Courtesy of: AUFORA News Update
Monday, February 24th, 1997 http://www.aufora.org/
from UFO Roundup - http://www.ftech.net/~ufoinfo/roundup.hts Volume 2, Number 8

For the past two weeks, Australia has been repeatedly visited by UFOs. Over 50 encounters have been reported since February 1, including two landings in the suburbs of Melbourne.

The flap began Saturday, February 1, 1997 with an incident in Tasmania, the island off Australia's southern coast. A Glengarry family reported finding traces of a weird "bright yellow jelly slime" in their yard.

At 9:45 p.m., in Broken Hill, New South Wales (N.S.W.), a city 750 kilometers (450 miles) west of Sydney, people reported "sighting two bright lights traveling from the northwest to the southeast." At 9:51 p.m., another man saw a glowing object fly from the southeast to the northwest, then reverse direction and "shoot off to the southeast."

On Sunday, February 2, 1997, at 9:50 p.m., witnesses in Woori Yallock, Victoria (Vic.) reported "a bright white light" moving rapidly "from west to east in the northern sky, moving very fast, taking about 40 seconds" to reach the eastern horizon.

On Monday, February 3, 1997, at 9:30 p.m., residents of Albury, N.S.W., 200 kilometers (120 miles) west of Canberra, spotted "a white light traveling from north to south in a zig zag fashion."

Also that night, on Australia's east coast, "a large orange object" appeared over Port Macquarie, N.S.W. at 10 p.m. The UFO, which at first people took for a helicopter, "held position in the sky for about ten minutes. Before the object shot off and disappeared, several smaller yellow lights" emerged from the underside of the object. Port Macquarie is 250 kilometers (150 miles) north of Sydney.

Then, after midnight, at 2:46 a.m. on Tuesday, February 4, 1997, people in Yass, N.S.W. saw "a bright orange illumination traveling across the sky." They estimated it to be "about 1/2 to 1/4 the size of the moon." The UFO flew away to the northwest.

In Gosford, N.S.W., 60 kilometers (36 miles) north of Sydney, witnesses sighted "a large blue-white light" near the Moonie Bridge. The UFO was "close to the ground" and an estimated 200 to 300 feet (60 to 90 meters) in diameter.

A half-hour past midnight on Wednesday, February 5, 1997, people reported "flashing lights" located in and around the stars in Orion's belt.

At 9 p.m. on February 5, Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) personnel at Bogan Gate, near Parkes, N.S.W., 275 kilometers (165 miles) west of Sydney, spotted a "white golden illumination" crossing the sky and heading west. Nearly a half-hour later, at 9:25 p.m., civilian eyewitnesses at Ngunnaiual reported "orange and flashing illuminations" in "an arch over Orion's belt."

Several hours later, at 5:35 a.m. on Thursday, February 6, 1997, people in Cooma, N.S.W., a city west of the Gourock mountain range, 150 kilometers (90 miles) south of Canberra, spotted a UFO arrayed with lights heading east.

By the time the sun had set February 6, the theatre of UFO action had shifted to the sparsely-populated state of Western Australia (W.A.). At 7:30 p.m., people in Perth, the state capital, saw a hovering "blue-green tube- shaped object" in the day's fading daylight "before any star could be seen." (Editor's Note: Right now it's summer in the southern hemisphere, so the days are much longer in Australia and Chile.)

The following night, Friday, February 7, 1997, the UFO action moved to the southern state of Victoria. At 9:20 p.m., a "spinning yellow fireball" zipped across the sky, heading west, over Bairnsdale, Vic., just above the southern coast's Ninety Mile Beach and about 200 kilometers (120 miles) east of Melbourne.

At 9:25 p.m., people in Maffra, 60 kilometers (36 miles) west of Bairnsdale, sighted "a spinning yellow fireball" heading west towards Melbourne.

At 11 p.m., people in Barwon Head, Vic. sighted a UFO they described as "a moving and flashing yellow- red fireball illumination with a (dark) triangular shape on top." The UFO traveled in a north-northwest direction at about 15 degrees above the horizon.

The following night, Saturday, February 8, 1997, at 8:45 p.m., people in the Sydney suburbs of Oatley, Kogarah and Hurstville along the St. George's River saw "a green-to-yellow fireball with no tail traveling south in the eastern sky (about) 30 degrees above the horizon. There was no sound. The object suddenly stopped and hovered." Witnesses estimated the UFO to be the size of "an AAA battery held at arm's length."

Four hours later, at 12:40 a.m. on Sunday, February 9, 1997, further up the east coast in Brisbane, witnesses reported "an orange illumination traveling at the speed of a fighter plane" in the eastern sky at 30 degrees above the horizon." The UFO was headed south and soon disappeared among the stars of the Southern Cross.

On Sunday night, at 9:25 p.m., "a yellow-red fireball" was seen in St. Kilda, a bayfront suburb on the south side of Melbourne. The UFO was headed north and "flying beneath the cloud cover" at an estimated speed of 800 kilometers per hour (480 mph).

At 11:30 p.m., Queensland had its second sighting of the flap when a UFO flew over Sunnybank, a suburb 14 kilometers (9 miles) south of Brisbane. Witnesses described it as "a yellow-orange fireball" 10 to 15 miles away, moving in a 45-degree downward arc (top left to bottom right).

Five hours later, on Monday, February 10, 1997, at 4 a.m., a UFO returned to Brisbane. It was described as "a blue and red oval-shaped illumination in the western sky (about) 30 degrees above the horizon. It appeared to be three times the size of the largest stars in the sky."

The flap in Brisbane continued during the early morning hours of Tuesday, February 11, 1997. At 12:02 a.m., police in Brisbane received telephone reports of a huge UFO described as "a large red-pink illumination" near Mount Gravatt. The UFO hovered about 300 meters (1,000 feet) above the witnesses' heads for five minutes.

At 2 a.m., "a series of lights in a triangular formation" were seen by Brisbane residents heading south toward the air base RAAF Amberley. The lights appeared to fly in either a V-formation or a /\-formation.

On February 11, at 11:30 p.m., the city of Adelaide in South Australia (S.A.) reported its first sighting of the flap. The UFO was "a ball of fire that had red and blue associated with it."

An hour and a half later, on Wednesday, February 12, 1997, at 1 a.m., people in Taree, N.S.W., a river port near the coast about 210 kilometers (125 miles) north of Sydney, reported seeing "a slow-moving orange-red fireball heading southwest." The UFO made no discernible sound. At 2:30 a.m., people again noticed "a fireball traveling in the sky." As the UFO passed over, TV sets suddenly switched on without being touched by owners. After the UFO left, the TV sets all shut off at once.

After a 24-hour breather, the flap picked up again on Friday, February 14, 1997, this time in Victoria. At 11:15 p.m., residents of Craigieburn, a southern suburb of Melbourne, saw "a bright disc-shaped light" hovering above a paddock. Witnesses also saw what looked like automobile headlights in the paddock while the UFO hovered. Four or five seconds after the UFO flew away, the "headlights" winked out.

A few hours later, on Saturday, February 15, 1997, at 4:40 a.m., residents of Parkinsville, another suburb of Melbourne, saw a star-sized "red-blue illumination in the southwest sky."

Later the same day, in Duncraig, W.A., near Perth, people outdoors at 12 noon reported a weird "solar effect." Sunlight suddenly dimmed in an "eclipse-like effect" although the sky was perfectly clear. The effect lasted for approximately five seconds. No aircraft were seen or heard overhead. The phenomenon remains unexplained.

Also on February 15, at 8:25 p.m., people in the Lewis mountain range of South Australia spotted "a cigar-shaped object traveling high in the sky from west to east. It appeared to be four times the size of a jumbo jet." Not a sound was heard from the object. One man took a color photograph of the UFO with his camera.

Further east, in Eltham, Vic., a suburb south of Melbourne, residents reported three separate sightings of "light illumination" UFOs. The first was at 9:30 p.m., with the light headed southeast. The second was at 9:40 p.m. and headed east. The third and final UFO was at 9:45 p.m. and flew off to the southeast.

At 11:25 p.m. the night of February 15, people in Quakers Hills, N.S.W., near Sydney, reported seeing "an oval orange-red illumination heading northwest towards Richmond." The UFO stopped and hovered on several occasions during its ten-minute flyover and "appeared the size of a grape held at arm's length."

After midnight on Sunday, February 16, 1997, at 12:05 a.m. observers in Brisbane spotted "an orange- white illumination appearing in and out of clouds" just west of the seaside city.

At 3:20 a.m., February 16, people in Adelaide saw "a bright white illumination traversing the sky, then (it) suddenly stopped. When it began moving again, it gave off a series of flashes." To some, the UFO "appeared as a cross shape with one light at each end."

On Monday, February 17, 1997, people in Duncraig, W.A. reported a second weird "solar effect" identical to the one on February 15. A similar incident also took place in Duncraig on October 18, 1996.

At 11:20 p.m. Monday night, February 17, "an extremely bright orange fireball" flew "from northeast to southeast right over" the Australian Space Agency base outside of Alice Springs, in the Northern Territory. The UFO's altitude was 20,000 to 30,000 feet and it was "three to four times larger than the stars." It was last seen heading for the Oorarginna mountain range.

At 11:30 p.m., February 17, "a very large and bright orange illumination" appeared over Mildura, a city on the Murray River, about 450 kilometers (270 miles) northwest of Melbourne and 300 kilometers (180 miles) east-northeast of Adelaide. Witnesses reported a "large shape" poised above the orange glow. The UFO flew away to the northwest, stopping a few times before reaching the horizon.

Tuesday, February 18, saw more sightings all around the island continent. At 1 a.m., in Western Australia, at Bull Creek, near Perth, witnesses saw "three or four lights cross the sky," making a strange rumbling noise.

At 5:30 a.m., February 18, in Prospect, S.A. a "large white illumination traveling at (high) speed to the north" was seen. Its speed was estimated at 300 kilometers per hour (180 mph).

Tuesday night, February 18, at 10:30 p.m., people in Warrandyte, Vic., near Melbourne, people saw "three large bright orange fireballs" flying "in a triangular formation for 5 to 10 mintues. The glows were described as being as "large as a grapefruit held in your hand at arm's length."

Wednesday, February 19, 1997, saw the flap shift back to Sydney for one day. At 5:30 a.m., "three or four intensely bright orange ball illuminations" were seen rotating around each other as they crossed the sky over North Head. The UFOs were moving extremely fast. At 6:45 a.m., three large orange UFOs "with some burning coming from them" were seen over the suburb of Paddington.

That morning, radio station 3MMM stunned its listeners by reporting a scorched crop circle in a paddock on the outskirts of Werribee, a suburb southwest of Melbourne. The circle was seen from the air by a private pilot at 6:30 a.m., who radioed the tower.

The scene was investigated by a Melbourne man, who reported, "It was about 30 feet (10 meters) across with the grass flattened in a clockwise direction. The centre part seemed very symmetrical. Just within the perimeter of the circle were six circular indentations, each about a foot (0.3 meters) across and four inches (10 centimeters) deep. These were also located in exact symmetrical locations around the circle. The bottom of each hole was slightly parabolic and bore a cross imprint that was impressed further in."

However, he said he believes the circle to be a hoax. He noted that the "brown burn marks appear to have been painted on" and "the imprints looked dug out rather than 'pressed' by a solid weight."

At 3:45 p.m., a man in Nicholson, East Gippsland, Vic. reported a "scorched earth circle" similar to the one in Werribee. There are still no reports on this site as of February 23, 1997.

At 9:20 p.m., February 19, people in Geelong, Vic., a city on Port Phillip Bay 45 kilometers (27 miles) southwest of Melbourne, reported seeing a large "banana-shaped or crescent orange illuminated object" traveling in a northwesterly direction, headed for Ballarat.

At 9:45 p.m., February 19, "five bright yellow- white lights" crossed the sky over Adelaide. Three lights flew in a triangular formation, while the other two smaller lights flew parallel to the triangle. In the night's second event, one light flew away to the north, the other to the south. Then the lights turned, crossed each other's path and disappeared.

At 9:10 p.m., "a very large glowing illumination" was seen in the sky over Mount Barker, 30 kilometers (18 miles) south of Adelaide.

At 9:30 p.m., two UFOs visited Annandale, a suburb of Sydney, heading west. They were described as flattened discs, something like a drummer's cymbals.

At 11:20 p.m. a group of "three white lights" were seen speeding over Frankston, Vic., a port on the eastern shore of Port Phillip Bay, 35 kilometers (21 miles) southeast of Melbourne. They flew at an altitude of 300 to 400 meters (1,000 to 1,320 feet). Ten minutes later, at 11:30 p.m., "a large yellow white light" flew over Frankston, heading due west. (Many, many thanks to Ross Dowe of Australia's National UFO Hotline for this story.)