The Shag Harbour Incident

 

On October 4th 1967 a remarkable event took place in which the tiny an relatively unknow fishing village of Shag Harbour and its residents would be put on the world map once and for all. The incident drew enough attention to be investigated by both the civilian RCMP and Coast guard and military Canadian navy and air force.

The story is as follows. Multiple residents of the tiny fishing community of Shag Harbour began to notice strange orange lights in the sky in the evening of the 4th (approx. 11.20pm Atlantic Daylight Time) this was reported by multiple witnesses who generally believed there were four noticeable lights. The lights were flashing in sequence and then without warning dived at a steep angle towards the waters surface. However the lights did not crash in to the water but instead hovered above the waters surface approximately half a mile off shore. At first believing they may have witnessed a plane crash out at sea RCMP Constable Ron O'Brien was contacted by Laurie Wickens, Constable O'Brien had already witnessed the lights for himself and believed them all to belong to a singe aircraft approximately 60ft in length. He went to the shore line to get a better look and he noticed the lights on the waters surface as well as what was described as a yellow foam on the waters surface. As locals began to gather to look at the event the lights began to either move further away or sink below the waters. A coast guard cutter was sent out on a rescue mission to help retrieve the suspected plane and what survivors they could.

On arriving at the suspected crash site the crew of the cutter could not find any sign of the crashed plane although the yellow foam was still evident on the surface. The search was called off at 3.00am as no other evidence could be found. Upon checking with both the Rescue Coordination Centre in Halifax and NORAD it was confirmed that no aircraft had be reported missing civilian or military. The following day a report was filed with headquarters and HMCS Granby was dispatched to the scene (this was a old WWII Bangor-class mine sweeper that had been given to the RCMP after the war) and the search resumed with a team of divers searched the area for days but came up empty handed. It was later assumed that as this was at the height of the cold war what the witnesses may well have seen was a Soviet submarine although this could easily be used as a means of dismissing the entire event if the Government wished it to be so.

 Ariel Photograph of the Area of the incident (Credit: JFL Williams) 

Off the record reports have made comment that the 'UFO' had continued to travel some 25miles under water to a place known as Government Point there it was picked up on radar (or sonar) and monitored by the Canadian Navy. It was then reported that it was joined by a second 'UFO' perhaps to bring aid or repair? where upon after some time they both began to travel at speed under water accelerating away from the perusing navy craft and when they had gained enough distance rose up out of the water and took to the skies. This was reported by Chris Styles UFO investigator who was intrigued by the incident and has reported on it extensively.

It should also be noted that this is not the only time that strange lights and aerial craft have been spotted in the vicinity preceding the Shag Harbour incident. The captain of  Air Canada flight 305 reported an object out of the left side window  keeping parallel to them he described it as a rectangular object with a string of lights trailing it, this happened over Sherbrooke and Saint-Jean Quebec after taking off from Halifax international airport. A strange yellow object was seen by Darrel Dorey while sitting on his porch with his Sister and Mother at Mahone Bay. A captain of a fishing trawler reported a sighting of four strange lights in the sky forming a rectangle type shape after spotting them on his Decca radar. And many residents of Halifax reported seeing strange lights in the sky to the Chronical-Herald and local radio stations.

This is a very interesting case with what would seem to be a good amount of documented reports from both the RCMP and Canadian Navy as well as investigations by UFO investigators. There has not yet be a wholistic explanation as to what happened at Shag Harbour but we hope some day we will find out.

More information can be found Here, Here and Here and an interesting Word Document can be read with a fair amount of detail in it.

Thanks for stopping by.

Until next time

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RTI