Podcast UFO

Abstract: Nearly 25% of the universe is composed of a mysterious substance known as dark matter (while 70% of the cosmos is something called “dark energy”) making it the height of hubris to think that we know all there is to know about physics and astronomy today. This talk will review the strong evidence behind the existence of dark matter, such as gravitational lensing, then discuss how it might lead to naturally occurring anomalies not involving craft piloted by intelligent beings at all. Next, I will cover the possibility for its use as fuel for interstellar flight, one that can be gathered in transit, given its natural abundance being 5x that of interstellar hydrogen.

by Charles Lear

  Every so often, there are concentrations of UFO sightings reports, known as flaps or waves that receive a substantial amount of press coverage.  This occurred in the U.S. in the early years of the modern UFO era and the press generated by one flap in 1952, which included sightings over the Capital, caused a great deal of concern in Washington.  In 1954, there was a flap that was worldwide that involved reports of not only flying saucers, but also of landed saucers and humanoid occupants.  There are reports on record from South America to Africa and the Middle East but the heaviest concentration was over France.  It was there that French researcher, Aimé Michel came to international prominence as he investigated, collected data and tried to unravel the mystery.  A young Jaques Vallée first became interested in flying saucers at this time and was inspired by Michel’s work to go on to even greater prominence as a respected and influential figure in the field.

On September 10, 1954, an incident was reported to police by a 34 year-old man in Quarouble that went on to be covered by the press extensively, not only in France, but worldwide.  Marius Dewilde told police that at 10:30 PM, he was sitting in his house by the railroad tracks, when his dog, Kiki, started barking outside.  Dewilde went to investigate, bringing his flashlight, as it was dark.  Outside, he noticed a large object, which he assumed was a harvest cart, six meters from his front door.  He then saw two figures on a nearby path that was often used by smugglers.  He shined his flashlight at them and it reflected off of what he perceived was a helmet on one of the figures, both of which he estimated to be about a meter in height.  At that moment, a door opened up on the side of the object, a blinding light came out and Dewilde said he was paralyzed by fear.  He closed his eyes and when he opened them, the object had risen ten meters in the air and it then shot off to the west like “lightning.” Later, indentations were found in railroad ties that were thought to have possibly come from the object’s landing gear.  As the story made its way from newspaper to newspaper, Dewilde’s being paralyzed by fear turned into Dewilde being paralyzed by a beam of light.

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Just published for Den of Geek, Alejandro Rojas sat down with army veteran Colonel John Alexander and author Robert Powell to break down the Department of Defense’s recently declassified UFO videos, now formerly released by the Pentagon

By Charles Lear

 It often occurs among UFO enthusiasts that people will form a belief in a case and find it difficult to let go of that belief in spite of evidence that the case was more than likely a hoax.  The alleged 1948 crash and retrieval of a flying disk near Aztec, New Mexico is a classic example.  This case has spawned the well-known 1950 book by Frank Scully, “Behind the Flying Saucers”, two books that gave it new life, one in 1986 and one in 2011, and two extraordinary articles in True magazine that should serve as a model for investigative journalism.

Things got rolling on March 8, 1950 with a lecture at the University of Denver on the subject of flying saucers.  The lecturer spoke before a large group of students and remained anonymous for alleged security reasons.  He was originally chosen to provide a Basic Science class studying critical thinking something to work with but the word got out and, due to popular demand, it was necessary to move the lecture to a larger hall.  The man started with some background history, speculated that the craft were operated using magnetic propulsion and then mentioned that there had been four crashes and retrievals in America and a fifth in Africa.  A local paper wrote an article about the lecture and the hunt was on for the lecturer’s identity.  It was eventually discovered that the man in question was Silas P. Newton, who represented himself as a prominent geophysicist and businessman in the oil industry.  He happened to be a friend of Frank Scully, who was a writer for Variety, and Scully realized that he had a good story on his hands.  He talked with Newton who introduced him to a colleague who would be referred to only as “Dr. Gee” by Scully and the result was “Behind the Flying Saucers” published in September of that year.  It was in this book that details of the Aztec crash and retrieval were made public to a wide audience and a case was born that refuses to die in spite of evidence that the event in question never happened.

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For a little fun to relieve the stress, filmmaker Dean Alioto and his girlfriend Ali made a video for all the fellow quarantines out there who need a good laugh.

Check out his website: www.deanalioto.com

By Charles Lear

For most of the modern UFO era, those interested in the subject have depended on private groups for information.  The most prominent and enduring of these is the Mutual UFO Network.  What many may not know is that MUFON came about as an offshoot of an extraordinary group called the Aerial Phenomena Research Organization that was a mom and pop operation for much of its existence.

APRO was formed in the fall of 1951 through the efforts of Coral Lorenzen with the help and encouragement of her husband, Jim.  Coral’s interest in UFOs preceded the 1947 Kenneth Arnold sighting by more than a decade following her own sighting of an unexplained object.  Coral claimed that in 1934, as a young girl with the maiden name, Lightner, she and her two playmates, Barbara Stringer and Dorothy Wethern, saw what looked like a parachute moving across the sky.  Coral noticed that it didn’t have any strings and this caused her to question whether what she was seeing actually was a parachute.  She told her father what she had seen and he was impressed enough to make inquiries and found that there were no pilots in the area at that time.  Three years later, at the age of 12, Coral was being checked for astigmatism and told her doctor what she had seen.  He recommended that she read the books of Charles Fort, a writer who was a pioneer chronicler of the strange and unusual, and Coral developed an interest that would stick with her for the rest of her life.

By 1947, Coral had married Leslie James Lorenzen and had become an amateur astronomer.  On June 10^th, two weeks before Arnold’s sighting, Coral claimed to have seen a light appear next to a mountain in Mexico while looking for meteors from her back porch in Douglas, Arizona.  In her words, “It became a tiny ball of light, then suddenly shot up into the sky, eventually disappearing at nearly zenith.  After Arnold’s sighting of nine objects flying in formation over Mount Ranier, “flying saucer” sightings became big news and Coral began clipping and saving articles.

In 1951, Coral and Jim Lorenzen were living in Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin after a brief stay in Los Angeles.  While in Los Angeles, they had met contactee, George Adamski, and Coral reported that she was unimpressed by his claims, in part due to his repeated references to the moon as a planet.  In Wisconsin, Coral decided to start a group that would keep track of sightings reports and she wrote to people she knew who might be interested.  Around fifty responded positively and the Aerial Phenomena Research Organization came to be.  Coral had chosen the name, consciously avoiding the term, “flying saucers” which she found distasteful.  The center of operation for APRO was an antique table with clawed feet in the corner of the Lorenzen’s living room and the means of communication among its members was a portable typewriter.

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by Charles Lear

That UFO sightings, more often than not, have prosaic explanations should surprise no one.  Whether or not an explanation is accepted by witnesses and believers is another question.

An important factor influencing acceptance is the credibility of the investigator.  It should be safe to say at.this point that civilian UFO investigators have more credibility than government employed investigators.  This is because, far too often, commonly mistaken objects have been indiscriminately offered as explanations by public officials in order to put a case to rest.  This is unfortunate because there are occasions where a good solution to a case that could help clear out some of noise in the signal may be dismissed by many due to what has become a reflexive reaction.  From a list that seems logical, here are the most commonly misidentified objects listed from 1-7: military experiments, airplanes, Venus, balloons, weird cloud formations, missile tests and lightning.  Of these, Venus and balloons are the most infamous of abused identification choices but balloons, particularly weather balloons, have been a sore spot for civilian researchers and witnesses since the early days of the modern, post 1947, UFO era.

The July, 1947, headlines announced that the Air Force had recovered a “flying saucer.”  At a press conference set up to address the story, which originated from an Air Force press release, a weather balloon was displayed and the press was told that it was this that was recovered.  The press and public accepted the explanation until researcher, Stanton Friedman, investigated the case beginning in 1978 and found discrepancies and evidence of a cover up.  The case gained so much notoriety, that New Mexico Congressman, Steven Schiff was moved to pressure the General Accounting Office for Air Force records related to the event.  The Air Force took it upon themselves to investigate and, in 1995 released “Roswell Report: Fact vs. Fiction in the New Mexico Desert.”  The authors of this 1000 page report came to the conclusion that what was recovered was not a weather balloon but a string of balloons that were part of a developing top secret project.  The project was named, ”Project Mogul” and its purpose was to detect Soviet nuclear weapons tests.  The report failed to convince most of those who adhered to the extraterrestrial cash theory.

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The UFO mystery is not a 20th century phenomenon, but it did in many ways come into prominence in the 20th century. Serious study of UFOs began around World War II and thrived in the following decades. During this golden age of UFO study radio was the dominant form of electronic media. Although film and television existed, radio was a much more important source of timely news and information. Also during this time UFO investigators would find audio recording devices much more portable, reliable and affordable than film equipment. All of this led to an incredible amount of information from the golden age of UFO study being stored in audio formats.

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