Southern Africa Unexplained

Case No 116 · UFO Afrinews No 14, July 1996

Flashing Lights: Harare

1996 · Glen Lorne, Harare, in direct line with Ruwa; Mabvuku Township to the left, Zimbabwe

What was reported

From a hilltop garden in Glen Lorne on a clear March night, a racing cyclist and a safari guide watched a bright orange light some 15 to 20 km off toward Ruwa, which they judged about 250 metres up; the glow of Mabvuku Township lay separately to their left. After a minute it fell in an instant to about 50 metres and went out, and they took it for a flare. A minute later it came back, climbed, and vanished again after a minute. Outside again at about 20:45 they saw two small stationary lights roughly 500 metres apart flashing irregularly for ten minutes, one bobbing up and down now and then. A quarter of an hour later nothing remained. Both rejected a star, Venus and autokinesis. Marabini had heard three weeks earlier of someone seeing a Star of David shape emitting rays.

What Hind made of it

Witnesses ruled out star, Venus and autokinesis; a flare was considered for the first light.

Explanation offered
Flare (witnesses' first thought); star or Venus rejected

In their words

  • The flashing was definitely not autokinesis.

    Cynthia Hind, reporting the witnesses, spread 11

Cross references

  • Ariel School, Ruwa, 1994

Connected

  • Two round metallic UAPs over Glen Lorne (Hedebro letter)Case fileSame place

    Glen Lorne, eastern Harare: the Hedebro friend's two fast metallic objects of about 1988 and the 1996 hilltop watch toward Ruwa by Marabini and Lynch. Eight years apart, different phenomena.

  • The Children of Ariel SchoolCase fileSame place

    The Glen Lorne witnesses judged their orange light 15-20 km off toward Ruwa and Hind cross-references Ariel School; 18 months after the landing, at the peak of its publicity. The light's instant drop and extinction was first read by the witnesses themselves as a flare.

Source

Cynthia Hind, UFO Afrinews No 14 (July 1996), spread 11

Nearby

Stories within 60 km