"It's a UFO! Kill It!" Beaufort Farm Incident

If a UFO quietly hovered in front of you, would you start shooting it?

In the case of Bennie Smit, this is exactly what he did. When the police arrived, they joined in and only stopped when the object was hidden by brush or farm-workers were in the line of sight. This was in South Africa in 1972 when bullets were cheap and workers even cheaper…

How did this start? Two workers noticed a red light behind tall brush and called to it with the worst opening lines EVER for first contact:

“Who is making fire on Bennie’s farm?” As the ‘fire’ didn’t reply, they ran and told Bennie Smit.

Together they went out there and found a glowing object hovering just out of sight; he left the workers ‘on guard’ and ran back home.

"When I saw it, my whole body got goosebumps. I sprinted home and got my .303 and told someone to call the police. I knew I was safe if I had my gun."

Bennie grabbed his .303 and they headed over there to see an egg-shaped object partially visible above the brush. It glowed red and changed again from red to green and almost white. There was a ‘star-like’ extension that seemed to be connected to the blunter end. Warrant Officer Van Rensing and Sgt Kitching arrived around the same time (10am) and they later described it as a ‘gun-metal grey’ object within a glowing exterior light.



Bennie took a shot before sending four labourers into the brush to drive the object out with one of them carrying a long cane with a cloth tied to the top.

Together they collectively lost their tiny minds and started shooting at it with the .303 and their side-arms. 15 rounds in total were fired. The eighth round from the rifle struck the object and caused a thud that moved it slightly and altered its colour from red to green. Towards the end of the encounter, the object began to go lower and out of sight. At this point, Bennie aimed at the star-like light and hit it. The object no longer glowed and became a solid dark grey that slowly fell from sight and disappeared…

Comments from FSR 1972 Case Histories No. 11


When the men looked for it, they found what appeared to be landing traces and made an effort to record them. Below you can see the unusual marks (2.5” diameter) that were left in the ground:



The story caught the public attention and newspapers across S Africa, Europe and the USA enjoyed the comedy elements of stupid farmers shooting at things they didn’t understand. Some commentators were shocked that opening fire was the first reaction to engaging with a possible visitor from elsewhere and others wondered about manners and protocols when contact with the unknown is first made…



"It's inhabited by a pastoral but warlike tribe and you can forget about the dialogue!" Argus June 29 1972

Bennie Smit was ridiculed and Van Rensing and Kitching were chastised by their superiors. Years later, in 2009, Smit claimed to no longer believe the object was from space and instead thought it was a military secret that got lost on his farm. Van Rensing explained how he and Kitching had returned to the station and been criticised for firing without due cause...

"All they really wanted to know was what Act we had used to decide to fire at the craft and one superior was not amused when I joked, 'the Stock Theft Act'. We were scared and had to decide in a split second what was best. If we had brought it down, and there were aliens inside, then we would have all been heroes."

As a curious epilogue to the bizarre encounter, at the beginning of the following month, Smit's farm once again had UFO sightings. In the final account, his concrete water reservoir mysteriously exploded...

Nicap UFO Investigator August 1972


It's appealing to think that our mysterious object got its own back before returning to parts unknown...

Some thoughts...

Essentially, we have a multiple witness sighting of a solid object that was hit by bullets and apparently left landing traces. The testimonies leave two main interpretations:

1 - They saw what they say they saw
2 - They took part in a hoax

Whatever the object was, I can't think of anything of ours that could be unidentified at less than 15 metres away. Likewise, nothing since in our technology is ovoid or floating that can take rounds from a heavy rifle at close range. Nothing we have is up to 2 metres in size and can disappear. If indeed it was something from elsewhere, it's anyone's guess what purpose it would serve hanging out around farmlands in trigger-happy country. One thought that crossed my mind is the way cats follow lights on a wall. Whilst the cats are focused on the silly light, we are watching them carefully and laughing at them in friendly amusement. The way this object is playing peek-a-boo (despite the shots) seems peculiarly staged and more like a practical joke.

The question is, if we don't have the technology to create the object...who did? And why were they playing tricks on gun-happy farmers?

Sources and extra reading:

Cynthia Hind UFO Afrinews: p 18 www.ufoafrinews.com...
Brian Vike Interview with (then) Sgt P.C. Kitching - www.americanchronicle.com...
Wikipedia South Africa page - en.wikipedia.org...
The Big Study - thebiggeststudy.blogspot.com...
www.webcitation.org...
NICAP UFO Investigator August 1972 - www.ufodocarchive.org...
NICAP UFO Investigator October 1972 - www.ufodocarchive.org...

Somewhere, there's a Brian Vike audio interview with Kitching from 07/08 that would be nice if someone could post a link to.

Freakin aliens should have landed in the grey's only landing zone .Go blick to where you came from(is that PC)

Melvar: "Let's set her down over there, near those war-having, murder-happy primates."

Melnak: "Seriously bro? Bro, you seriously want to fly all the way here and risk your new saucer doing that? Bro? Why Bro? Why?"

Melvar: "I am now covered under mom and dads primate insurance. It's cool, we're covered if they try anything"

*I try to imagine what would cause them to land amongst us.

Great thread Kandinsky. These close contact cases are my favorite.

reply to post by Exuberant1
Cheers Ex, I'm the same...can hardly get enough of the up-close encounter stories. Of course, some of them are better than others and this is one of them.

If they were visitors...landing in the thick of Apartheid S Africa and being shot at by white guys whilst the black guys waved a stick at them and shouted must have been a blast!

why would you shoot at a UFO, if you beleive it came from outaspace then they must have advanced tech. would you shoot bullets at something that might have lazers... its like taking a knife to a gun fight

Originally posted by Kandinsky

If they were visitors...landing in the thick of Apartheid S Africa and being shot at by white guys whilst the black guys waved a stick at them and shouted must have been a blast!

It is like a microcosm of the Regan speech.

"...Perhaps we need some outside, universal threat to make us recognize this common bond. I occasionally think how quickly our differences worldwide would vanish....."

I guess it was actually more like this:

"That thing is different and strange. Let us unite and destroy it"

"Okay!"

Like the man says, they would have been heroes if they brought it down (and it was alien).

I enjoyed reading this case,I had not been familiar with it until now so for that,many thanks
After reading through the account these are the few obvious explanations I have come to:

1.) secret military tech. exercise that turned into one hell of a bad,amusing day for these South African gents

2.) "alien" probe, originating from interstellar space or the moon or even the possibility from somewhere within our planet,

3.) collaborated hoax between the men

4.) shared hallucination

Personally, I would lean towards # 1 or # 2, of course that is just my take on it and I believe similar experiences have been going on for a very longtime in one form or another.

I believe many individuals especially back then were fearful of being labeled crazies and shunned.
many were harassed and/or may have lost credibility,as seen with this case.

law enforcement may be fallible as any imperfect human being when it comes to eyewitness testimony ,
I believe having police/military/trained observers can give many cases a much needed corroborative plausibility that others tend to lack on grounds of comparison that many witnesses are merely your average citizens.

Genuine unexplainable experience or Hoax

It is quirky older cases like these leaving me scratching my head
If alien, we are probably a # 1 hit reality show being viewed by the superior cosmos as great entertainment

S&F

reply to post by Kandinsky


this makes perfect sense, observe a small sample of a species covertly so as not to be overwhelmed.

you know, if those hicks did bring it down, it would have ended the whole controversy right there and then...unless of course the gov't swoops in on them and confiscates everything and imposes a news blackout

Trans En Provence \\france.
A farmer ( maybe these guys are vegetarians and juat wanted to try some redeekio?)
Ive forgotten the name, but he was working outside when a saucer about the same size landed in his garden.
This is a famous and very well documented case from earlier days (60s i think)
I call your attention to the relative sizes of the crafts...almost identical.
The time periods are close enough i think as well.....
There is all kinds of smaller ufos reported, and i tend to believe this really did happen as stated.
S Afirca has a couple other very interesting close encounter cases as well, one other of a saucer landing i am aware of....seen by a woman i think....

Originally posted by DaveNorris
why would you shoot at a UFO, if you beleive it came from outaspace then they must have advanced tech. would you shoot bullets at something that might have lazers... its like taking a knife to a gun fight

I used to think I'd try an make peaceful first contact but then I realized they might just abduct me for food or something and I'd be helpless standing there making a live long and prosper hand sign.

No, I think it'd be smarter to shoot first possibly wounding/downing whatever it is so I have proof. The relations can start from there with me having the upper hand

Originally posted by DaveNorris
why would you shoot at a UFO, if you beleive it came from outaspace then they must have advanced tech. would you shoot bullets at something that might have lazers... its like taking a knife to a gun fight

Yes, that's true, but with all of the people who are convinced that all ET Beings are in fact Demons, rest assured there will be some who shoot at them. Not a doubt in my mind about that. Do you have spellcheck on your browser, friend?

In Firefox, type "about:config" in the url bar, press Enter. Type "spell" in the Filter Box, and look for an entry named layout.spellcheckDefault and change the value from the default "1" to "2," this will engage spellcheck.

reply to post by Kandinsky


Hi, Kandinsky.

What a great treatment of this story, I was not expecting this this morning and you just made the weekend that much more fun. These are just the kind of stories that I like best. Some of the details are great, like the observation that the thing seemed to have one powerful running light and the confusion between the witnesses as to whether or not it was a device surrounded by light or and object made of light. Good stuff.

So far I have not come up with the Vike interview but I will keep looking. I did find some interviews with police officers that were there and I will link that. I bet you have seen it but maybe others haven't yet.

Thanks again, really dig the story and especially the title of your thread.

"They're comin' right for us!"



Eyewitness accounts from policeman on the scene that took part in shooting at the thing...
ufopolice.blogspot.com...

On our arrival we did not witness any suspicious objects. We did the initial investigation and were skeptical. At that stage we were seven people. Four laborers, 2 policemen and Mr. Smit.

Whilst we were standing looking at the hill which were 150 meters from us, I saw an object which emerged from the thick bush and vegetation at the foot of the hill and hovered just above the vegetation. It moved slowly to our right and again disappeared behind the thick bush. It did this movement a couple of times and I had the feeling that we were being watched.

Mr. Smit had a .303 rifle with him and I decided to take a shot at it. The object were oval shaped and it was difficult to estimate the size of it. might have been just over a meter in diameter.

So he 'decided' to take a shot at it; why not?

And...(same link as above)

The following day we combed the area with other police officers and found nine evenly spread circular imprints about 10cm in diameter in the soil directly from where we saw it disappearing behind the bushes. The imprints were in hard clay soil easily 25 - 30 mm deep, as if the legs were spiraled in the ground. Samples were taken and send to the Council for Scientific & Industrial research Laboratories. Apparently it never reached them.

Originally posted by Kandinsky
Essentially, we have a multiple witness sighting of a solid object that was hit by bullets and apparently left landing traces.

Hi Kandinsky,

Interesting story, starred and flagged.

Are there any South African FOIA documents (from the police or military) relating to this sighting, e.g. more detailed witness reports?

reply to post by Frater210
Cheers Frater, last year I downloaded the Vike Reports that fell within two months of his posted interview with Kitching. Fortunately, it was just before Vike got Bigelowed...unfortunately, none of them have the promised interview. I should probably contact him and ask if the interview took place. Failing that I'll ask 'UFORadio' if he has any audio about the case.

Given the known evidence about it all, it's anyone's guess why such a juicy sighting has fallen down the back of ufology's sofa. Like other accounts, if it didn't happen in the US or Western Europe it needn't have happened at all. Ball lightning, Venus, mass hallucination or CIA mischief are often trawled out for these claims and yet none of them quite fit the details.

reply to post by IsaacKoi

Are there any South African FOIA documents (from the police or military) relating to this sighting, e.g. more detailed witness reports?

None so far.

One lead is the author of the article (Sunday Independent) that was posted on UFOUpdates. As we both know, it's hard to get a reply from journalists...my hit rate is 1 out of around 30.

FSR and NICAP refer to military investigation and other sources seem to me exaggerated or fictional. Like any good UFO case, mythology, urban folklore and BS were quickly attached to the reports.

reply to post by Kandinsky

Given the known evidence about it all, it's anyone's guess why such a juicy sighting has fallen down the back of ufology's sofa.

Agreed, there is a lot about this story that makes it special. The whole thing about the lockdown on the farm and the local media blackout are really juicy features of the story because somehow I believe that if it had happened here even that part of the story might have been scrubbed somehow. Maybe because it is from SA and that the witness accounts seem so frankly honest that the details of this case are richer somehow than usual. Everyone telling the tale seems to be simply recounting what they saw.

This is just pricelss.

“Who is making fire on Bennie’s farm?”

I just love these reports from ranches and farms. What the heck is going on on these ranches and farms, anyway? I actually almost took a job in Elko Nevada just so I could be close to these ranch type areas where all this high strangeness seems to occur.

reply to post by Kandinsky


Please Aliens from another planet take us smart people to a great place, and leave the morons behind. We aren't all like them I promise.

Yes,shoot first,make peace with the upper hand.A lot of people are being a little bite hypocrite here.The last time i checked,hovering lights were associated with abduction,cattle mutilations......I say,stay away from my arse and maybe peace can be discussed.