Sarnia sees surge in
UFO sightings
STEPHEN HUEBL
Local News - Monday, May 07, 2007 @ 16:00
Sarnia experienced a spike in the number of
mysterious objects spotted in the sky last year,
according a survey of Canadian UFO sightings.
Five unidentified flying objects were reported
locally in 2006, up from single sightings in 2004 and
2005.
The Sarnia cases include everything from a
light that appeared in the night sky briefly to more
perplexing sightings.
On July 15 a witness
described seeing a "large number of little black things"
as well as a large yellow disk and an unmarked
helicopter over the city around 9:20 p.m.
Another witness reported seeing an object
drifting in the sky, which "seemed to have a glow around
it.
"
There were 736
sightings of UFOs over Canada last year.
The
vast majority of cases, including those in Sarnia, have
a probable explanation such as a plane, planet, meteor
or fireball, said Chris Rutkowski, a Winnipeg-based UFO
expert and co-author of the survey.
"A small
percentage are what we call unexplained or
unidentified," he said. Those cases make up only 12 per
cent of the total sightings.
But they do give
one reason to ponder, said Rutkowski, recalling a case
in North Bay, Ont. last year in which a motorist
reported seeing three blue lights ahead of him.
"He thought perhaps they were three motorcycles
heading towards him, but then he watched and two of them
moved up and into the trees," he said.
The
remaining light continued to within a metre of the
vehicle and appeared to the driver as a "ball of blue
light about the size of a beach ball."
"Those
are the ones that tend to make you think, hmm,"
Rutkowski said.
Another witness reported a
large, black, triangular object surrounded by "little
white Christmas tree lights" on the coast of
Newfoundland.
After compiling the survey for 17
years, Rutkowski said one noticeable trend is that
people tend to be spotting large, triangular objects
more often than the traditional disc-shaped "saucers."
"The classic Hollywood flying saucer is pass‚,"
he said.
Although claiming to see a UFO still
carries a stigma, Rutkowski said many people seem more
willing to come forward and tell their stories.
Witnesses include pilots, air traffic operators,
military personnel and police.
Despite the
number of sightings, the survey notes there is no reason
to conclude alien life forms are responsible.
"Popular opinion to the contrary, there is yet
to be any incontrovertible evidence that some UFO cases
involve extraterrestrial contact," it states.
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