Letter: orange ball follows car from Selukwe to Shabani

What was reported

Marianne Griffiths of Fourways recalls a sighting in mid-1974 while driving from Selukwe to Shabani in Zimbabwe at about eight in the evening. A big orange ball, like a setting sun, appeared behind the car and followed it at a constant distance, hovering above the trees and staying with them even around bends, as she watched from the passenger seat. When they reached the lights of Shabani it suddenly disappeared. She is sure it was not a reflection of other cars' lights or of the moon. She read in the newspaper that a similar sighting had occurred outside Fort Victoria the same week, which Hind links to the Peter and Frances case printed next.

What Hind made of it

Hind notes the Fort Victoria sighting she read of refers to the Peter and Frances case recorded below.

Explanation offered
Reflection of car lights or the moon, rejected by the witness

In their words

• we noticed a big orange ball following us, like when the sun sets, that hovered above the trees

Cross references

• Peter and Frances sighting, June 1st 1974
• Fort Victoria newspaper report

Connected

• Vanishing 'bus' on the Shabani strip road (Authers and Sealy)Case fileSame place

  Both on the Selukwe/Shurugwi-to-Shabani road corridor, 28 km apart, a year apart (mid-1974 and August 1975), both at dusk or after dark with the object accompanying a car until the town lights. Different witnesses, reported decades apart.

• Aubrey and Russell: car stops on the Selukwe strip roadCase fileSame behaviour

  An object keeps station with a moving car and then vanishes without receding: Marianne Griffiths' orange ball holding distance round bends, Aubrey and Russell following the blue bubble until it was simply gone. Independent witnesses about 40 km apart.

• Vanishing 'bus' on the Shabani strip road (Authers and Sealy)Case fileHind follow-up

  Hind works backwards from later material in both: she ties Griffiths' newspaper memory to the Peter and Frances Fort Victoria sighting of 1 June 1974 printed next, and she retells the Authers/Sealy bus from her own 1982 book UFOS-AFRICAN ENCOUNTERS to gloss Case No 78.

Source

Cynthia Hind, UFO Afrinews No 7 (January 1993), spread 17

Nearby

Stories within 60 km

• The bus that vanished on the Shabani strip road 1975 · 28 km