The Muscarello Sighting
At approximately 2 am on September 3, 1965, Norman Muscarello was hitchhiking to his parents' home in Exeter along Highway 150. Muscarello, 18, had recently graduated from high school and was about to leave for service in the U.S. Navy. He had been visiting his girlfriend at her parents' home in nearby Amesbury, Massachusetts; since he did not own a car he would catch a ride to and from his girlfriend's home. However, at that time of night there was little traffic on the highway, and as he walked he noticed 5 flashing red lights in some nearby woods. The lights illuminated the woods and a nearby farmhouse (the farm belonged to the Dining family, who were not at home at the time). The lights soon moved towards him, and Muscarello became terrified and dove into a ditch. The lights moved away and hovered near the Dining farmhouse before going back into the woods. Muscarello ran to the farmhouse, pounded on the door and yelled for help, but no one answered. When he saw a car coming down the road, he ran into the road and forced it to stop. The couple in the car drove him to the Exeter police station.
At the station Muscarello told his story to police officer Reginald Toland, who worked the night desk at the police station. Toland, who knew Muscarello, was impressed by his obvious fear and agitated state. Toland radioed police officer Eugene Bertrand, Jr., who had earlier in the evening passed a distressed woman sitting in her car on Highway 108. When Bertrand stopped and asked if she had a problem, the woman told him that a "huge object with flashing red lights" had been following her car for 12 miles and stopped over her car before flying away. Bertrand considered her a "kook" but did stay with her for approximately 15 minutes until she had calmed down and was ready to resume her drive.
After arriving at the police station and hearing Muscarello's story, Bertrand decided to drive back to the Dining farm with Muscarello to investigate the field where he had seen the UFO.
Read more about this topic: Exeter Incident
Famous quotes containing the word sighting:
“Radio put technology into storytelling and made it sick. TV killed it. Then you were locked into somebody else’s sighting of that story. You no longer had the benefit of making that picture for yourself, using your imagination. Storytelling brings back that humanness that we have lost with TV. You talk to children and they don’t hear you. They are television addicts. Mamas bring them home from the hospital and drag them up in front of the set and the great stare-out begins.”
—Jackie Torrence (b. 1944)