Estimated to be about six metres wide, the object passed the vehicle with such speed that its slipstream forced their Mazda sedan into the middle of the road.

Lawrie Fuchs, 70, and his wife Gwen, 69, were returning to their home town of Elliott following a trip to Queensland.

They were travelling in a westerly direction and were about 55km east of the Threeways roadhouse when the incident occurred.

“It was about 4pm when suddenly we saw a dark, silvery flash and heard a loud sound as it passed,” Lawrie said.

“It was travelling at a terrific speed, very bloody fast, and there was no warning at all.

“I’m sure it dive-bombed us but I can’t imagine why.

“The force of the wind was what threw the car a couple of metres, and that’s a fair way considering our car was loaded down with shopping.

“We would have been given much more of a bump around if we were travelling light.”

Gwen said she saw a little flash just below the sun visor then heard a loud whoosh as it passed over.

“I actually thought it hit the car, but there were no marks,” she said.

“It was just so powerful. It couldn’t have been very far above us at all.

“But everything was over in a flash, it happened very quickly.”

Lawrie, a mechanic who has lived in the small Territory community for 40 years says he took the incident in his stride.

“I do a lot of bush work and over the years I’ve seen a number of strange, unexplained things,” he said.

“I don’t talk about it much because sometimes people don’t take you seriously.

“Not that I care what anyone thinks, in the end seeing is believing.”

• On Monday another man reported seeing a UFO near Tennant Creek.

Alan Martin, who is deaf, was obviously shaken by his experience.

The Aboriginal man in his 40s explained he bought some alcohol and headed alone into nearby scrub land to avoid being humbugged.

He described seeing a disc-shaped object at close range while he was drinking during the afternoon.

His drawing indicated it had red, green and blue lights.