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UFO-Related
Blackouts and Power Failures
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Sault
Ste. Marie, Ontario, STAR, 4 November 1957, Page 1
Mysterious
Flying Object Stalls Cars, Douses Lights
LEVELLAND, Tex. (AP) - Reports of a mystery object which
one witness said flew round with a "great sound and
rush of wind" had officials and the public puzzled
today.
Reporters and authorities had reports of sightings over
a wide West Texas area Saturday and Sunday.
Police checking areas where landings were reported were
unable to find any trace. Air force officials declined to
say whether an investigation was being made.
CUT
CAR ENGINES
Observers told reporters of at least five instances in which
the engines of cars approaching the object were unaccountably
stalled but restarted as the phenomenon rose into the air.
Sheriff Weir Clem, who said he observed the brilliant light
but didn't get a close view, reported one witness fainted
from fright.
Officers inspected the reported landing sites Sunday and
found no marks to indicate anything had sat down there,
the sheriff said. Policeman A. J. Fowler said at least 15
persons told of getting a good look and dozens sighted what
appeared to be flashes of light.
"They
seemed to agree that this something was 200 feet long, shaped
like an egg and was lit up like it was on fire - but looked
more like neon lights," Fowler related.
"They
said it was about 200 feet in the air, and when it got close,
car motors and lights would go off. Everybody that called
was very excited."
Pedro Saucedo, 30, a farm hand and part-time barber here,
said: "I was driving out to a farm near the Pettit
community (west of here) Saturday night with a friend, Joe
Salaz, when we first saw the thing."
"When
it got near, the lights of my truck went out and the motor
died. I jumped out of the truck and hit the dirt because
I was afraid. I called to Joe but he didn't get out. The
thing passed directly over my truck with a great sound and
a rush of wind. It sounded like thunder and my truck rocked
from the blast. I felt a lot of heat," he said.
It was "torpedo-shaped" or like "a rocket,"
but much larger.
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Kirkland
Lake, Ontario, NORTHERN DAILY NEWS, 5 November 1957, page
1
Mystery
Object Spotted In Texas Reportedly Stalled Nearby Autos
LUBBOCK, Tex. (AP) - A missile engineer reported seeing
a "brilliant colored egg-shaped object" which
stalled autos in New Mexico Monday at about the same time
the U.S. Air Force started an investigation into similar
reports in this and other areas.
Witnesses say a mystery object skipped about the countryside
here and near scientific military bases in New Mexico during
the weekend. The reported sighting startled citizens, peace
officers and servicemen but apparently left no concrete
trace.
James Stokes, 45, an engineer from the USAF missile development
centre at Alamogordo, N.M., said 10 autos were stopped on
an isolated desert highway, U.S. 54, between White Sands
proving grounds and Alamogordo Monday.
Stokes said occupants of cars saw a strange object flying
toward them from the northeast. He said his auto radio faded
and died, then his engine stopped.
He told a newsman: "It turned and made a pass at the
highway and crossed not more than two miles ahead. As it
passed . . . I could feel a kind of heat wave, like radiation
from a giant sun lamp. But there was no sound. It had no
visible portholes and there was no vapor trail."
The object moved very rapidly and its surface looked like
"glowing mother of pearl."
Col. Barney Oldfield of the air defence command said "The
object . . . was not picked up by radar. It did not seem
to be traceable."
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Sudbury,
Ontario, DAILY STAR, 5 November 1957, page 3
'Egg-Shaped
Ball of Fire' Flashes Across U.S. Sky
LUBBOCK, Tex. (AP) - A missile engineer reported seeing
a "brilliant colored egg-shaped object" which
stalled autos in New Mexico Monday at about the same time
the U.S. Air Force started an investigation into similar
reports in this and other areas.
Witnesses say a mystery object skipped about the countryside
here and near scientific military bases in New Mexico during
the weekend. The reported sighting startled citizens, peace
officers and servicemen but apparently left no concrete
trace.
James Stokes, 45, an engineer from the USAF missile development
centre at Alamogordo, N.M., said 10 autos were stopped on
an isolated desert highway, U.S. 54, between White Sands
proving grounds and Alamogordo Monday.
NEAR
A-BOMB SITE
His description was similar to ones reporting a big ball
of fire in this Texas area during the weekend. A huge, oval
object "nearly as bright as the sun" was reported
Sunday, hovering near bunkers used in the first A-bomb explosion.
Strange lights were also reported near Chicago and in Virginia.
Stokes said occupants of cars saw a strange object flying
toward them from the northeast. He said his auto radio faded
and died, then his engine stopped. Several other cars also
stalled.
He told a newsman: "It turned and made a pass at the
highway and crossed not more than two miles ahead. As it
passed . . . I could feel a kind of heat wave, like radiation
from a giant sun lamp. But there was no sound. It had no
visible portholes and there was no vapor trail."
CAR
BATTERY STEAMS
"When
I got back to my car and checked the engine, I found it
intact but the battery was steaming. But the engine started
with no difficulty. I called the air force and notified
them.
The object moved very rapidly and its surface looked like
"glowing mother of pearl."
Allan D. Baker of Las Cruces, N.M., reportedly shot pictures
of the object.
Col. Barney Oldfield of the air defence command said: "The
object . . . was not picked up by radar. It did not seem
to be traceable."
______
In Washington Monday, the U.S. Air Force undertook an investigation
of a huge and strangely-lighted mystery object reported
to have flashed over west Texas.
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North
Bay, Ontario, NUGGET, 10 November 1965, Page 1
Power
restored in big cities
Lights go on again in New York after frightening
night
NEW YORK (AP) - Power coursed anew through New York today
after a terror-fraught night of stygian blackout, brought
on by a massive electrical failure that paralysed the city.
Lights came back on but transportation remained grievously
crippled.
The restoration of electricity to the city's millions eased
an emergency unmatched in scope outside a war or disaster
area.
But commuter train schedules were on a skeleton basis. Subway
service was extremely spotty, as power was painstakingly
fed into one section at a time of 236 miles of track to
prevent overloading.
Public and parochial schools were open for more than 1,000,000
pupils, but thousands who use public transportation were
advised to stay home.
SCORES
TREATED
Hospitals treated scores of persons for bone breaks sustained
in falls, for heart attacks and for traffic injuries. But
miraculously no deaths were reported and the first rosy
glow of dawn failed to reveal the misery and tragedy that
it was feared the blackness of night was concealing.
Besides lights, water and steam heat were restored to hundreds
of apartment dwellings where pumps had failed for lack of
electricity.
At least two furniture stores, a wig shop, a record shop
and two men's clothing stores on Harlem's 125th Street were
broken into during the 10-hour blackout. Vandals also attempted
to loot a jewelry store, but display windows had been emptied.
Police seized two men in the looting and recovered two television
sets and a record player.
Uncounted thousands were stranded overnight away from home.
Many enjoyed the relative comfort of hotels. But others
made do for sleep on the cold floors of railway terminals.
Food and blankets were sent into stalled subways where at
least 2,000 elected to remain the night rather than attempt
emergency escape through the inky tunnels.
Power began returning to some outlying sections of the city
before midnight Tuesday night. But it was not until 3:35
a.m., EST that 10 hours of almost total blackout was lifted
from midtown Manhattan, a world centre of wealth and corporate
influence.
The potential for peril was greater than any in similar
set of circumstances ever to confront New York - dwarfing
indescribably a 1961 power blackout that covered five square
miles of Manhattan.
At one point during a dire autumn night of cold and confusion,
one of the few spots of light in the entire metropolis emanated
from the upthrust torch of the Statue of Liberty, the city's
historic harbor beacon.
Police officials reported only scattered instances of looting
- 41 arrests were made.
Mayor F. Wagner declared:
"All
New York should be proud of the way everyone has co-operated
and helped. I'm proud of the people in this city."
An aura of monetary panic, quickly dispelled, rolled through
the city like an evil fog as the lights went out at 5:28
p.m. Tuesday.
HUNDREDS
TRAPPED
It crept into skyscraper elevators, where hundreds were
trapped in more than 200 cars, some for hours. Doors had
to be pried open to free some passengers.
It swept through subway tunnels where hundreds of thousands
stood and sat interminably, waiting for rescue. One woman
suffered a miscarriage in one stranded train.
It swirled above the city's busy airports. Where humans
rode aloft in planes that had nowhere to land when they
arrived. Passengers reported an eerie view of the blacked-out
city beneath them.
And the panic flickered in the violent wards of city hospitals,
where the mentally disturbed were uncomprehendingly frightened.
Elsewhere in these institutions, babies were born and operations
performed under emergency conditions.
News tickers stopped throughout the world's prime communications
centre. Network radio microphones fell silent. Television
screens went dark.
STAY
IN OFFICES
Many persons simply spent the night where they found themselves
- high up in offices or in the lobbys of apartment buildings
where elevators were immobilized.
Said a woman in the lobby of a luxury East Side apartment
building:
"My
husband is up there with two quarts of whisky and a babysitter,
but I don't feel like walking up 19 floors to join him."
St. Patrick's Cathedral on Fifth Avenue was nearly filled
with worshippers. One woman knelt with her rosary in her
hand, while a small child beside her sobbed.
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Sudbury,
Ontario, STAR, 15 November 1965, page 1
Pilot
Reported Sighting Object Before Blackout
SYRACUSE, N.Y. (AP) - A pilot says he saw a huge fireball
last Tuesday night in the vicinity of the main power line
from here to Niagara Falls, moments after the power failure
in the northeastern United States and Ontario.
Weldon Ross of Syracuse, an employee of the Carrier Corp.
and a part-time instructor-pilot, told the Syracuse Herald-American
he and a student were approaching Hancock Field here "when
the lights went out" Tuesday night.
"We
were over the high line which runs from Clay to Niagara
Falls when we saw the fire flash. It looked like a barn
fire, a barn full of hay and it lasted for perhaps 10 seconds."
The New York Power Authority has two 345,000-volt lines
that run from Niagara Falls to the Niagara Mohawk Power
Corp. station in nearby Clay.
After the blackout, early reports said that it was possible
the failure began at Clay but Niagara Mohawk officials had
said their investigation indicates the Clay station was
operating normally.
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Sudbury,
Ontario, STAR, 3 December 1965, page 1
Four
Military Bases Affected
Another Blackout Strikes U.S., Sweeps
Part of Mexico
EL PASO, Tex. (AP) - A power failure that momentarily blacked
out four key U.S. military bases and plunged 1,000,000 persons
into darkness in New Mexico, Texas, and Mexico has brought
a federal investigation on orders of President Johnson.
The two-hour failure, triggered in El Paso, was a small-scale
version of the blackout that left 30,000,000 persons in
the northeastern United States and southern Ontario without
power for up to 10 hours Nov. 9.
All four military bases reported they switched almost immediately
to auxiliary power. But many civilian population areas were
without power for more than two hours.
Authorities of El Paso Electric Company said the trouble
was traced to failure of a device which regulated flow of
natural gas to the two units of the company's Newman plant
near New Mexico's border with Mexico.
President Johnson sent J. R. Johnson, a federal power commission
engineer, to El Paso to determine what caused the device
to fail and report to him.
Holloman air force base was reported without runway lights
for some time.
Other bases affected in El Paso included Biggs air force
base, where Strategic Air Command bombers are on constant
alert, and the army's Fort Bliss, which has an air defence
school for instruction of U.S. and allied troops in use
of air defence missiles.
White Sands missile range in southern New Mexico, a missile
development centre, also was plunged into darkness.
"The
mission capability of the air force missile development
centre was maintained, and combat readiness was not affected,"
a Holloman spokesman said.
Ironically, the president of El Paso Electric Company, Ray
Lockhart, has been quoted in an El Paso newspaper as saying
that a power failure such as occurred in the northeastern
U.S. and southern Ontario probably couldn't occur in this
area.
The blackout affected areas reaching to Van Horn, 20 miles
east of El Paso, on the U.S.-Mexico border, and Socorro,
N.M., about 175 miles to the north.
Juarez, Mexico, a city of 300,000 persons just across the
border, also was thrown into blackness.
Power was later restored in parts of El Paso, which has
a population of 350,000.
A spokesman for the El Paso Electric Co., which services
much of the stricken area with electricity, said the trouble
is believed to have originated in a company plant in El
Paso.
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Sault
Ste. Marie, Ontario, STAR, 18 April 1966, Page 2
See
UFO In Area Of Falls
BOSTON (UPI) - An official of an organization which investigates
reports of unidentified flying objects (UFOs) said today
a strange flaming object was sighted over the Niagara Falls
Power Station Nov. 9 just minutes before the northeast was
plunged into darkness.
Raymond E. Fowler, head of the Massachusetts unit of the
National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena (NICAP),
said in an interview with the Boston Record-American that
the weird object was sighted by an observer on the ground
and a crewman aboard a cargo plane.
"A
cargo plane was approaching Niagara Falls that night and,
just before the blackout hit, an observer aboard said he
saw a glowing mass over the power station," Fowler
said.
"The
man said it looked to him like a huge barn was on fire.
It was just above the station and was rising. Just at that
time, he said the lights began to flicker on the ground,"
Fowler said, "before the plane came to a halt on the
runway, the blackout had hit."
Fowler said the NICAP, a non-profit organization, with headquarters
in Washington, verified the report and an identical sighting
made by a ground observer.
He said the organization also verified four other sightings
the same night.
Fowler, an amateur astronomer who served in the Intelligence
branch of the U.S. Air Force, said he has never sighted
a UFO himself and is "convinced that most sightings
can be explained as misinterpretation of natural phenomena,
aircraft or artificial satellites, especially Echo I and
II."
"But
there is a certain percent - maybe 15 per percent - which
are solid, machine-like, metal objects, intelligently directed
and which have not been identified," he said.
"And
there is excellent observational evidence - radar, electrical
interference, burned areas, indentations, which, combined
with the visual sightings, indicate that they are not man-made."
_______
RAVENNA, Ohio - (UPI) - Several pictures of a "bright
circular" unidentified flying object which two Portage
County deputies chased from Atwater, Ohio, to Freedom, Pa.,
were to be turned over today to government officials for
study.
A spokesman said the photographs were somewhat obscure,
but the object was visible as a dark outline of an "oversized
dishpan" with a light shining around it.
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Sudbury,
Ontario, STAR, 31 July 1968, page 3
Massive
Blackout Linked With UFOs
WASHINGTON (AP) - The massive blackout of 1965 and other
power failures may be related to unidentified flying objects,
a university physicist contends.
"There
are too many instances of sightings of UFOs hovering near
power plants," Dr. James E. McDonald of the University
of Arizona told the House of Representatives Science and
Astronautics Committee Monday.
McDonald is senior physicist at the Institute of Atmospheric
Physics.
During the power failure of No. 9 and 10, 1965, the Federal
Power Commission received hundreds of reports of UFO sightings,
McDonald said at the committee symposium on unidentified
flying objects.
He added that there also were reports in upstate New York
of "a glowing object at the instant the lights went
out."
The blackout struck first in western New York and southern
Ontario and spread over 80,000 square miles.
The Ontario Hydro-electric Power Commission traced the cause
to a malfunction of an automatic relay device at a distribution
and generating plant near Niagara Falls.
McDonald stopped short of saying that failure and others
were caused by extraterrestrial life but held that "there
is a puzzling and quite disturbing coincidence between the
sightings and power blackouts."
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Sudbury,
Ontario, STAR, 26 March 1970, page 1
Power
Cut Is Blamed On Vandalism
Vandalism is suspected as the cause of a blackout Wednesday
which left a large part of Sudbury district without power
for about two hours, and trapped 400 men underground at
Falconbridge Nickel Mines operations in the Onaping area
for about five hours.
The line from Martindale transformer station on Maley Dr.
to Blind River was out for about two hours, but the line
from Creighton to Strathcona, a Falconbridge mine, was out
for about 10 hours.
The break occurred in the bush between Creighton and Larchwood,
about 10 a.m. Ontario Hydro crews were sent to the scene
and found insulators broken.
Pieces of insulators found in the snow near hydro poles
had marks indicating they were hit by rifle fire.
"The
line was patrolled about two weeks ago, and everything was
in good order, so we can only suspect it was vandalism,"
said a hydro official.
Communities on Highways 144 and on 17 as far as Webbwood
had no power until about noon, but the line to Strathcona
was out until 8:30 p.m. All services to the mines are back
to normal today.
About 400 miners who would have come up at 4 p.m. were trapped
underground because electrically-operated hoists were out
of service. A Falconbridge official said there were no problems
with light and air.
Men for the next shift reported for work as usual, but many
were sent home.
Some of the trapped men near the top were able to climb
out, and others got out through an adjoining Inco mine,
which is served by a different power line.
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Sault
Ste. Marie, Ontario, DAILY STAR, 26 March 1970, Page 3
Power
Fails Stranding 400 Miners
SUDBURY (CP) - A power failure stranded about 400 miners
underground for 102 hours Wednesday in six mines north of
here.
Some of the men were able to climb out from shallow levels
and a number left one mine through an adjoining mine owned
by International Nickel Co. of Canada Ltd. No one was injured.
A spokesman for Falconbridge Nickel Mines Ltd., owner of
the mines involved, said no troubles were reported underground
and the men were thought to be all out by 9:30 p.m.
Ontario Hydro officials said the power failure at 10 a.m.
might have been caused by vandals shooting out insulators.
Power was restored at 8:30 p.m.
About 1,000 homes in the Chelmsford Valley were also blacked
out but had their power restored about noon.
The Falconbridge spokesman was unable to say how deep the
stranded miners were. He said the men were stranded because
hoists are electrically operated.
He said they had ample food supplies and battery-powered
headlamps. Natural air circulation, although usually augmented
by machine, was sufficient, he said.
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News
clippings courtesy of The Sault Star, The Timmins Daily
Press, The Kirkland Lake Northern Daily News, The North
Bay Nugget and The Sudbury Star.
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