FYI

I will be away for an extended trip.

Aileen

REPORTS FROM ALBERT ROSALES (Thank you Albert!)

Location. Southeast England (exact location not given)
Date: February 11 2006 Time: night

The witness was taking out the rubbish when he heard an extremely low pitched sound, very deep and rumbling, he felt it more than he heard it. He peered at the forest which is at the end of his garden, separated only by a small, barred fence and could see two large circular objects that glinted with a soft yellow, sort of like cat’s eyes, except they were much larger and without pupils. The circles got darker towards the edges. He then switched on the outside light, which increased the pitch of the rumbling and the discs got brighter in color.

He dropped the rubbish and began to walk down the path, towards the end of his garden. After a few steps the pitch of the sound increased. He hesitated but then continued. With every few steps, the pitch increased, and when he was almost at the bottom of the garden, it was almost painful. He decided then to go no further, but he had a fairly obscured look of what was there.

The discs were high on the thing which made him think they were eyes. He could see that they were on the sides of a head, not on the front and he was merely seeing the front of almost orb-like eyes. He thought that the creature was furry, or at least had hair of some kind, but it was dark and he couldn’t see very well, it was rather large, about six or seven foot high. He couldn’t see much more of it, and it was slowly moving backwards.

Scared he ran into the house and locked the door. Later during the night he heard a low pitched rumbling a few times. Oddly enough it sometimes came from above and sometimes from below. When he turned the light on to take a look out the window he saw something pretty much the same shape as what he had seen earlier in the woods (vaguely humanoid rather wide and covered with humps) fluttering about in short hops in his garden and the field next to it. In the morning when he went to the yard to investigate he found the rubbish strewn about. Also the wire they used to make sure rabbits do not simply slip through the bars was sunken to the ground. He found many broken branches and scattered debris in the woods.


HC addendum
Source: Unexplained Mysteries Forum


Location. Lindenhurst, Long Island, New York
Date: February 17 2006 Time: 0200A

The witness had been watching television and when a commercial came on decided to look out the window, since the curtains were drawn. He found himself looking at a cluster of stars when suddenly there was a disturbance, one of the supposed stars blinked hard, not like a normal twinkling star, it was different. At first he thought it was a small plane since there is an airport nearby but the "star" got brighter and seemed to come towards him and then a small dark shadow about 150 yards away and 200 feet above the ground started to open and inside there was a green glowing saucer shaped craft with around five orange glowing circles across the bottom.

The witness felt very nervous and couldn't move. There was no noise from it but suddenly the witness heard a telepathic message from it, he heard a simple message that said, "Yes, we are here and watching, to be patient that there is more to life and to remember what he saw when he was 12-years old" (apparently he had a sighting then. Soon the object seemed to dip slowly down and to the right diagonally and then flare white hot and zoom out of sight at incredible speed.

HC addendum
Source: http://www.ufoevidence.org/sightings


Location. Sabana Grande, Puerto Rico
Date: February 28 2006 Time: 0030A

Miguel Camacho and other witnesses observed a large very intense bright white object descend and land on the ground at about 600-700 feet away. Soon after the UFO landed they observed three to four alien figures that appeared to be working or gathering something around the bright object.

The aliens had large heads, with large almond-shaped eyes that swept back and up at an angle and long thin arms and bodies with four fingered hands. The fingers were very long also. They stood about 3 to 4 ft high. The witnesses could not see their skin color or their legs.

After about 60 minutes of this activity the glow appeared to be surrounded by some sort of covering or possibly closing whatever access or hatch that was opened. A sequence of lights started to flash from the top and sides of a bell-shaped area of the craft. This went on for about 20 minutes then afterwards all lights except for a probe-like arm with a single white light on the end went dark. It hovered and moved within 20ft or so of its original position on the ground. This activity went on for several hours until well after sunrise. At this point a second object was observed flying/hovering about 500 ft directly above the object on the ground.

HC addendum
Source: John Hayes from UFOINFO, Brian Vike HBCCUFO

UFO WATCHTOWER DRAWS VISITORS

By JESSICA SIDMAN
The (Colorado Springs) Gazette


HOOPER, Colo. -- The strange light first appeared from the west.

It halted, and a group of onlookers flashed a high-powered flashlight twice.

The object flashed back twice.

It then moved to another part of the sky. The group flashed twice. Two flashes back. The object shifted again, mirrored their flashes once more, then disappeared into the starry black night.

Close encounter with the third kind?

The phenomenon was the first of 40 sightings that have occurred over the past seven years at Judy Messoline's UFO Watchtower in the San Luis Valley.

Messoline moved from Golden to the valley in 1995 to raise cattle. But the land was dry and soon there was nothing to feed the animals. She was forced to sell the herd, but refused to sell the land. There was something about it. It had an aura.

Since she and her companion, Stan Becker, arrived, neighbors had told stories about strange things they'd seen in the skies. They all joked about building a UFO watchtower, but Messoline and Becker never intended to do it.

When times got desperate, however, they began to see the joke as an opportunity.

"We had never seen anything prior to opening and never expected to," Messoline says.

They took out loans to build the $10,000 tower, and tourists and UFO fanatics have been steadily trickling in since, hoping to catch a glimpse of something out of this world.

More than 15,000 people have stopped by since the beginning of last summer. A guest book shows visitors from Tokyo, Zurich, Sydney and, um, Pluto.

At 10 feet tall, the tower is really less of a tower and more of an elevated balcony. But it does give visitors enough height to take in the miles of shrub-spotted desert stretching in every direction, to the Sangre de Cristo Mountains and nearby Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve.

There's a dome-shaped gift shop meant to look like a spaceship. Inside, you can buy alien-themed boxers, ET necklaces, UFO watchtower shot glasses and the like.

Donations, camping fees, and gift shop purchases bring in between $14,000 and $20,000 a year. Messoline works as a substitute teacher to supplement the income.

Visiting psychics say there are two portals to a parallel universe, guarded by invisible beings in a garden in front of the tower.

"We tell people because of all the energy -- and you can definitely feel it out in the garden -- to leave something in the garden and get their energy there as well," Messoline says.

Now it's an intergalactic junk yard. Yes, there is alien paraphernalia, but also swim goggles, a pair of white strappy heels, and a ukulele.

At the tower's 21 campsites visitors can spend all evening staking out UFOs and roasting marshmallows. Messoline also rents a small cabin.

Mancos artists Marty and Denise Stecher and their two young boys have come to the campground the past three summers. The stop usually includes visits to the nearby alligator farm and hot springs.

They aren't necessarily waiting for aliens, but say the barren campground is beautiful -- and cheap. On a recent visit, the family lit saucer-shaped fireworks that spun up in the air in a buzzing whirl. It was the closest they'd come to seeing a UFO on this trip.

Denise Stecher says she has seen "strange things" before but she wouldn't necessarily say that little green men are behind them.

"I believe in people who believe," she says. "I like to see people who are passionate about different things, including aliens."

The Stechers were the only campers on a recent night, but Messoline says the place does fill up, particularly at her annual UFOlympics conference that draws more than a hundred for a weekend of speakers and sky gazing. This year's conference was held late last month.

"We have a sighting every year," she says.

For the most part, visitors are curious tourists passing by on Colorado Highway 17, but occasionally someone claims personal experience with extraterrestrials.

One of the first visitors was a truck driver who said he'd been abducted.

He told Messoline he'd been driving north on Highway 285 toward Sawatch when he saw a big light in the sky. The light was suddenly in front of his truck and he swerved. The next thing he remembers is driving on the other side of Sawatch heading toward Monte Vista. When he was filling out his log book later, he realized he was missing three hours.

The trucker was the first of more than 100 self-proclaimed abductees who have come to Messoline seeking a kind ear.

"They know that they can come here and we'll listen. They can talk about anything they want to talk about no matter how bizarre it is. Nobody makes fun of them. Nobody says, 'What did you have to drink tonight?"' They feel comfortable here."

Messoline has started to record their experiences.

"I've seen them at night. Strange lights moving strange ways," reads a notebook entry from April 15.

There are photos, too: Eerie lights. Saucers. Orbs. But with computer programs like Photoshop, it's hard to say what's real.

That's not to say strange things don't happen in the San Luis Valley.

Messoline recalls one night when she pulled up in her pickup and felt a strange presence. The next day, cameras quit working, cars wouldn't start and watches stopped.

Messoline is reluctant to flat-out say that what she's seen has come from another planet. Becker says the government could be responsible.

"I'd like one to land so I can take a good look. I would really like that. And I've got all the room here for them to do that," she says. "There's something really bizarre going on up in that sky, and I can't explain it."


Copyright © 2007 by the Casper Star-Tribune published by Lee Publications, Inc., a subsidiary of Lee Enterprises, Incorporated

ORBS

Is this the proof that spirits DO exist?
By HAZEL COURTENEY

At first, it seemed no more than a curious coincidence. Professor Klaus Heinemann, a researcher for NASA, the U.S. space agency, was studying a collection of photographs his wife had taken at a gathering of spiritual healers when he noticed that many of them featured the same pale but clearly defined circle of light, like a miniature moon, hovering above some of the subjects.


Like most rational people, he assumed that the pictures were faulty. 'I presumed the circles were due to dust particles, flash anomalies, water particles and so on,' says Prof Heinemann.

Scroll down for more...

'But I was sufficiently intrigued that I returned to the room in which the pictures were taken, in the hope of finding an explanation - like a mirror in the background. None was forthcoming.'


Nor could he find any faults with his wife's camera. And as a scientist with considerable experience in sophisticated microscope techniques - examining matter down to atomic levels of optical resolution - his methods were nothing if not rigorous.


Still puzzled, Heinemann set out to discover what else might have caused the mysterious circles. He and his wife began taking hundreds of digital photographs at random events to see whether they could recreate the mysterious effect.


The answer was that they could make these shimmering 'orbs' appear again, but only - absurd as it may sound - if they 'asked' the apparitions to make themselves visible to the camera. And they found this method worked particularly well when the couple photographed spiritual gatherings.


What on earth was going on? Again, a maverick technical glitch seemed the obvious answer. Such anomalies happen frequently in digital photography. If you accidentally jog a camera while a picture is being taken, especially in dim light, you can easily get a double image.


But again, Prof Heinemann ruled out a technical fault. 'We were quickly able to eliminate the common problems associated with photography - such as dust particles, water droplets, reflections and a host of other likely causes.'


Yet the orbs still kept appearing. And the more images he took, the more he was able to study the bizarre properties of these shimmering lights.


Heinemann set up dozens of experiments using two cameras on static tripods under controlled conditions. His early experiments found that orbs can move very fast, up to 500mph or more.


Heinemann also found that during his numerous dual camera experiments, when he used twin cameras to capture an object from two different angles, a single orb shape would often appear - but only in one of the two images taken simultaneously.


It was as if the orbs somehow chose which camera to appear on, or whether to appear at all.


Eventually, Heinemann was left with only one conclusion: that he was witnessing some form of paranormal intelligence.


'There is no doubt in my mind that the orbs may well be one of the most significant "outside of this reality" phenomena mankind has ever witnessed,' says Professor Heinemann.


'Until now, there has been a huge amount of anecdotal evidence that the spirit world exists. I believe it's no longer anecdotal. Thanks to digital technology, we can see it for the first time. We are dealing with a non-physical - albeit real - phenomenon.'


The temptation, of course, is to dismiss such claims as bunkum. Indeed, many of Professor Heinemann's colleagues consider his research to be 'utter flaky nonsense'.


And yet a growing number of respectable scientists refuse to write off the possibility that these orbs, which are starting to appear on cameras around the world, just might offer a fascinating glimpse into the unknown.


Earlier this year, the world's first conference on orbs took place in Sedona, Arizona, where several scientists controversially stated that they believed orbs were indeed a genuine paranormal phenomenon.


Their conclusions, if correct, could have huge implications on the way we view the universe and our part in it. The experts say that just because something has not yet been scientifically proven, it doesn't mean that it is not real.


Professor William Tiller, a theoretical physicist who spent 35 years researching consciousness and matter at Stanford University in California, reminded the conference that what we see with our physical eyes comprises less then 10 per cent of the known universe.


This is because human vision operates only within a limited range of the electromagnetic spectrum. For instance, we cannot see radio waves, which carry huge amounts of information, yet we know they exist.


Similarly, Miceal Ledwith, a former professor of Theology, who for ten years was President of Maynooth College at the National University of Ireland, reminded the sceptics that when, in 1861, Dr Ignaz Semmelweis had claimed there might be some unseen link between surgeons who didn't wash their hands and the high rate of infection in childbirth, his mainstream colleagues ridiculed him.


Yet he had found the first evidence of what was later to become known as bacteria.


'Most great discoveries throughout history have been initially ridiculed,' Ledwith told the orbs conference. 'To my mind, there is no doubt that the orb phenomenon is real and deserves to be taken seriously. There are not just a few pictures of orbs, which could easily be faked, but hundreds of thousands from all over the world.'


To date, Ledwith, who was also a member of the International Theological Commission at the Vatican, has a collection of more than 100,000 orb pictures .

'They come in all sizes, ranging from a few inches to several feet across,' he says. 'Sometimes they appear alone, and at other times hundreds of them, in colours ranging from white to blue, green, rose and even gold.


'Over time, I realised that a flash seemed to be essential to capture them, even in daylight. I believe this is because we can see the orbs only through the process in physics known as fluorescence. The camera flash sparks this fluorescence process, making the orbs visible to the camera.'


Ledwith is still uncertain about what these orbs might actually be, but he has no doubt that they are some sort of paranormal apparition.


'I believe they could be many things. They may turn out to be the spirits of those who have passed on; or, as some spiritual teachers state, they might be spirits waiting to be born into a physical body,' says Ledwith.


'They may also be, or represent, a host of other intelligences - from nature spirits to beings of pure energy that have never been incarnated in a physical form. There are hundreds of different types of orb.'


Many of the scientists at the conference believe the orbs are plasma-like balls of energy - but an energy that can be detected by physical means, and which appears to have some control over its own shape and form.


It's certainly the case that they can often be photographed best at places of psychic significance. 'They definitely seem drawn to spiritualtype gatherings,' says Ledwith.


'We regularly see orbs near healers' hands or heads. Perhaps they assist in the spiritual healing process.'


Take the case of Anna Donaldson, a freelance photographer who was commissioned to take pictures of Keith Watson, a medium who had been drafted in to help solve the disappearance of Sarah Payne, the little girl who was snatched while playing near her grandparents' home in West Sussex seven years ago.


The shoot took place at the exact spot where Sarah was last seen, because the medium had suggested that he 'might pick something up'. Sure enough, when the pictures were developed, a mysterious glowing dot appeared in one of the crucial images.


'I didn't believe in any of this paranormal stuff,' says Anna, 'but I couldn't find any fault with the camera - if there had been, then all the images would have been tainted, not just one of them.'


Still sceptical, Anna had the film and images analysed for technical faults, but again no one could provide a logical answer - until a member of the Psychic Institute suggested that the pictures could indeed be evidence of 'auras'. In this case, Anna was told that the blueish colour of the orb suggested the presence of a very young soul.


Still intrigued, Anna arranged to photograph Watson again - at the exact spot from where another young child had disappeared, this time in Greece. To her astonishment, the photographs again showed the presence of a blue orb.


And when Anna repeated the shoot the next day, in a bid to rule out a trick of the light, she got the same result - only this time it was two orange orbs.

'So what I now had was pictures of orbs from three different cameras, in two different countries, on three different days - there's simply no way that could be a chance occurrence or a technical fault,' says Anna.


'I still don't know what to think about it, but I suppose because a camera can pick up an image at a shutter speed of 1/2,000 of a second, it's possible it can detect things the naked eye cannot see.'


Could it have been the spirits of the lost children?


Terri Caldwell, a healer from Belbroughton, in Worcestershire, is among those who are convinced that orbs are a visible manifestation of human spirits.


'To my mind, the orbs are the spirit world simply going about their business,' she says. 'I believe we are all spirits having a physical experience, and when we die our energy field which carries all the information about us continues on.'


But not everyone is convinced. Gary Schwartz, Professor of Psychiatry at Arizona University, has conducted many experiments into orbs with the help of optical scientist Katherine Creath and remains sceptical.


'We feel that a large majority of so-called orb pictures are too readily attributed to some form of paranormal phenomena when, in fact, stray reflections in uncontrolled environments often produce orb-like images,' he says.


That does not deter those, like Miceal Ledwith, who feel orbs are simply too widespread to be written off as a misunderstanding. 'The orbs are an everyday part of reality, as much as we are,' he maintains. 'Their world may be as real as ours, but exists on higher frequencies.'


'If you change your TV channel, you switch to different frequencies, which contain different information. It's illogical to think that what we cannot see is not real, because the human eye is able to receive only a very narrow part of the light spectrum. Many animals can see in spectrums invisible to us.'

As Professor Heinemann summarised: 'Research into orbs is only in its infancy. But the photographs of these spirit emanations offer evidence - as close to scientific proof as we have ever come - in proving the existence of spiritual reality.'


Klaus Heinemann's and Miceal Ledwith's book, The Orb Project, will be published by Simon & Schuster in November.

I GO TO SEE MR. ED

An interesting article by James Moseley. It was in the pages of Caveat Emptor some time ago.


by James W. Moseley

THE BEGINNING

I must admit I had mixed feelings as my plane began its landing approach at Gulf Breeze.

For many months now, I had filled pages and pages of my newsletter, Saucer Smear, with disparaging remarks about the man known as "Mr. Ed" and the series of strange UFO encounters he purportedly had in the small bedroom community of Gulf Breeze, Florida, near Pensacola.

The entire affair involving dozens and dozens of sightings and related events by Mr. Ed and other residents of Gulf Breeze, had split many of the higher echelons of MUFON between believers and skeptics. A series of photographs taken of strange objects by Mr. Ed had been variously labeled as fact or fiction, depending on who analyzed them.

At the convention of the National UFO Conference in Cleveland Dr. Willy Smith, a Florida-based researcher, said the whole case was a hoax. At the same time, Smith made no bones about telling one and all of Mr. Ed's true identity, and even provided a photo of the man during his slide presentation.

Despite this public disclosure, Mr. Ed still hopes he can somehow keep his real name out of the public eye. In order to discurage the idly-curious, he has had his telephone number unlisted. He has also moved to a new home, and has likewise kept his new address a secret.

Out of respect for Mr. Ed, whom I frankly admit I have come to like, I am going to keep his real name private. The truth or falsity of his experiences doesn't rest on who he is, but on what he has to say and on the evidence he provides to back it up.

In all, I spent 16 hours with him during the weekend. I visited his home and had dinner with him and his wife. I had ample opportunity to evaluate his sincerity and I developed some clear impressions as to the kind of man he is.

In every case, Mr. Ed's wife was most cooperative in amplifying his remarks and supporting him during his lengthy conversations with me. Mrs. Ed was on hand to witness at least some of her husband's UFO encounters. I could not find any way in which they substantially disagreed as to facts or background.

My first meeting with them was at the motel at which I was staying. I invited them both to dinner, and kept the intial conversation on topics of a general nature, as I sized up Mr. Ed.

I got to see Mr. Ed's new residence, to which he had only recently moved, and also the home that was the scene of many of his UFO encounters. I was also taken to other sites where he had had sightings. I was given copies of some of his UFO photos, after discussing them at length.

I asked him question after question. I didn't hesitate to pose a pointed question when I felt it was necessary, and I brought up the many sharp critcisms that were leveled by UFO researchers against his claims.

It would be fair to say that I was not converted from skeptic to believer. The story Mr. Ed told me is in many ways absolutely incredible, and I don't want to jump to any unwarranted conclusions. But he did try to answer all my questions clearly and completely.

I have met all kinds of people during my years in the UFO field. While I admit that recording and analyzing technical information is probably not my forte, I believe I know how to evaluate someone's personality. Mr. Ed struck me as a perfectly normal husband and father. He has two children, a son and a daughter. He has also been honored on many occasions for his work in the fight against juvenile delinquency. In every way, he is a pillar of the community.

The small talk completed, I got down to the question of UFOs. I took lengthy notes as Mr. Ed described his various UFO encounters.

THE COMING OF THE SAUCERS

According to Mr. Ed, his first sighting occurred on the evening of November 11, 1987. It was about 5:00 p.m., twilight. He was seated alone in his office at home. His son was elsewhere in the house and was not a witness. Looking out a window, his attention was drawn to a glow of some sort beyond a tree. He grabbed his Polaroid camera and went out the front door of the house.

The object he saw was described as between 150 and 200 feet away, and was traveling in a northeast direction. Later analysis of the five photos he took of the object supposedly indicated that the circular craft was about eight feet in dimater at its bottom edge.

The UFO had what appeared to be two rows on the bottom half of the structure. The top one seemed to consist of lighted windows, the bottom row possible outlets for the strange beams that were later seen to shoot forth from the strange craft.

My impression from looking at the photos was that the UFO seemed much larger, perhaps 30 feet or more in diameter. Mr. Ed said he couldn't really tell how big it was. He depended instead on the MUFON photo analysis which supposedly indicated a smaller size.

Soon thereafter, Mr. Ed sent a report about the sighting along to the local newspaper, the Sentinel, but he admits that he left out some key informtion about the UFO encounter, which perhaps opened him up to later criticism that he added those details to embellish his report.

In retrospect, those details seemed the most fantastic of all.

During the sighting, a beam or a glow of some sort, blue in color, shot out from beneath the UFO. There was a white underglow to the craft, and Mr. Ed isn't certain if the beam of light originated there, or from the first row of outlets that he observed.

With the arrival of the beam came a psychic communication of some sort for Mr. Ed not to be afraid. At this point, the strangest part of the encounter took place. Mr. Ed claimed that he was lifted or levitated a few feet from the ground for several seconds. It struck him as possibly a half-hearted attempt to abduct him.

He amitted that this portion of his experience seemed so weird to him that he at first thought it was better to leave it out -- only later did he decide to reveal the full story.

In all, he had 16 sightings, and took 36 photographs of UFOs. The sightings ran the gamut from strange aircraft in the sky to reports of odd creatures right out of the frequently reported abduction cases.

On December 2, 1987, a barking dog signalled the presence of a weird, sleazy creature on Mr. Ed's back porch. He and his wife both described the creature as resembling the alien pictures on the cover of Whitley Streiber's Communion, a large head, big hypnotic eyes, a slit for a mouth, and a small or non-existent nose.

Mr. Ed reached for his gun and a camera and walked out onto the porch and along to the backyard pool. By this time, the alien was nowhere in sight, but he saw a UFO in the sky over the roof of his home. Again he was struck by a blue beam, but this time he wasn't levitated or given any telepathic communications. He did manage to capture the image of the craft with his camera.

A UFO was blamed for a near-accident on the evening of January 12, 1988, when the craft passed over Mr. Ed's truck as he was driving to a job site along Highway 191B in Gulf Breeze. As the low-flying UFO passed above his truck, a white beam was flashed at him. Mr. Ed's arms became numb. He panicked and nearly drove off the road, but somehow brought his vehicle to a safe stop. He sought refuge beneath the truck.

The ever-present shotgun and a camera were in hand.

Like something out of Star Trek, an alien dropped down the white beam, and was soon joined by four other creatures. They all looked similar to the alien seen on Mr. Ed's back porch a few weeks earlier. They all carried shields and rods.

The five creatures proceeded to march slowly towards Mr. Ed's truck, but he mustered enough courage to re-enter the vehicle and speed off. He evidently wasn't followed.

The last experience he had was probably the most complex and bizarre of all. It seemed to represent a finish for him of his UFO sightings. He explained that he has not had any encounters since then, at least to the present day.

THE HOODED VISITOR

It was early on the morning of May 1, 1988. Mr. Ed was seated at a picnic table in an area adjacent to a sandy beach. He reportedly had a feeling that something would happen that night that would bring the whole sequence of uncanny events to a conclusion.

At the urging of UFO investigator Dr. Bruce Maccabee, Mr. Ed and his wife had previously erected a series of wooden posts around the area as a kind of marker to gauge relative distances. The posts were located in multiples of ten feet from the picnic table.

Mr. Ed was alone. It was around 1:10 a.m. when he heard or felt a buzzing noise. This same buzz had been sensed on previous occasions, heralding the arrival of a UFO. He was armed with a stereo camera to record the event in three dimensions.

When he saw two objects, though, he became very frightened and started talking to himself. He said he was then "whited out," using that phrase to distinguish between blacking out or being "blued out," as he described earlier experiences.

Somehow he was assaulted physically or psychically. When he came to his senses, he picked himself off the sand of the beach, some 20 feet from the picnic table. He was bruised all over. In a panic, he collected all of his gear, threw it into the truck, and sped off.

It was 2:25 a.m.

According to Mr. Ed, he had experienced incidents involving "missing time" on four previous occasions. He said he had thought little of those experinces till then. But this final "missing time" encounter apparently put the focus on those previous events.

He went on to describe the final event as a "replay" of the earlier experiences, and through hypnotic regression that was conducted by a psychologist at a later date, he was able to recall what had happened to him.

The hypnotic session was part of a detailed psychological evaluation performed on Mr. Ed by Dr. Dan Overland, a noted Florida psychologist who is past president of the Florida Psychological association.

In an account of the examination published in the Pensacola News Journal, Overland said, "He's as normal as the rest of us."

While in a hypnotic state, Ed told of awakening in a pie-shaped room that was small in size. A light was emanating from above.

A creature then came through the doorway. The entity or being wore a gray hood and pink tights. It was the same kind of creature he had seen before.

The being was accompanied by three companions who were similarly garbed, but without the hood. All had shields and white rods, which were about the size of flashlights. The rods had some sort of power source within. Mr. Ed became quite angry at this point and tried to grab the hooded alien, who appeard to be the leader of the party. The other three aliens stepped forward.

The next thing he knew, a wall in the room had bgun to move, and suddenly Mr. Ed was in another room, quite alone. There was a bright light in the room, and a large table in the middle. On that table he saw a series of strange symbols. The room was otherwise bare of furnishings.

In touching the table, some kind of sticky substance got caught between his fingernails. This detail alone seemed like something no contactee could possible make up, unless he wanted his whole experience to seem unbelievably weird.

His abduction had ended. Mr. Ed lifted his bruised body off the sandy beach, and went home. Without doubt, his sleep that night was fitful and restless.

When he awoke he was still tired and aching, but then he sensed a horrible stench, which evidently came from that sticky substance between his fingernails. He scraped the substance off his fingernails, carefully placed it in a jar, and put it in his refrigerator. The jar helped conceal that awful odor.

Days later, the substance, still having a hideous smell, was turned over to a MUFON investigator for analysis. So far there has been no report to indicate that the odd substance is of an unearthly origin.

MY ANALYSIS

I left Gulf Breeze with the feeling that Mr. Ed had absolutely nothing to gain from creating such a lengthy and complex series of hoaxes. Although the local residents know who he is, his real name has been kept out of the national media. (It hasn't now!) He doesn't appear on Oprah Winfrey or on any other television talk show. His face has never appeared in print anywhere. He is a perfectly normal looking man who, when traveling outside of his local community, would pass by totally unrecognized by anyone.

Just as important, lots of other Gulf Breeze residents have reported sightings, long after Mr. Ed's own UFO encounters had ceased. It would be stretching one's crediblity to the limit to believe that he was able to fake those sightings too.

Additionally, other photos have turned up, one set from someone who calls himself "Believer Bill," another from a person named "Alice." No evidence has been presented that these photos were actually taken by Ed to substantiate his own sightings.

In looking over all of my notes of the two days I spent with Mr. Ed and the magazine articles and countelss letters I have received about the case, my questions still remain unanswered. If he faked those photos, I don't know how he did it. None of his crtiics have come up with a proven, definitive answer to that one either. Though he lives in a small town, and is known by almost everybody who lives there, no telltale evidence against him has yet been recovered.

Secondly, if the case is a fraud, why did he do it?

Like countless other sightings that I have studied in the UFO field, the Gulf Breeze case may remain unsolved. There will be lots of claims and counterclaims in the years ahead, without any result.

Mr. Ed has taken a lie detector test and a voice stress analysist est, and has passed them both. While such tests are rarely conclusive, he gives every impression of believing he had a bizarre series of UFO encounters. Whatever the ultimate truth behind all this may be, until this case is finally resolved, Mr. Ed surely deserves the benefit of the doubt.

James Moseley

THE RISE OF THE WATCHERS

“The Watchers”, biblical angelic figures are once again carving out a reputation. Their popularity is so much on the rise that some UFO researchers have actually argued that they might be the people abducting people. Whether or not the return of the Sumerian gods is factual or merely mythical – their popularity continues to rise.

Philip Coppens


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The Watchers. They first appear on the scene in Sumer. “Shumer”, it seems, literally means the “Land of the Watchers”. For the American author Zecharia Sitchin, they are alien beings whose specific task is to orbit the earth, monitoring events on Earth. For Sitchin, the Watchers are not a “race” or a “species”, they are merely a “job specification”. Their colleagues had abandoned their ships and had landed on Earth – they continued to orbit the Earth. Those who did land, either mated or genetically engineered Mankind into its present form. As a consequence, Mankind worshipped the Watchers as gods.

Carl Sagan once remarked that we still have no clear perspective about the origins of the Sumerian culture. “Their language is foreign; it shows no resemblance to Indo-European, Semitic or any other language. We can only map them by the actions of their successors, the Akkadians, who created a voluminous Sumerian-Akkadian dictionary.”

The Chaldeans referred to the Watchers as “Ir”. The Egyptians “neter” means Watcher. And the Watchers are also in the Bible, where, in Genesis 6:1-4, they are listed as the sons of Gods who “fell” for the Earthly women, descended from heaven, chose women, and had children. They were described as “giants”, though the height of their fathers is never stated. Still, the giants did not sleep or spoke.

The Bible refers to the Watchers or Grigori as “evil”. They were the ones who “fell from heaven” and who were “weak” for the flesh of women. In this respect, they sit within the tradition of Lucifer, the leader of the Fallen Angels, who came to Earth. Could the leader of the Watchers and the biblical Lucifer be one and the same?

The Koran has a similar story, though the strict good vs. evil of the Bible has been toned down. Two angels, Harut and Marut, watch the actions of Mankind and note that Mankind seems to be unable to escape temptation and sin. The angels’ negative comments are heard by God, who states that the two angels should not speak of Mankind in such manner. If the angels were placed in an identical situation, their behaviour would be similar. Harut and Marut consider this to be an invitation from God and are sent to Earth. God asks – demands – that they do not fall for the gravest of sins: murder, worship of the wrong deities, alcohol and unlawful sexual relationships. But the angels have just arrived and immediately fall in love with Earth’s beauty. When a passer-by sees their sexual adventure, they kill him, so that no-one will be able to report their sin. But God’s Eye is everywhere and God makes sure that their colleagues in heaven – the other Watchers – also get to see their crimes.

As the two angels were unsuccessful in their task, they are hung upside down in a water hole in Babylon, a punishment they prefer over Hell. At the same time, the other Watchers have to agree with God about his point of view on the difficulties of being a human.

It seems that this story is twofold: to repeat what is right and wrong, but also to teach those in Heaven some respect towards Mankind and its challenges.

The Nephilim, the giants, continued to live on Earth. It seems that their biggest contribution on Earth was the creation of chaos. Most ancient civilisations had a major fascination with order vs. chaos, good vs. evil. Evil would create chaos and thus the Nephilim, the sons of the Fallen Angels, obviously displayed their fathers’ faults. This eventually leads God to decide to send a Deluge, to wash away the sins of these beings. Here, we find another parallel with the story of Harut and Marut: they are also “washed of their sins” in the water hole in Babylon. Water as the cleanser of sin is therefore chose in both – as opposed to a “baptism by fire”.
Still, Jewish history suggests that not all Nephilim perished. The Jews stated that they lived in Israel and the Anakim and Rephaim were both tribes considered to have been descended from the Nephilim. There remained a few Nephilim who fought in some of the battles, but they slowly seemed to have disappeared from the scene. Perhaps they married and their specific characteristics – apparently six toes and six fingers – disappeared within the larger genetic pool.

The story of the Watchers fell in disrespect within the Catholic Church, who wanted to portray Heaven as good and perfect – whereas the Watchers were all too human, it seemed, to neatly fit within this depiction. The Book of Enoch, which provides great detail about the Watchers, was not included in the Bible. Its substitute was the Apocalypse of John, where there are no references to Watchers mating with human women. Still, some references remained. In Daniel (4:13, 17 and 23) they appear, even making an appearance in front of the king.

In 1990, the Watchers were back with a vengeance. Sitchin had prepared the way, and others were now jumping on the wagon – in which UFO researcher Raymond Fowler made a major contribution.

Since 1979, Fowler has been researching the case of an alleged UFO abductee, Betty Andreasson-Luca, a deeply religious American woman who claims she has been abducted by alien beings. Fowler concluded that Andreasson’s story was legitimate – she had not confabulated this account to create attention or controversy. A series of books was the result, the third of which was titled “The Watchers”. The title is derived from information given by the abductors to Andreasson. They identified themselves as “The Watchers”, guardians of the Earth. They stated they had been present since earliest human history and that they had always lived next to us. Andreasson was given this revelation as they wanted Mankind to know that Man was more than just a body. Andreasson was tasked with giving this knowledge to Mankind; it was the main reason why she had been contacted by them.

Fowler’s book created some interest. Gregory Little was most impressed and made a study of the Book of Enoch, in light of Andreasson’s revelation. He identified that the Book of Enoch noted that there were angels both at the gates of Heaven and Hell – mimicking the Egyptian neters, who also guard the gates of Heaven and Hell in the Egyptian Afterlife. Little noted that the guardians of Sheol – hell – were described as angels “grey of colour, small as children, with a shape that is somewhat similar to the human form.” Little observed that this description was not present in the Slavic edition of the Book (the most commonly used), but was present in the Hebrew version.

Little realised that Fowler himself was unaware of this passage, but was it not obvious that the “little grey aliens” seemed to be “witnessed” in ancient times, where they had been described as guardians of Hell – and not as extraterrestrial beings.

Further research brought Little across a Jewish encyclopaedia. It stated that the Fallen Angels that shown Mankind how to “call upon” other angels from heaven. It involved a technique which allowed Mankind to make angels materialise. The technique was a ritual chanting, which had to occur at certain times and places to be effective. However, the key message was the “materialisation” of the “angels” in physical form – was this not another key ingredient of the UFO phenomenon?

Reanalysing Fowler’s book, certain imagery there was similar to that of the Watchers. Andreasson had described how the Watchers guarded a door. Under hypnosis, she stated how she was shown a “Great Door” and how she was lead towards it. “The door is an entrance to the other world. The world of light.” Behind the door, was the abode of “The One”, “home”, God, whom she met – though she was unwilling to give further details.

Did the Christian Andreasson merely confabulate stories she might have seen in her childhood with reality? Perhaps. But it is clear that she is not the only person who claims to have been abducted. Fowler himself analysed the Book of Enoch and came upon an intriguing reference on the general UFO abduction phenomenon. Enoch is home alone, resting in a seat and falls asleep. Suddenly, he hears something, though does not understand what is being said. Two men appear at the end of his feet; they know his name. Enoch wakes up, sees the two men and is afraid. They tell him not to be afraid, “you will ascend to Heaven with us”. It is in Heaven that Enoch is brought in front of “the Elders” and the rulers of a “stellar hegemony”.

The events described by Enoch are identical – if not archetypal – of the events reported in UFO abductions. Fowler was also intrigued by references Andreasson had made. She had described a group of blond human-like beings that were in control of the grey beings. She named these blond people “the Elders”.

True or not, there are important cultural parallels between the story of Enoch and the modern UFO abduction phenomenon. Budd Hopkins, who is largely responsible for the modern definition of the UFO phenomenon as an interaction of alien beings with Mankind for the creation of a hybrid race, has thus identified a modern parallel with the Watchers.

The Watchers materialised on Earth to have children with female women. The UFO abductors materialise on Earth to abduct people, resulting in pregnancies or a general interest in female genetic material. The consequences of these actions are “Giants” or “hybrid babies”.

The parallels are there, but what do they mean? Are they ancient legends, adapted to our modern civilisation? Or are they genuine events, written down both in ancient and modern times? Is history repeating itself? Or are we merely still intrigued by the same heroic and thrilling stories of our ancestors?


The article originally appeared in Frontier Magazine 2.1 (1996) and has been slightly adapted. - Philip Coppens

DEMON HOUND

by Jason

I was born and raised in South Eastern Minnesota. The entire area is mostly rural. Fields, rolling hills and forests cover much of it. There are also quite a few parks in the area. A good friend lived near one of these parks. This particular park is many miles away from any real town. Lying less then 15 minutes from the Iowa border, one must travel down an old, lonely, narrow road to reach it. As the aged two-lane curves, winds, and flows from hill to hill one gets the feeling that they are stepping into a land that time forgot. The forests are dark and deep, the trees like old sentinels quietly watching all who enter. A magical place by day, very creepy at night.

As I mentioned, my good friend lived near this park. His worn house could be found by travelling a few miles down an old, dead-end, dirt road. One summer night when we were in high school he invited me to go camping with him and his brother. We were between the ages of 16-18 at the time. Our plan was to take his jeep out to a camper that sat in the woods behind his house. This woods lies just outside the border of the park and it took us about 15 minutes, cross country and over an old trail, to get there. We were all looking forward to having a great time.

When we got to the camper we were pretty deep in the woods. Arriving early in the evening, it was already plenty dark amongst the trees. We unpacked our gear and took it inside the broken down camper. Everyone was in great spirits and we spent a few minutes inside before we planned on going out to start a campfire.

My friend was the first to hear it. Mentioning the sound gives me chills to this day. He told us all to be quiet. Then we all heard it. Something was coming through the woods. Whatever it was, it was big/strong enough that one could hear the forest break in its path. The moans and the impendng crack the wood made when it snapped continued to get louder. It sounded like trees were literally being snapped in half and we could hear it clearly from inside the camper.

Our initial curiosity was quickly becoming fear. No one had the courage to move. We all just sat there as this thing, that devastated the forest in its path, get nearer and nearer. Quickly, it was near the camper. Us three young men, usually full of bravado, were all holding our breath afraid to make a noise. Than we heard it breath. It was right outside the camper. Its breath was ragged and almost sounded like a snort. Unexpectedly, something crashed into the side of the camper with enough force that it rocked it hard and made us scramble to keep our balance. Before we could do anything, the creature smashed into the camper again.

My friend yelled "Go!!!" and his brother was the first one to the door. Thankfully, the door was on the oppoisite side on the camper the beast was on and the jeep was only a few yards from the door. As we all ran out and jumped into the jeep the creature bore into the camper again, rocking it very hard. My friend's brother started the jeep quickly and made a wild U-turn that nearly smashed us into a tree. Soon we were flying back down the path toward their home and back out of the woods. I was in the back of the jeep and looked back to see the thing that was creating all this havoc.

I'll never forget what I saw. It was no longer smashing the trailer now, but running very quickly down that path after us. It looked like a dog at first glance. Only much bigger. It looked like a mix between a razorback boar and a shaggy dog. Its back was slighly arched like that of a razorback. The highest point of its back reached at least five and a half feet tall. Its legs were long and narrow. It had thick, long hair that was mostly black but with hints of brown like some dogs have. The beast had a shaggy tail like a dog as well. The most terrifying aspect was it's face. It had a snout like a boar, its nose was slightly upturned. Its eyes were dark and focused intently on us. It was very fast as well and took long strides, unlike a pig.

My friend and I were yelling at his brother to go faster. Thankfully, we lost it along the path. We were still very frightened and could not understand what we saw. As we exited the woods and came to the grassy field that sat between the forest and my friend's house we breathed a sigh of relief. But it was short-lived. Somehow the creature had gotten ahead of us and was off to our left, standing in the weeds about 50 yards away. I can't understand to this day how it managed to get ahead of us. My friend's brother slammed on the gas and we went up over a hill. The creature began to race towards the jeep again. We went up and over the hill and his house was now in sight. We didn't slow at all, but as I looked back the creature never came over the rise.

We arrived back at the house and their mother wasn't there. We all knew we were part of something we could not explain. We didn't go back to the woods that night. We actually left for town almost immediately. Both the boys ended up staying overnight at my house, instead of going back home. It wasn't until three or four days later that they gathered up enough courage to go back out there and get our gear we left behind. I never went back.

That wasn't the last I saw of the "Demon Hound" though. Less than a year later I met a girl who happened to live less than a mile from my friend's house. Many late nights I drove the lonely stretch of road from her house, near the park, back to my home in town. About three years later I was driving the stretch with my girlfriend one night. It was snowing lightly but warm enough to melt right away. As we came over a rise in the road we both saw the same exact creature I described. It was standing on the edge of the road, facing it, it's long flank towards us. My first instinct told me a horse, based on it's size and shape. But I got a glimpse of its face, and it's snout. I didn't know if my girlfriend saw it or not as we kept going down the road because it had stood perfectly still and it was snowing lightly and dark out. She said she did and described exactly the same thing to me.

That was the last I ever saw of the creature. Her family and my friend both since moved so I have little reason to go back down that old road anymore. I'm glad for it too. My friend and I have discussed that day in the woods a few times and it still scares the hell out of both of us. This is only one of many things that have happened to me and the people I know who live in that area that we cannot explain, but this was the worst for me. I felt I was in physical danger. I wish this story wasn't true and that it never happened.It still scares the heck out of me to this day and it happened 10 years ago. But it is all fact. I have never been able to explain what the creature is but I don't doubt it's still there.

MORE FROM ANONYMOUS, ONLY THIS TIME IT IS ABOUT HIMSELF

I am now 57 years of age, and I had a UFO childhood abduction! On the map of the San Fernando valley I saw a map grid with two arrows, if you look in the middle of these two arrows, you see a water works project called the "Hansen Dam Reservoir. Right in front of the Hansen Dam in 1952 there was a government housing tract, called the "Basilone Homes." In the year of 2004 there is now a "golf course". In any event, I also notice on the map there was an area called "UFO base". This is very interesting as if one were to investigate, they would find that the Hansen Dam, was built by the Army Corps of Engineers and the housing project was also government housing. Moreover, I believe the dam and the housing were part of a black operation, ie, a government study with no paper trail.

Before I forget, in the mid 1960's in the Tujunga mountain range area it was known by the local populace, that this area was a landing base area for UFO's.

At the onset of my case, as it pertains to UFO's, I believe this mapped area has been since 1950's until the present time a government (word missing) and interactions with the local people, by abduction, and with military personnel.

Before a day time sighting in 1952 when I was at the age of 6 years old, my mother was helping a friend of hers move from our apartment to another town. I was helping my mother's friend pack boxes. The lady let me keep a penlight that I found in the apartment. I then took this penlight, a heavy duty penlight that her husband used for work, to her upper story bedroom and I pointed the penlight out the window, towards the "Hansen Dam." I began to noice that if I were to blink once, I would get a return blink from the Dam area! This went on blink for blink, until my mother saw me and told me to stop the blinking as I might make the airplane crash. Needless to say it was not a plane but my first encounter with a UFO. Even at the tender age of 6 years old, I wondered how an airplane could be on the rim of the dam itself!

The next day around midday while playing with my two brothers, and two cousins who also resided at the government housing project, I brought it to their attention, that there was a silver disk/craft, ie., UFO, hovering over a small hill on Foothill and Glenoaks Blvds. As we watched this UFO oscillate in a falling leaf motion, it started to follow a service drive midway in the housing project towards the children's playground area that was at the foot of the Hansen Dam itself.

This UFO/craft then flew very low to the ground and it then flew over the swings, and came to rest at the base of the dam.

As my case was investigated by the late Dr. J. Allen Hynek, of CUFOS, it came out that my brothers, cousins and other children from the housing project waved at the UFO as it was so low to the ground. I remember my cousins and my brothers waving at some alien beings that were in front of, for the lack of a better word, a big picture window. The alien beings waved back at us. The thing that I remember most is that the alien beings arms were longer than normal, that is to say past their knees!

As the UFO landed in a 45 degree angle at the base of the dam, it actually was in this angle, and one could see the entire craft.

What I remember is a smell like battery acid coming from the craft.

The children, which included my brothers and cousins, and other playmates, stood in front of this landed craft and just stared in wonderment. It came out in the investigation that the other children decided to return to the housing project and that I was left by myself!

I crawled the circumference of the UFO/craft. I don't remember any heat coming from the craft but what I do remember is that as I crawled around this craft when I got to the lowest point of the craft I saw an opening. As I looked inside this opening, from a distance, I saw the most beautiful lights blinking. One light in particular was a golden color and I felt drawn to the light which was overpowering!

I must report something that doesn't make sense, but as I crawled towards the lights my knees touched a grading like the ones you see on the news in the winter time in New York with hot steam coming out of the grading. In any event I fell downward.

I remember being taken to a room with lights that somehow seem to be alive? It was almost like the craft was breathing as the lights were blinking.

The next thing I remember was that I was walking back on the service road going in the direction of the housing projct.

My playmates who abandoned me at the craft site, were now deep into a game of hide and seek. As I made my way to the apartment I felt dazed. As I entered our apartment my mother was combing my sister's hair and to this day I can remember the color of her red dress, but I couldn't remember who my sister was!! I asked my mother who was the girl that my mother was combing her hair. My mother became agitated with me and said "don't you know your sister?" I remember asking my mother if my sister was chinese too as in ELONGATED EYES!! Needless to say I was disorientated but I feel that when I asked my mother if my sister was chinese, it was the only way a six year old child could try to describe something out of the ordinary, as in alien wrap around eyes. At this point my mother was fit to be tied and yelled at me to go to my room I did just that. Once inside my room I closed the door and sat in my favorite red sofa chair, the same color as my sister's dress, as if I needed that.

As I was seated in the center of the room in my sofa chair, like the Lazy Boy sofas of today, I felt myself floating in the room. Let me say it again, I was levitating in my room. I can still remember touching the curtain rods and I used my hands to walk across the ceiling. I remember touching the light switch, going back to the center of the room, where the overhead light was located, and then floating downward back to my red sofa! I guess I have been blessed for some reason, as in some cases. The alien beings can walk through wall, doors, etc. But I was spared the visual of looking at the beings in my room. This was to happen in short order.

This being said, may I take you back to my families apartment, where the levitation took place in my bedroom after leaving the UFO site. Being that my mother was alredy upset with me for not knowing who my own sister was, she was in no mood to hear what I had to say next about levitating in my bedroom. As I told my mother what happened she yelled out to me, "get out, you have to have a plane ticket today!" Sadly I found myself being sent outside once again to face another round of UFO activity.

As my playmates left the landing sight, near the playground which was located at the base of the dam, they regrouped to play a game of hide and seek back at the housing tract. As I was the last one to enter the game it was me who had to count backwards from a hundred and then find my playmates. I was sent to a telephone pole to start my count. I was showed an old tire, where I was to use as a staging area once I found the children.

What was to happen next I need to remind the readers that there was a span of maybe about an hour and a half at the most from the time the UFO landed and what was to transpire next.

As I started to count backwards from 100 and then search for the children when I got to around 75 I fell into a deep stupor and when I awoke I found myself on top of the apartments (3rd story roof). While there I was somehow able to hear the children whever they were located and hiding in this game of hide and seek. I would then somehow find myself standing in front of the children and I would proceed to take them back to the old car tire staging area. After dropping off the first group of children to seek the others, when without any warning I found myself once again on top of the third story roof, as bizarre as this may sound. This repeated itself over and over to the point that the other playmates began to demonstrate fear in their voice and wanted to know how this was happening?

By this time darkness fell over the governmental housing tract and the game broke up. It must have been late summer or early fall, as all the children seem to be outside enjoying the night air.

My parents left our apartment and went to the nearest Mom and Pop store to buy food for breakfast. My cousins and brothers were watching one of the adults throw a baseball high in the air and then catch the ball with his baseball glove. There had to be a full moon out as I could see the ball clearly in the night air. After about the third toss into the air I asked the man how high can you throw the ball? "To the moon kid, to the moon." I kept my eye on the baseball to see how high he could really throw the ball when all of a sudden the ball seemed to be coming back down in slow motion.

I noticed a bright light about the size of a basketball. I noticed this round light seemed to circle the complete housing tract two times when all of a sudden this round light showed its true size as it stopped straight in the air, and once again, we were to witness a UFO, only this time it was so large that it overlapped both apartment roof tops. By this I mean in the "Basilone Housing Tract" there was a row of apartments, then grass in the middle, then it would start another row of apartments. This UFO craft was so big that I noticed that it was touching two roof tops at the same time.

Remember what I said about the beautiful lights when the UFO made it's daytime appearance near the children's playground, well the lights were on the outside of the craft. If you have ever seen an emergency vehicle like a fire department truck at night and its emergency overhead lights, turn around and around, it was the same with the craft, only the lights were a beautiful golden color and magenta, green and yellow. These colored lights would rotate on the craft.

The men adults took over the situation as I remember the women screaming "is it an airplane?" "No," ansered the men folk, "is it a helicopter?", "no" answered the men. Once again, "get the children inside, get the children inside."

My parents were shopping at the store. My brothers and myself went with my cousins to their apartment. Once inside the apartment my older brother was cowering near the stove and crying. My two male cousins just stood in the kitchen in awe! And you guessed it, once again, I go to see the craft. I can remember my aunt had some kitchen curtains, the kind you can see through. I could still see the UFO lights through the curtains so I walked over to the kitchen window and pulled back the curtains and looked upwards to the bottom of the craft. All of a sudden it tilted downward as to almost look down inside the kitchen area. It then righted itself and flew upwards. It was gone in a second.

What was to transpire next was overtaxing to this youngster of ony six years old.

I want to bring to the attention of the readers, something I have a vague memory of, but have a sister who has a better recollection of what transpired. As I made mention when it was my turn to seek and I had the phenomenon of appearing on the apartment roof top, then appearing in front of the children. It was brought to my attention by my oldest sister that I was left on top of the apartment third story roof and not returned to the bottom of the apartments. There was no way to get me down as the third story stairwell door to the roof area had no knob but would open by key only. There was no maintenance crew available from the housing tract. The adults called the fire department and they brought me down by hook and ladder. For what it is worth I felt I should make mention of this.

After my parents returned from shopping my aunt and uncle tried to tell them what had transpired when the UFO overlapped the roof tops. My parents just could not comprehend what took place and they gathered up my brothers and sister and took us home to our own apartment. After we were put to bed in the safety of our apartment, the unthinkable happened.

It must have been about 3:00 a.m. when I felt a presence in our bedroom. Now this is very important, as we were not well off financially speaking. I shared a bed with my youngest brother and my older brother had his own bed. When I felt this presence the fear factor was more than I could bear. I tried to call out for help but I was totally paralyzed. I could only open and close my eyes. Then it happened, I began to levitate in the prone position, that is with my face looking upward. Am I going crazy I thought. Can a six year old go crazy? On no, I recognized the hallway. I'm going to hit the door leading outside the apartment. My God in heaven, I'm at the playground where the UFO first landed in the 45 degree angle to the Hansen Dam.

Either I never thought of it, or I have no memory of it, but I don't remember being cold in the outside air. What I do remember is this: If you ever have been in an emergency room, and you are being checked out by the medical team of doctors and they want to give you some privacy, there's a curtain they can pull in a circle. I remember this, and then waking up in my bedroom.

What I'm about to tell you next, again, I ask for your understanding. This happened about three times night after night. The last two times before I told my mother what was happening to me. I remember being put on a curved chair and being strapped down in front of a large picture window for lack of a better word. Then I could hear something like air breaks or hydraulic lifts and the chair would move in a different positin. I could see blackness outside of the picture window, then fast, fast, moving stars. Then coming to a complete stop. Then the sequence would repeat itself over and over until I was returned to my bed.

Now back to Mom. Keep in mind that she told me to get out when I told her about levitating in my bedroom. Well when I told her I was flying at night she said "OK if you fly tonight you're going to take your brother! "What?" I thought to myself, well my mother got a clean white bed sheet and tore it into strips. Then she tied my arm to my brothers arm and my leg to my brother's leg. My free arm she tied to the bed post and my free leg to the other side bed post.

It must have been about 5:30 a.m. I remember smelling hot coffee and the smell of bacon as my mother was making breakfast for my father. Then I saw the hallway light as my Mother opened the door to check in on my brother and myself.

The next thing I heard is my mother yelling "this is not funny! Why are you two doing this to me?" By this time I was wide awake. That's when I found myself tied underneath the bed. One leg tied to one bed post, one arm tied to the other bedpost. After my mother untied me, I remember giggling with my brother as I asked him did you do that and he is asking me the same thing.

At this time I should say I had an opporuntiy to speak to Travis Walton in September of 2003 about the air break type noise and the chair that would move in front of the big window during his time in a UFO. I met Mr. Walton in a meeting of abductees and non abductees in Los Angeles in a meeting of the minds, concerning UFOs. Mr. Walton was kind enough to give me a moment of his time. He said he is sorry he was ever abducted by a UFO as it has been very hard on himself and his family.

CHILE: GHOSTLY IMAGE CAPTURED ON CELLPHONE

SOURCE: IIEE and Crónica Newspaper

DATE: 02.24.07

CHILE: CELLPHONE PICKS UP GHOSTLY IMAGE

by Tania Merino

Technicians believe the phenomenon is "bizarre"

The time was 11:02 pm on February 4, 2007 when after a family get-together in a house at Villa Cap, a 25 year-old man tried to take a photo of his mother with his cellphone camera. All of the guests were gone and only the young man and his parents were in the house. It was for this reason that uncertainty gripped them all when they saw the images that the cellphone had captured.

Only in one of the snapshots, taken in a quick sequence of four photographs, did the woman appear. The rest of them picked up sections of the face of a man who looks straight into the lens and who was never in the room.

"My mom got nervous, I put the cellphone away, we checked the house, but there was no one there but us," said the young man, who preferred anonymity rather than face public questioning of his sanity. He said that "a heavy atmosphere" weighed over the house at the time, that it was "saturated", and that strange things had already occurred to them, such as objects moving without any reason whatsoever.

Upon seeing what had happened, he fired another volley of three photos and the same thing occured. The man's face reappeared.

He nervously showed us the time and date of the images captured by the cellphone. All of them correspond to the hour and minute he indicated and each sequence falls within the same minute: 23.02, 23.03, 23.05 and 23.06 minutes. the photos remain inside the cellphone until their origin can be ascertained.

The next day, he informed his brother of the event and they uploaded the images to a computer through a USB cable. They assembled the parts of the jigsaw puzzle and were surprised to clearly see the features of a man aged between thirty and forty, wearing a white suit and shirt. "This is a person that doesn't exist in the household; no one knows him. No one in my family wears three piece suits, to begin with."

"I even asked the old owner of my mother's house and she had never seen him either," he added.

Furthermore, he added that "the other day a neighbor who drives a taxi cab was getting home at 3 a.m. when he saw an image appear in the backyard of our house, a man wearing a three-piece suit and smoking. The driver turned on the headlights, but by the time he did so, there was no one there." Our interviewee showed the cellphone images to the neighbor and the driver recognized him - not by the face, but by the shape and the suit.

"Now I want to know who this person is, what he wants and what he needs," he concluded fearfully.

We consulted with an expert from a cellular telephone company and explained the situation. "Nowadays, cameras have a VGA system with pixels, and capture the image that is before them. These can only be manipulated and rearranged by editing, but there is no way that they can invent an image or create that of a person that isn't standing in front of the camera," explained Roman Montero. He admitted that it is "bizarre, because I can't find a logical explanation for it. It is impossible that it should occur. A camera cannot photograph something that it can't see," he added. He suggested taking the photos to a lab and to have them analyzed. He understood the urge to associate the images with a ghost. In earlier times, the exposure of a negative could justify such a thing, but it is not possible with a digital photograph.

(Translation © 2007, S. Corrales, IHU. Special thanks to Raul Nunez, IIEE)

Credit for this cellphone mystery goes to Scott Corrales, editor of Inexpicata-The Journal of Hispanic Ufology, February 2007. Go to: http://inexplicata.blogspot.com

Also thanks to Brent Raynes and Mysterious America for this article

ROAD TO ARACARIGUAMA

Still stunned by the new information in our possession about the Prestes case, we got on the only bus that makes the trip between Sao Roque and Aracariguama. Since 1946, when it was a village without electricity, running water and sewerage, Aracariguama hadn't grown much and poisonous snakes were still abundant. It is one of the region's oldest towns and has 7000 residents. It was founded some 350 years ago, and was home to the bandeirants, the conquerors of Brazil's vast interior.

According to a report published in the 1960's by the late Dr. Walter Buhler, the police condemned Joao Prestes's house and it was later demolished, since his family was apparently afraid to return to the house, perhaps considered an accursed location.

In Aracariguama, we met with Fabiana Matias de Oliveira, head press secretary for the small township, and she led us to her Uncle Hermes de Fonseca, nearly 70 years old and deeply knowledgeable about the history of the region and its occupants. As is the case with many Brazilians of his age, he continued working to earn a living, making small improvements to his farm close to the Town Hall. Hermes sat on a tree stump and told us about his life, his arrival in Aracariguama in 1945 and the fact that a rattlesnake had bitten his ankle - a scar he showed us proudly.

"I knew Joao Prestes. I remember the date of his death perfectly - it was March 5, 1946. He left behind five of six children and a widow. I never got to see the body - only a few people did. But they said that it was burned. The press would later say that his body had melted, fallen to pieces," the septuagenarian told us.

"Weird things have always occurred here. A year after Joao's death, his brother Emiliano Prestes saw two fireballs rising and striking each other, rising again and repeating the same action, close to the cemetery. Suddenly the lights encircled him and he felt intense heat. He knelt and prayed until the lights left. Even today you can still see these lights, but with less intensity, over at Ibate, between Aracariguama and Sao Roque. When they strike each other they let sparks fly, but don't disintegrate. Giomar Gouveia, a champion jockey and owner of some stables at Ibate, saw a light hovering over his animals, giving off orange beams of light. This was in 1995," Hermes da Fonseca recalled.

Enthused by our interest, Hermes continued, remembering dates and details worthy of his appointment as "official chronicler" of Aracariguama. In 1960, Celso Gomide, a bus driver, was on his way from Sao Roque when he saw a red light that caused him to stop the vehicle. The light approached the cabin and Gomide, frightened began to pray. The passengers were stunned by the uncanny light, which encircled them for some 20 minutes."

"In 1955," he continued, "I worked on the construction of a cable car in the Santa Rita cement factory. It was supposed to be used to transport rock from a local quarry. It was August 24 of that year and the heat was unbearable when myself and other workers saw an object drifting in the blue sky as large as a truck tire, very tall, aluminum-colored, spinning and giving off smoke - circles of white smoke. We saw it at a quarter past eleven, and by twelve o'clock, five or six FAB (Brazilian Air Force) airplanes arrived. They were smaller than the flying wheel, which distanced itself esily from the planes. On the following day, the Folha de Sao Paulo newspaper published an article about the fact that thousands of people in Osasco (near Aracariguama) had seen a flying saucer with the same characteristics."

Less than a kilometer away from the town is the graveyard. We found the local gravedigger, 53 year old Nelson Oliveira, who led us to the tomb where the mortal remains of Joao Prestes lay. On the cement box covered by earth, there rose a crudely carved cross and an identification number. Claudio and I felt knots in our throats as we thought about the last moment of Joao Prestes's agony. Regaining our composure, we asked Nelson, who had been a gravedigger since 1976, if he had seen anything strange in the area.

"Around 1989 I saw something weird, round, flying over the cemetery. It was like an upside-down hat made of aluminum, shining when it moved in a straight line and balancing. It was headed toward Sao Paulo," the gravedigger told us, using his own hat as an example.

During a personal interview with ufologist Antonio Ribera in Barcelona, he expressed the belief that Joao Prestes could have been burned by an alien ship's propulsion system. "I don't think the aliens wanted to harm or kill the farmer. They simply didn't know what would happen if they came too close to human beings," Ribera said.

We had much time to reflect upon the tragic death of Joao Prestes Filho as a ramshackle bus took us away from Aracariguama. "What do you think the light that killed Prestes was?," I asked Claudio. "Maybe ball lightning" he replied. "But how can one explain the other lights and creatures in the region?," I insisted.

Claudio Suenaga said nothing. He shrugged and cast a last glance on the church tower of that accursed village.


Sao Roque, Santana do Parnaiba and Aracariguama: Window areas

The region surrounding Sao Roque, Santana do Parnaiba, Aracariguama and other towns neighboring one of the most densely populated cities on Earth (Sao Paulo, with its 18 million inhabitants) has been the scene of unusual phenomna for many years.

The "Supysaua" Newsletter (March'95), published by the Grupo Ufologico de Guaruja, reported that three children had witnessed a glowing UFO on January 4, 1994 in Santana de Parnaiba, where Joao Prestes died. The object approached the backyard of the home in question and floated less than 15 meters over the witnesses. Its color was largely yellow and it possessed sparkling green and red lights. What was remarkable was that within the yellow light, the children could make out a semi-circular shape resembling a dome. The children were startled by the UFO's abrupt, zigzagging movements as it departed at high speed.

In that same year and region, a married couple witnessed from the "Lila" ranch on Km 41 of Castelo Branco highway, a spherical object measuring three meters in diameter which floated between the trees and made no sound whatsoever. It was red in color and was darker at its core. Its periphery was surrounded by several smaller, blinking lights, alternating between blue and red.

In 1993, a 12-year old girl named Regiane Barbosa da Silva witnessed on the same ranch a spherical object measuring some 5 meters in diameter. The UFO suddenly fired a beam of yellow light that covered the girl's body and lit the surrounding area. After the event, Regiane experienced headaches and eye irritation. Three months later, another witness spotted the same object at the same spot. The watchmen of the "Lila" ranch claim having seen two humanoids floating over a brook on the ranch's property.

An elderly Japanese woman who spent her youth in Santana de Parnaiba told Suenaga that she had seen a half-wolfman, half-centaur being in the vicinity of Sitio do Morro. San Roque has also experienced one of the most intense waves of Chupacabras activity in all of South America.
__________________
The translations are all courtesy of Scott Corales and the Institute for Hispanic Ufology, with translation copyright being retained. This article is from South American and other Spanish-language newspapers and media sources It was taken from the UFO Newsclipping service edited by Lucius Farish.

JOAO PRESTES (Continued)

We immediately headed toward the residence of Vergilio Francisco Alves. Upon reaching it, his daughter advised us that her father was working in the fields in front of the house, clearing vegetation with a scythe. After some time had elapsed, Vergilio appeared. To our surprise, he produced his identify card proving his 92 years of existence in full health.

Seated on a threadbare sofa in his modest home, Vergilio explained that he was Joao Prestes's second cousin. "I was born and raised in Aracariguama. That's where I began working in the Morro Velho gold mine at the age of 15 or 16. There was a British engineer who couldn't write my name and called me garoto de ouro ("golden boy").

I'll tell you what I know about the horrible death of Joao Prestes. It was in 1946 during the carnival season. He went fishing in the nearby Tiete River, riding in his cart, while the wife and children went to the festivities. It was the dry season and there was no rain. When he got back, he stabled his horse and fed it some corn. He put the fish in a pot and heated some water with firewood to take a bath. When he changed clothing, a sort of beam of light or yellow light had appeared in his room. He felt his body burning and that his beard, while short, was burning. Panicked and unable to move his hands, Joao raised the door latch using his teeth and ran into the street barefoot, since he never wore shoes. He ran screaming to his sister Maria's house, near the Aracariguama church. He dropped on a bed and said he'd been burned. The police chief, Joao Malquias, went over immediately, who told him there was no one to blame for what had happened, because his attacker 'had not been of this world.' This was followed by lightning and thunder, and a powerful rainstorm...."

This part of Vergilio's story reminded me of the Varghina case, which occurred in 1997 in Minas Gerais. A rainstorm the likes of which had never been seen in Varghina occurred after the appearance and alleged capture of one or more supposedly alien creatures. Significant atmospheric changes tend to occur in "fortean" cases.

"So, you were able to see Joao Prestes on his deathbed?" Claudia Suegana asked Vergillio Alves.

"Yes, my cousin Emiliano Prestes, who was my neighbor, called me over. When I got to Maria's house, I found Joao Malaquias, the sheriff, speaking with Joao. He was in bed and having problems using his tongue. His skin, which was fair, was toasted, reddish, as if he'd been roasted. His hands and face had the worst burns. The hands were twisted. His hair didn't burn, nor did his feet nor clothing. He was only burned from the waist up. His feet were torn up from running barefoot on sharp rocks."

"Did you see Joao's flesh falling off in pieces at any time?", I inquired.

"No, no. His skin was burned, but it wasn't falling off. I think that the boitata was to blame, since it had attacked him once before," Vergilio told us. Claudio and I exchanged looks of stupefication as the lucid nonagenarian imparted his information.

"Please tell us about this other indident," we said, almost in unison.

"Well, when Joao was a tropero (cattle driver), he was still young and lived with his father in Aracariguama. One day at sundown, as he led the donkeys over a hill, he saw a fire that fell from the sky -- a fireball. He was near a chapel that had a cross, and he could feel the fireball passing him, almost knocking him down. Joao would tell me that at that spot you could sometimes see ten or twelve balls emerging from the sky. Some of them were red, others Moon-colored. Sometimes five or six of them would fall to the ground and explode. People would call them the boitata lights..." Vergilio explained.

I would like to digress to explain that the word "boitata" is of native origin and designated mysterious lights that would pursue and even kill the native Indians, according to Portuguese colonial chronicles and the stories of Canarian priest Jose de Anchieta in the 16th Century.

Vergilio himself witnessed the apparition of one of these lights, which emerged from behind the mountain where the gold mine was and landed on Mt. Saboao, another hill where strange lights always appear. "We also called those fireballs maes do ouro (mothers of gold). There was also the "golden lizard," an elongated tongue of flame that moved in a straight line, slowly, without making a sound."

The mysterious Morro Velho gold mine is currently abandoned. Canadian general George Raston, who founded the mine in 1926, lived there until it was closed in the late 1930's.

While we ate some delicious plantains grown by Vergilio on his own farm, he told us that wolf-men had also been seen in Aracariguama, thus confirming the information provided by Luis Prestes.

"Who took Joao to the hospital?" I asked Vergilio in order to resume and finish our interview on the case.

"Malaquias, the sheriff, wanted to take him to a hospital in Sao Paulo, but the road was in bad shape and they went to Santan do Parnaiba. An investigation was requested from the police but no answer was found for the case. They only said that nothing had burned in Joao's house, since some had said that he had burned himself with a candlestick."

Tomorrow, the "Road to Aracariguama."

JOAO PRESTES

The following case is one many of you have heard before. We have never heard the intimite details that Scott Corrales (Copyright) has translated for the UFO Newsclipping Service. Read at your own discretion.

THE INCREDIBLE SAGA OF JOAO PRESTES
by Pablo Villarubia Mauso

In 1946, almost a year prior to the famous incident at Mt. Rainier (USA) which heralded the start of the modern UFO age, a farmer died in a most hideous fashion in Brazil's back country. Within a matter of hours, a strange light had brought about the death of Joao Prestes Filho by intense burns, according to some witnesses, or as a result of his flesh falling off from his bones, leaving bones and tendons exposed -- as others would claim.

The answer to one of the most disconcerting and horrifying cases in the history of ufology started in the small, noisome "Minas Gerais" hotel where historian/ufologist Claudio Tsuyoshi Suenaga and I had lodged in order to research several alleged Chupacabra attacks in the region. We were in the town of Sao Roque -- 47 kilometers away from the city of Sao Paulo (Brazil) when my room mate called my attention, breaking the silence of night, to the pages of a newspaper he had found in the room's grimy bathroom.

With a mixture of ecstasy and emotion, stumbling over words, the young Japanese-Brazilian read out the paper's contents, dated April 12, 1997: "The esteemed Roque Prestes died at 91 years of age on April 6, at his home in this city,.... he was the brother of Joao Prestes (deceased)..." To our astonishment we had stumbled onto the trail of the parents of Joao Prestes Filho, the man who died a terrible death on March 4, 1946; after having been attacked by an unexplained light, his flesh began to fall off his bones in chunks, especially off his jaw, chest, hands, fingers and feet, dooming him to die within a matter of hours. To the horror and helplessness of onlookers, some pieces of flesh remained dangling from his tendons.

The Hotel Minas Gerais was the mute witness to our insomnia and restlessness until dawn, when we contacted a son of the late Roque Prestes by phone. In a matter of minutes and at a brisk pace, we reached the modest home of sixty year-old Luis Prestes on the outskirts of Sao Roque. Luis was still in mourning for the recent death of his father, Roque - a former soldier of the constitutionalist revolution of 1932.

"Up to very recently, shortly before his death, my father recalled his brother's tragic passing on the distant year 1946. I was small - some 9 years old - but I clearly remember what happened to my Uncle Joao. It was carnival week and Joao, who loathes such festivities, dcided to go fishing and drove off in his cart. He lived in Aracariguama, a little village only 7 kilometers away from San Roque and a hitherto isolated and quiet community. My aunt went to the festivities with the children and left Joao's supper already made at home," Luis Prestes would explain as we looked on attentively.

"I was in Aracariguama when I learned that my uncle was dying at a relative's house. I wanted to go in, but it was forbidden, since I was too young and Joao's physical condition could have caused a traumatic impression. My father did see him, and Joao told him that upon returning home and opening the window something resembling fire or a 'fiery torch' entered the room in which he was standing. He fell to the floor and felt that his body was on fire. Wrapping himself in a blanket, he walked over two kilometers into the village. My father said that Joao was only burned from the waist up, with the exception of the hair on his head. I managed to see my uncle when they removed him from the house to take him to Santana do Parnaiba by truck, where the nearest hospital was located. I remember that the sheets covering him were blackened, perhaps by the burns on his body. Joao died shortly before being admitted to the hospital," Prestes related as we caught his account on tape.

"A number of books published in English, Japanese and even Russian have said that Joao Prestes died in a hideous manner, with pieces of his body, such as his ears or parts of his face, melting off. Is this true?," I asked.

"No. His appearance, according to my father, who escorted him to the hospital, was truly ruinous, but it wasn't that extreme. He had serious burns all over his body. His flesh was dark and he presented no bodily injuries," explained our interviewee, making partial changes to the story which had appeared in books and hundreds of articles published on the case. "My father was a deputy policeman at Santana de Parnaiba and requested the assitance of the forensic unit to research the case, but I don't know anything about the results. The fact is that nothing burned in the room where Jose was when the fire appeared. He had no enemies or anyone who'd be interested in doing such a thing to him. Even as he died, he repeated that the light had attacked him and that it was 'otherworldy,' explained our interviewee. The following item of information brought us back to reality with a start. "Back then, people would constantly see fireballs known as 'assombracoes' (ghosts) in Aracariguama and its vicinity. Some believed they came from the gold mine that's now closed. Other weird things would happen too. My late father told us that around 1922 he was able to see a lobisomem (wolf-man) while with my grandfather and an uncle. My uncle apparently threw a rock at it and hit its hand. The next day, a neighbor turned up with his hand bandaged. Other people told similar stories," Luis Prestes informed us. The idea that the Sao Roque area could be some fantastic "window area" through which an astonishing variety and quantity of anomalous phenomena jelled in our minds.

The theory seemed to match the following data imparted by our informer. "Something equally scary happened to Emiliano Prestes, my uncle and Joao Prestes' brother. A few months after his brother's tragic death, Emiliano was walking through an Aracariguama forest, in Agua Podre - the same one from which the lobisomen appeared in 1922 and where the light burned Joao. A fiery torch appeared above him, causing the terrified Emiliano to run to a canyon's edge when the thing fell on him. All he could do was kneel and pray for his life. He told us that he felt an intense heat, but luckily, the fiery torch moved away and vanished." Luis's account added even further mysteries to the area.

The "fiery torch" or "fireball" was also seen on several occasions by Luis's father. The oject would frighten horses and riders alike as they made their way through Aracariguama's dark nights to reach their humble abodes. "The lights were seen most frequently between 3 and 4 in the morning, and were three or four times larger than the Moon. People would feel their heat even at a distance, and they were able to move amazingly fast. My father stopped going to parties at night because of these lights," Luis Prestes recalled.

FURTHER AGGRESSIONS

Before ending our interview, feeling satisfied by the new information shedding light on the Joao Prestes case, just as we were thinking to add nothing further to the proceedings, Luis Prestes gave us a valuable clue; the possible existence of the last witness having seen Joao's dying moments. "He's an elderly gentleman, but very lucid and strong. He lives close to my neighborhood in San Roque. This is his address."

Continued tomorrow.

UFOs MAKE YUMA, COLORADO, MAN'S LIFE A PIT STOP

POST, Denver, CO
May 9, 2007

He plopped down in a big chair in his sturdy old home on Main Street in this northeast Colorado town, a village nestled in a land where alfalfa grows quickly, time passes slowly and when it turns black at night, well, all kinds of things can dance across the sable sky.

Big Tim Cullen says it was a night like that so many years ago when the lights of a UFO rose over the grassy hills and settled alongside his car. He says he got a good look.

"It was 100 foot long, 30 feet wide and about 10 foot high."

And then it was gone.

On Sunday, just a few weeks shy of the 29th Anniversary of that night in 1978, Cullen leaned back in the chair and talked of that night the spaceship came down. It hovered along Colorado 59 between Yuma and the smaller town of Joes, he says. And even though he doesn't remember this part, Cullen said the aliens took him that night and implanted a strange metal chip in his left wrist - a chip he wouldn't find until 1998.

Cullen isn't alone, of course. Thousands claim they've been abducted by aliens. Hundreds of thousands say they've seen UFOs. Heck, just a few weeks ago a well-respected former Arizona governor said he saw a UFO hovering over Phoenix while he was in office.

"When I saw it, I said, 'this is definitely a UFO,'" ex-Gov. Fife Symington said of the 1997 event. "It was absolutely breathtaking."

Which leads to the obvious question: Arizona had a governor name "Fife"?

And another question: How come it took Cullen 20 years to discover the freaky alien implant in his left wrist? The answer: it took him that long to whack his left thumb with a hammer!

Cullen, 55, stood up Sunday morning and disappeared into a back room of the house where he and his wife have lived for nearly three decades. He came back with an X-ray and held it against the living room window. The images, taken at a Yuma medical clinic, clearly showed a small spot in the wrist, a white trinagular image lodged in the tissue above the bones.

Cullen didn't say a word. Not that he's shy about this. He's been featured on lots of UFO-type websites and even on a Learning Channel show called "101 Things Removed From the Human Body."

But sometimes, he doesn't know what to say. Or what to think.

"It's all so strange," he said quietly.

CRASH KICKED OFF SIGHTINGS

It all began April 2, 1978. He awoke from a dream about a terrible car crash. Seven days later, the car he was driving rolled five times, according to the police report. Cullen, then 27, sufferered a broken neck and other injuries. About seven weeks later, on May 30, while returning from a doctor's apointment in Denver, his neck still encased in a protective collar, the UFO appeared from the darkness where Vernon Road slices through the hay fields and meets the highway. Cullen and his wife, Janet, stared.

"It didn't make any noise," Cullen said.

And that was that.

Until he saw another UFO two years later, in 1980, in the exact same spot along Colorado 59. And then, a third encounter of the "Yipes!" kind came in 1994, 40 miles to the south near the cemetery in Cope.

"That one had blue and white lights," he said.

The story goes quickly then. Cullen whomped his thumb with the hammer in 1998 while trying to drive a steel rod into the ground for a cement project. The ensuing X-ray showed the odd chunk of metal.

"I knew then what had happened," Cullen said. "I knew it was an alien implant from that first encounter in 1978. There was lost time that night. I have to assume I was abducted."

THEY WANT OUR POWERS

Weeks aftr the X-ray, Cullen talked to a reporter at the Yuma newspaper. Word reached the UFO community. Websites trumpeted "The Cullen Abduction." In 2000, he said, he traveled to a clinic in California and had the alien, well, thing removed from his wrist. No one knows what the thing is, he said.

But this is what he believes: the aliens chose him because of his psychic abilities. In addition to the dream of the 1978 car crash a week before it happened, Cullen said there are constant psychic moments n his life. Aliens, he surmises, don't have that power. They are gathering information via these implants from Cullen and others like him.

He got out of his chair then and went to the door. Outside his small home on the Colorado grasslands, branches with tiny new spring leaves rustled in a fresh wind. From his front steps he looked to the west. Storm clouds gathered on the horizon.

"I am totally open to the idea," said Symington, the Harvard-educated former Arizona governor and an ex-Air Force captain, "that whoever they are occasionally pass this way."