UFO Depiction
Published: 7:08 PM
7/30/2015
white light far brighter
than any star or planet...
Sam Uptegrove has been has
been fascinated with the unexplained since childhood. He began actively
investigating paranormal incidents in his late teens and has continued for more
than four decades. Now retired and a cancer survivor, he has lived in the
southwest Missouri Ozarks for over 30 years.
Recently, I received an
email from a reader, and the body of the message consisted of the six words
that make up the title of this column. My response was considerably longer than
the question, since a thorough investigation into any unexplained incident can
become quite complicated. Then a gentleman in Ozark reported an unidentified
light to the Mutual UFO Network and his narrative account was posted on the excellent
website, UFO Casebook.
It required several steps
in the course of its investigation, and I decided to write this week’s column
so that other readers had an idea what goes into determining whether a report
has earned the ‘U’ in the familiar abbreviation UFO.
The report was relatively
simple in itself. On the evening of July 19, the witness observed a white light
far brighter than any star or planet in the sky, which suddenly began dimming
and continued to do so until it had disappeared completely within a matter of
15 seconds or less without any discernible movement.
He mentioned the
possibility of it flying directly away from him at high speed. First, I checked
on the possibility of it being the International Space Station or some other
man-made object, since entering the Earth’s shadow can create a similar fading
effect. There was nothing scheduled to be even near the right part of the sky
any time that evening.
I also considered the
possibility of an aircraft coming directly toward him with its bright “landing
light” under its nose pointing directly at him, and the light fading as the
aircraft turned.
The problem with that
scenario is that a winged aircraft does not simply rotate in one spot like it
is on a turntable — it makes a looping change of direction that would have been
almost certain to be seen as lateral movement by the observer. Besides, if it
had been an aircraft landing light at a distance to present the brilliance and
size he described — “easily three to four times brighter than any star and two
to three times brighter than any observed planet” — the witness would have
probably heard the sound from it.
Such proximity would have
also made it more likely that he would have heard its engine and seen the red
or green wingtip light that was turned toward him, as well as making the
lateral movement even more noticeable.
That left one other
possible solution I could think of — a helicopter is capable of stopping,
rotating in place and flying in the opposite direction.
There is no question that
this sighting, since it was so close to Springfield and the observation was
made looking in that direction, could have been a helicopter. There are
certainly no shortage of these craft in the area operated by law enforcement,
air ambulance services, Air National Guard units and the local television
stations
. But at least one of the
reasons for calling a fixed-wing aircraft an unlikely culprit makes a copter an
even less likely suspect. You can hear their distinctive engine and rotor
sounds from several miles away.
I made several inquiries
that failed to pinpoint a specific helicopter being airborne at the proper
time, but of course there was no way to account for all of them.
Based upon the information
available in the original report and the additional data that I uncovered
during my own follow-up investigation, it was impossible to discount the
sighting by explaining it away. But that does not mean that it constitutes
proof that an alien craft was either conducting surveillance or simply out
sightseeing in the skies over Christian County on July 19.
It only means that a
light, which was apparently attached to something, was seen on that date in
that place. What that something was remains unidentified, was flying and was
clearly an object of some kind — by definition, a UFO.
I would love to ask the
witness a few questions concerning his experience. Perhaps, if he reads this
column in the Headliner News he will contact me.
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