From: "Skywatch International" <SKYWATCH> To: "(list #1)" 
Date: Fri, 26 Dec 1997 07:32:54 +0000
Fwd Date: Sat, 27 Dec 1997 00:54:09 -0500
Subject: Skywatch: Filer's Files #51

Filer's Files #51  MUFON Skywatch Investigations From George A.
Filer:  MUFON Eastern Director, Dec. 25 Majorstar@aol.com  (609)
654-0020

UFO sightings are down sharply in December indicating crews are
enjoying the holidays.

NEW HAMPSHIRE:

Case 97/11/3: MUFON Investigators Frank Coviello Jr. and Sandra
Black were departing from her home in Stewartstown on 3 November
at approximately 9:00 p.m.. They noticed a large star above the
horizon, that they thought at first was the star Antares.  Then,
the object blacked out and appeared a little to the right in a
ruby red in color.
Susan ran to get binoculars so they could get a closer look.
Both witnesses then saw the object rise and move closer to them.
They also noticed very unusual lightning light up the night  sky.
 It was a strange mixture of lights resembling a mix of Northern
lights and regular lightning.  When the sky glowed white, Frank
was able to see that the UFO was triangle shaped with the corners
angled off.  There was a red light on top of the craft and three
white strobing lights along the center.  Frank also noticed two
"projectiles" emitted from the object.  The first went up on a
sharp angle and then descended.
The second projectile went across the horizon at an faster rate
compared with a nearby jet plane. Frank and Susan watched the UFO
for 10 minutes.

The Manchester Union Leader of Friday, December 5, 1997, reported
on a couple who spotted a very bright light moving from the south
toward Hooksett.  One of the witnesses said, "You could bundle
five airplanes together and it wouldn't come close to that much
light."  The sighting lasted about a minute. Bright lights were
observed  for two days over Hookset, on  3 and 4 December. One
woman watched the lights  hover and suddenly take off.  There
were two independent sightings of the same object.

PENNSYLVANIA

TWO  NEW UFO SIGHTINGS    On Tuesday, December 16, 1997, at 8:00
p.m.,  Kevin L. spotted a large triangular UFO in the skies
above his hometown of Allison Park, Pennsylvania   on the William
Flinn Highway (Route 8) just  north of Pittsburgh.  "My best
description of color would be a dark  classical gray," Kevin
reported.  "There were six large  lights on the outer rim of the
object. The two lights at  the point of the (triangular) objet
were red, while the others on the corners were white.  The lights
on the  object were not very bright compared to what you see  on
aircraft--they looked more like a glow.
"The object was in constant motion.  It basically  looked like a
great granite slab crossing the sky.  My best guess was that the
object was at 5,000 feet. "I looked at it through a pair of
binoculars that  were 7 x 35mm and rated for a view area of 578
feet  at 1,000 yards.  The object took up about one-half of the
view of the binoculars at full magnification."  Kevin estimated
that the UFO approached Allison  Park from the east at about 70
degrees above the horizon.  The object then "headed off in a
northwesterly  direction.  This is an unusual route for air
traffic.  The  Pittsburgh airport is 25 miles southwest of my
house.  When I first saw the object, it was already one- quarter
of the way across (the sky) from the horizon.  I could  see it
clearly for about one minute, after that it was  too small to see
any real details."  As the UFO left, Kevin estimated that it was
headed for the Franklin Park section of Pittsburgh  and nearby
Marshall township.  (E-mail Interview)

On December 2, 1997, at 11:33 p.m., Brian C.  was driving west on
Interstate Highway 76, the  Schuylkill Expressway, just west of
Philadelphia.  As his car approached the West Manayunk exit
(Belmont Avenue-), he noticed "a green light  with my peripheral
vision to the right of my car out  the passenger side window.  My
initial reaction was  that I thought it was a helicopter. Air
traffic copters  often fly up the Schuykill River for their
reports. Almost as quickly, I realized how fast it was moving,
because it shot straight up the river parallel to the  highway
and no more than 300 feet in altitude."  "The whole incident took
no more than five  seconds," Brian added. "There was no tracer
following,  no smoke or trail of any kind...It could not have
been a  meteor because it was so low and flew straight across  at
a consistent height."  (Many thanks to Tim Hagemeister of NACOMM
and UFO Roundup Vol 2, # 49  12/21/97  Editor: Joseph Trainor for
this report.)

GREENLAND

Last week we reported that a giant meteor  lit up a large area of
the Atlantic Ocean around Greenland on December 9, 1997, at 5:15
a.m.
Fishermen aboard the motor vessels Halton Trawl  and Regina C.
cruising off the eastern coast of Greenland heard a faint
rumbling sound.  Looking  west, they spied "a giant flash split
the darkness." The bright flash was also seen by fishermen aboard
the Timmarut, a Danish motor trawler  moored in Greenland's
Julianehaab Bay.  "The glow lit up the whole ice cap," Jens P.,
one of the fishermen, said.
A parking lot surveillance camera in Nuuk,  the Danish
territory's capital on Greenland's west  coast, "also recorded a
brief illumination at that  time."  Scientific analysis of the
data indicates, " the flash was so huge that we have good reason
to believe that  this was a giant meteor," said Bjoern Franck
Jorgenson of the Tycho Brahe Planetarium in  Copenhagen, Denmark.
 "Jorgenson said it was probably a 'one-piece,  solid meteor'
that exploded.  Most meteors travel  at more than 7,400 miles per
hour and explode or  break up as they enter the atmosphere," the
Reuters report noted. Scientists at the Niels Bohr Institute at
the  University of Copenhagen and the Tycho Brahe  Planetarium
estimated that the meteor struck the Greenland ice cap at a point
50 kilometers   (30 miles) northeast of Narsarsuaq airport. The
meteor "can be compared to the Kap York meteorite," which fell in
"Melville Bay, Sassivik,  south of Thule." "The flashes observed
with the meteorite were  so bright as to turn night into day at a
distance of  100 kilometers and can be compared to the  light of
a nuclear explosion in the atmosphere.  However, we stress that
there is no reason to  believe (the flashes) were other than
natural causes."  The institute reported a strange discrepancy in
the incident, however.  The "meteor" crashed no later than 5:15
a.m.  Greenland time or 8:15 a.m. UTC time.  Yet, six  minutes
later, at 8:21 a.m. UTC, a "seismic  disturbance," attributed to
the meteor, was recorded  at Svalbard, Norway.  Two minutes
later, at 8:23 a.m.
UTC, a second "shock wave" was recorded by the  seismic detectors
at Finmarca, Norway.  The readings were announced by the
Norwegian Seismic  Agency at Kjeller.  Similar readings were
taken in  Finland and Germany.  Yet, according to the Institute,
there were no  readings of a "shock wave" or "seismic
disturbance"  at Danmarkshavn and Sonder Stromfjord, Greenland
only 380 miles (608 kilometers) west of the meteor  strike zone.
Although grounded by a severe blizzard on Monday, December 11,
planes of the Danish Air  Force continued their search for the
meteor crater.  It has not yet been found.  (Many thanks to the
Geophysical Dept. at the Niels Bohr Institute and  the Tycho
Brahe Planetarium for the news release.)

UNITED KINGDOM

Miles Johnston, BUFORA sent the following report: On Monday,
December 8, 1997, at 1415 hours, a British Midland 737 flying
from London Heathrow to Belfast International, had a 2,000 foot
long, cigar shaped UFO maneuver 150 miles off its starboard wing.
 It was a very long, black, thin vehicle,. with a very bright
white tip.  It moved at all times very slowly, but was of
considerable size.   Relative width to length ratio about 20:1.
Seen almost on the horizon, approximately at the same height as
the aircraft (33,000). Aircraft position, approximately over
Liverpool. Object was seen directly at right angle to its course.
  This would position the UFO approximately over Yorkshire. The
object was observed by a passenger on the plane, for 15 minutes.
The aircraft was flying due North west, from London to Belfast,
Northern Ireland. Conditions:-   Heavy thick cloud base, below
the aircraft would have made sighting of this object from the
ground impossible.  The aircraft was 60-% along its usual flight
path, when it made a very unusual climb seemingly to avoid the
object which was initially moving in a potentially interception
course.   However the object maintained its position, over
Yorkshire area, and steered a slow course in and around that
region.

After 15 minutes the object simply flew in an easterly direction,
into very high cloud. over that region. At all times the object
was visible in bright clear sunlight,  high above the low level
cloud base. Thanks to Miles Johnston, BUFORA. Editor's Note:
Significant sightings of large mother ships are frequently
followed by numerous UFO reports.

WASHINGTON

The Associated Press on  December 16, 1997, announced that most
Americans believe there is life on other planets.  Most of those
who think that way say life out there probably is more
intelligent than anything down here on Earth. Scientists
promoting the effort to detect signals from outer space were
quick to cheer.  Marist Institute conducted the Public Opinion
Poll.  "I'm happy to hear that the mainstream and I have similar
views," said Paul Horowitz, a professor of physics at Harvard who
directs a project that operates a 250-million-channel receiver
listening for signals from space. "It could be that the American
people are taking two and two and    coming up with four," said
Brian Welch, a spokesman for the    National Aeronautics and
Space Administration. The telephone survey of 935 adults asked,
"Do you think there is intelligent life on other planets?" Sixty
percent of the respondents said yes; 40 percent said no.  Marist
researchers then asked those who said yes if they thought    life
on other planets was "more, less, or about as intelligent as
human life on Earth." The aliens came out ahead, with 47 percent
of those who believe  in life on other plants saying they thought
extraterrestrial life was  more intelligent, 13 percent said less
intelligent and 40 percent said it was about the same. By a
margin of 86 to 14, people said they thought galactic  neighbors
are friendly rather than hostile.

Despite the positive expectation of otherworldly life, the survey
found Americans divided on spending for the space program.
Forty-seven percent said the government was spending too much, 43
percent said funding was about right and 10 percent said it was
too low. Asked if they thought the space program was a good
investment, 45 percent said yes and 55 percent said the money
would be better spent on other programs.  The survey was
conducted October 5-7, and the results had a margin of error of
3.5 percentage points. Broken down by age, people from 18 through
60 were strongly supportive of the idea of life on other planets.
But people older than 60 rejected the idea by a margin of 67 to
33.  "The subject has moved a lot in just the last couple of
years, said Louis Friedman, executive director of the Planetary
Society, whose 100,000 members are strong advocates of continuing
research into the possibility of life in outer space. Horowitz
said researchers are "riding along on this wave of
technological innovation." He said that his project listens on
250million channels simultaneously. The first serious search for
signals from space was in 1960 and had just one channel, he said.
 Thanks to John Thompson, GA State Director.

NORAD:

NORAD reports tracking Santa on Christmas. COLORADO SPRINGS,
Colorado.
(AFNS) -- For 40 years, American and Canadian personnel in the
North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) have followed
Santa Claus on Christmas Eve as he delivered gifts to the
children of North America and the world.

The children of Canada and the United States of America once
again were able to get progress reports telling them of Santa's
flight path from the North Pole to their countries. Using
ground-based radars and satellites in space, NORAD scanned  the
skies of northern Canada and Alaska and detected Santa taking off
from his North Pole workshop. He took off a few minutes earlier
this year and delivered toys to the children in Japan and China
and worked across the world in the various time zones.  He works
at a fantastic pace spending only a few seconds at each house.

Numerous children called the NORAD Command Post receiving data on
Santa's progress on Christmas Eve through each time zone. (719)
474-1110.

The tradition of tracking Santa Claus started in 1955 with
continental Air Defense Command, headquartered in Colorado
Springs. A misprint in a local store's newspaper advertisement
resulted in children calling in to the commander in chief's "Hot
Line." The line was flooded with calls so the director of
operations, Col. Harry Shoup, decided to respond to the
children's queries. The staff jumped in and handled all the calls
as they came in. The duty crew drew a picture of Santa and his
reindeer-drawn sleigh on its display of North America, and a
tradition was born.

The calls are answered by volunteers who work in various work
centers in Cheyenne Mountain and NORAD headquarters. These
civilian and military people answer all calls with a personalized
report, thus adding a human dimension to the program. Thanks to
Skywatch  and AFNS Colorado Springs, Colorado

For all our On-line friends:
Merry Christmas
and
Happy New Year

Regards, George and Janet Filer
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