Alternate Perceptions Magazine, October 2024
The Saucer Files
by: Rick Hilberg
1980 Was Active in Northern Ohio
In 1980 I had my telephone UFO hotline in full operation and received literally hundreds of calls over its five-year tenure. Here's a sampling from a particularly active year.
March 2, 1980 - A 58-year-old Cleveland man happened to glance up at the afternoon sky to observe a high-flying aircraft traveling from east to west leaving a well-defined contrail. After observing the plane for several seconds, he then noted a silvery, fast-moving oval object come from out of the northeast and "pass" the plane, and then either disappear or (as the witness thought more likely) quickly change direction and shoot upward into the sky. The oval object was in view for no more than ten seconds, and the witness noted the time as 3: 35 p.m.
March 9, 1980 - A man living on Luray Drive in Painesville was outside his home when his attention was drawn to a lighted object that was giving off a "static, fluttery sound." The night was cool, and as he looked up the witness made note of the fact that the sky was perfectly clear, with many stars visible. In the northern sky at approximately 60 degrees above the horizon, the witness saw a cigar-shaped object with a bulge on the top part that was rose colored with a slight grayish tint to it. The witness described it as large as a dime held at arm's length. He stood watching it for a few moments and reported that at the time it seemed to be hovering motionless, however after a time the thing began making drifting movements.
The witness ran inside to get his wife and two children to join him in watching the strange lighted thing, and when they all got outside it seemed as if another identical object was near the first one, but whatever they noted rapidly disappeared, leaving the original object in the same position as observed initially. The UFO then went back and forth in the sky from east to west, and during these motions a passenger plane passed near to the object heading eastward. The initial witness stated that the object seemed to follow the airliner briefly, and then resumed its drifting movements for about five minutes.
During this part of the experience the local police was dispatched, and a squad car came to the scene. Also, at this time another couple from the neighborhood joined in the observation, making a total of seven witnesses.
At this point, the object did very rapid maneuvers from the northeast to the southwest two to three times, appearing to loom closer to the group viewing it than at any time previously. The object then began to do spirals or circular motions very rapidly and seemed to move away to the northeast horizon out over nearby Lake Erie, and was lost to sight when it passed behind a tree line.
The duration of the encounter was fifteen minutes or longer.
April 3, 1980 - A woman called the hotline to report she had observed a bright, silvery disk from a location just north of Brook Park Road near Chevrolet Boulevard near the southwest border of Cleveland.
She was alerted by a very bright light shining through a window of her mobile home and decided to go outside and ascertain the cause. Upon arriving outside she noted that the almost full moon was visible, with few stars to be seen because of the brightness of the moon and the presence of a very light cloud cover.
She walked a short distance away from the other nearby homes and trees to get a closer look at the source of the unnaturally bright light. It was then that she clearly saw a large disk- shaped object hovering over a nearby railroad line and some high-tension power lines serving the many medium to large industrial and commercial businesses in the area.
She estimated the object as being at an approximate elevation of 30 degrees and thought that it was at an altitude of 180 feet above the power lines. She also estimated the object to be 30 to 40 feet in diameter, and 15 to 20 feet high at the bulge.
She watched the UFO circle or orbit over the power lines for approximately ten minutes, when it unexpectedly rose straight up at a high but erratic rate of speed and was quickly lost to sight.
