The Melton Police Pursuit

An object carrying lights hovered over the Melton shopping centre at twenty to one in the morning, according to the police officers who saw it. Then it flew a triangular circuit between Melton, Rockbank, Sydenham and Diggers Rest. At one point it headed straight for the Army's signals antenna array at Rockbank before veering away. Two constables saw it first. A sergeant and a chief inspector joined them and the officers kept it in view until six.

The archive's telling describes a near-silent wingless craft about thirty feet by twenty hovering low over the shopping centre. Chief Inspector Paul Hickman sketched it as a quiet delta-winged object flying low.

What is on the record

The outside record names Raymond Ellens, Peter Ferguson and Barry Harman. It gives the senior officer as Chief Inspector Hickman, which matches the archive. The archive's telling has a Sergeant Harmon, who is probably the Barry Harman of the outside record. The constables filed a written report and the Rockbank defence signals station was alerted. The case is carried in Chalker's files and in later Australian catalogues as a well-known police sighting.

There is one real disagreement. The archive's telling says there were no radar tracks despite the closeness of Tullamarine airport. Eberhart's catalogue, citing Chalker, says Tullamarine radar picked the object up. The archive cannot settle which is right. No explanation is on file.

Melton lies about 120 kilometres from Bendigo. This is a separate event from the archive's Bendigo wave and should not be read as part of it.

Why it sits where it does

This case grades L3 on two resolved claimants from one video on one channel. Those two are Hickman and the sergeant. The record behind them is stronger than that count, with at least four officers and a written police report. The archive does not hold that report. What the Melton officers followed through the night is not resolved here.