ANOTHER strange light was seen over Leicester on Saturday night. This time the U.F.O. was described as being an “orange saucer.” This latest sighting follows reports of flashing lights over the city last Wednesday night. Mr. and Mrs. Laurence Black of Wintersdale Road, Leicester, saw the light at 12:25 a.m. ‘Shower Of Light’ “It was hovering over the city,” said Mrs. Black. “We watched it gradually move away and pick up speed. It almost disappeared, then came back and threw off a shower of yellow light. It then went out of sight. “I have never seen anything like it before - it was definitely a flying saucer.” said Mrs. Black. During the four minutes that the “saucer” was visible, Mr. Black tried unsuccessfully to awake his neighbours to borrow a pair of binoculars. (51/69/06). (7).

“Regarding strange noise heard on 12^th. March 1970. I was awakened at approximately 3.00 a.m. by this noise which can best be described as an aeroplane in severe difficulty. The duration of hearing it after waking was approximately two minutes of extremely loud noise, seeming to come from directly overhead, after which it suddenly went very faint as if heard from far in the distance, this lasted only a moment. Five other people were woken up and know they heard a noise, but cannot give very accurate descriptions. I did not see any object. In the area where I live we get a perpetual whine from the John Bull factory, sirens going off any odd hour of the day or night, also a helicopter frequently passes over, so I am used to all sorts of noises, but this one was unlike anything I have ever previously heard.” Mrs. J. Spiers. (7).

A QUORN woman thinks she saw the mysterious flying object, seen over West Leicestershire yesterday morning, come to earth not very far from her home. Following our story yesterday in which Mr. George Holt, of Top Street, Appleby Magna, spotted a strange glowing in the sky and going at a terrific speed, Miss Edna Selvester of Loughborough Road, Quorn also said she had seen it. Mr. James Gandy of Bird Nest Avenue, New Parks, Leicester, also spotted the object while he was taking the dog for a walk when he got home from night shift. (51/71/20). (7).

A noiseless Unidentified Flying Object has been travelling back and forth over Rutland and Leicestershire. It was first spotted at Newton Harcourt at 6:30 on Monday morning, moving to Stamford by evening and 20 hours later was reported at Hinckley. Mrs. Peggy Metcalfe of Newton Harcourt was the first to see something. She said: “It was silver, and at first I thought it was a big helicopter - then I realised that it was slipper-shaped with no rotary blades and no noise” Mrs. Metcalfe watched it moving slowly, taking more than five minutes to move out of sight. It left a trail of grey and white vapour. Several people something above Stamford about midnight. A spokesman from RAF Wittering said: “It was described as an orange and gold coloured light, about 5,000 feet high”. Three hours later, a police patrolman saw it moving west over the George Hotel, in Stamford. Mr. S. Hodgeson, of Cambridge Road, examined it through a telescope and was confident it was not a star. Then at 7:55 last night Mrs. Pauline Hall, of Hinckley, was sitting in a car outside the Hinckley Working Men’s Club when she saw a shiny low-flying object move across the sky. She identified it as oblong, about 400 feet high, moving westwards. She commented: “I just could not believe my eyes - I have never seen anything like it in my life.” The spokesman from Wittering said: “It is certainly nothing to do with the Air Force, it could be a satellite.” At 2:50 this morning police went to the Braunstone Estate, Leicester, after a resident of Hockley Farm Road reported a UFO. But later, Chief Superintendent Douglas Glenn said: “We solved the mystery - The UFO was in fact a television aerial lit in a rather odd manner by some nearby sodium lighting that was giving an eerie effect. (7).

FOLLOWING several reports of sightings of mysterious objects in the sky over several parts of Leicestershire during the last two days, theories have been put forward that the objects could either be a satellite or the planet Mars. At Leicester University Observatory it was thought that what was seen was a satellite or the planet Mars, which can be clearly seen at the moment. “Of course, Mars, which is bright and red, and can be observed in the south, would not be moving quickly, so this is an unlikely theory” said a spokesman. The Midland Air Safety Centre at R.A.F. North Luffenham, were unable to throw any light on the subject, but the Leicester Astronomical Society say the object is definitely Mars. Mr. Gordon Lennox, of Gwendolen Drive, Countesthorpe, reported seeing a bright object travelling at speed from south to north, which he saw near his home at 9 p.m. last night. “It was pulsating with light and no sound came from it” said Mr. Lennox, who added that it cleared a 90 degree angle in under 15 seconds. Mr. Geoffrey Richardson, of Burgess Road, Leicester, claims to have seen on Tuesday night an object land in a field near Uppingham, and then take off again. Mr. Richardson, who was driving his car with his girlfriend at 9:30 p.m., said: “It looked like a large spinning top. It was round and glowing, and circled in the air. It could not possibly have been an aircraft because it took off so quickly after it landed.” There was another reported sighting of a mysterious pulsating white light seen whizzing across the sky by a Leicester man last night. He was standing in the garden of his home in Scraptoft Lane, Leicester, with his Son while they were studying star constellations on a map of the night sky. Then at about 9:30 p.m., he and his Son saw a fast moving object in the southern sky, There was no noise from it and he said it could not have been a plane because there were no red or green navigation lights. “It was not a planet or a satellite, I even checked the satellite to make sure. It was white and alternating. It took about five seconds to cross the sky and was moving very fast. I would say it must have been going at 2,000 miles a hour” said the witness. Yet another strange light in the Leicestershire sky on Tuesday night has been reported by five people who were driving between Copt Oak and Coalville. Mr. Ian Hodges, a quality control engineer, of Wentworth Road, Coalville, was travelling in a car with his Wife, his two Sons and a young friend. They first spotted the light about 8 p.m. shortly after leaving Copt Oak, and kept it in view for ten minutes. Mr. Hodges said: “It was like a flame from a rocket, only it was horizontal - not vertical. If I had held a ruler in front of my eyes, the flame would have been about an inch long. It was coloured red and orange and appeared to be quivering. It looked as if it was red hot. It was moving in a north-north westerly direction. I am certain it could not have been an aeroplane.” The Meteorological office in Nottingham could advance no theories at all. The Air Traffic control at the t Midlands Airport said: “Two Viscounts and a Chipmunk light aircraft were in the area at the time, but it doesn’t sound like an aircraft at all. That leaves us with the popular theory that it could have been a flying saucer. This airport can offer no reasonable explanation at all.” (7)

FURTHER confirmation of a strange light in the sky low over Leicestershire comes today from Coalville. Yesterday, Mrs. Enid McCowen, of South Croxton, reported that she had seen a light glowing orange in a Southerly direction from her home. She said the light glowed orange and faded, alternately, for some time. Mrs. R. H. Middleton, of Croft, also saw an orange-glowing object in the sky, and is sure it was not an ordinary star. Mrs. Sheila Aucott, of Agar Nook, Coalville, also reported to the Leicester Mercury (7) that she saw a similar light last night. This was in a roughly Southerly direction. It faded and glowed orange, alternately, and it appeared to have considerable movement in the sky. Mrs. Aucott said at times when clouds obliterated the stars this bright object remained giving the impression that it was below cloud level. “It did not resemble a star and the movement was more than I would have expected from a star over a similar period of time”. Mrs. Aucott went on to say that she has a very open mind about the question of flying saucers and does not regard it as outside the realms of possibility that some space vehicle from another world could be hovering over this earth for the purpose of the crew making some observations. “Such things could be possible, and although astronomers say that conditions on other planets are not suitable for life as we know it, it has been shown by the way living creatures and organisms adapt themselves to chemical substances which would have initially killed them, that life forms are extremely flexible and adjustable to their environment.” People who are sceptical that the light can only be explained by as an astronomical phenomenon have suggested that the light observed in the last two nights is consistent in colour and behaviour with the planet Jupiter, now in the Southern sky nightly. (7).

Mysterious lights have again been sighted in the Hinckley area, this time by Mr. James Young, of Alexandra Gardens, Hinckley and his girlfriend, Miss Susan Davies, of Shilton Road, Barwell. It was 10 p.m. on Sunday as the couple were walking along Chapel Street, Barwell, when Susan noticed an unusual light in the sky over the top of Woodward’s garage and pointed it out to James. The star-shaped light, which both described as being a brilliant white in colour, was roughly three times larger than an ordinary star. As James and Susan watched, they saw a ‘plane fly by the light. (This is reminiscent of a report earlier this month when witnesses saw seven aeroplanes fly past a strange light viewed from Burbage). The night’s happenings were not yet over for as the couple walked along Hill Street, Barwell, Susan noticed the light was moving and as James was going back to Hinckley after seeing Susan home, he saw the light over Powers’ corner. It appeared to be moving towards Hinckley when slowly it changed direction and moved in a zigzag fashion in the direction of Leicester. On Monday at 11 p.m., as James arrived home from Susan’s house, he saw the light again, It was the same star-shaped brilliant white light as before, and was once more in the direction of Powers’ corner. The light was moving quickly away from James but instead of getting smaller it appeared to be growing larger and then it completely disappeared. Mrs. Dorothy Heathcote, of the Sycamores Inn, Burbage, also reports seeing a strange object in the sky early on Sunday morning. Through the window of her bedroom she saw a star-shaped light alternating brilliant red and white. It was stationary in the sky towards the south-east then it moved high in the heavens before returning to its former position and disappearing altogether. (8).

The “mysterious light” light in the sky reported in the Leicester Mercury (7) is nothing more sinister than the planet Mars, which members of Leicester Astronomical Society have been observing for the past few weeks from our observatory at Oadby. The reason Mars is now attracting so much attention is that three weeks ago, it was closer to Earth than it has been since 1924 and though moving rapidly away from us, is still the brightest object in the sky with the exception of the Sun and Moon. It is rising in the South-east around 9:00 p.m., reaches a point due South just before midnight, and sets in the South-west in the early hours of the morning. It will still be visible each night for several more weeks. The apparent pulsations, change of colour and shape are explained by the fact that Mars is so low in the sky as seen from Britain, and at this low angle we are observing it through approximately 100 miles of turbulent atmosphere. Although naturally orange in colour, it appears even redder at this low altitude, as does the Sun when it sets. Incidentally, even brighter than Mars is the planet Venus (not observable at present as it is behind the Sun). It will next be seen in November low in the western sky just after Sunset. No doubt this will lead to a further series of “mysterious lights” in the sky! Derek D. Brown - Leicester Astronomical Society. (7).