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The article below was published in the daily newspaper The Examiner, San Francisco, California, USA, on October 5, 1973.
CAPE GIRARDEAU (Mo.) - UPI - A physics professor investigating a reported attack on a truck driver by an unidentified flying object said today that the victim's eyeglasses were damaged by internal heat from an unknown source.
In the latest of a series of recent UFO sightings in southeastern Missouri, Eddie Webb, 45, of Greenville, said he was blinded for several hours after the incident. He is recovering his vision, but intends to visit an eye specialist in St. Louis.
Webb said he was driving a tractor-trailer rig about dawn Wednesday when he saw a bright light or aluminum object in the air behind him, "coming up real fast."
He awakened his wife, Velma, who was asleep in the cab, he said, but she didn't see anything.
"Then I stuck my head out the window and a large ball of fire struck me in the face," Webb said. "My glasses fell off and I couldn't see. But I got the truck stopped."
Mrs. Webb said her husband screamed, "Oh, my God I'm burned!! can't see!"
One of the lenses of his glasses reportedly fell out of the plastic frame, which was warped. Mrs. Webb, who serves as a relief driver, drove him to a hospital.
Sgt. Ed Wright of the Highway Patrol took Webb's glasses to Dr. Harley Rutledge, head of the Southeast Missouri State University physics department, for an analysis.
Rutledge, who has been working for six months to attempt to identify reported mysterious flying objects, said he put the glasses under a microscope and "it appeared they were heated internally.
"The plastic apparently got hot and the mold came to the surface. The heat warped the plastic, causing the lens to fall out."
Rutledge said he plans more tests on the glasses. He said there appears to be "some residue which we hope to put through some chemical tests." Meanwhile in Tupelo, Miss., police reported for the third consecutive night the sighting of what they called multicolored UFOs yesterday.
The Lee County sheriff's office said two deputies told of seeing brightly lighted objects and that similar reports had come from sheriff's departments in neighboring Pontotoc and Itawamba counties.
