UFOs and Vimanas

The » Vaimanika Shastra (or Vymaanika-Shaastra) has eight chapters with diagrams, describing three types of aircraft, including apparatuses that could neither catch on fire nor break. It also mentions 31 essential parts of these vehicles and 16 materials from which they are constructed, which absorb light and heat; for which reason they were considered suitable for the construction of Vimanas. This document has been translated into English and is available by writing the publisher: VYMAANIDASHAASTRA AERONAUTICS by Maharishi Bharadwaaja, translated into English and edited, printed and published by Mr. G. R. Josyer, Mysore, India, 1979 (sorry, no street address). Mr. Josyer is the director of the International Academy of Sanskrit Investigation located in Mysore.

There seems to be no doubt that Vimanas were powered by some sort of "anti-gravity." Vimanas took off vertically, and were capable of hovering in the sky, like a modern helicopter or dirigible. Bharadvajy the Wise refers to no less than 70 authorities and 10 experts of air travel in antiquity. These sources are now lost.

Vimanas were kept in a Vimana Griha, a kind of hangar, and were sometimes said to be propelled by a yellowish-white liquid, and sometimes by some sort of mercury compound, though writers seem confused in this matter. It is most likely that the later writers on Vimanas, wrote as observers and from earlier texts, and were understandably confused on the principle of their propulsion. The "yellowish-white liquid" sounds suspiciously like gasoline, and perhaps Vimanas had a number of different propulsion sources, including combustion engines and even "pulse-jet" engines.

It is interesting to note, that the Nazis developed the first practical pulse-jet engines for their V-8 rocket "buzz bombs." Hitler and the Nazi staff were exceptionally interested in ancient India and Tibet and sent expeditions to both these places yearly, starting in the 30’s, in order to gather esoteric evidence that they did so, and perhaps it was from these people that the Nazis gained some of their scientific information!

According to the Dronaparva, part of the Mahabarata, and the Ramayana, one Vimana described was shaped like a sphere and born along at great speed on a mighty wind generated by mercury.  It moved like a UFO, going up, down, backwards and forewards as the pilot desired.

It is evident that ancient Indians flew around in these vehicles, all over Asia, to Atlantis presumably; and even, apparently, to South America. Writings found at Mohenjodaro in Pakistan (presumed to be one of the "Seven Rishi Cities of the Rama Empire") and still undeciphered, has also been found in one other place in the world: Easter Island! Writing on Easter Island, called Rongo-Rongo writing, is also undeciphered, and is uncannily similar to the Mohenjodaro script. 

Was Easter Island an air base for the Rama Empire's Vimana route? (At the Mohenjo-Daro Vimana-drome, as the passenger walks down the concourse, he hears the sweet, melodic sound of the announcer over the loudspeaker,

"Rama Airways flight number seven for Bali, Easter Island, Nazca, and Atlantis is now ready for boarding. Passengers please proceed to gate number..") in Tibet, no small distance, and speaks of the "fiery chariot" thusly: "Bhima flew along in his car, resplendent as the sun and loud as thunder... The flying chariot shone like a flame in the night sky of summer ... it swept by like a comet... It was as if two suns were shining. Then the chariot rose up and all the heaven brightened."

In the Mahavira of Bhavabhuti, a Jain text of the eighth century culled from older texts and traditions, we read:

"An aerial chariot, the Pushpaka, conveys many people to the capital of Ayodhya. The sky is full of stupendous flying-machines, dark as night, but picked out by lights with a yellowish glare"

The Vedas, ancient Hindu poems, thought to be the oldest of all the Indian texts, describe Vimanas of various shapes and sizes: the "ahnihotra-vimana" with two engines, the "elephant-vimana" with more engines, and other types named after the kingfisher, ibis and other animals. 

The Atlanteans, known as "Asvins" in the Indian writings, were apparently even more advanced technologically than the Indians, and certainly of a more war-like temperament.

Although no ancient texts on Atlantean Vailixi are known to exist, some information has come down through esoteric, "occult" sources which describe their flying machines. Similar, if not identical to Vimanas, Vailixiwere generally "cigar shaped" and had the capability of maneuvering underwater as well as in the atmosphere or even outer space. Other vehicles, like Vimanas, were saucer shaped, and could apparently also be submerged. 

According to Eklal Kueshana, author of "The Ultimate Frontier," in an article he wrote in 1966, Vailixi were first developed in Atlantis 20,000 years ago, and the most common ones are,

"saucershaped of generally trapezoidal cross-section with three hemispherical engine pods on the underside."

"They use a mechanical antigravity device driven by engines developing approximately 80,000 horse power."

"...(the weapon was) a single projectile 
charged with all the power of the Universe. 
An incandescent column of smoke and flame 
As bright as the thousand suns rose in all its splendor... 

An iron thunderbolt,
A gigantic messenger of death,
Which reduced to ashes
The entire race of the Vrishnis
And the Andhakas.

... the corpses were so burned
As to be unrecognizable.
The hair and nails fell out;
Pottery broke without apparent cause,
And the birds turned white.

... After a few hours
All foodstuffs were infected...
... to escape from this fire
The soldiers threw themselves in streams
To wash themselves and their equipment..."

With the cataclysmic sinking of Atlantis and the wiping out of Rama with atomic weapons, the world collapsed into a "stone age" of sorts, and modern history picks up a few thousand years later. Yet, it would seem that not all the Vimanas and Vailixi of Rama and Atlantis were gone. Built to last for thousands of of years, many of them would still be in use, as evidenced by Ashoka's "Nine Unknown Men" and the Lhasa manuscript.

That secret societies or "Brotherhoods" of exceptional, "enlightened" human beings would have preserved these inventions and the knowledge of science, history, etc., does not seem surprising. Many well known historical personages including Jesus, Buddha, Lao Tzu, Confucius, Krishna, Zoroaster, Mahavira, Quetzalcoatl, Akhenaton, Moses, and more recent inventors and of course many other people who will probably remain anonymous, were probably members of such a secret organization.

It is interesting to note that when Alexander the Great invaded India more than two thousand years ago, his historians chronicled that at one point they were attacked by "flying, fiery shields" that dove at his army and frightened the cavalry. These "flying saucers" did not use any atomic bombs or beam weapons on Alexander's army however, perhaps out of benevolence, and Alexander went on to conquer India.

First of all we need to understand that the Vedic conception of universal time is divided into different periods. For example, a period called one day of Brahma is equivalent to 4,320,000,000 of our years on earth. Brahma's night is equally as long and there are 360 of such days and nights in one year of Brahma. Each day of Brahma is divided into one thousand cycles of four yugas, namely Satya-yuga, Treta-yuga, Dvapara-yuga, and finally the Kali-yuga, which is the yuga we are presently experiencing. Satya-yuga lasts 1,728,000 years, and is an age of purity when all residents live very long lives and can be fully developed in spiritual understanding and mystical abilities and remarkable powers.

Some of these abilities, or mystic siddhis, include changing one's shape, becoming very large or microscopically small, becoming very heavy or even weightless, securing any desirable thing, becoming free of all desires, or even flying through the sky to wherever one wanted to go on one's own volition. So at that time, the need for mechanical flying machines was not necessary.

It is explained that it was not until the beginning of Treta-yuga that the development of vimanas took place. In fact, Lord Brahma, the chief demigod and engineer of the universe, is said to have developed several vimanas for some of the other demigods. These were in various natural shapes that incorporated the use of wings, such as peacocks, eagles, swans, etc. Other vimanas were developed for the wiser human beings by great seers of Vedic knowledge.

In the course of time, there were three basic types of vimanas. In Treta-yuga, men were adept in mantras or potent hymns. Thus, the vimanas of that age were powered by means of knowledge of mantras. In Dvapara-yuga, men had developed considerable knowledge of tantra, or ritual. Thus, the vimanas of Dvapara-yuga were powered by the use of tantric knowledge. In Kali-yuga, knowledge of both mantra and tantra are deficient. Thus, the vimanas of this age are known as kritaka, artificial or mechanical. In this way, there are three main types of vimanas, Vedic airplanes, according to the characteristics of each yuga.

Of these three types, there is listed 25 variations of the mantrika vimanas, 56 variations of the tantrica vimanas, and 25 varieties of the kritakaah vimanas as we find today in Kali-yuga. However, in regard to the shape and construction, there is no difference between any of these vimanas, but only in how they were powered or propelled, which would be by mantras, tantras, or mechanical engines.

Additional information on the mercury engines used in the vimanas can be found in the ancient Vedic text called the Samarangana Sutradhara. This text also devotes 230 verses to the use of these machines in peace and war. We will not provide the whole description of the mercury vortex engine here, but we will include a short part of William Clendenon's translation of the Samarangana Sutradhara from his 1990 book, Mercury, UFO Messenger of the Gods:

"Inside the circular air frame, place the mercury-engine with its electric/ultrasonic mercury boiler at the bottom center. By means of the power latent in the mercury which sets the driving whirlwind in motion, a man sitting inside may travel a great distance in the sky in a most marvelous manner. Four strong mercury containers must be built into the interior structure. When those have been heated by controlled fire from iron containers, the vimana develops thunder-power through the mercury. At once it becomes like a pearl in the sky."

This provides a most simplistic idea of the potential of the mercury engines. This is one kind of a propulsion mechanism that the vimanas of Kali-yuga may use. Other variations are also described. Not only do these texts contain directions on how to make such engines, but they also have been found to contain flight manuals, aerial routes, procedures for normal and forced landings, instructions regarding the condition of the pilots, clothes to wear while flying, the food to bring and eat, spare parts to have, metals of which the craft needs to be made, power supplies, and so on. Other texts also provide instructions on avoiding enemy craft, how to see and hear what occupants are saying in enemy craft, how to become invisible, and even what tactics to use in case of collisions with birds. Some of these vimanas not only fly in the sky, but can also maneuver on land and fly into the sea and travel under water.

There are many ancient Vedic texts that describe or contain references to these vimanas, including the Ramayana, Mahabharata, Rig-veda, Yajur-veda, Atharva-veda, the Yuktilkalpataru of Bhoja (12th century A.D.), the Mayamatam (attributed to the architect Maya), plus other classic Vedic texts like the Satapathya Brahmana, Markandeya Purana, Vishnu Purana, Bhagavata Purana, the Harivamsa, the Uttararamcarita, the Harsacarita, the Tamil text Jivakacintamani, and others. From the various descriptions in these writings, we find vimanas in many different shapes, including that of long cigars, blimp-like, saucer-shapes, triangular, and even double-decked with portholes and a dome on top of a circular craft. Some are silent, some belch fire and make noise, some have a humming noise, and some disappear completely.

“Having spoken thus, Maharaja Nirga made a complete circle around Lord Krishna and touched his crown to the Lord’s feet. Granted permission to depart, King Nirga then boarded a wonderful celestial car as all the people looked on.” (Bhagavata Purana)

“While Dhruva Maharaja was passing through space, he saw, in succession, all the planets of the solar system, and on the path he saw all the demigods in their vimanas showering flowers upon him like rain.” (Bhagavata Purana)

“He traveled in that way through the various planets, as the air passes freely in every direction. Coursing through the air in that grand and splendid vimana, which could fly at will, he surpassed even the Devas.” (Bhagavata Purana)

“Then the highly intelligent Asura Maya built the cities . . . There were many palaces with gems. Aerial cars shining like the sun, set with Padmaraga stones, moving in all directions and looking like moonbeams, illuminated the cities.” (Siva Purana)

“When morning dawned, Rama, taking the Celestial Car Puspaka had sent to him by Vivpishand, stood ready to depart. Self-propelled was that car. It was large and finely painted. It had two stories and many chambers with windows, and was draped with flags and banners. It gave forth a melodious sound as it coursed along its airy way.” (Ramayana)

“The Puspaka Car, that resembles the sun and belongs to my brother, was brought by the powerful Ravan; that aerial and excellent car, going everywhere at will, is ready for thee. That car, resembling a bright cloud in the sky, is in the city of Lanka.” (Ramayana)

“Beholding the car coming by force of will Rama attained to an excess of astonishment. And the king got in, and the excellent car, at the command of Raghira, rose up into the higher atmosphere. And in that car, coursing at will, Rama greatly delighted.” (Ramayana)

“Karna took up that fierce weapon, which resembled the tongue of the Destroyer or the Sister of Death. That terrible and effulgent dart, Naikartana, was hurled at the Rakshasa. Beholding that excellent and blazing weapon . . . the Rakshasa began to fly away in fear . . . Destroying that blazing illusion of Ghatotkacha and piercing right through his breast that resplendent dart soared aloft in the night . . . Ghatotkacha, then uttering diverse roars, fell, deprived of life by the dart of Sakra.” (Mahabharata)

“The vimana had all necessary equipment. It could not be conquered by the gods or demons. And it radiated light and reverberated with a deep rumbling sound. Its beauty captivated the minds of all who beheld it. Visvakarma, the lord of its design and construction, had created it by the power of his austerities, and its outline, like that of the sun, could not be easily delineated. (Mahabharata)

“And he also gave [unto Arjuna] a car furnished with celestial weapons whose banner bore a large ape . . . And its splendour, like that of the Sun, was so great that no one could gaze at it. It was the very car riding upon which the lord Soma had vanquished the Danavas. Resplendent with beauty, it looked like an evening cloud reflecting the effulgence of the setting Sun.” (Mahabharata)

“Bhima flew along in his car, resplendent as the sun and loud as thunder . . . The flying chariot shone like a flame in the night sky of summer . . . it swept by like a comet . . . It was if two suns were shining. Then the chariot rose up and all the heavens brightened.” (Mahabharata)

“And on this sunlike, divine, wonderful chariot the wise disciple of Kuru flew joyously upward. When becoming invisible to the mortals who walk the earth, he saw wondrous airborne chariots by the thousands.” (Mahabharata)

“And the celebrated Arjuna, having passed through successive regions of the heavens, at last beheld the city of Indra. And there he beheld celestial cars by thousands stationed in their respective places [an airport?] and capable of going everywhere at will, and he saw tens of thousands of such cars moving in every direction.” (Mahabharata)

“And thereupon that best of cars became still more dazzling with its splendour and was incapable of being looked at by created beings, as the midday sun surrounded by a thousand rays . . . And Achyuta, that tiger among men, riding with the two sons of Pandu upon that celestial car . . . coming out of Girivraja, stopped (for some time) on a level plain outside of town.” (Mahabharata)

“We beheld in the sky what appeared to us to be a mass of scarlet cloud resembling the fierce flames of a blazing fire. From that mass many blazing missiles flashed, and tremendous roars, like the noise of a thousand drums beaten at once. And from it fell many weapons winged with gold and thousands of thunderbolts, with loud explosions, and many hundreds of fiery wheels. Loud became the uproar of falling horses, slain by these missiles, and of mighty elephants struck by the explosions . . . Those terrible Rakshasas had the shape of large mounds stationed in the sky.” (Mahabharata)

“Vimanas, decked and equipped according to rule, looked like heavenly structures in the sky . . . borne away they looked like highly beautiful flights of birds. (Mahabharata)

“Gifted with great energy the Rakshasa once more came down to Earth in his golden vimana . . . when it had landed it looked like a beautifully shaped mound of antimony on the surface of the ground.” (Ghatotrachabadma)

“The splendid chariot, made of silver and coated with tiger-skin, and bright like the fire itself, making a noise like the roaring of the clouds; defying all obstacles, adorned with jewels and gold, dazzling to the eyesight and bright . . . went speedily on, making space resound like unto the muttering cloud in the sky. He issued out of his abode like the beautiful moon passing through a huge cloud.” (Ayodhya Kandam, XVI, pp. 235-236)

 “Causing the heaven and the earth to be filled by a loud sound, then Indra came to Yudhishthira on a car and asked him to ascend it.

“Seeing his brothers fallen on the earth, King Yudhishthira the just said to that deity of a thousand eyes these words: ‘My brothers have all dropped down here! They must go with me. Without them by me, I do not wish to go to the celestial region, O lord of all the celestials. The delicate princess Draupadi, deserving of every comfort, should go with us! You should permit this.’

“Indra answered, ‘You shall behold your brothers in the celestial region. They have reached it before you. Indeed, you shall see all of them there, with Krishna. Do not give way to grief, O chief of the Bharatas! Having renounced their human bodies they have gone there, O chief of the Bharata race! As for you, it is ordained that you shall go there in this very body of yours.’”

[After a long debate between the two the following occurs.]

“Then Dharma and Indra and the other deities, causing Yudhishthira to ascend on a car, went to the celestial region. Those beings crowned with success and capable of going everywhere at will, rode their respective cars. King Yudhishthira, riding on his car, ascended quickly, causing the entire sky to blaze with his effulgence.”

Let me draw attention to the phrase “propellers furnished with wheels, working with atmospheric expansion.” This is the way a modern jet engine works: pulling in fresh air using impeller blades, expanding the air by heating it, then directing it through more blades, which turn a shaft connected to the forward turbines, which packs in more air. If we substitute “impellers” for propellers and “turbines” for wheels—both more modern terms—it begins to make a great deal of sense.

Ancient drawings of these machines actually portray turbines and expansion chambers similar in some ways to our modern jet engines. So, at this point let me suggest that in many cases the Sanskrit word chakrashould be translated “turbine” rather than “wheel,” without doing violence to the Sanskrit.

The ancient Aryans of India tended to allegorize a lot, making it difficult to look at their propulsion systems from our scientific point of view. Often the vimanas were said to be drawn through the sky by “celestial steeds” (whether horses, swans, asses, or elephants). What means this?

No doubt some of these descriptions are not allegories, but are presented in such a manner because the propulsion units were deliberately constructed to resemble these animals! The following passage illustrates this clearly describes:

“A huge and terrible black vimana made of black iron, it was 400 yojanas high and as many wide, equipped with engines set in their proper places. No steeds nor elephants propelled it. Instead it was driven by machines that looked like elephants.” (Ghatotrachabadma)

The Saubha is at once Salva's city, flagship, and battle headquarters. In it, he can fly wherever he chooses. Fortunately, the Vrishni heroes are similarly well equipped, and at one point have Salva at their mercy. The hero Pradyumna is about to finish him off with a special weapon, when the highest gods stop him "Not a man in battle is safe from this arrow," they say, and declare that Salva will fall to Krishna.

Krishna took to the sky in pursuit of Salva, but his Saubha clung to the sky at a leagues length... He threw at me rockets, missiles, spears, spikes, battleaxes, three-bladed javelins, flame-throwers, without pausing... The sky... seemed to hold a hundred suns, a hundred moons... and a hundred myriad stars. Neither day nor night could be made out, or the points of a compass.

Krishna, however, wards off Salva's attack with what sounds like antiballistic missiles; I warded them off as they loomed towards me.

With my swift-striking shafts, as they flashed through the sky, And I cut them into two or three pieces with mine -- There was a great din in the sky above. However, the Saubha becomes invisible. Krishna then loads a special weapon, perhaps an ancient version of a smart bomb? I quickly laid on an arrow, which killed by seeking out sound, to kill them... All the Danavas [Salva's troops] who had been screeching lay dead, killed by the blazing sun like arrows that were triggered by sound.

Another chapter, describing the use of the Agneya weapon by the hero Adwattan.

When the weapon, a "blazing missile of smokeless fire" is unleashed; dense arrows of flame, like a great shower, issued forth upon creation, encompassing the enemy... A thick gloom swiftly settled upon the Pandava hosts. All points of the compass were lost in darkness. Fierce winds began to blow. Clouds roared upward, showering dust and gravel. Birds coked madly... the very elements seemed disturbed. The sun seemed to waver in the heavens. The earth shook, scorched by the terrible violent heat of this weapon. Elephants burst into flame and ran to and fro in a frenzy... over a vast area, other animals crumpled to the ground and died. From all points of the compass the arrows of flame rained continuously and fiercely.

And if that sounded like a firestorm, then a similar weapon fired by Gurkha sounds like nothing less than a nuclear blast complete with radioactive fallout;

Gurkha, flying in his swift and powerful Vimana, hurled against the three cities of the Vrishnis and Andhakas a single projectile charged with all the power of the universe.

An incandescent column of smoke and fire, as brilliant as ten thousand suns, rose in all its splendor. It was the unknown weapon, the iron thunderbolt, a gigantic messenger of death which reduced to ashes the entire race of Vrishnis and Andhakas.

The corpses were so burnt they were no longer recognizable. Hair and nails fell out. Pottery broke without cause... Foodstuffs were poisoned.

To escape, the warriors threw themselves in streams to wash themselves and their equipment.

The existence of the text was revealed in 1952 by G. R. Josyer, according to whom it is due to one Pandit Subbaraya Shastry, who dictated it in 1918-1923. A Hindi translation was published in 1959, the Sanskrit text with an English translation in 1973. It has 3000 shlokas in 8 chapters and was attributed by Shastry to Maharishi Bharadvaja, which makes it of purportedly "ancient" origin, and hence it has a certain notability in ancient astronaut theories.

Unlike modern treatises on aeronautics that begin by discussing the general principles of flight before detailing concepts of aircraft design, the Vaimanika Shastra straightaway gets into quantitative description, as though a particular aircraft is being described. The topics covered include, "definition of an airplane, a pilot, aerial routes, food, clothing, metals, metal production, mirrors and their uses in wars, varieties of machinery and yantras, planes like ‘mantrik’, ‘tantrik’, and ‘kritak’" and four planes called Shakuna, Sundara, Rukma, and Tripura are described in greater detail. The extant text is claimed to be only a small (one-fortieth) part of a larger work Yantra Sarvaswa ("All about machines) composed by Maharishi Bharadwaj and other sages for the "benefit of all mankind".

In 1991, the English portion and the illustrations from the Josyer book were reprinted by David Hatcher Childress in Vimana Aircraft of Ancient India & Atlantis as part of the Lost Science Series. According to Childress, the 8 chapters treat the following:

• The electromagnetic field coil, which consists of the closed circuit exchanger / condenser coil circuit containing the liquid metal mercury and / or its hot vapor, is placed with its core axis vertical to the craft.

• A ring conductor (directional gyro-armature) is placed around the field coil (heat exchanger) windings so that the core of the vertical heat exchanger coils protrudes through the center of the ring conductor.

• When the electromagnet (heat exchanger coils) is energized, the ring conductor is instantly shot into the air, taking the craft as a complete unit along with it.

• If the current is controlled by a computerized resistance, (rheostat), the ring conductor armature and craft can be made to hover or float in the Earth's atmosphere.

• The electromagnet hums and the armature ring (or torus) becomes quite hot. In fact, if the electrical current is high enough, the ring will glow dull red or rust orange with heat.

• The phenomenon (outward sign of a working law of nature) is brought about by an induced current effect identical with an ordinary transformer.

The basic turbo-pump engine has four main sections: compressor, combustion, or heating chambers, turbo-pump and exhaust. Burning gases are exhausted through the turbo-pump wheel to generate power to turn the electric generator:

1. Propellant tanks will be filled with liquid air (obtained directly from the atmosphere by on-board reduction equipment).

2. Liquid air may be injected into expansion chambers and heated by the metal working-fluid mercury confined in a boiler coupled to a heat exchanger.

3. The super heated M.H.D. plasma (or air) will expand through propellant cooled nozzles.

4. The ship may recharge its propellant tanks with liquid air and condensate water collected directly from the upper atmosphere by the on-board reducing plant.

Important is that this mercury vortex propulsion model is intented for terrestrial flight only. The strange ball of light that is often seen by UFO like craft, is the ball of light that surrounds a craft is: the magneto-hydrodynamic plasma, a hot continuously recirculating air flow through the ship's gas turbine which is ionized (electrically conducting). Magnetohydrodynamics (MHD) is described by Childress as an ionized gas that is passed through a magnetic field to generate electricity. (Childress (2000), p.182)

 This effect of the ball of light makes the craft to appear alive and breathing. The reason why ships disappear from view is according to Clendenon: The ionized bubble of air surrounding the UFO may be controlled by a computerized rheostat so the ionization of the air may shift through every color of the spectrum, obscuring the aircraft from view. (Childress (2000), p. 181)

The word vimana is purportedly derived from vamana: "he who is able at three strides to take measure of the entire earth and heavens."

"In the Vedic literature of India, there are many descriptions of flying machines that are generally called vimanas. These fall into two categories: (1) manmade craft that resemble airplanes and fly with the aid of birdlike wings, and (2) unstreamlined structures that fly in a mysterious manner and are generally not made by human beings. The machines in category (1) are described mainly in medieval, secular Sanskrit works dealing with architecture, automata, military siege engines, and other mechanical contrivances. Those in category (2) are described in ancient works such as the Rg Veda, the Mahabharata, the Ramayana, and the Puranas, and they have many features reminiscent of UFOs." 

[ Richard L. Thompson, Alien Identities- Ancient Insights into Modern UFO Phenomena ]

"One time while King Citaketu was traveling in outer space on a brilliantly effulgent airplane given to him by Lord Vishnu, he saw Lord Siva..." 

"The arrows released by Lord Siva appeared like fiery beams emanating from the sun globe and covered the three residential airplanes, which could then no longer be seen."  

[ Srimad Bhagasvatam, Sixth Canto, Part 3]

"The so-called 'Rama Empire' of Northern India and Pakistan developed at least fifteen thousand years ago on the Indian sub-continent and was a nation of many large, sophisticated cities, many of which are still to be found in the deserts of Pakistan, northern, and western India. Rama...was ruled by 'enlightened Priest-Kings' who governed the cities. 

[ D. Hatcher Childress, "Ancient Indian Aircraft Technology" ]

In The Anti-Gravity Handbook

"An aerial chariot, the Pushpaka, conveys many people to the capital of Ayodhya. The sky is full of stupendous flying-machines, dark as night,but picked out by lights with a yellowish glare." 

[ Mahavira of Bhavabhuti  (A Jain text of the eighth century culled from older texts and traditions)]

"The Vedas, ancient Hindu poems, thought to be the oldest of all the Indian texts, describe vimanas of various shapes and sizes: the 'ahnihotra-vimana' with two engines, the 'elephant-vimana' with more engines, and other types named after the kingfisher, ibis and other animals." 
- D. Hatcher Childress, "Ancient Indian Aircraft Technology" 

In The Anti-Gravity Handbook

"Now Vata's chariot's greatness! Breaking goes it, 
And Thunderous is its noise, 
To heaven it touches, 
Makes light lurid [a red fiery glare], and whirls dust upon the earth." 

[ Rig-Veda  (Vata is the Aryan god of wind.) ]

"The airplane occupied by Salva was very mysterious. It was so extraordinary that sometimes many airplanes would appear to be in the sky, and sometimes there were apparently none. Sometimes the plane was visible and sometimes not visible, and the warriors of the Yadu dynasty were puzzled about the whereabouts of the peculiar airplane. Sometimes they would see the airplane on the ground, sometimes flying in the sky, sometimes resting on the peak of a hill and sometimes floating on the water. The wonderful airplane flew in the sky like a whirling firebrand - it was not steady even for a moment." 

[ Bhaktivedanta, Swami Prabhupada, Krsna ]

"An Air Force RB-47, equipped with electronic countermeasure (ECM) gear and manned by six officers, was followed by an unidentified object for a distance of well over 700 mi. and for a time period of 1.5 hr., as it flew from Mississippi, through Louisiana and Texas and into Oklahoma. The object was, at various times, seen visually by the cockpit crew as an intensely luminous light, followed by ground-radar and detected on ECM monitoring gear aboard the RB-47. Of special interest in this case are several instances of simultaneous appearances and disappearances on all three of these physically distinct 'channels', and rapidity of maneuvers beyond the prior experience of the air crew." 

[ July 17, 1957 sighting reported in the journal Astronautics and Aeronautics ]

"It is significant that Salva dropped such things as snakes, stones, and tree trunks from his vimana. There is no mention of bombs, and it would seem that even though Salva possessed a remarkable flying machine, he did not have the kind of aerial weapons technology used in World War II. He did, however, have a quite different technology, which could be used to affect the weather and produce whirlwinds, thunderbolts, and hailstones." 

[Richard L. Thompson, Alien Identities- Ancient Insights into Modern UFO Phenomena ]

Later, when Saubha becomes invisible, Krishna relates:

"I quickly laid on an arrow, which killed by seeking out sound, to kill them...All the Danavas [troops in Salva's army] who had been screeching lay dead, killed by the blazing sunlike arrows that were triggered by sound." 

[ The Mahabharata ]

"But the Saubha itself has escaped the attack, and at last Krishna hurls against it his 'favorite fire weapon', a discus having the shape of the 'haloed sun'. Severed in two by the impact, the aerial city falls down. 

"Salva himself is killed, and with his death this episode of The Mahabharata comes to an end." 

[ Reader's Digest Mysteries of the Unexplained ]

"Dense arrows of flame, like a great shower, issued forth upon creation, encompassing the enemy....A thick gloom swiftly settled upon the Pandava hosts. All points of the compass were lost in darkness. Fierce winds began to blow. Clouds roared upward, showering dust and gravel. 
"Birds croaked madly...the very elements seemed disturbed. The sun seemed to waver in the heavens. The earth shook, scorched by the terrible violent heat of this weapon. Elephants burst into flame and ran to and fro in a frenzy...over a vast area, other animals crumpled to the ground and died. From all points of the compass the arrows of flame rained continuously and fiercely."

"Gurkha, flying in his swift and powerful Vimana, hurled against the three cities of the Vrishnis and Andhakas a single projectile charged with all the power of the Universe. An incandescent column of smoke and flame as bright as the thousand suns rose in all its splendour...An iron thunderbolt, a gigantic messenger of death, which reduced to ashes the entire race of the Vrishnis and the Andhakas....The corpses were so burned as to be unrecognizable. The hair and nails fell out; pottery broke without apparent cause, and the birds turned white....After a few hours all foodstuffs were infected.... To escape from this fire, the soldiers threw themselves in streams to wash themselves and their equipment..."  

[ The Mahabharata ]

"It would seem that The Mahabharata is describing an atomic war! References like this one are not isolated; but battles, using a fantastic array of weapons and aerial vehicles are common in all the epic Indian books. One even describes a vimana-Vailix battle on the Moon! The above section very accurately describes what an atomic explosion would look like and the effects of the radioactivity on the population. Jumping into water is the only respite. 

"When the Rishi City of Mohenjodaro was excavated by archaeologists in the last century, they found skeletons just lying in the streets, some of them holding hands, as if some great doom had suddenly overtaken them. These skeletons are among the most radioactive ever found, on a par with those found at Hiroshima and Nagasaki." 

"Futhermore, at Mohenjo-Daro, a well planned city laid on a grid, with a plumbing system superior to those used in Pakistan and India today, the streets were littered with 'black lumps of glass'. These globs of glass were discovered to be clay pots that had melted under intense heat! " 

[ D. Hatcher Childress, "Ancient Indian Aircraft Technology" ]

"The Vedic universe is described as a product of maya, or illusion, and it can be thought of as a universal virtual reality system.....The role of the computer is played by a fundamental energy called pradhana. This energy is activated by an expansion of the Supreme known as Maha-Visnu, who acts as the universal programmer. Thus activated pradhana produces subtle forms of energy, and these in turn produce gross matter." 

"Uma, the wife of Lord Siva, is also known as Maya Devi, or the goddess in charge of the illusory energy. She is also the Mother Goddess who has been worshipped all over the world by many different names. Since Siva is Uma's husband, he is the master of illusion and technology. Thus there is a natural connection between Lord Siva, who Salva approached to obtain his vimana, and Maya Danava, the master of illusion who manufactured it." 

[ Richard L. Thompson, Alien Identities - Ancient Insights into Modern UFO Phenomena ]

Many of properties of the vimanas bring to mind the ephemeral nature of UFO's and their seeming ability to defy the conventional laws of physics. Carl Jung has remarked on the dreamlike quality of UFO's, and somewhere, amidst the observation of bright lights and lost time, the delineation between objective and subjective consciousness appears to break down.

"Our research has found extensive similarities between UFO encounters and religious and metaphysical mysticism, folklore, shamans' trances, migraine attacks, and even the operations of the creative imagination. Among the similarities are recurrent image-constants, a basically consistent sequence of events, and the unusual "peak experience" quality common to all. Also, very bizarre incidents in abduction reports have parallels in these phenomena. For example, the embarrassingly incredible "bodily dismemberment" sometimes reported by abductees is a regular feature of shaman's "death-rebirth" trances." 

[ Alvin H. Lawson ]

An early UFO report in 1929 (18 years before Kenneth Arnold filed his famous report which lead newspapers to coin the term "flying saucers") may be instructive. In a valley in between Mongolia and Tibet, a team of Norwegians and sherpas had just completed building a shrine dedicated to Shambhala. (To Tibetan lamas, Shambhala [which means "quietude"] is a secret place of enlightenment in the northern mountains.)

"On August fifth - something remarkable! We were in our camp in the Kukunor district not far from the Humboldt Chain. In the morning about half-past nine some of our caravaneers noticed a remarkably big black eagle flying over us. Seven of us began to watch this unusual bird. At this same moment another of our caravaneers remarked, 'There is something far above the bird'. And he shouted in his astonishment. We all saw, in a direction from north to south, something big and shiny reflecting the sun, like a huge oval moving at great speed. Crossing our camp the thing changed in its direction from south to southwest. And we saw how it disappeared in the intense blue sky. We even had time to take our field glasses and saw quite distinctly an oval form with shiny surface, one side of which was brilliant from the sun." 

[ Nicholas Roerich, Altai-Himalaya ]

According to a lama, the shiny oval was a "Radiant form of Matter" from Shambhala. It was, he said, a protecting force that was always near but could not always be perceived. In Tibetan Buddhist belief"matter is a development of thought, crystallized mental energy".

"What we are today comes from our thoughts of yesterday, and our present thoughts build our like of tomorrow; our life is the creation of our mind." 

[ The Dhammapada]

Students are taught to mentally visualize their tutelary god which slowly takes on the same quasi-reality as a phantom monk. Under experienced control such ephemeral creations of the mind, or tulpas can take many different forms such as man, animal, tree, rock, etc.

"According to ancient Sanskrit texts found a few years ago by Westerners in a South Indian temple, vimanas were open topped flying devices, not strictly UFOs since they were restricted to the Earth's atmosphere. Dr. Roberto Pinotti is an Italian scientist, and on the 12th of October 1988 was a speaker in the World Space Conference in Bangalore, India. He referred to several Hindu texts and pointed out that Indian gods and heroes fought in the skies using piloted vehicles armed with weapons. These weapons consisted of seven different types of mirrors and lenses which were used for offensive and defensive purposes. The 'Pinjula Mirror' offered a form of 'visual shield' preventing the pilots from 'evil rays', and the weapon named 'Marika' was used to shoot enemy aircraft. Dr. Pinotti said that these weapons 'do not seem to be too different from what we today call laser technology'.

"The vehicles themselves were made of special heat absorbing metals, called 'Somaka, Soundalike and Mourthwika'. According to Dr. Pinotti, the 'principles of propulsion as far as the descriptions were concerned, might be defined as electrical and chemical, but solar energy was involved as well.' Other scientists have put forward the theory that the craft were driven by some sort of mercury ion propulsion system. Dr. Pinotti concluded that the fact that vimanas were written about hundreds, perhaps even thousands, of years ago, plus that they resembled modern UFOs would suggest that India had a '...superior but forgotten civilisation. In the light of this, we think it will be better to examine the Hindu texts and subject the descriptive models of vimanas to more scientific scrutiny'." 

[ Nick Humphries, "UFO Guide" ]

In The Anti-Gravity Handbook

"G. R.. Josyer, director of the International Academy of Sanskrit Research in Mysore, India, stated on September 25, 1952, that Indian manuscripts several thousands of years old dealt with the construction of various types of aircraft for civil aviation and for warfare. 

"The specific manuscript on aeronautics included plans for three types of vimanas (aircraft), the Rukma, Sundara, and Shakuna. Five hundred stanzas of an ancient text treat of such intricate details as the choice and preparation of metals which would be suitable for various parts of vimanas of different types." 

"There were eight chapters...that provided plans for the construction of aircraft that flew in the air, traveled under water, or floated pontoon-like on the water's surface. Some stanzas told of the qualifications and training of pilots." 

[ Brad Steiger, Worlds Before Our Own ]

Like the devices described in the Indian Brihat Kath Álokasamgraha, Chinese flying machines are often described as being made of wood and fly according to straightforward (although not understood) mechanical principles. The following accounts also postdate the spread of Hellenistic culture.

"On the southern peak of Tian Lau mountain, a long time ago, Lu Ban carved some wood into a crane which then flew 700 li. Later, the bird was placed on the west peak of the northern mountain. Emperor Wu [157-87 B.C.] ordered his people to go take it, but then it flew back to the southern peak. Often, when it looks like it is about to rain, then the bird's wings begin to move, flapping as if it is about to fly." 

[ Shu I Chi ]

"By the third century A.D., we read of people constructing a flying vehicle." 

[ Dr. Benjamin B. Olshin, "Mechanical Mythology: Private Descriptions of Flying Machines as Found in Early Chinese, Korean, Indian, and Other Texts" (draft copy) ]

The Koreans have accounts of similar flying machines, although of much more recent derivation.

"There is another story related to these [ways of naming]. Jung Pyung Goo was the inventor of an airplane in Choson [Korea]. During the Im Jin War [between Korea and Japan, 1592-1597], when Jin Joo fortress was in danger, he rescued his friend by an airplane, flying 30 miles away, and then landing. The spinning top with which children play, 'Ping Goo', whirls around on the ground as it is whipped by them, and then lifts up into the air. This is like Jung Pyung Goo's riding of the airplane, moving up and down. So the name 'Pyung Goo' was given [to the top], changed to 'Ping Goo'." 

[ Kwon Tokkyu in a 1923 Korean text ]

Where were such machines manufactured?

"Several thousand of li from China, in what is today Russia... it is said that the people were able to manufacture wheels for a flying machine. Each flying machine required four wheels in all. Furthermore, legend has it that they were able to fly one thousand li in one day. The people of Xi Wu [?] also produced a flying machine, and utilizing a bellows [usually] used in smelting, a pulley hauling device, and other methods, enabled the flying machine to move. The machine was able to float in the air and move freely and without obstacle on rivers or land. During the dangerous times of war and turmoil, this vehicle could be used to ward off attacks from the enemy." 

[ Yi Kyu Gyong, "A Discriminating Look at the Possibilities of Flying Machines" in A Compilation of Previously Uncollected Texts from Throughout the World ]