What the two observers reported
Trotter’s statement describes a target on the high beam of an AA No. 4 Mk. 6 radar, approaching from approximately north and leaving toward the east. He reported timing part of the movement and said another serviceman observed the occurrence with him. This is a contemporaneous operator account, rather than a surviving continuous radar recording.
Baker was watching a trial through binoculars. He described a circular, dark-grey, apparently translucent form crossing or approaching the Canberra’s path, turning and slowing. When he tried to see it without binoculars, he lost it and could not reacquire it. He explicitly qualified his speed estimate because he did not know the object’s height.
The uncompleted radar-visual comparison
The short separation between reporting positions makes comparison possible in principle, but it does not resolve the forty-five-minute difference between their stated approximate times. A trial log or synchronized communications record could show whether one estimate was wrong, whether several passes were involved or whether the reports described separate observations.
The covering letters are evidence that officials considered the accounts related. They should be preserved alongside the discrepancy rather than used to erase it. The later catalogue’s compact radar-visual label compresses an association which still needs checking against the underlying statements.
Speed and height in the radar statement
Trotter reported timing 15,000 yards in ten seconds and gave an approximate speed of 3,600 mph. A direct conversion of those written distance and time values is about 3,070 mph. The following sketch also marks the timed 15,000-yard section. This is a schematic accompanying the statement, rather than an instrument-generated continuous track; it preserves the calculation’s inputs without independently confirming the target’s motion.
His height estimate above 60,000 feet was derived from use of the high beam at long range. It was not a separate altimeter reading of an object. Evaluating that inference requires the radar’s beam pattern, elevation coverage and operating settings. An unusual screen return must also be distinguished from a continuously tracked reflector before physical performance can be assigned.
Baker’s comparison with the Canberra cannot independently confirm those radar-derived values. Similar apparent size through binoculars does not establish equal distance, and his statement acknowledges uncertainty about height. The two kinds of evidence are potentially complementary, but they cannot supply each other’s missing quantities by assumption.
Evidence assessment
The contemporary statements justify retaining Woomera as a substantive radar and visual case. They record trained personnel encountering something they could not readily identify during range activity. They do not yet establish a single object simultaneously observed at the claimed range, altitude and speed.
The timing discrepancy, rough speed conversion and absence of a continuous instrument recording weaken an extraordinary-performance conclusion. No specific conventional identification is demonstrated in the reviewed material. The appropriate result is an unresolved paired report whose proposed correlation remains testable, rather than a verified high-speed vehicle track.
Questions raised by the evidence
Do 16:00 and 16:45 refer to the same episode?
The covering officials linked the statements, but their approximate times require an independent check.
What did high-beam reception constrain?
The altitude inference depends on the actual radar configuration and propagation, not merely the beam label.
Research priorities
Source library
Tier 1 Australian archival file D250, 56/483
Released government-file reproduction. PDF pages 135–139 include the forwarding correspondence, signed-copy statements and accompanying sketch. The sketch is present in this copy even though Basterfield did not locate it in the other file he examined.
Tier 2 Keith Basterfield: Woomera report catalogue
Original archival research and document transcriptions, including distinctions between catalogue summaries and the underlying May statements. Its later narrative is not an independent contemporaneous track.