The Text

Saucer over Waterdown?

By Ian Haysom
Spectator Staff

FLAMBOROUGH —A Waterdown high school student has captured amazing photographs of an unidentified flying object over Flamborough.

Pat McCarthy, 19, took the pictures yesterday afternoon near his home on Highway 5 in Waterdown and as he said: “just couldn’t believe my eyes.” Last night Pat brought the unprocessed film into The Spectator offices where it was developed and printed.

“I just didn’t want anybody to think it was a hoax”, Pat said this morning. “I didn’t want to tamper with the film at all because people always think the worst . . . . but I guess this proves what I saw was true”.

Pat got the photographs during a “pretty boring” expedition near an unused quarry near Clappisons Corners.

“I had the day off school because of exams and I figured I’d go to the quarry and take some pictures of birds. I’d got some good shots of hawks before, but yesterday I couldn’t see a thing”.

Object in sky

He gave up his picture-taking in disgust about 1.30 pm and was walking along the highway “when I suddenly saw this massive object in the sky.

“I’d been focusing on a branch when I saw this thing like a frisbee zig-zagging around above me. I just started snapping away as soon as I could.” Pat, who dabbles in amateur astronomy and has built his own telescope, tried three times to keep the UFO in the viewfinder but failed.

“It was flitting about everywhere and every time I thought I’d got it it would pass out of camera range again. “Then I knew I’d got it. I was so excited it was untrue.”

The object, which Pat described as, “twice the size of a DC-8 aircraft” was also seen by a Burlington woman, but no other people in either Flamborough, Hamilton or Burlington reported any sightings.

“I just can’t understand why nobody saw it,” Pat said today. “It was a heck of a long way away but if you looked up it was obvious something unusual was happening.”

Pat was unable to guess its exact size: “I can’t say how far away it was but it filled up about a quarter of my lens. I was using a 135 mm telescopic lens which gives you a pretty big enlargement.

Travelling fast

“But it was obviously a distance from the ground. I’d say it was travelling at thousands of miles an hour.”

Pat said the object zig-zagged over Waterdown for about 30 seconds “but maybe it was longer. I don’t know, I was just so surprised.”

Pat said the object changed speed halfway through the 30-second period, “suggendly accelerating away. I can’t guess what it was doing.”

He likened its action to a “hat being thrown about in the wind, except it seemed to have some purpose and direction. At one moment it was jumping around like a madman, the next it was going in a straight line.”

He said he was unable to tell its color or shape beause it was so far away: “But it seemed round sometimes the sun would reflect off its side, so it could have been shiney.”

Pat reached home with his camera and did not remove the film until he brought in into the Spectator.

No fake

This morning, when told the photographs were a success, he was ecstatic: “I suppose I was laying my head on the line, I hoped I’d got a good shot but I knjew there was a chance there’d be nothing on the film. I’m just knocked-out.”

A Burlington woman sighted a similar object hovering over Lake Ontario.

Daisy Wilmot of Lakeshore Road said she saw a thin fluorescent object with a dome shaped top that glowed with an orange light.

Describing the object as being about 20 fee long and five feet high at the dome, she said it remained stationary above the water about 500 yards from shore for between five to eight minutes.

The craft started to virbrate, slowly began rising, held stationary for a few seconds and then shot off to the west around the corner of the building.

Although two women in Mrs. Wilmot’s apartment building reported hearing the sound of an airplane nearby at the same time, no one else in the building saw the object.

Carol White, a Hamilton high school mathematics teacher, is an official UFO investigator for the Aerial Phenomena Research Organization, Inc. (APRO) of Tuscon, Arizona.

APRO is entering its 23rd year of UFO research and is a federally recognized scientific and educational tax-exempt organization.

Most important

Mrs. White said that photographic evidence was the most important for investigations into UFOs, and highly unusual.

“I would be very interested in seeing the pictures,” said Mrs. White. “I would like to get a copy and send it down to Arizona because I msyelf am not an expert.”

She said the most recent of a UFO occurred two months agon in the area, but it tourned to be just some lights.

“This is really exciting,” said Mrs. White.

The Flamborough Flight - Fact or Fancy?

By Ian Haysom
Spectator Staff

The Waterdown-what-is-it, the unidentified flying object photographed over Flamborough, has left the experts baffled and bemused.

Nobody questioned about the sombrero-shaped object yesterday could offer any plausible explanation of what it is, where it came from, or what it was doing.

Now, to add to the bewilderment, staff in The Spectator’s photography department have discovered it has legs… or perhaps antennae.

Each one of the series of four pictures taken by Waterdown high school student Pat McCarthy Tuesday was magnified about 150 times in the newspaper’s darkroom.

Antennae

Late yesterday afternoon, two faint, thin prongs were discovered sprouting from the saucer-like object, suggesting landing legs or antennae… and the mystery deepened.

The Spectator took the photographs, published yesterday, to scientists, aeronautics experts, and ufologists and contacted military personnel and astronomers.

The result was almost totally negative, give or take a theory or two, and the experts are still scratching their heads.

The four photographs are to be examined by the United States Centre for UFOs at Dearburn Observatory in Evanston, Ill.

The centre is headed by Dr. Alan Hynek, considered to be the world’s leading authority on UFOs.

A spokesman for the centre said UFO investigators in Ontario have been flooding Dr. Hynek’s office with calls since the photographs were published in The Spectator.

Interested

“We’re obviously interested,” he said today. “It’s rare that photographic evidence of this kind is available, and from what we can understand, the pictures really are exciting.”

The spokesman said photographic experts were to examine negatives of the photographs and speak to Pat McCarthy.

Dr. Hynek is often employed by the United States Air Force on UFO investigation.

Pat, meanwhile, insists the whole incident is not a hoax: “I’ve honestly no idea what it is. I just took some photos of something in the sky and now everybody is asking me for my own special theory. I just don’t know.”

“There’s no way I’d ever try and set up anything like that. I’m in the middle of exams at school at the moment and haven’t got time to mess around. I’m as much in the dark as anybody else.”

Pat took the four pictures of the UFO at 1:30 Tuesday afternoon near his home on Highway 5 in Waterdown while he was out photographing hawks.

He immediately contacted The Spectator and was told not to take the film out of his camera or have it developed. The film was then processed in the newspaper’s darkroom by staffers.

Hobby

Pat, 19, whose hobby is astronomy, said the object zig-zagged around the sky for about 30 seconds while he tried to capture it through his viewfinder, taking four shots in rapid succession.

Yesterday, a group of physicists at McMaster University studied a blow-up of the object and the four-photo series of pictures and declared themselves completely baffled.

After looking at them through a microscope, studying cloud formations in the pictures and puzzling over the object from a variety of angles, they admitted to defeat.

As one of the scientists said: “All we can say with absolute certainty is that it is an unidentified flying object. Beyond that, it’s all hypothesis.

Spaceship

“Unfortunately, people tend to think UFO means spaceship. It doesn’t, it just means that it’s an object, it’s in flight, and nobody can tell you what on earth it is.”

Local astronomers and ufologists also admitted puzzlement, and the provincial ministry of transport said it is interested in pursuing the case further. The Canadian Forces Air Command is also intrigued and is studying the newspaper pictures of the object.

Air traffic controllers confirmed that nothing unusual showed up on radar screens at the time of Pat’s sighting: “But that doesn’t mean a thing,” said a spokesman at Malton airport.

“We pick up aircraft on our radar system, but if this object were composed of an alien material, then conceivably we wouldn’t bet a beep.”

The Hamilton area is below one of the busiest air traffic systems in North America, but no pilots reported seeing anything unusual yesterday.

The theories, however, bear reporting, even though every theorist was adamant he or she was just guessing.

The hoax - If Pat McCarthy has manufactured the whole incident himself, then he has fooled just about everybody.

Distance

McMaster physicists speculated on a hoax, but generally ruled it out as unlikely. The cloud formation suggested a distance of more than a mile between the camera and the object, and the UFO showed obvious movement.

A tennis ball stuffed into a frisbee? Unlikely since it would require four different throws, and the pictures suggest consistency of a single flight.

Pat himself says he expects the hoax allegations, “but I promise they’re wrong. I saw the thing, and I wanted you to develop the film to show I didn’t tamper with it.”

A hawk - One of the series of four photographs shows another spot near the object which one scientist said appeared very much like a hawk chasing a smaller bird. The spot was a speck of dust, and physicists agreed that when the object was magnified, it didn’t look like a bird in motion.

A plane - This theory was advanced by an aeronautics expert who then withdrew the guess, saying: “It looks like a flying saucer… that’s all I can tell you.”

A flying saucer - Almost everyone questioned about the pictures said the object looked like a saucer… but few of them would commit themselves.

“It has the classical, accepted appearance of a saucer, or what the books tell us flying saucers look like,” said an astronomer with the Hamilton Astronomical Society. “But it beats me… it sure looks pretty authentic. It’s one of the best pictures of its kind I’ve ever seen.”

Diana Henwood of Lakeshore Road, Oakville, a UFO investigator and member of the Toronto Society for Psychical Research, said today the photographic evidence seemed sound.

“If scientists don’t think it’s a hoax and there’s no other explanation, then you never know . . . we may be looking at a spaceship,” she said.

“We get many, many verbal sightings of objects in the area, but nothing quite like this.”

Look, legs!

Canadian Press (CP)

Staff in The Spectator’s photography department reported Thursday that a saucer-shaped object photographed Tuesday by a 19-year-old amateur astronomer has protrusion from its body that resemble legs or antennae.

Pat McCarthy, a high school student, had gone to a disused quarry to photograph birds and was walking back “when I suddenly saw this massive object in the sky.”

I’d been focusing on a branch when I saw this thing like a frisbee zig-zagging around above me,” he said in an interview. “I just started snapping away as soon as I could.”

Pat immediately called The Spectator and was told not to take the film out of the camera. The film then was processed in the newspaper’s darkroom.

Each of the four pictures was magnified about 150 times and the two thin protrusions were discovered.

Scientists, aeronautics experts, experts on unidentified flying objects, military personnel and astronomers who were interviewed were baffled by the object.

The photographs will be studied by the United States Centre for Unidentified Flying Objects at Dearborn University, Evanston Mich.

A spokesman for the centre said: “We’re obviously interested-it’s rare that photographic evidence of this kind is available and from what we can understand, the pictures really are exciting.”

A group of physicists at McMaster University studied a blow-up of one of the photographs and looked at the pictures through a microscope.

One of the scientists said that “all we can say with absolute certainty is that it is an unidentified flying object. Beyond that, it’s all hypothesis.”

“Unfortunately, people tend to think UFO means spaceship,” he said. “It doesn’t- it just means that it’s an object, it’s in flight and nobody can tell you what on earth it is.”

Air traffic controllers in the area said that nothing unusual showed up on radar screens. But one spokesman said “that doesn’t mean a thing.”

“We pick up aircraft on our radar system, but if this object was composed of an alien material, then conceivably we wouldn’t get a bleep.”

UFO Sightings ‘serious’ say police

By Ian Haysom
Spectator Staff

Police in Waterdown— the scene of Tuesday’s amazing UFO photographs— were bombarded with calls last night on new sightings.

This morning, police said they were taking all the sightings seriously.

“We’re getting them from responsible citizens, not maniacs,” said Constable Roger Siim of the OPP detachment.

“There’s something going on somewhere. We received numerous calls last night, many of them identical, but we couldn’t find a thing.

“But these people were all sincere and intelligent, and we just can’t ignore them. We’ll be investigating any apparent valid sighting reported to us.”

The Waterdown calls were just a few of a flood of sightings reported across southern Ontario over the past few days.

Since The Spectator published photographs of a sombrero-shaped object taken by Waterdown high school student Pat McCarthy, scores of others have reported seeing similar unidentified objects in the day and night sky.

UFO experts in Ontario say the photographs are among the best they have seen of a flying saucer-style object, and scientists say they are certain the pictures are not a hoax.

One UFO investigator said today the flood of sightings “sometimes happens after an incredible sighting like the Flamborough photographs.”

“But the sightings are coming from intelligent people, not children or hoaxers trying to jump on the bandwagon. It really does look as if something is happening.”

Four unrelated persons called The Spectator yesterday, saying they had seen two objects, similar to the Unidentified Flying Object, flying in formation. One Greensville resident told Waterdown OPP he had seen three “saucer-shaped things” in the sky.

Bright Objects

Amazingly, police in Waterdown also received a call from a couple in Freelton who said they saw three brightly coloured balls in a field near their home.

The description was almost exactly the same as given by a Grimsby family yesterday on a Saturday sighting.

There are some of the sightings reported over the past few days:

• Mike Dorman, a 30-year-old letter carrier working on Hamilton Mountain, yesterday afternoon said he saw two saucer-like objects flash across the sky at 2 p.m. while delivering mail. “One of them just went straight across the sky, but the other made a U-turn,” he said. “They were saucers and reddish in colour.”

• Mr. and Mrs. Arthur Johnstone of Highway 8, Winona, said they saw two round objects outside their home at 10 p.m. Saturday. “We were indoors when I saw what looked like sparks outside the window,” Mrs. Johnstone said. “My husband and I went to the window and saw these two reddish objects. There were black in the middle but with a thing like a halo around them.”

• Mrs. Corrie DeJong and her 14-year-old son, Charles, and daughter, Sylvia, nine, say they witnessed perhaps the most incredible scene from their home on Ridge Road, Grimsby, last Saturday night. Charles had returned home from a church group at 9:45 and rushed indoors telling his mother to look outside. “We went to the window and looked out,” Mrs. DeJong said. “I just couldn’t believe it, and we just The family saw massive gold balls in a field about half a mile from their window. The balls, glowing in the night, hovered for a minute and then disappeared, dropping four or five smaller gold balls to the ground. Then, says Mrs. DeJong, eight large gold balls raided about six feet above the ground, hovered for a few minutes, then “popped out”. Next, the family saw a massive, glowing red ball. “It was just sitting there on the ground - and it looked like the sun going down,” said Mrs. DeJong.

Astronomers, amateur and professional alike, don’t get very excited about UFO reports.

But Tuesday’s photographs in The Spectator of what appears to be the proverbial “flying saucer” have intrigued some members of the Hamilton chapter of the Royal Astronomical Society.

Last night, two of them revealed that they too have witnessed unusual celestial activity, events beyond their comprehension.

In other words, UFOs.

Robert Speck, 29, of East 13th Street, observed the manoeuvres of a pair of unusual objects in 1972, while viewing some astronomical activity with a friend.

“We were observing Mars when we swung our telescope to the south to identify an unfamiliar constellation.

“I had just glanced at some charts for information and when I looked up, I was surprised to see two reddish-brown discs. They were both about half the size of the moon and moving in a parallel direction across the sky. Then they crossed each other’s path once, crossed back, made an arc into the area of Sagittarius, and blinked out,” he said.

Both Mr. Speck and his friend observed the discs and couldn’t believe their eyes.

Reddish discs

“I’d heard reports time and time before, but I wasn’t convinced. You always felt that there must be a logical explanation, that someone with little knowledge of the night sky had confused a satellite or a planet. But I know the sky and I’m used to watching it. And that was nothing I had ever heard of.

Eighteen-year-old Ambrose Moore was stargazing from his Victoria Avenue North home when he was startled to see a triangular configuration of three white dots come into his field of vision.

“They stood still for a few moments, and I thought I was seeing things. Then they just disappeared at what must have been a fantastic rate of speed.

“I was just completely stunned at the time. Later, I wrote an observation report and gave it to Ken Chilton, who was keeping the society’s records at the time. It was certainly nothing that I or any of the rest of us have an explanation for.

(Reprint May 22, 1975 - ‘Incredible’ UFO photo stirs Canada, U.S. experts)

Excited UFO investigators descend on Waterdown

By IAN HAYSOM

Spectator Staff

Provincial UFO investigators are conducting a detailed test of the Waterdown “Mexican Hat” photographs today in an air of unabashed excitement.

Photographic and astronomical experts from the Mutual Unidentified Flying Objects Network say a preliminary investigation shows the pictures are “100 per cent genuine . . . the best daylight UFO photographs we’ve ever seen.”

The pictures were taken by 19-year-old Waterdown high school student Pat McCarthy on Tuesday when he was on Highway 5, in Waterdown, taking pictures of hawks.

In the past four days, he has been besieged by UFOlogists, TV and radio stations, magazines, and American newspapers asking for his detailed version of the incident.

Yesterday afternoon, Dennis Prophet, a provincial member of MUFON and the owner of a $20,000 mobile UFO research unit, spent three hours in the Hamilton area probing the sighting.

He studied blow-up shots of the object processed by The Spectator from the undeveloped film Pat brought to the new papers on Tuesday night.

Then, he spoke to Pat for 90 minutes, asking for a detailed account of the sighting and the method used in photographing it.

“All I can say is that I’ve never seen anything quite like this,” he said afterwards. “You sometimes get the odd photograph of a blurry image, but these are just incredible.

“I’m certain they’re genuine. We’ll be studying them minutely over the weekend and seeing what happens.”

Mr. Prophet, director fo the Reptune Research Organization, said he intends to bring his research unit to Waterdown one night soon, in an attempt to track down “whatever’s up there”.

The unit, a converted Dodge van, is equipped with a dome for observational purposes, a variety of telescopes, camera equipment, binoculars, and equipment— and an intriguing licence number UFO 002.

Mr. Prophet says he has documented hundreds of UFO sightings in the past year, many of them in and around Hamilton-Wentworth, but said the Waterdown evidence “looks as if it could be a real breakthrough”.

He said he had studied many photographs “which after a short while we could easily see were hoaxes.”

“But the fact these photographs were processed by The Spectator rules out any suggestion of tampering with the negatives, and they look authentic right down the line.”

UFOlogists from other North American societies agree that they cannot find anything wrong with the pictures. They hope they can be fully authenticated by the UFO research centre in Evanston, Illinois, next week.

The centre has the most highly developed equipment in the world and is headed by Dr. J. Allen Hynek, director of the Dearborn Observatory and consultant to the U.S. Air Force on UFOs.

The centre says it is anxious to carry out its own investigation into the sighting.

Meanwhile, Ontario UFOlogists say there have been many sightings across the province in the past few months, many of them consistent with other sightings, and the majority from intelligent, mature persons.

Only 25 per cent are ruled out as having no credence… the remainder “bear looking into and 3 or 4 per cent are indisputable,” one investigator said yesterday.

So what is the Waterdown object? Nobody yet is willing to say for certain, and UFOlogists say nobody probably will until full investigations are made by governmental and military agencies.

“At the moment, all I can suggest is that it is some extraterrestrial craft… but that’s as much as I can guess,” said Mr. Prophet.

Pat’s UFO pictures stand tests

Waterdown’s mystery UFO remains an intriguing question mark one week after its first spectacular appearance. Seven days of detailed examination of the four pictures taken by 19-year old Waterdown high school student Pat McCarthy have still failed to discredit them.

Scientists, UFOlogists, students and photographic experts have all dissected last Tuesday’s sighting and the likelihood of a hoax is growing dimmer.

“It’s just incredible. I don’t think anyone has ever come up with anything like this,” said Dennis Prophet, A UFO Investigator for MUFON (Mutual Unidentified Flying Objects Network) yesterday.

Mr. Prophet, direct of Reptune Research Organization, a Toronto-based group which probed the sighting last weekend, said experts are completely baffled.

“Our photo experts pulled the picture to pieces for eight solid hours but still couldn’t find anything wrong with them. Every expert we have said they are genuine, so what more can you say.”

One MUFON investigator, who deals with model flying objects, said it was impossible for a model of a sombrero-shaped saucer to have been used in the pictures.

“He studied the direction, size, shape and angle of the object and the quality of the film and said he was certain it wasn’t a model flying in the distance,” said Mr. Prophet.

“The was a suggestion some prankster could have made a tiny black flying saucer and sent it up in the air, but this now seems impossible.

“Our experts say the htin photographed is really quite a size. We’ve also looked closely at the material of the object and it suggests trranslucency. We’re looking at a highly -developed, not plastic or cardboard.”

Mr. Prophet and other UFOlogists intend to converge on the Hamilton area in the coming weeks to try to spot the object themselves.

One consultant for the U.S.-based APRO (Aerial Phenomena Research Organization) said yesterday its investigators felt the McCarthy shots were a breakthrough in UFO sightings.

“We’ve been getting thousands of reports of strange objects in this part of Canada but nothing to substantiate them. These are going to help us considerably. They suggest one thing - flying saucers - and we can’t ignore them.”

UFO groups have been inundated with calls from Hamilton-Wentworth, Burlington and Niagara since The Spectator published the McCarthy photographs last week.

Scientific MP hopes UFO pictures irrefutable

By Ian Haysom
Spectator Staff

A Canadian MP — the only scientist in the House of Commons — says the Waterdown UFO photographs could provide “irrefutable evidence” spacecraft are flying above us.

Dr. Frank Maine, chosen to represent Canada at the European science planning conference in Paris next month, described the pictures yesterday as “quite possibly the big breakthrough we’ve been waiting for.”

And he added that should the spacecraft be carrying “people with superior knowledge to ours then we have to try to use that knowledge to benefit the country.

“We have to attempt to contact them rather than be afraid of them.”

Dr. Maine, Liberal MP for Wellington South, has requested Spectator blow-ups of the four photographs of a sombrero-shaped object made by Waterdown high school student Pat McCarthy, last week.

Scientists, UFOlogists and other groups have already mulled over the pictures and say they are genuine, and Dr. Maine, who claims to be the first scientist to take a parliamentary seat in Ottawa, says he agrees.

“Everything seems to point towards it. I’ve looked at many photographs which turned out to be very good hoaxes, but these could be the first concrete evidence we’ve had that something is up there.”

Dr. Maine, admitting that his theories might not win him many friends among his non-scientific parliamentary colleagues, hinted that the government may have been gathering information on UFOs for some times.

“Possibly they feel that it would be harmful for people to know certain things — they don’t want to start an Orson Welles — War of the Worlds — panic situation by telling the Canadian people something up there is looking at us.”

Dr. Maine, stressing that he wishes to investigate the Waterdown pictures from a scientific rather than political approach, said he thought the people of Canada could mentally manage such a revelation.

“Personally, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to believe there is other life in the universe. As a scientist, I have to believe there could be another environment, somewhere.

“Even the environment on the planet earth has gone through a massive geological change in the past 50 years, and I feel you have to have a very open mind about spacecraft and other such things.”

Dr. Maine said the possibility of being chosen to climb into a flying saucer “intrigues and fascinates me.

“The craft itself appears to be the most incredible thing of all if we can believe some of the pictures we have seen. It suggests two rotating discs with a magnetic field between them, the two forces lending themselves against each other to create motion.

“It would be marvellous to have evidence of how they worked.”

It would also be marvellous, according to the MP, to tax the resources of superior beings should they exist.

“If there is a superior knowledge, somewhere, then I am certain it could only be of benefit to the country. There’s a general tendency to be afraid of the unknown, whereas it would be much more useful to be positive about the good it could do for us.

“I’ve been waiting for the irrefutable evidence and this could just be what I’ve been waiting for.”

He agreed it is “a little unfortunate” that Canada does not possess any official agency to look into UFO sightings “when they seem to be becoming so common in this part of the world.

“I don’t think the armed forces looks into them at all. I know the United States Air Force once had some form of investigation program, but I think we ought to be doing more.”

He said, however, he would not be pushing for governmental action on UFO sightings: “I just want to document all the evidence scientifically and try and find out what is going on.”

Dr. Maine agreed he would have a hard time convincing fellow MPs that UFOs are to be taken seriously: “I’m having a hard enough time telling them about earthly things like fusion reactors. I have to put it into layman’s language.

“Perhaps some of them will ostracize me, but I really haven’t discussed it — it’s a personal thing which I feel has to be pursued.”

A spokesman in the ministry of defence said he was not aware of any cover-ups but added that the Canadian armed forces did not investigate UFO sightings.

He said the National Research Council normally looks into any unusual phenomena.

Item description

Pat's UFO 99.9% true: top expert

By IAN HAYSOM
Spectator Staff

CHICAGO — The world's leading authority on UFOs is almost 100 per cent convinced Waterdown's flying saucer is genuine.

J. Allan Hynek, head of the United States Centre for UFOs, examined the negative and prints of the sombrero-shaped object yesterday and said he couldn't find a flaw.

“If they are legitimate photographs — and all the evidence suggests they are — then they are among the best ever taken,” he said.

Dr. Hynek said the photographs, snapped by 19-year-old Waterdown high school student Pat McCarthy two weeks ago, closely resemble three UFO pictures taken in Peru, Australia and Europe which are regarded as the most authentic.

But he said the fourth frame showing antenna-like protrusions jutting from the object had him stumped.

New, exciting

“I honestly have never seen anything like them before,” he said.

“We're into something completely new — something I admit is pretty exciting.”

Dr. Hynek, who was invited to the White House next week to discuss federal U.S. funding for UFO research, announced his centre will be making serious overtures to the Canadian government to take a positive stance on UFO investigation.

He said there had been overwhelming evidence in recent years of seemingly authentic UFO data in Canada.

“We have investigators in Canada, but now we have to do something concrete, especially in the light of these photographs,” Dr. Hynek said.

He said he intends to meet with Dr. Frank Maine [the scan is somewhat unclear on the first name] — the Liberal MP who last week said he believed the Waterdown object is a flying saucer — and exert pressure on the Canadian government to set up an official UFO program.

Dr. Hynek, who for 22 years was the consultant to the U.S. Air Force on UFOs, examined the Waterdown photographs and the evidence supporting them yesterday afternoon at the Dearborn Observatory in Evanston near Chicago.

He said he intends to carry out more detailed research over the next few days culminating in what he anticipates will be 99.9 per cent endorsement of the photographs.

“I can never say I'm 100 per cent certain because there is no way you can be,” he said. “You can examine a photograph from every technical angle imaginable and still be wrong.

“I choose to say that every test has proven positive and the object defies description, that it has no earthly rational explanation.

“But I'm never prepared to say that anything is a flying saucer and has little people inside it.”

The best

“I simply investigate and document the most authentic sightings. If these four stand every test — as I believe they will — then they will be invaluable in our research.”

Dr. Hynek, who for many years as an astronomer was a self-admitted debunker of UFO pictures and sightings, says his centre can normally spot fakes very quickly.

“These,” he said of the Waterdown pictures, “are either the best I've seen of their kind or a magnificent hoax which is fooling everybody. I don't think they are fakes. They couldn't have stood so much testing for so long and survived.”

Dr. Hynek, who says the catalogue of recent sightings in southern Ontario should be thoroughly examined by the authorities, contends that the final test on the photographs will be a psychological one.

He said Pat McCarthy, the photographer, and only Pat McCarthy has the key to the answer.

The doctor said he would like to see a lie detector test given to the Waterdown student.

“If he is willing to take one then I'm sure that could be the final step,” he said. “After that the proof factor is irrelevant. It becomes a fact and a statistic.”

Dr. Hynek taped the statement of the circumstances surrounding the taking of the pictures. Pat claims they were taken on an expedition to take photos of hawks in Waterdown.

He said the fact The Spectator processed the film and investigated the whole affair is perhaps the most pleasing fact of all.

“Most newspapers just publish unfounded reports and pictures without investigating them,” he said.

“That does us more harm than good.”

“I'm impressed that the newspaper has spent so much time looking into this incident, investigating every aspect.

“Much of the groundwork has already been done, and that is going to help very much.”

Middle path

If the Waterdown sombrero is genuine then Dr. Hynek hints broadly that there has to be some form of life inside the object operating it.

“I haven't time for scientists who dismiss UFOs out of hand or people who believe in them blindly,” he said. “If we can steer a middle path looking for facts and documented proof then we're playing the part of reporter. We are doing everything we can to find out what is going on.”

“I honestly have never seen anything like them before,” he said.

“We're into something completely new — something I admit is pretty exciting.”

Dr. Hynek, who has been invited to the White House next week to discuss federal U.S. funding for UFO research, announced his centre will be making serious overtures to the Canadian government to take a positive stance on UFO investigation.

He said there had been overwhelming evidence in recent years of seemingly authentic UFO data in Canada.

“We have investigators in Canada but now we have to do something concrete especially in the light of these photographs,” Dr. Hynek said.

A particularly important detail in this one

There are several statements here that are much stronger than the March 22 article. Most notably, the April 3 article records Hynek as saying:

“I choose to say that every test has proven positive and the object defies description, that it has no earthly rational explanation.”

And it records his statement that the photographs were either “the best I've seen of their kind or a magnificent hoax which is fooling everybody,” followed by his explicit statement: “I don't think they are fakes.”

It also documents something that I think will be valuable for your website's historical chronology: Hynek specifically praised The Spectator for processing the film and investigating the incident, saying that most newspapers simply publish UFO reports and photographs without investigating them.

Waterdown UFO photos ‘100% okay’: world expert

The now-renowned Waterdown UFO photographs have passed every conceivable test… with flying colours.

Dr. J. Allen Hynek, the world’s foremost authority on unidentified flying objects, said yesterday that he hasn’t been able to find a flaw in them… and thinks they’re for real.

“All I can say now is that the photographs show something which certainly appears to be a flying saucer. We’ve tested them thoroughly from every viewpoint and are convinced they’re not fakes.”

Dr. Hynek heads the U.S. Centre for UFO studies in Evanston, Ill., and was the former consultant to the United States Air Force on UFOs.

He revealed his findings on the Waterdown pictures two months after 19-year-old Waterdown high school student Pat McCarthy photographed the sombrero-shaped object, about a mile from his home.

Since that date, UFO investigators, police, politicians, scientists, and even the military have been involved in the bizarre incident, quizzing McCarthy, investigating the scene where the photographs were taken, and probing the sighting from every angle.

No one has ever been able to disprove that they are genuine, but it was felt Dr. Hynek, who has collected data on thousands of unexplained UFO sightings, would be able to eventually give the authoritative verdict.

The Spectator, which processed the original McCarthy film, took the negative to Dearborn Observatory near Chicago early in April, where Dr. Hynek gave them some preliminary tests.

At the time, he was 99 per cent convinced they were genuine, but said other tests— most importantly, thorough examination by photographic expert Frederick Beckman— were needed to authenticate them fully.

“I have never wanted to jump the gun by rashly saying a UFO photograph is genuine,” Dr. Hynek said yesterday.

“I have been researching now for many years, and I don’t want the rug pulled from under my feet by making a bad judgment.”

“But Mr. Beckman studied the photographs in detail and is convinced they are 100 per cent OK. Many experts here have now looked them over from every possible viewpoint, so all we can say for sure now is that they are not fabricated.

“I still don’t know what the object is, although it’s very similar to photographs taken in other parts of the world, some of which have been impossible to authenticate.”

Dr. Hynek said Mr. Beckman’s only concern was that there was no point of reference— such as a tree or telephone pole— in the photographs.

“That would have helped us considerably, and because of that, we had to give them a more critical going-over.

“But the fact that neither we nor the scores of other people who have had direct contact with the boy have not been able to discover one flaw, I think proves without a doubt the authenticity.”

Dr. Hynek said he would be happier if McCarthy was to take a polygraph— or lie detector— test to prove to the public he had not faked the photographs.

“Basically, that can be of great importance to people who investigate UFOs but have been scoffed at over the years. We’re convinced they’re real, but there’s a segment of the public which will never be convinced unless they see something they can relate to.

“People know what a lie-detector test is … and if McCarthy took one, then I’m sure it would show everyone the lad is telling the truth.”

During his preliminary testing of the photographs, Dr. Hynek said that if the pictures were genuine, “then we are certainly looking at some form of extraterrestrial life.”

Yesterday, he affirmed that this is still his feeling: “This is another point, and a valuable point, on the curve.”

Dr. Hynek has contended that the U.S. Air Force, for whom he has worked for 19 years, has covered up many genuine UFO sightings: “The Pentagon would never accept anything that wasn’t explainable. I investigated many cases which pointed to another life, but again and again, they turned them down and cooked up some logical, earthly explanation of their own.”

He has, however, collected reams of data from his Pentagon days and insists governments, including Canada, will have to begin looking seriously at UFOs before too long.

“Basically, I feel the governments of the world are afraid of alarming the people on Earth by telling them point-blank there is other life.

“But sooner or later it’s going to come out. I just hope it’s in my own lifetime.”

Because of official reticence towards UFOs, Dr. Hynek believes the Waterford UFO will only be accepted by his own centre and UFO agencies for now.

“But their value lies in the future. As far as I’m concerned, they are part— a large part— of the documentation that there is other life in this universe.

“One day they’ll have a great part to play.”

CANADIAN PHOTOGRAPHS UFO

Ontario, Canada has recently been a focal point for UFO activity. NICAP has been literally inundated with telephone calls, letters, newspaper clippings, and reports from people in the Ontario area. The most substantiated report was one from an area of Ontario named Flamborough.

On March 18 a nineteen year old student was out taking photographs of birds in a desolated area near a quarry. He had not been too successful in his attempts to photograph hawks, when suddenly he noticed a massive object in the sky. The young man, Pat McCarthy, who is an amateur astronomer as well, began snapping photos as fast as he could. He was having a great deal of difficulty in trying to keep the UFO in his viewfinder. The object was “flitting about everywhere and every time I thought I'd got it, it would pass out of the camera range again.” After many attempts, McCarthy felt fairly sure he had been able to focus on it. He was ecstatic about his accomplishment. Because of McCarthy's photographic experience, he decided not to develop the film himself for fear his peers would suspect that he tampered with the photo during the development, He took the film still loaded in the camera to a local newspaper office, THE SPECTATOR, and had them process the film.

McCarthy described the behavior of the UFO as erratic in the way in which it traveled throughout the sky. He further stated that due to the distance, it was rather difficult to be accurate regarding its size and speed but he estimated that it was about the size of a DC-8 aircraft and must have been traveling thousands of miles per hour. The witness was using a 135 mm telescopic lens and the object filled up about a quarter of the viewfinder. The time of the sighting was approximately 1:30 pm on a clear day.

One other area resident, Mrs. Daisy Wilmot witnessed a UFO at approximately the same time. She was able to view the object for approximately 5 to 8 minutes. She said it hovered over a body of water about 500 yards from shore. The craft started to vibrate, and began to rise slowly, held stationary for a few seconds and then shot off to the west and out of sight. Two other women in the same apartment building as Mrs. Wilmot did not see the object but stated that they heard sounds like an airplane.

Pat McCarthy could not understand why even more people did not see the UFO due to its size and strange behavior. McCarthy stated that the object, even though erratic in its movements, seemed to have purpose and direction. “At one point it was jumping around like a madman, and then it was going in a straight line.” He stated that the UFO made a complete figure eight and then made another half loop before darting across the sky and disappearing.

The photo when enlarged approximately 160 times depicts a “saucer-like” structure with a dome on the top. NICAP is presently trying to secure a copy of the photograph for future publication. However, we did not want to hold the article waiting for the photo. An artist's conception of the craft is included for your review.

Of course, photographic evidence is more valid than a report without such information. However, without the original photograph a conclusive evaluation can not be made. Basing evaluation on the honesty and personal character of the witness along with his testimony of what he saw and the fact that Mrs. Wilmot possibly witnessed the same object, the case does seem to have very strong points. Due to the nature of the photographs (the lack of reference points shown in the image) it may not be possible to determine photographically whether the object was a small one close to the camera lens or a large one far away.

As previously stated, there have been a rash of UFO sighting in the Ontario area which also lends some credibility to the McCarthy sighting. A second full report was received only 2 days after McCarthy's observation from a witness in the same vicinity.

Mr. Michael W. Dorman is a letter carrier with the Canada Post Office in Hamilton, Ontario. He is also a student of Anthropology and Geomorphology.

Mr. Dorman reported to NICAP that he witnessed 2 UFOs on March 20. Once again, this was a daylight sighting with clear visibility. The witness claimed that the color of object #1 was almost white, and metallic indicating a highly glossed surface reflecting in the sunlight. Object #2 was similar in color except for when it flickered an amber-red during its short 2 to 3 second ascent, before disappearing.

Mr. Dorman included with his report a diagram indicating position duration and flight patterns the UFOs took. He also was able to conclude that he did not feel that the objects could have been falling debris from terrestrially-launched space probes due to the fact that any debris would probably have burned up before reaching that far down in our atmosphere.

The witness did observe several propeller-driven aircraft passing slowly and noisily overhead about 15 minutes prior to the sightings as well as a jet passenger plane with dual engines. The witness was very sure that the UFOs that he observed were not conventional type aircraft. The UFOs moved much more quickly than any conventional aircraft and the sky was clear enough to enable the witness to observe that the objects were wingless.

Mr. Dorman stated to NICAP that, “unless someone else saw the two UFOs when and where I did, I would venture to say that I am an expert on what I saw, not an expert on what they were. I was not hallucinating. I value my powers of observation as a naturalist artist, who takes great pains with minute detail, very highly.”

“My parents were abducted by aliens”

…and all I got was this lousy T-shirt

By MARY PAT ELLIOTT
The Spectator

Here, oh where have the aliens gone?

Once upon a time, visitations from other-worldly beings were a common occurrence around here.

Triangular craft were reported hovering above Henderson Hospital, young lads on bikes spotted metallic saucers circling the skies over Westdale, and housewives videotaped glowing, orange lights in the Glanbrook night sky.

Lately, though, there's been a dearth of strange sightings in the Hamilton area, and the only things flashing in the night sky are the stars.

According to the National Research Council, which keeps official track of such things, there have only been three reports made to its Ottawa office in the past five years from Hamilton.

And Ontario's Mutual UFO Network (MUFON), has taken only about 15 calls this year, compared to about 200 in 1993, and 150 last year.

So why aren't our intergalactic neighbors flying our friendly Steeltown skies anymore?

“Maybe they've gone on holidays,” jokes Tom Theophanous, head of MUFON.

“Maybe there's too much smog in Hamilton to see them any more,” speculates Rob McConnell, who hosts a weekly broadcast on the paranormal on CHML.

Scared to come here

But true believer Pat McCarthy of Waterdown thinks the answer is simple: aliens have seen what's here and don't want any part of it.

“They're scared to come here,” he says, not a hint of irony in his voice. “They know we've got nuclear weapons and could destroy them if we wanted to.”

Mr. McCarthy knows a thing or two about those pesky flying saucers. Twenty years ago, he took what is still considered to be Canada's most authentic photograph of a UFO.

In March of 1975, Mr. McCarthy was 19, had long hair, a twin brother, and hoped to make Canada's Olympic track and field team in 1976.

But most of all, he liked to take pictures.

During a break in exam-writing, he decided to head down to the quarry near Clappison's Corners. He knew there were thousands of red-tailed hawks in the trees there and he wanted to get some good shots of them with his camera.

It was a fairly cloudy, overcast day, and when he arrived at the quarry, just before noon, he was greeted with the eerie sound of silence. The birds were nowhere to be found.

“It was so unusual,” he remembers. “They had never behaved like that before — they had never been so quiet. I knew something was up.”

Frustrated, he waited around until about 1.30 p.m. and started walking home, when suddenly, he spotted a disc whizzing around in the sky overhead.

“I just grabbed my camera and started clicking. It was going so fast, I missed it a few times.”

He says the grey, domed saucer then did a figure eight and disappeared into the clouds. He ran right home, and finding no one home, took a cab down to the old Spectator offices on King Street East.

He handed the camera — film still inside — to the Spec's photo department. Staff developed and enlarged the picture which was promptly placed in a newsroom safe. The photo revealed a sombrero-shaped craft, which appeared to have legs.

Just a few weeks ago, Mr. McCarthy bought a house on Overdale Avenue in Waterdown, where he runs his own photography business, specializing in wedding pictures. His hair is short now, he's still a bachelor, and he still believes that what he saw 20 years ago was not of this world.

He never did make the Olympic team, something he partially blames on his brief brush with celebrity.

The public has become used to the idea that life forms from other planets could visit our own.

[The article continues:]

“...I grew tired of it when ‘reporters kept calling me, and everyone could only talk about the picture.’”

It inspired a few pranksters to bring in copycat pictures to The Spectator that year, and inspired Mr. McCarthy to read all he could on the subject.

He now believes the craft he saw spent the night in the swamp, and aliens took birds back with it “for testing.”

“It changed my whole outlook on life. But I realize that the (UFO) I saw is gone, and will never come back. These things are smart enough not to leave any evidence behind. It's no big deal.”

“And the only evidence I have is the picture I took.”

The year Pat McCarthy saw his first and only UFO — 1975 — is considered a “flap” year, where UFO sightings are particularly high.

That year, 204 sightings were deemed “unidentified” by the NRC, nearly twice as many as in 1974.

Media attention

Many UFO debunkers attribute these fluctuations to the media attention: movies, books and TV shows about aliens, released just before the rash of reports.

“There's usually a lack of interest (about UFOs) in the public until the media comes up with a story,” says Henry Gordon, chair of the Ontario Skeptics. “You get all these other people calling the papers saying they saw the same thing.”

Hamilton UFO enthusiast Scott Jordan, 31, a former member of MUFON, believes that people who really have experienced contact with beings from outer space have their memories jogged when they read a story or watch an account of someone else's close encounter.

“It's like driving down the road and smelling wood, and remembering the time you sat around a fireplace with friends.”

Other flap years in Canada were 1947, 1968 and 1988, the latter being the year following three best-selling books published on UFOs, including Budd Hopkins' Intruders and Whitley Strieber's Communion.

In fact, the high number of reports made in 1975 is often attributed to the airing of a made-for-TV movie about one of America's most famous alien incidents: the alleged abduction of a New Hampshire couple in 1961.

Betty and Barney Hill's tale of “missing time,” being kidnapped from their car and probed by small, shiny beings, is considered the blueprint for people who claim to have been abducted ever since: anal probing, memory loss and telepathic communication with aliens.

Some psychologists believe when an incident like the Hill abduction is hyped in the media, it can influence people to believe that a life-like dream they had may have been a real-life experience.

“People who are vulnerable or depressed can be highly suggestible,” says Dr. Michael Persinger, a Laurentian University professor whose research involves electrically stimulating patients' brains while subtly suggesting to them they may have been abducted.

He has found that even the most “normal” person will believe they have been abducted by aliens, suggesting that although alleged abductees truly believe they've been taken aboard a mother ship, it may all be in their heads.

“People are deciding if they see something in the sky it's no big deal”

“(UFOs) haven't gone away. They're just not popular any more,” Dr. Persinger says. “They've been replaced, so to speak, with the alien abduction phenomenon.”

Although the type of sightings has changed since 1975 — 30 per cent of MUFON's calls are about alien abduction — there just aren't as many calls as there used to be.

In fact, 1990s' media attention to the subject seems to be having the opposite effect on the phenomenon.

This is not a “flap” period for sightings, despite the cultish popularity of two people named Mulder and Scully.

According to some Ufologists, the plethora of programs dealing with the realm of “the unknown,” like the X-Files, Encounters and Unsolved Mysteries, may be responsible for the decline in reported UFO sightings.

“People are deciding if they see something in the sky it's no big deal,” says MUFON's Mr. Theophanous. “Every time you turn the TV on, there's someone who's been abducted by aliens. It's not unique or important anymore.”

“The Spielberg generation has grown up,” says Winnipeg ufologist Chris Rutkowski.

“Twenty years ago it was new and exciting to see a UFO and the newspapers would cover it. But we've seen E.T. and Star Wars and now we're used to seeing aliens on TV.

“No one really cares any more.”

Sightings have peaked

He predicts that as a result of television saturation, UFO stories will not even be around in 10 years' time.

“The sightings have peaked. The whole alien thing is going to stagnate unless someone puts a fresher twist on the story.

“First, ships are visiting us in the sky, then they're kidnapping our loved ones and now we're hearing about aliens impregnating humans and making hybrid babies who are living among us.

“I can't see it getting more outrageous than it already is — I think in the minds of many North Americans, these folks have already gone off the edge.

Henry Gordon believes that in a post-Watergate, post-Iran-Contra world, most people realize that claims of government coverup are unrealistic.

“We all realize that no one, not even the U.S. government, can cover up something this big.”

Mr. Emery also theorizes that in the age of home video, the fact that none of these encounters makes the evening news is proof that alien visitations are all a romantic figment of the human mind.

“One woman I interviewed said aliens kept coming back to kidnap her in her home,” he says. “I asked her why she didn't just set up a video camera to record it. She didn't.

“Give me a break. If you had the chance to prove one of the greatest scientific discoveries of all time, wouldn't you bother to put up a video camera?”

Jaded by hoaxes

He points out that newspapers are no longer jumping on stories about UFOs because they're jaded by past photo hoaxes and possibly like everyone else, sick and tired of the whole thing.

When 14-year-old Jeff Timmons of Hamilton called The Spectator two summers ago to say he witnessed a flying saucer hovering above his west Mountain backyard, he says that the response was a polite thank you for calling, but no thanks.

So he called the Mountain News. It had blue and green lights, he told them, and when he tried to take a picture, his camera wouldn't work.

But they didn't believe him either, and accused Jeff of copying a story the paper had run a month before about an eight-year-old who said a UFO landed in his backyard.

“I really wanted pictures so someone would believe me, but no one did,” Jeff says. “But every Aug. 2, I go out to the backyard for a couple of hours just to see if it would come back.”

Twenty years later though, Pat McCarthy's UFO days are over. He hasn't read a book on the subject in 15 years, and his eyes don't dart upward any more than they used to.

“I haven't had much of an interest in UFOs for a while now,” he says. “I'm much more interested in taking pictures of people here on Earth.”

Photo captions

Top photograph:
Who needs aliens when we've got Spielberg? It used to be exciting to see a UFO, but that was before Close Encounters, E.T. and Star Wars.

Pat McCarthy photograph:
Twenty years ago Pat McCarthy took the picture he holds here, still considered to be Canada's most authentic photograph of a UFO.

Lower photograph:m description

CANADIAN PHOTO CASE

At 10:30 a.m. on Tuesday, March 18, 1975, Pat McCarthy, 19, left his home in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, and took his camera with him in hopes of finding some hawks to photograph. He had visited the area previously and had gotten some good shots of birds, but on this particular day he saw no birds, and decided to give the vigil at about 1:30 p.m. He was walking away from the quarry, which is located on Highway 5 near Waterdown when he caught a movement “out of the corner of his eye” and when he turned to look, noted the object resembled a “frisbee.”

The object was moving too fast to be a bird and he decided he should take photos and raised the camera but had difficulty keeping it in the view finder because of its speed, but finally snapped the first shot. He didn't realize he had caught the object until later when the film was developed. Pat was sure he missed the second shot, (which he did — he got only a tree) took a third, then momentarily lost it from the view finder. After regaining it, he snapped photo Number 4. (See the accompanying diagram for the path the disc followed). He did not have the time to take a fifth exposure because the object suddenly straightened its course and moved away at great speed. Pat said it diminished in size at a constant rate until it disappeared.

The young man realized how important the photos could be, so he took the camera with the roll of film still in it, to the offices of the local newspaper, the Hamilton Spectator. Although he has his own darkroom he decided the film should be developed by another party so as to help establish authenticity. McCarthy, who is an amateur astronomer and is generally conversant with aircraft, estimated the object to be twice the size of a DC-8, based on the fact that he is familiar with the craft at various altitudes and the cloud formations in the sky at the time were cumulonimbus and that they are formed at between 15 and 20 thousand feet.

Field Investigator Carol White interviewed Pat McCarthy on behalf of APRO and the information related above (See “Canadian” — Page Three).

Canadian

Pat McCarthy was using a Praktica Nova 1 (1966) camera, made in Germany, a Hanimar 135 mm lens with a focal length F2-8. The film was Kodak plus X ASA 125. The whole episode lasted 30 seconds.