Reports from the Void: 'Anomaly in the Sky'

On December 16th, 2020, the Singular Fortean Society received the following email:

Anomaly in the sky. In April of 1974, I witnessed what can only be a bright, glowing, large disc chasing me down the road at about 12:30 at night. I had seen a bright glow in the far distance only a couple minutes before it nearly landed on the trunk of my car. It eventually went away.
Terrified, I stayed in my car for some time after getting home, then ran to get in the house. My mom knew something was wrong. She questioned me later the next day. As it turns out, her friend witnessed this same anomaly herself from her kitchen window.

Investigator Tobias Wayland replied to the witness in an attempt to ascertain more details of their encounter, but received no response to his inquiry.

While reports of glowing, disc or saucer-shaped UFOs are relatively common, reportedly being chased by one is decidedly less so. There was, however, a similar incident reported over three decades ago in Western Australia.

On Wednesday, January 20th, 1988, two separate groups of people reported near simultaneous encounters with an unidentified flying object.

Faye Knowles said she and her three sons were driving through the Nullabor Plain from Perth in Western Australia at 2:45 a.m. when they were chased by an eggcup-shaped object along a remote stretch of outback highway. The object reportedly lifted their car off of the ground and covered it in a black, powdery ash. Knowles told police that her and her sons' speech changed during the encounter.

During their efforts to evade the UFO, the Knowles family reportedly reached speeds of over 100 mph, and while travelling at speed, burst a tire.

The driver of a truck headed in the same direction later reported he had witnessed a bright light hovering over their car in his rear view mirror.

Meanwhile, the crew of a tuna boat 50 miles away in the Great Australia Bight, a body of water off the Australian coast, said they were buzzed by a UFO shortly after the Knowles family's encounter, and that their voices were rendered unintelligible as a result.

A spokesman at the Royal Australian Air Force base in Edinburgh in South Australia told the press that he was not aware of any military aircraft in the area at the time of these incidents.

The police were initially skeptical, but ultimately took the sightings seriously.

″We were a little bit skeptical at first,″ Sgt. Jim Furnell of Ceduna Police in the state of South Australia told the Associated Press. ″But after investigating, we are treating the reports very seriously.″

He added that there was no way the crew of the tuna boat would have known about the Knowles family's experience when they reported their sighting.

″It apparently picked the car up off the road, shook it quite violently and forced the car back with such pressure that one of the tires was blown,″ Sgt. Furnell said. ″While this was happening the family said their voices were distorted and it was as if they were talking in slow motion.″

Forensic scientists reportedly examined a small amount of black, powdery ash found inside and outside Mrs. Knowles' car, but ultimately determined it to be consistent with material from burning, shredded rubber and brake linings, according to Monty Luke of the Australian Mineral Development Laboratories.

Reports from the Void is a repository to share those stories for which we do not have enough information to make a full report. This is usually because of little or no communication from the witness following their initial submission. The Singular Fortean Society will always provide as much information as possible regarding any correspondence during our attempts to speak with those involved.

This series is meant only to present you with the full breadth of the information sent to us, and makes no judgments towards the veracity of any stories shared within it.

To report your own encounter with the impossible, reach out to us directly at the Singular Fortean Society through our contact page.

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