If, as my Body Snatchers in the Desert book on the Roswell affair suggests, certain key events in the summer of 1947 – of a perceived flying saucer nature – had far less to do with the actions of aliens and far more to do with matters of a classified, military nature, then it would be most reasonable to assume that (a) discussions of such a possibility would have been flying around Washington, D.C., and (b) the government, and people in the military, would have been secretly digging deep to try and determine if this was indeed the case. Guess what? That is exactly what happened. Although many UFO investigators have said that the government’s worries and concerns about UFOs in ’47 were provoked by fear of them having definitive alien or Soviet origins, we have prime evidence in our hands that demonstrates the domestic “secret weapon” angle was one most definitely discussed – and even accepted – at an official level, as we shall now see. It is a crucial part of the argument that at least some UFOs are not from faraway worlds, but from right here.

(Nick Redfern)

In early July 1947, Brigadier General George F. Schulgen, who was the Chief of the Requirements Intelligence Branch of Army Air Corps Intelligence, met with Special Agent S.W. Reynolds of the FBI. The purpose: to determine if the Army Air Force could solicit the assistance of the Bureau on a regular basis in its investigation of the growing flying saucer controversy. General Schulgen advised Reynolds that, “every effort must be undertaken in order to run down and ascertain whether or not the flying discs are a fact and, if so, to learn all about them.” The foremost thought on General Schulgen’s mind, at the time, was that the saucers were probably man-made in origin. He had another theory, too, and confided in Special Agent Reynolds that, “the first reported sightings might have been by individuals of Communist sympathies with the view to causing hysteria and fear of a secret weapon.” It was for this reason that the Army Air Force sought the FBI’s assistance.

General Schulgen pledged to the FBI “all the facilities of [my] office as to results obtained.” He outlined a plan that would involve the FBI in both locating and questioning witnesses to UFO sightings to ascertain whether they were sincere in their statements that they had seen flying saucers, or whether their statements were prompted by personal desire for publicity or subversive reasons. According to declassified FBI files, Schulgen was careful to advise Reynolds too that: “It has been established that the flying discs are not the result of any Army or Navy experiment.” But, was that statement the literal truth? Was someone keeping the FBI in the dark? Following the meeting between Schulgen and Reynolds, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover instructed his agents to begin investigations into flying saucer sightings, specifically in the manner suggested by General Schulgen. As a result of these investigations, on August 15, 1947 the FBI learned of the distinct possibility that the military’s involvement in the flying saucer subject extended beyond that of mere observer. In a memorandum to Edward A. Tamm, the FBI Assistant Director, D.M. Ladd of the Bureau’s Domestic Intelligence Division wrote the following:

(Nick Redfern) The Legendary Crash Site Outside of Roswell, New Mexico

“The Director advised on August 14, 1947, that the Los Angeles papers were carrying headlines indicating that Soviet espionage agents had been instructed to determine the facts relative to the flying discs. The article carried a Washington date line and indicated that Red espionage agents had been ordered to solve the question of the flying discs, the Russians being of the opinion that this might be some new form of defense perfected by the American military [italics mine]. The article further recalled that during the recent war pieces of tin foil had been dropped in the air for the purpose of off-setting the value of radar being used by the enemy forces and that these aluminum discs might be a new development along this line. The Director inquired as to whether the Bureau had any such information.”

(Nick Redfern) Hanging Out at Roswell a Couple of Years Ago

Suspecting that, if the Russians were snooping around, the saucers just had to be American in origin, Special Agent Reynolds of the FBI’s Liaison Section was directed by J. Edgar Hoover to make further inquiries with the Air Force. Answers were sorely needed. Answers came, too. But, they weren’t the ones you might expect them to have been. On August 19, 1947, Reynolds met with a Lieutenant Colonel George D. Garrett and the entire secret weapon issue was discussed frankly and openly, as were the potential consequences should the Bureau uncover details of a top-secret, domestic research-and-development program. Following their very candid exchange, a remarkable memorandum captioned “Flying Discs” was prepared by Reynolds for the attention of Hoover. It is this document, perhaps, more than any other, which indicates that the American military was testing flying saucer-type aircraft in the summer of 1947. Or, craft that were not circular-shaped but which still came under the UFO banner, such as massive balloon arrays. Somewhere in all of this are the strands that place the Roswell affair  into the “human experimentation” category.

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I moved to the United States to live in 2001, and, in the summer, I traveled around much of the west coast – chiefly to do a series of lectures for various UFO groups situated in California. An old lady put out a thread and asking if we could talk. Well, that would be just fine. On July 28, 2001 I hung out with the then-seventy-nine-year-old woman: we had lunch in a Los Angeles restaurant and chatted extensively. She was driven to the restaurant by a family member, a much younger man who seemed to be equally as worried as she was. Nevertheless, she agreed to share what she knew, providing her name was never published (although, she was required to provide Simon & Schuster’s legal people with a release form, as were each and all of the other whistleblowers, too). So, I sat back and listened. I referred to her in the book as the Black Widow. When we met, and knowing that she had read my 1998 book, The FBI Files, my natural assumption was that she wanted to tell me something about UFO encounters at the Oak Ridge atomic facility, where she worked. Makes sense, right? No. I was dead wrong: what she actually wanted to share with me was certain information that, if provable, would radically alter the face of Ufology and blow the Roswell case right out of the water. As we ate, I wondered, with a fair degree of excitement: what the hell have I got myself into? It wasn’t long before I had the answer to that loaded question.

The Black Widow, born in 1922, had been in the employ of Oak Ridge from the mid-1940s to the early 1950s. While there, and on three occasions between May and July 1947, she saw a number of unusual-looking bodies brought to the facility – and under stringent security. They looked like regular Japanese people, she said. Others, however, displayed the signs of certain medical conditions: dwarfism, oversized heads, and bulging eyes. A few of the bodies were extensively damaged – as if they had been in violent accidents, which proved to be the case. In all, fifteen such bodies were brought to Oak Ridge under great secrecy; all of them reportedly used in certain high-altitude, balloon-based experiments in New Mexico, one of which led to the Roswell legend. Or, became a part of the legend is probably more correct. The Black Widow said: “Those bodies – the Roswell bodies – they weren’t aliens. The government could care less about those stories about alien bodies found at Roswell – except to hide the truth.” She added she didn’t know anything at all about how these people were brought to the United States, but she heard at Oak Ridge that some of them were in the States in late 1945 and brought over with Japanese doctors and Nazi doctors who had been doing similar experiments. “That’s when some of this began,” she told me. The story continued that at least some of the people used in the tests were American prisoners given the opportunity to cut the lengths of their sentences – if, that is, they were willing to take a chance and take part in the dicey experiments. Reportedly, a number did take the bait, but failed to survive the flights. Not all of the handicapped people came from Japan, but from “hospitals and “asylums” in the United States. The grim plot was that they wouldn’t be missed. Ever.

(Nick Redfern) At the “Roswell Ranch”

All of the material evidence was said to have been eventually destroyed – chiefly because the operations didn’t provide much in the way of results, and because of the outright illegality of the experiments. Everything, the Black Widow said, was hidden beneath a mass of fabricated tales of flying saucers and little men from the stars. She doubted that anything of any significance still existed – certainly not the bodies or the balloons, and probably not even the old records, which she believed were burned to oblivion. Unless, however, some of them were preserved for secret, historical purposes, which is not impossible. I hope they were. If not, it may be nigh on impossible to conclusively prove anything about Roswell – ever. There was one other aspect of the Black Widow’s story that needs to be addressed: her overwhelming fear. It was ever-present throughout our 2001 meeting. She tried to disguise that fear with smiles and laughter, but she was certainly no Oscar-winning Hollywood actor. That’s for sure. Seeing through her facade was like seeing through freshly polished glass. In my Body Snatchers in the Desert book I said that she “possessed the sad and somewhat sunken eyes of a person with the weight of the world on her shoulders. She was clearly looking for someone to speak with; but, equally, she was very concerned about the ramifications of doing so, ‘if the government finds out.'”

In my original manuscript, I detailed why she was so scared, but that section didn’t make the cut. The reason? The publisher was highly concerned about the Black Widow’s extremely controversial claims to me that certain people who had got too close to the truth of Roswell, and who couldn’t keep their mouths shut, had been “removed.” So the story went, certain hired assets, who regularly worked with the intelligence community on troublesome situations, were secretly contracted to terminate those who threatened the status quo and its dangerous secret. Yep: very controversial. Interestingly, the Black Widow made a mention to me of a long-retired nurse from Roswell who had died under extremely questionable circumstances “a few years ago.”  I didn’t know it at the time, but it’s highly possible that she was referring to a woman named Miriam Bush. Miriam was not actually a nurse, at all: in 1947 she was an executive secretary at Roswell’s RAAF hospital. She worked for a medical officer named Lieutenant Colonel Harold Warne, and saw the bodies found on the Foster Ranch – specifically when they were brought into the confines of the hospital. They were, as nearly everyone claimed, small, damaged, decaying and unusual-looking. This trauma-filled experience clearly affected Miriam to a huge degree. The whole thing was like an albatross around her neck. That huge, ominous bird never left her.

(Nick Redfern)

Miriam’s private life was a mess and she became an alcoholic – as did, by the way, two other players in the Roswell story. They were Major Jesse Marcel and Dee Proctor; a sign, perhaps of the tremendous burden of hiding what they knew. And, in the late 1980s, Miriam became fearful that she was being watched and followed. She was. Miriam  was found dead in a motel-room just outside of San Jose, California, in December 1989. A plastic bag was around her head and her arms were bruised and scratched. The verdict? Suicide. Yeah, really. When the story of Miriam Bush surfaced – years after I spoke with the Black Widow, and also a couple of years after Body Snatchers in the Desert was published – my mind instantly swung back to the Black Widow’s comments relative to the highly suspicious death of a certain “nurse” from Roswell. Was it Miriam Bush? I don’t know. But, logically, it would make sense, even if the ranks and positions were wrong. If so, though, how did the Black Widow know this? After all, Miriam was based at Roswell, New Mexico and the Black Widow worked in Tennessee. I have no answer to that question; I wish I did. But, I do know that the Black Widow’s major concern about speaking on the record was the fear that she would finish up like the woman from Roswell; a woman who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, and who paid for it with her life, years later.

Now, it’s twenty years since I began to seriously pursue the theory that the Roswell affair was a top secret experiment – rather than a UFO crash – that revolved around high-altitude flights and the secret use of handicapped people in that same experiment. A dark and disturbing story, for sure. It still is a dark story, And, I still continue to get new information that makes me believe Roswell had zero to do with aliens. Not even a single one. It’s too bad that the UFO research community is scared (rather, absolutely pissing themselves) to look at what I call the alternative side of Roswell. Should they delve into it all of this, they may not like what they find. But, they will know the real story – even though it’s a terrible one.

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The vast majority of Bigfoot researchers subscribe to the viewpoint that Bigfoot is nothing stranger than a giant ape that science and zoology have yet to conclusively classify. There is, however, a small body of data that suggests Bigfoot is something far stranger than just a regular ape. Peppered throughout Bigfoot lore and history are stories of the beasts vanishing in flashes of light, of them fading away into nothingness, and of them becoming invisible to the human eye. This has given rise to an intriguing theory: that Bigfoot has the ability to traverse multi-dimensions. In other words, while the creatures may be comprised of flesh and blood, their overwhelming elusiveness may be due to the fact that they are only temporary visitors to our realm of existence. A perfect example has been recorded by Jack Lapseritis, author of The Psychic Sasquatch. He tells the story of a group of people that had an amazing encounter with a Bigfoot. The story came from a Mrs. Jeffery, and whose story Lapseritis summarizes as follows:

“After returning from a long hike, the group was stunned when a nine-to-ten foot Sasquatch stepped out in front of them a short distance away.  Then, in the twinkling of an eye, the Bigfoot completely disappeared in front of the witnesses!  The witnesses insisted that it literally dematerialized!  Mrs. Jeffrey reported that she was so awed at what she saw, that when they returned home, she did not leave the house for two weeks.  The woman was in such a total state of shock that she did not return to the area for some time.” Ronan Coghlan is the author of a number of acclaimed books, including A Dictionary of Cryptozoology and – with Gary Cunningham – The Mystery Animals of Ireland. In a 2012 interview with me, Coghlan provided his views on the nature of Bigfoot, and what he believes may be evidence of a link between the phenomenon and that of multi-dimensions. His words are primarily focused on Bigfoot in Britain, but they could quite easily apply to the creatures seen just about here, there, and everywhere.

“The idea that there is a viable, reproducing population of apes or humanoids in Britain is totally risible; it just couldn’t be. So, alternative explanations for their presence are to be sought,” begins Coghlan. “A lot of the British reports seem to be quite authentic. So, there probably are actual beasts or humanoids out there. And the question is: How did they arrive there in the first place?” Coghlan answers his question with the following words of reply: “It’s now becoming acceptable in physics to say there are alternative universes.” He continues on this controversial but thought-provoking path: “The main pioneer of this is Michio Kaku, of the City College of New York.  He has suggested that not only are there alternate universes, but when ours is about to go out in a couple of billion years, we might have the science to migrate to a more congenial one that isn’t going to go out. I think he expects science to keep improving for countless millennia, which is very optimistic of him, but whatever one thinks about that, the idea of alternative universes is now gaining an acceptance among physicists, and he’s the name to cite in this area.”

(Nick Redfern)

The subject is far from one lacking in mysteries and questions, however, as Coghlan acknowledges: “Now, how do you get into, or out of, alternative universes? Well, the answer is quite simple: You have heard of worm-holes, I’m sure? No-one has ever seen a worm-hole, I hasten to add. They are hypothetical, but mainstream physicists say they could be there, and there’s one particular type called the Lorentzian Traversable Wormhole. Physicists admit there is a possibility that this exists, and it would be like a short-cut, from one universe to another. Thus, for example, it’s rather like a portal: Something from the other universe would come through it. Or, something from another planet could come through it.” Turning his attentions towards the links between worm-holes and bizarre beasts, Coghlan comments that: “If there are any of these worm-holes on Earth, it would be quite easy for anything to come through, and it’s quite possible any number of anomalous creatures could find their way through from time to time. You remember John Keel and his window-areas? That would tend to indicate there’s a worm-hole in the vicinity; such as Point Pleasant, West Virginia, where the Mothman was seen.”

If the US military has learned anything from the videos of the Tic Tac UFOs, it might be that when the cat is out of the bag, it’s best to acknowledge it rather than deny the feline, the bag, and the person who left it open exist and instead direct attention to the dog chasing a squirrel across the street. Yet that is close to what is happening at the Skunk Works – the super-secretive aircraft lab responsible for the U-2, SR-71 Blackbird, F-117 Nighthawk and other highest-tech planes that is ostensibly owned by defense contractor Lockheed Martin but is in reality controlled by the US Air Force and the Pentagon. A video leaked recently showing what looks like a cross between a stealth plane and a flying saucer at the Skunk Works and both parties are having no part in explaining what it is. So … what IS it?

Air Force U-2

“Coincidentally, this morning I stumbled upon a very interesting tiktok video of an unknown shape on a flatbed trailer. The scaffolding in the background got my interest and this appears to be the Helendale Radar Cross Section Facility. Also, this does not seem to resemble the so-called polecap used for calibration purposes. So if it isn’t that, then what is it…”
@rubenhofs

The TikTok video was discovered by Ruben Hofs, who posted it on Twitter (see the video and screen shots here) and brought it to the attention of the media and military analysts like The War Zone, which then put both Lockheed Martin and the Pentagon on the spot.

The War Zone confirmed Hofs’ speculation that the video was taken at the Helendale radar-cross section (RCS) measurement facility – a site in the Mojave Desert near the Skunk Works headquarters at Plant 42 in Palmdale, California, used for measuring the radar reflectivity of stealth aircraft. The War Zone notes this is a high security site, yet someone openly took a cellphone video which picked up an expletive of shock – both unexpected in such a secure location. The War Zone determined that the ‘thing’ was being transported upside down and it resembled other next-generation planes, but was unable to discern if this was full-sized or a scale model.

SR-71

“Can you tell us anything about this?”
“I can’t.”
“Has your security posture changed?”
“We’re good.”

The War Zone reports that in an interview with Jeff Babione, the Skunk Works’ Vice President and General Manager (a Lockheed employee) by Defense One’s Marcus Weisgerber, refused to answer any questions due to security. In a separate interview with Air Force Chief of Staff General Charles Q. Brown by Defense One’s Tara Copp, the general said he was “not aware of that particular photo” and also refused to comment. In both interviews, those ‘no comment’ responses lead one to suspect that this was a highly secret test, or it was a massive breach of security … or both.

The War Zone notes that Lockheed Martin claims “85 percent of what Skunk Works does is classified.” Was this video of something in the non-classified 15%? Another military website, The Aviationist, could not identify the object either. Yet no one knows why Lockheed nor the Pentagon would say anything about it. The Pentagon at least admitted that the Tic Tac UAPs were real. Why not this object?

Do you think we’ll ever find out?

One of the more spectacular types of UFO accounts are of these objects coming down to crash on earth, and these have been reported from all over the world. The scene here is the small, picturesque town of Megas Platanos, a small village just outside of Athens, in central Greece. It is a serene, rural place, infused with history and mostly populated by goat and sheep herders and farmers, a place where not much ever really happens, but all of that would change in the very early morning hours of September 2, 1990, when at around 3 a.m. some of the villagers saw a strange scene playing out in the sky above. As these simple folk looked up, they saw between six and one dozen brightly lit objects sailing through the air silently, and these objects were seen to change course numerous times, first passing over Mount Pentelicus and heading north past the city of Thessaloniki, then sharply turning to go south. At some point, one of the objects began to wobble and fly erratically, with the color and intensity of its light changing as well, and things would only get weirder from there, turning into what many have called “The Greek Roswell.”

The object in question seemed to be in some sort of trouble, steadily losing altitude and obviously not flying straight, until it suddenly dropped  down to smash into a small hill called Tympristo. There were apparently quite a few witnesses to this event. One shepherd claimed that it had come down just 500 feet away from him to spew fire, while another family called the Karadratus claimed to have seen the object hurtling toward the ground in flames, and they would say of it:

After falling, the object made black smoke, like that of burning tires. After a while, the other objects descended near the grounded craft and landed around it, as if encircling it. The lights of the other objects were so bright that they illuminated part of the hill. We were standing there, watching. My husband and I went closer for a better look. He could see movement in front of the burning object, like shadows that passed back and forth but we could not discern if they were human or something else. They did something in the bright circle that formed around the big object.

After the object had come down, many witnesses claim that the remaining objects in the sky hovered over the location for some time and began dipping down close to the ground and shooting back up again, as if they were rescuing their friends. Although only a few people had witnessed the actual crash, there were many more who had been awakened by a sound like and explosion and had come out to see these lights bobbing up and down above the site. Villagers were afraid to go anywhere near the site until the following day, when things would get even stranger still.

The following morning, some people warily made their way out to where the object had come down. Not only was there scorched earth and trees that were still hot to the touch, but there was allegedly an oval hole in the ground containing a small metallic object with two antennas on it, as well as what appeared to be an engraving of a shape that looked like a lightning bolt. There were also scattered pieces of metallic debris and wires, and before long police had been notified and arrived for an investigation. When they arrived, they were given some of the pieces that had been found, but they concluded that it had not been a plane crash, but rather just a brush fire, something which all present denied. The Greek Air Force also converged on the scene and were also quick to write it all off as nothing but a fire. The Air Force would whisk off some shards and the round object with the antenna, after which they would explain it away, saying of it all in their report:

We certify that the object in question burned grass and shrubs within a radius of 200 meters. The debris collected was as follows: Pieces of an 11cm diameter female plug made of copper and with Arabic numerals in its center. A series of copper multipin cables, connected to the aforementioned plug. The insulation of these cables was made of silk, such as cloth and teflon. A burnt rubber circular cover. A steel ring. Three 10cm steel bars each. At the bottom two regulators with the Greek letter F at their base. The debris found was of earthly origin, given that there were numerical and alphabetical indications. It was old technology, possible pieces of an old satellite. This conclusion was based on measurements, wiring and construction. The satellite must be from Europe or the former Soviet Union, as only in these parts of the world is the metric system in meters and centimeters. On the letter F, it is from the Soviet Union since that country uses this Greek letter in its Cyrillic alphabet and also has the technology for such a device.

Witnesses were sure of what they had seen, and insisted it was no satellite that had come down, and that the other objects had hovered there over the crash site for some tie on their “rescue operation,” and they also denied that there had been any Greek letter F on the wreckage. but for authorities the case was closed. They would say it was either a satellite, a jet, or a helicopter that had come down, but this seems odd because if that were the case then where was the rest? Another expert theorized that it had been a meteor, with the director of the Astronomical institute of the National Observatory of Athens stating:

These are not just extraterrestrials. At this time (September 1990) the orbit of the Earth passes near a flock of meteors, the so-called Persians. These meteorites, as they enter the Earth’s atmosphere at a height of about one hundred kilometers, due to their high speed, develop a high friction and ignite. So the world sees flashes. When it comes to meteors, they may be artificial satellites. As many pieces of the satellite are destroyed, they also ignite in the atmosphere. Finally, the phenomena may also be due to abnormal refractions or reflections in the atmosphere from lights on the earth. Even the lights of a range of cars can cause such a spectacular sight. Everything else is devoid of seriousness and is due to fantasy or group hysteria.

Again, the people who had seen it disputed this, and Greek UFO researchers were also skeptical of the official reports. Indeed, they suspected that these official remarks were false, and also found that the witnesses to the actual event had never even been properly interviewed. Curiously, the incident was also mostly absent from the press, with very little coverage on it, and most of what there was simply speaking of a downed satellite. Indeed, to this day it remains a mostly obscure case only known of through the testimonies of villagers in the area gleaned from intrepid Greek ufologists. What happened on that night out in the countryside of Greece, and what is the real story? It looks like we may never know for sure.

In an interesting new study, researchers have revealed that several ancient volcanic eruptions actually helped the dinosaurs to dominate the planet and thrive for so many millions of years. The volcanic eruptions started happening about 230 million years ago which caused significant changes to the environment and ecology such as Earth’s carbon cycle as well as the climate.

Researchers came to this conclusion by studying sediment and fossil plant records that came from a lake in the Jiyuan Basin in the northern part of China. They noticed that there was more humidity and higher temperatures that were caused by extreme volcanism and climatic shifts. These environmental changes included the CPE’s (Late Triassic Carnian Pluvial Episode) “mega monsoon” climate around 234 to 232 million years ago. When these changes occurred, massive amounts of marine creatures were wiped out, conifer trees increased in numbers, and dinosaurs became dominant.

Jason Hilton, who is a professor of paleobotany and paleoenvironments at the University of Birmingham in Britain and a co-author of the study, went into further details, “Within the space of two million years the world’s animal and plant life underwent major changes including selective extinctions in the marine realm and diversification of plant and animal groups on land,” adding, “These events coincide with a remarkable interval of intense rainfall known as the Carnian Pluvial Episode.”

As a matter of fact, the researchers separated the shift that lasted two million years into four episodes that were each caused by a volcanic pulse. These events allowed more carbon to be released into our atmosphere which ended up making our planet warmer and caused large amounts of rain to fall.

Dr. Sarah Greene, who is a Senior Lecturer at the School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences at the University of Birmingham as well as being another co-author of the study, weighed in by noting, “Our results show that large volcanic eruptions can occur in multiple, discrete pulses – demonstrating their powerful ability to alter the global carbon cycle, cause climate and hydrological disruption and drive evolutionary processes.”

While these climatic shifts gave rise to the dinosaurs, experts still aren’t clear as to the reasoning behind it as explained by Emma Dunne who is a paleobiologist at the University of Birmingham but was not involved in the study, “This relatively long period of volcanic activity and environmental change would have had considerable consequences for animals on land.” “At this time, the dinosaurs had just begun to diversify, and it’s likely that without this event, they would never have reached their ecological dominance we see over the next 150 million years.”

Well, at least the dinosaurs benefited from the numerous volcanic eruptions that took place millions of years ago – until the asteroid wiped them out 66 million years ago.

The study was published in the journal PNAS where it can be read in full.

For many recent nighttime observers in North America and Europe, strange glowing lights may have made an appearance in the evening skies.

Although they may have looked otherworldly in appearance, these phenomena were of the celestial variety, rather than indications of extraterrestrial visitation.

On Monday, a powerful geomagnetic storm was logged by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), who predicted that resulting displays of the aurora borealis could have been visible as far south as New York, Wisconsin, and Washington.

Geomagnetic storms occur when Earth’s sun ejects energy in the form of highly charged particles that strike the magnetic field that encircles our planet. As the particles collide with our planet’s magnetic shielding, it creates the famous dancing auroral displays, which under the right conditions can be very colorful and vivid.

NOAA features an online aurora forecast that provides real-time updates on when and where auroral appearances will be visible to nighttime viewers in the northern hemisphere. Similarly, viewers further south may occasionally be able to spot the aurora australis, the southern counterpart to the aurora borealis, which can be seen from various locales in the southern hemisphere.

However, the aurora borealis probably wasn’t the only thing causing the appearances of eerie lights in the night sky over parts of North America this week.

Many skywatchers in North Carolina were also made privy to a light show in recent days as a mysterious object was seen streaking through the sky shortly after 7:30 PM. Was it a UFO?

Probably not in this case, according to the American Meteor Society (AMS), who received videos of the nighttime intruder from North Carolinians who managed to film it, and said the object was a bright fireball.

The AMS says it was one of a handful of similar fireball sightings that occurred across North America last Friday night.

The meteor apparently cut through the atmosphere at a height of around 48 miles as it entered above Jacksonville, North Carolina. Observers estimate that it traveled at speeds nearing 32,000 miles per hour as it burned along.

According to its outlook for the dates encompassing when the sighting occurred, the AMS said that the estimated total hourly meteor rate for observers had been near 2 for observers in northern latitudes, and 1 as seen from tropical southern locations.

“The actual rates will also depend on factors such as personal light and motion perception, local weather conditions, alertness, and experience in watching meteor activity,” the AMS outlook read, adding that “Rates are reduced due to moonlight during this period,” and that “observers viewing from urban areas will see less activity as only the brighter meteors will be visible from such locations.”

Like auroras, the dynamics of meteors are well understood, although there have been a variety of anomalous occurrences associated with each of these phenomena, namely involving unusual sounds associated with the passage of bright fireballs through the sky. These noises that often accompany meteors have long baffled astronomers, because they cannot easily be reconciled as being produced by the objects burning through the sky since observers often report them simultaneously, as opposed to several seconds (or even minutes) later, allowing time for such sounds to travel.

While some phenomena associated with meteors does obviously remain mysterious, recent sightings of unusual things in the night sky over the Northern Hemisphere do seem to have a reasonable explanation, this time.

Encounters with mysterious, glowing balls of light – ones that have the mystifying ability to change into the forms of strange and savage creatures – have been reported on more than a few occasions in Texas. A classic example is the large body of data that surrounds a certain huge area of forest in Texas. As someone who is proud to call the Dallas-Fort Worth area my home, I am all too well aware that many people think and assume that Texas is just one big desert. In reality, however, that’s far from the case. Yes, West Texas is extremely flat and filled with almost endless fields of cotton. And, it’s also true that South Texas has its fair share of harsh and scalding landscapes. However, Central, North, and East Texas are very different: they are dominated by thick forestland that extends for miles and miles…and miles. Indeed, a 2011 Forest Inventory and Analysis report prepared by the Texas Forest Service revealed that Texas’ woods ran to 62.4 million acres, and which cover almost forty percent of the state. And it’s to one particular area of dense woodland that we have to turn our attention to. Its name: the Big Thicket.

(Nick Redfern)

Located in the Piney Woods area of East Texas, the Big Thicket has a most apt moniker: it is a huge, 83,000-acre area of woodland. “Dense” barely begins to describe the massive, forested environment, which is home to numerous wild animals, including alligators and bobcats – as well as to other creatures of a very odd kind, as we’ll soon see. Running through the heart of the Big Thicket is a long, thin, and incredibly sandy old road called Bragg Road. That’s not what the locals call it, though. To them, it is known as Ghost Light Road. Or, just Ghost Road. There is a very good reason for this: for at least three centuries, people have reported seeing weird, small balls of light flitting through the trees late at night. But, we’re not talking about anything quite as down to earth as fireflies. These particular lights vary in size from – approximately – a tennis ball to a beach ball. They also exhibit evidence of intelligence: witnesses describe the lights approaching them, even circling them, in what is occasionally perceived as a playful fashion. Such is the interest that the lights provoke in the people that live there, and in visitors too, a historical marker has been erected at the start of Bragg Road and which details the strange story of the lights.

(Nick Redfern) Nick Redfern and the late Rob Riggs

The late Rob Riggs was a well-known figure in the Bigfoot research field and someone who spent a significant portion of his life living in the Big Thicket area. Riggs collected numerous reports of the mysterious ghost lights, dating back to the 1800s. But, Riggs did far more than that: he also catalogued an astonishing number of reports of what seemed to be Bigfoot and large, black leopards. I say “seemed to be” for a very good reason. While most people who have reported seeing large black cats, and who have had hairy wild-man type encounters in the Big Thicket, the vast majority are content to conclude they encountered animals of the type that very few ever get to encounter. But, not all of them. A small body of individuals have sworn that the large cats and the hairy humanoids – when spotted by the astonished and sometimes terrified onlookers – vanished before their eyes. We’re not talking about them making hasty getaways into the woods. Rather, we are talking about the “animals” – in an instant – changing form from big cat and Bigfoot to a small, brightly-lit globe of light. The ghost lights that have been staple parts of the area for centuries, of course.