The Clarenville Constable

When Constable James Blackwood flashed his cruiser's headlights at the object, the public record says, it seemed to flash back in the same pattern. Blackwood of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police had answered a resident's call at about 1.50 a.m. He told of studying the object through binoculars and then through a 15x to 60x telescope. It was oval and metallic. Its blue and red-white lights flashed rapidly and its underside glowed. It hung off Random Island for about an hour and a half, turning slowly and making quick movements. Then it moved off and suddenly vanished.

The resident who called it in had reported the same object a week earlier. He looked through the telescope that night and confirmed the sighting.

What is on the record

Two claimants are resolved: Blackwood and the resident, a married man in his mid-forties whom the public record names as Mr Lethbridge. The wider record says about a dozen residents watched the object over the water for one to two hours. That is the public record's figure and not the archive's count.

For a sighting of this kind the paper trail is good. Blackwood filed an RCMP report and the sighting was covered on CBC and NTV news. In 2020 the Royal Canadian Mint issued a commemorative coin for it. The town's own account dates the night to 27 October. The archive follows 26 October with the rest of the public record. The archive does not yet hold the RCMP report itself. No ordinary explanation has been accepted.

Why it sits where it does

A police officer with a telescope and a second witness who had seen the object before give this file its L3 grade, and make it stronger than most single-telling cases. The police report exists outside the archive and is a candidate to strengthen it further. What hovered off Random Island is not resolved here.