The Ejstrup­holm UFO Lan­ding

The Enco­un­ter

One day during the har­vest sea­son in 1957,  betwe­en 2PM and 3PM, a 15 year old boy was col­lecting grain on a field 2 kilo­me­ters south of Ejstrup­holm. The weat­her was grey and clou­dy with no wind. The tee­na­ger sud­den­ly felt that he was being wat­ched. When he tur­ned aro­und, he saw a myste­rious vehi­c­le par­ked in the field 35 meters away, with two “crew mem­bers” stan­ding near­by it, look­ing at him. The vehi­c­le was a metal­lic grey in col­or, oval in sha­pe with a cupo­la on top, about 2 meters tall and 2½ meters wide. It was sup­por­ted by three lan­ding legs, each 1 meter long and about 12 cen­ti­me­ters thi­ck. The two figu­res loo­k­ed human with brow­nish skin, except that they were no tal­ler than 90 cm (3 feet) each. They wore skin-tight suits of a shiny, dark gre­en col­or, with no visib­le but­tons or zip­pers. The wit­ness noti­ced that the suits worn by the crew also cove­red their hands. Both crew mem­bers wore trans­pa­rent bubb­le-sha­ped hel­mets with anten­nae atta­ched.

The wit­ness, who was very sho­ck­ed by what he saw, obser­ved the specta­c­le for a few minu­tes. Then he beca­me ner­vous, pre­pa­ring to defend him­self with rocks, should they come any clo­ser. Next thing he knew, the UFO crew mem­bers tur­ned their heads towards each other, and a blin­ding flash of light appea­red. Both crew mem­bers were nowhe­re to be seen. At the same time the UFO took off at a ver­ti­cal path and was gone wit­hin seconds. The wit­ness felt that the obser­va­tion lasted no more than five minu­tes, and he heard no sound whatso­e­ver during the enti­re time. The wit­ness felt com­ple­te­ly dumb­struck and in dis­be­lief about what he had just expe­ri­en­ced. After the UFO had flown away, he noti­ced that the vege­ta­tion was flat­te­ned whe­re the UFO’s lan­ding legs had stood.

Afraid of being ridi­cu­led, he never told about the obser­va­tion to eve­ry­o­ne else except for his imme­di­a­te family. In 1959, a mem­ber of Scan­di­navi­an UFO Infor­ma­tion first heard a rumor about the case, but did­n’t mana­ge to tra­ck down the wit­ness. It would not be until 1972, during a UFO lec­tu­re in the town of Virum, that a woman in the audi­en­ce con­fir­med the sigh­ting and hel­ped establish con­ta­ct with the wit­ness. The fol­lowing year, a mem­ber of Scan­di­navi­an UFO Infor­ma­tion (SUFOI) final­ly visi­ted the wit­ness to inter­view him about the case.

Com­men­tary

Den­mark has very few clo­se enco­un­ters of the third kind (CE3) cases com­pa­red to other Western Euro­pe­an coun­tri­es like Fran­ce or Bri­tain, and most of the Danish CE3 cases are from befo­re the 1980s. The Ejstrup­holm sigh­ting is espe­ci­al­ly similar to two others, the 1960 Gyl­den­holm case and the 1967 Sjæl­lands Odde case, in seve­ral aspects:

The first is that the enti­ties repor­ted look qui­te human, except they are no tal­ler than 3 feet. The enti­ties were also wea­ring similar uni­forms to the beings in the Gyl­den­holm case. Both of the­se fea­tu­res are very typi­cal of similar “lan­ding” cases from aro­und Euro­pe during that peri­od.

Some details in the report are worth hig­hligh­ting, which indi­ca­te that the wit­ness was being hone­st, at least about what he belie­ved he saw. The first is that the SUFOI inve­sti­ga­tor X. P. Mad­sen, on the basis of seve­ral mee­tings with the wit­ness, found him to be trustwort­hy, and that he had a reputa­tion for being a rea­so­nab­le and hone­st guy among his fri­ends and family. The second is the wit­ness expe­ri­en­cing what UFO inve­sti­ga­tors call the Oz Factor: a total absen­ce of sound, as if one has ente­red ano­t­her sta­te of conscious­ness and encap­su­la­ted in a sort of invi­sib­le “bubb­le”. Also, con­cer­ning the sud­den flash of light and dis­ap­pea­ran­ce of the huma­noids: One would imag­i­ne that someo­ne pur­por­ting a hoax or made up story would just do the “logi­cal” thing and descri­be the crew ente­ring the craft through a hatch or a door, inste­ad of inclu­ding such sur­re­al ele­ments.

All that being said, one might legi­ti­ma­te­ly won­der, sin­ce the Ejstrup­holm sigh­ting was not repor­ted until much later, whet­her or not the wit­nes­s’s memory could have been col­ored by other reports that had come into print in the mean­ti­me.

Sour­ce

• UFO-Nyt #6 (1975)