"This is one of the most remarkable cases of a flying saucer..." Adelaide - 1962

Hi all,

As readers of this blog will be aware, I always try and locate original source material on an incident, where ever possible.

One case which has appeared in numerous magazines and on the Internet, is the October 1962 report from a Mrs Sylvester of Adelaide, South Australia. The details which I recorded in one of my Australian case catalogues, is as follows:

28 Oct 1962  Salisbury  SA  CE3  1930hrs  40mins Sylvester   (34:56, 138: 36)

A high school teacher and her three children were travelling back to Adelaide, by car, along a highway. They were turning from a southerly direction to an easterly one, facing the Adelaide hills. On the lower level of the hills, at an angular elevation of 45 degrees, they reported seeing an orange coloured, oval shaped object. Her 9 year old son first saw it. “It appeared to have landed on the earth on a level piece of ground.” It sat on three “legs.” It had round windows and the son reported seeing people inside it. He said one of them came down steps to the ground. After a while the object began to move, to the north at incredible speed.

Australian Saucer record:

While recently in the State Library of South Australia, I made time to locate a copy of the "Australian Saucer Record" Volume 9 Number 1, dated March 1963, pp13-14. In this issue I found the best documentation yet, on this incident. I'd like to share it here for other researchers to be aware of it.

"A Flying Saucer lands near Adelaide.

This is one of the most remarkable cases of a flying saucer observed so close and having been seen 'landed' so near to a city, at least in Australia. However, the integrity of the witnesses, particularly the mother of the children, leaves us in no doubt at the reliability of the evidence, and the actual incident being a very factual one.

Mrs Ellen D Sylvester, the mother, is a high school teacher, and indeed her ability to give evidence places her in the class of a first class type of witness. The following account is an abbreviated one taken from the actual tape recording of the interview, made by our special investigator Colin Norris, whose work in the field over the past twelve months has been one which calls for commendation which we like to register here.

Mrs Sylvester is a resident of one of the close suburbs of Adelaide and the date on which this occurred was October 28th 1962, a memorable date for sightings as this was the evening of the sighting which caused a stir to the police when an object was observed at Pine Point, across the gulf a few hundred miles distance away from the observation and we consider it is very possible it was one and the same craft.

The time was 7.30pm and the sighting was made as Mrs Sylvester and her family of three children were travelling back to Adelaide along a highway. They were turning from a southerly direction to an easterly one which brought them into a position which faced the hills surrounding Adelaide.

It was on the lower level of these hills that the object was first observed. The whole actual observation lasted about 40 minutes and therefore was one which could hardly be classified as an optical illusion or an hallucination. The elevation was about 45 degrees. The object was oval and orange in  colour to the outline of the sky and Sun setting reflections.

A son 9 years old first drew his mother's attention to the object and it was very clear to all the party. It appeared to be landed on the earth on a level piece of land fully observable to the party. It had three legs upon which it stood. It had windows round in shape and the lad remarked that he could see some people in it. Then one of the occupants got out and came down some steps to the ground and appeared to be doing something to one of the landing legs.

Mrs Sylvester says she thought that he seemed to have some trouble in making it retract which finally he overcame. Evidently some adjustment had to be made to it  as it was on this portion of the craft he worked all the time he was being observed.

The distance from the observers was, Mrs Sylvester said, a few miles away. She said had she been closer she would have gone up to the object. She had no fear, merely amazed wonderment. The person from the craft was about six feet tall she thought, as best as she could determine from the distance, as his head reached the outer fringe of the craft in height.

He wore a helmet more like a description to a gas mask of the war type so Mrs Sylverster said, and a drawing is given below as done by the son.

The craft had a light around the centre rim. Weather conditions were admirable fine and very clear.

After the mechanic had attended to the landing gear he returned to the craft and it began to move at first slowly away, then terribly fast and disappeared incredibly swiftly away to a northerly direction.

Mrs Sylvester stated herself that she could not understand why other people had not reported it as there must have been people closer to it than they, as well as traffic was passing along the two main highways close at hand. It seems she said that because they were not facing the actual object but travelling north and south with the object in the east, may have been an explanation in that to see it they would have had to take their eyes off the road and look directly away from their driving direction. Also the speed travelled on these highways would not give a good point of view unless the attention was drawn to it as their's was by turning and facing directly east.

Asked is she believed in such things and if she considered that a craft could have been from space she answered positively in the affirmative and added that it could not have been an earthly craft  its speed was too terrific. Also that she had never seen any known craft of this size and description as belonging to earth.

She ridiculed the idea of anyone classifying the man from the craft as a little 'green man' saying in her opinion such belongs to the fantasy world of the science fiction writers and the press. It was here that she was able to tell us the height by comparing the man's height with that of the craft. She was positive that it was not any known object normal to earth.

A press man was present at the interview and appeared to be very impressed by the evidence given.
Upon questioning as to the headgear of the man she added that there were two lights on either side of his helmet and there was a  form of breathing apparatus coming from the helmet down to his chest. This made it impossible for them to determine any facial features of the man, or the color of his skin, as he was clothed in a uniform which gave no clues to this."


My comment:

Having now obtained the above, detailed description, a large number of questions come to my mind. Not least is Mrs Sylvester's estimate that the object was "a few miles away." How would it be possible to see the fine details she reported, at such a distance? The fact that the event occurred in 1962 prevents us from any further analysis. Best perhaps, to simply record the above details and move on to other things.