Stuart Webb - Alien Encounters

CONTENTS

As the figures still took no notice of him, Botta reached out and touched one. The humanoid was rigid and hard, and its skin had the texture of charred wood. Believing that the beings were dead, Botta fled. He dashed back to his car and drove to the hotel where he and his fellow engineers were staying.

Botta blurted out his story to his two closest colleagues. One of them had a gun he used for hunting. He suggested that the three of them return to the craft to inspect it further. It was by now dark, so the men decided to go in the morning.

Alien Files

DO PEOPLE REALLY HAVE ALIEN ENCOUNTERS?

Most of the encounters described in this book were witnessed by one or two people, or a small group at most. There is usually little or no physical evidence of the encounter to support their stories. So we are forced to rely almost exclusively on the eyewitness reports themselves. We must ask ourselves how reliable the witnesses are. It is possible that the encounter was the product of a lucid (real-seeming) dream or hallucination, or false-memory syndrome. False memories are sometimes created in the course of psychotherapy. Some stories might even be deliberate hoaxes. However, the possibility always remains that the witnesses did have an extraterrestrial encounter. Scientists will probably never be able to prove that UFOs and aliens dont exist.

The next morning, the three men drove back to the site of the encounter, but the disk-shaped craft had gone. According to them, all that was left was a small pile of ashes. One of Bottas friends stooped to touch it. It was hot and his hand allegedly turned purple, so he dropped the ash. They later claimed they spotted a UFO circling high overhead. It was shaped like a cigar and pulsed with a red glow. After a few minutes it flew off and the men were left alone.

Later that day Botta apparently collapsed with a fever and was rushed to the hospital. His skin broke out in a rash and began to blister. A test showed no sign of radiation, and the doctors thought that a very severe case of sunburn was the most likely explanation, although Botta had not been out in the sun much due to his job. Botta recovered after a few days and returned to work. He decided not to talk about the incident, but later as news of UFO sightings became more common in South America, he elected to speak out.

The Squyres Encounter

As intriguing as the Botta encounter was, it gave no clue about who the ufonauts were, where they came from or why they were visiting.

What UFO researchers (ufologists) were hoping for was an encounter with a living alien known as a close

encounter of the third kind (or CE3).

Perhaps the first report of a close encounter of the third kind to receive public attention occurred on August 25, 1952. William Squyres, a radio worker in Pittsburg, Kansas, was driving to work through farmland at 5:30 am along Highway 60. As he drove he apparently saw something odd in a pasture field. The following story is based on his description of what happened next.

As he drew closer he saw the object was silvery-gray in color, about 70 ft (21 m) across and 12 ft (3.7 m) high. It was shaped, Squyres said, rather like two soup bowls placed rim to rim and then flattened somewhat.

Squyres drove up until he was alongside the field and only about 300 ft (90 m) from the object. He then stopped his car and studied the object more closely. He could now see that the underside had a faint bluish glow to it. Around the objects edge was a rim or walkway. From this rose a number of vertical poles, each topped by what seemed to be a spinning propeller. The object was making a dull, throbbing noise.