The National Sea Rescue Institute (NRSI) launched a search party and scoured twelve square miles of ocean, finding nothing. Witnesses had described ‘smoking trail’, ‘flames’, ‘water exploding’ and ‘ripples’ in the water from the impact and assumed that an aircraft had gone down.

NSRI spokesman Craig Lambinon said that nothing had been found, despite and extensive search and that no aircraft had been reported missing.

A teacher at Port Shepstone High School claimed that what was seen was actually a tornado forming out to sea, sucking up water and creating the illusion of something impacting with the ocean.

Witnesses dispute this, maintaining that they saw a solid object come down. It has also been suggested that some space debris or a meteorite is behind the incident.

The event at Port Shepstone is similar to what happened at Shag Harbour, Novia Scotia, Canada in 1967, when numerous people witnessed a UFO crash into the sea. Despite lengthy searches, nothing was ever found, but mysterious naval activity in the area after the event led to theories that ‘something’ had been recovered.