Do UFOs favor PA? Statistics say 'yes'

from examiner.com


Westmoreland County, PA. Mapquest image.
Recent UFO sighting statistics suggest that one particular Pennsylvania region ranks highest among low-population counties nationwide. Westmoreland County is tucked away in a southwestern piece of the keystone state in the Pittsburgh-metro area with a 2,000 census population of 369,993.

A story in the March 2009 issue of Popular Mechanics lists the top five UFO hot spots for both major metro counties and less populated counties. Westmoreland County ranks number one for less populated regions with 396 UFO reports between 1947 and 2005, according to data the magazine acquired from Chicago's Center for UFO Studies (CUFOS). And CUFOS, according to the story, "gathers data from UFO reporting groups and public records."

Are the stats correct?

Ufologists will tell you - while Westmoreland County is recognized as a major UFO hot spot - the numbers are deceiving. While this chunk of PA seems to have generated higher than average numbers, the actual UFO reports from this area are more likely in the thousands.

One reason for the higher number of reports might be as simple as the fact that this region has a longtime - and determined - ufologist accepting UFO reports. Greensburg native Stan Gordon has been researching UFO and other strange phenomena from PA since shortly after the 1965 UFO crash in the small town of Kecksburg.

Photo: Stan Gordon

Many areas of the country don't have a Stan Gordon, and most folks do not know how to report a UFO incident. There is also no one central gathering spot for UFO reports.

The largest U.S. UFO organization is the Mutual UFO Network.

Photo: John Ventre

According to MUFON PA State Director John Ventre, "The problem with UFO stats is that there is not one repository to report them. MUFON estimates that there are 10,000 sightings a year around the world, but MUFON gets less than half of them. The National UFO Reporting Center (NUFORC) gets about the same number of sightings as MUFON but doesn't investigate them. High crime areas where the residents don't trust the police and media get very few reports. Most countries have no reporting location or phone number or organization. Awareness and a fair and balanced media is the key. If UFO reports are laughed at by the media, people won't report or take them serious. I'd say MUFON gets around 20 Westmoreland County reports a year, but Stan probably gets more due to his reputation in the area."

Ventre recently spoke with InCahoots.TV about recent PA activity - a surge in UFO reports during summer and fall 2008. Check out Venre's web site, where his book, 12/21/2012 is available.

CUFOS Scientific Director Dr. Mark Rodeghier said that Popular Mechanics used a copy of their UFOCAT database. The depository, Rodeghier said, contains "amalgamated sighting data from a huge variety of sources. The database was begun by Dr. David Saunders in his work for the Colorado UFO Project, and it is now carried on by CUFOS and one of Saunders's students, Dr. Donald Johnson."

Photo: Dr. Mark Rodeghier

Rodeghier said "there are often more reports from areas where investigators have been active for many years, as Stan has been in western Pennsylvania. Those areas may be hotspots, or they may have been fortunate to have someone with the skill and tenacity of Stan to be available to receive reports and then conduct investigations."

Ufologist Stan Gordon

Stan Gordon's coverage of PA UFOs has been extensive - he's been taking calls from the public since 1969. The network television show - UFO Hunters - featured Gordon on an episode that origanlly aired Feb. 18, 2009. His 2008 update can be read here and he regularly posts stories and information on his web site. He appeared on numerous network televsion shows over the years and lectures on the topic.

"My first volunteer research group established in 1970," Gordon said, "was the Westmoreland County UFO Study Group. In 1975 it expanded to the PA Center For UFO Research. In 1981, I established the PA Association for the Study of the Unexplained (PASU) which was very active until 1993. Today I continue to actively investigate and document current UFO cases in this area and throughout Pennsylvania.

"I had established a very active localized "UFO Hot Line" where the public had a clearinghouse to report such sighting to. That was not the case in many other sections of the country. So it was likely that there would be an increase in UFO reports that originated from local communities. The 396 UFO sighting figure from 1947-2005, I am quite sure is dramatically low in regards to the actual number of sightings that I received especially from the 1970's through 1990's."

Not all UFO reports are anomalous

"I must stress," Gordon said, "that while I received numerous UFO sighting reports, on a yearly basis, a high percentage of such observations were determined to be Identified Flying Object (IFO) incidents. Many UFO reports could be explained as a bright Venus and Jupiter, fireball meteors, re-entry of space debris, search light beams, and even cases of lights reflecting off of birds and insects.

"There is, however, a long history of UFO incidents reported from Westmoreland County, involving detailed low level, and close proximity observations which are not easily dismissed. UFO incidents continue to be reported anually here in Westmoreland County and from surrounding areas, and these events are now continuing into 2009."

Close range UFO sightings

Pennsylvania continues to receive both a high number of UFO reports annually, and a percentage of those are anomalous crafts seen at a very close range. Gordon covered a Feb. 3, 2009 case where a low flying cylinder-shaped object hovered in daylight just about 250 feet off the ground near Greensburg, PA. Read the complete story - Cylinder-shaped UFO hovers 250 feet over PA town. An October 31, 2008 sighting near Mt. Pleasant, PA was described as a "bright ball of light" moving just a few feet above ground level. Read the complete story - Shpere of light approaches Pennsylvania motorists.

Not all of Gordon's investigations are in Westmoreland County. He reported on a very unusual case in October 2008 where two hunters in Elk County spotted two glowing lights in a forest - and soon observed a 3-foot-tall glowing human-like form. Read the complete story - Glowing creature - strange lights reported in Pennsylvania.

Historically

Sketch by Charles HannaThe most famous UFO story in Westmoreland County is the Dec. 9, 1965 crash at Kecksburg where U.S. troops quickly moved in, took control of the scene, and used a covered flat bed truck to remove the object from a wooded area. While hundreds saw what they believed to be a controlled object in the sky, many witnessed the crash, and a few made it to the crash site to see the acorn-shaped craft on the ground - only humorous reports of denial and weather balloons are issued by our federal government. NY Journalist Leslie Kean, though, has been instrumental in helping to tear down the wall of secrecy - recently sucessfully suing NASA for their stash of Kecksburg information.

Gordon is also the producer of an original DVD documentary, Kecksburg: The Untold Story.

Sketch by Charles Hanna

While PA has a long UFO history, a high level of strangeness sent local UFO investigators and police agencies into a near panic at times during 1973 and 1974 when two anomalous subjects not commonly tied together occured in epidemic proportions. Both low flying UFOs and sightings of Bigfoot creatures plagued the region for more than a year. Hundreds of reports mainly centering on Westmoreland County were called into either local police agencies or directly to Stan Gordon. Many of these cases were personally investigated by Gordon and his team at that time. No period of time since then has seen this number of witness reports.

One of the strangest cases during that period occured near Uniontown, PA, where a UFO landed on a rural farm. When witnesses approached, they saw two Bigfoot creatures neaerby. Watch this series of video interviews as UFO researcher George Lutz, working with Gordon at the time, reflects back on what happened that night - Bigfoot-UFO researcher George Lutz gets candid - an 8-part video.

Having been born and raised myself in Westmoreland County, and a witness to a low flying UFO during 1973, I was a natural partner to work with Gordon on a manuscript that details these cases. The manuscript - Strange Intrusions - was recently completed and a suitable book publisher is being sought.

Why the UFO attraction to this southwestern Pennsylvania area? Any guesses out there?

Watch this Unsolved Mysteries television show about the Kecksburg UFO crash.




Watch this History Channel episode about the Kecksburg UFO crash.



Listen to this video interview with Gordon as he talks about paranormal Pennsylvania.



Westmoreland County resident Eric Harris tells InCahoots.TV about his personal experience with a low flying UFO in this short video.

UFO hunters visit secret Area 51

I cant wait!!!






from lasvegassun.com

For the curious who want to know the latest about Area 51, the top secret desert base about 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, an hour-long episode of "UFO Hunters: Area 51 Revealed" airs tonight at 10 p.m. On the History Channel, Cox Cable TV Channel 43 in Las Vegas.

This episode is the first substantial new Area 51 show in nearly a decade, says Glenn Campbell, an expert who tracked activities at the world's "infamous secret base," as the History Channel promo says.

Area 51, also known as Groom Lake, is growing, Campbell reports. Satellite photos reveal new buildings, towers and runways. Secret flights with blacked-out windows fly between Area 51 and Las Vegas.

The federal government denied for years that the base existed on land next to the Nevada Test Site, where U.S. Defense Department officials and others experimented with nuclear weapons from 1951 to 1992, until satellite photos began to reveal its scope.

The UFO hunters head for the heart of the secret base and its military conspiracy theories, Campbell promises.

Triangular UFOs low flying over three states

from www.examiner.com

Portsmouth, RI. Mapquest image.

Triangular-shaped objects caught the attention of five witnesses from three states on Feb. 22 and 24 - while a low-flying "huge black object" was spotted moving north through Oklahoma skies

In the two Rhode Island and two California cases, the reports are similar enough that in both cases, it could be the same object being observed.

Following are the unedited witness testimony as filed with the Mutual UFO Network.

RI - Feb. 22, 2009 - Five bright white lights in shape of triangle with blue and red lights

While driving back home, I noticed 3 extremely bright lights in the distance, one was a bit higher than the other two. My boyfriend thought it might be a plane landing, however,as we drove further south, it flew to our east, about 200 feet over head, over the woods, it hovered there, moving extremely slow when we noticed a triangle shape, an actual object, with 5 extremely bright white lights, almost like bright spot lights, with a solid red light in the center and blue lights. Bright white lights did not flash, but stayed constant, no lights blinked. All on the UNDERBELLY of the object. We did not see wings or a tail of a plane, especially with it being that close. There was no noise like a landing plane would make and it seemed to just hang in the sky. We noticed a definite shape. It was surrounded by low clouds. Unfortuntely we couldn't stop because we were going 65MPH on the highway. I was shaken up by it because it was not moving and the lights were so HUGE and BRIGHT, so bright they were beaming down onto the trees below. We got to a further stretch of highway and every single street light was out on the road, which we have never seen in the 100s of times we drive on that road in a year.

RI - Feb. 22, 2009 - A configuration of three bright lights seen from Portsmouth, RI

I was leaving my girlfriend's apartment late Sunday night at 11:37 P.M. the time should be within a minute or two according to the clock in the car. When I walked out of the hallway and onto the second story deck I caught a quick glance of an object moving in the distant sky. It was on a north by north west heading. The object moved in a straight line away from me and out of sight behind the tree line with in a matter of five to ten seconds.

It had three bright lights, one red in the center and two white lights one on each side of the red light. I didn't hear any sound but it was quite windy that night so it may have masked it; in fact I wouldn't have even looked in that direction for more than a second if it wasn't for the wind blowing so hard into my face.

I wasn't able to determine an exact shape of the object but if you were to play connect the dots with the lights it would have formed a triangle with the red light slightly above the two white lights; they were very bright. The lights on the Newport Bridge, which you can see from the road looking south west, were dim in comparison.

It really didn't even register right away at what I could possibly be looking at until the next day. I was more concerned with not getting blown off the deck and making my way down icy stairs without breaking my neck.

CT - Feb. 22, 2009 - 2 bright headlights in the sky. As we got closer it slowed and hovered above the trees. We could see it was triangular under with 4 lights. There was no noise. It turned and moved away from us

We were driving and saw clearly what looked like bright headlights coming towards us from the south. I thought how weird it looked like a car in the sky. We thought it was a plane and seemed to be in the flight path. They lights were low in the sky and were moving slowly. As we drove towards it it seemed to slow then it stopped and hovered above the trees just to the left of the road. It was stationery for at least 10 seconds and we could now distinctly see a triangle shape with 4 lights. 1 at the top and 3 across the bottom of the triangle. We rolled the window down to hear noise but there was none. It took a 90 degree turn towards the east and slowly moved away from us. We kept saying "What is it?" We were trying to make sense of it. We turned the car around to get another look and it was gone.

CA - Feb. 24, 2009 - Three Red/Orange Lights in a shape of Triangel Moving slowly

I was driving back home with my friend from Vijeas Casino in San Diego County when we saw these Three red/orange lights in a shape of triangle, I looked at my friend and told him is that a UFO and he said naw that's probably some lights in the mountain, but as we were driving towards the lights we realized there is no mountain anywhere near the Object, we where astonished of what we were witnessing, so be stopped by this turnout before getting to freeway 8w approximately 1:15 am and we saw this 3 Red/orange lights moving slowly in triangular shape closer and closer, we try to take a picture with the cellphone but it was too dark to take a pic with it, and we were just amazed of what we were seeing...as the object getting closer it was getting bigger and you could see it rotating slowly as well... around 1:30 am the Object started to disappear. First, one light disappeared, after 15sec the second light did, and it wasn't just instant, but slowly dimming, and after 15sec the third and final one disappeared. and my friend and I where just amazed of the sight we just had, it was nothing that we ever saw on the sky it looked nothing like the stars or plans or helicopters or flairs or any earthly thing it was a UFO. We called 911 at 1:32 and we reported it and asked if anyone else reported it they said no but they took the name and phone number and said they will call us and let us know if anything was reported.

CA - Feb. 24, 2009 - 3 Bright red lights, Triangle shaped, slowly moving west / northwest, then slowly disappear

On 2-24-2009 at 1:15am, the skies were clear with no clouds in the way, I saw 3 bright red lights in the shape of a triangle in the eastern sky of El Cajon, East County of San Diego. Seemed to be moving in a West or Northwestern direction, slowly, but was clearly moving, Started as a equilateral triangle, but looked like it was turning, and then the triangle began to get tighter at the bottom, then return to a more equal triangle. after about ten minutes of watching this, the lights began to flicker out, one at a time, starting with the top or the triangle, then the right bottom, then finally the left bottom. My brother is the one who first saw it, he called me on his cell, he was on the 8 freeway heading east, when he called to tell me to go outside and check it out. I witnessed the lights , as well as my mom and my dad. I'm a 30 year old Security Guard, and have never seen anything like it., I'm still shocked and amazed at the same time.

OK - Feb. 21, 2009 - Huge black object with lights across the back traveling south to north

I am reporting this for my husband who is pretty much an unbeliever (meaning he has not personally seen anything he could not identify until tonight) but now he is not so sure, after what he witnessed. He was leaving our side road which leads to the highway from our house going to work. He had just called a friend he works with and was almost to the highway, coming to a stop at the stop sign when he saw a HUGE black object traveling over Hwy 9. Hwy 9 & I-44 intersect about a half mile from here. The area has those turnpike lights along the highway so the area is fairly well lit up. He immediately got off the phone with his friend & tried calling me as he had only gotten a mile from home. But his cell phone wouldn't work for some reason. He sat at the stop sign & watched it until it went over the trees which was over Hwy 9 by now. His discription was, at first thought, it was a low flying commercial airplane but he could not see any wings anywhere on it. It had 5 or 6 lights across the back, red & amber colored, in a straight line. The lights were flashing in a sequence of four then would pause and resume. It did not make any noise at all. He said it was about 1000-2000 ft in altitude, flying or gliding at a slow speed & it was HUGE. It was traveling south to north over the Bridgecreek area. He said from the time he first saw it, the sighting only lasted about 2-3 minutes. We live in the general area where the couple had a sighting back in early Jan. He is not what you would call a believer in UFO's but he said this was definately something he could not identify. If anyone else saw this thing tonight, I hope you report it on here.

Former defence minister says UFO proof 'irrefutable'

from globeandmail.com

'As far as I'm concerned, it's irrefutable."

Paul Hellyer is in his downtown Toronto office on a Saturday morning, just as he is the first five mornings of every week, still driven at 85 years of age.

He has been finishing up a book, his 13th, that is part memoir, and so he has been looking back on a remarkable career that once made him Canada's youngest member of Parliament, that took him to key cabinet posts in the governments of Lester Pearson and Pierre Trudeau and that had him run for the leadership of the two main national parties and even form his own political party.

Lately he has not been looking backward - but into the future.
Paul Hellyer in 2002

Paul Hellyer in 2002 (File)
The Globe and Mail

A future in which humans will have to accept they are far from alone in this universe.

Hellyer's "irrefutable" evidence received a bit of pumping this past week. A Winnipeg group that tracks UFO sightings across Canada says 2008 produced a record number of sightings - 1,004 - a 25 per cent increase from the year before. Ontario and British Columbia were the hot spots, reporting 334 and 272, respectively, while Prince Edward Island had only two mysterious objects flying about, Nunavut one and Northwest Territories none.

And that is just Canadian evidence. There is also a report coming out of the Carnegie Institution in Washington that there may not be just one planet out there somewhere that is capable of creating and sustaining life, but as many as 10 billion trillion planets.

Astronomer Alan Boss says that he and others now believe that almost every star similar to our sun could conceivably have a life-harbouring planet orbiting it.

Boss believes there are 100-billion sun-like stars in our galaxy and 100-billion galaxies in the universe, numbers that would result in Vegas putting the odds far, far greater that there is life out there than that there isn't.

Boss, in fact, predicts that some time within the coming three years or so a planet very much like Earth is going to be found spinning around some distant star.

No sooner had Boss had his say than another cosmologist, Paul Davies of Arizona State University, was suggesting that we may already be sharing Earth with forms of life we cannot even comprehend.

"It could be right under our noses," said Prof. Davies, "or even in our noses."

Let others snort at all this, Hellyer says. He doesn't. He's been a true believer since 2005, when he stunned the cautious Canadian political world by announcing in a speech that, in his opinion, "UFOs are as real as the airplanes that fly over your head."

He never believed so in the years that he was minister of defence, but in later years became convinced after watching a documentary on extraterrestrial life by the late Peter Jennings, a Canadian, and after reading a book on the 1947 incident at Roswell, N.M., where many believe a flying saucer crash was covered up by the U.S. military. Hellyer believes American intelligence has systematically sought to block or debunk any information that might convince people that life from other worlds often visits Earth.

"The cosmos is teeming with life," Hellyer believes.

His new book, as yet untitled, will be in three parts, the first part memoir, the second containing his views on religion and the third concerning his thoughts on what went wrong with world's banking and monetary system and how it, along with the environment, might be fixed. The current financial meltdown is almost precisely what Hellyer predicted in a previous book.

In Hellyer's musings about religion, he touches again on the possibility of other worlds, other life forms.

"I think there is a spiritual longing out there," he says. "People are so distressed at the present time by all that is going on in the world. The banking system has fallen apart. People worry there's a possibility of war between the Christian world and the Muslim world. We want something better."

This widespread longing, he suggests, covers everything from people actually hoping there is more intelligent life out there than here all the way to the remarkable rise of Barack Obama in the United States over the past two years.

"People want something with a wider world view," says Hellyer. "That's why Obama has been so well received.

"It's about hope - what we are all looking for."

The book, which he will finish in the next couple of weeks, will also contain a photograph of a UFO.

It was taken late last August, at twilight, from the dock of Hellyer's summer place in Muskoka.

Hellyer was not the photographer but says the man's name is instantly recognizable and that he has signed an affidavit verifying that under no circumstances was the picture rigged or altered electronically.

Hellyer believes, absolutely, that it is more "irrefutable" proof - even though he himself has yet to see a UFO no matter how often he looks up in the hopes of catching a glimpse of something unknown, perhaps unknowable.

"I haven't seen the Taj Mahal, either," says Hellyer.

"But I know it exists."

Alien in the window!??!?!

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