The Shag Harbour Incident, Part 2

Evidence later emerged from various military and civilian witnesses of a highly secretive military search involving a small flotilla of U.S. and Canadian ships about 30 miles to the NE of Shag Harbour near Shelburne (see map above), site of a top secret submarine detection base. According to one military witness, he was allegedly briefed that the object had been originally picked up on radar coming out of Siberia. After crashing in Shag Harbour, it traveled underwater up the coast and came to rest on top of the submarine magnetic detection grid near Shelburne. The ships were anchored there for a week, apparently in an attempt to recover the object. A barge was hurriedly brought in on which to place the object, with a likely cover story printed in the local newspaper to explain its presence there. (See press coverage immediately below.) Many photographs were taken by divers and some foam-like debris brought up. One American diver named "Harry" stated that the object wasn't from planet Earth. Another military witness claimed that there were actually two objects, one perhaps trying to assist the other. The naval search was suddenly called off on October 11. Coincidentally or not, that night a seemingly identical UFO was seen departing the area by witnesses near the original Shag Harbour crash site.

In the most recent History Channel documentary about the incident, which aired on August 10, 2006, investigators reported that one of the divers involved in the Shag Harbour search did come forward during the mid-1990s, refusing to allow his identity to become known publicly. Once the researchers verified that the man in fact had served as a diver during that search, he recounted his version of what had happened at Shag Harbour.

According to the diver, by the time they reached Shag Harbour, they already knew that nothing would be found there, because the target had already been located off the coast at Shelburne. He went on to further say that the Canadian military and the United States Navy monitored the "unknown objects" by radar and sonar, and that the objects were underwater. This monitoring continued for at least three days, until a Russian submarine was observed entering allied waters to the north. With that, the navy departed to intercept the submarine, and by the time they had returned, the "unknown objects" had evidently departed. There so far has been nothing to substantiate the divers claims, with the exception of archived records that do indicate a substantial amount of search and monitor activity in the Shelburne area during that 10 day period.

Unlike the event at Shag Harbour, no official documentation has yet emerged to support witness stories of a second search near Shelburne.

Today, no known RCMP reports of this sighting remain. The Department of National Defence has identified this sighting as unsolved, and the only documentation that is known to exist is a DND memo.

The Shag Harbour Incident

http://www.ufocasebook.com/shagharbormuseumopen.html

The Shag Harbour Incident was the purported crash of an UFO in Shag Harbour, Nova Scotia in October 1967.

On the night of October 4, 1967, at about 11:20 p.m. Atlantic Daylight Time, it was reported that something (later referred to as a UFO) had crashed into the waters near Shag Harbour, on Nova Scotia's South Shore. At least eleven people saw a low-flying lit object head down towards the harbor. Multiple witnesses reported hearing a whistling sound "like a bomb", then a "whoosh", and finally a loud bang. Some reported a flash of light as the object entered the water. Thinking that an airliner or smaller aircraft had crashed into the Sound next to Shag Harbour, some witnesses reported the event to the local Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) detachment.

The unknown object was referred to as a "UFO" in official Canadian government documents. A Canadian Naval recovery effort immediately followed, perhaps aided in part by the U.S. military. The event is sometimes compared to the Roswell UFO incident and Kecksburg UFO incident, two other events alleged to be military crash-recoveries of UFOs.

The initial report was made by Laurie Wickens, a local resident, and four of his friends. Driving through Shag Harbour on Highway 3, they spotted a large object descending into the waters of the harbor. Other residents had seen the descent and agreed the object was about 60 feet long, angled downwards at 45 degrees, and initially displayed four or five flashing and glowing amber lights.

Attaining a better vantage point, Wickens and his friends could see an object floating 250 to 300 meters out to sea. Visibility was good – clear with no moon. At that time, the object only had a yellow light shining from its top side.

Wickens contacted the RCMP and reported he had seen a large airplane or small airliner crash into the Sound. Subsequent calls were received from Mary Banks on Maggie Garron's Point reporting similar information. Other residents also called in to report the incident, adding details about loud whistling noises and bangs. RCMP staff were dispatched to the site.

Assuming an aircraft had crashed, within about 15 minutes, three Mounties were at the scene along with multiple other witnesses, and observed a pale yellow or white light bobbing on the surface of the water. Concerned for survivors, the RCMP contacted the Rescue Coordination Centre in Halifax to advise them of the situation, and ask if any aircraft were missing. Before any local effort at rescue could be made, the object started to sink and disappeared from view.

A rescue mission was quickly assembled. Within half an hour of the crash, local fishing boats went out into the Sound to look for survivors. At the location at which the object had sunk, an oily, yellow foam was observed on the surface, about 80 feet wide and half a mile long. Oddly enough, this foam could not be picked up with nets, as a witness to the scene tried to examine some of it by running his fishing net through it. When he pulled his small net up, there was no trace that he'd pulled it through anything. Bubbles rose from from beneath the surface of the water to surround the boats. There was a smell of sulfur in the air. No survivors, bodies or debris were located, either by the fishermen or by the Coast Guard vessel, which arrived about an hour later.

By the next afternoon, it had been determined that no planes were missing. Still searching, the captain of the Coast Guard vessel received a message from the Rescue Coordination Center that all commercial, private and military aircraft were accounted for along the eastern seaboard from Atlantic Canada down into New England.

Two days after the crash, the Rescue Coordination Center had assembled a team of Navy divers, who for the next three days combed the bottom of the harbor looking for the object. One local fisherman said he saw them bringing up aluminum-colored metal debris, although it was unclear if this had been actual crash debris. The final report said not a trace of the crash object had been found.