By Adam Dolge
adolge@seacoastonline.com

EXETER - There has been a considerable response to Tuesday’s article in the News-Letter about a recent UFO sighting. Interested local residents and skeptics joined UFO enthusiasts commenting from throughout the nation, and reaction was even received from a French "Ufologist" who recalled two similar sightings in Europe.

Yann Marchandin, the French "Ufologist" who contacted the News-Letter via e-mail, said there was a similar UFO sighting in Poland in 1997 and another in 1999. In both incidents, witnesses claimed to have seen large "military ship-sized" tubes, or cigar-shaped objects in the sky.

She said this recent report, by an Exeter man who wished to be identified only as "David," was very interesting to her because of its similarities to the two other sightings and also because of his military and aviation background.

There were also those who questioned the recent sighting. If the object was so large in the sky, why did nobody else see it, many asked in e-mails sent to the News-Letter.

Last Wednesday, Aug. 20, David reported seeing a silver, cigar-shaped object around 3 p.m. that he said was roughly the size of two aircraft carriers. It changed colors to an orange-red before stretching to twice its original size, then disappearing.

David is recently retired as a flight engineer with the U.S. Navy and has logged more than 10,000 hours in the air.

Contcted this week, David said he couldn’t explain why he alone saw the UFO, and he even asked several of his neighbors if they saw anything odd that day. No one had, he said.

He still has several houses to check, as he lives in a neighborhood with about two dozen homes.

The Exeter Police Department said there were no reports that day, or since then, of a UFO sighting. Local Federal Aviation Administration officials could not be reached for comment.

But Peter Davenport, director of the National UFO Reporting Center in Seattle, said there are various reasons why no one else witnessed what David did. David submitted a report to the reporting center shortly after his encounter.

Davenport said that perhaps David was in the right place at the right time. Also, the object’s technology could have been so advanced that it might only have been visible from where David was standing.

David’s report will soon be available for public viewing at the center’s Web site at www.nuforc.org.