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by UFO History Buff & Author, Charles Lear 

From the very beginning of the flying saucer/UFO mystery, Joseph Allen Hynek played a huge role as an investigator.  According to him in his 1972 book, The UFO Experience, in 1947 he was asked to be a scientific consultant for the Air Force’s investigation program (which was then called Project Sign) based at Wright-Patterson AFB in Dayton, Ohio. He explains he was “then director of Ohio State University’s McMillan Observatory and, as such, the closest professional astronomer at hand.” He remained a scientific consultant for what operated as Project Sign, Project Grudge, and then Project Blue Book as of 1952, up until its termination in 1969. He went on with his own investigations, formed the Center for UFO Studies in 1973, and continued as its director until his death in 1986. In his almost 40 years of involvement with the mystery, Hynek’s beliefs and public stance evolved quite a bit. Read more →

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by UFO History Buff & Author, Charles Lear 

In last week’s blog, we looked at a case that is typical of UFO reports in the news these days: it originated on social media, there was no proper name for the source, and a great deal of fruitless speculation and arguing followed. As if in answer to our complaints, a case showed up that has just about everything a researcher/investigator could hope for. It involves an Air Traffic Control recording of multiple pilots reporting strange lights moving around in unusual patterns near Eugene, Oregon. Supporting the fact that the recording is genuine, one of the pilots has come forward and talked to the news media.

According to the article by Flynn Nichols headlined “Pilots told to ‘maneuver’ around Oregon ‘UFO’ in leaked cabin audio” published on the Newsweek website on December 12, 2024, a 44-minute recording was posted on Reddit by user SabineRitter on Sunday (which was December 8, 2024). The link to the original recording on LiveATC.net no longer works (the recording seems to have been deleted from the site), but there is an edited 13-minute, 28-second version still available on Youtube as of this writing. The article was updated later the same day with the statement from the FAA that “a pilot reported seeing unidentified lights while flying in Seattle Air Route Traffic Control Center airspace on Saturday, December 7.” It is explained by Nichols that “The URL of the archived recording from LiveATC.net contains a timestamp (Dec-08-2024-0430Z), which specifies the date and time the recording began: 4.30 a.m. on December 8 in Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) or 8:30 p.m., December 7, in Oregon (PST)” and that “The URL also contains the code KEU, which is the airport code for Eugene Airport, and ZSE, which is the official abbreviation of the Seattle Air Route Traffic Control Center (ARTCC).” Read more →

by UFO History Buff & Author, Charles Lear 
Amidst the reports of drone incursions over military bases and northern New Jersey, there was a story that made the news involving video footage reportedly taken by a co-pilot of an unidentified object in the sky above Manchester Airport in England, along with still shots of what was said to be the same object, seen to be a blue sphere, hovering over the tarmac. As is typical of UFO coverage in the news these days, when it’s not about what government officials think about the phenomenon, the origin of the story was a post on social media with no real names provided for the poster or the source. All that was left for those with an interest in the case was to conduct some rather imaginative analysis of the footage and argue back and forth over the possible alien origin of the object. Read more →

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by UFO History Buff & Author, Charles Lear 

John Keel, most well-known as the author of the 1975 book, The Mothman Prophecies, was a controversial figure in flying saucer/UFO world back in the late 1960s and throughout the 70s due to his unorthodox views. He was first and foremost a fortean (interested in all things strange) and it was his view that whatever was behind the flying saucer/UFO phenomenon was not extraterrestrial and might be behind other phenomena as well. From May 1969 to April 1974, Keel put out the “irregular newsletter,” Anomaly. He asked those wishing to receive a copy to send him a self-addressed, stamped manila envelope, and the number of copies he printed depended on the number of envelopes he received. For fans of Keel, issue No. 1 provides a detailed look at his views and investigative methods (in the form of “concrete suggestions for investigating the phenomena”) just after his adventures in West Virginia and New York that he chronicled in The Mothman Prophecies. Read more →

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by UFO History Buff & Author, Charles Lear 

On November 24, researcher/investigator Christopher O’Brien died in a tragic mishap. According to the post by Loren Coleman on his site Cryptozoonews, O’Brien was staying at the house of Ron James in Sedona, Arizona, helping him with the sequel to his film, Accidental Truth, when he started experiencing what James described as “catastrophic breathing difficulties” and tried to drive himself to the hospital. According to James, he likely lost consciousness and “crashed his car into a stone sign and was fatally wounded.” James wrote that he asked for a sign from his “departed friend” as he was returning from San Francisco and stopped by the crash site. He includes a picture of what he found, which was a piece of stone on the ground with the words “Church of Chris” (the final “t” was covered by debris). O’Brien leaves behind many friends in the UFO/Paranormal community who mourn his loss and celebrate his contributions.

O’Brien was a rare breed of researcher, and his methods and integrity remain as a standard that other researchers should be measured by. He appeared on Martin’s show on December 14, 2021, where he mostly talked about a UFO data acquisition system (developed as part of the Unidentified Flying Object Data Acquisition Project) and his involvement with it. He describes duplicating footage shot in Salida, Colorado, in 1995 of what became known as the “Edwards Cigar” when he happened to see a long strand of spider web floating in the breeze and shot footage of it as it was backlit by the sun. He explains, “We need to be intellectually honest about this stuff.” He adds “I’m just as willing to debunk a case or explain it away as I am to confirm it as being high strange.

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