Ariel School, Ruwa, Zimbabwe
17°53′S, 31°15′E — Mashonaland East Province, ~20 km east of Harare — primary school in farming community
What's documented
Ariel School is a primary school in Ruwa, Zimbabwe. On the morning of 16 September 1994, during the morning recess, approximately 62 students aged 6-12 reported observing a disc-shaped craft land in bushland adjacent to the schoolyard, and that beings emerged from it. The case was investigated within weeks by Harvard psychiatrist John E. Mack and BUFORA's Cynthia Hind. Mack interviewed 12 of the children individually; their drawings and statements are housed at the John E. Mack Institute.
Notable & intriguing
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Harvard psychiatrist John E. Mack conducted individual interviews with twelve Ariel School children in late November 1994 and reviewed drawings made by the children within hours of the event. Mack stated on the BBC Newsnight program of 8 September 1995 that 'the consistency of their accounts and their emotional engagement was striking; I do not believe this could be a hoax.' Mack died in a road accident in London on 27 September 2004.
Mack interviews with Ariel children (24-25 November 1994), Mack Institute archives; BBC Newsnight, 8 September 1995
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Cynthia Hind, head of UFO Afrinews and the first researcher on-scene at Ariel School, interviewed teachers and students within 48 hours of the event. Hind's contemporaneous case file documented that children's reports included detailed descriptions of 'a message about the environment' from the entity; multiple children independently described the entity's eyes as 'going back into the head.'
Hind, 'UFO Afrinews,' Issue 11, 1994; Hind case file, Mack Institute archives
Public-record imagery
