the school with one of them landing (or hovering) over a section of rough ground made up of trees, thorn bushes, and some brown-grey cut grass with bamboo shoots sticking up out of the ground.

The children are not allowed in this area although it is adjacent to their playing field and not fenced off, because of snakes, spiders and perhaps other harmful creatures. One can soon disappear from view while walking here and there is only one very rough track used by tractors in an attempt to clear this area.

There is a line of electricity pylons and according to one boy, the object followed along this line prior to landing. There is also some controversy as to whether the object _landed_ on the ground or hovered above it. On Tuesday, 20th September, I went out to the school with a BBC reporter and their television equipment, as well as my son and Gunter Hofer, a young man who builds his own electrical equipment, viz, a Geiger counter, a metal detector and a magnetometer, to try and see if the object left any traces behind.

The headmaster of the school is Mr. Colin Mackie, who was most co-operative, and although he had never been involved with UFOs or a believer in them, said that he believed the children had seen what they said they saw.

I was able to interview about 10 or 12 older children and this was recorded for BBC television.

One eyewitness, Barry D., said he had seen three objects flying over, with flashing red lights. They disappeared, and reappeared almost immediately, but somewhere else. This happened about three times. Then they came and landed near some gum trees; Barry said the main one (object) was about the size of his thumb nail held at arm's length.

The reports were similar although some children were more observant than others. The consensus of opinion was that an object came down in the area where they indicated, about 100 metres from where they were at the edge of the school playing field.

Then a small man (approx 1 metre in height) appeared on top of the object. He walked a little way across the rough ground, became aware of the children and disappeared. He, or someone very like him, then re-appeared at the back of the object. The object took off very rapidly and disappeared. The little man was dressed in a tight-fitting black suit which was 'shiny' according to one observant girl (11 years of age). He had a long scrawny neck and huge eyes like rugby balls. He had a pale face with long black hair coming below his shoulders.

I had suggested to Mr. Mackie prior to visiting the school and before the children had been interviewed, that he let the children draw what they seen and he now has about 30-40 drawings, some of which are very explicit and clear, although some are rather vague. The childrens' ages vary from 5/6 to 12 years. I have 22 photocopies of the clearer drawings as Mr. Mackie kindly allowed me to page through the pictures and choose those I wanted. Most of the descriptions are similar but some of the craft are very obviously 'flying saucers', and I wonder how many of these children have had access to the media. Others are crude but more or less in this saucer shape.

The children vary in cultures: there are black, white, coloured and Asian children. One little girl said to me, 'I swear by every hair on my head and the whole Bible that I am telling the truth.' I could see the pleasure on her face when I told her that I believed her.

The smaller children from 5-7 years were very frightened at the time and ran shouting 'Help me, help me.' When the older children asked why they were saying this, the reply was, 'He is coming to eat us.' I should think this applied more to the black African children who have legends of 'tokoloshies' eating children.

Their teachers were in a meeting and did not come out. When I queried the headmaster about this he said the children always shouted and yelled during their playtime and no-one thought there was anything unusual going on. The only other adult available at the time was one of the mothers who was running the tuckshop. When the children came to call her, she did not believe them and would not come out: she was not prepared to leave the tuckshop with all the food and money.

Gunter and the men thoroughly examined the ground around where the children had seen the object, but could get no reaction on the geiger counter geiger or any other equipment. If the object was hovering perhaps nothing would show.

I walked, on my own, along the electricity pylons for quite a away, caught up in thorn bushes, trampling blithely over snake holes and discarding all caution. I found no place where some object could have landed and pressed down the foliage. In fact, I should think the bamboo stumps would have been a deterrent. The day was hot, around 33 C (91F)...

Dr John Mack was visiting Zimbabwe at the time of the event, and he spent two days at Ariel School with the children. He also spoke to yhe headmaster, Colin Mackie, the teachers and some of the parents. John and his fellow researcher, Dominique Callimanopulos, were able to get through to the parents and teachers and convince them that even if they did not believe the children, it was counter-productive to accuse them of lying.

Listen and think about what they were saying, he advised. His particular interest in child psychiatry was also of great use during the questioning and many former hidden memories came to light, something John is sure to make public when he has had a chance to re-assess his interviewing. (sic)

Continued on page 2 of 3

 

[Comfortably Numb]

Page 2 of 3

ARIEL SCHOOL REPORT (CONT.) Case No. 96

The Ariel School case developed much further when an interview with the children was made by Dr. John Mack. He spent two days speaking to them and was able to elicit a great deal more information. I am sure he will report this himself at a later date.

I have also found out that some of the children actually saw a 'cigar-like' object on the Thursday, September 15th, 1994 the day before the general sighting. One young boy said that as he was driving from school with his mother - in broad daylight - on the 15th September, they saw an object ahead of them.

This sighting was verified by three little girls who were sitting in the playground on the Thursday and observed the mysterious object, 'like a cigarette in the sky' very briefly, when it then disappeared. Had it been after the Friday event, I would have been wary of the report, as they could easily been been influenced by the big event. This report is being investigated and will be reported on in a later issue.

Fiona, aged 9, said that on the Friday she could see this strange object, very bright, over in the bush and something dark on the object. But she could not identify it as a 'little man'; she says: 'It could have been a branch or something like that.'

I was impressed by the honesty of the children. When they weren't sure, they were hesitant; when they were sure, they spoke out quickly and confidently.

It was a cross-section of Zimbabweans: black African children from several tribes, coloured children (a cross-breeding of black and white),

Asian children (with parents born in Zimbabwe but whose grandparents had come from India) and white children mostly Zimbabwean-born, but whose parents were either from South Africa or Britain.

Ariel School is a privately-owned Primary School with classes from the smallest 5-6 year olds, to Grade 7 class with children of 11 and 12 years.

The school is expensive and the standard of children is of a reasonably high intellectual level. Most of the parents live in the area but several come from Harare and do the long drive - approx 20 Km - every day.

Obviously there are cultural differences. When Guy G. asked two little boys why they were crying, they both said the little man in black was 'coming to eat' them. They were obviously black children, as Western parents no longer (certainly for several decades) threaten their children with demons who come and eat you. But this is still part of the African culture where 'the Tokolosh could very well gobble children up if they were naughty.'

On the other hand, the white children were mostly - although not all - aware of UFOs. So when they drew pictures, it was often identified as 'a UFO' and the little men in black labelled 'aliens'.

In drawings from other ethnic groups the labelling was different: the little men were called 'unidentified persons' and the craft - or whatever - was called 'the machine', or 'the object'.

Farai M., aged about 11, agreed with Guy's description of the object being striped with green, black and silver.

One of the boys told me that he thought at first that the little man in black might have been Mrs Stevens' gardener, but then he saw the figure had long, straight black hair, 'not really like African hair', so he realised he had made a mistake!

Continued on page 3 of 3

 

[Comfortably Numb]

Page 3 of 3

Shortly after the event (certainly within 7 days), Gunter Hofer drove out to the Ariel School and, using a map of the area, took samples of the soil from several different areas. These were subsequently analysed by the Chemistry & Soil Research Institute, Department of Research and Specialist Services, free of charge, and the readings simplified for us by Dr Keith Viewing, now retired from the University of Zimbabwe.

Unfortunately, although there were some anomalies, none were of particular significance and Dr Viewing suggested that a better and perhaps more relevant reading would be obtained from the Institute of Mining Research at the University. So, this is our next step.

An important issue to consider is that the children pointed out _two_ landing areas, the first where the craft touched down - at the third electricity pole from their viewpoint - and the second landing point, where the little men emerged.

I have alway maintained that one or two visits to any important UFO case are not enough; it is an on-going exercise and although 10 months have passed since the sighting, the event is still firmly etched in the minds of the children. I am hoping to make this - because of accessability -an on-going exercise. I realise only too well that even months or years after the event, factors of extreme significance can come to light. And surely any evidence to solve this fascinating mystery is worth its weight in gold?

During the interviews with the children, several significant, direct statements were made. These are quoted here.

One young girl said that when she first looked, she saw three figures: one in red, one in white and one in black. The one in black was sitting on the 'spaceship'. This was the first time the word 'spaceship' had been used. She admitted that she had presumed that what she saw was a UFO.

Guy G: said that the objects were disc-shaped and were glinting among the trees before landing. He pointed out the landing place as at the third pole from the school grounds and the objects had come in along the electricity wires towards this area.

Of the little man, Guy said: 'He was quite lightish in colour, not black. His clothes were black. But there was no noise. And they disappeared into the valley down there' (Below the landing site).

Oriana: 'I saw this black stick, a very thin, long thing on top of the silver thing.

Colin Mackie, Headmaster: 'I feel sure the children saw something. I don't believe or disbelieve, but they definitely saw SOMETHING. I agree that it could be something natural with which were are not familiar, but it was certainly seen by the children.'

Nathaniel said he saw 'a ship' land on the ground. It had an elongated hull with a platform around the side, and a small man in black was running around. He was about one-metre-plus tall.

Luke N.: 'I saw the little man. He had long black hair and was all in black. He looked like a shadow of something.'

Trevor: 'I was walking towards the school as the bell had rung, and I saw flashes of light from the corner of my eye.'

Daniel M.: 'I saw this silver thing among the trees, with one thing sitting on the side and another on top. They were running back and forth. It looked like a real person but it was quite plump [1]. At first I thought it was someone from the compound (labourers' quarters) playing around, but his hair was not like the usual African hair - very curly and close to the head - it was almost like a hippy's hair, long and black.'

Emily B.: 'I saw the little men with longish black hair and big black eyes. They turned round and stared at me and went back into a kind of ship. There was only one ship and some little ones scattered around it. I could see their big eyes and long hair. I definitely saw them!

Charity S.: 'I saw this silver thing and a person in black alongside it. It looked like a saucer.' When asked by Tim Leach of the BBC if she had heard of UFOs, Charity replied:'I've not heard of UFOs before.'

Emma C.: 'I saw the objects disappear. They went up about a metre and then they disappeared. The little men were wearing clothes which were very, very shiny black. Like a diving suit and tight-fitting. I saw a glimpse of his face; his eyes were big. I thought they were aliens from another planet.'

Lisa P.: 'I saw this silver thing lying on its side. A man dressed in black came out. He had big eyes. I thought it was an alien and then I thought it was the gardener.'

Earlier that day, Mrs Stevens, whose farm is close to the school, said that she had got up to go to the bathroom, in the early hours, when she saw a huge orange glow from her window, over her chicken house. It was like a big round ball. She had never seen anything like it before and rushed to call her husband, but when he came, it had gone!

How does one assess a sighting like this? Were the children highly imaginative or were they dreaming? Is the whole UFO experience a mental aberration with which we are not familiar? Were the children - as has been suggested by one friend - in a state of hysteria, as has happened recently in some girls' schools in Zimbabwe? But in checking out the latter, the hysterical girls were at the age of puberty (14/15/16 year olds) and were _only_ girls. Here, as many - if not more - boys were involved and the ages of the witnesses ranged from 7 to 12 years.

None of this proves anything, one way or another, but one cannot help feeling that a statement is being made. What it is, well, as John Mack says, that's the question!

[1] - Only mention of the little figure being 'plump'.

[Article reproduced with permission]
(End)

 

[BS3]

As someone on this thread - which I've just read through again - pointed out a couple of years back, this has strong similarities with the mass sighting at a school in Pembrokeshire in 1977. The main one for me is that nearly all the witnesses in both cases seem to describe something that is on, or close to, the ground, which suggests an earthly stimulus (eg a vehicle). Both also seem to be in the context of a 'flap', although this wasn't immediately made clear at Ruwa.

 

[Paul_Exeter]

Thanks Comfortably Numb.

"i've not heard of UFOs before". And yet her classmates are talking about 'aliens' and 'spaceships'...

The large eyes are a constant feature in what are otherwise quite disparate witness statements (one creature vs lots of creatures, running vs standing, black vs red etc...)

Could they be sunglasses:

https://www.trendhim.co.uk/moses-ve...sbQsvHw5CoNp5et8CBcwm32QsdBWmCXxoCj2QQAvD_BwE

And the first photo here:

https://www.esquire.com/entertainment/news/g2743/50-photos-bono/

Bono made these types of sunglasses pretty trendy in the 90s.

I'm not saying I don't believe the children or that nothing happened, but we do have to consider all possibilities before we can say 'aliens'.


Here is the provocative take on this case by the Three-Dollar Kit blog:

https://threedollarkit.weebly.com/blog-how-many-dollars

• John Mack fucked with the minds of school children until they believed the flash in the trees and regular-sized human they saw outside their school two months earlier was actually a flying saucer with tiny aliens giving them telepathic messages about the environment.
• Two of the children are now grown women who should know better, telling tall tales about what they saw that completely contradict what was said and seen at the time.

 

[Paul_Exeter]

A Mailonline article out today featuring 'exclusive ' photos of the depression left by the Ariel school UFO (allegedly):

"New photos show imprints in a field left by an alleged UFO that was seen by over 60 witnesses in a famous 1994 sighting in Zimbabwe.

A whole class of children at the Ariel School in Ruwa drew media attention nearly 30 years ago after they said they had seen a disc-shaped craft land in a field behind their playground one Friday morning in September 1994 – and some even said they saw humanoid beings come out from the craft and communicate with them.

A Pulitzer Prize-winning head of psychiatry at Harvard interviewed many of the 62 children at length shortly after, and concluded they were telling the truth. Now adults, they have all stuck to their stories for decades"

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...-imprints-left-UFO-spotted-Zimbabwe-1994.html​

 

[Zeke Newbold]

I am struck by the parallels between this incident and that of one which allegedly occurred half a decade earlier in Central - (and as then Soviet Russia) - the Voronezh Close Encounter. This has been covered before a few times elsewhere on this site. For example:

https://forums.forteana.org/index.php?threads/the-voronezh-saga-continues.63943/#post-1766901

In both cases:

*A mass sighting was involved - of something somewhere between CE2 and CE3.
*Both cases have something of a vision or `show` about them - Vallee's `theatre of the absurd`.
* In both cases there is some degree of unanimity around the event - but also a great deal of troublesome variety in the description of the precise nature of the sighting.
*In that area of Zimbabwe and in Voronezh there is some suggestion of anomalous things seen in the sky by others prior to the `main` event.
* In both cases the local and international media responded to the event in a markedly mixed manner. (In the cause of Voronezh TASS famously promoted it - whereby the report reached the States- but other press outlets such as `Pravda` did not).
* In both cases Ufological `superstars` later descended on the area - Mack in the Zimbabwe case and Vallee in the Voronezh case (although he was disallowed from actually visiting the town).
*Likewise in both cases there was an attempt to later analyse the local any signs of significant disturbance or residue - with inconclusive results. (The Voronezh case involved dowsing).
*Generally both events carry with them an inescapable - but not conclusive - whiff of some kind of `mass hysteria` about them.

Most tellingly: in both stories there has since been a faintly chauvinistic implication that the experience occurred to people who were in some way backward or culturally isolated - and hence more credible as witnesses! (In the case of Voronezh, I can say, for sure, that this is pure nonsense. Russia and the Soviet Union had had it's own homegrown Science fiction novels and TV shows for a long time before 1989 - and UFOs had been discussed before then and were growing in popularity in that heady time. Also Voronezh is not some rural backwater: I have been there. It is a standard lacklustre medium sized Russian city found on a longstanding train route that also serves Moscow).

Some of the differences include:
*In the Voronezh case the witnesses were not just kids - but also adults (including some military men and academics) waiting at a bus stop near the park.
* There has been no mundane explanation forthcoming (that I know of) to explain the UFO sightings around Voronezh prior to the mass sighting - unlike the space debris re-entry that is claimed to have triggered the Zimbabwe case.
* Whilst some of the witnesses at Voronezh who were children at the time have since been interviewed as adults, they have not since - as far as I know - become quasi- celebrities on this account, unlike as with the Zimbabwe case.
* In the Voronezh incident there is no suggestion of any attempt to communicate any kind of message from the phenomena.

For what it's worth I think both cases are too psychologically loaded to represent anything like extraterrestrial contact. But I do think something significant occurred. (The skeptics over-reductive cod explanation of people passing by with balloons is almost insulting). With regard to the Zimbabwe report, I find the description of balls of light moving around pylons - coupled with what seem like hallucinatory episodes, to be highly suggestive - and similar to many, many other such cases.

 

[BS3]

So, has anyone seen the recently released (as in 3 days ago) Ariel Phenomenon documentary yet? It's certainly been a long time in production, I seem to remember seeing something about it a decade ago.

 

[charliebrown]

The Ariel School UFO is like Roswell in that it won’t die.

Here we have 62 children witnesses who, I presume, never changed their stories in adulthood.

The explanation was John Mack’s interviews were flawed, or the kids pulled a giant prank, or a simple case of mass hysteria.

Mass hysteria is a favorite explanation, so what does mass hysteria really mean ?

Has anyone ever seen mass hysteria ?

I have not seen mass hysteria as far as I know.

 

[BS3]

The Ariel School UFO is like Roswell in that it won’t die.

Here we have 62 children witnesses who, I presume, never changed their stories in adulthood.

The explanation was John Mack’s interviews were flawed, or the kids pulled a giant prank, or a simple case of mass hysteria.

Mass hysteria is a favorite explanation, so what does mass hysteria really mean ?

Has anyone ever seen mass hysteria ?

I have not seen mass hysteria as far as I know.

I suppose the simplest analogy is the time I worked in an office and someone announced they thought they had seen a flea.

For the rest of the day people were complaining of itching, having been bitten, and misinterpreting various mundane bits of fluff, dirt etc as "fleas". There were no fleas, but the idea of their presence was pretty powerful on its own.

Similarly I suppose once the idea takes hold that you are looking at something strange, even quite mundane and explicable things can easily be misperceived due to social pressure, groupthink, excitement, etc. I'm not saying this certainly happened at Ruwa but I think needs to be ruled out given the particular susceptibility of children to peer pressure - perhaps they saw an earthly vehicle and contagious excitement did the rest, along with unintended 'coaching' by researchers.

 

[BS3]

One important point picked up following that article by Sheaffer posted some time back: the witness "Oriana F", who drew a canonical large eyed occupant in her drawing, clarified that she didn't actually get to see the 'aliens' herself and indeed the child she knew who claimed to have seen them had only done so as they went past the school boundary onto the adjoining land, which she didn't want to do as it was against the school rules.

So we can already see a few aspects of peer pressure etc in operation.

 

[BS3]

Having said all that...just to elaborate on the "mass hysteria" thing, I'm not aware that in the past this was particularly linked with the Ruwa case.

The reason it has been seems to be largely down to an article in Skeptoid, which (as all too often with that site) bases the conclusion on a single academic 'paper' (in reality a very brief journal article which cites it in passing among a few other disparate cases of 'panics' in African schools - not sure of the value of this given the fairly atypical nature of Ariel School, an expensive fee paying school for people from Harare). In reality, I think this case might be a bit more complex - or at least deserve a more complex analysis.

Personally I wonder if the original stimulus might have been some sort of earthly vehicle, or even an electrical phenomenon connected with the power lines that ran through the area. I seem to remember that power line workers were suggested as one possible origin for the figures supposedly seen by some of the children, although a lot of them seem to have described only a shiny object or light seen amongst the scrub.

 

[charliebrown]

According to wikipedia, the children were scared because they thought the humanoids were the evil goblins of Shona called Zvikwambo.

The students must have experienced something not normal ?

What did the kids see ?

 

[Ronnie Jersey]

Has anyone interviewed these children as adults?
I would be most interested to hear their stories, I'm sure most people would!

 

[charliebrown]

Ronnie Jersey,

I have wondered too what happen to these grown children !

According to wikipedia, it seems it is hard to trace these students in Rhodesia/Zimbabwe.

Ufologist, James Fox, in his 2020 documentary “ The Phenomenon “ found a few, but I have not seen this documentary.

According to wikipedia, the only grown up child who received some attention was Emily Trim, who in 2016 exhibited her paintings of this UFO event, but no details about this exhibition given.

 

[Paul_Exeter]

One important point picked up following that article by Sheaffer posted some time back: the witness "Oriana F", who drew a canonical large eyed occupant in her drawing, clarified that she didn't actually get to see the 'aliens' herself and indeed the child she knew who claimed to have seen them had only done so as they went past the school boundary onto the adjoining land, which she didn't want to do as it was against the school rules.

So we can already see a few aspects of peer pressure etc in operation.

The same thing happened in the ’77 Broad Haven school case, whereby only a handful of the pupils actually witnessed the event but the entire school produced drawings on the following Monday based solely on what they had heard. This is critical to take into account as the humanoid in the drawings (with Dr Spock ears no less) was not seen by the actual witnesses

 

[BS3]

Has anyone interviewed these children as adults?
I would be most interested to hear their stories, I'm sure most people would!

There is a documentary film that has just been released, The Ariel Phenomenon - it's been in production for at least a decade. I haven't seen it yet but I understand that interviews are included with a large number of the witnesses, including many who haven't gone on record before (although Emily Trim, mentioned above, is one of the main interviewees).

https://arielphenomenon.com/

As I said I haven't yet seen it but have heard that it takes a relatively open minded stance on what the witnesses saw - the director focuses on the human experiences behind the event.

Note this is a different film to the 2020 documentary, The Phenomenon, mentioned above. The titles are confusingly similar.

 

[Paul_Exeter]

The excellent Three Dollar Kit blog has now focused on this case:

"The incident at Ariel had profound effects on some of them, who still believe and testify that they saw a flying saucer land and aliens on that day. Since then, they've no doubt gone over and over the details - and talked to each other as well - and those details are changing yet again. Two witnesses now report they got within arm's length of an alien - something neither they, nor any other child, reported at the time. It's not something the other children on the playground would miss, surely? - seeing their classmates come face-to-face with aliens?

The UFO now buzzed like a machine bee. The aliens are now floating. Or, they ran not only in slow motion but in a strange looping pattern - covering a distance, then disappearing, reappearing at the start, and running the same distance again, repeatedly. This sure sounds like someone is recalling and replaying the memory of a single event, not the event itself repeating. None of this supernatural behavior was reported at the time by the very witnesses now "remembering" it.

Which goes to show how malleable and how fallible memory is. In every other aspect of life we know this is true - we forget things, we remember things incorrectly, and of course we misperceive. When it comes to a UFO sighting from childhood, why would adult perception and memories be deemed accurate? Even when we have filmed evidence that the sighting as originally reported was not remarkable, and that memories have changed?"

Read the whole analysis here:

https://threedollarkit.weebly.com/ariel-school.html

 

[BS3]

The excellent Three Dollar Kit blog has now focused on this case:

"The incident at Ariel had profound effects on some of them, who still believe and testify that they saw a flying saucer land and aliens on that day. Since then, they've no doubt gone over and over the details - and talked to each other as well - and those details are changing yet again. Two witnesses now report they got within arm's length of an alien - something neither they, nor any other child, reported at the time. It's not something the other children on the playground would miss, surely? - seeing their classmates come face-to-face with aliens?

The UFO now buzzed like a machine bee. The aliens are now floating. Or, they ran not only in slow motion but in a strange looping pattern - covering a distance, then disappearing, reappearing at the start, and running the same distance again, repeatedly. This sure sounds like someone is recalling and replaying the memory of a single event, not the event itself repeating. None of this supernatural behavior was reported at the time by the very witnesses now "remembering" it.

Which goes to show how malleable and how fallible memory is. In every other aspect of life we know this is true - we forget things, we remember things incorrectly, and of course we misperceive. When it comes to a UFO sighting from childhood, why would adult perception and memories be deemed accurate? Even when we have filmed evidence that the sighting as originally reported was not remarkable, and that memories have changed?"

Read the whole analysis here:

https://threedollarkit.weebly.com/ariel-school.html

There's an article on Westall too, I notice. Seems to base its conclusions on Keith Basterfield's HIBAL balloon suggestion, but adds that the second bit of the sighting (involving the planes chasing a 'saucer') could have been a training exercise put on by the military to cover the fact a balloon with a heavy, secret payload including explosive squibs, had almost dropped on a load of schoolchildren.

 

[Paul_Exeter]

There's an article on Westall too, I notice. Seems to base its conclusions on Keith Basterfield's HIBAL balloon suggestion, but adds that the second bit of the sighting (involving the planes chasing a 'saucer') could have been a training exercise put on by the military to cover the fact a balloon with a heavy, secret payload including explosive squibs, had almost dropped on a load of schoolchildren.

Whilst I don't agree with every detail of this blog's conclusions, it does do a very good job of exposing constantly shifting narratives in these famous cases as self-styled 'Ufologists' got involved and got, well, creative.

I do feel the analysis for the Travis Walton case is about as close to the truth we may ever get, they are gaping holes in the testimony of Walton in particular. The analysis of Betty and Barney Hill is close to that of one of those in the excellent Encounters at Indian Head and to my mind is pretty much the correct conclusion. In both instances it was the use of hypnosis and piss-poor research methods that created the enduring mythology of these cases.

The 'Golden Age' of UFOs is over, we simply don't get these big, multiple witness, headlines cases anymore in which humans are abducted onto crafts and subjected to medical examinations. The last one in the UK was back in the 1990s. Now the dust settled I have to say these cases no longer appear as strong as they have historically been portrayed in the media and modern folklore. To be honest, they are far more intriguing cases from this time period that weren't sensationalised through the use of hypnosis and - to my mind - might be suggestive of sort sort of 'other intelligence' or robotic alien probes.

 

[Sabresonic]

Whilst I don't agree with every detail of this blog's conclusions, it does do a very good job of exposing constantly shifting narratives in these famous cases as self-styled 'Ufologists' got involved and got, well, creative.

I do feel the analysis for the Travis Walton case is about as close to the truth we may ever get, they are gaping holes in the testimony of Walton in particular. The analysis of Betty and Barney Hill is close to that of one of those in the excellent Encounters at Indian Head and to my mind is pretty much the correct conclusion. In both instances it was the use of hypnosis and piss-poor research methods that created the enduring mythology of these cases.

The 'Golden Age' of UFOs is over, we simply don't get these big, multiple witness, headlines cases anymore in which humans are abducted onto crafts and subjected to medical examinations. The last one in the UK was back in the 1990s. Now the dust settled I have to say these cases no longer appear as strong as they have historically been portrayed in the media and modern folklore. To be honest, they are far more intriguing cases from this time period that weren't sensationalised through the use of hypnosis and - to my mind - might be suggestive of sort sort of 'other intelligence' or robotic alien probes.

Which cases are you talking about which haven't been sensationalised.

 

[Ronnie Jersey]

The 'Golden Age' of UFOs is over, we simply don't get these big, multiple witness, headlines cases anymore in which humans are abducted onto crafts and subjected to medical examinations. The last one in the UK was back in the 1990s. Now the dust settled I have to say these cases no longer appear as strong as they have historically been portrayed in the media and modern folklore. To be honest, they are far more intriguing cases from this time period that weren't sensationalised through the use of hypnosis and - to my mind - might be suggestive of sort sort of 'other intelligence' or robotic alien probes.

Of course we don't hear about these big cases anymore, who in their right mind would come forward to be criticized and scrutinized for years on end.
We have no idea how many people have never said a word about their experiences, I know I wouldn't want to see myself splattered all over The National Enquirer.
Just my opinion.

 

[Paul_Exeter]

Which cases are you talking about which haven't been sensationalised.

Philip Mantle explains it better than me:

https://www.audible.co.uk/pd/Myster...a91-2ceac137094a&pf_rd_r=JWFYPDTW1Y58RXGHEG6Z

His latest book focuses on lesser-known UK landing cases. Also see Malcolm Robinson’s books eg

https://www.amazon.co.uk/UFO-Case-Files-Scotland-Encounters-ebook/dp/B074PQ8MXF

Then you have current events being investigated by Paul Sinclair:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Truth-Proof-Truth-That-Leaves-Proof-ebook/dp/B01GQCLKZE/ref=sr_1_2?crid=1GVIPJB18TIQB&keywords=Truth+proof&qid=1657988361&s=digital-text&sprefix=truth+proof,digital-text,83&sr=1-2

He has quite a number of fascinating UK UFO reports from recent years

 

[BS3]

Whilst I don't agree with every detail of this blog's conclusions, it does do a very good job of exposing constantly shifting narratives in these famous cases as self-styled 'Ufologists' got involved and got, well, creative.

I do feel the analysis for the Travis Walton case is about as close to the truth we may ever get, they are gaping holes in the testimony of Walton in particular. The analysis of Betty and Barney Hill is close to that of one of those in the excellent Encounters at Indian Head and to my mind is pretty much the correct conclusion. In both instances it was the use of hypnosis and piss-poor research methods that created the enduring mythology of these cases.

The 'Golden Age' of UFOs is over, we simply don't get these big, multiple witness, headlines cases anymore in which humans are abducted onto crafts and subjected to medical examinations. The last one in the UK was back in the 1990s. Now the dust settled I have to say these cases no longer appear as strong as they have historically been portrayed in the media and modern folklore. To be honest, they are far more intriguing cases from this time period that weren't sensationalised through the use of hypnosis and - to my mind - might be suggestive of sort sort of 'other intelligence' or robotic alien probes.

Oh I agree, there are some very puzzling cases, both 'UFO' (Michael Swiney / Mainbrace sightings for example) and even entity cases (eg Cussac, 1967 - there's a whole lot of stuff on this in French which hasn't made it into English).

Ufology in general has tended to get hung up on things like hypnotic regression, 'crash' stories, continuing to try and insist on validity in particular events long after a solid explanation has presented itself, etc etc. This hasn't got it anywhere and doesn't reflect well on some researchers. The attachment to some of these dubious 'classics' seems emotional as much as anything.

 

[Paul_Exeter]

Oh I agree, there are some very puzzling cases, both 'UFO' (Michael Swiney / Mainbrace sightings for example) and even entity cases (eg Cussac, 1967 - there's a whole lot of stuff on this in French which hasn't made it into English).

Ufology in general has tended to get hung up on things like hypnotic regression, 'crash' stories, continuing to try and insist on validity in particular events long after a solid explanation has presented itself, etc etc. This hasn't got it anywhere and doesn't reflect well on some researchers. The attachment to some of these dubious 'classics' seems emotional as much as anything.

Absolutely.

For some reason the rather dubious Broad Haven school UFO sighting has become the ’classic” encounter that defines the ‘76-‘78 Welsh UFO flap. This is despite the object never being off the ground and only only a handful of the children actually seeing it. Those drawings of the object keep reappearing in the media and yet they were all drawn the following Monday by all the children, hence the inclusion of a ‘Dr Spock’ and other fictional details by child ‘witnesses’ who didn’t even see the object (Jenny Randles established this fact).

There are far more intriguing reports from that period: for example the HGV driver and his mate who saw two huge silver-suited humanoids during the early hours; the poltergeist, UFO, humanoid and high strangeness events of Ripperstone Farm, the Haven Fort Hotel sightings and more. Yet it is always the kids with their fictional drawings *sigh*