MYSTERY FIREBALL TAKES PLUNGE SOUTH OF CHICAGO

UFO ROUNDUP

Volume 2

Number 47

December 7, 1997

Editor: Joseph Trainor

MYSTERY FIREBALL TAKES PLUNGE SOUTH OF CHICAGO

On Sunday evening, November 30, 1997, pilot Tim
Janecyk of Tinley Park, Illinois was driving with his
girlfriend on Interstate Highway 80 south of Chicago
when he saw an unusual light in the sky.

As he drove through New Lenox, Illinois
(population 9,627), Janecyk, a pilot with eight years’
experience, “off to his left…saw a ‘brilliant fireball
descend from the clouds straight down.'”

“The object, the size of a full moon, lit up the
clouds, trailing a column of smoke, Janecyk said.
It appeared to be descending at 125 to 150 miles
per hour, he said, ‘It was too slow for a meteor.’
Within 20 seconds, it dropped behind some trees.”

“Janecyk called New Lenox police, who notified
Will County sheriff’s police. Officers investigated but
found nothing, said Lt. Mike Moran.”

“Will County sheriff’s police found no evidence of
debris, and the FAA (Federal Aviation Administration)
reported no planes missing or sightings on radar.
‘We looked at it, and there is no aviation connection
we can determine,’ FAA spokesman Don Zochert said.”

The case is being investigated by John Timmerman
of Lima, Ohio, a MUFON investigator.

New Lenox is at the intersection of the Lincoln
Highway (Illinois Highway 30) and Cedar Road, about
six miles (10 kilometers) east of Joliet. (See the
Chicago Sun-Times for December 3, 1997, “‘Fireball’
Fires Up the UFO Crowd.”)

NEW SIGHTING IN NEW JERSEY

On Sunday, November 30, 1997, at 7:11 p.m.,
MUFON investigator Frank Moriarty and his wife were
in the rear of their home in Somerdale, New Jersey
(population 5,440), getting ready to cook supper on
their outdoor grille.

“I noticed a light or lights in the sky over our
neighbors’ house,” Moriarty reported. “The light
seemed to be either a collection of whitish lights or
a single white light of varying brightness across its
width. Actually, this is what attracted my attention
to it–I could not clearly focus on it.”

“It was at an angle of 35 to 40 degrees…and was
moving from the north to the southwest. As it moved,
I heard the very faint sound of a propellor engine
aircraft, coming from behind me to the east. I actually
tried to look for the aircraft but was unable to see it
because of the low clouds…Turning back to the object,
I realized that there was no sound emanating from the
lights.”

“Several times the light wavered slightly in its course
as it continued to move in a regularly straight line. The
light/lights occasionally blinked or pulsed on an irregular
basis, accompanied by what appeared to be a trail of
light following from it and heading straight down.”

Somerdale is on New Jersey Highway 30, about
17 miles (27 kilometers) southeast of Camden, N.J.
and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. (See MUFON
Skywatch Investigations #48. Many thanks to George
A. Filer of MUFON for this report.)

(Editor’s Comment: Hmmm, two UFO sightings on
November 30, and they both took place in communities
on a state highway 30. Interesting coincidence, eh?)

CALF MUTILATION FOLLOWS COLORADO UFO SIGHTING

On Saturday, November 29, 1997, at 11 p.m.,
four people in Crestone, Colorado (population 200),
on the western slope of the Sangre de Cristo
Mountains, spotted “unusual multi-colored lights”
in the sky about 15 to 20 miles northwest of town.

Identical lights were also seen by four people
traveling on Colorado Highway 17, located 15 miles
(24 kilometers) west of Crestone. This sighting took
place at around 4:45 p.m.

The following morning, Sunday, November 30,
a rancher found a dead mutilated calf on his property
just northwest of Center, Colorado (population 1,963)

The “year-old, still-warm, female calf…was missing
all the flesh from its right-side mandible, its right eye
and a 10-inch (25-centimeter) rectum coring that
extended 18 inches (45 centimeters) into the animal.”

“The crime scene was completely devoid of any
tracks–except for the dead calf’s,” reported Skywatch
investigator Christopher O’Brien, author of THE
MYSTERIOUS VALLEY (St. Martin’s Press, 1996).
There were no “footprints or blood or any additional
clues as to how the calf was killed and subsequently
mutilated.”

The rancher, who owns a herd of 38 cattle, told
O’Brien that he found “a second calf with a bloody nose
and is missing a third.” The case is being investigated
by the Saguache County Sheriff’s Department.

Center is on Highway 112 approximately 165 miles
(264 kilometers) southwest of Denver. (Many thanks
to Steve Wilson Sr. for this report.)

(Editor’s Note: Chris O’Brien’s long-anticipated sequel,
INSIDE THE MYSTERIOUS VALLEY, dealing with UFO
sightings and other anomalies in southern Colorado,
will be published by St. Martin’s Press in May 1998.
Reserve your copy today.)

TWO MORE UFO SIGHTINGS REPORTED IN BRITAIN

On Monday, December 1, 1997, at 8:30 p.m., Bruce
B. was outdoors in Rotherham, South Yorkshire when
he “looked up through his north-facing arbor” and “saw
a flame–a fiery, green-orange thing moving from left to
right and downward. He said it had flames on it, and
he thought it was going to crash three-quarters of a mile
(0.7 kilometers) away.” (Many thanks to Colin Brownbill
for this report.)

On November 12, 1997, at 5:14 p.m., Harry Price was
walking his dog in Bognor Regis, West Sussex, about
70 miles (112 kilometers) southwest of London “on a clear
but chilly evening.” As he approached the Bognor Regis
railroad station, “looking up in a northerly direction, he saw
a shining light that split into seven smaller lights and
traveled away” to the north. Harry’s workmate, who was
with him at the time, “also saw the same thing.”

A third eyewitness, waiting at the train station,
saw the same UFO “from the platform a few minutes
before the arrival of the 5:30 train.” (Many thanks to
Roger of CompuServe for this report.)

(Editor’s Note: In August 1986, Rotherham, S. Yorks
was the scene of two ghost incidents. A poltergeist
raised havoc at the ground-floor flat inhabited by an
elderly couple, Albert and Ivy Cardwell. Shortly
thereafter, Stephen Dimbleby saw a ghost in a coal
mine at the Silverwood Colliery just outside of town.
See UNEXPLAINED MYSTERIES OF THE 20TH
CENTURY by Janet and Colin Bord, Contemporary
Books, Inc., Chicago, 1989, pages 81 and 91.)

ROD-SHAPED UFOs STARTLE MOTORISTS IN AUSTRALIA

On Sunday, November 23, 1997, at 7:50 p.m.,
Wayne Banks and his friends were “heading from
Doonside near Blacktown to Penrith,” New South
Wales (N.S.W.), 25 miles (40 kilometers) west
of Sydney when they spotted a UFO.

“We stopped at the traffic light at the corner of
Phillip Parkway and Eastern Road,” Banks reported.
“I was looking west at the terrific sunset and
commented on this to the people in the car. There
was scattered cloud and the sun gave off a reddish
glow.”

“It was then that I noticed an extremely bright line
just to the right of where I was looking. I originally
thought it was an aircraft jetstream (condensation trail,
or “contrail” for short, here in the USA–J.T.), although it
didn’t seem high enough. It would’ve been almost an
inch long at arm’s length. I then turned to one of my
friends, and I pointed it out to him.”

“He too thought it was some sort of jetstream, but
then it started to move slowly, until it began to rotate
from horizontal to almost vertical. By this stage, all
six of us in the car were watching. It was then that one
of the girls noticed the line to the northwest of us.
It was moving towards the other line but very slowly.
I also noticed a small red light in the direction of the
second line, but this could have been an aircraft. I
lost sight of them as we got to the bottom of the hill.
Almost a minute later, we had an unobstructed view
of the western sky again, but we could not see anything
at all.” (Many thanks to John Hayes for this report.)

(Editor’s Note: The Katoomba Valley, west of Penrith,
has had numerous UFO sightings since 1942.)

UFO SPOOKS COUPLE IN TAURANGA, NEW ZEALAND

On Saturday, November 15, 1997, at 9:50 p.m.,
a couple living in Tauranga, New Zealand, a city of
the North Island located 130 miles (208 kilometers)
southeast of Auckland, spotted a UFO flying slowly
over Welcome Bay.

“It appeared approximately 100 metres (330 feet)
from where we were standing on a second-storey
verandah, looking out to the north,” they reported.
“It was approximately 15 to 20 metres (50 to 67 feet)
wide and appeared almost mist-like. It was round
in shape. There was no noise or lights. One of us saw
it and asked the second person (if) they could see it.
When both acknowledged seeing it, it disappeared,
and not in any particular direction. From the first
(moment), it was there for almost ten seconds.”

(Many thanks to Jane S. Derry for this report.)

UFO FOLLOWS BUS IN CENTRAL ARGENTINA

A glowing UFO paced a local transit bus on
the highway between Rio Cuarto and Las Higueras
in Cordoba province, Argentina, approximately
512 kilometers (320 miles) west of Buenos Aires,
the national capital.

The incident took place Tuesday evening,
November 25, 1997. Sra. Alicia Ana de Lourenco
boarded a transit bus owned by Transportes Rio
Cuarto Ltda. for a trip to the nearby town of
General Cabrera.

At 8:55 p.m., Sra. de Lourenco looked out
the bus window at “a storm front in the south.”
Suddenly, “a luminous object, bigger than a star
and far more brilliant, caught her attention, and she
began to observe it with great care.”

The OVNI (Spanish acronym for UFO) “had a
half-moon shape,” and she estimated that its flight
path carried it over Carnerillo, southeast of Rio Cuarto.

“To corroborate what she was seeing, she called
to a policeman sitting a few rows in front of her. Then,
to get a better view of the object, they opened the side
window and observed how it zigzagged right and left.”

As the UFO came closer, the bus passengers
saw that it contained “four rows of lights, which Sra. de
Lourenco described as ‘the lights of a theatre.'” The
“luminous OVNI” kept pace with the bus until it reached
Las Higueras, about five kilometers (3 miles) northeast
of Rio Cuarto” and then it zipped away.

The UFO was seen and videotaped in Las Higueras
by a teenager, Valeria Angelini, who used a Panasonic
M8000 camcorder “to capture the luminous object on tape.”

On Monday, December 1, 1997, Srta. Angelini was
interviewed by three ufologists from the Argentine UFO
study group COR–Mario Bracamonte, Pablo Odello
and Frederico Smaldone. (Muchas gracias a Carlos
Iurchuk y Fundacion Argentina de Ovniologia para
eso caso.)

UNKNOWN VANDALS DISTURB GRAVE OF H.P. LOVECRAFT

“Even now, what really happened that October night
behind the Phillips tombstone remains a mystery.”

“The grave diggers left only a footprint.”

“The next morning a Swan Point Cemetery security
guard discovered the hole.”

“Soon thereafter, Martin E. Dugan Jr., Swan Point’s
president, hurried to the gravesite, which each year
attracts visitors from around the world, devotees of
the man resting below.”

Yes, that’s none other than Howard Phillips
Lovecraft (1890-1937), the early 20th Century horror and
science fiction writer. Lovecraft’s grave at the Philiips
family plot in Swan Point Cemetery, Providence, Rhode
Island (population 160,728) was apparently dug up by
persons unknown the night of October 13, 1997.

“What happened the night of October13 or early
October 14 is unclear. Police said yesterday
(December 3, 1997) their investigation is continuing
but offered no details of what they found.”

“Cemetery president Dugan declines to elaborate
on the grave desecrators, not wanting to attract any
more attention.”

“What Dugan will say is that the hole was about
three feet deep and that the dirt at the bottom did not
appear to be disturbed.”

“‘Is he (Lovecraft) there?’ Dugan says, repeating
the BIG question. ‘As far as we know. There is no
indication to the contrary.'”

“Did the intruders leave any evidence? A shovel?
A footprint?”

“‘There was a footprint,’ Dugan says. No, the
police did not make an impression.”

“‘No,’ Dugan says, no one stuck a rod in the
ground to see if it would strike the coffin. ‘It did
not appear than anything had been removed and
then refilled.'”

Lovecraft, who died sixty years ago, is
considered the finest American horror writer after
Edgar Allen Poe. He is best remembered for his
“cosmic horror” stories such as “The Colour Out
of Space,” “The Call of Cthulu” and “Pickman’s
Model.” (See the Providence, R.I. Journal-
Bulletin for December 4, 1997, “New Lovecraft
Mystery Surfaces at Swan Point,” page 1.)

(Editor’s Note: The Lovecraft grave disturbance
occurred the same week as the appearance of a
large triangle-shaped UFO over Route 10 in
Cranston, R.I., about 12 miles (20 kilometers)
south of Swan Point Cemetery. Stay tuned for
the sequel…”Howard Goes to Yuggoth.”)

WINTER ENDS FAMILIES’ SEARCH FOR MISSING LEAR JET PILOTS

With the onset of winter snows, the families of
missing Lear jet pilots Johan Schwartz and Patrick
Hayes have ended their weekend searches in the
upper Connecticut River valley of New England.

Since the official search ended on January 6,
1997, the men’s relatives and numerous friends have
scoured the woods on both the New Hampshire and
Vermont sides of the river, searching for the wreckage
of the Lear jet, which vanished on the morning of
December 24, 1996.

“The plane left Bridgeport (Connecticut) at 9:20
a.m. At 9:45, it was within a few miles of Lebanon
(New Hampshire), 176 miles north.”

“At 9:51, one of the pilots told the (Lebanon, N.H.)
tower he had missed on his first approach in the rain
and fog. The tower cleared the pilot to turn around and
try again. The plane called the tower, but an airport
spokesman said the signal was ‘very, very weak’ and
unintelligible. ‘The tower tried to call back, and there
was no answer,’ the spokesman said.”

The families, aided by hundreds of volunteers and
friends, launched a new round of ground searches on
October 12.

In early November, the search’s focus turned to
Topsham, Vermont (Vt.), a town 45 miles north of
Lebanon, N.H., following a report from a woman
who had been driving on Route 302 that morning.

Over the Christmas carols on her car radio,
“Donna Nelson heard a roar like a cranky furnace
firing up on a cold morning. She turned and saw a
plane flying ‘much, much too low. It was a little
over the tree level. I’m not one to look at planes
flying around, but it was making this awful noise,’
she said.”

“The jet appeared to be following the road
she was on, U.S. Route 302 from Topsham
to Barre, Vt. It was just after 10 a.m. on Christmas
Eve day (December 24–J.T.).”

Yet a search of the Topsham area proved futile.
No wreckage was found.

According to Major Ron Alie of the N.H. Fish
and Game Department, over 275 witness reports
were collected this year. Most of them contradict
each other.

For example, “Two witness reports in Lincoln–
(N.H.) well north (55 miles) of Lebanon–appeared to
correlate. A woman who is a member of the local
ambulance service looked up from Church Street
as she was passing St. James Church and saw
‘the belly of a low-flying aircraft.’ She said she’d
never seen a Lear jet before but it looked like the
Lear jets she’d seen in the movies.”

“At the same time, a hair stylist on Lincoln’s
North Main Street was working on a client. She
looked out the window and saw a jet flying easterly
over Main Street. She described it as ‘smaller than
a military aircraft.’ That airplane appeared to be
two-tone bluish, she said. It disappeared over
Loon Mountain.”

The Lear jet flown by Schwartz, 31, of Westport,
Conn. and Hayes, 30, of Clinton, Conn. was flying
at a speed of four miles per minute. Yet, even at
that speed, it could not have been over both
Topsham, Vt. and Lincoln, N.H., communities
70 miles apart, at just after 10 a.m.

Eyewitness reports of “low-flying jets” were
also received from Campton, N.H., 70 miles east
of Lebanon; East Andover, Croydon and Meriden,
and also in Charlestown, N.H., on the river,
40 miles south of Lebanon and 60 miles southeast
of Topsham, Vt.

“Vermont witness reports came from towns
as far south as Putney north to the St. Johnsbury
area and to Hardwick, about 10 miles west of
St. Johnsbury.” (Incidentally, the Hardwick/St.
Johnsbury area was the site of several UFO
sightings between January and May 1997–J.T.)

The families’ “grief has been tinged with
bitterness that the official search was called off
so soon, and that their pleas to resume the
search in the spring went unanswered.”

“‘Yes, we realize that there were no survivors,
but we’re still alive and we should be helping each
other,’ Jay Hayes said.”

“Search officials say too much time has
elapsed for them to get involved.”

“Jay Hayes does not know how long he
will keep looking.”

“‘Once a year’s over, I don’t know what I’m
going to do,’ he said. ‘I’ve done everything I
can. But you never give up hope.'”

(See the Providence, R.I. Journal-Bulletin for
November 30, 1997, “Pilots’ Families Still Seek
Answers as Anniversary of Crash Nears,” and
October 13, 1997, “Flight of N.H. Mystery Jet
Lingers In Witnesses’ Memories.”)

from the UFO Files…1909: UFO DAZZLES CROWD OVER MARLBORO

Last summer UFO ROUNDUP presented actual
newspaper accounts from the 1909 UFO flap in
New Zealand. This month we’re going to run actual
newspaper stories from “L’Affaire Tillinghast,” better
known as “the New England Airship Invasion of 1909.”

Although UFOs were seen in Leominster,
Massachusetts (Mass.) and White River Junction,
Vermont (Vt.) as early as July, the flap really got going
in December 1909 with multiple UFO sightings in the
small city of Marlboro, Mass., approximately 28 miles
(45 kilometers) west of Boston.

Here’s the actual newspaper story:

“One of the most positive proofs of the existence of
the airship comes from ex-councilman B.W. Johnson,
who says he saw the airship Thursday evening,
Dec. 16th, in the southwestern part of the city, and
that it came down so low that he could hear a man
talking from the craft.”

The (newspaper) Marlboro Enterprise also refers
to ten other sightings in the city that week, including
this tantalizing item: “A young man named Beauregard
is an authority for the statement that that on the same
night (December 16, 1909) the airship landed on the
southern side of Lake Williams.”

On December 21, crowds of Marlboro residents,
excited by the Johnson and Beauregard stories,
gathered on Main Street to watch the skies.

“They saw an aerial craft shooting along the
southwestern heavens at a good rate of speed…
At the city hall, crowds formed and at 7:45 (p.m.)
what looked like a comet showed up and rapidly
steered to the southwest and disappeared…
Among those who saw it was Officer J.J. Buckley
but he would not talk for publication on the
matter.” (See the Marlboro, Mass. Enterprise
for December 22, 1909, page 1.)

FUN UFO WEBSITES:

James Aho just opened a new website called
“The W-Files,” an archive on UFO incidents and
other paranormal events in Wisconsin. Drop in at
http://www.execpc.com/~ahoj/wfiles/index.htm

MUFON Connecticut just opened its website
this week. For a look at the UFO scene in the
Nutmeg State, check in at http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Zone/9047

For a look at UFOs in Mississippi, try out Jay
Michael Long’s new website, “MS-UFO Files.” Log in
at http://www.c-gate.net/~jmichael/ufo/index.html

Like Net newsletters? Then you must try out Kent
Steadman’s great new “CyberSpace ORBIT.” Chock
full of UFO news, the ORBIT can be accessed at
http://www.eagle-net.org/phikent/orbit1a.html

Don’t overlook our parent site, UFOINFO, full of
news, photos and features. Log in at this URL:
https://ufoinfo.com/

For back issues of UFO ROUNDUP, try our
website at https://ufoinfo.com/roundup

Today is St. Ambrose Day, which makes the
H.P. Lovecraft story in this issue even weirder than
it already is. One of Lovecraft’s literary idols was
American author Ambrose E. Beirce, who vanished
in Mexico under very puzzling circumstances back
in 1913. A few years later, in 1922, a man named
Ambrose Small vanished in Toronto, Canada. The
father of ufology, Charles Fort, once wondered if
“somebody was collecting Ambroses.”

If your name is Ambrose, forget you ever read
this item…

Can’t you just visualize H.P. Lovecraft waking
up in the dark stone crypt on Yuggoth, looking
around in horror and shouting, “Hey! This isn’t
Benefit Street!”

And we’ll be back next weekend with more
saucer news from “the paper that goes home–
UFO ROUNDUP.”

UFO ROUNDUP: Copyright 1997 by Masinaigan
Productions, all rights reserved. Readers may post
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