"Close Encounters Down Under" the series

For the past 6 weeks I’ve been posting on Facebook little pocket reviews and screen grabs of each episode airing, on the Blaze TV UK connection. of a new TV series exclusively dealing with UAP/UFO events from possibly the best part of the world – Oz, Australia, Down Under (and our friends across the big pond – New Zealand, off course, Kiwi country, land of the long white cloud, territory of Australia (just kidding on the last one – we have a great affection in bondage? Huh?) And yes, dear mother country, there is more to Australia and New Zealand, than "Neighbours" and "Wellington Paranormal", and don’t let “Wake in Fright” and “Wolf Creek” put you off.

I got the chance to watch the first episode of the new 6-part series "Close Encounters down under" via the Blaze TV UK connection, where it premiered on Thursday 5 January, 2023. Apparently it will air here in Australia on 7 MATE, sometime soon? I ultimately agreed to participate in filming for this show, after encouragement from Jamie Leonarder and the series producer Max Murch. I was interviewed back in June 2022 (having ventured out of "the COVID cave") on a broad cross section of case data from all over Australia, so I suspect I'll turn up again in other episodes, in a sort of commentary capacity, as the rest of Australia and New Zealand are covered. My main interest here was to assist a production that was attempting to present a UFO/UAP journey across these "great southern lands" - not often that a TV series offers up multiple episodes that focus on the UFO/UAP experience in these parts. Well, I found the first episode interesting, particularly with the focus on Tully 1966. There were other more recent curios - the Middlemount video of July 2019, a Gladstone area abduction milieu, a strange 2021 single frame security camera capture from central Queensland (perhaps something prosaic soaring past the camera?), and strange activity in the Townsville area. It must be obvious that such a program is hardly scratching the surface of the vast Australian and New Zealand UFO/UAP story. Hopefully interesting things to follow as this series does the rounds of these two countries. Here are some screen grabs from the first episode

Close Encounters Down Under episode 2 features the Bass Strait & New Zealand focusing on the disappearance of Cessna pilot Federick Valentich (with commentary from George Simpson author of "Nothing on Radar - the Valentich Mystery", myself and others), a striking close encounter event at Christchurch with witness Brian Grindrod, and an abduction/contact incident near Wellington involving Paul Simpson, via Roger Stankovic of MUFON down under. The Valentich "tape" perhaps should have been identified as a recreation. I would have like to have seen coverage of the New Zealand Gisborne milieu which I have looked into. Witness Bev Parsons and the work of Suzy Hansen's UFOFocus group would have been ideal presences. Again it is obvious this is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to cases down under. Here are some images from that episode

Back to Queensland in episode 3 of Close Encounters Down Under with Roger Stankovic MUFON Australia director providing commentary of Andy Gault's 2 videos (both taken during storms) and a close encounter with apparent entities shared with his partner from 2018/19, near Bundaberg. Local journalist Angeline Lowther reported on her own filming of a possible UFO/UAP in February 2019 and on retired farmer Trevor Garrad sightings. Harvard's astrophysicist Avi Loeb and Canberra based ANU astrophysicist Brad Tucker talk about the plan to retrieve a UAP or meteorite from the ocean floor near Papua. Gerald Vandaele describes his own witnessed sighting near Airlie Beach

"Close Encounters down under" episode 4 of 6 heads down to Victoria featuring the Westall 1966 case with witnesses Joy Clarke, Terry Peck and Paul Smith describing what they experienced, and Shane Ryan and myself providing commentary. The Burkes Flat "bent headlight beam" experience of Ron Sullivan gets coverage. Grant Lavac gives perspective on the FOI efforts to unravel the Australian Defence Department position (that they are doing nothing apparently). Avi Loeb gets a repeat cameo on the Galileo Project. Roger Stankovic gives an analysis of one of Andrew Radziewicz videos. Andrew describes his alien "communion" with a focus on CE5 "meditation" mediated contacts, with Mary Rodwell adding perspective. Ben Hurle describes he & his sister's experience near Bairnsdale. I get to conclude, on the show, "The overall impression one gains, I guess, of the surface view of a lot of these close encounter type sightings, is that they appear to be nuts and bolts sometimes, but then the more you dig down into these sightings, they seem beyond our understanding of physics. You are getting into the cutting edge of, I don't know, dimensional physics, and that kind of stuff. Its a very interesting area to trawl through, particularly if you are an advanced physicist. This is a kind of interesting stamping ground, because people seem to be having experiences that kind of interact with earth domains, so its an area that warrants serious scientific attention. Its something that people, particularly in scientific domains, are starting to play catch-up with."

(Shane Ryan: primary researcher, rather than primary witness)

I watched episode 5 of the 6-part series "Close Encounters Down under" last night. Bridgett Sinclair took a film of a strange light near Newcastle. Roger Stankovic of MUFON Australia concluded was "unknown ... a UAP." A couple, Rob (a science teacher) and Shelly Hartland, at Darlington just out of Perth, WA, have taken many photos and some footage of things they think are unexplained, some of which I think were possibly explainable. The couple share a hobby in photography and this led to sharing another, securing imagery of things in the sky that may be unexplained. Dr. Brad Tucker offers some commentary.

                                                                      Insects?

Peter Khoury's experiences were covered in part which led to a hair from a possible abduction episode featuring a "nordic" looking female being. I was involved in a team that undertook a DNA investigation, which yielded unusual results. The program incorrectly said Peter Khoury was getting ready for work, and that the hair was examined at "government labs." It was examined at a number of private labs with the work coordinated by then CSIRO senior DNA scientist Dr. Horace Drew, working in a private capacity. Hypnotic regression played only a minor role in Peter Khoury's case investigation, as he consciously recollected what apparently happened. Mary Rodwell shared a case in which it was. Unstated in this "Close Encounters Down Under" episode was that Peter Khoury's experience and Mary Rodwell's client case were both featured on the SBS documentary "My Mum speaks to aliens" in seperate polygraph tests. Peter Khoury passed, Mary Rodwell's client did not. I will note here that I had tried to discourage Peter Khoury from taking the polygraph test as I regarded them as scientifically unreliable. Here are some screen grabs from the 5th "Close Encounters Down Under" episode.

Friday on my mind ... had me thinking, catch up with what I think might be (correct me if I'm wrong Max Murch of EQ Media?) the last episode of Season 1 (hopefully there might be more seasons?) - episode 6 of 6 - this time loosely "rural Australia", watched via the Blaze TV UK connection. Still no information of an airing down under, but the style of the show is an attractive encouragement to come down and experience the place and take in the UFO/UAP haunts the show and the long history of such things down under have described. 

This episode starts dark, very dark indeed (with a viewer warning) with accounts up Mackay Queensland way of "cattle mutilations" with a possible UFO connection. Farmers Mick and Judy Cook described what has happened on their property over the years. This has Linda Moulton Howe giving commentary on her dark journey into this harrowing topic. The "mute" mystery has drawn all sorts of commentary over the decades ranging from prosaic predation, secret programs with bizarre agendas, through to ET connections. Some cases are very strange and confronting.

Phil Tindale describes he and his twin brother's observation of "UFOs in combat" on the outskirts of Adelaide back on 7 February 1980. Phil relates this to a close encounter event that drew headlines at the time - the UFO in the tree episode involving local Stirling man Darryl Brown. It seems a lot was going on that night.

Sheryl Gotschall provides some thoughtful commentary on the range of "alienation" effects, some good, some bad.

Then some photo images - the Trent photo upside down? Intentional? The program after all is about the "down under" perspective.

Then Damien Nott describes some of his extraordinary "UFO lightning rod" experiences and his attempts to capture these "strange things" on camera, with one involving my friend Mike Williams. Like most experiences covered in the series, only a light touch is revealed, with a deeper dive necessary. 

Roger Stankovic of MUFON Australia provides some commentary on UFO shapes.

Carly Portch, currently a radio announcer, describes a frightening country road trip shared with a friend on the way to Griffith in South West New South Wales, that seemed like a classic "Min Min light" encounter. Aspa Leonarder provides some background. I provide a "nature unbound" perspective, but highlight that some cases seem unexplainable in prosaic terms.

From rural Victoria young farmer Pat provides an impressive description of an encounter that unnerved him and his dog on his parents’ property back in 2005. An unseen "presence" led to terrified flight, with the mystery compounded the next day with the discovery of a classic simple "crop circle" which unfortunately he failed to photograph or document.

Some screen grabs from episode 6:

So 6 episodes delivering a fascinating tour of "Close Encounters Down Under" - still just the tip of the massive UFO/UAP iceberg.

Hmm ... did I ever tell you about a very strange letter my UFO group UFOIC received in 1970. I didn’t formerly join the Sydney based committee until I moved to Sydney in 1975. In the letter a woman describes the experience of her and her daughter being terrified by a road encounter near Kurrajong, way back in 1944, with what looked like “a huge iceberg” “from “nowhere”: “It had a white ice brilliance that we could not bear to look at and a coldness as we approached it.”

Strange close encounters down under indeed.