The two are not mutually exclusive. One thing to be noted about UFO sightings are that they usually combine a number of anomalous conditions to produce the appearance of something 'unexplainable'
Ah, now we have the conjunction of a “number of anomalous conditions”…what ever happened to Occam? (after all UFO debunkers love to cite Occam don’t they!)
The key phrase being "in the vicinity"... would 120 miles be considered "in the vicinity"? and indeed, did anyone look for evidence of squid boats so far away?
” Robert Guard, the copilot, did recall seeing the squid fleet 130 nm east of Christchurch during the flight south between 0015 and 0100 hours. He also saw the SB fleet as the plane flew northeastward out of Christchurch over an hour later. “
(
http://brumac.8k.com/NEW_ZEALAND/NZSB.html)
And …
“Four days after the sighting the copilot made a tape recording of his recollections of the sighting. (…) … the copilot stated that he could see the bright white light of the squid fleet on the horizon (see Figure 1), which is consistent with the expected horizon distance (about 130 nm) at the altitude of the plane, 13,000 ft (3960 m) as it flew southeastward. In comparison with the brilliant white of the squid boat lights, the copilot noted that the unknown light was noticeably more orange. Since he had both "types" of light source (squid boats and the unidentified object) in sight at the same time (although not in the same direction) it is reasonable to accept the copilot's statement that he detected a definite color difference.” (
http://brumac.8k.com/NEW_ZEALAND/NZSB.html)
Oh, and the photo you supply - there is absolutely NO “green” or “orange” in squid boat lights – this is a known fact, they are intensely bright white. So your photo-representation is not a true (faithful) rendering of what a squid boat light really looks like. The colours you see are purely an artefact of having to reduce the exposure level…
Ireland addresses this in his article. His impression is that it was most likely a single squidboat and he presents a good case for it. I suggest you dig into your piggy bank and purchase it or are you just going to trust Dr. M.'s word on the matter?
Actually… Ireland’s article IS contained in one of Dr Maccabees reports – that you did NOT know
that shows me that you have not even read Dr Maccabee’s reports! Huh! …and he does NOT make “a good case for it” at all, in the article he merely states that because he
assumes there were SBs in the area, then that is what the cause was…
So, they saw some flashing lights and no actual craft. What happened to this radar target? Where did it go? Did it move west, east, south, or did it just "disappear"? What happened to the flashing light at that point? Did it follow the track? Not much of a contact if you ask me. A light that was lined up with a random contact if you asked me.
Yeah, of course…a random contact… the WATCC says, we have a target at X location. The pilot states yep, I see it at X location! Sure… that’s random! LOL.
It is amazing that you can not summarize things in your own words and simply parrot what Dr. M. writes without even trying to explain it. Are you just too lazy to try or don't you understand what he is writing? I think it is a crime that I use quotes for you when I really should state they are the words of Dr. M.
You’re rambling Astroguy. True scientists don’t let their emotions disturb their train of thought on a subject – especially when they lead them into making patently false and unintelligible statements like you just did.
For an example of an extended exercise in summary see here
and if I understand the meaning of your last sentence at all, then I consistently reference any quotes I use
as you well know, but interestingly, you RARELY do!
According to Klass, the plane was also visible on the Christchurch radar saw no such contact. What does that say? Dr. M. goes into the idea that the radar was not sensitive enough or the UFO was too low. However, if the plane was visible and the UFO was right next to it, it certainly would have been high enough, which is a poor argument. Dr. M. then goes on to attempt to show that AP can not be the cause for this target. One of his centerpieces is a rafractivity profile at Christchurch. That is all well and good but it completely ignores the fact that the radar was in Wellington and the plane was between Wellington and Christchurch. This profile is no good because it does not intersect the radar beam.
I’ll have to take all that on notice.
In this case, the only radar contact comes from the airplane's ground mapping mode radar. There was no radar contact from Christchurch and there was nothing from Wellington. Dr. M states this has a lot to do with the UFO being too low to be seen by either radar. Perhaps the light was on the water, just like a squidboat.
So not an AP then?
1. So, the boat said it was going to be in Pegasus bay (where the sighting took place btw). There is no indication that it changed location. Can you demonstrate the boat left pegasus bay and went someplace else?
It must have, because the ministry has NO SB there at the time of the sighting!
2. Ireland states in his article that boats were enroute between the fleet and shore and several were fishing singly.
So… given where the main squid fleet actually WAS… (130 nm EAST of Christchurch) then the boats mentioned MUST have been heading AWAY from the sighting area (from Wellington to go around the TOP of the South Island to get to the east coast…) and another fleet was located “110 nm South west of Christchurch” … but again, an “en route” boat MUST have been travelling
away from the sighting area (NOT across Pegasus bay) in order to head in such a direction. Besides…”en route” boats don’t have their fishing lights on!
…and fishing singly? Where?
In one case you want the pegasus bay boat to disappear/move after two weeks and in another you state that the boats had to stay where they said they were going to be. This paints your argument in a negative light. Keep digging away.
Huh? Who knows
what Klass’
alleged Pegasus Bay boat might have been doing! IF there WAS such a boat, given that it was but a single boat, it was possibly testing its running gear… and it does not take two weeks to do that. Besides, Pegasus Bay squid fishing?
“Most squid are open-sea animals… (http://www.teara.govt.nz/en/octopus-and-squid/5) and “Most of the time squid will be found at least 1,000 feet below the surface.” (http://www.squid-world.com/squid-habitat.html)
So squid fishing in Pegasus Bay? Extremely unlikely!
It was this northbound contact with the plane looping towards it (and then Startup promptly leaving when they got close) that is considered a probable squidboat. That was the whole arguement in the article. The information from Startup indicated they were approaching a relatively stationary target:
Ah, so now we get to the specifics!
See below for a detailed diagram.
You will note that you provide misinformation (non-factual information) here.
“At about 0229 the plane reached its final altitude of 13,000 ft and Startup decided to turn toward the light to see what would happen. At this time he had the impression that the light was traveling parallel to the plane and that if he made a “sudden” turn toward it he would have the light “on the nose of the aircraft” before it had a chance to react. He didn’t expect to have to turn very far before the plane would be heading toward the light. He initiated a turn at the rate of a 2 minute orbit and watched the instrument panel as well as the sky ahead. If any of his meters on the instrument panel had indicated abnormal operation he would turn back immediately. However, all the meters indicated normal operation. So he continued the turn and was surprised to find that he couldn’t get the light “on the nose” of the plane. It seemed to him that the light had stopped its forward motion. After about 30 seconds he had the impression that the light was taking an avoidance action that would prevent him from flying toward the light. Since he didn’t want to go around in a circle, he stopped the turn. By this time the plane had turned 92o as illustrated in Figure 6. Although the pilot, sitting in his seat at the left side of the flight deck, didn’t have a direct view of the light, he did see a glow from the object to the right of straight ahead. The others on the plane (Grant, Fogarty and Crockett standing and Guard in the right hand seat) could see it directly, clearly at a lower elevation than the airplane. It did not appear on the radar, suggesting that it was below the mapping mode radar beam, i.e., more than 15o below horizontal. As the plane flew in the southeast direction, again the direction to the light moved toward the rear. The copilot said the light moved so that it was between the plane and Banks Peninsula. (He also said he could see light from the Japanese squid fishing fleet on the horizon about a hundred miles east of the plane.)
(http://brumac.8k.com/ - A HISTORY OF THE NEW ZEALAND SIGHTINGS OF DECEMBER 31, 1978)
This puts paid to your “squidboat” hypothesis immediately! If Startup could NOT turn the plane to head toward the object (alleged SB), then either the squid boat was suddenly jet propelled and coincidently zoomed from its previously alleged (according to you, Klass, etc) “stationary” position, to stay away from the plane… or there was a moving object in the sky just as the plane’s radar and co-pilot visual and cameraman film confirmation shows!
The fact that there were numerous contacts present indicates that AP was dominant that night. From what I have seen from the interviews with the radar operators (on Nova and quoted by Klass), it was common for this to happen.
I am curious as to why nobody but the pilots/TV crew saw these lights as UFOs? Were there any people on shore or at sea that also saw these UFOs zipping around the skies? Why isn't there any confirmation from ground sources? Again, all we have are random contacts where the pilots/TV crew saw some lights in the sky. There is no evidence that these lights represented any "alien" craft.
You again “overstate” the case. APs had been observed before, but there is NO indication they were “common”. Particular weather conditions were known to cause them, but such conditions were not present on the night in question.
But the whole POINT is that there were reports of “UFO” activity from others! That is the precise reason WHY the reporter and camera crew were in the plane in the first place! Ughhh…
