WEBVTT - Excited and Scared at the Same Time 0:00:01.840 --> 0:00:04.960 Strange Arrivals is a production of I Heard Radio and 0:00:05.080 --> 0:00:08.840 Grim and Mild from Aaron Meckley. For the best experience, 0:00:09.360 --> 0:00:18.760 listened with headphones. The interesting thing was that they had 0:00:18.880 --> 0:00:22.079 seen a ball of light rolling across the lawns. It 0:00:22.200 --> 0:00:25.360 had rolled up a wall and burst into flame, and 0:00:25.560 --> 0:00:29.600 Clifford Machanna, who was one of the more responsible workers, 0:00:29.880 --> 0:00:32.800 had run to ring a bell which was kept there 0:00:32.800 --> 0:00:36.000 for an emergency. While he was ringing the bell, this 0:00:36.200 --> 0:00:40.760 ball of flame gathered together climbed down the wall. They 0:00:40.840 --> 0:00:45.279 used the expression walked down the wall when past behind him, 0:00:45.320 --> 0:00:49.519 and burst into flame again in another place. When this happened, 0:00:49.560 --> 0:00:53.680 he was aware of three figures standing there. The three 0:00:53.760 --> 0:00:58.840 figures turned around in unison, but slowly, and when they 0:00:58.960 --> 0:01:02.960 faced him, he saw this brilliant light emanating from their 0:01:03.040 --> 0:01:06.480 heads and it was upper power. Because he fell to 0:01:06.560 --> 0:01:10.480 the ground. And I said, but they were three meters 0:01:10.480 --> 0:01:13.959 away from you, about ten feet. How came you fell 0:01:14.000 --> 0:01:17.160 to the ground, And he said their power was so strong. 0:01:17.880 --> 0:01:20.440 Now when he described them to me, he said they 0:01:20.440 --> 0:01:24.399 had shiny suits. And you might remember that I told you. 0:01:25.080 --> 0:01:28.640 There's no word in Shona mis Shona, which is their 0:01:28.720 --> 0:01:32.759 language for the words silver. So when I wanted him 0:01:32.800 --> 0:01:35.480 to be more explicit, he took a coin out of 0:01:35.600 --> 0:01:39.160 his pocket, silver coin, and he said that was what 0:01:39.280 --> 0:01:42.640 they were wearing. And then I said, Clifford, who did 0:01:42.680 --> 0:01:45.800 you think they were? And he said, I knew they were. 0:01:46.000 --> 0:01:50.360 They were my ancestors, the ghosts of my ancestors. And 0:01:50.480 --> 0:01:55.360 I said, for Joe, ancestors wore fur and monkey skins 0:01:55.960 --> 0:01:59.800 and lions teeth. They didn't wear silver suits. And he 0:02:00.080 --> 0:02:04.880 thought for a better and then he said, well, times change. 0:02:10.200 --> 0:02:24.200 I'm Toby Ball and this is strange Arrivals Episode two 0:02:25.400 --> 0:02:32.560 Excited and scared at the same time. In episode one, 0:02:32.919 --> 0:02:35.639 we took a look at a UFO encounter in Papua 0:02:35.680 --> 0:02:39.040 New Guinea. Aside from the details of the event, what 0:02:39.160 --> 0:02:41.760 stood out to me was the matter of fact attitude 0:02:41.840 --> 0:02:45.200 taken by Father William Gill, one of the witnesses and 0:02:45.320 --> 0:02:49.520 the main chronicler. He reported what he saw, expressed his 0:02:49.560 --> 0:02:52.800 sense of wonder, conceded that he might be mistaken in 0:02:52.880 --> 0:02:56.280 thinking it was something alien, and understood if people didn't 0:02:56.320 --> 0:03:00.640 believe him. But what happens when people with specific beliefs 0:03:00.639 --> 0:03:04.320 about UFOs become involved in the reporting of an encounter. 0:03:05.440 --> 0:03:07.600 In the next two episodes, we'll take a look at 0:03:07.639 --> 0:03:10.520 an event similar to the one in Papua New Guinea, 0:03:10.600 --> 0:03:14.640 but in this case, the investigations undertaken by UFO researchers 0:03:14.639 --> 0:03:17.920 and journalists may have changed the narrative to a degree 0:03:18.000 --> 0:03:20.920 that it is now hard to discern what actually happened 0:03:20.919 --> 0:03:23.440 on the day of the sighting a setting that took 0:03:23.440 --> 0:03:29.200 place at a dusty schoolyard in Zimbabwe. The summer of 0:03:29.280 --> 0:03:32.480 nineteen eighty eight saw the first edition of a newsletter, 0:03:32.800 --> 0:03:37.160 or maybe it was a zine titled UFO Afrinews, published 0:03:37.160 --> 0:03:41.440 out of Harari, Zimbabwe in Southern Africa. The cover had 0:03:41.440 --> 0:03:44.680 the title and date of publication in a no frills font. 0:03:45.240 --> 0:03:47.560 In the middle of the page was a fairly rough 0:03:47.600 --> 0:03:50.800 outlined sketch of the African continent, flanked on the right 0:03:50.960 --> 0:03:53.800 by a drawing of a classic flying saucer with a 0:03:53.880 --> 0:03:57.640 single antenna and either five windows or five heads looking 0:03:57.640 --> 0:04:00.240 out of a window running the length of the craft. 0:04:01.080 --> 0:04:03.720 To the left of the continental outline was a drawing 0:04:03.800 --> 0:04:07.400 of what I think is an antelope. Anyway, the cover 0:04:07.560 --> 0:04:09.960 is very basic and sets the tone for the rest 0:04:10.000 --> 0:04:13.680 of the presentation. Which is by today's standards almost comically 0:04:13.720 --> 0:04:18.240 bare bones. But the content of the UFO Afrinews is 0:04:18.240 --> 0:04:21.520 another story. It is the testament to the efforts of 0:04:21.520 --> 0:04:24.839 a woman named Cynthia Hind, along with a small group 0:04:24.880 --> 0:04:29.920 of correspondence, to document UFO encounters in Africa. The very 0:04:29.920 --> 0:04:35.160 first paragraph of the first article, headlined comment, reads like this, 0:04:36.560 --> 0:04:41.080 Like most investigators, over long period twenty years, my terms 0:04:41.080 --> 0:04:46.480 of reference have changed subtly. Where isolation, disrespect, and ridicule 0:04:46.800 --> 0:04:50.799 were at one time paramount, I've recently begun to notice 0:04:50.880 --> 0:04:56.680 a change, the grudging acceptance of the possibility of life 0:04:56.760 --> 0:05:00.880 out there, even from the most conservative member of society, 0:05:01.480 --> 0:05:05.880 a laid back support, however hopeless, and current terms of 0:05:05.920 --> 0:05:11.560 what ufologists are doing. Over the next twelve years, UFO 0:05:11.640 --> 0:05:16.159 AFRINUWS published twenty two editions featuring stories with headlines such 0:05:16.200 --> 0:05:20.800 as UFO crash on Botswana, South African Border, Bus in 0:05:20.839 --> 0:05:25.159 the Sky and UFO in the fields of afrom Planes. 0:05:26.080 --> 0:05:29.520 But the biggest story covered by UFO Afrinews ran in 0:05:29.600 --> 0:05:33.680 its eleventh edition, released in February of nineteen ninety five. 0:05:34.800 --> 0:05:38.039 Spanning several articles. It began with a report on an 0:05:38.040 --> 0:05:42.120 object that was seen across Southern Africa traversing the night 0:05:42.200 --> 0:05:46.719 sky the evening of Wednesday, September fourteenth, nineteen ninety four. 0:05:47.400 --> 0:05:52.280 According to Hind, the first reports came from Johannesburg, South Africa, 0:05:52.360 --> 0:05:55.320 where people called into a local radio show to report 0:05:55.400 --> 0:05:58.520 seeing lights in the sky. Over the next ten to 0:05:58.520 --> 0:06:03.080 twelve minutes, the light were seen by people in South Africa, Botswana, 0:06:03.320 --> 0:06:09.479 Southern Zambia and Zimbabwe. Hind wrote the general consensus of 0:06:09.480 --> 0:06:12.799 opinion was that the lights were preceded by a ball 0:06:12.800 --> 0:06:15.680 of fire which seemed to have a point to it 0:06:16.160 --> 0:06:19.839 with a long tail of sparks. It was white or 0:06:19.880 --> 0:06:24.000 goldish color and lit up brilliantly in the sky. Some 0:06:24.040 --> 0:06:27.520 people saw three huge lights at the front, with smaller 0:06:27.600 --> 0:06:32.000 lights varying from eight to twenty. Many reported that the 0:06:32.080 --> 0:06:36.640 objects were traveling very fast from north to south, others 0:06:36.680 --> 0:06:41.120 that had moved slowly. Her article went on to relate 0:06:41.200 --> 0:06:44.640 in detail the reports of a number of individuals about 0:06:44.640 --> 0:06:47.800 what they had witnessed that night. She concluded that there 0:06:47.800 --> 0:06:51.800 were three possibilities for what was seen. A plane flying 0:06:51.839 --> 0:06:56.440 the Johannesburg to Bulawayo to Harari route that was running 0:06:56.480 --> 0:06:58.880 late putting it in the right place and time to 0:06:58.960 --> 0:07:02.440 be the object an unknown craft not of this Earth, 0:07:03.360 --> 0:07:06.760 or anticipating what is now considered the fact of the matter. 0:07:07.200 --> 0:07:10.120 A Russian satellite that had been launched on the twenty 0:07:10.160 --> 0:07:13.720 sixth or twenty seventh of August had jettisoned its nose 0:07:13.800 --> 0:07:17.480 cone on September fourteenth. The nose cone had broken up 0:07:17.480 --> 0:07:21.200 as it entered the atmosphere over southern Africa. She mentioned 0:07:21.240 --> 0:07:24.680 pieces of the cone being retrieved northwest of Harari and 0:07:24.800 --> 0:07:29.080 from a river in Mozambique. It was in this atmosphere 0:07:29.080 --> 0:07:32.040 of concern about the lights in the sky above southern 0:07:32.080 --> 0:07:36.280 Africa that the events behind the most consequential revelations of 0:07:36.280 --> 0:07:43.320 this edition of UFO Afrinows occurred. On Friday September sixteenth, 0:07:43.360 --> 0:07:46.480 thirty six hours after the lights in the sky, sixty 0:07:46.520 --> 0:07:50.360 two children at the Aerial School in Rua, Zimbabwe had 0:07:50.400 --> 0:07:53.680 an encounter with an object and non human beings in 0:07:53.720 --> 0:07:58.120 the fields beyond their school yard. The Aerial School is 0:07:58.120 --> 0:08:01.640 a private elementary school in the town of Rua, which 0:08:01.680 --> 0:08:04.800 is about twelve miles east of the capital city of Harrari. 0:08:05.720 --> 0:08:09.240 In nineteen ninety four, the school was racially diverse, and 0:08:09.320 --> 0:08:12.200 it's more than two hundred. Students were pulled largely from 0:08:12.240 --> 0:08:15.720 middle class and upper class families. They came from as 0:08:15.800 --> 0:08:19.720 far away as Harrari, reportedly about a thirty minute drive. 0:08:20.480 --> 0:08:23.640 The boys at the school wore uniforms of khaki shorts 0:08:23.720 --> 0:08:27.600 and matching button up Safari shirts. The girls wore square 0:08:27.640 --> 0:08:30.880 collared dresses of light blue with white piping on the 0:08:30.960 --> 0:08:35.240 collars and sleeves. At ten fifteen that warm spring morning, 0:08:35.559 --> 0:08:39.560 they were outside at recess. No adults were present. There 0:08:39.600 --> 0:08:43.080 was a staff meeting inside. Older students had been left 0:08:43.120 --> 0:08:46.480 in charge. In all, there were about two hundred and 0:08:46.520 --> 0:08:51.120 fifty students. Outside of those, sixty two would reports seeing 0:08:51.120 --> 0:08:55.120 a craft and some number of beings. The basics of 0:08:55.120 --> 0:08:59.559 the encounter were fairly straightforward. What complicates matters was that 0:08:59.720 --> 0:09:02.640 all all of the witnesses were children who were interviewed 0:09:02.679 --> 0:09:06.240 again and again in whose stories could not help but evolve. 0:09:06.960 --> 0:09:10.880 That's not a criticism of the children. In fact, because 0:09:10.920 --> 0:09:16.079 adult interviewers generally did not exercise proper precautions in interviewing 0:09:16.080 --> 0:09:19.920 the children, it is almost inevitable that the children's perceptions 0:09:20.000 --> 0:09:23.880 would change. With that in mind, let's take a look 0:09:23.880 --> 0:09:26.480 at the basic story that comes out of the encounter 0:09:26.800 --> 0:09:30.880 before examining how the students were questioned in the days, weeks, 0:09:30.920 --> 0:09:34.199 and months that followed. I'm not going to spend time 0:09:34.240 --> 0:09:37.960 on a few issues tangential to the main story, such 0:09:37.960 --> 0:09:40.400 as whether a small number of students saw lights in 0:09:40.440 --> 0:09:44.080 the sky either that morning or the day before at 0:09:44.080 --> 0:09:48.280 the time of this recording. Charlie Wiser's excellent and comprehensive 0:09:48.320 --> 0:09:51.720 website three Dollar Kit is a great source for a 0:09:51.800 --> 0:09:54.600 detailed look at all of the issues in this encounter. 0:09:55.800 --> 0:09:59.280 With all that being said, there are essentially two elements 0:09:59.320 --> 0:10:02.520 to the encounter, the sighting of the craft at a 0:10:02.600 --> 0:10:06.040 distance beyond the playground amongst some trees, and then the 0:10:06.080 --> 0:10:09.880 appearance of some figures around the craft. It began with 0:10:09.920 --> 0:10:13.400 some children noticing an object glinting in the sun, maybe 0:10:13.400 --> 0:10:16.800 a hundred meters past the edge of their schoolyard from 0:10:16.840 --> 0:10:22.760 the February nineteen ninety five edition of UFO Afronows. Shortly 0:10:22.800 --> 0:10:26.000 after ten o'clock, a few of the children noticed something 0:10:26.080 --> 0:10:30.360 strange beyond their playground, which was dotted with several clumps 0:10:30.360 --> 0:10:34.280 of trees, the rest being mostly cleared ground there was 0:10:34.360 --> 0:10:38.040 bush area. The ground there belonged to the school, and 0:10:38.200 --> 0:10:41.680 though attempts had been made to clear it and level it, 0:10:41.679 --> 0:10:45.680 it really was still rough land, long grass with thorn 0:10:45.800 --> 0:10:50.320 and other indigenous bushes, trees growing in higgledy piggledy fashion, 0:10:50.720 --> 0:10:54.440 and undergrowth thick and heavy enough to hide a child 0:10:54.520 --> 0:10:58.400 should they venture there. Besides which no one knew what 0:10:58.520 --> 0:11:05.040 dangerous small animals such as snakes, jackals, and identified spiders, scorpions, etc. 0:11:05.840 --> 0:11:10.600 Might be lurking in the grass. The following are clips 0:11:10.640 --> 0:11:15.280 of aerial students taken from interviews conducted by Zimbabwean radio 0:11:15.400 --> 0:11:19.760 and television personality Jill Dark in the weeks following the encounter. 0:11:20.320 --> 0:11:23.480 Here they described seeing the craft. We start with a 0:11:23.559 --> 0:11:29.480 student named Candice, Me and my friend Play Hailey and 0:11:29.559 --> 0:11:32.520 kamal Up. We were just walking and then we saw 0:11:32.559 --> 0:11:36.600 this maroon color just waving about and it was disappearing 0:11:36.640 --> 0:11:41.160 and disappearing, and we started to follow it. And then 0:11:41.200 --> 0:11:45.600 we stood over there on one of the logs and 0:11:45.679 --> 0:11:50.120 we saw like this silver thing and we decided that 0:11:50.240 --> 0:11:53.000 we should go down there and see. But Play said 0:11:53.080 --> 0:11:56.400 we're not allowedly, so I said that it doesn't matter 0:11:56.520 --> 0:11:59.600 let's just go and see. And we got closer and closer, 0:11:59.640 --> 0:12:03.720 and we saw this silver thing just shining it and 0:12:03.880 --> 0:12:07.240 we thought that it was just a house of glass 0:12:07.320 --> 0:12:10.959 and reflecting in the sun and shining here. We thought, no, 0:12:11.160 --> 0:12:14.280 it can't be that, because there's no houses up to 0:12:14.280 --> 0:12:18.440 play on the rocks. And then we waited for a 0:12:18.480 --> 0:12:20.840 few minutes and we just stared at it, and we 0:12:20.920 --> 0:12:25.760 heard this flute, sort of like a flute. Louise, this 0:12:25.960 --> 0:12:29.599 is Muna Rodzy. He mentions a touch shop, which is 0:12:29.640 --> 0:12:33.160 more or less a snack shop at the school. Well, 0:12:33.200 --> 0:12:35.600 I was at the touch shop of the year, and 0:12:35.600 --> 0:12:39.120 then I shook with the pros at the year the slight, 0:12:39.240 --> 0:12:42.640 so I wanted and I looked and I saw this 0:12:43.240 --> 0:12:46.560 shot and he had the slide like a patten um 0:12:46.760 --> 0:12:54.240 yellow pole and me, this is another aerial student named Guy. 0:12:55.080 --> 0:12:57.400 So I went down to think know what was happening, 0:12:58.000 --> 0:13:01.319 and I actually saw this school of trees and it 0:13:01.559 --> 0:13:04.320 was like in a multi way pattern like silver and 0:13:04.880 --> 0:13:07.960 green and that sort of colors. And then there was 0:13:07.960 --> 0:13:09.880 this little boy crying. So I went up to him 0:13:09.880 --> 0:13:11.480 to see what was wrong with him, and he said 0:13:11.800 --> 0:13:14.880 he was quite afraid of it. And then that actually 0:13:14.920 --> 0:13:17.120 made me quite afraid of it, because then somebody's afraid 0:13:17.160 --> 0:13:22.160 like it to see interviews conducted by Tim Leach of 0:13:22.240 --> 0:13:26.040 the BBC and Cynthia Hind on the Monday and Tuesday 0:13:26.080 --> 0:13:29.000 after the sighting, so a few weeks before the clips 0:13:29.040 --> 0:13:34.120 we just heard provide additional information. Guy who we heard 0:13:34.160 --> 0:13:38.720 from earlier described the craft as quote roundabout like a disk. 0:13:39.320 --> 0:13:42.960 A student named Nathan said, quote it had a round 0:13:43.000 --> 0:13:45.720 top and it was flat like that around the sides. 0:13:46.600 --> 0:13:50.000 Charity described it as quote like a saucer, but the 0:13:50.040 --> 0:13:53.959 shape wasn't really round. The students also saw figures by 0:13:53.960 --> 0:13:56.959 the craft. As we will see later, there was some 0:13:57.080 --> 0:14:02.240 inconsistency in their descriptions of these figures. Here's Muna Rodzi again, 0:14:03.360 --> 0:14:06.800 there was something running across in something the shop that 0:14:07.640 --> 0:14:10.760 didn't when I looked more dumb, when I looked like 0:14:10.920 --> 0:14:16.160 strength and strength to some like million things. He had 0:14:16.240 --> 0:14:20.920 big guys like once guy was saying, here, Guy, I 0:14:20.960 --> 0:14:23.680 saw this person and his eyes were like in a 0:14:23.760 --> 0:14:27.480 slant like say like so, and his life was just 0:14:27.560 --> 0:14:31.400 like a line like this. And then at the time 0:14:31.400 --> 0:14:34.960 the teachers were in a starting team, so nobody actually 0:14:34.960 --> 0:14:37.160 went have to go and call the teachers, because I 0:14:37.160 --> 0:14:41.040 think there were two phrases and everything. This is Candice. 0:14:42.240 --> 0:14:45.840 I saw this black figure running in slow motion, and 0:14:45.840 --> 0:14:48.480 then I didn't want to see it, so I looked away, 0:14:48.520 --> 0:14:54.200 and I looked again. Wasn't there anymore? Candice's friend Claire, 0:14:55.480 --> 0:15:01.240 this figure like Candace Seed running in slow ocean and 0:15:02.000 --> 0:15:06.640 when clicked, its hit and looked at me onto the grass, 0:15:07.240 --> 0:15:12.080 and me and Canvas were really scared. We nearly screamed. 0:15:12.640 --> 0:15:15.080 We were so scared, and we were running back and 0:15:15.280 --> 0:15:19.400 forth because we were excited and scared at the same time. 0:15:21.600 --> 0:15:25.040 In their interviews with the students, Tim Leech and Cynthia 0:15:25.120 --> 0:15:28.640 Hind also elicited descriptions of the figures around the craft. 0:15:29.440 --> 0:15:35.160 Some examples, Oriana said, quote, I don't know what it was, 0:15:35.480 --> 0:15:38.320 but it was very thin. All I saw was a 0:15:38.400 --> 0:15:42.680 long thing on a silver thing. Kayley saw three figures, 0:15:42.720 --> 0:15:46.800 stating we saw some people, a white one, a red one, 0:15:47.120 --> 0:15:50.400 a black one. The black one was sitting on the spaceship. 0:15:51.280 --> 0:15:53.920 Luke recalled that the figure he saw seemed to have 0:15:54.040 --> 0:15:58.320 long hair, quote, I didn't see the spaceship, but I 0:15:58.320 --> 0:16:01.560 saw the little black guy. He was all black, and 0:16:01.640 --> 0:16:05.400 it looked like he had long hair, Daniel said, quote, 0:16:05.840 --> 0:16:08.680 it almost looked like a real person, except it was 0:16:08.760 --> 0:16:14.280 fairly plump. He continued, his hair was it looked more 0:16:14.320 --> 0:16:18.000 like our hair. It wasn't curly. That thing almost looked 0:16:18.000 --> 0:16:24.400 like a hippie. Big eyes, slanted eyes, very thin, fairly plump, 0:16:25.000 --> 0:16:30.200 long hair, red white, black, almost like a hippie. The 0:16:30.320 --> 0:16:35.880 descriptions aren't consistent and are occasionally contradictory, and more detail 0:16:36.000 --> 0:16:38.720 was to come when they were asked to draw pictures 0:16:38.720 --> 0:16:41.000 of what they had seen, but we'll get to that 0:16:41.080 --> 0:16:45.760 in a minute. BBC correspondent Tim Leech heard about the 0:16:45.880 --> 0:16:50.080 encounter on Friday, the day had occurred. He called Cynthia Hind, 0:16:50.200 --> 0:16:52.760 a friend of his, to tell her about the event. 0:16:53.640 --> 0:16:58.360 Hind began her investigation that weekend. She called Alison Kirkman, 0:16:58.480 --> 0:17:01.440 who was volunteering at the Touch shop when the sighting occurred, 0:17:01.760 --> 0:17:05.760 as well as three student witnesses. It's not clear which 0:17:05.840 --> 0:17:11.199 three students those were. The most interesting thing about the 0:17:11.440 --> 0:17:15.119 aerial school encounter is that there is this kind of 0:17:15.880 --> 0:17:19.399 unfortunate weekend like it happened on a Friday. There's a 0:17:19.440 --> 0:17:25.119 weekend where possible contamination of testimony could occur, like the 0:17:25.200 --> 0:17:28.040 kids apparently broke up from school at one o'clock on 0:17:28.080 --> 0:17:31.040 the Friday afternoon, and then people were talking about it 0:17:31.520 --> 0:17:36.080 for presumably the rest of that day. This is researcher 0:17:36.119 --> 0:17:40.600 and writer Gideon read and then, as I understand it, 0:17:40.640 --> 0:17:44.760 Cynthia and spoke to some people by telephone that weekend. Now, 0:17:45.160 --> 0:17:49.840 if those telephone conversations have been recorded and can be published, 0:17:49.840 --> 0:17:51.960 that would be fascinating because that would kind of go 0:17:52.040 --> 0:17:55.640 a long way toward countering any arguments the testimonies were 0:17:55.640 --> 0:18:00.920 hopelessly corrupted. What Gideon is talking about here is that 0:18:01.160 --> 0:18:05.440 hind through her four conversations could have affected the way 0:18:05.440 --> 0:18:09.600 that people, particularly the students, understood what they had seen. 0:18:10.320 --> 0:18:13.280 We'll see how this can work in a minute. School 0:18:13.359 --> 0:18:17.800 went back into session on Monday morning. The headmaster, Colin Mackie, 0:18:18.280 --> 0:18:20.440 asked each of the students who had seen the craft 0:18:20.480 --> 0:18:22.919 and the figures to draw a picture of what they 0:18:22.960 --> 0:18:25.920 had seen. There was a wide range in the students 0:18:26.040 --> 0:18:29.720 artistic ability, owing largely to the difference in their ages. 0:18:30.840 --> 0:18:33.720 While the drawings are not all consistent, there are some 0:18:33.800 --> 0:18:37.000 basic details that the majority of the drawings hint at 0:18:37.840 --> 0:18:40.280 a craft more or less like what you would think 0:18:40.320 --> 0:18:43.720 of when you think of a flying saucer, short and wide, 0:18:43.760 --> 0:18:47.520 either a disk or a rectangular shape, often with windows 0:18:47.600 --> 0:18:50.399 or lights. A number of the drawings have the craft 0:18:50.480 --> 0:18:54.240 situated within a group of trees. Many of the drawings 0:18:54.280 --> 0:18:58.120 depicted a being or beings, some looking like the classic 0:18:58.200 --> 0:19:01.360 alien with the big angled eyes in the barely their 0:19:01.520 --> 0:19:07.080 nose and mouth, and critically bald heads. Others showed a 0:19:07.119 --> 0:19:10.920 figure with long, straight hair, as we heard described earlier. 0:19:12.119 --> 0:19:16.160 Over the next two days, Tim Leech and Cynthia Hind, 0:19:16.320 --> 0:19:20.159 along with a BBC camera crew and Hind's assistant and 0:19:20.280 --> 0:19:27.439 cameraman Gunter Hofer, visited Aerial School. Mackie, the headmaster, found 0:19:27.520 --> 0:19:31.560 himself in a difficult situation. His school was suddenly thrust 0:19:31.640 --> 0:19:35.840 into the spotlight, with both an international news organization and 0:19:35.960 --> 0:19:41.159 the most prominent UFO researcher in Southern Africa converging on RUA. 0:19:41.240 --> 0:19:44.240 His thoughts on what happened in the schoolyard were complicated. 0:19:45.680 --> 0:19:47.920 I feel sure that the children feel that they did 0:19:47.920 --> 0:19:51.800 see something. I don't believe or disbelief to be perfect honest, 0:19:52.080 --> 0:19:54.119 but I do feel that they definitely saw something. We 0:19:54.160 --> 0:19:56.600 had a number of children say they did. We asked 0:19:56.600 --> 0:19:59.080 them to do a pictures of what they saw this morning, 0:19:59.240 --> 0:20:02.159 what they saw on Friday, and after looking at it 0:20:02.200 --> 0:20:05.320 as I definitely feel that they did see something. I 0:20:05.400 --> 0:20:09.280 agree that it could be something that we are not 0:20:09.359 --> 0:20:12.360 common with, but to actually say that it was a UFO, 0:20:13.160 --> 0:20:15.800 I would be reluctant to make a decision like that. 0:20:16.520 --> 0:20:21.720 I personally did not see it. No adult had. Leech 0:20:21.840 --> 0:20:24.280 came to the school and conducted his interviews for the 0:20:24.359 --> 0:20:29.520 BBC on Monday. On Tuesday, Cynthia Hind arrived with Gunter Hofer. 0:20:30.240 --> 0:20:33.480 Hind reviewed the children's drawings and then began to question 0:20:33.520 --> 0:20:36.760 the children. And here we begin to see the problem 0:20:36.920 --> 0:20:42.880 that plagues accounts of this event. After the break, strange 0:20:42.960 --> 0:21:01.720 arrivals will return in a moment. Cynthia Hind, the most 0:21:01.760 --> 0:21:05.600 prominent UFO researcher in Southern Africa, arrived at the Ariel 0:21:05.720 --> 0:21:10.000 school on the Tuesday following the Friday encounter. During the 0:21:10.040 --> 0:21:13.200 intervening weekend, she had talked to an adult who hadn't 0:21:13.240 --> 0:21:16.040 seen anything, but had been the nearest adult to the 0:21:16.119 --> 0:21:19.760 students who did, as well as three students who were witnesses. 0:21:20.359 --> 0:21:23.480 She came to Ariel School to gather more information from 0:21:23.480 --> 0:21:26.360 the other students who had seen the craft and its occupants. 0:21:27.880 --> 0:21:32.000 Questioning witnesses is a difficult endeavor. A good questioner wants 0:21:32.000 --> 0:21:35.880 to obtain the subject's information, not influence it, and this 0:21:35.960 --> 0:21:40.960 requires training and skill. Questioning children is even more difficult 0:21:41.200 --> 0:21:45.200 because they are more susceptible to influence, whether intentional or not. 0:21:46.080 --> 0:21:51.240 On his blog Skeptic versus the Flying Saucers, Jille Fernandez, 0:21:51.480 --> 0:21:55.280 a writer and lecturer with a PhD in cognitive psychology, 0:21:55.640 --> 0:22:02.000 identifies two critical mistakes that Hind makes while interviewing this students. First, 0:22:02.440 --> 0:22:05.520 she not only interviews the children in a group where 0:22:05.560 --> 0:22:09.160 other children form an audience to watch the interviews. This 0:22:09.280 --> 0:22:13.520 allows for students to influence each other's accounts. We heard 0:22:13.600 --> 0:22:17.320 an example of this dynamic earlier when in an interview 0:22:17.320 --> 0:22:22.280 with Jill Dark Muna Rodzy said, the guys like what 0:22:22.400 --> 0:22:27.160 guy would say. He says he had big eyes, like 0:22:27.200 --> 0:22:31.040 one guy was saying. Here, he's referencing the account that 0:22:31.119 --> 0:22:35.440 he's just seen his classmate Guy give and confirming its accuracy. 0:22:36.280 --> 0:22:41.280 Here's another example, again with Jill Dark I saw this 0:22:41.480 --> 0:22:45.359 black figure running in slow motion. And then I didn't 0:22:45.359 --> 0:22:47.480 want to see it, so I looked away, and I 0:22:47.600 --> 0:22:53.320 looked again, and I wasn't there anymore, This figure like canvacy, 0:22:53.680 --> 0:22:58.320 running in slow motion, and one pluck, it hit up 0:22:59.280 --> 0:23:05.760 and looked at me onto. Here Candice and her Frank 0:23:05.760 --> 0:23:09.119 Claire are telling the story together. They can't help but 0:23:09.280 --> 0:23:14.080 influence each other's accounts. Second, Hind doesn't allow the children 0:23:14.119 --> 0:23:18.119 to freely tell their story for Nandez explains that interviewers 0:23:18.160 --> 0:23:22.480 should not interject or ask specific questions. Children should be 0:23:22.520 --> 0:23:26.160 allowed to tell their story without prompting and less rephrasing 0:23:26.200 --> 0:23:28.840 what they had just said is necessary to get them 0:23:28.880 --> 0:23:33.960 back to talking. Fernandez writes, of a generic interviewer quote, 0:23:34.200 --> 0:23:38.440 he absolutely must not interrupt him nor ask him specific 0:23:38.600 --> 0:23:44.560 and precise questions. On that Tuesday, Hind began by interviewing 0:23:44.560 --> 0:23:47.920 a group of children together with the headmaster and other 0:23:48.000 --> 0:23:53.520 children watching. They brought in the oldest children. Randall Nickerson, 0:23:53.920 --> 0:23:59.200 creator of the documentary The Aerial Phenomenon, all those children 0:23:59.200 --> 0:24:01.840 in that first interview. She brings in the Actually the 0:24:01.840 --> 0:24:04.879 headmaster did was to bring in all the older kids, 0:24:04.920 --> 0:24:08.800 who are much more responsible and were more experienced, and 0:24:09.400 --> 0:24:13.920 that's what you see there. Addressing the same point, Gideon 0:24:13.960 --> 0:24:18.560 Read references film taken and posted by Hine's assistant Gunter Hofer. 0:24:19.640 --> 0:24:23.800 So the video that you see on gafa's YouTube channel 0:24:24.000 --> 0:24:26.800 sank behind and spearing the children. She's kind of going 0:24:26.840 --> 0:24:29.400 along the line of children in the room and there's 0:24:29.400 --> 0:24:32.240 like a crowd of children in the doorway. I think 0:24:32.280 --> 0:24:35.640 that was filmed on the Tuesday, and to leach when 0:24:35.640 --> 0:24:40.000 the BBC was there on the Monday. So by the Tuesday, 0:24:40.119 --> 0:24:43.119 the children have already probably been asked the same question 0:24:43.320 --> 0:24:45.920 a whole bunch of times. There's just so much unknown 0:24:45.960 --> 0:24:52.120 about that whole little period. This section of the transcript 0:24:52.160 --> 0:24:56.320 of Hinds interview with Candice read by actors shows that 0:24:56.560 --> 0:24:59.600 far from allowing the student to tell her story, Hind 0:24:59.720 --> 0:25:03.760 guy the telling. While she doesn't seem to intentionally elicit 0:25:03.840 --> 0:25:08.159 certain answers, the questions that she asks indicate what she 0:25:08.320 --> 0:25:11.920 thinks is important about the story. She also asks either 0:25:12.080 --> 0:25:16.960 or questions that limit possible answers. Would you say it 0:25:17.000 --> 0:25:19.840 was like an ordinary suit? Was it like what mister 0:25:19.920 --> 0:25:24.320 Mackie's wearing, No? Or what would you call the type 0:25:24.320 --> 0:25:28.119 of clothing. I'm not sure, but he was really Have 0:25:28.280 --> 0:25:31.600 you ever seen the divers going in the sea? Oh? Yes, 0:25:31.800 --> 0:25:35.280 like that? Was it like that or was it like 0:25:35.320 --> 0:25:39.760 an overall or tight fitting suit? It was tight fitting. 0:25:40.119 --> 0:25:44.920 It was tight fitting, yes, and it was shiny. Yes. 0:25:45.640 --> 0:25:49.399 Could you see his face? Well, I only saw a 0:25:49.440 --> 0:25:53.640 glimpse of it, and you don't remember any individual features. 0:25:54.280 --> 0:25:57.520 I only remember that his eyes were quite big. Eyes 0:25:57.560 --> 0:26:03.720 were big? And were you afraid? I was a little afraid. Here, 0:26:04.240 --> 0:26:07.440 Hind has introduced the idea that the students might be afraid. 0:26:08.080 --> 0:26:11.879 Candice can answer either in the affirmative or negative, and 0:26:12.000 --> 0:26:14.840 actually kind of splits the difference by saying she was 0:26:15.280 --> 0:26:19.879 a little afraid. What do you think it was? I 0:26:19.920 --> 0:26:22.040 don't know. I just thought it was some kind of 0:26:22.160 --> 0:26:27.480 alien from a different planet. She asks for Candice's opinion, 0:26:28.000 --> 0:26:32.360 moving the conversation away from the student's experience and to conjecture. 0:26:33.040 --> 0:26:36.480 And given who Hind was, the answer that she is 0:26:36.520 --> 0:26:40.760 looking for is probably clear to Candice. So you knew 0:26:40.840 --> 0:26:47.640 about UFOs, Yes, you've watched on television. Yes, you think 0:26:47.680 --> 0:26:51.040 that influenced you? Or you weren't thinking about that? When 0:26:51.440 --> 0:26:55.720 I wasn't thinking about it? And then, talking in front 0:26:55.760 --> 0:26:59.520 of a group of students and Headmaster Mackie Hind speculates 0:26:59.560 --> 0:27:01.760 that although people may have seen the breakup of a 0:27:01.840 --> 0:27:05.800 Russian rocket on August twenty seventh, it doesn't explain the 0:27:05.800 --> 0:27:11.280 figures they saw. She continues, we don't know what it 0:27:11.400 --> 0:27:15.080 is and it could be just there was a Russian 0:27:15.160 --> 0:27:18.760 satellite breakup on the twenty seventh of August, and it's 0:27:18.760 --> 0:27:22.200 a possibility something came down, but it would not account 0:27:22.280 --> 0:27:25.240 for the figure you saw. And I think it's time 0:27:25.280 --> 0:27:28.840 the world woke up that something's going on. And they 0:27:28.920 --> 0:27:32.320 don't all think I'm a kookie character, a weird lady 0:27:32.359 --> 0:27:37.639