London's Telegraph newspaper rates it as the fifth-greatest UFO mystery of all time, but another mystery is how little-known the episode is. A documentary - Westall '66: A Suburban UFO Mystery - premiered on Austar and Foxtel's Sci-Fi Channel. Producers hope it will flush out an official who can say what the military were doing and what they found. Researcher Shane Ryan has spent five years tracking 110 witnesses, many found through an appeal in the Herald Sun in 2006, but could find no military officials, and no record of a military response. But locals remember it vividly, saying it lasted days. The 110 Mr Ryan has found, who say they saw saucers, include professionals, tradies and a Ministerial Adviser, but not one military official of the time.He says time is running out for them to come clean. "Whatever security concerns there were at the time, they are redundant now,' he says.
A TV crew covered the incident and it screened on the 6pm news, but the film canister from the job was recently found empty in the station archives. Several witnesses say they were warned off speaking by sharply-dressed men in dark suits, in the principal's office and at home. Others recall school threats of detention for UFO talk. But talk there was, and coverage. The Dandenong Journal reported the incident on its front page for consecutive issues and ran interviews with witnesses. Many were school pupils who say they saw flying saucers from their school yards. Some ran to Grange Reserve, where the craft appeared to have come down. Terry Peck, 56, was among them. She says she was playing cricket on the oval, saw the saucer and chased after it to Grange Reserve. "Two girls were there before me. One was terribly upset and they were pale, really white, ghostly white. They just said they had passed out, fainted. One was taken to hospital in an ambulance, she says. Ms Peck says she saw a silver, classic-shape saucer rise up. "I was about 6m away from it. It was bigger than a car and circular. I think I saw some lights underneath it. "We all got called to an assembly... and they told us all to keep quiet. "I'd absolutely just like someone to come forward from the services just to say 'yes, it did happen, and it landed and there was a cover-up'.
Jacqueline Argent, 58, in Form 3 then, says she saw a UFO from the oval and was one of the first three kids over the fence looking for where it came down. "Originally I thought it must have been an experimental-type aircraft, but nothing has emerged like that after all these years,' she said.
She says she was called into the headmaster's office and interrogated by three men: "They had good-quality suits and were well spoken. They said, 'I suppose you saw little green men'? "I spoke to my parents about it at the time and they were pretty outraged. Retired engineer Kevin Hurley, a Monash Uni student then, missed the saucers but saw the aftermath. "There were army or air force people in the area, he said. "I'm pretty sure they were going around the area with geiger counters or metal detectors. "I'm not a freak that thinks Martian people are coming. I don't think that kind of stuff, but it's bugged me. "After 44 years, I reckon they need to come clean on this.
The Dandenong Journal covered the encounter in detail and ran two front page stories (see images). The first was on 14 April. and the next was on 21 April.
Broadsheet newspaper, The Age ran a very small article about the Westall incident on 7 April 1966, on page 6:
"Object Perhaps Balloon - An unidentified flying object seen over the Clayton-Moorabbin area yesterday morning might have been a weather balloon. Hundreds of children and a number of teachers at Westall School, Clayton, watched the object during morning break."
The newspaper also said a number of small aeroplanes circled around it. However, a check later showed that no commercial, private or RAAF pilots had reported anything unusual in the area. The Weather Bureau released a balloon at Laverton at 8:30 am and the westerly wind blowing at the time could have moved it into the area where the sighting was reported". Witnesses and researchers were surprised when The Sun News-Pictorial (a tabloid) ran no story, yet The Age (a broadsheet) did.
The Sun and The Herald newspapers, while not mentioning the Westall incident, both published cartoons in the following day's editions that made light of the flying saucer phenomena.
GTV Channel 9 television also ran a news report about the encounter. A student, Joy Tighe, described the event for the reporter. However, a copy of this film is not available. Channel 9 reports that it was removed from their archive and not returned.
Unofficial investigation
The alleged sighting was investigated by two groups: The Victorian Flying Saucer Research Society (VFSRS) and Phenomena Research Australia (PRA). Both groups described it as being one of Australia's major unexplained UFO cases. The VFSRS team arrived on the site on 8 April and spoke to students and viewed the ground mark. The VFSRS printed an image and a small report in their magazine "Australian UFO Bulletin" in December 2000. An investigator, Brian Boyle (PRA), arrived at the site on 9 April with four army investigators. Boyle did a number of interviews, which he recorded on tape, over a number of days and took samples from the ground mark. These investigators were able to speak to many of the witnesses as it was over the Easter holidays (8–11 April).
Proposed explanations
Conventional
Although some witnesses reported five Cessna-type aircraft around the object, investigators were unable to find any record of such aircraft. Moorabbin Airport, which is 4.76 km (south-west) from the location, was checked but no aircraft from that airport entered the airspace. The RAAF also reported no military activity in that area.
The Australian Skeptics described the object as potentially having been an experimental military aircraft.[ They suggest that it may have been a nylon target drogue, like a wind sock, towed by one plane for the others to chase and known to be in use by the local RAAF at the time.
Reunion
A witness reunion was held at Westall Tennis Club Hall, on 8 April 2006, to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the incident.
Recent Documentary
A 50 minute HDTV documentary called “Westall ‘66: A Suburban UFO Mystery” first aired on Australian TV on 4 June 2010. It was funded by the Australian Government Screen Australia,[23] and was directed by Rosie Jones and produced by Carmel McAloon. Melbourne's Herald Sun newspaper, on 3 June 2010, had an article on page 37 promoting this documentary. The Herald Sun article featured drawings of the incident and a photo of four witnesses. The documentary was featured on the 4 June 2010 cover of "Times 2" magazine in The Canberra Times.
On 4 June 2010 a Seven Nework TV program, Today Tonight, produced a segment about the Westall case and documentary.
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