By CAM LUCADOU-WELLS
GARFIELD retired firefighter John Williams has no doubt something strange lies behind the 50-year-old world-renowned Westall UFO mystery.
Mr Williams, then based with Oakleigh fire brigade, was among the first responders to Westall High School on a clear morning on 6 April 1966.
The questions endure over what were up to three silver shimmering objects that hovered over the school, flew and landed behind pine trees and disappeared.
Mr Williams is shy of the event’s controversy, but vividly remembers the day and appeared on Channel 10 to mark the 50th anniversary.
Expecting to find a fire, Mr Williams and crew-mate ‘Mopey’ drove to where a group of excited kids were milling around at the high school. They were pointed to where UFOs had landed.
An older man and his wife standing on the corner of Westall and Fairbank roads directed the firies to The Grange’s orchards.
“We didn’t find a fire. We found an area of grass that’s flattened, about twice the size of your lounge room.”
Deep down, the two firefighters knew they’d found “something” even though their colleagues dismissed the event.
“We tried to keep an open mind. We haven’t got an answer for it but we thought something has happened here.
“All of these people can’t be wrong.”
The story has been kept alive in a documentary, marked by a flying saucer playground in the locale’s Grange Reserve, and the anniversary recently featured in various media.
Dandenong Journal ex-reporter Des Carroll was one of the few journalists to capture the story at the time.
There were no photos or videos of the awesome event and nothing more elaborate than a hand drawing of a flying saucer shape graced the Journal’s front page at the time.
The official explanation proffered was that it was just a weather balloon.
But Mr Carroll extracted vivid eye-witness descriptions of these objects which pointed to something more strange – despite the media clampdown by defence department authorities and a “terrified” school principal.
Teacher Andrew Greenwood described to Mr Carroll at the time that the saucer was playing “cat and mouse” with pursuing aircraft.
Mr Carroll recalled: “The kids were excited – abuzz with excitement, not terrified. I could see what a big buzz it was for them.“
Mr Carroll, now 78 years old and living in Castlemaine, remembers getting the call-out to the high school after a tip-off from a Clayton stringer that day.
He was led to a nearby grassed area where the objects allegedly landed.
“The grass had been pressed down in a large circle but it looked bloody impressive.”
Theories flourished. Talk of a US military exercise or experiment probably stemmed from the increasing American defence presence on Australian soil and chatter of Communist threats, Mr Carroll said.
A former Air Force member in the Journal office thought the incident was just a military target practice exercise.
“But I said to him there are no military airports anywhere nearby,” Mr Carroll recalls.
“I didn’t really come out with any opinion at all.”
For many days afterwards, he found himself sidelined from the looming federal election.
He often had to field interrogatory phone calls from a “mad Yank” from a Moordialloc UFO society.
“It was a fun story to do.”
More than 100 eyewitness accounts of the incident were collected by Canberra-based researcher Shane Ryan.
He says the ongoing conspiracy such as the unexplained presence of Department of Defence officers at the scene helps keep the story alive.
“We know there was some sort of Air Force involvement. There was no paper trail to tell us why they were there and what they were doing.
“If a solution came forward we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”
After 11 years of collating eyewitness reports, Mr Ryan feels he is piecing together the jigsaw.
“It’s gradually putting a degree of pressure on who may be holding the keys to the mystery.
“Maybe the keys are in another country, maybe no-one around has the keys or no-one ever had the keys – the box was empty.
“My hope is it will put more pressure on those people, if they exist.”
Anyone who can provide information is asked to contact Shane Ryan on 0402 085 553 or shaneljryan@iinet.net.au, or visit the Westall Flying Saucer Incident group at http://www.facebook.com/groups/7613851618/
For more details go to the Westall ’66: A Suburban UFO Mystery documentary web site at http://www.westall66ufo.com.au
