The Mammoth Encyclopedia of Extraterrestrial Encounters

by Story, Ronald

  Although unaware of it, Jacobs has defined, in that paragraph, classic sleep paralysis. He might have accidentally explained the event that causes some to believe they have been abducted.

  It has been estimated by some researchers that as many as 50 percent of the alien abduction cases can be explained as sleep paralysis. Sleep paralysis is now better un derstood because of the research done in the last twenty years. And because of that research, a cause for some abduction cases has been found. Please note that it is a cause for some abductions, but certainly cannot explain all of them.

  —KEVIN D. RANDLE

  References

  Hufford, David J. The Terror That Comes in the Night (University of Pennsylvania Press, 1982).

  Jacobs, David M. Secret Life (Simon & Schuster, 1992).

  Randle, Kevin D., Estes, Russ, and Cone, William P. The Abduction Enigma (Forge, 1999).

  Socorro (New Mexico) landing One of the most highly-publicized physical-trace cases of all time is the Socorro, New Mexico, “landing,” which allegedly occurred on April 24, 1964. The case is considered by many UFOlogists to be one of the “best” because of the combination of factors that make it interesting. It has abundant detail and was reported by an apparently credible, reliable witness. It is also listed in Blue Book files as “unexplained.”

  Eyewitness sketch of the Socorro object

  According to the story, as Officer Lonnie Zamora (a five-year veteran with the Socorro Police Department) was chasing a speeder down South Park Street. (The time was reported as 5:45 P.M. MST) The speeder wound up on a dead-end street and Zamora stopped his patrol car to wait. Just then, Zamora was startled to hear a loud “roar” whereupon he saw a bluish-orange flame, conical in shape (narrower at the top), slowly descending in an unpopulated area to the southwest. (Zamora was, at this point, 4,000 feet away from the site where he later found the imprints of the UFO.)

  Landing scene near Socorro, as depicted by APRO artist Norman Duke

  Hearing a loud sound and knowing that a dynamite-storage shed was located in the approximate vicinity of the bright flame, Zamora first thought that someone might be “fooling around” over there. As the flame disappeared behind a small hill, he forgot about the speeder and headed toward whatever was causing the disturbance in the other direction.

  Zamora began to see something when he came to the top of a small mesa (about 800 feet from the landed object). At first, all that he could see appeared to be an overturned car, down in the gully, and two “small kids” standing next to it. He was quoted by Look magazine as saying: “All I could see from that far away was what looked like two sets of white coveralls beside the object. I couldn’t see any features, just two figures in the distance. It was like two sets of coveralls hanging on a washline, that’s all. They looked about four feet high.”

  He tried to drive his car to a better vantage point and, in doing so, temporarily lost sight of the object. When he saw it again, the two figures were gone, and suddenly a deafening roar again filled the air. Zamora dived for cover and was on the ground as the object rose into the air. It halted about twenty feet off the ground and hovered motionless for a few seconds before flying away horizontally. (its speed was later estimated to be around 120 miles per hour.)

  Alleged markings on the object as sketched by the witness, Lonnie Zamora

  While the object was hovering, Zamora saw some red markings on its side, which he described as “… a crescent with a vertical arrow pointed upward inside the crescent and a horizontal bar beneath that.” He tried to use his radio but without success. Even though it was in perfect working order before, it now ceased to function. After a few more tries it started working again, and Zamora requested that Sergeant M. Samuel Chavez of the New Mexico State Police be sent to the scene.

  When Sergeant Chavez arrived, both he and Zamora went down in the arroyo (gully), where the object had been seen, to investigate. They found eight imprints in the ground—four large (averaging 10 by 18 inches) rectangular indentations, apparently from the landing legs of the craft, and four smaller round ones (thought by some to be points on the ground where a ladder had been set, and reset). A mesquite bush and a small clump of grass smoldered nearby. The following is quoted from the official Air Force report:

  Sgt. Chavez was skeptical of the situation and proceeded to where Zamora had observed the object. Here he found the marks and burns. Smoke appeared to be coming from a bush which was burned but no flame or coals were visible. Sergeant Chavez broke a limb from the bush and it was cold to the touch. The marks were fresh and no other marks were in the area. The burning seemed to be sporadic. Clumps of grass in close proximity to the burned ones were not burned, while others just a short distance away from the unburned ones were again burned, etc. Diagonals of the four impressions (made by the legs of the object) intersect in a perpendicular and the major distance is about 13 feet.

  A closer USAF examination of the site on 29 April revealed a fair amount of charred particles mixed in with the dirt, and some charred cardboard was also found. Analysis of soil samples taken on the evening of 24 April was completed on 19 May. It included spectrographic analysis, which revealed that there was no foreign material in the soil samples. Also, no chemicals were detected in the charred or burned soil which would indicate a type of propellant. There was no significant difference in elemental composition between the different samples.

  A check for radioactivity was made with a geiger counter at approximately 4 P.M. on 26 April, with negative results. The counter was checked against a watch dial and found to be in working order.

  Although Zamora was the only witness to the actual sighting as he described it, nine people in all saw the markings while they were still fresh.

  According to Opel Grinder, Manager of Whitting Brothers’ Service Station on Route 85 North, at least one other person, an unidentified tourist traveling north on 85, saw the UFO just before it landed in the gully. Grinder said the man stopped at the station and remarked that aircraft flew low around there. Grinder replied that there were many helicopters in that vicinity, and the tourist said, “it was a funny looking helicopter, if that’s what it was.” The man said further that the object had flown over his car. It actually was headed straight for the gully where it landed moments later. The tourist also commented that he had seen a police car heading up the hill. This was apparently Zamora’s car. (From El Defensor Chieftan, Tuesday, 28 April 1964, and verified by a direct telephone call to Mr Grinder. Note that this information implies that the UFO not only disappeared in the direction of White Sands [Missile Range] but also came from that same direction.)

  The tourist who stopped at Grinder’s service station has apparently been identified as Mr Larry Kratzner of Dubuque, Iowa. Kratzner and a friend, Mr Paul Kies, traveling together at the time, were finally traced, through an old newspaper clipping (from the 29 April 1964 Dubuque Telegraph-Herald) by UFO researcher Ralph C. DeGraw, who published results of the belated personal interviews—conducted in May 1978, fourteen years after the Socorro incident—in his publication, The UFO Examiner.

  DeGraw noted that the witnesses’ “descriptions of what they saw were entirely different.” There were also significant discrepancies between the two tourists’ testimony and that of Lonnie Zamora.

  Agreeing that they were traveling east on Highway 60, approximately one mile southwest of Socorro, at about 3 or 4 p.m. MST (at least one hour and forty-five minutes earlier than the time given by Zamora of his first sighting of the object), Kratzner, the driver, said he saw “a cloud of black smoke coming from the ground ahead of them and to the right.” He was also reported to have seen “a round saucer or eggshaped object ascending vertically from the black smoke.” He even described a row of four “windows” on the “craft” and a “red Z” marking on the side facing them. After the vertical climb, Kratzner claimed that the object leveled off and disappeared in the cloud of black smoke it was producing, in the southwest.

  Kies, on the other hand, rep
orted seeing black smoke coming from the ground (ahead of them, and slightly to the right) and a bright, shiny “reflection,” which appeared to be within the smoke. Kies said he saw the shiny reflection only on the ground, and saw nothing flying in the sky. He thought, at the time, that the source of the smoke might have been a junkyard where someone was burning tires and cutting up wrecked cars, and, perhaps, the reflection was from a car window or part of a car body that had caught the sun. (According to Zamora, there was no smoke, only dust, in the area.)

  Both Kratzner and Kies estimated their position at the time of their observations to be about one mile from where the black smoke was apparently coming from. Neither of them heard any noise, even though, according to their accounts, they were at about the same distance from the “object,” when first sighted, as Zamora when he said that he heard a “very loud roar.”

  An even greater discrepancy has been pointed out by the UFO debunker Philip Klass. During his on-site investigation, in December 1966, Klass interviewed a local resident, “Mr Felix Phillips, whose house is located only one thousand feet south of the spot where the UFO allegedly landed. Phillips said that he and his wife had been home at the time of the reported incident, and that several windows and doors had been open—yet neither of them had heard the loud roar that Zamora reported during the UFO landing and later during takeoff. This was especially curious because Zamora’s speeding car was four thousand feet away from the site and the Phillips home was only one-quarter this distance.”

  Klass concluded (after fitting together several other key pieces of information) that the “UFO landing” was a hoax intended to turn the economically-depressed town of Socorro into a tourist attraction.

  Nevertheless, many UFOlogists still consider the Socorro case a “classic,” which was apparently taken seriously by the U.S. Air Force back in 1964.

  —RONALD D. STORY

  References

  “Flying Saucers,” a Look magazine special by the editors of UPI and Cowles Communicatons (1967).

  Klass, Philip J. UFOs Explained (Random House, 1974).

  Phillips, Ted. “High Strangeness Ground Trace Reports,” The MUFON UFO Journal (December 1979).

  ———. “Landing Traces, Physical Evidence for the UFO” in the MUFON Symposium 1973 Proceedings (MUFON, 1973).

  Sorell (Australia) saucers Two men, who prefer to remain anonymous, sighted three UFOs at Lake Sorell, in Tasmania, on February 26, 1975. The reporting witness was a tail gunner in the Royal Australian Air Force, who later became a professional man and is considered to be reliable. He and a friend (a commercial artist) were camped on the skore of Lake Sorell to do some fishing.

  At 8:45 P.M., Mr. “Smith” (a pseudonym for the reporting witness) noted three “things” in the sky which he at first thought might have been aircraft. The objects were approaching from the northeast and appeared to be two large craft and a smaller one.

  Underneath each of the craft was a red, pulsing light in the center and other red-to-orange lights running around the circumference. The two objects stood out clearly, and one of them headed toward the fishermen’s location.

  Smith said, “It was about 2½ miles away when we saw it move, and then it was right there only about a thousand yards away and five hundred feet above the lake.” He said that if he had not seen it himself, he would not have believed any craft could display such a performance. He was sure that the size of the object was no less than two hundred feet in diameter.

  During the next few minutes, the object turned on a “monstrous light” which was directed down toward the lake. It was half the diameter of the UFO itself; the shaft of it was well defined, and it came from one side of the bottom of the UFO. The light was very intense, and it was painful to the eyes to look at. Smith compared its brilliance to that of a welding torch. While watching the phenomena, he took careful sightings on hills in the area with which he was familiar. The spill of light from around the main shaft of the light illuminated a distance of 1½ miles around the lake. The beam was swung back and forth in an arc. “It seemed like a careful search of the Robinson’s Swamp area, and I have no doubt that beam of light was intelligently controlled,” Smith said.

  Artistist’s conception by Brian James

  The two men had a large tent set up at the lakeside together with cover for the car. The car’s radio was being used because a portable radio he had was not strong enough to pick up radio stations some distance away. Smith observed that when the UFO flew close to their campsite the car radio emitted a loud “intense static noise.” Still watching the object, Smith traversed the radio dial across the whole band; but he could not pick up one radio station. “There was just the static,” he said.

  After its “inspection” of the area, the UFO put out its gigantic light beam, after which a blue-white phosphorescence was left hanging about thirty feet above the lake’s surface. Once the light was out, the UFO was clearly seen; and it departed “in a flash.” Its departing speed was tremendous, Smith said. and watching it leave was “like watching a tracer bullet going away from you.” It was accompanied by the other UFO, which had been hovering near Mount Penney. When the two left, the time was 9:30 P.M. Smith and his friend made sketches of what they had seen (redrawn for publication). The next day, Smith and friend met some fishermen who had seen the UFO light up the lake the night before. The anglers had been camped one mile away from Smith’s location at Silver Plains. They told Smith they had been in their tent when suddenly the tent was lit up inside like daylight.

  Another sighting took place at Lake Sorell on March 14, 1975, when a Mr. Knapek and his two sons and two friends sighted an object while camped in a clearing one mile east of the lake. They were about to have a snack when the children, ages thirteen and fifteen, pointed out an object rising slowly from behind trees three hundred yards to the west toward the lake. The object, once above the trees, rose rapidly and shot up into the southwestern sky diminishing to star size and then being lost to view at 75 degrees elevation. The whole event took only five seconds.

  The object in this case was football-shaped and estimated by the witnesses to be about fifty feet across. It was bright yellow underneath, with a lighter yellow on top. As it moved away, the color became more white and much brighter. No ground check was made for physical traces.

  —CORAL & JIM LORENZEN

  soul exchange This term describes the process of a “Walk-in” experience, in which a human being agrees to vacate their own body-mind system, and allow a second soul (often considered an ET spirit), to take their place and incarnate directly into their voluntarily surrendered body and mind. It is claimed that this is done by mutual agreement for the purpose of release for the departing soul, and to provide an opportunity for greater world service for the entering soul. This process is comparable but not identical to the process by which an “ET Wanderer” comes to take birth in a human body.

  —SCOTT MANDELKER

  Soul Samples (Wild Flower Press, 1999). This book, by psychologist R. Leo Sprinkle, gives a psychological, psychical, and spiritual perspective on the UFO phenomenon and its relationship to people’s lives. UFO author Keith Thompson encapsulated Dr. Spinkle’s efforts by saying, “when other investigators were chasing lights in the sky and gathering soil samples, you [Leo] were helping UFO experiencers and gathering soul samples.”

  Partly biographical in nature, this book reveals Dr. Sprinkle’s conclusions and insights on the link between UFO/ET activities and the process of reincarnation.

  soul transfer This is a general term applicable to both “Wanderers” and “Walkins”: individuals who claim to be ET souls living in human bodies. While both claim to be ETs who freely chose to enter human incarnation, their entry into the human system occurs through different modes of transfer. Wanderers are those whose transfer was at birth, and continues for multiple incarnations, while Walkins claim to enter human life in a soul exchange with an adult. According to their metaphysics, ET souls are the vanguard of the benevol
ent ET community, and are here to assist in human evolution.

  —SCOTT MANDELKER

  Space Brothers An alternate term for benevolent extraterrestrial races, allied in service to various planets and Earth humanity. Especially popularized in the 1950s by science fiction writers, UFO researchers, contactees, and channels. Carl Jung called them “technological angels.”

  —SCOTT MANDELKER

  Space-Gods Revealed, The (Harper & Row, 1976). Ronald Story demonstrates how proponents of the “ancient astronaut theory” (especially Erich von Däniken) are guilty of absurdities, active imaginations, faulty suppositions, and superficialities. As astronomer Carl Sagan writes in the foreword to Story’s book: “The possibility of extraterrestrial intelligence is something I and many other scientists take very seriously—to the point of using large radio telescopes to listen for possible signals sent our way by beings on planets of other stars. If there were good evidence that in the past we were visited by such beings, our task would be made immeasurable easier. But unfortunately there is no such evidence, as the present book helps to make clear.”

  —RANDALL FITZGERALD

  Spaceships of Ezekiel, The (Econ-Verlagsgruppe, 1973) NASA engineer Josef Blumrich reinterprets Ezekiel’s vision of a “fiery chariot” from the Old Testament to produce an engineering analysis which concludes the Jewish priest and prophet proba bly encountered an extraterrestrial spacecraft. On four occasions over a 20-year period Ezekiel observed the same craft, according to the Biblical account, which leads Blumrich to believe these trips represented exploration missions to study humans and influence the development of human civilization.