ANN ARBOR, Mich. (UPI) — At least 40 persons saw an
eerie unidentified flying object land in a swamp near here Sunday night,
police said today. Twelve witnesses were policemen.
Officers said four sister ships
hovered in a quarter-circle above the object until it took of with a warbling
sound like the echo of a ricocheting bullet.
Patrolman Robert Honeywell of Dexter,
a nearby village, said he and other residents of the area saw similar objects
zipping through the skies early last Monday and Wednesday.
Frank Mannor, 47, a farmer and his
son, Ronald, 19, said they approached within 500 yards of the object. It lay
in swamp, they said, with pulsating haloed lights on each end. Mannor said it
was pitted “like coral rock” and about the length of a car. He drew a picture
of it, showing its shape about that of a football.
‘KIND OF FOG’
“There seemed to be a kind of fog
underneath it,” Mannor said.
He said his son said, “Look at that
horrible thing!” and the craft vanished. Two deputies, Mannor’s son-in-law and
other witnesses said it zipped over the tree tops. They described the same
noise. Mannor and others said it was like the warbling sirens used on some
police cars or a ricocheting bullet.
Six police cars chased the formation
but the objects vanished.
Policemen said they and other
witnesses, except the Mannors, could see only lights because of the darkness.
BLINKING LIGHTS
Two Washtenaw County sheriff’s
deputies said they saw blinking lights — apparently from the object — rise
above the trees, then dip again.
Honeywell said he saw “four of those
lights hovering over the area” in a quarter circle above the object on the
ground.
“The light went out over the centre
object (the one on the ground) and then it flew over the top of us,” Honeywell
said.
Robert Taylor, Dexter police chief,
said he watched the object from Mannor’s home on a knoll overlooking the
300-acre swamp about 12 miles northwest of here.
“I saw a red glow down in the swamp,”
Taylor said. “It was a pulsating bright red and then it grew dimmer. I put the
binoculars on it and saw that there was a light on each end of the thing.”
D e p u t y Stanley McFadden said at
least 60 persons saw the strange lights in the air or on the ground.
OBJECT LANDED
McFadden and Deputy David Fitzpatrick
left their car and slogged through the swamp after watching the object rise to
tree top level, then sink down and apparently land.
“It had a red and green light, one
light on each side, and a white reddish glow in the centre. Mannor and his son
said it was like two (elliptical) bowls cupped together, with a glove on the
top, brownish in color, with a waffle skin,” said McFadden.
Selfridge Air Force Base near
Detroit, about 50 miles from here, referred inquiring newsmen to the Detroit
Air Defence sector headquarters in Baffle Creek, Mich. Telephones were not
answered at the sector’s public information office and a secretary said the
base commander was out.
HOMEPAGE