Somewhere in the Skies - Invasions and Crashes and Landings, Oh My!

Episode Date: February 18, 2019

On episode 96 of SOMEWHERE IN THE SKIES, Ryan brings a handful of cases to the table that ranges from a UFO invasion in California to a UFO crash in a Brazilian lake. From astronauts claiming to have seen photos of real aliens to a soldier disappearing after discovering a downed craft. And don't forget about those metal-fanged aliens who hunted down a pair of young boys in Japan. This and so much more this week as Ryan gives you a sneak peek of what to expect when you become a Patreon subscriber today! Patreon: www.patreon.com/somewhereskies Watch ROSWELL: MYSTERIES DECODED for free! Available now at www.cwseed.com Website: www.somewhereintheskies.com YouTube Channel: CLICK HERE Official Store: CLICK HERE Order Ryan's Book by CLICKING HERE Twitter: @SomewhereSkies Instagram: @SomewhereSkiesPod Opening and Closing Theme Song, "Ephemeral Reign" by Per Kiilstofte SOMEWHERE IN THE SKIES is part of the eOne podcast network. To learn more, CLICK HERE SOMEWHERE IN THE SKIES is sponsored by HelloFresh. To receive 50% off your first order, use promo code: SOMEWHERE50 at checkout by visiting www.HelloFresh.ca Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/somewhere-in-the-skies. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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live only on Netflix. Saturday, May 16th at 9 p.m. Eastern Center time, 6 p.m. Pacific Time. Was a NASA astronaut really shown photos of an alien? What happened to a soldier who discovered a UFO crash and was never seen or heard from? again. A bizarre UFO invasion in California. A UFO crashes into a lake in Brazil. And a metal-fanged alien hunts down two young boys in Japan. Hoo! All this and so much more right now.

This is Somewhere in the Skies with Ryan Sprigg. Welcome to Somewhere in the Skies. I'm your host Ryan Sprigg. Well, I finally made a cross-country back to my new home. Well, I guess old home. Whatever. I'm now in New York City. And while I'm getting settled back in and getting the new NYCHQ in order, it's been a little tough to get any interviews recorded. But fear not, because this week, I am bringing you a collection of case histories that I personally find very interesting and just plain weird and mysterious. For any Patreon subscribers, you may recognize some of these stories from the bonus episodes. But for those who aren't patrons, this is your sneak peek at what to expect when you do become a Patreon subscriber.

To learn more about the Patreon campaign, please visit patreon.com slash somewhere skies. Thank you as always. I can't wait to bring brand new shows to you out of my New York City headquarters, and I hope you enjoy the show. It was 2.30 p.m.

October 31st, 1963, when the saucer fell. Ruth Sousa, 9-year-old daughter of Sonora Sousa, was playing near the bank of the Peripava River, when a loud roar frightened her and caused her to look up into the sky. What she saw coming at her was even more startling. A shiny disc-shaped object moved slowly

just above the treetop level. As it moved towards their house, it lost altitude and collided with a palm tree, growing between the house and the river. Unable to move, the little girl watched awestruck as the shiny craft seemed to try to gain altitude as it moved over the water of the river. It rocked violently and maneuvered awkwardly,

as if trying to regain stability. Then it suddenly dropped directly into the water of the river. Ruth ran to her mother, who would come out at the sound of the tremendous roar. Had there been no other effects besides the roar, the disc-shaped object that the little girl described might have been written off as the construction of a child's imagination. But when Mrs. Sousa reached the river, the water where her daughter said the

object had fallen was boiling violently, churning up mud and other debris from the bottom. Raul Sousa, Ruth's uncle, who was working about a hundred yards away from the spot, came running to the house at the sound of the roar. As he looked out over the river, he too witnessed the strange, boiling, churning water. But even with these witnesses, Ruth's story might have gone unbelieved had not verification come from across the river. Fishermen, working the opposite bank of the river, described exactly the same phenomena that Ruth had.

They all heard the roar and saw the craft as it moved from the river, then plunged into it. Sonora de Sousa's home is located in the Sao Paulo provenance of Brazil, and a report of the sighting and of the fall of the object immediately went to the city of Sao Paulo. Police from the nearest town, Agupe, went to the scene at once and questioned the witnesses while the incident was still fresh in their minds. The story they pieced together described a disc of small thickness, about one meter, but about five meters in diameter. By all accounts, it had resembled an aluminum basin. It had been very bright, and in broad daylight it had looked almost luminous. When first sighted, the craft was moving very slowly, and at no time did it show any

ability to accelerate at any great rate. The roar that announced its coming was almost deafening and seemed to indicate that the craft possessed great power. As it moved toward the Susa House, it appeared to be having difficulty maintaining its altitude. After several erratic movements, the power had seemed to give out, and the disc had plunged toward the river. All the witnesses agreed that the river had erupted violently, and the water had begun to boil. The craft did not stay on top of the water for any time at all, but settled immediately beneath the surface, indicating that it was of greater average density than water. The depth of the water at the spot is 12 feet, but where the water stops, the silt begins, and the mud layer on the bottom is about

15 feet thick and is mixed with clay. The disc had stuck to the top of a palm tree, next to Mrs. DeSouza's house before it had moved over the river. The police observed that something had freshly gouged a chunk out of the tree about 15 feet above the ground. Whatever the object's identity, it had been very substantial,

heavier than water, and in trouble before it plunged into the river. The incident caused an immediate sensation in Brazil. UFO investigators had waited for years for a saucer to land or crash in order to establish. their claims to the existence of extraterrestrial intelligence. This seemed to be the perfect opportunity.

The craft had sunk in a river, but it had not fallen on military property. It seemed to be just a matter of recovering it where it had fallen. The first attempt to retrieve the disc was made by a diving instructor, Quatano Hermano and Ivane, with two companions, Peter Runger and Manuel Batista Andrade. They spent four hours searching the bottom in several efforts, but they were hampered by the mud. Although the exact spot of descent into the river was marked, exactly what had happened to the disk-shaped object once it had passed under the surface was a matter of speculation.

One possibility is that it had sunk straight down into the mud and silt layers on the bottom. Yet, if it had not moved immediately into the mud, the current might have pushed the object toward the ocean, It also could have been moved under its own power underwater before finally coming to rest on the river bottom. Another attempt to recover the disc was made by a second team of divers, led by a man named Gigi Delmasquil. Although much special equipment was brought in by the determined group of men,

they had as little luck as the first team. Once again, the mud on the river bottom was the biggest obstacle to successful diving. Several theories concerning what happened into the disk have been advanced by the residents of Aguapé and by the divers who have gone in search of the object. The most immediate possibility is that it may have been washed downstream. Most of the witnesses to the crash think that this is highly unlikely. The way the disc plunged into the river, it was probably a very heavy object. Those believing that the disc had come from some point in outer space have suggested that it may have been secretly retrieved some night

immediately following the crash. But eyewitnesses to the crash can test this position, pointing out that immediately after the craft hit the water, mud was spewed up, which would indicate that it had probably buried itself deep in the silt, making such an operation extremely difficult.

Furthermore, any mysterious activity in the alerted Agupe area, surely would have been observed by the residents. The remaining possibility, and the one which many people consider to be the most likely is that the disc is still there. Perhaps it moved with the current underwater, or even under its own power, but it is probably buried somewhere between the banks of the Peripava, still settling to the bottom of the 15-foot layer of enveloping almost impenetrable mud. With the

reports of the witnesses and the evidence of a notched palm tree, the facts seem to indicate that an unidentified flying disc had had navigational trouble over Brazil and had been forced down in the Parapava River. Whether it was manned or operated by remote control is unknown. But the witnesses agree that it seemed to be moving under its own power when it plunged into the water. It forms another mystery yet to be unraveled. On a summer day in 1955, a group of children ranging in the age from four to 15, had one of the most frightening sustained in out-and-out bizarre alien encounters ever chronicled. Over the course of hours, these children endured a series of events so outlandish that it's

nearly impossible to categorize. This series of truly astonishing events began at approximately 2 p.m. on Sunday, August 22nd, 1955, in the picturesque Casablanca neighborhood in Riverside County, California. That day, a group of about eight boys were playing in the garden of Mr. and Mrs. Douglas, the parents of one of the children. That child, one Kermit Douglas, was wrestling on the lawn with another boy when he suddenly noticed a strange object hovering in the air above him. The kid stopped playing and stared skyward at the translucent, yet radiant, don't-like structure, until it abruptly vanished. A moment later, a second object appeared with a distinct musical ping sound. This resembled a disc hovering on its side, which at times seemed to be spinning.

When it did so, the lines of light emanating from it seemed to be bent around the rotating structure in what was an apparent breakdown of traditional physics. Within seconds, the group of children became transfixed by the semi-transparent objects, which were round like basketballs, and consisted of various colors, like red, blue, and orange, but mostly silver. These bizarre orbs and domes

were repeatedly vanishing and reappearing with the high-pitched pings ringing out with every flash. The display went on for some time, but whenever one of the children ran into the home to call the parents outside, the odd objects suddenly disappeared. This apparent awareness,

on the part of the UFOs regarding who happened to be watching them was odd enough. But when Blanche Campbell screamed for her mother to come outside and see the display, the UFOs remained completely visible to the children, but cannot be seen by the adult. At first, the group were fascinated by this amazing aerial extravaganza. But without warning, the phenomena transformed from a colorful display to an alarmingly bizarre series of encounters. with a group of entities. The kids started in astonishment as one of the more beautiful and brightly colored objects

landed in a football field about a half a block away from them. One of the witnesses described the colossal orb as being about as large as three houses put together and that it was very beautiful and colorful. The massive UFO hovered three feet off the ground, but as the group began to migrate towards it, Two of the boys suddenly became aware of something moving near the house next door to the Douglas home.

Stunned, the boys claimed that they saw a translucent being, roughly the size of a four-year-old child, floating just off the ground. They described the creature as having a big red mouth, big red eyes, and four round objects on its face, which sparkled like diamonds where the nose would be. As if this wasn't weird enough, where its legs and feet ought to have been was just a tapering round nub. They also noticed a belt around its waist with a disc-shaped buckle that shone like a bright mirror, dazzling the children. At this point, the children were becoming terrified and began to scream and cry. One of the horrified kids nearly plowed over his own mother as she sprinted outside to see what the panic was all about. Needless to say, like all other adults who had come outside to see what the commotion was all about,

she saw nothing. The rest of the group who remained outside left the hovering thing behind to get a better look at the object floating above the football field. As the kids arrived at the sprawling field, a seven-year-old boy became transfixed and began walking toward the object, saying it was the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen. Two of the older boys concerned for his welfare, tackle the hypnotized kid before he could get too close to the UFO.

It was then that all hell broke loose. Marvin Sims claimed that UFOs begin to descend from the sky, appearing and disappearing at a rapid pace, stating that they sort of spiraled down, and when they took off, they disappeared with a whirling motion. One of the UFOs landed on a nearby rooftop, while another apparently knocked a branch off a walnut tree. A third flew past with a long antenna, which seemed to admit some kind of ray.

At the same time, one of the boys were startled to see a disembodied, child-sized silver arm beckoning to him from midair from about 20 feet away. The arm appeared to be clad in some sort of riveted armor or protective shielding. Although the report fails to mention whether or not the unnamed boy responded to the gesture, one can hope that he had the good sense to run in the opposite direction. Yet another boy told reporters that he saw a strange man in the field who was gripping two gun-like devices with which he temporarily paralyzed a pair of his friends. While this description of a fast-shooting, futuristic gun-wielding human instantly invokes images of Terminator in many modern minds,

One can only imagine how perplexing such a vision must have been to kids, weaned on the altogether more wholesome television exploits of Davy Crockett and Rocky Jones Space Ranger. As if all of these inexplicable happenings weren't weird enough, it was then that an opening appeared on the side of the massive craft and out-flooded one of the strangest creatures ever recorded in either paranormal, cryptozoological or euphological lore. According to the eyewitnesses, the thing that emerged from the huge orb was about three and a half feet tall, with red eyes and a red mouth, like the other hovering ghost-like creature.

This one also had a rounded head and four diamond-like objects embedded in its face. But perhaps the most bizarre characteristic of this being were its odd series of appendages, consisting of four legs that ended in rounded nubs, and two arms that split at the elbow to grow into two sets of four arms on each side, with a hand attached to it. In total, this thing had two arms, four four arms, four hands, and four tentacle-like legs, making this a truly alien apparition. One of the boys, Ronnie Strickland, claimed that the floating multi-limbed entity spoke to him

and told him to climb up into a nearby tree, whereupon it promised to pick him up in 15 minutes time. He and another boy apparently climbed the tree in a trance-like state, and the children confirmed that another UFO approached right on schedule. This Saturn-shaped vehicle had a stationary outer rim and a rotating central part that made a swishing sound. According to the kids, a group of little men were seen climbing out onto the rim in an attempt to reach Strickland and his friend

and helped the hypnotized boys aboard. The panicking children, no doubt fearing that their friends might be abducted, never to be returned, pleaded with the two boys to come down. But they refused and continued to focus on the rotating UFO. In a brilliant piece of ingenuity, some of the youngsters ran for a nearby garden hose attached to one of the neighbor's homes. The lengthy tube reached the tree, and the intrepid kids began to douse their friends with.

water in an attempt to bring them out of their trance. One of the boys snapped back to reality and climbed down the tree, but Strickland remained in a daze and sort of slid off the branch he was perched on and levitated onto a nearby rooftop. Still in a trance, Strickland proceeded to walk right off the edge of the roof. Blanche Campbell later claimed that she had watched in horror as Strickland had turned red before he jumped up. off the house. Although the boy landed on his head, he mercifully suffered no permanent injury from the long fall. But when he came to, Strickland could recollect nothing of what had happened to him, and he refused to believe that he had floated to the roof and stepped off on his own accord.

Following Strickland's potentially ruinous spill, the multiplicity of UFOs and their various and increasingly more outlandish inhabitants abruptly disappeared. never to be seen again. Perhaps it was all fun in games for these otherworldly entities until Strickland's fall brought a more serious note to the proceedings. Perhaps they simply grew bored, or maybe their mission, as unfathomable as it may have been, was accomplished. Either way, these myriad creatures and their multifaceted vehicles

departed as swiftly as they had arrived, leaving the befuddled children to a lifetime of wonder. And one can only assume more than a few lingering psychological traumas to work out. According to famed UFO researcher, Ted Blocher, after this, the objects with their paranormal pilots, disappeared. But when the Riverside Press reporter arrived about an hour later, one of the little boys was still crying. In Blotcher's summation of this encounter,

he wrestled with the perplexing nature of the event. in question. He would say that, quote, this extraordinary incident, manifestation may be a better word. It lacks sufficient information to come to any final conclusions. Even so, available data are sufficient to conclude that something bizarre and inexplicable occurred that afternoon at Casablanca, that the children alone were able to perceive it, and that whatever it was, it appears to be directly related to an area of UFO phenomena suggestive of certain types of parapsychological experiences. The question of whether these entities were extraterrestrial, interdimensional, biological, or merely phantasmagoric manifestations of the children's collective imaginations,

remains open, and as such, is still intensely fascinating and deeply frustrating for all of us. us who ponder its implications. Not only for the children who bore witness to this prolonged and disturbing series of incidents, but for the human race as a whole. For if the intentions of these presumably superior beings are to at best mess with our minds and, at worse, absconded away with our children for purposes too terrifying to contemplate, then it seems that we're all in for a whole lot of grief. It bears mentioning that the infamous alien attack on the Sutton family, now known worldwide, as the Kelly Hopkinsville encounter, took place in the same 24-hour spam as the Casablanca incident.

Though there are few apparent connections between these two events, it surely must be registered as one of the most astonishing days in the history of euphology. A few days following the heroin events at Casablanca, a church. trio of investigators from the Borderland Sciences Research Association, interviewed the children involved with the event, and concluded the report with a statement that they felt certain that the children that day at Casablanca were telling the truth. This episode is brought to you by Planet Oat Oak Milk. Some people like their coffee hot, some like it, ice cold, but everyone can agree planet oat is made for every cup, delivering the perfect pour, rich, smooth, and delicious every time.

Try several varieties like Planet Oat barista lover's oat milk. It's great for frothing and steaming and will upgrade your at-home coffee. Whether you're team hot or team iced, discover your favorite oat milk at planetoat.com. Gary Irwin was a Nike missile technician at Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas. On February 28, 1959, he was driving back from Nampa, Idaho, where he'd been on leave. At Cedar City, Utah, he turned southeast. onto Route 14. About six miles from the turnoff, he spotted a glowing object that seemed to come to earth in a field just off the road. Thinking he had seen an airplane crash, or at least a forced landing,

he stopped to see if he could give assistance. He wrote a note and placed it on the steering wheel of his car. It read, quote, have gone to investigate possible plane crash. Please call law enforcement officers." Then he wrote, stop in large letters on the side of his car. About 30 minutes later, a fishing game inspector

happened to be driving past and stopped at Irwin's car. He saw the note and took it to the Cedar City Sheriff's Office, where Sheriff Otto Fife gathered a party of volunteers and returned to the site. When they searched,

they found no trace of a plane crash, but they found Private Gary Irwin unconscious in a field by the side of the road. 90 minutes had passed since he had first seen the glowing object. Irwin was taken to the hospital in Cedar City, where Dr. Broadbent

could find nothing physically wrong with him. Erwin was merely asleep and could not be awakened. Dr. Broadbent could find no explanation for this, so his diagnosis was hysteria. When Private Irwin eventually awoke, he felt perfectly well, but he was mystified by the glowing object he had seen. He was.

also confused by the fact that his jacket was missing. The sheriff's search party stated that he was not wearing it when they found him. Erwin was flown back to Fort Bliss and placed under observation at William Beaumont Army Hospital for several days, after which he was released as fit to return to duty. The episode was not over yet, though. Some days later, Erwin fainted on base, and a few days after that, he fainted while in the city of El Paso. He was taken to the to Southwest General Hospital, where he was found once again to be asleep and unwakable. About 24 hours later, he awoke, asking, quote, were there any survivors? He behaved as if he had lost all memory of the period between seeing the object on February 28th in Utah and waking up on March 16th in El Paso. Once again, he was taken to William Beaumont Army Hospital, where he was placed under observation by psychiatrists. After one month, extensive testing could find nothing wrong with him, so he was released on April 17th. The next day, Erwin was seized by a powerful impulse that made him take a bus from Malpaso to Cedar City,

arriving on April 19th. He then walked back to the field in which the sheriff's party had found him. He found his jacket on a bush. There was a pencil stuck in one of its buttonholes with a piece of paper wound tightly around it. Irwin burned the paper and then seemed to come out of some kind of trance. He could not recall the path back to the road or why he'd come there. He made his way back to Cedar City and turned himself in to Sheriff Otto Fife, who told Irwin about his first encounter on the 28th of February.

Once again, Irwin returned to Fort Bliss and was given psychological examinations. On July 10th, he again entered William Beaumont Army Hospital. He was discharged again, but on August 5th, First, he failed to report for duty, and one month later, he was listed as a deserter. After this, Private Gary Irwin disappeared from the public view, and his current, if he still is alive, whereabouts are unknown. Some time before 7 p.m., on the evening of February 23, 1975, two seven-year-old boys, Masato Kawano and Katashiro Yamahata were roller skating near the Hinoid housing is stationed. in Kamemachi, Kofu City, when they noticed a pair of glittering orange UFOs, cavorting

in the sky above them. The enthralled boys stared in astonishment as the larger of the two objects broke off and flew northwest toward Mount Otago, while the smaller craft slowly descended to the ground, landing amongst the props of a vineyard located behind the estate. The boys later confirmed that despite the distance, the descending aerial anomaly could be heard emitting an odd series of crackling or ticking sounds, not unlike that of a Geiger counter. It goes without saying that the curious youngsters wasted no time in removing their skates and charging into the vineyard in order to get a better look at this now earthbound object.

As the second graders approached the formerly orange spacecraft, They noted that it now resembled a dome atop a silver disc, which stood approximately seven feet high and was roughly 15 feet in diameter. This now classically shaped flying saucer was perched on three ball-shaped legs and had what the children described as strange characters embossed on the metallic surface of its hull. While inspecting the craft, both Coano and Yamahatta were astounded. to see a hatch open on the side of the craft, and a ladder automatically extending down to the ground below.

The boy stared in stunned silence as a peculiar, long-armed humanoid, began to disembark from the ship. It was at that moment that the boys noticed another slightly smaller, though virtually identical, entity that remained inside what was apparently the object's button and lever-filled controlled room. Kowano and Yamahata later reported, that the creatures were both approximately four feet tall and were clad in a glowing or reflective silver uniform.

They also depicted the entities as having large pointed ears, an uncovered feet ending in two toe-like protubances. The creatures were also described as being dark brown and smothered in wrinkles so dense they obscured any noticeable facial features, save three distinct, nearly two-inch long, metal, fang, While the metal fangs are a new twist, the wrinkly skin might ring a bell for those who've studied the Pascagoula alien abduction. The boys also claimed that the being had emerged from the craft had been carrying a long object slung over its shoulder, which they stated resembled a rifle.

This strange visitor from out of this world surveyed the terrain outside the saucer, oblivious to the spellbound duo, openly awkeling at it. oblivious, that was, until it sharply turned and placed one of its claws onto Yamahata's shoulder, patting him twice and uttering a series of sounds that sounded to the boys, like a tape recorder running backwards. At this point, Yamahata collapsed to the ground, paralyzed by terror. As soon as Yamahata fell to the ground, Kawano, exhibiting a commendable degree of courage for one so young, rapidly pulled his friend up into his shoulders and carried him away from these potentially

vampiric alien assailants as swiftly as he could. Upon returning to the estate, the now almost hysterical boys immediately informed their mothers about this bizarre close encounter. Their curious, yet almost certainly incredulous mothers, followed their clearly perturbed sons to the back of the apartment, where, much to their shock, confirmed seeing an orange strope-like light pulsating in the vineyard. The boys tried to convince their mothers to investigate the area, but they sagely decided to keep their distance from the inexplicable object.

The mothers later testified that the unusual light show continued for another five minutes, before the UFO rocketed skyward with a burst of light so brilliant that the eyewitnesses were compelled to avert their eyes. It should be noted that while Yamahata and Kawano were the only ones to have actually seen the allegedly ET entities, their classmate, 8-year-old Ichiro Minigishi, also reported spying a shining saucer flying toward the Hinoid housing estate while riding in a car with his parents near the Kofu bypass, approximately the half an hour before the boys claimed to have encountered the UFO. Later eyewitnesses also included both a janitor and a local woman driving in the area. The following day, Kawano and Yamahata had a captivated audience of students and teachers at the Yamashiro Elementary School, as they drew pictures of the beings and retold the harrowing tale of their alien encounter. It wasn't long before alien fever had infected the entire student body,

And in an effort to quell the escalating mania, schoolmaster Nabayoshi Kineko, with what appears to be a surge of open-mindedness, decided that they would inspect the area for themselves. The school officials, armed with whatever scientific paraphernalia they could get their hands on, made their way to the scene of the event. Upon their arrival, they noted that two solid concrete posts had been pushed over at the landing site. it was determined that the boys would have been unable to accomplish this task of intergalactic vandalism on their own. This investigative team also discovered what they referred to as landing traces,

including soil impressions as well as a ring pattern in the dirt near the broken concrete posts where the UFO had allegedly landed. One school teacher even claimed to have discovered radioactivity within the circular patch. Following the event, both boys were questioned in depth by their parents, their schoolmaster, as well as noted UFO investigator, Maser Mori. Their stories remained disturbingly consistent. Not surprisingly, when asked what the orange lights might have been, authorities at Civil Aviation Bureau of Transportation Ministry

claimed that the UFOs were nothing more than the lights of YS-11 propeller plane. which often flew at an altitude of a thousand meters and was visible to the naked eye. These aviation experts apparently reserve common as to whether or not this conventional aircraft could transform into a silver dome, as well as assume the form of small, pointy-eared, fanged humanoid. Kynide sci-fi fans and skeptics, including researcher Banturo Yamaguchi, have noted that an alien appearance in an episode of Japan's Ultra 7, a popular live-action special effects television series bears at least a superficial resemblance to the Kofu humanoid, minus the metallic fangs. Known as Alien Hook, the unusual entity appeared in 1968, many years before this event occurred.

Was this all an elaborate prank in the imagination of two young boys at school? Or did they truly encounter alien vampires? No matter the case, this will truly go down as one of the strangest and scariest encounters ever to come out of Japan. And perhaps even the world. Throughout the history of modern UFO research, there have been many reports of crashed flying saucers and dead alien bodies being shipped off to destinations unknown.

And while many of these reports come from dubious, and less than credible witnesses, there are those rare occasions when the story rests on the shoulders of extremely prominent and highly credible individuals. Such was the case for Clark B. McClelland, former spacecraft operator of the NASA Space Shuttle Fleet. McClelland came forward to tell a fantastic story he'd heard from the late Lieutenant Colonel Ellison Onizuka, former Discovery astronaut who tragically died, in the 1986 Challenger Space Shuttle explosion. During a routine prep mission, the two had connected

and exchanged several conversations throughout their working relationship. Many astronauts had been aware that McClellan had an interest in UFOs, having spoken on many occasions with Major Donald Kehoe and Dick Hall, two former members of the National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena. During one of McClellan's correspondence with Onizuka, he was quite surprised when Onizuka asked him about his opinions on the possibility of an extraterrestrial intelligence, having visited the planet. McClellan once stated that he told Onizuka that he believed that life does exist among the stars and that it has visited Earth throughout human history. At this point, Onizuka smiled and then pressed on.

He asked McClelland if his name had any type of connection to McCleland Air Force Base in California. When he admitted that he wasn't aware of any connection, he asked Onizuka, why he was so curious. McClelland recalled the following about Onizuka's response. He had a surprising experience along with other USAF Aerospace Flight Engineers and pilots while on military training duty and McClellan Air Force Base, about eight or nine years prior to his astronaut training. He and his group were at the base for specialized training when they were directed to report to a viewing room. As they were seated, the room darkened,

and a movie began without the usual official introduction by a USAF officer. End quote. At this point, Onazuka remembered being startled when the film began to show what appeared to be some sort of medical examination room, with small bodies laying on some sort of table. The bodies, according to Onusuka, were, quote, small, strange-looking creatures. They were

humanoid and appeared similar to those described by alleged witnesses at the well-known Roswell site in 1947. They all had large heads, large eyes, slight torsos, arms, and legs. They did not appear to be of earthly origin. But why were Onizuka and others shown this film? to what purpose was it to usher them in, sit them down, and not explain what they were seeing. Onozuka explained his theories on this to McCleland, stating that, quote, we were all caught off guard. Perhaps it was a test of our psyche to determine our overall reaction. Well, we were all caught by surprise, end quote.

This certainly would have been enough reason to question what it was they were seeing. So had they been given the opportunity to inquire? Onizuka went on to explain. that they were not even given a moment to question their superiors. He would go on to say that, quote, we were then asked to exit the room and continued our scheduled technical activities, as if nothing special had occurred. End quote.

So this had clearly been a cryptic and bizarre experience, prompted by Onizuka's superiors and various agencies. So while it may have been a test on the collective and individual psyche of the viewers at the time, What was the overall intent, in the opinion of Onizuka? He postulated the following to McClellan. Quote, perhaps it was a planned USAF psychological test for military reasons. NASA may have been evaluating it in my selection as an astronaut in 1978. You know, what would my reaction be if I actually saw an alien being?

End quote. It was at this point that McClellan claims that the two went their separate ways, but not before. agreeing to meet again to discuss the extraordinary story in more detail, McClelland wished Onozuca the best of luck in his upcoming Challenger spaceflight mission. Unbeknownst to both men that day, it would be the last time they ever spoke. On January 8, 1986, Onozoa and the other members of the Challenger crew lost their lives in the tragic accident that shook the nation. McClelland was at Kennedy Space Center that day when the Chaleked.

Challenger exploded and fell into the Atlantic Ocean. With it, the incredible accomplishments of the crew lived on in the memories of many. And for Onusuka in particular, he was remembered by most for being the first Asian American, the first Japanese American, and the first Hawaiian in space as an astronaut on the space shuttle discovery. But for McClelland, his memory of Onizuka included the amazing story of possible. alien beings, and the strange film he'd witnessed, ushering in yet another controversial tale in the annals of UFO lore. All right, that's it for this week's episode.

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