Canada’s 1970 Duncan UFO incident was a prank, resident claims. Pic credit: Pixabay
Canada is commemorating the 1970 New Year’s Day UFO sighting at Cowichan District Hospital, Duncan, B.C., on a newly issued collectable coin.
However, following media reports that the Canadian Mint is using a collectable coin to commemorate the event, a senior resident of the Cowichan Valley came forward with the claim that the incident was a New Year’s Day prank.
He alleged that the UFO incident was a prank involving a local couple, GoldStreaam News-Gazette reported.
The Duncan UFO incident
A nurse reported on New Year’s Day 1970 that she saw a flying saucer UFO with a glass dome while attending to patients at the Cowichan District Hospital, Duncan, B.C.
She went to the window to draw the curtain when she saw a saucer-shaped UFO flying past.
Flying saucer UFO had aliens behind a glass dome
According to the witness, the UFO had lights on the underside. It was about 15 meters in diameter and rose silently in the air.
Two humanoid beings in dark suits sat behind a panel visible through the glass dome on the upper half of the saucer.
The nurse watched as one of the humanoids turned to look in her direction. The other alien pulled a lever, and the saucer tilted at an angle and began rotating counterclockwise.
As the rotating UFO moved away, she called nurses in the adjoining room. The object had receded in the sky, and only its lights were visible when two other nurses came to the window.
Police investigated the sighting
The hospital called the RCMP, and officers came to investigate.
According to UFO researcher Chris Rutkowski, the witness accounts puzzled the police investigators. But they believed the nurses saw something unusual.
UFO incident was a prank, senior resident claimed
However, Dan Hughes, a resident of the Cowichan Valley since the late 1960s, has come forward with the claim that the incident was a prank.
Hughes said he followed media coverage of the incident over the decades but felt compelled to break his silence after he learned that the Royal Canadian Mint had issued a coin about it.
He identified the couple as Les and Renee Palmer, who have since died. But in the 1960s, they lived in a house near the hospital.
Pranksters allegedly constructed Duncan UFO from plastic bag
The couple allegedly constructed an object that looked like a flying saucer from pieces of wood and a plastic bag. They then used a hair dryer to fill the bag with hot air.
The nurse happened to be at the window when the contraption floated past. She mistook patterns on the plastic bag for aliens.
Hughes said that the Palmers demonstrated the contraption during a private party he attended in the 1970s. The plastic bag rose into the air and flew higher until it disappeared.
He remained silent about it for decades and did not share his knowledge because he felt it was just a “harmless New Year’s Day prank,” that accidentally “snowballed” into a national incident.