UFO Movements in Norway UFO Movements in Norway

650 Heilund

Chapter 80 UFO Movements in Norway UFO Movements in Norway

Jan Bertil Heilund

Introduction

Modern UFO beliefs followed in the wake of Kenneth Arnold’s observation of “flying saucers” in 1947, the Roswell case a couple of months later, and subse quent developments that saw George Adamski (1891–1965) and others take on the role of contactees with the “space brothers” in the 1950s. UFO groups were formed, not only in the USA, but in most Western countries. This was the case also in Norway, which saw the formation of some informal groups in the 1950s, the most prominent of which was established in the city of Bergen. Institu tionalisation did not take place until 1967 when Finn Kalvik (1922–2001) and Nils Sælensminde (1922–2004) founded the association Bergen UFO-forening (Bergen UFO Association). Sælensminde’s close friend, the founder of Danish SUFOI (Scandinavian UFO Information) Major H.C. Petersen, was also a friend of George Adamski. Bergen UFO-forening was thus regularly updated on what happened on the American UFO scene. The Theosophically-inspired depiction of the space brothers and Adamski’s role as a messenger put his credibility into doubt among the more sceptically oriented in the early 1970s, and when Sælensminde found diminishing support for his belief in Adamski’s narratives, he left the group. In 1973 most of the local Norwegian UFO-groups were united in Norsk UFO Center (NUFOC), an organisation that saw as its primary task to collect infor mation on Norwegian UFO observations. In 1979 internal controversies led to a schism within NUFOC, and a new organisation, UFO-Norway, was founded on the initiative of Knut Aasheim (b. 1932). Whereas Aasheim gradually devel oped a more distinctly spiritual and occult understanding of the UFO s, NUFOC became a sceptics’ organisation and a local branch of CSICOP (Centre of Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal; the organisation in 2006 changed its name into Committee for Skeptical Inquiry). In 1983 Project Hessdalen was organised as a joint effort by UFO-Norway and UFO-Sweden to investigate a recurrent atmospheric phenomenon in a valley 30 kilometres north of the town of Røros. Early reports on the phenomenon described mysterious lights in different colours and shapes moving around at different speeds and heights. These reports naturally triggered the interest of

UFO enthusiasts. Key figures in the formative phase of Project Hessdalen were electronic engineer and lecturer at Østfold University College Erling Strand (b.1955) and Knut Aasheim. At the time of writing, Strand remains the leader of the project. Internationally acclaimed scientists and representatives of sev eral scientific organisations have visited the valley, including Allan J. Hynek and several NASA scientists. The other institutionalised UFO organisation in Norway, NETI (Norwegian Organisation for the study of Extraterrestrial Intelligences), was founded in 1997. The founding of this group was inspired by American leader of CSETI (Center for the Study of Extraterrestrial Intelligence) Steven Greer’s appeal during a UFO conference in Oslo to establish work groups aiming to promote ‘a serious, open and democratic handling of the UFO case’. CSETI is primarily associated with the Disclosure Project, an effort to have military and scientific authorities disclose UFO evidence and alien technology supposedly covered up by various governments. The spiritually oriented Greer tried in this way to combine the authority of scientific rationality with popular belief in an invisi ble, spiritual dimension of life. This strategy, a core characteristic of many UFO communities since the early 1950s, and which has resulted in fusions and con flicts, also characterises the development of the Norwegian UFO milieu.

The Norwegian UFO Organisations and their Theorising on the “UFO Phenomenon”

UFO-Norway Although UFO-Norway claims to be founded on and seeks support in estab lished science, stories, myths, and ideas known from the international UFO milieu influence the imagery and the theories found within the organisation. Frequent references to Roswell and von Däniken, and speculations on ESP phenomena and the existence of spirit worlds in order to explain UFO phe nomena, are symptomatic of an “alternative” worldview, rather than of a rationalist and scientific perspective, despite of the fact that the organisation more than thirty years ago distanced itself from Adamski and his contactee narratives. The organisation has on several occasions ridiculed Finnish ufolo gist Rauni-Leena Luukanen for purportedly being a spiritualist, and it has labelled Steven Greer an esoteric mystic, but cooperation with the more mysti cally inclined NETI nonetheless shows how fluid borders can be between the various branches of ufology. Greer, for example, who was one of the main speakers at a UFO conference arranged jointly by UFO-Norway and NETI in the