When UFOs Collide

By Charles

There is a discussion among UFO enthusiasts as to whether or not the objects being reported are actually material in nature.  Cases where there have been physical traces left behind after a sighting support the argument that some objects are indeed solid but there were times when those traces were left behind none-too-gently.  Actual collisions have been reported between UFOs and aircraft, cars and, possibly, even a train according to a report referenced to in the forum section of Trains magazine.

The most famous case involving a UFO hitting a car comes from Marshall County, Minnesota.  At around 1:40 AM on August 27, 1979, Deputy Sheriff Val Johnson was driving on duty close to the North Dakota Border when he saw a light.  He described it in a taped statement for UFO investigator, Guy Wescott, as “a very bright, brilliant light, eight to twelve inches in diameter, three to four feet off the ground” with well-defined edges.  Thinking it was a landing light from a distressed aircraft, Johnson drove towards it, traveling a little over a mile, when it suddenly came towards him and “intercepted” the vehicle.  Johnson lost consciousness for “approximately thirty-nine minutes” and came to with his car stopped sideways across the road at the end of 99 feet of skid marks, and a total of 953 feet from the site of impact.  He radioed for help and Deputy Sheriff Everett Doolittle was the first to arrive.  Doolittle found Johnson sitting in the driver’s seat, in a state of mild shock, with his head against the steering wheel.  Johnson complained of pain in his eyes that reminded him of burns he’d experienced after welding and said his head felt as if he’d been hit “in the face with a four-hundred pound pillow.”  Doolittle called for an ambulance and Johnson was taken to a hospital where his eyes were treated with salve and bandaged.

What followed was an investigation by the Marshall County Police and three UFO investigators that left all parties mystified.  The car had sustained minor damage including a smashed inside left headlight (there were two lights on each side), a small half-inch circular dent with a flat bottom on the left side of the hood close to the windshield and the windshield had a crack from top to bottom with what looked like four points of impact.  The windshield was examined at Ford and the expert there, Meridan French, was baffled by what appeared to have been inward and outward forces acting on the glass simultaneously.  The roof antenna was bent 60° at a point six inches above its base and the trunk antenna had a 90° bend near its top.  The electric clock in the car was 14 minutes slow as was Johnson’s wristwatch, which was a windup and spring-powered.  In addition to the physical damage, the car battery was unable to hold a charge.

The first civilian investigator on the scene was Guy Wescott, who happened to be vacationing nearby and was notified by Canadian researcher, Chris Rutkowski, who described the case in his 1999 book, “Abductions and Aliens:  What’s Really Going On?”  After Wescott had come and gone, two investigators from the Center for UFO Studies arrived, Bradley Ayers (a former CIA operative), and Allan Hendry.  No one was able to come up with an explanation for the damage and the state of the battery and the Marshall County Police closed the case having reached no conclusions.  Johnson was offered money by the National Enquirer for exclusive rights to his story, which he declined.  The magazine then asked if he would undergo regressive hypnosis and he replied that he was “not curious” about what might have happened to him.  As time passed, Johnson was subjected to such a degree of ridicule that he had to move out of the state.  Even so, the car was impounded and eventually put into a county museum where it remains to this day.

An incident took place on November 27, 1998 in Northern Michigan that was not nearly as violent.  Between 7:00 and 7:30 PM, a female driver saw a very bright light the size of a basketball coming towards her.  She heard a slight thump as there was an impact on the edge of the passenger side of the roof and after that had no idea of what became of what may have been a physical object.  There was no dent in the car but there was a residue that was collected and sent to Phyllis Budinger for analysis.  Budinger identified the chemical makeup and concluded that a celluloidal material found in the residue seemed to have been of plant origin.  She also pointed out that the lack of a dent meant that whatever impacted the car had a low mass and that ruled out any sort of bolide.

Getting hit by an unknown object while driving is scary but getting hit while flying is terrifying.  At around 1:30 AM on October 28, 2017, a plane carrying the Oklahoma City Thunder basketball team was struck by an unknown object at 30,000 ft. while decending into Chicago-Midway.  The plane managed to land safely but the nose had been severely dented.  The explanation given by Delta Airlines was that the plane had likely hit a bird but this seems highly unlikely due to the plane’s altitude and lack of bird remains on the point of impact.

A pilot in Alabama was not so lucky.  According to an article posted by Aero News Network, around 7:40 PM on October 23, 2002, Thomas J. Preziose was five minutes into a flight from Mobile to Montgomery, Alabama when he got on the radio to Mobile approach.  Preziose, in a Cessna 208B Cargo Master, was at 1000 ft. and ascending and was told to maintain at 3000 ft. as there was a DC 10 approaching at 4000 ft.  Preziose confirmed and said he saw the DC 10 above him.  He then made his final transmission saying, “I needed to deviate, I needed to deviate, I needed to deviate, I needed-”  When Preziose’s plane was found, the engine had been mostly vaporized indicating a head on collision and there were red marks on different parts of the plane from an unknown source.  Though it seems from Preziose’s last transmission that he was referring to the DC 10, radar data showed the two planes never crossed paths.  The DC 10 was checked for damage and none was found.  The NTSB listed the cause of the accident as, “collision with an unknown object.”  NTSB spokesman, Keith Holloway stated that investigators didn’t know of any other file at that time that contained such a statement.

In the forum section of Trains magazine, a member requested information that might verify the story of a train collision with a UFO that he saw posted on the website, Phantoms and Monsters.  The story was first reported to the National UFO Reporting Center by a person who claimed to have been an engineer on the train in question.  According to the written report, at 2:47 AM, on January 14, 2002, the first two cars and trailing unit of a coal train en route from Russell to Shelbiana, Kentucky were damaged by a collision with a UFO.  The electrical systems of the two locomotives “went haywire” and the writer’s watch stopped at the aforementioned time.  Just before the collision, the engineer and his conductor had seen three metallic objects, 18-20 ft. long and around 10 ft. high with multi-colored lights on the mid-sections and bottoms along with what seemed like search lights trained on the area below them.  The engines died and as they coasted, one object, that was 10-12 ft. above the track, failed to move out of the way and was hit.  The brakes engaged automatically and the train came to a halt one and a half to two miles beyond the point of impact.  They notified their dispatcher in Jacksonville, Florida and were told to inspect the damage and then proceed to the train yard in Paintsville, Kentucky if they could.  They were able to make it to Paintsville and, when they pulled into the yard, heard what seemed to be “an army of workers” hurriedly attending to the train.  There were lights coming from all directions, “vehicle doors slamming, guys running by in weird outfits” but no railroad officials.  A man named Ferguson asked them to follow him into the yard office and they were interrogated and told they’d be medically tested.  Hours later they were lead away and told to be silent regarding the incident in the interest of National Security.  As they left they saw a large tent that they assumed was covering the, now detached, locomotives.  Although one commentator referring to him or herself as a “railfan” confirmed that the lingo in the report was accurate and identified the rail line as CSX due to the location of the dispatcher, another commentator identifying as a former CSX employee who was working at the time considered the story to be a hoax and a NUFORC note at the top of the report goes along with this sentiment.

Accidents are a part of life and that’s what insurance policies are for.  In the PRWeb magazine, CISION, car insurance brokers address a call they received from a customer wanting to know what would happen if a UFO crashed into his car.  Most will be relieved to know that along with damage caused by safari park monkeys, frozen blocks of urine or common, everyday meteors, damage by UFOs should be covered by most comprehensive policies.  One less thing to worry about.