National Archives of Australia releases UFO files
UK’s National Archives released more UFO files from the Ministry of Defence less than a month ago. Now it’s Australia’s turn. The Sydney Morning Herald reports that the National Archives of Australia released UFO files to the public. These files, from the 1970s and 1980s, have been released under the National Archives’ thirty-year rule—an act approved by Parliament that opens files to the public after thirty years.
Many interesting UFO sightings are documented in the files. The Sydney Morning Herald highlights a few notable cases, including one in which a high-altitude UFO was detected on radar near an RAAF base traveling at speeds of 1100 to 6500 km/h.
The Newcastle Herald reports that “A note attached to the files says the RAAF has not been responsible for collecting UFO sightings since 1994.” Interestingly, a different memo states the RAAF collected sighting reports up to 1996. But the Department of Defence allegedly continued taking UFO sighting reports until November of 2000.
With this latest release of UFO files from Australia, it would seem that the Department of Defence did some housekeeping during the past year. It was only a year ago when they announced that their UFO files had been lost. Back in June 2011, the Sydney Morning Herald sought UFO files from the Department of Defence, but the department’s Freedom of Information assistant director informed them that only one file could be located, and “the others had been destroyed.”
It doesn’t appear that the latest Australia UFO files have been added to the National Archives UFO page yet, but they can be located with a simple search on their site.