The Hill Case — Part 2

What We Know and How We Know It, Part 2

What we know: Betty and Barney misidentified the aircraft warning light on the top of Cannon Mountain as a flying saucer.

How we know it:

When Betty and Barney arrived in Franconia Notch, with Cannon Mountain on the west and Mount Layfayette on the east, they had been watching what they supposed was a UFO ahead of them for over an hour.  They stopped in Franconia Notch and this is what they observed:

They saw the lights on the upper station of the Cannon Mountain Tramway, and, above  those lights, the UFO.  What you or I would have seen, standing at that same location on that same date at that same time, would have been the lights at the upper station of the tramway, and the aircraft warning beacon on Cannon Mountain.  The beacon, then and now, appears above and to the left of the tramway station.   So:  in physical reality there are two lights visible on Cannon Mountain at this point, the light on the tramway station and the beacon.  What Betty and Barney saw, however, was the light on the tramway station and the UFO.  They are looking at the aircraft warning beacon, they are pointing at the aircraft warning beacon, and they’re saying, in effect, That’s it!  That’s the UFO!

This is sufficient in and of itself to prove that they had mistaken the aircraft warning beacon on Cannon Mountain for a flying saucer.

But … this is not everything we have.