An Extension of La Rochelle? Sawmill motor failure near Mutare

What was reported

Jakob Niewergelt, a mechanical engineer managing a sawmill at Mutare, 9 km from La Rochelle, gave Hind a statement she links to that case. On a clear weekday around 10 am, probably the week after 15 August 1981, he was drinking tea when a pinpoint of intensely white light flared high overhead, so bright it struck his eyes though he was not looking up. A colleague thought it an explosion; a clerk also noticed a flash. Moments later the operator of the radial arm saw outside the factory reported its 20 hp motor had stopped. There was no jam and the motor was cool, yet it would not turn. Dismantled, its armature solder had melted into the coil. Electrical engineers could not explain it and joked about flying saucers, then the talk of Mutare. He still keeps the motor.

What Hind made of it

Hind stresses the motor stopped instantly rather than running down, that the weather was clear with no lightning, and that nothing explains the failure; she dates it to the week after La Rochelle because the sawmill does not run at weekends and the incident was fresh in people's minds.

Explanation offered
Explosion (rejected); neon office light flashing (rejected); overheating (rejected, motor was cool)

In their words

• a white point in the sky so bright that it hit the eyes even without looking up.

• The motor, it was emphasised, did not just run down; it stopped instantly.

• oh well, Flying Saucers!!!

Cross references

• La Rochelle case, 15 August 1981
• Odd Points to Ponder, p 7 (Clifford Muchena)

Connected

• Fireball and three shining men at La RochelleCase fileHind follow-up

  Hind titles the sawmill motor failure 'An Extension of La Rochelle?' and dates it to the week after 15 Aug 1981 (weekday, c.10 am) by inference from the sawmill's working week and the freshness of the story. The two sites are c.9 km apart. Niewergelt gave his statement when 'flying saucers' were 'the talk of Mutare', so the link was made after the La Rochelle story had already spread locally.

• Fireball and three shining men at La RochelleCase fileSame window

  15 Aug 1981 (18:00) and a weekday c.17-21 Aug 1981 (10:00): two events within one week, the only week in the cluster with two independent witnesses of separate incidents. Different phenomena though: a ground-level fireball with figures versus a high overhead flash with an electrical effect.

• Letter from Gunter Hofer: the Mutare sawmill motor failure (La Rochelle extension)Case fileHind follow-up

  Gunter Hofer's letter in Afrinews 5 proposes an electromagnetic-pulse mechanism for the sawmill motor's melted armature solder and why indoor motors were spared. A reader's mechanism, not a new observation; Hind printed it without reply.

Source

Cynthia Hind, UFO Afrinews No 2 (June 1989), spread 07-08

In the archive

This case became a story on this site.

1981 · Zimbabwe

The fireball at La Rochelle

A ball of fire rolled across the lawns and up the tower of the Courtaulds' old house. Then three men in shiny overalls turned round, and the foreman went down.

LIFTLift

Documented

Nearby

Stories within 60 km

• The horses on Hospital Hill 1988 · 3 km