AUFORN Compiled Sighting Reports Issue 8, October 1998

AUFORN
Compiled Sighting Reports

Issue 8
October 1998

Compiled by Robert Frola
Australian UFO Research Network
PO Box 738 Beaudesert QLD 4285

UPDATE:

Angel's Hair Case Quirindi, nr Tamworth NSW

Bryan Dickeson, Bill Chalker

The Investigation Todate:

Bill Chalker (UFOICNSW, Sydney) phones Moira McGhee for info on Quirindi and sample and offers to use his scientific analysis contacts for testing. Bryan agrees to have Bill organize the analysis. Bill collects package across town from Moira (very late 15th August, monsoon conditions!).

Bill spends Sunday 16 trying to stabilize container/sample - unwraps package, which only seems to show a small speck of 'something' on the bottom, but does not actually open container/remove plastic film cover. Bill also contacted Mrs. Stansfield directly -- she said she had checked the container/sample later on the 10th and noticed most of the sample had evaporated. She had gone outside in the dark to find/collect (difficult) some more material to add to the container. There is now a possibility the 'sample' to hand may not be the original 'angels hair', but cobweb.

However, Bill extracts a sample of the atmosphere from the container for possible future testing, with some difficulty. Complications: Bill tries to contact a colleague to arrange further testing/viewing of sample (colleague not available for several days; wife has just had a baby). All samples kept cold/constant temperature. Bill had also hoped he might be able to get an air sample (in a yogurt container) from Quirindi, as a 'standard' for any later tests, but delays/etc. suggest this would not be worthwhile.

Bill contacts Moira and Bryan to update them with a detailed progress report of what is happening. He indicates he may only be able to get one or possibly two chances to test the remaining sample, there's so little of it left and that could degrade. Bryan to delay sending his report to Mrs. Stansfield, until sample can be viewed/tested. (Bryan had asked that while the equipment/expertise was available, would it be possible to create and test the white, unstable 'ash' created by a Van De Graaf generator, as a further 'control' sample for the Quirindi material? Bill (rightly) indicates this would be difficult to coordinate at this stage, and the emphasis should be on the Quirindi material in hand.)

Some days later, Bill arranges a 'micro-endoscopic' (cf 'microscopic') inspection of the speck in the bottom of the yogurt container (micro-endoscopy - the sample speck is put on a glass slide and strongly illuminated; light from the sample is collected by a bundle of glass fibles and magnified 5, 50, 5000 times; results shown on a TV 1. (Bryan Dickeson, 18.09.98)

Ross Dowe's Response:

Your recent report on UFO sightings around Australia is nothing short of total bunk..

From the Australian National UFO Hotline's call to the public, this service has received some 50 samples of the "flying web type substance" not only from the public but from official channels as well.

Our findings are that the odd aerial event was cause by cotton farming activity some 300 klm west of Tamworth.

Sample of the flying cotton came in from a 300klm radius of Tamwoth NSW.

These huge Cotton farming companies harvest large areas and the light cotton fibbers get caught in the temperature thermals and travels for 100s of kilometres. During that week the winds were heading east. End of story. (Ross Dowe, 08.09.98)

(In response to Bryan Dickenson's Report - Editor) THIS STORY IS TOTAL RUBBISH and all the solaced facts are incorrect. (Ross Dowe, 15.09.98)

Researcher's Response to Ross Dowe's Comments:

Bill Chalker

I'm not defending Ross Dowe's comments at all, but I think it is premature to rule out anything at this stage. Based on the information Moira McGhee, Bryan Dickeson and myself separately gleaned from the witnesses it is difficult to reconcile the observations of the "dumbbell" shaped objects and the smaller objects. But we should not rush to judgement about certainty on either dismissing the case as a "IFO" or a confirmed "UFO". Currently it is a sighting - an interesting one at that, subject to ongoing investigations.

Now as for the "angel hair". The material I managed to extract from the container provided by the witness was subjected to a powerful video microscopic imaging, with spider's web from my back yard as a control comparison. There were many similarities, and at this stage if I had to draw a conclusion I would be suggesting the material is spidersweb, or something very similar. I will be showing the microscopic videoing imaging during my presentation at the UFO conference at the YWCA, Sydney, on Saturday, Sept. 12th. People can draw their own conclusions. Also I will point out that I took elaborate precautions in the sample transfer to a more secure container, in case we were dealing with a sample that sublimates, as it appeared to do in my hands, in my own experience with possible "angels hair" back in 1969 at Grafton. I also extracted a gas phase via an eppendorf syringe prior to opening the container, just in case. Now the sub-sample on the micro slide we extracted from the sample remained stable throughout the imaging session and seemed comparable to prosaic garden-variety web samples on a separate slide. Both slide samples after a week are still stable and will be subject to further comparative testing when time and other priorities permit.

It is possible that the sampling sequence carried out by the witnesses may have inadvertently led to a combination of sampling - "angel hair" and "spiders web". That's a bit of a long bow, but may be consistent with the statements made by the witness to me on tape.

All this is preliminary observation but I thought it was appropriate to comment to focus speculation on this event, which seems to be quickly out stepping the facts so far gathered.

As for the "cotton" suggestion: the sample looks superficially like "fine cotton", but better resembles (or is) "spiders web".

This affair is a very instructional and worthwhile exercise in focusing speculation and debate on the issue of "angel hair". It certainly has had me reviewing all the literature, my own 1969 experience and the literature on possible natural explanations.

I will advise when I have further info to hand. But at the moment lets be led by the facts rather that the fancies. I am very interested in the truth, irrespective of where it led us. (Bill Chalker, 10.09.98)

Bryan Dickeson

I had thought Ross Dowe's "cotton-picking" comments so awful and unscientific as to not even warrant consideration (which is pretty typical of much of what he does).

However:

1) You don't need to be an agronomist to know when the cotton is fluffing up and raring to go; certainly not late winter (at best them lil' old cottonseeds will still be tucked up in their lil' old cotton beds, waiting to sprout in the spring!). Ask Ross to check it for himself anyway, the Agriculture Department people are just a phone call away and I believe he can run to that.

2) After a series of days of very high rainfall throughout the district, it is very unlikely that any cotton bolls that might be around would be dry enough the first day of sunshine afterwards to pop their boll en-masse.

3) Most of the fertile riverbed 'bottom lands' used to grow cotton (which requires a lot of water and fertilizer to grow) were flooded by those same rainfalls - result (at best) soggy cotton, or cotton plantlets -- any that had been planted up to the rains would probably have to be replanted once the floods subside.

4) The Meteorological Department says there was no wind in the area (just the thermals mentioned by the main witness) - suggest Ross 'phone the Met folk to check this as well.

And there are other considerations.

Where does that guy get his info from? - certainly not the Junior Woodchuck's Manual. I don't know why he wastes everyone's time or even why we give him e-space. (Bryan Dickeson, 16.09.98). (Source Diane Harrison, e-mail: tkbnetw@fan.net.au.)

REPORTS:

07.01.96 Central East Northern Territory 2020hrs (CE1)

(Source: Brian Richards. Credit: Diane Harrison, e-mail: tkbnetw@fan.net.au. The Keith Basterfield Network 17.09.98)

Sunday 7th January 1996 8.20pm, Central East NT cattle station hand has daylight sighting of battleship gray object 100ft wide by 40ft height, box shape beneath 25ft wide, 6ft high. Altitude 130ft. Top of object spinning. Bottom half-unmoving and emitting a vapour(?) and smell like steam off hot metal. A whirlwind or vortex underneath near wild livestock. Station hand ex-marine and UN force member took photos and reported the cattle and wild horses 'transfixed by the object'. (UFORUM)

November 1996 Honeymoon Gap, nr Alice Springs, NT (CE2)

(Source: Keith Douglass Credit: INUFOR Digest Vol.4 No.2 October 1998)

"Mary Adams" and a friend were driving from west to east - passing Honeymoon Gap (10 km west of Alice Springs) when they noticed a bright blue "glow" in the trees at the base of the mountain about 1/2km away. It was very low, and lit up the ground, and Mary believes it had actually landed.

Suddenly the "light" rose up, and moved towards them. They could see it was a solid object, about 40 metres in diameter, with a flat base and a rounded top. It was huge - "the size of a semi-trailer, with lines around the bottom". The blue light formed a "halo" around the craft, and as it "floated" overhead they could hear a "whirly noise". It was about 11.20pm and as the object followed them "above the car" for a short time, they felt they were being "watched". They were relieved when it flew back over the hills towards Pine Gap.

28.02.98 Doncaster, VIC 2225hrs (CE1)