Montagne du Sud, automne 1967
Enquêteurs : Ayer, Wadsworth
Résumé
La mort d'un cheval fut populairement admise comme étant liée à des observations d'ovnis, mais une enquête professionelle n'a rien dévoilé d'inhabituel dans la condition de la carcasse. Aucune conclusions
significatives ne peuvent être dérivées des nombreuses rapports d'observations d'ovnis.
Contexte
Au début de l'Automne 1967, des nouvelles d'une série d'événements that were
popularly held to be related filtra dans le projet du Colorado. Un de ces événements fut la mort d'un cheval dans des circonstances prétendumment mystérieuses un mois auparavant. Cette mort était devenue associée dans l'esprit du public avec les récentes observations d'ovnis dans la région.
Le cheval, propriété d'une femme et pâturant sur la ferme de son frère, n'était pas venu boire depuis 1 jour et fut retrouvé mort 2 jours plus tard.
Il fut signalé que l'ensemble de la chair et de la peau avaient été enlevé de sa tête et de son cou selon une coupe droite juste au-dessus de l'épaule, et que de la végétation écrasée, des dépressions étranges dans le sol, et des dark "exhaust marks" had been found nearby. The owner of the horse
was a correspondent for a local newspaper, and a spate of releases
had rapidly inflated public interest in the case.
When, a few days later, word came through that a second dead horse
had been found, amid persistent rumors of unreported UFOs, it was
decided that project investigators should go to the area.
Enquête
The area about the carcass had been trampled by several hundred
visitors. The investigators therefore considered it was not
worthwhile to try to investigate anything at the site except the
carcass. When they learned that no veterinarian had examined it, they
called in a veterinarian, who examined the carcasses of both of the
horses. His essential findings were:
The horse's carcass was extremely old for an autopsy, but there was
evidence suggesting a severe infection in a hindleg that could have
disabled or killed the animal. There was evidence also of a knife cut
in the neck, possibly made by someone who found the horse hope-
lessly sick. Absence of nerve tissues and viscera was normal for a
carcass dead several weeks.
Magpies and other birds ordinarily cannot peck through the skin of a
horse, but will eat the flesh and skin if they can get into it. In
this case, they evidently had taken advantage of the cut and removed
all accessible skin and flesh from the neck and head before the
carcass had been found.
The second horse carcass showed evidence that death had resulted from
encephalitis.
It had been reported that a forest ranger with civil defense training
had found a high level of radioactivity near the "exhaust marks."
When questioned by an investigator, he said that his meter had
indicated only "slight" activity two weeks after the carcass had been
found. The investigators concluded that the activity he had measured
on his simple survey instrument had been no greater than the normal
background radiation they measured three weeks later.
Conclusions
There was no evidence to support the assertion that the horse's death
was associated in any way with abnormal causes.
Autres observations
The investigators then turned their attention to the numerous reports
of UFO sightings in the same area. Many were vague or involved direct
lights at night. Only the more interesting cases are reported here.
-
A service-station attendant and former aircraft gunner reported
three sightings in ten years. The second, about 1962, occurred while
he, with three companions, was driving west at 65 mph., about 3:30
a.m. They noticed on the slope of a nearby mountain a point of blue
light that moved toward the highway and then turned parallel to it,
pacing the car a few feet from the ground. It soon pulled ahead and
vanished over the valley. Suddenly, the witness saw what he assumed
was the same light appear in the middle of the road some distance
ahead and approach at high speed, so that he ran the car off into the
graded ditch to avoid collision. As the light approached, it grew to
at least the size of his car. As it passed, it shot upward a few
feet, turned south, and disappeared.
In the spring of 1967, the same witness, with his wife, was driving
west when he saw an object that resembled a box kite crossing the
highway from the left. He associated it with a helicopter, although
he was familiar with them and the apparition was silent. Thinking
that it was some kind of aircraft that might land at the airport, he
drove directly there. During this part of the trip, the object
disappeared behind some buildings. When they arrived at the airport,
it was nowhere in sight.
- About 5:15 a.m., late summer, 1967, a couple were driving south
when they saw two extended objects outlined with a dull glow, at an
altitude of about 15°. One was directly south over the
road, and the second was south-southwest. The objects moved
northwesterly until they were apparently "directly over [the
mountain]." There the second moved up beside the first and they
hovered for several minutes before descending rapidly to the ground,
where they merged with the vegetation and disappeared. The witnesses estimated that the minimum distance to the objects was one mile,
and presumably was never very much greater; however, they hovered
"directly over [the mountain]," which was at least 8 mi. away.
- On an unrecalled date, late in the summer, 1966, about 5:30 a.m.,
two boys, ages 13 and 17, were traveling north when they saw an
extended bright light in the road. The UFO kept ahead of them for
about 20 mi., then disappeared.
- At 10:15 p.m., early fall, 1967, the owner of the horse mentioned
above, with her husband, was driving west. They saw three pulsating
red-and-green lights pass over, moving generally southwest.
After five to ten minutes, the third object seemed to explode,
emitting a yellow flash, then a second flash nearer the ground, and a
puff of smoke that the witnesses observed for ten minutes. Several
fragments were seen to fall to the ground after the second explosion.
The husband and wife disagreed as to the location. He said the
wreckage should lie somewhere between the second and fifth hill south
of a nearby town, but she said she saw the explosion over a brown
hill ten miles east of the same town. The explosion was also seen by
a farmer, and his times and bearings supported the husband's account.
Ayer drove between the second and third and the third and fourth
hills, and he flew over the region south of the fifth hill, but he
saw nothing of interest.
The data on this sighting were sent to Major Quintanilla, who
reported that no satellite re-entries had been seen or predicted at
the reported time. This finding, however, did not preclude the
unobserved re-entry of a minor fragment that had not been tracked.
- Another couple reported several sightings, one of these, between
9:00 and 10:00 p.m., fall, 1967, considered by them to be a "meteor."
Its location was not given. This sighting was also reported to Major
Quintanilla, but no satellite had been observed to re-enter on that
day.
- A l'automne 1967, 10 mn avant l'obscurité, 2 fermiers driving west saw a small cigar-shaped cloud, vertically oriented in a
sky that had only one other cloud in it. The cigar was about the size
of a thumb at arms length, 200 above the "horizon" and 45°
south of the road, that is, southwest of the point of first sighting.
It was slightly boat-tailed at the bottom and its outlines were not
sharp. The second cloud was obviously a cloud, at a slightly greater
altitude in the south. The two men drove about three miles while the
"cigar" tilted slightly toward the other cloud and moved slowly
toward it. They stopped the car to observe more closely. Pointing
toward the larger cloud, the "cigar" continued to approach it. After
a few minutes the witnesses drove on, and a few minutes later the
"cigar" melted into the cloud.
Résumé
Aucun de ces signalements d'observations n'ont été considérés comme suffisamment récents ou étranges pour justifier une enquête détaillée.