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

Emily Trim was one of the schoolchildren and today in fact this year she is going on a tour in America telling her story.
http://ufocongress.com/emily-trim/
This will be her first time speaking on the event in the states.Could be interesting hope I can make it.
 
EnolaGaia said:
The bit I find most interesting is the notion the mystery thing (craft; whatever) was not just of terrestrial origin but of terrestrial-only capability (i.e., a land vehicle - possibly a camper trailer or something similar).
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Indeed...and perceptions / interpretations can mean everything.

Here is a possible reductionist (and mundane) potential explanation as to what they may have seen. This is just a gut feeling, only a personal theory...but hear me out.

Back in the early/mid 1990s, much of the world was gripped by a fanatical following for the television fantasy franchise "Power Rangers" or "Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers".

This was a North American adaptation / reboot of a Japanese / South Korean action adventure series, with multicoloured suited&helmeted human(oid) athletic superheroes. These iconic characters were the subject of much unofficial fancy-dress emulation, and 'official' product placement by dressed play-actors (this includes in eg Zimbabwe- I've checked with family members that were there at that time).

However, although these figures were genuinely-iconic for many TV and movie viewers, it's a safe bet that they would *not* be recogniseable to all rural residential private school kids in Africa. As costumed characters, they look quite intimidating. But for me, they are a strong possible candidate for being ground-bound 'alien' mistakees.

mighty_morphin_power_rangers__1994__by_jajuruns90rebels-dap4v33.jpg


Screenshot_2017-08-08-22-43-21.png


  • Quite commonly-available suits and helmets
  • The children refer to the 'aliens' as "men" (how would/could this not then be suited tricksters?)
  • She draws the eyes beyond the helmet, illustrating how they appear to wrap around the side/back of the helmet
  • She emphasises strongly the lines on the outer surface of ths suit, especially the inner arm seams
A couple of guys. In an unusual (promotional?) vehicle. Playing audio tracks from an in-vehicle enertainment system. Unworldy kids in the middle of nowwhere.

Tell me how this isn't feasible....
 
INT21 said:
Eburacum,

..The Rendlesham case and the Westall case seem very relevant. In both of those cases the story has changed from a distant encounter (at least 50 metres in Rendlesham, hundreds of metres in the Westall case) to 'nearly touching' or 'touching' the object...

What is the source (and date) of your version of the Westall story ?

INT21
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See
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westall_UFO

For the remainder of this post's content relating to the Westall incident, see the relevant thread:

https://forums.forteana.org/index.php?threads/westall-clayton-south-incident-1966-australia.65893/
 
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I suspect the children reported what they saw and heard,I doubt the power ranger theory ,I doubt they even had tv that would air programming such as this.Now I believe the children shared an event through their perspectives.A film about the incident called Ariel Phenomenon is trying to raise $290,000 to make the film.I suspect that's the reason why Ms Trim is going on the lecture circuit,for awareness and fund raising.
 
All interesting stuff.

In the end it boils down to another confused mess with no one being able to believe it one way or the other.

Seems to be the fate of all ufo sighting stories.

INT21
 
Ermintruder said:
... Tell me how this isn't feasible....
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At the time (1994) there were 2 TV broadcast channels (TV One / TV Two) in Zimbabwe, operating out of Harare and broadcasting in the evenings. Ruwa, being only circa 22 miles away on relatively flat terrain, would have probably afforded over-the-air reception.

I can't find any info on broadcast programming in the 1990's. There were imported TV series being broadcast, but I can't confirm what type they were other than specific reference to soap operas.

I have no idea if there was any alternative means for accessing TV programming there and then.

Another possibility would be VHS tapes. However, according to IMDb:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Mighty_Morphin_Power_Rangers_home_video_releases

... the first VHS tape release for the TV series was the initial Region 1 (North American format) release - a single episode per tape, first 10 episodes.

This was the only release prior to the Ruwa school incident ...

... and it occurred only 3 days earlier (September 13, 1994).
 
Some additional factoids, just for the record ...

Cynthia Hind's UFO AFRINEWS newsletters can be accessed online as PDF files. The two issues providing immediate coverage of the Ruwa incident were:

- Feb. 1995 No. 11
- July 1995 No. 12

In Issue 11, Hind (cf. pp. 19 - 20) indicates all the children at Ariel School were outside for their mid-morning break / recess while the entire adult staff was in some sort of meeting. She later mentions there were 250 children attending Ariel School at the time.

The Hind / Mack investigations ended up focusing on circa one quarter of the students who'd claimed to have been witnesses (circa 14 - 15 out of 60 - 62, depending on whose numbers you use). I haven't found any other source that goes on to mention the 60-some students who'd claimed to be witnesses were in turn only about one quarter of the students supposedly outside in the play area at the time of the sighting.

Another factoid that doesn't usually get mentioned is an alleged sighting by up to four Ariel students the preceding day (Thursday, September 15) - the day between the Sept. 14 re-entry / meteor event and the famous schoolyard sighting.

Hind (Issue No. 12, p. 7) mentions one boy and 3 girls related having seen a 'cigar-like' or 'cigarette in the sky' object on the 15th.
 
Altria said:
I doubt they even had tv that would air programming such as this.
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I am not suggesting that their collective experience was just the witnessing of a TV programme.

My possible suggestion is that (if it was a terrestrial-based misidentification on their part, via a trick played upon them) the two entities were perhaps simply men wearing TV publicity/promotional costumes that had suddenly become available to them. Whilst the TV action series was being seen globally (and avidly-enjoyed by youngsters that were of the same age-bracket as those in the video), I am making the points that:

  • The timeline fits, for the early days of maximum publicity for the tv series
  • Franchise promotional costumes used for publicity presentations in malls/streets etc were cheap (or free), light and plentiful
  • These particular rural children are unlikely to have seen the released live TV programmes, but their urban counterparts may well have done so. The key point being that the TV stations and franchise were 'pushing' the shows just at that time
  • Subjectively, the descriptions from the school-childrens' statements may be resonant with the general physical appearance of a couple of people wearing promotional costumes for the Power Rangers TV series which they had never seen in their lives before.
This is all sheer conjecture on my part, but my gut feeling is that something like this might have happened, viz, an unannounced, unauthorised mobile promotional event, made in character by a couple of human artistes, in a ground-based automobile of a style that was very-unlike any of the utility / pickup / 4WD mundanity the children were familiar with.

This was in Africa....but, in just an extended rural location, not for example the depths of the Amazon jungle or the Andes. Isolation to an extent, perhaps resulting in an over-reaction to what was seen.

Wiki said:
Ruwa is a town in Mashonaland East, Zimbabwe, situated 22 km south-east of Harare on the main Harare-Mutare highway and railway line
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Joina City Shopping Mall, Harare c1994
1280x720
 
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Ermintruder i just can't find your theory feasible as marketing is done to target markets based on income etc etc.The area today where the event occurred looks very isolated.Now could it have been a military exercise ,yeah could be ,but that's pure speculation on my part.It seems the experience has had an effect on the witness after all these years.I rule out the mass hysteria,hoaxs,and misidentified object in this case.These specutive conclusion on my part concur with the investigators conclusions.Makes it easy to to armchair a case.
I suspect they had a very real experience but the origin of the craft/occupants will probably never be known.
 
eburacum said:
Here's an article by Robert Schaeffer on this subject.

http://badufos.blogspot.co.uk/2016/07/a-new-investigation-of-1994-ariel.html
Looks to me like a lot of leading questions being asked by the investigators, especially the utterly irresponsible John Mack.

At that time Zimbabwe was in the middle of a UFO flap, caused apparently by a Russian first stage re-entry a few days before. So it seems likely the kids were already alert to extraordinary events. Whatever caused this event may have been strange, but probably terrestrial in origin.
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What I had seen, in a TV documentary, was John Mack who was asking a witness boy, after the boy had described slanted eyes with pupils, if the creature had not in fact completely black eyes – in the Greyish mode. But the boy was being adamant that it didn't -meaning that if Mack was trying to infleunce him, he was not successful. However, the feeling I had was that he was asking a test question – a common pratice for an investigator.

It is true that all children didn't give identical descriptions of the beings. Some black pupils described them more like an African fairy, while the depiction that white pupils gave was usually closer to the picture of what is usually thought to be a ufonaut in the western world. Whatever it was they saw, children from different backgrounds tended to interpret it in a way that was more acceptable to their cultural and family environment, to 'color' and 'insert' their experience within the frame for paranormal happenings more favored by this background.

They did see something unusual. I considered the possibility of a joke, by costumed pranksters, but it is unlikely. A publicity stunt is equally unlikely, after all, what would be the purpose for an unacknowledged advertising for Power Rangers, for example ? I believe that they were probably confronted with an extraordinary happening, that Cynthia Hind tried to shoehorn into the frame of alien visitors that she advocated, so that we probably dont have a clear picture of what happened ; but which like in many other cases, display features associated with unusual encounters.
 
Analis said:
What I had seen, in a TV documentary, was John Mack who was asking a witness boy, after the boy had described slanted eyes with pupils, if the creature had not in fact completely black eyes – in the Greyish mode. But the boy was being adamant that it didn't -meaning that if Mack was trying to infleunce him, he was not successful. However, the feeling I had was that he was asking a test question – a common pratice for an investigator.

It is true that all children didn't give identical descriptions of the beings. Some black pupils described them more like an African fairy, while the depiction that white pupils gave was usually closer to the picture of what is usually thought to be a ufonaut in the western world. Whatever it was they saw, children from different backgrounds tended to interpret it in a way that was more acceptable to their cultural and family environment, to 'color' and 'insert' their experience within the frame for paranormal happenings more favored by this background.

They did see something unusual. I considered the possibility of a joke, by costumed pranksters, but it is unlikely. A publicity stunt is equally unlikely, after all, what would be the purpose for an unacknowledged advertising for Power Rangers, for example ? I believe that they were probably confronted with an extraordinary happening, that Cynthia Hind tried to shoehorn into the frame of alien visitors that she advocated, so that we probably dont have a clear picture of what happened ; but which like in many other cases, display features associated with unusual encounters.
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Good post...and the encounter fits what Dr Vallee and others have often referred to as 'high strangeness'.....now one can interpret that any way they like; be it some kind of bizarre hoax or a real encounter with something unknown'.
I simply don't see any reason to assume that this was a made up tale by the children. Something happened that was out of the ordinary and as others have said we probably will never know what it was.
 
INT21 said:
Mythopoeika,

Zimbabwe wasn't know for it's traveling pot-headed hippies, with or without psychedelic transport.

At least it wasn't when I was there in 1983.

INT21
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What comment of mine was that in reply to?
 
Analis said:
What I had seen, in a TV documentary, was John Mack who was asking a witness boy, after the boy had described slanted eyes with pupils, if the creature had not in fact completely black eyes – in the Greyish mode. But the boy was being adamant that it didn't -meaning that if Mack was trying to infleunce him, he was not successful. However, the feeling I had was that he was asking a test question – a common pratice for an investigator.
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Why does this remind me of the Orkney Devil Worship Child Abuse case?
Counsellors, social workers and psychiatrists developed their own narrative when questioning the children.

During the investigation the children received several lengthy interviews. McLean was later described by several of the children as a terrifying figure who was "fixated on finding satanic abuse", and other children described how she urged them to draw circles and faces, presumably as evidence indicating abusive rites.[2] These techniques were strongly criticised by Sheriff Kelbie.

One of the children later said of the interviews:

In order to get out of a room, after an hour or so of saying, "No, this never happened", you'd break down.[3]

One of the children later said:

I would never say that a child's testimony in the company of Liz McLean at the time [is reliable]. She was a very manipulative woman, and she would write what she wanted to write. I would doubt any child supposedly making allegations in that situation."

— Interview with "Karen", 2006[2]
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orkney_child_abuse_scandal
 
Mythopeika,

..What comment of mine was that in reply to?..

My apologies, it was by Krepostnoi in response 32 above.

INT21.
 
To address a few points about the case raised here.

1) The kids at this private school were middle-class, aged between six and twelve. They included black African children, white ones with forebears from Britain and South Africa, Asians, and those of mixed race – a “cross-section of Zimbabwe” as Cynthia Hind called them. (I copy from FT: see below) They were not “unwordy” (sic = unworldly) primitives as if they had bones through their noses.

2) Ergo they would most likely have satellite TV, and ergo it’s possible they saw some Power Rangers episodes, whatever channel that was on at the time. Amazingly enough people even have telephones.

3) Ruwa is not isolated. Nor is it really rural. The outskirts/suburbs of Harare stretch for miles, and you can drive for bloody ever through populated districts before you reach the city proper. Houses are sparse by UK standards, true, but Ruwa isn’t as isolated as (say) Reserve, NM.

4) That said, the bush that separates settlements is rough and risky stuff to drive. Hippies might be daft enough to try it, but then there is a curious shortage of them in the country, then as now. White Rhodesians are, perhaps not surprisingly, remarkably conservative in their dress, even the loopiest New-Agey ones, in my experience. No idea what they smoke though.

5) The ‘case’ was discussed in the Flying Sorcery column in FT347 (I think), which mentions Emily Trim (eight at the time but not interviewed by Hind and Mack) and gives a link (http://skepticversustheflyingsaucers.blogspot.co.uk/) to Gilles Fernandez’s excellent dissection of H&M’s incompetent interrogatory methods.

6) I have no idea what the root cause of this incident was. I do know kids can make up the most remarkable tales at that age. Its interest to me is the way it’s become part of the substrand of ‘school sightings’ in UFO folklore, and quasi-canonical.
 
The Ruwa Zimbabwe sighting was featured on an episode of Destination Truth with Josh Gates a while back.
He had 4 or 5 of the original witnesses, grown up now of course, who told their story. They basically told the same tale though their descriptions of the object and the 'aliens' did vary a little, but were pretty consistent. They seemed convinced this was a real event and not some hallucination they all had together though I'm not sure how that would even happen.
I think they did experience a real event; in other words something was there that triggered them seeing this object, etc........for me the question is what did they see?
 
Well, I would guess you and I are not alone in wanting to know what did they see. For sure they did not see ETs (I will bore you to death explaining why not, should you or even I world enough and time). I'll concede that somebody saw something, or said they did, and then that was socially—maybe even gleefully—reinforced. Not necessarily dishonestly. But that would help account for the latter-day consistency among witnesses. I haven't seen the Destination Truth episode: how ethnically varied or multicultural were the interviewees?

I can't help but be reminded of the Welsh case, which I believe [corrections welcome] was the first of these school sightings, from the late 70s. Hilary Evans satisfied himself—and for me, plausibly—that the trigger was a council dustcart. What he didn't explore unfortunately was what was 'in the air' at the time that made the little dears think they were seeing aliens. But here at Ruwa we have something for sure that invites leaping to a fashionable conclusion.
 
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I believe there were two caucasians and two Africans in the interview circle?.....both men and women.
The episode is probably on you tube.
But there were far more that saw the event including I believe one or two teachers....?
I find it hard to think this was mass hysteria or a complete fabrication.
 
dr wu said:
I believe there were two caucasians and two Africans in the interview circle?.....both men and women.
The episode is probably on you tube.
But there were far more that saw the event including I believe one or two teachers....?
I find it hard to think this was mass hysteria or a complete fabrication.
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Apparently no teachers, nor even the ?physiotherapist? manning (personing?) the tuck shop.

I asked the question because according to C. Hind, the African kids didn't report 'aliens', while the white ones did. O well. So it goes.
 
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THA said:
Apparently no teachers, nor even the ?physiotherapist? manning (personing?) the tuck shop.

I asked the question because according to C. Hind, the African kids didn't report 'aliens', while the white ones did. O well. So it goes.
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So what did the African kids call the little beings...?
I wasn't sure if any teachers had seen the event.
 
dr wu said:
So what did the African kids call the little beings...? ...
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Here's the entirety of what Hind wrote about different terminology and student demographics in her UFO AFRINEWS reports. This comes from No. 12, July 1995:

Page 7:

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.
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Page 9:

Obviously there are cultural differences. When Guy G. [one of the student-witnesses - EG] 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 where they drew pictures, it was often identified as 'a UFO' and the little men in black were 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'.
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^Well...cultural differences aside it looks like they all saw/experienced something similar...so the question remains as to what that was.
 
Not all, by any means. Only a quarter of the children in the school yard were witnesses; what were the others doing? Starting fixedly in the opposite direction?

If only a quarter of the kids saw anything, it seems unlikely that this event happened close to the schoolyard - whatever it was happened a long way away and was difficult to see/ not particularly intrusive/not particularly interesting.
 
eburacum said:
Not all, by any means. Only a quarter of the children in the school yard were witnesses; what were the others doing? Starting fixedly in the opposite direction?

If only a quarter of the kids saw anything, it seems unlikely that this event happened close to the schoolyard - whatever it was happened a long way away and was difficult to see/ not particularly intrusive/not particularly interesting.
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Agreed ... Even with maps of the school environs and photos illustrating the playground and the scrub land beyond its bounds, it's hard to piece together a clear picture of how far the witnesses were from whatever they saw.

The various accounts tend to agree that whatever-it-was occurred in the scrub terrain outside the schoolyard. The photos of witnesses standing in the schoolyard and pointing to the sighting's location lead me to believe the witnesses had to be at least 75 - 100 yards distant from whatever it was. It's also evident that whatever they saw was at least partially obscured by the scrub vegetation, so the actual distance to the object / visitors could have been even farther.
 
dr wu said:
So what did the African kids call the little beings...?
I wasn't sure if any teachers had seen the event.
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Ergghh. I can't remember what the African kids called the beings. If memory serves, the answer is in Cynthia Hind's account, which is online, and someone on this thread has posted the link. And if memory serves, they were the local equivalent of elves, pixies or leprechauns. A whole other set of connotations, in other words, than 'aliens'.

Could've been animals, of course. I don't recall seeing a monkey in Zim though (for what that's worth!).

PS/EDIT: I wrote this before seeing the quote from C Hind above.
 
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For some reason this is back on reddit today
https://www.reddit.com/r/videos/comments/bukcej
so I thought I'd post a link (as not all the comments are inane).
I don't recall the case and so have only just been reading about it there and in this thread. But I have to say, my first impression is that the psychologist did ask a lot of leading questions in that video. I suppose it's hard not to, if you want to extract information out of people (children). But he's a psychologist, you'd think he'd be trained and try not to?!
Someone gave a link to more of the interviews of the children as adults. But we all know what memory's like, especially after years! But I guess it's interesting from that very angle, isn't it.

youtube / IrM93GnmY4M:1692
Video link is dead; insufficient description to recommend a substitute.
 
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What's interesting to me is that the kids who did see the 'event' all described it more or less the same...some odd 'craft' with little 'aliens' floating next to it...and some of the kids apparently said the 'being's talked to them about harming earth...which is even more bizarre for young kids to relate. Where;s that coming from if this was just a mis-perception of some normal event?
Did the kids just have ecology day in class or something? ;) And why see it as little 'aliens' and a 'ship' if it was something else? Why describe it that way..?
 
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