The article below was published in the daily newspaper L'Ardennais, France, pages 1 and 4, October 25, 1954.
See the case file.
EPINAL. -- A worker from Saint-Remy (Vosges), Mr. Louis Ujvari, 40 years old, told the gendarmes that last Wednesday, around 3 AM, while on his way to work, he was stopped on the road by a stocky, medium-sized stranger wearing a gray jacket with shiny insignias on the shoulders.
The man spoke an unknown language. Mr. Ujvari, who is of Czech nationality, tried speaking Russian. His interlocutor understood him perfectly. "Where am I?" he asked. "In Italy or in Spain?" He then inquired about the distance to the German border and asked for the time.
(See the continuation on page 4)
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The worker, having told him that it was still 2:30 a.m., saw the man take out a watch from his jacket, which showed 4:00 a.m. He then ordered the worker to move forward. Soon, Ujvari saw in the middle of the road a craft shaped like two plates inverted against each other, from which a sort of periscope protruded.
Takeoff
When he was about thirty meters from the craft, which was approximately 1.5 meters high and 2.5 meters wide, the stranger told him to step back. However, courageously turning around from time to time, Mr. Ujvari was able to see the craft slowly ascend vertically with "a sewing machine-like noise." Upon reaching an altitude of 500 meters, it leveled off and disappeared toward the south.
Meanwhile, the testimonies collected over the past month regarding the "flying saucers" and "flying cigars" seen in the skies over the peninsula have led to a statement from the Italian Ministry of the Air Force.
"So far," the statement specifies, "radar devices have not detected any such craft, apart from known aircraft and weather balloons whose characteristics are well documented."
"Special instructions have been given to the heads of detection posts to intensify surveillance during twilight and nighttime hours, during which, according to witnesses, 'flying discs' have been observed," the statement adds.
"As for the documentation on 'flying discs' held by the Italian Air Force, it consists only of a few testimonies from officers who claim to have seen these craft over the Tyrrhenian coast, moving in a south-to-north direction at speeds exceeding 2,000 kilometers per hour," the statement concludes.
