Just a dot in the sky, but what was it at 50,000 feet?

Hi all,

Recent blog readers  may recall my 29 July 2014 post titled "Condensation trails passing in the moonlit sky." This told the story of two commercial flights, which had reported seeing a mystery object leaving a condensation trail, above their flights, in the early hours of Monday 29 November 1982, near Derby, Western Australia. The estimated height of the object was some 37,500 feet. The object was never identified.


State Library search:

On a recent visit to Melbourne, I paid a quick visit to the State Library of Victoria, and browsed through their copies of "The Australian UFO Bulletin." I located  a parallel case from 1980, except this time, the incident occurred in daylight. The source of the Bulletin's story, was Russell Boundy of UFO Research (Far North Queensland) and excellent researcher.

At about 1300hrs EST on 7 August 1980, a TAA jet aircraft, flight 534, left Cairns, Queensland, on a flight to Darwin, via Gove. It was flying domestic route AVOCADO.

When it was about 120 miles north-west of Carins, and at 30,000 feet, Captain Willinczyck reported to a Cairns Flight Services Officer, that he had sighted an unknown object above his own aircraft.

At an estimated height of 50,000 feet, it was headed north-west, the same direction as the TAA aircraft. It was visible for five minutes until it was lost to view in the distance. It was seen as a dark dot with a normal looking condensation trail. The sky was totally clear.


Checks made:

A check revealed that there were no other civilian, or Australian military aircraft in the area at that time. Even the US embassy was checked for US aircraft, but with negative results.

Russell spoke with the Cairns FSO, who told Russell that the pilot seemed disinterested in speaking further on his observation. Russell did write a letter, to the pilot, with a series of questions. However, the pilot never responded.