The event occurred over forty six years ago. There were three of us present, and unfortunately I am the last surviving member of the group.
It was Late October 1972, the Friday evening before Halloween in Southern New Jersey. My future X, my little brother, and I were on our way from our home town of Cinnaminson to our family cabin on Bamber Lake, in the Southern New Jersey pine lands. I was driving. Our route took us on unimproved two lane back roads that normally only see farm traffic. The weather was a crisp and clear October evening with unlimited visibility.
About a mile east of Vincentown I rounded a bend and there it was in the north west corner of a small rectangular field of maybe three possibly four acres. The road ran the length of the field. The field was surrounded by large old oak trees along the West and the North. The road ran along the south boarder and then curved along the eastern boarder. The field was long and narrow.
As I rounded the bend a brilliant light caught my eye. There in the north West corner of the field was a large object hovering. It was shaped like a bell, about 40-50 feet high and maybe 70-80 feet in diameter. Only an oval dome at the top of the bell was above the tree line.
Upon later reflection we realised that the location of the object was less than three miles to McGuire AFB. It would have been a great vantage point to observe the airfield.
I noticed that there was a berm along the edge of the field which I drove up on to put my headlights on the object. We sat in awe for maybe 20 seconds at which time the three of us exited the car to get a better look. Please note, to this day whenever I think of that evening the hair stands up on my neck, it was that profound an experience.
The object was hovering, maybe ten feet off the ground. It was shaped like a bell with a convex bottom. It was a dirty whitish grayish in colour. The apex had a brilliant white light which radiated beautiful, quickly pulsing, beams of light in pure crystalline colours, vivid blue, violet, red, and green. The beams seemed to come from a brilliant blue white point just below the oval disk on the top of the “bell” to a row of the same colour of white lights evenly spaced along the rim, then from those white spots to another white light in the centre of the convex bottom of the craft.
Maybe ten years later I saw my first laser light demonstration, it was that type of pure crystalline single wavelength light that instantly reminded me of that object. In fact the hairs on the back of my neck and on my arms stood straight up.
As it hovered it made a sound akin to a very large saw mill blade swinging. I cannot find other words to describe that whirring sound other than a saw mill blade spinning.
The three of us were standing in front of the car, headlights on the object just gawking at the objet. This went on for maybe a minute possibly a minute and a half.
BTW I am a licensed pilot and also a highly experienced sea captain, I am a good observer, with an eye for size and distance. We were maybe 175-200 feet away from the object.
At that point I alone started walking towards it, my x and brother were too awestruck to move. When I got extremely close, less one hundred feet, probably more like seventy five feet away. The size of this thing sank in. It was the size of a small house! I started smelling that lightning storm ozone odour, began getting a strong metallic taste in my mouth, and felt tingly on my skin. This scared me so I made a slow retreat back to the car never taking my eyes off the object.
When I rejoined the other two we stood there for maybe two more minutes, just looking, listening to the whirring, not speaking beyond a few “wows” and “oh my gods”. Then it hit me, I had a Yashica 35mm camera loaded with asa 400 film and sporting a 200mm lens on the front seat.
I reached into the car, grabbed it and began fumbling trying to remember how to focus it when you could not see thru the view finder. It was one of those old 35mm cameras with all manual controls. I was unfamiliar with the camera and fumbled around. I never did get a shot, something I truly wish I had done, as anyone I related this story to since that day some forty six years ago has either thought I was crazy or simply humoured me.
Any way, as soon as I aimed the camera at the object it seemed to immediately react to the threatening move of pointing what may have been perceived as a weapon at it.
iI’s sound began to change. It got higher and higher and higher in pitch and volume until it was just a deafening hiss, like high pressure steam being vented thru a small aperture.
Some years later in San Diego I had another hair standing up moment when I went to work with a fixed hard disk manufacturer. We had tanks of liquid freon that were huge ultrasonic cleaners used to clean the 18” stainless steel disks before transferring them into the clean room for final assembly. The first time I turned one on and heard that hissss there went the hair standing up again. That was the frequency of the sound. This had to be around 1982.
Sorry to digress, any way the sounds frequency went up, the pulsing lights became gradually brighter and more brilliant until the entire craft was one very bright white fuzzy bell. The craft slowly rose to an altitude of maybe 150 feet. It slowly went on paralleling the road heading northeast about 100 feet to the west of the road.
We jumped in the car and followed. We were able to keep up with it for maybe a mile and a half while it slowly accelerated until it finally had a good lead of maybe several hundred yards. It’s altitude was increasing as was its rate of climb. Slowly at first, but obviously steadily accelerating in what settled in at about a 30 or 40 degree climb.. The road ended in a “Tee” intersection. So again we got out of the car and stood in the middle of the itersection watching as it continued its climbing. We were able to keep an eye on it due to the exceptionally clear sky and the fact that we were way out on the country, so light pollution was not a factor..
Finally after another five or more likely six minutes the thing was just another one of the stars in the sky. It grew fainter and fainter, until it was indiscernible from all the other stars.
At that point we got back in the car and continued on our way.
One interesting point is that from the point where that craft was to the runways of McGuire AFB is only a couple of miles. Back in 1972 the area of the jersey pines we were in had many Cold War installations,Nike missile installations, the Space Track “ golf Ball” and others. There had been a nuclear warhead on a missile that had caught fire and contaminated a very large area with plutonium, the active air base was there as well. Plenty to look at if you were interested In the military capability of a civilisation.
For the rest of our lives whenever either of the three of us met, right up to the ends of their lives, we always said ” hey remember the flying saucer”. I have only told this story to four or five others over the years. The blank stares or that look like you are some kind of nutter shut me down.
Any way there you have it. I wish you luck with your build, and YES please post a video when it is complete, and send me a link.
Thanks again,
Jenny
Jennifer Edwards
johnsmachines 