This is from 8 mm film which does not have sound. Continue reading for information about what was covered during this meeting.
The official UFO Hearing held at the United Nations Special Political Committee on November 28, 1978 was undoubtedly one of the great milestones in the history of ufology, particularly when it comes to its recognition by key international institutions. While photos of this event have been published many times, I am not aware of any footage ever been shown in a UFO documentary or news story. Last week I received a box of old videos that had somehow gotten separates from the rest of my UFO collection, and while looking at the videotapes, I rediscovered one that had been given to me many years ago by the late Colman von Keviczky, the director of ICUFON (Intercontinental UFO Network) and veteran New York ufologist. The tape included raw footage of the UN UFO Hearing and press conference shot by Colman himself, who was a professional cameraman.
The footage you are about to see lasts 1:15 min. and begins with a shot of the hall of the Special Political Committee where the UFO Hearing was held; it then shows Dr. J. Allen Hynek addressing the delegates and you can see Prime Minister Gairy sitting behind the astronomer; the camera then pans over the tables where the delegates sit, showing many empty seats; back to Hynek and the screen where a montage of UFO footage (both films and still photos) prepared by Lee Spiegel for Hynek's Center for UFO Studies (CUFOS) was shown—because the camera was far from the screen and you can barely see the footage, we have edited it out; next you'll see a second panelist addressing the committee, Lt. Col. Lawrence Coyne of the U.S. Army, who talked about his close encounter with a UFO on a Huey Army Reserve helicopter near Mansfield, Ohio, on October 18, 1973, during the peak of the 1973 American UFO wave. Gairy was careful to point out in his introduction that Coyne was speaking on his own behalf and not as a representative of the U.S. military.
Von Kevicky's camera then switches to the press conference, which happened right after the end of the morning session of the UFO Hearing and which, as opposed to the Special Political Committee, was packed. You see here the speakers' panel starting from the right with Grenada's Education Minister, Wellington Friday, who was the number two man for the Grenadian UFO initiative, Prime Minister Gairy, and Dr. Hynek smoking his pipe—that itself shows how many decades have passed since the event—and then shows two of the other panelists, Dr. Jacques Vallee and Lt. Col. Coyne; the camera then pans quickly through the audience at the press conference, where I recognized my friend and long-time New York ufologist Mike Luckman wearing a yellow shirt; the film ends with close-up of Gairy and Wellington Friday.
