Ufo encounter 264

february/march 2012

264

47th year of publication

this issue: the dalnegorsk ufo crash

-www.uforq.asn.au bimonthly

journal

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of

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research

queensland

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ufO encounter issue

264

february/march 2012 bimonthly journal of

cOmmittee Chairperson - Sheryl Gottschall (07) 3376 1780 Vice-Chairperson - Tino Pezzimenti Secretary - Lee Paqui Treasurer - Sheryl Gottschall Public Relations - Sheryl Gottschall Membership - Lee Paqui Sightings - Martin Gottschall (07) 3376 1780 Book Sales - Sheryl Bayliss Librarian - Michael West Committee - Roy Kalescinski M Tooma

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from the

public meeTinG

editor

proGramme Kenmore Library, Meeting Room 3

It's a continual failing of modern archaeology to ascribe to every great monument from humanity's long, long history a religious purpose.

Pyramids? They must have been built for the gods.

Ancient building complexes? They must surely have had a religious purpose.

Statuettes of scantily clad women? They definitely must have been goddesses.

(Heaven help the archaeologists 1000 years from now, digging through our rubbish heaps and finding all those Barbie dolls…)

It seems that ancient man, ignorant as he must surely have been, never did anything for himself. Every building he built, every pottery doll he fashioned, every mark he made in the ground with a stick, had to have a religious purpose, because God, apparently, was all that he ever thought about.

Back before there was God, there was only the Sun and the Moon and the stars, and yes, if the archaeologists are to be believed, ancient man even worshipped those. Boy, were we ever dumb!

However! Don't be fooled by the ill-formed speculations of archaeologists. Ancient man may indeed have looked to the Sun, but the reasons he did so may have been far more sophisticated than we think -because modern man, too, is currently looking to the Sun. As many of you will know, the Sun is misbehaving mightily. Giant sunspots, solar flares, gamma rays and plasma ejections, mysterious black balls and an unexpected addition to its poles. Those following the alternative news will also know that a number of very strange objects have been f ilmed and photographed by NASA hovering near the Sun, all of which remain, to date, unexplained. Many contend that these strange objects are of extraterrestrial origin -- alien spacecraft perhaps, making their own observations of our nearest star. How can we ever know?

What's becoming apparent is that the Sun, for so long a stable aspect of daily life, seemingly benign and unchanging, is anything but. Planet Earth has noticed it, and maybe so has somebody else.

We've long known that the Sun can bring us life. It's only now that we're beginning to understand that it can also bring us death. I believe that ancient man knew this very well, and that all their observations of the Sun, all the measurements they inscribed in stone, were not the activities of a people who believed the Sun was a god, but the actions of a people living on the edge.

They knew exactly what was coming. They just didn't know when….

lee

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264 cOntains: sightings.........................................4 nola’s story...............................6 the dalnegorsk ufo crash......................................8 the skinwalker ranch........11 news and science .................16 After one look at this planet any visitor from outer space would say 'I want to see the manager.' - William S. Burroughs 3

marcH- maY 2012 Helensvale, March, 10.30pm We live in Helensvale on the Gold Coast.

Our house is on a hill and sort of backs onto the M1 motorway. It was in late March 2012 at approximately 10.30pm that my mother and I, both being light sleepers, kept being woken up by helicopters flying back and forth over our house. It was so loud! The first thing we thought was it must be police helicopters searching for someone. My mother and I walked out the back door of our house and our three dogs were all running around the yard. We couldn't see the helicopters outside. I moved to the side of the house and looked in the sky and there it was... this huge UFO! It was round, very large, orange in colour, hazy around the outside of it, and it seemed to be so close to us! It sat in the same spot in the sky for about 15 seconds. I called my mum over with my eyes still fixated on this huge UFO! And I said to my mum, "That is not a ****** helicopter!!" We both didn't say anything after this. It all happened so quickly -- before we knew it, the UFO

shot from the right side of the sky to the left side, so quickly it was impossible for your eyes to keep up with it. It just disappeared! My mum said to me after it happened, "You're right... that wasn't a helicopter or like anything I'd seen before!" It doesn't matter how much of a sceptic you are with these things, once you see it with your own eyes, there is no denying we are not alone!

Darwin, April 21, 2012 I am a local resident of Darwin. I love going walks in the evening, and this image [below] is taken from my iphone.

I have taken this picture in the Brinkin area during the last full moon.

Wangetti, April 22 2012, 8.00pm On the 22nd April 2012, four of us were travelling from Port Douglas to Cairns.

At approximately 8.00pm we were 3 kilometres south of Wangetti. No other vehicles were in sight on the road and we were travelling in darkness apart from our car headlights.

Three of us saw a green-blue light in the sky ahead that was travelling vertically

Object/s photographed over Darwin, April 2012. Object on left is white, object on right is orange/yellow.

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Object photographed over Mudgeeraba, April 2012. Object is dark red in colour. downwards in a controlled manner. The light was bright but contained. I was sitting in the passenger seat and was just about to vocalize my concern that the light was heading for us when it disappeared.

We were unable to explain what we saw!

It was only visible for a few seconds. The fourth person in the vehicle failed to see the object.

Mudgeeraba, April 23 2012 Here are the photos [above] of what we saw over Mudgeeraba last night -- a red fireball-looking object which remained stationary for quite some time (easily 10 minutes), and another red-green object. The red fireball was quite high and zoomed off to our left The red fireball was above the second green and red object, which seemed to have six bright red lights in a curved line shape, with a bright green light underneath, and it was about five times bigger than the red fireball.

We are just a normal family, never believed in anything like this, but when we saw it for our own eyes, its very exciting indeed.

Caloundra, April 3 2012, 6.15pm I live in Golden Beach Caloundra on the Sunshine Coast. I have never reported a

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UFO before, but I am not a sceptic either, as in the past I have seen some odd occurrences in the skies when I used to do Security down at Beaudesert.

Anyway, on Tuesday 3rd April 2012 in the afternoon around 6.15pm I walked out the front of my house to get some fresh air and stretch my legs. I noticed a light plane coming from the north (I live just behind the Caloundra Airport). It was travelling north to south with its navigation lights on. I thought it was going to land at the airport so I continued watching. As I looked to the south I noticed a rather large and VERY bright light coming from the south in the opposite direction to the plane. At first I thought it may have been a helicopter with landing lights on, but it was travelling rather slow and by my estimate at maybe 3 -4,000 feet in altitude. The plane to my estimate was under 1000 feet. The plane then made a steep right hand turn towards the runway then did another turn left then right. My initial thoughts were that he was inexperienced with night flying or wasn't sure of the runway. But he eventually turned towards the highway and looked like he was heading for Caboolture Airport.

Meanwhile the light I was also watching at the same time was still heading in a northerly direction. Unfortunately my home phone rang and I ran inside to answer it. When I returned back outside (no more than 30-40 seconds) the bright light (which by the way made no noise that I could hear) had turned to the northeast and was heading out toward the ocean. I suppose this is where I was more convinced I had seen a UFO because the light I had seen coming toward me, if it was a landing light from an aircraft, was still bright. I watched it for at least another minute, still bright and moving away, then all of a sudden the light began to turn yellow as if it either took off really fast or died out. But it gave me the impression it had moved away fast, as the light not only got yellow but smaller, and eventually I lost sight of it as it disappeared.

Lawnton, April 7 2012, 8.15pm Tonight my wife and I saw lights fly about suburban houses around Lawnton-Petrie at 8:15pm on the 7th of April. First I saw a blue green coloured light moving like a plane, then it quickly started to drop at a right angle to its current path, so my wife ran inside to get a video camera. I then saw two objects, one red, the other a bluish colour, moving about at odd angles and descending towards the houses. It was difficult to capture the lights on film as they briefly rose several times and moved across several hundred metres before descending again. I got the very last one we saw on video. Even though we stayed outside for 15 more minutes, we didn't see them again. The footage is on Youtube at http://

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youtu.be/PD-mYAfy4-M

Brisbane, April 22 2012, night I am writing to you about a UFO sighting witnessed by me and two others on the night of 22nd April 2012. I was outside in the backyard for some fresh air and gazing at the stars as it was a clear night. I had been looking at the stars and watching planes fly over the house for an hour when I decided I had had enough. Getting up I notice a plane coming from the north, like they been all night, and decided to wait and watch it fly over. Then I proceeded to fold up the chair and took one more look north.

There in the distance, just right of the flight path, was a blue pulsating light.

No other light could be seen, just a blue light. I knew straight away that what I was seeing was unique, so I ran inside to grab my partner and her 13 year old son. By the time we had got back outside the object was almost over the top of the house and we could see clearly that the blue light was as bright as an LED light. It was very bright and very rich in colour. We also noted that the light was reaching down, then back up to the blackness of the sky, then reappearing again, and doing this in an irregular pattern. The light was moving at a medium speed over our heads when it disappeared and then reappeared on the left side of the flight path, heading south. It then continued travelling south towards Brisbane.

I noticed at this stage that there where no planes to be seen in the sky, nor could my partner see any. This was unusual as it had been very busy with planes only five minutes earlier. (From my house I can see planes coming in for landing from the north and southside of Brisbane). The blue object continued on its course until it was about three quarters of the way between us, Brisbane and the Airport, when it changed course only slightly southeast.

It didn't change speed and headed down the coast line.

By this stage it was getting hard to see in the distance. I grabbed my night vision monocular that I had been using for star gazing. I was able to watch it for a further 30 seconds to a minute more before it faded out of sight. My partner and son went back inside, and I stayed just in case it came back. Another five minutes went by when I heard a faint sound in the distance that got louder then faded away. Then the same sound again. I knew that noise because I had heard it many time before -- the sound of a fighter jet or jets. you can't mistake that sound.

Once again I ran inside and grabbed my partner. We listened and then heard the sound of fighter jets. Still nothing could be seen in the skies. Not one plane. We looked for a while longer when I spotted a light over Brisbane that appeared to

be circling the city. And there was another circling what I believe was where the airport is. This went on for awhile, then the planes took off out to sea. Then the first passenger plane since this started flew over our house, but from the east to west. When I looked to where it was headed I noticed a few more planes out that way. Another ten minutes went by, then one after another, north to south on the same flight path as earlier, the planes flew over the house. They were no more then one minute apart. Maybe five to six passenger planes, and at the very last a smaller propeller plane. At the same time we could see them coming in from the south side of Brisbane. This started around 9.00pm till about 10.00 that night.

I stayed up until 3.00am in the morning watching the ABC News and looking on the Internet expecting to see a report on what we had witnessed. But nothing, not one thing!

There must have been other people who saw this blue light. And there is also the issue of aviation safety that we as the general public are not being told. This object had no right being in the flight path of passenger planes without the right aviation lights. It's against the law isn't it? I know why they would keep it quiet too, because it has made me think twice about flying if our own government has no control over our skies.

Elanora, May 16 2012 A woman saw an orangey-red light travelling west to north-east about 2500 to 3000 metres high. The object moved then stopped, moved and stopped again just hovering in the sky. She had called her husband out to look and he thought the object was round and looked like a top hat. They observed the object for at least three minutes so they got a good look at it. but lost sight of the object behind treetops and clouds. The object made no sound.

Rosebank (NSW), May 10 2012 I was in the back yard last night with two other adults and we all saw a sighting.

I'm not great with all the details so I'll keep it brief. The UFOs were flying in a triangular formation... or was it one UFO with three lights on it? We also saw lights fly across the sky then change directions.

Pinkenbar, May 18 2012, 9.30am I spotted an orange to red-coloured ball of light following a plane around 9:30am today while driving to work at Pinkenbar.

It was visible for about 5 to 10 seconds.

Warner, May 22 2012, 10.15pm I just watched two UFOs fly over my house. I saw them approach and watched them for approximately 6 minutes before they disappeared. I took some pictures with my IPhone but they don't show much.

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NOLA’S STORY

1993: MAIN BEACH, GOLD COAST INVESTIGATION THANKS TO PETER MATIC, UFORQ GOLD COAST AFFILIATE Around midnight one night in 1993, Nola, the manager of the Admiralty Towers unit block at Main Beach (Gold Coast), was hanging her washing when she observed a UFO hovering soundlessly between her building and the next tower block. The UFO was so close to the ground, and so close to the witness, that she estimated that if she had had a broom, she could have reached out and touched it.

The object was circular or disc shaped, matte black or dark charcoal grey in colour, and had square windows lit with yellow light around the perimeter. She estimated there were between ten and fourteen windows.

The object was estimated to be about the size of a large loungeroom (15-20ft).

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Nola was unable to see anybody moving about inside the craft, but after about 30 minutes what sounded like 'drawers opening and closing' could be heard emanating from the vehicle. This sound continued for another half an hour.

Nola went around to the front of the building to observe the craft from a different angle. She took the long way around, for if she had gone through the back gate, she would have needed to pass beneath the object and was too afraid to do so. However, observing the UFO from this angle meant she was almost standing underneath it.

Nola then went into her ground floor bedroom and stood on the bed to

observe the object through the window.

Soon after doing so she lay down on the bed, whereupon the room was filled with 'disco lights' that whirled around the bedroom. At this point Nola became very scared.

The UFO must then have departed, although Nola did not see it depart. Nola reported that she has suffered no illeffects as a result of the sighting.

There were no other witnesses from the Admiralty Towers and Nola's husband was asleep throughout. However, the next day some guests staying at the units next door reported seeing the UFO to the local radio and television stations.

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above and left: sketches depicting the craft that Nola saw, and the position of the object to the Admiralty Towers. right: Position showing the first floor area where the object hovered. below: Another view of the area.

right: Corner room courtyard with laundry rack below: Bedroomwindow where disco lights occurred.

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THE

DALNEGORSK UFO CRASH

by Philip Mantle

This internationally famous UFO incident took place in 1986, on January 29, at 7:55pm. Some have called it the Roswell Incident of the Soviet Union.

The information concerning this incident was sent to us by a number of Russian ufologists.

Dalnegorsk is a small mining town in the Far East of Russia. That cold January day, a reddish sphere flew into this town from the southeast, crossed part of Dalnegorsk and crashed at the Izvestkovaya Mountain (also known as Height or Hill 611, because of its size).

The object flew noiselessly and parallel to the ground; it was approximately three metres in diameter, of a nearperfect round shape with no projections or cavities, and its colour similar to that of burning stainless steel.

One eyewitness, V. Kandakov, said that the speed of the UFO was close to 15 metres per hour. The object slowly ascended and descended, and its glow would heat up every time it rose up.

On its approach to Height 611, the object “jerked” and fell down like a ton of bricks. It burned intensively at the

cliff’s edge for an hour. A geological expedition to the site, led by V. Skavinsky of the Institute of Geology and Geophysics of the Siberian Branch of the Soviet Academy of Sciences (1988), had confirmed the object’s movements through a series of chemical and physical tests of the rocks collected from the site. Valeri Dvuzhilni, head of the Far Eastern Committee for Anomalous Phenomena, was the first to investigate the crash. With the help of our colleagues in Russia this is the most accurate account of the incident to date.

Dr Dvuzhilni arrived at the site two days after the crash. Deep snow covered the area at the time. The site of the crash, located on a rocky ledge, was devoid of snow. All around the site remnants of silica-splintered, ‘smoky’ looking rocks were found. Many pieces, and a nearby rock, contained particles of silvery metal, some ‘spray’-like, some in the form of small solidified balls.

At the edge of the site a burnt treestump was found to be giving off a chemical smell. The objects collected

at the site were later dubbed ‘tiny nets’, ‘little balls’,‘lead balls’, and ‘glass pieces’.

Closer examination revealed very unusual properties. One of the ‘tiny nets’ contained torn and very thin (17micrometre) threads. Each of the threads consisted of even thinner fibres, tied up in plaits. Intertwined with the fibres were very thin gold wires.

Soviet scientists at such facilities as the Omsk branch of the Academy of Sciences, analyzed all collected pieces, finding them to be highly complex. The ‘iron balls’, for example, were composed of iron mixed with aluminum, manganese, nickel, chromium, tungsten and cobalt – in other words, an alloy. When melted in a vacuum, some pieces would spread out, while others would form into balls. Half of the balls were covered with convex glasslike structures. Neither the physicists nor metallurgists could reach a definite conclusion after testing these samples.

The ‘tiny nets’ (or ‘mesh’) have confounded many researchers. A. Kulikov, an expert on carbon at the Chemistry Institute of the Far Eastern

The location of Height 611

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Department of the Academy of Sciences, USSR, wrote that the mesh resembled glass carbon, but conditions leading to such a formation were unknown. He confirmed fire alone could not produce such glass carbon. The only thing that could be more or less easily explained was the ash found on site.

Something biological had burned during the crash: a flock of birds, perhaps, or a stray dog?

One of the silver balls found at the site.

Dr. Dvuzhilni’s article was published in the Soviet (Uzbekistan) Magazine NLO: Chto, Gde, Kogda? (Issue 1, 1990, reprint of an article in FENOMEN Magazine, March 23, 1990). In his article Dalnegorski Phenomen V. Dvuzhilni provides details unavailable elsewhere.

The southwesterly trajectory of the object just about coincides with the Xichang Cosmodrome of the People’s Republic of China, where satellites are launched into geo-synchronous orbit.

There is no data of any rocket launches in the PRC at the end of January. Similarly there were no rocket launches at any of the Soviet cosmodromes that could account for this crash.

There is another curious detail: at the site of the Height 611, small fragments of a light grey material were discovered, but only in the area of the crash. These specimens did not match any of the local varieties of soil. Indeed, the spectroscopic analysis of the specimens matched them to material from the Yaroslavl area, rather than those Dalnegorsk.

Eight days after the UFO crash at Height 611, on February 8, 1986, at 8:30pm, two more yellowish spheres flew from the north, in a southward direction.

Reaching the site of the crash, they circled it four times, then turned back to the north and flew away.

On November 28, 1987, at 11.24 pm, 32 flying objects appeared from nowhere, witnessed by hundreds of people, including members of the military. The objects flew over 12 different settlements, and 13 of them flew to Dalnegorsk and the site. Three of the UFOs hovered over the settlement, and five of them illuminated the nearby mountain. The objects moved noiselessly, at an altitude between 150 to 800 metres. None of the eyewitnesses thought they were UFOs but assumed they were aircraft involved in some

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disaster. As the objects flew over houses they interfered with the local T V reception. Another group of eyewitnesses included workers from a quarry at Bor. At 11.00pm they observed a giant cylindrical object flying straight towards them. Its length was estimated to around 200 or 300 metres. The front part of the object was brightly lit.

Half an hour later, one of the quarry’s managers, a Mr Levakov, observed a huge, cigar-shaped object slowly moving at an altitude of 300 metres.

Mr Levakov stated that he was well acquainted with aircraft and had never seen anything like this before in his life.

Dr. Dvuzhilni’s conclusion is that the object that crashed on Hill 611 was a malfunctioning alien space probe.

Another hypothesis has it that the object managed to ascend, and escape (almost in one piece) in the north-easterly direction and probably crashed in the dense taiga.

There are of course opposing opinions.

V. Psalomschikov, an expert on aircraft crashes, and a well-known journalist, stated that the object was manufactured in the USSR, the technology to produce it dates back

to 1970s, and that he has similar ultrathin filaments in his possession.

However, a Soviet probe would selfdestruct immediately, whereas the object reportedly did try to ascend several times. Actually, Psalomschikov believes the crashed object was a Soviet-built remotely piloted vehicle.

A Russian ufologist and scientist, Gennady Belimov, presented information in 1993 that a Soviet military probe had crashed at Height 611. His proof was based on similar crashes of highly classified Soviet probes. As for the lead collected at the site, Belimov believes it was extracted from the Kholodnensky deposit in the Northern Baikal region.

A new generation of Russian UFO researchers has reached the conclusion that the probe was an aerostatics reconnaissance vehicle possibly equipped to make infrared photographs. The speed of the probe was estimated to be approximately 54 km per hour, which would negate Dr Dvuzhilni’s data. But even among them there is no consistent belief as to the origin of the probe. Vladimir Smoly, for example, does not believe there was a thermite self-destruction device

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aboard the probe. The self-destruction would be expected to be immediate, unlike to what had happened at Height 611 to the crashed object.

Russian newspaper Komsomol’skaya Pravda in its December 1, 2000 issue published an article about the Dalnegorsk case (NLO svili v Primorje gnezdo). Most interesting was Andrey Pavlov’s (the author of the newspaper article) reference to the fact that in the early 1990s Russian generals from the anti-aircraft forces became concerned about the UFO activity in the area, and contacted local UFO researchers. An exchange of information ensued. It is newsworthy when a major Russian newspaper mentions such fact (the author actually quoted Dr. Dvuzhilni, the chief investigator of the Height 611 UFO crash).

According to Alexander Rempel (NLO Magazine, 1999) very few Russian ufologists recall the crash, or pay attention to it. Alexander Rempel informed participants of the UFOMIND Russian UFO Forum that fragments of the crashed object have been examined in Vladivostok, Khabarovsk, and Munich, Liege and other places. In 2000, four Japanese and Korean expeditions examined the Height 611.

Ufologists from Korea and Japan have made offers to purchase the “balls”.The current price for one gram of any fragment is $500.00, and the price has been going up. There are offers of

$1,500 per gram, but the demand exceeds the supply. Rempel is aware that there have been numerous conclusions of a number of institutes and laboratories in Russia and abroad, and yet all of them differ from each other. There is no final conclusion that the object was made on Earth, but at the same time, there is no definite conclusion that the object was of extraterrestrial origin.

Some peculiarities of the object still cannot be explained. Since 2000 there has not been anything anomalous in the area.

Russian ufologists show little or no interest in the famous case, states Rempel, except for those in Vladivostok. Two exhibits of the Height 611 incident have been made and are active; one is in the Dalnegorsk museum, and the other in the UFO Museum in Vladivostok. There are hundreds of witnesses, and dozens of the actual eyewitnesses, and many drawings of the incident, We must mention another interpretation of the Dalnegorsk crash.

It was published in Soviet newspaper Ribak Primorya (Issue 14, 1991). The author of the article was Y. Vasilyev, and he makes several interesting points.

According to him, V. Dvuzhilni and a group of his students arrived at the site of the crash. They searched the area three times, quite thoroughly, and found tiny metallic drops. All the required measurements and photographs were taken. Then they initiated physical and chemical analyses of the findings. The

temperature of the melting point was 390 degrees. This silvery metal was very soft; it was easy to break with a pair of tweezers. On February 8, 1986, V. Dvuzhilni and V. Berliozov, a geologist (who had studied the Sikhote-Alin’ meteorite) again ascended the hill. The geologist confirmed that the crashed object was of a cosmic origin, and the traces confirmed this. Its luminescence was similar to that of usual meteorites.

Five years later, V. Dvuzhilini came up with further details (“fantastic details”, according to Y. Vasilyev).

Next the author came up with his own hypothesis. On January 28, 1986, American shuttle Challenger exploded in the sky.The force of the explosion was such that the fragments were thrown all over the Atlantic. Is it possible that one of the fragments, flying from the southwest, landed in Dalnegorsk the next day?

There seems to a consensus of opinion that the Height 611 crash may well have a conventional explanation, but exactly what remains to be seen. It does have its parallel’s in the West, the Roswell case being one of them, but there are others.

Irrespective of this, it is a fascinating case, which is sure to divulge more information and more theories in the years to come.

There is much more to this fascinating incident all of which is now featured in my new book ‘RUSSIA’S ROSWELL INCIDENT’ that I have coauthored with Paul Stonehill. It is available in print and kindle via RoswellBooks.com and of course Amazon.

Mesh-like fragment found at the site

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THE

‘SKINWALKER RANCH’ Excerpted from Chapter 16 of Zones of Strangeness: An Examination of Paranormal and UFO Hot Spots by Peter A. McCue Not wishing to encourage intruders, the authors of Hunt for the Skinwalker don't give the precise location of the ranch that is the focus of their book. But photographs and videos of the property, and information about its location, have been published on websites (see, for example, http:// www.skinwalkerranch.org/). It's widely known as the 'Skinwalker Ranch', and I'll use that label. Kelleher and Knapp (2005, p. 12) state that it's located halfway between Roosevelt and Vernal.

In fact, though, it's about two-and-ahalf miles south-west of Fort Duchesne, and therefore much closer to Roosevelt than Vernal. It's surrounded by the Uintah and Ouray Indian Reservation.

In the religion and lore of the Native American tribes of the south-west USA, a 'skinwalker' is an evil, shape-shifting witch. Kelleher and Knapp (2005, p. 44) state (apparently on the basis of information provided by Junior Hicks) that the Skinwalker Ranch has been declared off-limits to members of the Ute tribe, because it supposedly lies in the path of the skinwalker - hence the figurative use of 'skinwalker' in the title of the book. However, Salisbury (2010, p. 225) notes that the Native American stories that Hicks has heard don't apply to much of the ranch, although Hicks reports that the ridge forming its northern boundary is of special significance to Native Americans and they refuse to go there.

Funded by the wealthy businessman Robert Bigelow, the National Institute for Discovery Science (NIDS) was established to study anomalous phenomena. In 1996, Kelleher took up a post with the organization. In August of that year, it bought the Skinwalker

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Ranch from its then owners, who are accorded the pseudonymous surname 'Gorman' by Kelleher and Knapp. The Gormans ('Tom', 'Ellen' and their two children) had been there for about two years, and had reportedly experienced a succession of bizarre and harrowing events. The family's real name is in the public domain. But Frank Salisbury has been in touch with Tom Gorman (see below), and the latter is apparently anxious to remain anonymous.

Therefore, in referring to him and his family, I'll use the pseudonyms employed

by Kelleher and Knapp.

According to Hunt for the Skinwalker (p.

8), the Gormans moved to the ranch from New Mexico. But in an e-mail to me in November 2010, Frank Salisbury wrote: "As far as I know, the [Gormans] had [...] been living in Utah before they bought the Skinwalker ranch. [Tom Gorman] grew up [in Utah], he told me."

Hunt for the Skinwalker states that the Gormans acquired the ranch at a very fair price. The book makes the following assertions about the property and its transfer to the Gormans: (1) The previous owners bought it in the 1950s.

(2) The ranch had been unoccupied for almost seven years when the Gormans arrived, although the previous owners would visit it a couple of times a year to check that the fence lines were intact.

(3) The previous owners had put some very strange clauses in the property sale contract, stipulating that there was to be no digging on the land without their receiving prior warning. (The book says that the Gormans regarded that as meaningless and chose to ignore it.) (4) The Gormans found that every door in the ranch house had several heavy-duty dead bolts on both the inside and outside;

all the windows were bolted; and there were indications that the previous owners had chained large guard dogs to both ends of the building.

These claims are challenged by testimony cited by Salisbury (2010). It appears that the previous occupants, Kenneth and Edith Myers, had bought the property in about 1933, not in the 1950s, starting with about 160 acres and then increasing their holding by buying further parcels of land. Dr Garth Myers, a former paediatric neurologist, told Salisbury that his brother Kenneth had died in 1987, after which his (Kenneth's) widow had continued to live at the ranch until about 1992. She died in 1994, whereupon Garth Myers and his sisters inherited the property, which they sold to the Gormans. Regarding the matter of digging on the ranch, Garth said that the only stipulation in the real estate contract was one retaining oil rights for the sellers. He denied that there was a profusion of locks at the property, although he told Salisbury that there were small sliding locks on cupboards inside; and he denied that his late brother had ever used large guard dogs.

Hunt for the Skinwalker (p. 16) states that the greatest concentration of high strangeness in the basin has always been at the Skinwalker Ranch. But Garth Myers told Salisbury that he'd been close to his brother and sister-in-law, and that "[t]here was nothing, unequivocally, absolutely nothing, that went on while [they] lived there" (quoted by Salisbury, 2010, p. 219). As a teenager, Garth had worked on the ranch for three summers, but without apparently seeing UFOs. In an e-mail to me in November 2010, Salisbury explained that a couple of weeks previously, he'd visited the Uinta

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Basin with Jacques Vallee, and they'd interviewed a number of people, including the son of John Garcia, whose ranch adjoins the Skinwalker Ranch on the east. (John Garcia is referred to, pseudonymously, as 'Mr Gonsalez' in Hunt for the Skinwalker.) Garcia's son explained that he'd worked for Kenneth Myers when he was a teenager and had got to know him quite well, but Myers had never said anything to him about UFOs or other strange things on his ranch.

Salisbury considers the possibility that Kenneth and Edith Myers refrained from telling Garth about UFO sightings because he was sceptical about such matters. But Salisbury indicates that there's only tenuous evidence for that proposition: Hicks seemed to recall an assistant at a drugstore telling him that Edith Myers had UFO stories to tell. Tom Gorman was a key witness regarding many of the events mentioned in Hunt for the Skinwalker. Salisbury (2010, Chapter 8) indicates that he's had a number of lengthy telephone conversations with him, and that Gorman contends that many of the things in Kelleher and Knapp's book only resemble a true account of his experiences. He informed Salisbury that he was unaware that a book was being written about his family's experiences, and he said that he'd never met George Knapp, although he'd spoken to him on the phone. Salisbury states that Gorman basically supports Garth Myers' version of the history of the ranch.

In talking to Salisbury, Gorman was somewhat guarded about what had occurred at the ranch. But what he said, along with information from Junior Hicks, convinced Salisbury that strange phenomena had indeed occurred, even though some of the details in Hunt for the Skinwalker may be wrong.

The following paragraphs outline some of the incidents recounted in Hunt for the Skinwalker. Obviously, though, in the light of what Salisbury reports, I can't be sure that they've been described accurately.

Phenomena during the Gormans' occupancy The Gormans reportedly had an encounter with a very large wolf-like creature early in their occupancy (Kelleher & Knapp, 2005, pp. 3-8). It attacked a calf. Despite being kicked, hit with a baseball bat, and then shot several times, the strange animal showed no signs of distress and trotted

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away. Tom Gorman and his son followed it. They eventually lost sight of the creature, but they were able to follow its tracks. However, the tracks suddenly stopped, as if the animal had vanished into thin air. (Salisbury, 2010, p. 227, relates that when he asked Gorman about this story, he was told that much of it was based on hearsay, although Gorman wouldn't elaborate.) Objects went missing in strange circumstances. For example, Ellen Gorman would leave a kitchen utensil on the counter, go outside briefly, and then return to find it gone, although it would later turn up somewhere unexpected. At one point, her husband left a 70-pound post-digging implement on the ground while he went away to get a wrench from his truck.

When he returned a couple of minutes later, it was missing. Sometime later, he found it - perched 20 feet up a tree (Kelleher & Knapp, 2005, p. 29, p. 81)!

There were UFO sightings. For example, Kelleher and Knapp (ibid., pp. 30-32) refer to an occasion when Tom Gorman spotted what appeared to be the lights of a trespassing recreational vehicle (RV) on his land. Accompanied by his son and nephew, he headed towards it, but it started moving away from them when they got within about 200 yards of it.

They broke into an easy jog and later started running, but the object maintained its distance from them, seemingly lifting itself over fences.

Eventually, it rose smoothly and slowly and crested a tree line. Silhouetted against the skyline, it appeared roughly oblong and shaped like a large refrigerator. It had a headlight in front and a red light at the back. It made no sound and slowly disappeared into the distance.

Kelleher and Knapp (ibid., pp. 52-54) describe some experiences that befell Ellen Gorman one memorable evening.

Driving home from work, she arrived at the gate of the ranch around 6 p.m. After closing the gate behind her, she got back into her car and then noticed a shadow moving slowly over the vehicle. She looked up and saw a large, black, triangular object, which was moving slowly, seemingly pacing her car as she drove towards the house. It appeared to be no more than 20 or 30 feet above her, and yet she heard no noise from it. She noticed tiny multicoloured lights on the ground, on each side of the car, as she pressed on the accelerator. When she pulled into the driveway, the object flew

west over the house and disappeared into the night. She felt badly frightened.

Her husband was away at the time and her children were staying with friends.

She phoned her husband at the hotel where he was staying, and he calmed her down. Later, while she was washing some dishes, she looked through a window to see what appeared to be an RV parked no more than 200 yards away.

Its interior was brightly lit and she saw what looked like a desk inside. A figure then moved into view and sat behind the desk. Then it suddenly got up and went to what appeared to be a doorway filled with light. It looked huge and probably male, and appeared to be dressed in black, with knee-high boots and something like a black visor over its face. Ellen felt its cold gaze. Quickly, she closed the window drapes and rang her husband again. He drove through the night and arrived the following morning. At the spot where Ellen had seen the RV, there were huge bootshaped impressions in the mud, almost 18 inches long. They didn't look like those of a military boot, since there were no ribs.

There were reportedly sightings of blue orbs on the ranch. Kelleher and Knapp (ibid., pp. 84-86) describe an occasion when three of Gorman's dogs chased after an orb that appeared to be intentionally teasing the enraged animals. The dogs followed it into a copse. The next day, Gorman found the dogs' incinerated remains in a clearing there. Salisbury (2010, p. 230) notes that Junior Hicks visited the ranch shortly after the incident, "and saw the circles of dead grass with their plies of 'grease' in the center."

At times, cattle were found mutilated.

Other animals simply disappeared and weren't seen again. For instance, a breeding cow went missing during the winter of 1994/5. It left tracks in the snow, but they suddenly stopped, with no sign of the animal.

Kelleher and Knapp (ibid., pp. 62-65) explain that members of the family sometimes saw an unworldly orange structure in the western sky. Observing it through the night-vision scope of a rifle one night, Gorman saw what looked like another sky in the middle of the orange form. It was as if he were looking through a window to a place where it was still daylight. On another occasion, he was viewing the orange

ufO encounter

structure through the night-vision scope when he saw a black object that seemed to be flying towards him. It got bigger, but then vanished into the night.

There was also an occasion when he saw an object that appeared to be exiting through it. The homestead was reportedly the only point from which the orange structure was perfectly visible.

Drivers on the roadway a mile away would see only a faint, ordinary-looking cloud. Frank Salisbury and Tom Gorman discussed the orange 'portals' during one of their telephone conversations.

As noted above, NIDS bought the ranch from the Gormans in August 1996.

According to Hunt for the Skinwalker (p.

90), the family moved to a small ranch 25 miles away, although Salisbury (2010, p. 231) suggests that it was "possibly more like fifteen miles away". At any rate, NIDS hired Tom Gorman to manage the Skinwalker Ranch for them. If significant events occurred when NIDS personnel weren't present, Gorman could contact the organization. The NIDS team had a private jet at their disposal and could therefore fly into Utah and arrive on the scene relatively quickly.

Phenomena after NIDS acquired the property During the early months of NIDS's ownership, dozens of tape-recorded interviews were conducted with local residents concerning strange events that had allegedly occurred near the ranch over the years. But relatively little was experienced by the NIDS researchers themselves during this early period - Hunt for the Skinwalker mentions just two UFO sightings (p.

101, p. 105). The first occurred one night in September 1996, when an unusual light was seen by team members and Tom Gorman. The second sighting was in November of that year. Looking at the night sky from the ranch, Kelleher and a colleague saw a silent, bright yellow light appear from over a ridge. It moved as fast as a high-speed jet aircraft, circled over them, and then zoomed back over the ridge. Kelleher took a couple of photographs, but they showed only a dimly visible, blurry light.

There were numerous incidents between March and August 1997; and between June and August of that year, phenomena reportedly occurred whenever scientific personnel were present. For example, Hunt for the

ufO encounter

Skinwalker (pp. 143-147) describes an event that occurred one night in late August. Two NIDS colleagues saw an area of yellow light. Observing it through stateof-the-art night-vision binoculars, one of them saw what appeared to be a tunnel suspended a couple of feet above the ground. He saw a black, faceless creature crawl out of it and walk away! His companion, without the night-vision binoculars, saw only an area of yellow light that got brighter and larger and then got smaller and less intense. He took photographs. A very faint, blurry light appeared in one, but there was nothing on the rest of the roll of film.

Incidents also occurred when NIDS personnel were absent. For example, in March 1997, a newborn calf was found mutilated (ibid., pp. 107-112). Its internal organs had gone, but there was no sign of blood. Another incident occurred in early April 1997, when Ellen Gorman made a rare visit to the ranch (pp. 118-120). As she and her husband passed a corral containing four bulls, she remarked that she would go out of her mind if she lost any of them. Forty-five minutes later, the couple found the corral empty. But shortly after, Tom Gorman reportedly discovered the bulls crammed into a trailer, although there was no entrance to it from the corral, except by a tightly locked door. (Salisbury, 2010, p.

233, refers to this incident, but states that it involved a small shed, not a trailer.

Hicks apparently visited it soon after the event.)

In 1997, NIDS set up six surveillance cameras close to an area on the ranch where a series of dramatic events had

occurred, such as the disappearance of six cattle. Some of the cameras could see into the infrared part of the spectrum. The cameras operated around the clock. However, a year passed with nothing unusual being detected. Then, on 20th July 1998, Tom Gorman discovered that three of the cameras weren't working - the wiring had been ripped out of them.

Investigation revealed that all three had lost power around 8.30 p.m. the previous day. However, one of the other cameras was pointing at the telephone pole on which the vandalized cameras were mounted. The investigators examined what it had recorded at the time in question. It showed the pole, with cattle grazing in a pasture beyond. Strangely, though, even with digital enhancement, there was no sign of any vandal.16 (See Hunt for the Skinwalker, pp. 186-189.)

Kelleher and Knapp (ibid., pp. 257-258) note that in February 2002, a perfect circle appeared overnight on the thin ice covering a pond not far from the ranch house. It was just under six feet in diameter, and was cut into the ice to a depth of about a quarter-of-an-inch.

Apart from the hoof prints of cattle, there were no footprints in the mud surrounding the pond. Examination showed that the circle had been cut by a sharp object moving anticlockwise.

There were ice shavings at the edges of the grooves. Along with some from a control spot elsewhere on the ice, they were taken for analysis, but the test results showed nothing noteworthy.

Magnetic field, electric field, and radiation readings were taken in the

Ice circle purportedly found at the Skinwalker Ranch

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vicinity of the pond, but Kelleher and Knapp imply that nothing remarkable was found. The cattle were checked for unusual marks, but none was found, and there were no unusual tracks. The authors note that it would have required a deft touch to carve the circle without breaking the thin ice. A photograph, purportedly showing the circle, can be seen on the Internet (e.g. at: http:// www.skinwalkerranch.org/).

According to Hunt for the Skinwalker (p.

193), Colm Kelleher left NIDS in 2004.

By then, apart from the aforementioned circle that was cut into the ice, nothing of note had apparently happened at the ranch for some years. In an e-mail to me in October 2008, George Knapp stated: "I know there have been incidents since [2004] in other parts of the [Uinta] basin but nothing to speak of at the ranch, other than [trespassers and UFO hunters] who get drunk and then wander around the property." Frank Salisbury informed me (e-mail, November 2010) that he was hoping to visit the ranch in September 2009. He contacted the caretakers, who explained that they would have to check with Mr Bigelow. About two hours later, Salisbury received a call from Colm Kelleher, who wouldn't permit the visit. Evidently, then, Kelleher was still associated with Bigelow and was still involved in some way with the ranch.

Remote Viewing Remote viewing is a procedure whereby people try to picture distant places using extrasensory perception. NIDS asked a number of remote viewers to give their impressions of the Skinwalker Ranch (Kelleher & Knapp, 2005, pp. 221-224).

One exercise involved members of the Nevada Remote Viewing Group. Their overall impression was that a military operation was underway, most likely involving the US Navy; and three out of five of them independently perceived a large grid or honeycomb consisting of sophisticated electronic equipment and wires embedded in the ground. But as Kelleher and Knapp acknowledge, such impressions don't constitute solid evidence. However, it's worth noting that the Gormans reportedly claimed that they'd often heard sounds of heavy machinery or metal equipment coming from beneath the earth (p. 224).17 And Kelleher and Knapp note (p. 225) that military personnel were seen in the vicinity on several occasions.

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Comments On balance, Kelleher and Knapp think that it's unlikely that the Utah ranch was the target of a deception operation by the military. Among other things, they state (ibid., p. 228) that even if the present-day military had the wherewithal to replicate some of the strange objects seen on the ranch, it's doubtful whether any earthly government had such technology more than 50 years ago, when sightings of huge, structured UFOs in the Uinta Basin became a matter of discussion. Their book was published in 2005. Taken literally, their assertion about these huge UFOs would relate to a period no later than 1955, although the sightings mentioned in Salisbury's book occurred after that. However, Salisbury informs me (e-mail, November 2010) that, "Junior Hicks says the first cases he investigated were about 1951, but that was before he began keeping files."

Since the most dramatic manifestations at the Skinwalker Ranch seem to have occurred when members of the Gorman family were present, this may have been a family-centred case rather than a reflection of 'regional strangeness'.

Alternatively, there may have been a person-place interaction: the Gormans may have somehow catalysed phenomena just waiting to happen! At any rate, it would be interesting to know whether the Gormans had experienced any strange phenomena prior to their time at the ranch.

UFO events and paranormal phenomena often have a theatrical character. If the reports cited above can be believed, that was the case at the Skinwalker Ranch.

Take, for example, the strange figure that Ellen Gorman reportedly saw standing in the doorway of something that looked like an RV. The figure seemed very tall and was dressed in black; there was something like a black visor over its face; and it left enormous footprints - all attention-compelling features.

Similarly, the UFO that flew over Ellen's car earlier that evening compelled attention - by casting a shadow over the car, by flying very low, and by pacing the vehicle. But the phenomena were also malevolent and mischievous, which may be why things quietened down after NIDS took over the property. The investigators were hoping to observe and record manifestations. Whatever was behind the phenomena may have relished the opportunity to serve up some tantalizing titbits and a large dose of frustration!

Zones of Strangeness: An Examination of Paranormal and UFO Hot Spots Peter A. McCue

REVIEW by Mr. D. L. Taylor At last a detailed book that examines the theory that reports of paranormal activity `cluster' in certain areas. Peter McCue is a well known and highly respected paranormal researcher and former Clinical Psychologist. After outlining the history and theories for the paranormal, he sets out examining certain well known areas where paranormal activity has been reported, from ghosts and poltergeists to UFOs. After taking the reader on a detailed history of the paranormal (worth the price of the book alone) Peter examines, in some details, various paranormal `hot spots' around the world, although the emphasis is on reports from the UK. Reports of UFO 'window' areas as well as clusters of ghost and other paranormal activity are examined, and in many instances all these subjects cross-over. A good example of this would be the Woodbridge UFO 'landing' case. The area also has a long history of paranormal activity.

This multidisciplinary approach makes this book an absolute `must have' for all serious researchers. Peter McCue is to be congratulated for producing such an important and informative tome (and a big tome it is!).

David Taylor, Chair, Parasearch Editor, Unitarian Society for Psychical Studies Editorial Board, Association for the Scientific Study of Anomalous Phenomena

ufO encounter

PAUL B. NORMAN 22-04-1916 - 23-06-2012

It is with sadness that I wish to inform members of the passing of Paul Norman at the age of 96. Paul died on Saturday 23rd peacefully; he spent the last years in a nursing home, suffering dementia.

Paul was born in Tennessee, was enlisted in the United States Navy during WW2, and had a long and distinguished naval career which included active service in the Pacific. It was through that period of his life that Paul discovered Australia and New Zealand.

His interest in UFOs came when he first saw a UFO in November 1953. Paul was the superintendent of a power station in Tennessee and one night a UFO came right over the station. He noted that he “thought it had to be a night-flying helicopter but there was no sound at all. It approached the power station at helicopter speed, stopped overhead for about half a minute and sped away fast and silently.”

In 1963 he left the United States to live in Australia where he married and established a family in Timboon and Arcadia.

He could be relatively candid about issues and “didn’t suffer some Ufologists gladly” especially those with egos and beliefs that pushed their standing/position within the subject above the research. He had a good sense of humor and a cheeky play on words when someone stepped on his toes.Two of his most used lines was “Malfunction Junction” and “Armchair Ufologist.” He believed that the important investigation into the UFO would be damaged if researchers’ had “less get up and go and suffered from their over bloated egos.” Paul was also frequently highly critical of Government policy on the UFO phenomenon, but understood that their actions whilst on the surface was disruptive and silent, people within were human, and through that he was able to make valuable connections and source material not generally available to the public, even today. He was simply trusted by authority and that was due to his honest, hard-nosed, diligent and ceaseless energy. Paul appeared in many UFO documentaries and was frequently quoted on the subject in the media.

I had a very close working association with Paul from the late 1970s to the early 1990s.

During this period we traveled together to many locations within Australia and researched hundreds of cases. He was an easy man to work with and loved to travel,

ufO encounter

frequenting airports, police stations, news editors and DoD establishments.

Frequently staying in hostels, he questioned just about everyone on the UFO subject hoping to get another lead. Where I was inundated with technical equipment, he trusted his note pad, tape recorder, camera and business card to do the work, amazingly with great success.

We worked on some of the best cases in the world, but three that strike me were the unexplained disappearance on 21 October 1978 of 20-year-old Frederick Valentich while piloting a Cessna 182L light aircraft over Bass Strait in Australia. The famous Quentin Fogarty NZ UFO footage, recorded on board an Argosy freight airplane over December 1978 and the January 20th 1988 Knowles family car encounter whilst travelling across the Nullarbor Plain.

The work Paul put into these cases was amazing tribute to his drive and it was a great pleasure working with him during these landmark events. However, in truth this list is much longer. Paul had heart valves replaced back in the 1980 and he amazed me on how well he recovered to get back researching at a frantic pace. On many occasions after that we would arrive in some location for the night and while we discussed all things that day, he would consume, against the Doctors orders, two litres of full cream milk. He had the ‘constitution of an Ox.’ Paul had many friends around the world and visited just about everyone at some stage over the years. I just want to list a few people Paul spoke fondly of and had a close relationship with; Coral and Jim Lorenzen, Walt Andrus, Lou Farish, Derek Dempster, Gordon Creighton, Allen Hynek (I should note that Paul was very suspicious of Hynek and saw him as a “Born Again Ufologist”), Betty Hill was a favorite and he stayed with her on many occasions, Lord Hill Norton and James McDonald. Paul was a key organizer in the visit to Australia of Dr James Edward McDonald in 1967 and then Dr. J. Allen Hynek in 1973. His Australian friends are too numerous to mention. Many VUFORS committee members were very close to Paul, but his greatest friend and long term working colleague was Judith MaGee. As a longtime member of FSR and MUFON, Paul was very proud of MUFON and spoke fondly of its efforts; he occasionally spoke at their conferences. He has also been for many years the MUFON area

representative for the State of Victoria. But his great love was the Victorian U.F.O. Research Society ( VUFORS) and its members. Paul served in many capacities but principally as the Vice President and Researcher. And his connection with members through his “On the UFO Trails” travel logs and reports in the VUFORS publications were important to Paul. I taxed him about writing a book, using his many notes and logs, as he had many ideas and stories to tell, and at one stage we sat down and did a number of interviews and drafted a concept, but he was not eager to push his own story as it distracted people from the main game. As I noted above he had a wicked sense of humor and on one occasion attended a committee meeting with an Einstein mask on. On another occasion while returning to the US to visit his sister in Concord, California, he found himself stuck in immigration, officially listed as “Deceased;” it became obvious that someone or some group was playing games with his profile. By the time that was sorted out he opened his luggage at his sister’s only to find that it was well and truly picked over by the authorities. Where most would find this an upsetting form of Governments intrusion, Paul wore it with pride. In his rich American voice he told me “John, I am affecting someone in high places and that’s a good sign they care about the subject.” He took a lot of pleasure from this event.

A constant welcomed overnight guest in our home, while we planned our research, he was always respectful and non-intrusive.

Paul communicated with me over the years after I departed VUFORS. However, time took its toll and toward the last 10 years unfortunately I sadly lost ‘one to one’ contact with him.

Paul was a great friend to me and ufology and an esteemed colleague who was wellliked by many. Paul will be remembered as a great and important Ufologist and for his valiant pursuit to find answers to the UFO enigma and will never be forgotten in Australian Ufology. Paul will be remembered, as he was an extraordinary man who lived an extraordinary life.It’s hard to say one can truly and deeply know a person, but it easier to say that I am glad our life paths did meet. Our thoughts and sympathy go to the family at this time. Paul will be sadly missed.

John W. Auchettl, Phenomena Research Australia

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NEW PLANET FOUND IN OUR SOLAR SYSTEM? Richard A. Lovett, http:// news.nationalgeographic.com/news/ 2012/05/120511-new-planet-solarsystem-kuiper-belt-space-science/

An as yet undiscovered planet might be orbiting at the dark fringes of the solar system, according to new research.

Too far out to be easily spotted by telescopes, the potential unseen planet appears to be making its presence felt by disturbing the orbits of so-called Kuiper belt objects, said Rodney Gomes, an astronomer at the National Observatory of Brazil in Rio de Janeiro.

Kuiper belt objects are small icy bodiesincluding some dwarf planets-that lie beyond the orbit of Neptune. Once considered the ninth planet in our system, the dwarf planet Pluto, for example, is one of the largest Kuiper belt objects, at about 1,400 miles (2,300 kilometers) wide.

Dozens of the other objects are hundreds of miles across, and more are being discovered every year. What's intriguing, Gomes said, is that, according to his new calculations, about a half dozen Kuiper belt objects-including the remote body known as Sedna-are in strange orbits compared to where they should be, based on existing solar system models.

The objects' unexpected orbits have a few possible explanations, said Gomes, who presented his findings Tuesday at a meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Timberline Lodge, Oregon. "But I think the easiest one is a planetary-mass solar companion"-a planet that orbits very far out from the sun but that's massive enough to be having gravitational effects on Kuiper belt objects.

How big exactly the planetary body might be isn't clear, but there are a lot of possibilities. Based on his calculations, Gomes thinks a Neptune-size world, about four times bigger than Earth, orbiting 140 billion miles (225 billion kilometers) away from the sun-about 1,500 times farther than Earth-would do the trick. But so would a Mars-size object-roughly half Earth's sizein a highly elongated orbit that would occasionally bring the body sweeping to within 5 billion miles (8 billion kilometers) of the sun.

Gomes speculates that the mystery object could be a rogue planet that was kicked out of its own star system and later

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captured by the sun's gravity.Or the putative planet could have formed closer to our sun, only to be cast outward by gravitational encounters with other planets.

However, actually finding such a world would be a challenge. To begin with, the planet might be pretty dim. Also, Gomes's simulations don't give astronomers any clue as to where to point their telescopes-"it can be anywhere," he said.

Other astronomers are intrigued but say they'll want a lot more proof before they're willing to agree that the solar system-againhas nine planets."Obviously,finding another planet in the solar system is a big deal," said Rory Barnes, an astronomer at the University of Washington. But, he added, "I don't think he really has any evidence that suggests it is out there." Instead, he added, Gomes "has laid out a way to determine how such a planet could sculpt parts of our solar system.

So while, yes, the evidence doesn't exist yet, I thought the bigger point was that he showed us that there are ways to find that evidence."

the solar structure a "monster sunspot" in a Twitter announcement.

AR 1476 is big enough for amateur astronomers with decent equipment to spot from their backyards, weather permitting. (Warning: Never look at the sun directly with telescopes or the unaided eye. Special filters are required for safe solar viewing to avoid serious eye damage.)

"With at least four dark cores larger than Earth, AR 1476 sprawls more than 100,000 km from end to end, and makes an easy target for backyard solar telescopes."

Big solar flares are often associated with coronal mass ejections (CMEs), massive clouds of solar plasma that streak through space at 3 million mph (5 million kph) or more. If these clouds hit Earth, they can wreak havoc, spawning geomagnetic storms that can disrupt GPS signals, radio communications and power grids. CMEs also often super-charge the northern and southern lights, providing dazzling shows for skywatchers at high latitudes.

After remaining surprisingly quiet from 2005 through 2010, our star began waking up last year, spouting off numerous powerful flares and CMEs. Most experts expect such outbursts to continue over the next year or so. Solar activity waxes and wanes on an 11-year cycle, and scientists think the current one - known as Solar Cycle 24 - will peak in 2013.

feel great again... with a Psychic Therapy Session MONSTER SUNSPOT THREATENS TO UNLEASH POWERFUL SOLAR FLARES Mike Wall, http://www.space.com/15580monster-sunspot-ar1476-solar-storm.html Huge sunspot group AR 1476

An enormous sunspot group has taken shape on the surface of the sun, hinting that our star may soon start spouting off some powerful storms. The huge sunspot complex, known as AR 1476, measures more than 60,000 miles (100,000 kilometres) across. Scientists with NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory mission, a spacebased telescope watching the sun, dubbed

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For more info call Paul on 0417 789 606

www.paulboulton.com.au ufO encounter

SOLAR REALIGNMENT COULD SPELL DECADES OF COOLER TEMPERATURES http://io9.com/5906413/our-sun-couldsoon-have-four-poles

Looks like the Sun is up to some more crazy stunts.The website Asahi Shimbun reports that the Sun may soon have four poles, according to research by the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan and the Riken Research Foundation. This, in turn, could lead to much colder temperatures on Earth... starting as soon as May 2012.

Writes Asahi Shimbun: The researchers...found signs of unusual magnetic changes in the sun. Normally, the sun's magnetic field flips about once every 11 years. In 2001, the sun's magnetic north pole, which was in the northern hemisphere, flipped to the south.

While scientists had predicted that the next flip would begin from May 2013, the solar observation satellite Hinode found that the north pole of the sun had started flipping about a year earlier than expected. There was no noticeable change in the south pole. If that trend continues, say researchers, the north pole could complete its flip in May 2012 but create a four-pole magnetic structure in the sun, with two new poles created in the vicinity of the equator of our closest star.

They also speculate that the sun may be entering a period of reduced activity that could result in lower temperatures on Earth.

The current activity of sunspots resemble an 80-year period in the 17th century,when London's Thames river froze over and cherry blossoms bloomed later than usual in Kyoto. This era, known as the Maunder Minimum, experienced temperatures 2.5 degrees lower than in the second half of the 20th century.

ANOTHER NASA UFO COVERUP? http://news.gather.com/ viewArticle.action?articleId=281474981317152

A SOHO watcher on YouTube claims a new NASA UFO coverup after live streaming video from the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory was disabled in the last few days. What's it all about?

The poster to the YouTube channel, rob19791, is claiming that after another video he'd posted went viral, the live streaming images from the solar observatory were disabled, ostensibly due to what NASA calls a "false trigger" on the detector.

Here's NASA's official announcement: "SOHO went into 'Emergency Sun Reacquisition' mode on Friday May 4, 2012, caused by a false trigger of the Coarse Sun Pointing Attitude Anomaly Detector. We are working on the recovery of the spacecraft to normal mode."

This incident was supposedly triggered, claims the poster on YouTube, after a new

ufO encounter

image of a gigantic UFO was spotted on Thursday, May 3, 2012.nThe image [above] shows another immense, oblong, seemingly manufactured object, similar to one spotted in April, which doesn't seem to be affected by the solar furnace, hovering just above the surface of the star.

Since the live streaming capability was lost, other observers are reporting that still photographic images are being posted by NASA, but the live video cam remains offline.

TRIANGLE -SHAPED TRIANGLE-SHAPED UFOS BUZZ UNITED ST ATES, ENGLAND STA AND AUSTRALIA http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/ 03/triangle-ufos_n_1471817.html

Those triangle-shaped UFOs just don't seem to go away. Whether they're conventional planes, experimental stealth technology or truly unexplained vehicles, reports continue to surface about these aircraft.

And the sightings aren't isolated to a single location. Reports and videos have emerged recently from the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia.

It used to be that most UFO spotters related stories about unusual saucer-shaped or cigarshaped craft in the skies. Around the mid-

1970s, sightings of triangle-shaped, boomerang-shaped and, yes, Doritoshaped objects hit UFO news outlets.

Some of these UFOs may, in fact, be top-secret military aircraft like the ones now known to have been developed and tested at the legendary Area 51 base north of Las Vegas. But does that explanation fit all of them? Here's a look at some of the latest triangular craft.

On April 26, three UFOs appearing to fly in a triangular-shaped formation were reportedly videotaped by a passenger on an airplane over England. In another case, a slow-moving triangle-shaped craft was spotted on April 28 over Independence, Missouri., according to Examiner.com. An eyewitness reported the sighting to the Mutual UFO Network. "It was very odd -- a triangular-shaped flying object that had two blinking lights in the rear only," the witness wrote. "There were no other lights on the craft like you would see on a plane."

The Missouri report has no corroborating pictures or videos, and the eyewitness preferred to remain anonymous, but she and a friend were very intrigued by the craft. "We were amazed at how this big solid object was even airborne and how it was moving so slowly!" she wrote in her report to the Mutual UFO Network.

A triangle-shaped UFO was captured on video in the middle of the day over Sydney, Australia, according to Gather.com. A video, above, lasting more than four minutes showcases an object not easily identified. Last year the land down under also made headlines when Australia's official records of UFO sightings suddenly went missing.

With these triangular-craft reports surfacing just in these recent months, perhaps the balance of this year will yield more.

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SCIENTISTS DEPL OY GENETICS DEPLO IN SEARCH FOR BIGFOOT http://au.news.yahoo.com/queensland/a/-/ mp/13754984/scientists-deploy-geneticsin-search-for-bigfoot/

LONDON (Reuters) - Scientists are turning to genetic testing to see if they can prove the existence of the elusive hairy humanoid known across the world as bigfoot, yeti and sasquatch. A joint project between Oxford University and Switzerland's Lausanne Museum of Zoology will examine organic remains that some say belong to the creature that has been spotted in remote areas for decades.

"It's an area that any serious academic ventures into with a deal of trepidation ...

It's full of eccentric and downright misleading reports," said Bryan Sykes at Oxford's Wolfson College. But the team would take a systematic approach and use the latest advances in genetic testing, he added.

"There have been DNA tests done on alleged yetis and other such things but since then the testing techniques, particularly on hair, have improved a lot due to advances in forensic science," he told Reuters. Modern testing could get valid results from a fragment of a shaft of hair said Sykes, who is leading the project with Michel Sartori, director of the Lausanne museum.

Ever since a 1951 expedition to Mount Everest returned with photographs of giant footprints in the snow, there has been speculation about giant Himalayan creatures, unknown to science.There have been eyewitness reports of the "yeti" or "migoi" in the Himalayas, "bigfoot" or "sasquatch" in America, "almasty" in the Caucasus mountains and orang pendek' in Sumatra. Tests up to now have usually concluded that alleged yeti remains were actually human, he said. But that could have been the result of contamination. "There has been no systematic review of this material."

The project will focus on Lausanne's archive of remains assembled by Bernard Heuvelmans, who investigated reported yeti sightings from 1950 up to his death in 2001. Other institutions and individuals will also be asked to send in details of any possible yeti material. Samples will be subjected to "rigorous genetic analysis", and the results published in peer-reviewed

science journals.

Aside from the yeti question, Sykes said he hoped the project would add to the growing body of knowledge on the interaction between humanity's ancestors. "In the last two years it has become clear that there was considerable inter-breeding between Homo Sapiens and Neanderthals ... about 2 to 4 percent of the DNA of each individual European is Neanderthal," he said.

One hypothesis is that yetis are surviving Neanderthals.The joint project will take DNA samples from areas where there have been alleged sightings to see whether the Neanderthal DNA traces are stronger in the local population.

As for the project's chances of success? "The answer is, of course, I don't know," said Sykes.

"It's unlikely but on the other hand if we don't examine it we won't know."

KILLING BIGFOOT OK IN TEXAS - IF HE'S TEXAN Jeremy A. Kaplan, http://www.foxnews.com/ scitech/2012/05/08/killing-bigfoot-ok-intexas-if-hes-texan/?cmpid=cmty_twitter_fn

Texas has no position on the existence of Bigfoot -- but go on, hunt it anyway.

John Lloyd Scharf, a Bigfoot fan from Oregon, emailed the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department last week about hunting unknown creatures. Chief of staff Lt. David.

Sinclair told FoxNews.com he responded with a straight description of the law -- which hinges not on whether the mythical beast exists, but on precisely how the government would label it.

"The statute that you cite (Section 61.021) refers only to game birds, game animals, fish, marine animals or other aquatic life. Generally speaking, other nongame wildlife is listed in Chapter 67 (nongame and threatened

species) and Chapter 68 (nongame endangered species)," Sinclair wrote back to Scharf. "An exotic animal is an animal that is non-indigenous to Texas.Unless the exotic is an endangered species, then exotics may be hunted on private property with landowner consent."

The law boils down to provenance, Scharf decided. If Bigfoot is indigenous to Texas, it can be killed.

But Sinclair told FoxNews.com his response has been taken wildly out of context. "This guy never really alluded to Bigfoot, though it seems maybe he said something about Sasquatch," Sinclair told FoxNews.com. "He took my statement and said that it was safe to hunt an 'indigenous cryptid,' whatever that is. He misquoted me."

Scharf did not respond to several FoxNews.com requests for more information. But the rules Sinclair cites are clear: It would be legal to shoot Sasquatch.

"Nongame" means wildlife indigenous to Texas that aren't deer, sheep, geese, alligators, or any other animal hunted for food. If the Commission doesn't specifically list a beast -- and needless to say, Bigfoot doesn't make the list -- it isn't protected.

So Bigfoot a Longhorn? Absolutely, said Brian Brown, media coordinator for the Texas Bigfoot Research Conservancy.

"We've got hundreds of sightings going back decades. I don't think we'd have any problem proving it's indigenous. We think they're all over the region," Brown told FoxNews.com.

Oregon resident Scharf worried that the policy could be interpreted as "kill it first, ID it after." He thinks it could even lead to premature extinction of the Bigfoot species. "Individuals of an unknown species, and therefore not be listed as 'endangered' under the Endangered Species Act of 1973, could be exterminated without criminal or civil repercussions - essentially causing extinction?" he asked on an enthusiast bulletin board.

Brown argued that killing a Bigfoot is a necessary way to prove its existence.

"Our primary mission is to conserve these animals.They cannot be conserved until they are accepted as fact. They will not be accepted as fact until a type specimen is produced. It's as simple as that," he wrote on the group's website, texasbigfoot.com.

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ufO research queensland

inc

www. uforq. asn. au email: info@uforq.asn.au phone: 07 3376 1780

be com e a member bec ome Membership with UFO Research Queensland Inc costs $35.00 annually for membership [$45.00 AUD for International members]. Membership entitles you to benefits such as discounts on meeting entry, Library membership, and sees six issues of UFO Encounter delivered to your door. Cheques and money orders should be made payable to ‘UFO Research Queensland Inc’ and mailed to UFO Research Queensland Inc, PO Box 15222, City East, Queensland, 4002. Overseas applications should be made by International Money Order or bank drafts in Australian dollars.

publi c meetings public Public Meetings are held on the last Friday of every month [except December] at 7.30pm sharp.

Kenmore Library, Meeting Room 3 Kenmore Village Shopping Centre 9 Brookfield Road, Kenmore [see map below] Please use elevator for meeting room entry.

Admission is $7.00 for members and $10.00 for non-members.

PLEASE NOTE: Membership cards must be produced for member-discounted entry.

For further enquiries call 07 3376 1780 or email info@uforq.asn.au

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ShoppingCentreEntrance Brookfield Road Moggil Road

ufOr q library ufOrq The Library now has over 500 books, videos and DVDs on its shelves, with new additions being made all the time - which makes it the largest UFO library in the Southern Hemisphere! Members are able to borrow books, periodicals, dvds, videos, audiotapes and other items on a monthly basis. Items are available to borrow and return at Public Meetings.

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www.uforq.asn.au email: info@uforq.asn.au

affiliates uforq ipswich [qld]

Public Meetings are held at the Ipswich Trades Hall on the first Friday of the month, 7.30pm

gympie ufo and paranormal research [qld]

contact: Roma Ravn; (0754) 864 458 or Carlo Riva, (0754) 852 116 Public Meetings are held on the first Wednesday of every month at the Community Centreplace, 24 Lawrence St, Gympie, 7.30pm

sightings hOtlines

ufohsar - ufo hotline Brisbane - Martin Gottschall (07) 3376 1780 and abduction research Gympie - Roma Ravn (07) 5486 4458 gympie [qld]

Gold Coast - Peter Matic 0418 750 180 Toowoomba - Andrew & Lisa Pearson-Webb (07) 4638 1997 Stanthorpe - Carol Watson 0403 918 336 Tully - Claire Noble (07) 4068 1538 Cairns - Andrew Brimacombe 0431 543 025 or email - info@uforq.asn.au

contact: Carlo Riva; (0754) 852 116

gold coast [qld] contact: Peter Matic , 0418 750 180 email: pcmatic@bigpond.net.au

stanthorpe [qld]

contact: Carol Watson; Stanthorpe Skies, 0403 918 336 email: carolynannwatson@gmail.com

toowoomba [qld]

contact: Andrew & Lisa Pearson-Webb, 07 4696 9035 / 0419332752, email: andrewgwebb@bigpond.com

cairns [qld]

contact: Andrew Brimacombe, 0431 543 025, email: alecbacp@yahoo.com.au

consciousness development and research group [qld] contact: Kay McCullock ND, CDRG and CSETI Working Group; 0429 641 222 email: cdrg.contact@gmail.com

blue mountains ufo research group [nsw] contact: Rex Gilroy; (02) 4782 3441; email: randhgilroy@optusnet.com.au website: http://www.mysteriousaustralia.com/rexufo/australian-ufos-mainpage.html

cosmic connections [sa]

contact: Kevin Robb; 0406362340; email: Kevin@australiancosmicconnection.com.au website: http://australiancosmicconnection.com.au/ 20

ufO encounter