José Bonilla Observation
From Biocrawler, the free encyclopedia.
On August 12, 1883, the astronomer José Bonilla claimed to have observed 283 objects at Zacatecas Observatory in Mexico, over the course of two hours. The objects were small and had a strange light around them. The objects travelled in front of the sun in smaller groups. Bonilla obtained the first known UFO photograph. On the next day, José observed another 116 objects. This is one of the earliest documented UFO sightings.
Bonilla and an assistant were preparing to study the Sun's corona when he saw objects crossing the field of view. The two worked over the next two days to record the transits of these objects using the Observatory's new camera equipment.
Bonilla said some object showed as circular shadows against the Sun, that they traveled side by side in pairs in groups of up to 20 and that they moved across the face of the sun from west to east (right to left).
Bonilla wrote up his observations and submitted them to the French journal L'Astronomie. He calculated the objects' motion, speed and estimated distance. He first reported them at 300,000km, later correcting this to 242,000km.
References
- Perceptions.couk (http://www.perceptions.couk.com/uef/first.txt)
- Historical UFO Sightings (http://www.bibleufo.com/ufos6.htm) (BibleUFO.com)
