Ariel School UFO Landing - Zimbabwe, 1994
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In September of 1994, more than 60 children at the Ariel primary school in Zimbabwe witnessed a strange silver object land outside the playground, and were approached by small, black beings with large, entrancing eyes. The children’s stories alarmed their teachers, and aroused the curiosity of the BBC, and the esteemed Harvard Psychiatrist, John E. Mack. While the common elements in the children’s stories suggest that the object and the beings were physically real, the many divergent details, and the kids’ highly personal reactions, suggest that there are many subjective elements to UFO and entity encounters that we don’t yet understand.
The Ariel Incident
The Ariel Primary School is a private institution in the agricultural community of Ruwa, 22 km outside of Harare, the capital city of Zimbabwe. The school was founded by area farmers in 1991, and by 1994, it had more than 200 students from grades 1 to 7, or from 6 to 12 years old. The students were a racially diverse group, though most of them were from wealthier farming families. Friday, September 16 was a clear and warm, sunny day. During the regular 10:30 am recess, all of the teachers were attending a staff meeting inside the school, and only one adult was outdoors, operating a tuckshop, or snack store, on the playground. Shortly after recess began, the tuckshop attendant, Alyson Kirkman, volunteer and mother to one of the Ariel students, said that a bunch of kids ran into the shop and told her about a little “black man” on the playground. Kirkman thought that the kids were trying to trick her, and refused to leave the shop.(1)
Shortly after, dozens of children rushed into the school screaming about a landed craft outside the schoolyard, and little “black men” with big, black eyes. The teachers could tell that the kids were deeply frightened, but they could not believe what they were saying.(2) The school’s headmaster, Colin Mackie, sat the students down and had them each produce a drawing of the things they saw, as well as a written account of their experiences. These efforts committed the childrens’ earliest memories to record, and created crucial documentation for later investigators. Shortly after classes ended and the kids were sent home for the weekend, teachers saw several parents searching the ground at the edge of the schoolyard with their children.(3) The yard was virtually empty, with minimal grass, no trees or bushes, and only a few play structures near the classrooms. The children said that the beings appeared beyond the fence at the furthest point from the school: not a place where the children typically played. Beyond this fence was a field covered in brush and short trees. There was nothing there that could have been mistaken for a UFO or entity, and no indication that anything had been there at all.
The following Monday, the school was inundated with letters from parents asking what had happened to their children on Friday that made them so frightened and upset. Several students were traumatized, and did not return to school for several days after the event.(4) That week, Tim Leach, senior correspondent with the BBC, visited the school, and other African news outlets picked up the story as well, including South African and Zimbabwean state television channels. Leach spoke with the children and had them tell their stories for the first time on video. He found that they were all genuinely shaken, and was convinced that they believed what they were saying. Leach later claimed that despite all his experience as a war reporter, it was the Ariel School incident that frightened him most.
Cynthia Hind, a MUFON field investigator and editor of UFO Afrinews, was the first ufologist on the case. Gunter Hofer, an electronics enthusiast and acquaintance of Hind’s, accompanied her, and swept the yard with a Geiger Counter, a metal detector, and a magnetometer, with no unusual finds. The team also sent ground samples to the University of Zimbabwe, which returned with no significant anomalies.(5) Whatever the children saw - if anything - were then only memories. After reviewing their drawings and first written accounts, Hind interviewed 62 of the witnesses grades 3 and up, and spoke with the school’s teachers and administrators.(6) Dr. John E. Mack, the noted Harvard Medical School Psychiatrist and ufologist, was visiting Africa at the time to explore the abduction phenomenon there, and visited Ariel School. He spent two days talking with the kids, accompanied by his assistant and a South African TV camera operator, who filmed some of the interviews.(7)
The Sighting
Hind and Mack found that the witnesses' stories conflicted on many details, but converged on a few key claims. Most students agreed that a round, elliptical-shaped silver-coloured object appeared amongst some trees just beyond the boundary of the school yard. The object had a lustrous surface, and a bright white or golden glow.(8) Most of the students only saw the object on the ground, but some claimed to have seen it flying overtop of the schoolyard before landing. The object glowed brightly from its landing place, attracting the kids’ attention, so they ran towards the fence to investigate. At this point, one or two small, black beings approximately one meter tall emerged from the object. Some kids said that one paced back and forth on the ground, and others said they saw one on the object doing the same thing.
The being on the ground then began to move towards the students. The beings were mostly black, with pale faces, and huge, elongated black eyes that were angled inwards. Very few of the students reported any other details about the beings’ faces, though at least one saw a nose and mouth. Twelve-year-old Lisil and 8-year-old Emily remember the being hovering over the ground, rather than walking, though others described it taking steps. Emily said that two beings hopped alongside her and Lisil, as if to imitate the girls skipping on the playground, though their feet never touched the ground.(9)
After covering a short distance, the figure or figures stopped and stared at the children, who all felt compelled to stare back in return. Emily said that the two beings she saw appeared in front of her instantaneously. At this point, some of the students began to feel that the beings were communicating with them telepathically, and a few students felt a rush of wind blow by. Several children saw visions of environmental catastrophe: Lisil said that she saw a vision of Earth after all trees had been cleared, and there was no air left to breathe, and received a non-verbal warning about humans destroying the planet.(10) Another student saw visions of polluted oceans. Emily saw a quick succession of still images showing scenes of the environment in crisis, and was urged to use technology more responsibly.(11) Another student, Emma, received a similar message about humanity’s destructive use of technology, and given the imperative that we “musn’t get too technologed.”(12)
Eleven-year-old Salma was holding Emma’s hand during the encounter, and yet she has no memory of any communication at all, though she felt that the being was gazing into her soul, as she put it. Both Salma and Emily have stated that they felt that time was distorted for the duration of the encounter. Salma said that although she tried to run to the protection of her younger siblings, she was unable to break eye contact with the being. After several minutes of staring at the children - perhaps as many as 15 - the encounter abruptly ended, and the intruders disappeared. At least one student said that he saw the beings climb back inside the object and fly away again, but most said that the beings and the UFO simply vanished on the spot.(13) Emily claimed that they disappeared the instant that the bell rang for the end of recess, and her sense of reality immediately returned to normal.
Analysis
Though many of the students agreed on these details, there was a considerable amount of variation in their stories, and some outright contradiction. Some students reported seeing the black entities, but not the silver object; other students described the object in vivid detail but had no recollection of the entities. Some students nearby to the action even said that they saw nothing at all. Multiple students attested to seeing a cluster of objects flying in the air, while others were adamant that they saw only one. As Hind noted, although most of the students identified the object as some sort of vessel or craft, they could not agree on its appearance. Students variously drew windows, doors, lights, cockpits, landing gear, and many combinations of the above. Two boys said that it had stripes of black and green; others that there was a platform around the outside.(14) One child drew it red. Most agreed, however, that it was generally elliptical in shape.
There were also several different accounts of how the object arrived on the ground. Several noted that they saw flashes of bright, colourful lights above their heads before the sighting, and at least two students claimed to have heard loud noises in the sky. One student even described a flute-like sound.(15) Another student claimed to have witnessed the object and several auxiliaries flying along some electricity wires beside the schoolyard before landing in the field.(16) He said that they flew over him with flashing red lights, disappearing and reappearing elsewhere in the sky several times before landing. Other students drew the object flying overhead in their illustrations as well.
There was generally more agreement on the appearance of the ufonauts, but accounts varied here as well. Some described the figures as having long, black hair, while other students claimed to have seen no hair at all. One student described the beings as looking like little, “plump” humans, with long, straight hair, though Emily saw beings with long necks and spindly limbs.(17) Some students claimed that the beings wore skin-tight garments or shiny suits, and others thought that they were naked, with black skin. One child claimed that the figures “looked just like a shadow.”(18) Another young girl said that there were three beings: in black, red, and white.(19)
While most teachers admitted to being initially skeptical of the children’s stories, they later came to realise how profound the experience had been for the witnesses. The Ariel School headmaster acknowledged that he believed that the children saw “something,” but suggested that some of their recollections were products of their imaginations.(20) However, other teachers were more sympathetic to the children's claims. It was difficult for them to accept that the children’s imaginations had caused them all to conjure up such a strange experience, and to react so dramatically. The teachers were generally convinced that the students could not have faked their hysteria when running into the school that morning, and that no one could have forced dozens of children to play along with the same hoax. Hind agreed. Mack was also convinced that the students had shared an authentic experience, and that it was unlikely, if not impossible, that they had all staged a hoax.(21)
And the Ariel children were not the only ones to see strange things around Ruwa and Harare. On the morning of the kids’ encounter, a woman who owned a farm near the school saw a bright orange ball of light outside her chicken coop.(22) The day before, a mother and her son reported seeing a craft ahead of their car, around the same time that three Ariel students saw an object shaped like a “cigarette” above the schoolyard.(23) And the day before that, thousands of people across eastern Africa saw massive lights in the sky. Many of these sightings were probably due to a meteor shower in the area, but Hind received calls and letters from numerous people asserting that they had seen a fireball with a tail of sparks and smaller lights.(24) Like many UFO and entity encounters, the Ariel School incident appears to have been part of a broader wave of sightings.
Significance
Hind and Mack’s research on the Ariel Incident was never published as a formal report. Hind shared some details on the case in UFO Afrinews in 1995, and more in her 1996 book, UFOs Over Africa.(25) Mack was killed by a drunk driver in 2004, before publishing any of his work on the incident. After his death, Mack’s family created the John E. Mack Institute, which hired filmmaker Randall Nickerson to produce a film based on Mack’s involvement with the case. Nickerson went on to find Tim Leach as well as several of the Ariel School witnesses - then in their mid-to-late 20s - and arranged a reunion in Los Angeles in 2013.(26) He has also organized a number of public appearances and media interviews to help the Ariel school witnesses share their stories. Nickserson’s film, Ariel Phenomenon, is now complete and seeking distribution.
There is no doubt that the Ariel School students saw something unusual that day, but what it was is still unclear. Nothing about the object or the entities suggested a particular origin, either on Earth or in outer space. The beings conformed in many ways to the image of the grey “visitors” popularized by Whitley Strieber’s Communion in 1987, but differed greatly in other ways, including in the presence of hair, squat bodies, and black skin or body suits. Still, they were similar to other commonly encountered entities in the sense that they only stood about a meter tall. Nickerson has also claimed at a public talk that many of the children’s stories were extremely bizarre, and highly illogical. For example, he spoke of one student who said that he saw one of the black beings approach across the field, then vanish, and instantly reappear where it started, only to repeat the exact same approach.
Perhaps the numerous discrepancies in the childrens’ accounts were due to their failures to accurately recall what they’d seen. After all, it’s well known that human memory is extremely faulty, especially when memories are formed under stressful and traumatic circumstances. Alternatively, the discrepancies in the children’s accounts may reflect real differences in the things themselves, or in the children’s perception of those things, rather than simply differences in their recollection of those things. Ufologist John Keel proposed that UFOs were vessels for “ultraterrestrials,” or interdimensional beings, that could somehow manipulate how they appeared, or how we perceived them. Jacques Vallée made a similar argument in suggesting that UFOs are both physically real, and culturally constructed, either by some mind-interfacing technological operation, or a collective act of psychic projection. These considerations have moved some ufologists to focus attention away from the strictly material aspects of the UFO phenomenon, and towards their effects on witnesses.
Nickerson, too, has focused on the effects that this event has had on witnesses, and his documentary offers a fuller view of the ways in which it changed them. It was a dark and frightening experience for the majority: one student said that the being looked “evil,” as if it wanted to “come and take” the kids.(27) Many of the younger children said that they feared that the little men were coming to eat them. Lisil told Mack that when she got home that day she felt “horrible inside,” describing an anxiety about humans not treating the environment with enough respect. Still, years later, many of the students contacted by Nickerson and other journalists claim that it was a powerful and transformative experience for them, that initiated lifelong changes in their openness to new ideas, and their general sense of purpose. For example, Salma pursued degrees in International Relations and Human Rights Law, and claims that the incident taught to her to believe her own experiences, regardless of what people thought of them. Lisil became a social support worker. She said that she has always felt a strong duty to give back and “do her part” since the incident. Emily began producing art, with pieces that frequently feature otherworldly beings. Mack made similar kinds of observations of abductees - or experiencers - in general: he claimed that many experiencers seek out more fulfilling, outreach-based jobs after their encounters, become better stewards of the environment, and develop a greater sense of spirituality.(28) It’s difficult to imagine that the students could have effected these changes on the basis of a mistaken sighting, or an imagined incident.
Summary
What is particularly striking about the Ariel School case is the sheer number of witnesses, and the diversity of the student body. The fact that none of the witnesses have gone back on their claims, or confessed to a hoax, even after more than 25 years, is a huge point in favor of their veracity.(29) Witnesses such as Salma, Lisil, and Emily continue to speak about their experiences at public events and on a variety of media platforms. But while there’s no doubt that the kids saw something highly unusual that day, the discrepancies in their accounts also suggests that there was a strong subjective component to their experiences. Whatever the kids at Ariel School saw that morning, it moved them all on a very deep level, and effected lasting changes in their lives. And maybe that was the point.
Notes:
1) Cynthia Hind, “The Children of Aerial School,” UFO Afrinews no. 11 (February 1995), 19. http://ufoafrinews.com/pdfs/UFO_AFRINEWS11-150.pdf.
2) According to one teacher, “I was very sceptical in the beginning as well. I believed that they had seen something, but I wasn’t prepared to accept that it was anything supernatural or anything like that,” in Sac Seti, “Ariel School UFO Sighting in Ruwa, Zimbabwe – September 1994,” YouTube video, 31:05, Posted July 29, 2014, https://youtu.be/IrM93GnmY4M.
3) According to the Headmaster, Colin Mackie: “That is when I really became concerned. Because if there was something [beyond the playground fence], then I didn’t really want everybody walking down there,” in Gunter Hofer, “Ariel School UFO landing 1994,” YouTube video, 21:52, Posted November 3, 2012, https://youtu.be/eBqKJHSrYZg.
4) McMenaminsVIDEOS, "Randall Nickerson presenting the Ariel Phenomenon with two of the original eye witnesses," YouTube video, 2:11:57. Posted May 7, 2019, https://youtu.be/UCqVpwg0oPc.
5) Cynthia Hind, “Ariel School Report,” UFO Afrinews no. 12 (July 1995), 10, https://www.ufoafrinews.com/pdfs/UFO_AFRINEWS12-150.pdf.
6) Hind puts the number of witnesses interviewed at 62 in the following clip, Paranormalcentral, “62 School children see UFO land and alien beings come out,” YouTube video, 3:35, https://youtu.be/aabVQPlNR4E; Cynthia Hind, "The Visit of John Mack, M.D. to Africa," UFO Afrinews no. 11, 24.
7) Linda Matchan, “An Out-of-this-World Assignment,” Boston Globe (7 June 2009).
8) “It looked like a saucer, but the shape wasn’t really round,” in Gunter Hofer, “Ariel School UFO.”
9) EARTH MYSTERY NEWS - EMN, “Zimbabwe UFO Child Conactee Speaks Publicly For The 1st Time,” YouTube video, 6:19, Posted June 16, 2016, https://youtu.be/jaLvp-BkqAo.
10) “It was like, in the world all the trees had just gone down, and there would be no air and people would be dying,” in Sac Seti, “Ariel School UFO.”
11) Emily’s testimony in EARTH MYSTERY NEWS - EMN, “Zimbabwe UFO,”; Alejandro Rojas, “Randall Nickerson & Emily Trim, Ariel Phenomenon”. Podcast UFO. Podcast audio, September 10, 2019. https://podcastufo.com/podcast/369-randall-nickerson-emily-trim-ariel-phenomenon.
12) McMenaminsVIDEOS. "Randall Nickerson presenting."
13) McMenaminsVIDEOS. "Randall Nickerson presenting."
14) Hind, “UFO Flap in Zimbabwe,” UFO Afrinews no. 11, 20.
15) Sac Seti, “Ariel School UFO.”
16) Cynthia Hind. "1994 Close Encounter at Ruwa, Zimbabwe," UFO Afrinews 1994, https://ufocasebook.com/2008b/1994zimbabwe.html; Hind, “Ariel School Report,” UFO Afrinews no. 12, 10.
17) “It wasn’t curly. That thing almost looked like a hippy!” in Gunter Hofer, “Ariel School UFO.”
18) Gunter Hofer, “Ariel School UFO.”
19) Hind, “Ariel School Report,” UFO Afrinews no. 12, 10.
20) Gunter Hofer, “Ariel School UFO.”
21) Sac Seti, “Ariel School UFO.”
22) “Earlier that day, Mrs Stevens, whose farm is close to the school, said that she had gone up to go to the bathroom, in the early hours, when she saw a huge orange glow from her window, over her chicken house. It was like a big round ball.” Hind, “Ariel School Report,” UFO Afrinews no. 12, 13.
23) "Remembering Zimbabwe’s great alien invasion," Mail & Guardian (September 4, 2014), https://mg.co.za/article/2014-09-04-remembering-zimbabwes-great-alien-invasion.
24) Hind, “UFO Flap in Zimbabwe,” UFO Afrinews no. 11, 4 - 6; Hind, “Ariel School Report,” UFO Afrinews, no. 12, 7.
25) Hind, UFO Afrinews, no. 11, 1 - 42; Hind, UFO Afrinews, no. 12, 1 - 42, http://ufoafrinews.com/pdfs/UFO_AFRINEWS11-150.pdf. Cynthia Hind, UFOs Over Africa (Madison: Horus House, 1996).
26) "Remembering Zimbabwe’s," Mail & Guardian.
27) Sac Seti, “Ariel School UFO.”
28) John Mack, Passport to the Cosmos: Human Transformation and Alien Encounters, Commemorative ed. (White Crow Books 2011), 15 - 19.
29) “It was a cross-section of Zimbabweans: black African children from several tribes, coloured children (a cross-breeding of black and white), Asian children (with parents born in Zimbabwe but whose grandparents had come from India) and white children, mostly Zimbabwean-born, but whose parents were either from South Africa or Britain,” Hind, “Ariel School Report,” UFO Afrinews no. 12, 7.
Sources:
EARTH MYSTERY NEWS - EMN. “Zimbabwe UFO Child Conactee Speaks Publicly For The 1st Time.” YouTube video, 6:19. Posted [June 16, 2016]. Accessed February 11, 2020, https://youtu.be/jaLvp-BkqAo.
Hind, Cynthia. "1994 Close Encounter at Ruwa, Zimbabwe," UFO Afrinews 1994. Accessed February 11, 2020, https://ufocasebook.com/2008b/1994zimbabwe.html.
Hind, Cynthia. UFO Afrinews, no. 11 (February 1995). Accessed February 11, 2020, http://ufoafrinews.com/pdfs/UFO_AFRINEWS11-150.pdf.
Hind, Cynthia. UFO Afrinews, no. 12 (July 1995). Accessed February 11, 2020, https://www.ufoafrinews.com/pdfs/UFO_AFRINEWS12-150.pdf.
Hind, Cynthia. UFOs Over Africa. Madison: Horus House, 1996.
Hofer, Gunter. “Ariel School UFO landing 1994.” YouTube video, 21:52. Posted [November 3, 2012]. Accessed February 11, 2020, https://youtu.be/eBqKJHSrYZg.
Mack, John. Passport to the Cosmos: Human Transformation and Alien Encounters, Commemorative ed. White Crow Books, 2011.
Matchan, Linda. “An Out-of-this-World Assignment.” Boston Globe, June 7, 2009.
McMenaminsVIDEOS. "Randall Nickerson presenting the Ariel Phenomenon with two of the original eye witnesses." YouTube video, 2:11:57. Posted [May 7, 2019]. Accessed February 11, 2020, https://youtu.be/UCqVpwg0oPc.
Paranormalcentral. “62 School children see UFO land and alien beings come out.” YouTube video, 3:35. Accessed February 11, 2020, https://youtu.be/aabVQPlNR4E.
"Remembering Zimbabwe’s great alien invasion." Mail & Guardian. September 4, 2014. Accessed February 11, 2020, https://mg.co.za/article/2014-09-04-remembering-zimbabwes-great-alien-invasion.
Rojas, Alejandro. “Randall Nickerson & Emily Trim, Ariel Phenomenon”. Podcast UFO. Podcast audio, September 10, 2019. Accessed February 11, 2020, https://podcastufo.com/podcast/369-randall-nickerson-emily-trim-ariel-phenomenon, https://stitcher.com/podcast/antique-auction-forum/podcast-ufo-podcast-feed/e/63819893.
Sac Seti. “Ariel School UFO Sighting in Ruwa, Zimbabwe – September 1994.” YouTube video, 31:05. Posted [July 29, 2014]. Accessed February 11, 2020, https://youtu.be/IrM93GnmY4M.
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Think Anomalous is created by Jason Charbonneau. Research by Jason Charbonneau. Illustrations by V. R. Laurence. Music by Josh Chamberland. Animation by Brendan Barr. Sound design by Will Mountain and Josh Chamberland.
In September of 1994, more than 60 children at the Ariel primary school in Zimbabwe witnessed a strange silver object land outside the playground, and were approached by small, black beings with large, entrancing eyes. The children’s stories alarmed their teachers, and aroused the curiosity of the BBC, and the esteemed Harvard Psychiatrist, John E. Mack. While the common elements in the children’s stories suggest that the object and the beings were physically real, the many divergent details, and the kids’ highly personal reactions, suggest that there are many subjective elements to UFO and entity encounters that we don’t yet understand.
The Ariel Incident
The Ariel Primary School is a private institution in the agricultural community of Ruwa, 22 km outside of Harare, the capital city of Zimbabwe. The school was founded by area farmers in 1991, and by 1994, it had more than 200 students from grades 1 to 7, or from 6 to 12 years old. The students were a racially diverse group, though most of them were from wealthier farming families. Friday, September 16 was a clear and warm, sunny day. During the regular 10:30 am recess, all of the teachers were attending a staff meeting inside the school, and only one adult was outdoors, operating a tuckshop, or snack store, on the playground. Shortly after recess began, the tuckshop attendant, Alyson Kirkman, volunteer and mother to one of the Ariel students, said that a bunch of kids ran into the shop and told her about a little “black man” on the playground. Kirkman thought that the kids were trying to trick her, and refused to leave the shop.(1)
Shortly after, dozens of children rushed into the school screaming about a landed craft outside the schoolyard, and little “black men” with big, black eyes. The teachers could tell that the kids were deeply frightened, but they could not believe what they were saying.(2) The school’s headmaster, Colin Mackie, sat the students down and had them each produce a drawing of the things they saw, as well as a written account of their experiences. These efforts committed the childrens’ earliest memories to record, and created crucial documentation for later investigators. Shortly after classes ended and the kids were sent home for the weekend, teachers saw several parents searching the ground at the edge of the schoolyard with their children.(3) The yard was virtually empty, with minimal grass, no trees or bushes, and only a few play structures near the classrooms. The children said that the beings appeared beyond the fence at the furthest point from the school: not a place where the children typically played. Beyond this fence was a field covered in brush and short trees. There was nothing there that could have been mistaken for a UFO or entity, and no indication that anything had been there at all.
The following Monday, the school was inundated with letters from parents asking what had happened to their children on Friday that made them so frightened and upset. Several students were traumatized, and did not return to school for several days after the event.(4) That week, Tim Leach, senior correspondent with the BBC, visited the school, and other African news outlets picked up the story as well, including South African and Zimbabwean state television channels. Leach spoke with the children and had them tell their stories for the first time on video. He found that they were all genuinely shaken, and was convinced that they believed what they were saying. Leach later claimed that despite all his experience as a war reporter, it was the Ariel School incident that frightened him most.
Cynthia Hind, a MUFON field investigator and editor of UFO Afrinews, was the first ufologist on the case. Gunter Hofer, an electronics enthusiast and acquaintance of Hind’s, accompanied her, and swept the yard with a Geiger Counter, a metal detector, and a magnetometer, with no unusual finds. The team also sent ground samples to the University of Zimbabwe, which returned with no significant anomalies.(5) Whatever the children saw - if anything - were then only memories. After reviewing their drawings and first written accounts, Hind interviewed 62 of the witnesses grades 3 and up, and spoke with the school’s teachers and administrators.(6) Dr. John E. Mack, the noted Harvard Medical School Psychiatrist and ufologist, was visiting Africa at the time to explore the abduction phenomenon there, and visited Ariel School. He spent two days talking with the kids, accompanied by his assistant and a South African TV camera operator, who filmed some of the interviews.(7)
The Sighting
Hind and Mack found that the witnesses' stories conflicted on many details, but converged on a few key claims. Most students agreed that a round, elliptical-shaped silver-coloured object appeared amongst some trees just beyond the boundary of the school yard. The object had a lustrous surface, and a bright white or golden glow.(8) Most of the students only saw the object on the ground, but some claimed to have seen it flying overtop of the schoolyard before landing. The object glowed brightly from its landing place, attracting the kids’ attention, so they ran towards the fence to investigate. At this point, one or two small, black beings approximately one meter tall emerged from the object. Some kids said that one paced back and forth on the ground, and others said they saw one on the object doing the same thing.
The being on the ground then began to move towards the students. The beings were mostly black, with pale faces, and huge, elongated black eyes that were angled inwards. Very few of the students reported any other details about the beings’ faces, though at least one saw a nose and mouth. Twelve-year-old Lisil and 8-year-old Emily remember the being hovering over the ground, rather than walking, though others described it taking steps. Emily said that two beings hopped alongside her and Lisil, as if to imitate the girls skipping on the playground, though their feet never touched the ground.(9)
After covering a short distance, the figure or figures stopped and stared at the children, who all felt compelled to stare back in return. Emily said that the two beings she saw appeared in front of her instantaneously. At this point, some of the students began to feel that the beings were communicating with them telepathically, and a few students felt a rush of wind blow by. Several children saw visions of environmental catastrophe: Lisil said that she saw a vision of Earth after all trees had been cleared, and there was no air left to breathe, and received a non-verbal warning about humans destroying the planet.(10) Another student saw visions of polluted oceans. Emily saw a quick succession of still images showing scenes of the environment in crisis, and was urged to use technology more responsibly.(11) Another student, Emma, received a similar message about humanity’s destructive use of technology, and given the imperative that we “musn’t get too technologed.”(12)
Eleven-year-old Salma was holding Emma’s hand during the encounter, and yet she has no memory of any communication at all, though she felt that the being was gazing into her soul, as she put it. Both Salma and Emily have stated that they felt that time was distorted for the duration of the encounter. Salma said that although she tried to run to the protection of her younger siblings, she was unable to break eye contact with the being. After several minutes of staring at the children - perhaps as many as 15 - the encounter abruptly ended, and the intruders disappeared. At least one student said that he saw the beings climb back inside the object and fly away again, but most said that the beings and the UFO simply vanished on the spot.(13) Emily claimed that they disappeared the instant that the bell rang for the end of recess, and her sense of reality immediately returned to normal.
Analysis
Though many of the students agreed on these details, there was a considerable amount of variation in their stories, and some outright contradiction. Some students reported seeing the black entities, but not the silver object; other students described the object in vivid detail but had no recollection of the entities. Some students nearby to the action even said that they saw nothing at all. Multiple students attested to seeing a cluster of objects flying in the air, while others were adamant that they saw only one. As Hind noted, although most of the students identified the object as some sort of vessel or craft, they could not agree on its appearance. Students variously drew windows, doors, lights, cockpits, landing gear, and many combinations of the above. Two boys said that it had stripes of black and green; others that there was a platform around the outside.(14) One child drew it red. Most agreed, however, that it was generally elliptical in shape.
There were also several different accounts of how the object arrived on the ground. Several noted that they saw flashes of bright, colourful lights above their heads before the sighting, and at least two students claimed to have heard loud noises in the sky. One student even described a flute-like sound.(15) Another student claimed to have witnessed the object and several auxiliaries flying along some electricity wires beside the schoolyard before landing in the field.(16) He said that they flew over him with flashing red lights, disappearing and reappearing elsewhere in the sky several times before landing. Other students drew the object flying overhead in their illustrations as well.
There was generally more agreement on the appearance of the ufonauts, but accounts varied here as well. Some described the figures as having long, black hair, while other students claimed to have seen no hair at all. One student described the beings as looking like little, “plump” humans, with long, straight hair, though Emily saw beings with long necks and spindly limbs.(17) Some students claimed that the beings wore skin-tight garments or shiny suits, and others thought that they were naked, with black skin. One child claimed that the figures “looked just like a shadow.”(18) Another young girl said that there were three beings: in black, red, and white.(19)
While most teachers admitted to being initially skeptical of the children’s stories, they later came to realise how profound the experience had been for the witnesses. The Ariel School headmaster acknowledged that he believed that the children saw “something,” but suggested that some of their recollections were products of their imaginations.(20) However, other teachers were more sympathetic to the children's claims. It was difficult for them to accept that the children’s imaginations had caused them all to conjure up such a strange experience, and to react so dramatically. The teachers were generally convinced that the students could not have faked their hysteria when running into the school that morning, and that no one could have forced dozens of children to play along with the same hoax. Hind agreed. Mack was also convinced that the students had shared an authentic experience, and that it was unlikely, if not impossible, that they had all staged a hoax.(21)
And the Ariel children were not the only ones to see strange things around Ruwa and Harare. On the morning of the kids’ encounter, a woman who owned a farm near the school saw a bright orange ball of light outside her chicken coop.(22) The day before, a mother and her son reported seeing a craft ahead of their car, around the same time that three Ariel students saw an object shaped like a “cigarette” above the schoolyard.(23) And the day before that, thousands of people across eastern Africa saw massive lights in the sky. Many of these sightings were probably due to a meteor shower in the area, but Hind received calls and letters from numerous people asserting that they had seen a fireball with a tail of sparks and smaller lights.(24) Like many UFO and entity encounters, the Ariel School incident appears to have been part of a broader wave of sightings.
Significance
Hind and Mack’s research on the Ariel Incident was never published as a formal report. Hind shared some details on the case in UFO Afrinews in 1995, and more in her 1996 book, UFOs Over Africa.(25) Mack was killed by a drunk driver in 2004, before publishing any of his work on the incident. After his death, Mack’s family created the John E. Mack Institute, which hired filmmaker Randall Nickerson to produce a film based on Mack’s involvement with the case. Nickerson went on to find Tim Leach as well as several of the Ariel School witnesses - then in their mid-to-late 20s - and arranged a reunion in Los Angeles in 2013.(26) He has also organized a number of public appearances and media interviews to help the Ariel school witnesses share their stories. Nickserson’s film, Ariel Phenomenon, is now complete and seeking distribution.
There is no doubt that the Ariel School students saw something unusual that day, but what it was is still unclear. Nothing about the object or the entities suggested a particular origin, either on Earth or in outer space. The beings conformed in many ways to the image of the grey “visitors” popularized by Whitley Strieber’s Communion in 1987, but differed greatly in other ways, including in the presence of hair, squat bodies, and black skin or body suits. Still, they were similar to other commonly encountered entities in the sense that they only stood about a meter tall. Nickerson has also claimed at a public talk that many of the children’s stories were extremely bizarre, and highly illogical. For example, he spoke of one student who said that he saw one of the black beings approach across the field, then vanish, and instantly reappear where it started, only to repeat the exact same approach.
Perhaps the numerous discrepancies in the childrens’ accounts were due to their failures to accurately recall what they’d seen. After all, it’s well known that human memory is extremely faulty, especially when memories are formed under stressful and traumatic circumstances. Alternatively, the discrepancies in the children’s accounts may reflect real differences in the things themselves, or in the children’s perception of those things, rather than simply differences in their recollection of those things. Ufologist John Keel proposed that UFOs were vessels for “ultraterrestrials,” or interdimensional beings, that could somehow manipulate how they appeared, or how we perceived them. Jacques Vallée made a similar argument in suggesting that UFOs are both physically real, and culturally constructed, either by some mind-interfacing technological operation, or a collective act of psychic projection. These considerations have moved some ufologists to focus attention away from the strictly material aspects of the UFO phenomenon, and towards their effects on witnesses.
Nickerson, too, has focused on the effects that this event has had on witnesses, and his documentary offers a fuller view of the ways in which it changed them. It was a dark and frightening experience for the majority: one student said that the being looked “evil,” as if it wanted to “come and take” the kids.(27) Many of the younger children said that they feared that the little men were coming to eat them. Lisil told Mack that when she got home that day she felt “horrible inside,” describing an anxiety about humans not treating the environment with enough respect. Still, years later, many of the students contacted by Nickerson and other journalists claim that it was a powerful and transformative experience for them, that initiated lifelong changes in their openness to new ideas, and their general sense of purpose. For example, Salma pursued degrees in International Relations and Human Rights Law, and claims that the incident taught to her to believe her own experiences, regardless of what people thought of them. Lisil became a social support worker. She said that she has always felt a strong duty to give back and “do her part” since the incident. Emily began producing art, with pieces that frequently feature otherworldly beings. Mack made similar kinds of observations of abductees - or experiencers - in general: he claimed that many experiencers seek out more fulfilling, outreach-based jobs after their encounters, become better stewards of the environment, and develop a greater sense of spirituality.(28) It’s difficult to imagine that the students could have effected these changes on the basis of a mistaken sighting, or an imagined incident.
Summary
What is particularly striking about the Ariel School case is the sheer number of witnesses, and the diversity of the student body. The fact that none of the witnesses have gone back on their claims, or confessed to a hoax, even after more than 25 years, is a huge point in favor of their veracity.(29) Witnesses such as Salma, Lisil, and Emily continue to speak about their experiences at public events and on a variety of media platforms. But while there’s no doubt that the kids saw something highly unusual that day, the discrepancies in their accounts also suggests that there was a strong subjective component to their experiences. Whatever the kids at Ariel School saw that morning, it moved them all on a very deep level, and effected lasting changes in their lives. And maybe that was the point.
Notes:
1) Cynthia Hind, “The Children of Aerial School,” UFO Afrinews no. 11 (February 1995), 19. http://ufoafrinews.com/pdfs/UFO_AFRINEWS11-150.pdf.
2) According to one teacher, “I was very sceptical in the beginning as well. I believed that they had seen something, but I wasn’t prepared to accept that it was anything supernatural or anything like that,” in Sac Seti, “Ariel School UFO Sighting in Ruwa, Zimbabwe – September 1994,” YouTube video, 31:05, Posted July 29, 2014, https://youtu.be/IrM93GnmY4M.
3) According to the Headmaster, Colin Mackie: “That is when I really became concerned. Because if there was something [beyond the playground fence], then I didn’t really want everybody walking down there,” in Gunter Hofer, “Ariel School UFO landing 1994,” YouTube video, 21:52, Posted November 3, 2012, https://youtu.be/eBqKJHSrYZg.
4) McMenaminsVIDEOS, "Randall Nickerson presenting the Ariel Phenomenon with two of the original eye witnesses," YouTube video, 2:11:57. Posted May 7, 2019, https://youtu.be/UCqVpwg0oPc.
5) Cynthia Hind, “Ariel School Report,” UFO Afrinews no. 12 (July 1995), 10, https://www.ufoafrinews.com/pdfs/UFO_AFRINEWS12-150.pdf.
6) Hind puts the number of witnesses interviewed at 62 in the following clip, Paranormalcentral, “62 School children see UFO land and alien beings come out,” YouTube video, 3:35, https://youtu.be/aabVQPlNR4E; Cynthia Hind, "The Visit of John Mack, M.D. to Africa," UFO Afrinews no. 11, 24.
7) Linda Matchan, “An Out-of-this-World Assignment,” Boston Globe (7 June 2009).
8) “It looked like a saucer, but the shape wasn’t really round,” in Gunter Hofer, “Ariel School UFO.”
9) EARTH MYSTERY NEWS - EMN, “Zimbabwe UFO Child Conactee Speaks Publicly For The 1st Time,” YouTube video, 6:19, Posted June 16, 2016, https://youtu.be/jaLvp-BkqAo.
10) “It was like, in the world all the trees had just gone down, and there would be no air and people would be dying,” in Sac Seti, “Ariel School UFO.”
11) Emily’s testimony in EARTH MYSTERY NEWS - EMN, “Zimbabwe UFO,”; Alejandro Rojas, “Randall Nickerson & Emily Trim, Ariel Phenomenon”. Podcast UFO. Podcast audio, September 10, 2019. https://podcastufo.com/podcast/369-randall-nickerson-emily-trim-ariel-phenomenon.
12) McMenaminsVIDEOS. "Randall Nickerson presenting."
13) McMenaminsVIDEOS. "Randall Nickerson presenting."
14) Hind, “UFO Flap in Zimbabwe,” UFO Afrinews no. 11, 20.
15) Sac Seti, “Ariel School UFO.”
16) Cynthia Hind. "1994 Close Encounter at Ruwa, Zimbabwe," UFO Afrinews 1994, https://ufocasebook.com/2008b/1994zimbabwe.html; Hind, “Ariel School Report,” UFO Afrinews no. 12, 10.
17) “It wasn’t curly. That thing almost looked like a hippy!” in Gunter Hofer, “Ariel School UFO.”
18) Gunter Hofer, “Ariel School UFO.”
19) Hind, “Ariel School Report,” UFO Afrinews no. 12, 10.
20) Gunter Hofer, “Ariel School UFO.”
21) Sac Seti, “Ariel School UFO.”
22) “Earlier that day, Mrs Stevens, whose farm is close to the school, said that she had gone up to go to the bathroom, in the early hours, when she saw a huge orange glow from her window, over her chicken house. It was like a big round ball.” Hind, “Ariel School Report,” UFO Afrinews no. 12, 13.
23) "Remembering Zimbabwe’s great alien invasion," Mail & Guardian (September 4, 2014), https://mg.co.za/article/2014-09-04-remembering-zimbabwes-great-alien-invasion.
24) Hind, “UFO Flap in Zimbabwe,” UFO Afrinews no. 11, 4 - 6; Hind, “Ariel School Report,” UFO Afrinews, no. 12, 7.
25) Hind, UFO Afrinews, no. 11, 1 - 42; Hind, UFO Afrinews, no. 12, 1 - 42, http://ufoafrinews.com/pdfs/UFO_AFRINEWS11-150.pdf. Cynthia Hind, UFOs Over Africa (Madison: Horus House, 1996).
26) "Remembering Zimbabwe’s," Mail & Guardian.
27) Sac Seti, “Ariel School UFO.”
28) John Mack, Passport to the Cosmos: Human Transformation and Alien Encounters, Commemorative ed. (White Crow Books 2011), 15 - 19.
29) “It was a cross-section of Zimbabweans: black African children from several tribes, coloured children (a cross-breeding of black and white), Asian children (with parents born in Zimbabwe but whose grandparents had come from India) and white children, mostly Zimbabwean-born, but whose parents were either from South Africa or Britain,” Hind, “Ariel School Report,” UFO Afrinews no. 12, 7.
Sources:
EARTH MYSTERY NEWS - EMN. “Zimbabwe UFO Child Conactee Speaks Publicly For The 1st Time.” YouTube video, 6:19. Posted [June 16, 2016]. Accessed February 11, 2020, https://youtu.be/jaLvp-BkqAo.
Hind, Cynthia. "1994 Close Encounter at Ruwa, Zimbabwe," UFO Afrinews 1994. Accessed February 11, 2020, https://ufocasebook.com/2008b/1994zimbabwe.html.
Hind, Cynthia. UFO Afrinews, no. 11 (February 1995). Accessed February 11, 2020, http://ufoafrinews.com/pdfs/UFO_AFRINEWS11-150.pdf.
Hind, Cynthia. UFO Afrinews, no. 12 (July 1995). Accessed February 11, 2020, https://www.ufoafrinews.com/pdfs/UFO_AFRINEWS12-150.pdf.
Hind, Cynthia. UFOs Over Africa. Madison: Horus House, 1996.
Hofer, Gunter. “Ariel School UFO landing 1994.” YouTube video, 21:52. Posted [November 3, 2012]. Accessed February 11, 2020, https://youtu.be/eBqKJHSrYZg.
Mack, John. Passport to the Cosmos: Human Transformation and Alien Encounters, Commemorative ed. White Crow Books, 2011.
Matchan, Linda. “An Out-of-this-World Assignment.” Boston Globe, June 7, 2009.
McMenaminsVIDEOS. "Randall Nickerson presenting the Ariel Phenomenon with two of the original eye witnesses." YouTube video, 2:11:57. Posted [May 7, 2019]. Accessed February 11, 2020, https://youtu.be/UCqVpwg0oPc.
Paranormalcentral. “62 School children see UFO land and alien beings come out.” YouTube video, 3:35. Accessed February 11, 2020, https://youtu.be/aabVQPlNR4E.
"Remembering Zimbabwe’s great alien invasion." Mail & Guardian. September 4, 2014. Accessed February 11, 2020, https://mg.co.za/article/2014-09-04-remembering-zimbabwes-great-alien-invasion.
Rojas, Alejandro. “Randall Nickerson & Emily Trim, Ariel Phenomenon”. Podcast UFO. Podcast audio, September 10, 2019. Accessed February 11, 2020, https://podcastufo.com/podcast/369-randall-nickerson-emily-trim-ariel-phenomenon, https://stitcher.com/podcast/antique-auction-forum/podcast-ufo-podcast-feed/e/63819893.
Sac Seti. “Ariel School UFO Sighting in Ruwa, Zimbabwe – September 1994.” YouTube video, 31:05. Posted [July 29, 2014]. Accessed February 11, 2020, https://youtu.be/IrM93GnmY4M.
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Think Anomalous is created by Jason Charbonneau. Research by Jason Charbonneau. Illustrations by V. R. Laurence. Music by Josh Chamberland. Animation by Brendan Barr. Sound design by Will Mountain and Josh Chamberland.
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