The Morning of April 6, 1966
On the morning of April 6, 1966, an unidentified object was witnessed by over 200 students and staff at Westall High School and Westall State School in Melbourne, Australia. According to witness testimony and contemporaneous accounts, the grey, saucer-shaped object descended into the Grange, an open paddock area located behind the schools. Multiple witnesses reported the object hovering near power lines in the vicinity. The object was subsequently reported to have risen and departed at high speed, with some witnesses describing the observation of additional smaller objects in the vicinity.
The sighting occurred during daylight hours and was observed by a large number of independent witnesses across both school locations, making it one of the largest documented mass sightings of the period.
Immediate Aftermath and Official Response
According to witness accounts, science teacher Andrew Greenwood reportedly gathered students in response to the sighting. Following this gathering, the school principal is reported to have advised students not to discuss what they had observed.
The incident was documented in the Dandenong Journal newspaper on April 14, 1966, eight days after the sighting. This contemporary newspaper account represents a key primary source documenting the event and public awareness of the incident at the time.
The Royal Australian Air Force was reportedly notified of the sighting. However, no official RAAF file addressing the Westall incident has been publicly located in subsequent decades, despite inquiries by researchers.
Documentation and Corroboration Over Time
Filmmaker Shane Ryan undertook extensive research documenting witness testimonies related to the Westall sighting for his documentary “Westall '66: A Suburban UFO Mystery,” released in 2010. Ryan’s work involved conducting interviews with original witnesses, many of whom provided consistent on-record accounts decades after the event.
Over fifty years following the sighting, multiple witnesses have maintained consistent descriptions of what they observed on April 6, 1966. These accounts, provided by dozens of independent witnesses, have remained largely consistent across the intervening decades.
In 2016, marking the fiftieth anniversary of the sighting, a reunion event brought together original witnesses who were students or staff at the schools at the time of the incident. This gathering provided an opportunity for witnesses to reflect on and further document their experiences.
Historical Record
The Westall encounter remains documented through multiple sources: the contemporaneous Dandenong Journal article from April 14, 1966; documented witness testimonies collected over subsequent decades; researcher documentation; and accounts preserved through Shane Ryan’s documentary investigation. The consistency of witness accounts across independent observers and across time has made the Westall sighting one of the most widely documented mass UFO incidents in Australian history.
The absence of publicly available official RAAF documentation remains notable, though the Royal Australian Air Force’s notification of the event is documented through witness testimony regarding the agency’s involvement at the time.