Brian Vike's Favorite Cases.
Some of the sighting reports I will be posting are cases from past years. I found this report as well as others fascinating, also the person, in this case, Sourdough Sue Ward was such a delight and very interesting to speak to in a telephone conversation. This like other cases are buried in my Canada UFO Blog so I figured I would post some of my favorites.
Winter of 1966,
Time 9:00 p.m.
Dear Brian, In 1966, finding myself alone, except for the family cat, Caboodle, after the family breakup and ultimate divorce, I traveled up the Fraser River Canyon to the small village of Lillooet, two hundred road miles north of Vancouver.
My former C.O. from my Army days, (name deleted), lived in a mobile home and worked with (name deleted) on her Bridge River-Lillooet News. I joined them, and having spent a month living over The News Office with (name deleted), I learned I could rent a dandy suite overlooking the Fraser River Canyon.
The sliding doors opened onto a wide sun deck. The P.G.E. rails were just beyond the fence at the end of the lot. When the 110 car freights rumbled by I was face to face with the engineers. I used to try to list the many boxcars, the rolling stock of railroads from all over North America in those pre computer days.
At nights no lights shone from the few homes scattered on the bench land below, on the other side of the tracks. The highway connecting Lillooet with the outside world was on the far side of the river. Came the darkness, the valley was pitch black except for the odd set of headlights of cars traveling into town. There was no road on the mountainside which loomed up on the town side of the canyon.
One winter Friday night my friend had walked over for a visit. The folks in the adjoining suite had the TV on for the Dean Martin Show which aired at 9:00 p.m. My friend relaxed in an easy chair from which she could see out through the sliding doors. I sat opposite on the chesterfield, too far back to share her view. As we chatted, she suddenly, turned her head, and, staring out through the glass door, exclaimed in a sharp voice, "What's that ?"
I jumped up quickly to share her excitement and immediately saw a huge red swirling ball with flaring red orange flaming edges coming towards us from above the west side mountain.
Grabbing the glass door catch I shouted "let's get out onto the deck," which we did. As we stood side by side, we watched the whirling fire ball hurdle towards us, so fast that we both ducked down, putting our hands on our heads as we truly expected to be hit as it crashed upon us. But, as we crouched and watched, the thing hovered "just above the mountainside" so to speak, spinning and flaring, to right, to left, to right again, for a few seconds.
It hesitated on the final jerk to the right, then in erratic short jumps, still spinning and flaring, it began to recede, grow smaller, to nothing, back into the sky from whence it had come.
We returned to the room, quite shaken up, and my friend snapped, "Exactly what did we see ?"
I put into words much as I have in this account, using my extended arm to describe the movement. "Exactly !" she snapped.
Being Friday night with everything closed for the weekend, we had no way of finding out if anyone else had shared the sight. The news was being printed, not in Lillooet, but in Fort St. John at Ma'sson Dan's newspaper shop, so nothing was "of the moment"
By the time the weekend was over and folks were back on the job, we felt rather foolish in speaking of our UFO encounter. Had we not rushed to the sun deck, causing us to be physically involved, had we just focused and seen it with our sight, we may well have pondered if we had seen it at all.
I recall when I saw the movie "Strange Encounters" some years back I thought the UFO props were not nearly as exciting as what we had shared on that Friday night in Lillooet, B.C.
It is now August 20, 2000 and in Houston Newspaper, Wednesday 9 August 2000 one Brian Vike is asking for news of any sightings "past or present" and as my friend passed on at 83, years ago, and I am now living in (location deleted) on the shore of (location deleted) at age 87, I decided to pass on our joint experience of that special Friday night in Lillooet. My friend would truly approve !
My many thanks and warm wishes to Sourdough Sue Ward and her friend.
Sue's colorful name comes from her adventures in Dawson City, Yukon.
Names and location of course are deleted to protect their privacy.
Brian Vike, Director Kamloops British Columbia Canada UFO Research. Email: brian_vike@telus.net
Kamloops British Columbia Canada UFO Research.
