Cold case review report - 23 August 1953 - Port Moresby

In a previous post, I advised that Melbourne researcher Paul Dean and I  were undertaking a 'cold case' review of the 23 August 1953, Port Moresby, visual sighting and movie film.

Port Moresby in relation to northern Australia

At about noon on 23 August 1953, Mr T P Drury, his wife, and young son, observed an unusual object in the sky. Mr Drury used a movie camera to film the object. The film was sent to the USA, and it has been claimed that when it was returned, some of the footage of the object was missing.

Close up of the Port Moresby area

In the last month, we have gathered a large amount of information, drawn from a mass of documentation; some of it courtesy of overseas researchers, including Barry Greenwood, Jan Aldrich, Mary Castner, Fran Ridge and others.

Article in South Pacific Post

The documentation gathered together, covers numerous newspaper articles; items in early Australian UAP newsletters; the USAF Project Blue Book' s records on the case; several books, and more recent Australian UAP magazines. As always, we have adopted a 'follow the evidence' approach; going back to original source material to check our facts. Something that many of today's researchers fail to do.

Early editions of the APRO Bulletin carried accounts

Despite the fact that some quite vital data is lacking in this material, it has turned out, in our opinion, that the available evidence points in a number of directions which run counter to prevailing beliefs about the case.

Australian researcher Edgar Jarrold investigated the case

Paul and I believe:

* that it is possible, that there may be no 'missing' film; which goes against current thinking

* that the object could perhaps have been a daylight meteor. The main observer, Tom Drury always maintained that the object was a guided missile. Others of course have claimed it to be a UFO

Courtesy of Bill Chalker

* that US researcher James E McDonald did not interview Mr Drury, when he (McDonald) visited Australia in 1967.

Courtesy of Melbourne researcher John Stepkowski, blog readers may now read our cold case paper.

As always, with our work, we welcome peer-review comments.