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Speaker 1: great as a species. Our ability to lie, embellish, and
Speaker 1: imagine is one of our most extraordinary traits. It is
Speaker 1: thanks to our human capacity for imagination that we have
Speaker 1: walked on the moon, built the great Pyramids of Egypt,
Speaker 1: and painted masterpieces such as the frescoes of the Sistine Chapel.
Speaker 1: It is also this imagination that enables us to create
Speaker 1: and share stories, Stories that, although almost always bear some
Speaker 1: form of fabrication, can often reveal certain truths about ourselves.
Speaker 1: And yet the notion of truth is the most elusive
Speaker 1: of things. For some, it can be a cause for annoyance,
Speaker 1: the frustration at finding not everybody sees things the way
Speaker 1: they do. For others, it can be the difference between
Speaker 1: life and death. At times, the truth can be hard,
Speaker 1: a bit of pill that might force us to even
Speaker 1: deceive ourselves in an attempt to escape from it. And
Speaker 1: sometimes this self deception can be so potent that sheer
Speaker 1: belief alone can serve as a satisfying substitute for the
Speaker 1: truth itself. The great physicist Werner Heisenberg's uncertainty principle tells
Speaker 1: us that we can never know both the momentum and
Speaker 1: the position of a particle at any one time. In
Speaker 1: other words, you might say, we can never know the
Speaker 1: whole truth, but only an approximation of it. The concept
Speaker 1: of objective truth becomes even murkier if we also accept
Speaker 1: cannot understand anything without first taking into account the mechanism
Speaker 1: through which it is observed. Although the truth may well
Speaker 1: be out there, it begs the question does it even exist?
Speaker 1: You're listening to Unexplained and I'm Richard McClain smith. Throughout
Speaker 1: history we have concocted stories of strange apparitions in the sky,
Speaker 1: of gods and monsters that might either threaten or protect us.
Speaker 1: In modern times, these stories are most commonly associated with
Speaker 1: the UFOs. Although the term had come into use early
Speaker 1: in the twentieth century, it wasn't until the summer of
Speaker 1: nineteen forty seven that the phrase really caught the public imagination.
Speaker 1: In July of that year, an American recreational pilot named
Speaker 1: Kenneth Arnold claimed to have been followed by nine sourcerlike
Speaker 1: objects whilst flying his plane over Mount Rainier in Washington State.
Speaker 1: In a world still deeply traumatized by the Second World War,
Speaker 1: the United States Air Force were unwilling to take any
Speaker 1: chances and swiftly set about establishing two things, just what
Speaker 1: exactly were those strange objects, and more importantly, to what
Speaker 1: extent did they pose a threat to national security? On
Speaker 1: this occasion, Arnold's story proved of little concern. However, the
Speaker 1: ensuing publicity led to an unprecedented influx of claims from
Speaker 1: hundreds of others citing similar experiences of their own. Although
Speaker 1: the Air Force were happy to ignore the civilian reports,
Speaker 1: it proved a little harder to dismiss those that had
Speaker 1: come from their own highly trained personnel. To this end,
Speaker 1: in nineteen forty eight, the US Air Force recruited a
Speaker 1: man named Joseph Allen Heineck to act as scientific consultant
Speaker 1: on a newly established project called Operations sign. The purpose
Speaker 1: of the unit was to create a localized propository for
Speaker 1: all suspected UFO sightings, with the ultimate aim of generating
Speaker 1: rational and scientific explanations to explain the strange occurrencies. For Heineck,
Speaker 1: a doctor of physics and astronomy from Ohio State University,
Speaker 1: the committed man of science, the opportunity to dispel the
Speaker 1: emerging myths of little green men was too good to
Speaker 1: turn down, and for the first few years this is
Speaker 1: exactly what he did. But then something changed. Heinick noticed
Speaker 1: a pattern creeping into his work. He had discovered that,
Speaker 1: although the majority of cases were fanciful and easily dismissed,
Speaker 1: for every twenty nonsense claims he received, there would be
Speaker 1: at least one that was impossible to explain. He termed
Speaker 1: these cases his unknowns. What's more, Heineck realized that, in
Speaker 1: spite of operations signs initial intentions, the project had rarely
Speaker 1: followed his own strict principles of the scientific method, namely
Speaker 1: that every case should be approached with complete disinterest and
Speaker 1: without bias. It became clear that even if a UFO
Speaker 1: were to land on the road in front of his superiors,
Speaker 1: they would have refused to believe it. It soon dawned
Speaker 1: on Heineck that his job had not been about investigating
Speaker 1: the UFO reports at all. It was purely to debunk them.
Speaker 1: On the night of July twenty third, nineteen ninety five,
Speaker 1: a group of amateur astronomers headed out into the Arizona
Speaker 1: Desert to a strip of land just south of Phoenix
Speaker 1: known as Pecola Ranch. After a few hours observing various
Speaker 1: galaxies and star clusters, one member of the group turned
Speaker 1: his attention to the constellation of Sagittarius. His name was
Speaker 1: Thomas Bob. Peering into the lens as the desert air
Speaker 1: began to chill, Thomas spotted something strange far out in
Speaker 1: the depths of space. Approximately four hundred miles away in Cloudcroft,
Speaker 1: New Mexico, astronomer Alan Hale was recording the brightness of
Speaker 1: a series of comets he had been tracking for the
Speaker 1: past couple of months. After taking the measurements he needed,
Speaker 1: who turned his telescope to the constellation of Sagittarius, and
Speaker 1: sure enough, he also spotted something unexpected, something that did
Speaker 1: not correlate with any of his established charts. Unbeknownst to
Speaker 1: each other, Allan and Thomas had simultaneously made the same discovery,
Speaker 1: a discovery that would change their lives forever. Roughly five
Speaker 1: hundred and seventy seven million miles from the two astronomers,
Speaker 1: a forty kilometer wide mass of rock, ice, and dust
Speaker 1: was hurtling through space at approximately one hundred thousand miles
Speaker 1: per hour relative to the Earth. It was as if
Speaker 1: Sagittarius himself had launched an arrow straight through the heart
Speaker 1: of the Solar System. That arrow was soon to become
Speaker 1: known as the hail Bop Comet. By March nineteen ninety seven,
Speaker 1: any casual observer would have been able to see the
Speaker 1: comet blazing its trail for the previous forty months, But
Speaker 1: the best was yet to come. As the earth spun
Speaker 1: into the evening of March twenty fourth, people all around
Speaker 1: the world turned their eyes to the sky and braced
Speaker 1: themselves for one of the most spectacular astronomical events in
Speaker 1: the history of mankind. For those of us watching in
Speaker 1: Great Britain, the occasion didn't disappoint. For those of us
Speaker 1: located around the border of Derbyshire and South Yorkshire, it
Speaker 1: was about to become a very memorable evening. Indeed, albeit
Speaker 1: for a somewhat different reason. Just exactly what occurred that
Speaker 1: night over the dark, misty moors of the British Peak
Speaker 1: District has never fully been accounted for. It has become
Speaker 1: known as the Howda Moore Incident and as a mystery
Speaker 1: that remains to this day unexplained. Howd and Moore, located
Speaker 1: in the aptly named Dark Peak region of Britain's Peak District,
Speaker 1: has long been associated with the strange and mysterious the
Speaker 1: wilder misty moors have played host to a number of
Speaker 1: peculiar sightings, ranging from the ghosts of plains, people and
Speaker 1: even ufoes. With more than fifty aircraft believed to have
Speaker 1: crashed in the region over the years, at the cost
Speaker 1: of roughly two hundred lives, it is easy to see
Speaker 1: how such tragedy might weave its way into the local folklore.
Speaker 1: But nothing could have prepared the local community for what
Speaker 1: was about to unfold. On the evening of Monday, March
Speaker 1: twenty fourth, nineteen ninety seven, with the hail Pop comet
Speaker 1: coming to its brightest and most prominent point, thousands had
Speaker 1: ventured out into the cold spring air to witness the spectacle,
Speaker 1: and the conditions could not have been more perfect with
Speaker 1: so many people preoccupied with the comet. For the officers
Speaker 1: manning the control room of Ecclesfield Police Station in the
Speaker 1: city of Sheffield, it was proving to be very quiet
Speaker 1: evening indeed, but all that was about to change. The
Speaker 1: first call came in just after ten fifteen pm. Two
Speaker 1: farmers from near a town named Bolsterstone reported a low
Speaker 1: flying aircraft traveling in a southwesterly direction. Moments later, after
Speaker 1: the plane had appeared to hit the ground. An orange
Speaker 1: glow was seen, followed by several plumes of smoke rising
Speaker 1: into the air. In the nearby village of Strides, local
Speaker 1: gamekeepers Mike and Barbara Ellison were watching TV when they
Speaker 1: heard a terrific explosion coming from the direction of the moors.
Speaker 1: After reporting the crash to the local police, mister Ellison
Speaker 1: was joined by community Officer PC Mick Hage as they
Speaker 1: attempted to find the location of the explosion. Although their
Speaker 1: search proved unsuccessful, they too reported seeing an eerie red
Speaker 1: glow in the sky just to the south of the moors.
Speaker 1: At around the same time, Police Special Constable Marie Franz
Speaker 1: Tattersfield and her husband Steve were also driving near the
Speaker 1: town of Bolsterstone when suddenly what looked like a four
Speaker 1: seat aircraft flew directly across their path. Marie Franz noted
Speaker 1: the craft was unusually low and extremely bright, and later
Speaker 1: described the incident as the strangest thing she had ever seen.
Speaker 1: As the aircraft continued on its path directly in front
Speaker 1: of them, it disappeared behind some trees and a tremendous
Speaker 1: boom was heard coming from the same direction as the
Speaker 1: phone calls flooded into the police control center. A bizarre
Speaker 1: picture was starting to emerge. Witnesses reported seeing a triangular
Speaker 1: object as wide as the street, passing overhead. Others recounted
Speaker 1: seeing strange pink and red lights hovering in the sky.
Speaker 1: Many reported hearing a loud bang or boom, followed by
Speaker 1: an eerie orange light glowing in the distance. There were
Speaker 1: also reports, including one from a retired Royal Air Force officer,
Speaker 1: of two Tornado fighter jets flying extremely low, as if
Speaker 1: they had just been scrambled for an unexpected operation. His
Speaker 1: report also noted how unusual it was for them to
Speaker 1: be seen at that time of night. One lady, described
Speaker 1: by police as a clear headed, reliable witness who was
Speaker 1: familiar with the night sky, reported seeing an aircraft shaped
Speaker 1: like a long cigar. The aircraft did not have wings,
Speaker 1: made no noise, and appeared to be glowing. Local businessman
Speaker 1: Dan Grayson recounted seeing a bright light that moved off
Speaker 1: before splitting into two and disappearing over the horizon. Shortly afterwards,
Speaker 1: a search and rescue helicopter flew over the exact same spot.
Speaker 1: Perhaps strangest of all was the eleven PM reported sighting
Speaker 1: of an unknown man seen wandering the eight fifty seven
Speaker 1: road by the passengers of a mini After flagging down
Speaker 1: the bus, the man requested a lift back to Sheffield,
Speaker 1: but was refused on account of his strange behavior. The man,
Speaker 1: dressed in dark brown clothes, was described as being in
Speaker 1: some distress and smelling strongly of diesel. The young man
Speaker 1: who reported the incident, a jet engineer in the Royal
Speaker 1: Air Force, later reported that the pungent smell of diesel
Speaker 1: was remarkably similar to the smell of aviator fluid. Whatever
Speaker 1: occurred that night was enough to convince the South Yorkshire
Speaker 1: Police to send over two hundred personnel to conduct a
Speaker 1: fifty square mile search of the Pennine Moorland. The search,
Speaker 1: which cost over fifty thousand pounds of public money, lasted
Speaker 1: for over fifteen hours but failed to yield any significant findings.
Speaker 1: Seeking a rational explanation for the events, head of the
Speaker 1: police operation, Chief Inspector Christine Burbery, reached out to the
Speaker 1: many Royal Air Force bases that operated in the area. However,
Speaker 1: they informed her that there had been no military aircraft
Speaker 1: flying that night that would have explained the reports of
Speaker 1: low flying planes and the explosions. The following day, a
Speaker 1: formal statement released by the Ministry of Defense declared unequivocally
Speaker 1: that no military exercise of any kind had taken place
Speaker 1: the previous night. The official South Yorkshire Police record categorize
Speaker 1: the incident as unexplained. Are you always taking care of
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Speaker 1: gives you access to a licensed therapist to help you
Speaker 1: get back to feeling your best, to feeling like yourself again.
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Speaker 1: by phone or video. Therapy appointments are available seven days
Speaker 1: a week from seven a m. To nine pm local time.
Speaker 1: If you feel overwhelmed sometimes, maybe you feel stressed or anxious,
Speaker 1: depressed or lonely, or you might be struggling with a
Speaker 1: personal or family issue, teledoc can help. Teledoc is committed
Speaker 1: to facilitating great therapeutic matches, so they make it easy
Speaker 1: to change counselors if needed. For free teledoc therapy is
Speaker 1: available through most insurance or employers. Download the app or
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Speaker 1: get started. That's teladoc dot com slash Unexplained podcast. Due
Speaker 1: to the extortionate cost to the public of the seemingly
Speaker 1: needless rescue operation, it fell to local MP for Sheffield
Speaker 1: and Hillsborough, Helen Jackson, to seek some more concrete answers.
Speaker 1: More than a year after the event, her questions were
Speaker 1: finally put to then Defense Minister George Robinson and Home
Speaker 1: Secretary Jack Straw in the House of Commons, but her
Speaker 1: questions were met with a familiar reply. The Ministry of
Speaker 1: Defense maintained their official stance that there had been no
Speaker 1: cover up over this incident and no aircraft were scrambled
Speaker 1: that night to intercept a UFO. Indeed, it is a
Speaker 1: court martial offense to break the sound barrier over land,
Speaker 1: an occurrence that might have explained the loud bangs described
Speaker 1: by many of the witnesses. Although there is no photographic
Speaker 1: evidence of the night in question, two mysterious sounds were
Speaker 1: picked up by microphones located at the British Geological Society
Speaker 1: Research Post in Leeds. According to senior seismologist Glenn Ford,
Speaker 1: the two bangs had without doubt come from the direction
Speaker 1: of the moors. After further examination, the sound signal was
Speaker 1: found to be indicative of two separate sonic booms, sounds
Speaker 1: that could only have been caused by high speed aircraft.
Speaker 1: More startling, however, is the claim allegedly made by a
Speaker 1: radar operator from the local Royal Air Force base in
Speaker 1: nearby Linton upon Ooze. The operator claimed to attract a
Speaker 1: UFO on the night of March twenty fourth for over
Speaker 1: ten minutes before it shot off his radar screen and disappeared.
Speaker 1: The claim was later retracted and an official statement put
Speaker 1: out by r F Linton upon Ouze declared, we are
Speaker 1: the only people in this area who would be flying
Speaker 1: above the region and we were not practicing last night.
Speaker 1: We can confirm that nothing was picked up on radar either.
Speaker 1: It is not without exaggeration that the Hailbop comet is
Speaker 1: considered the most widely observed in our history. With the
Speaker 1: growth of the Internet in the nineties, as well as
Speaker 1: rapid improvements being made to devices of communication, never before
Speaker 1: had the planet been so interconnected in its awareness of
Speaker 1: such an event. Also, taking into account the popularity of
Speaker 1: shows such as the X Files, it would be easy
Speaker 1: to classify the HOWD a more incident, not as evidence
Speaker 1: of an alien visitation, but rather little more than the
Speaker 1: workings of the human imagination, fueled by our collective excitement
Speaker 1: over the hail Bop comet the sightings of strange aircraft.
Speaker 1: Perhaps nothing but the self deception of people who wanted
Speaker 1: such an event to be true, coupled with our insatiable
Speaker 1: desire to attach reason and purpose to a set of
Speaker 1: disparate and mundane events. Or is there something else entirely
Speaker 1: that might explain the events of that night, something far
Speaker 1: more unnerving. In nineteen ninety eight, two psychologists named Arian
Speaker 1: Mack and Irvin Rock published a paper the Massachusetts Institute
Speaker 1: of Technology entitled Inattentive Blindness. Building on the earlier work
Speaker 1: of cognitive psychologists Ulrich Nisser and Robert Becklin, The paper
Speaker 1: included the results of a series of simple experiments that
Speaker 1: highlighted a fundamental deficiency in our sense of perception. The
Speaker 1: study concluded that, due to our brain's natural tendency to
Speaker 1: band multitudes of objects and stimuli into single groups, we
Speaker 1: might often fail to notice even the most obvious of stimuli,
Speaker 1: even if it was occurring directly in front of us.
Speaker 1: Is it possible the due to the public's hyper vigilance
Speaker 1: and heightened awareness of the sky above, that they were
Speaker 1: suddenly receptive to seeing an unusual object flying overhead, an
Speaker 1: object that might otherwise have passed them by completely unnoticed.
Speaker 1: Perhaps in the manner of the apocryphal story detailing the
Speaker 1: moment that Christopher Columbus approached the shores of what would
Speaker 1: later become known as the Caribbean, having never seen such
Speaker 1: a thing before. It is said that the people of
Speaker 1: the island were completely oblivious to the huge ships approaching,
Speaker 1: and only registered them after noticing strange disturbances in the water.
Speaker 1: It is widely accepted that, in a physical sense, at least,
Speaker 1: the world we see around us is not a truthful depiction. Rather,
Speaker 1: it is the result of a combination of both the
Speaker 1: limitations of our brains and the extraordinary way in which
Speaker 1: we have evolved to best suit our environment. Take, for example,
Speaker 1: the appearance of color, an extravagance that only exists because
Speaker 1: of the way our brains interpret variations in the wavelengths
Speaker 1: of light. And, although some may disagree, being able to
Speaker 1: see the world as a collection of solid and manageable
Speaker 1: materials as opposed to the vibrating mesh of subatomic particles
Speaker 1: that it really is, would seem superficially at least, to
Speaker 1: be of much more use to us. To counter these deficiencies,
Speaker 1: we have developed technologies that enable us to detect and
Speaker 1: observe the things that we might otherwise be unable to see,
Speaker 1: things such as gravity waves and the Higgs boson. And
Speaker 1: yet for all our technological ingenuity, we are still unable
Speaker 1: to account for what makes up over eighty percent of
Speaker 1: the known universe. The answer to what exactly constitutes dark matter,
Speaker 1: the substance believed to be responsible for this deficit, remains
Speaker 1: perhaps the biggest prize in physics. And if you take
Speaker 1: the view that technology is only an extension of the
Speaker 1: human experience and therefore susceptible to the same limits of perception,
Speaker 1: it's possible that some aspects of the universe might forever
Speaker 1: remain invisible to us. And if you consider the possibility
Speaker 1: that two species, having evolved in different ways, might look
Speaker 1: at the universe and see two completely different things, just
Speaker 1: what exactly is it that we are looking at? It
Speaker 1: is a thought that brings to mind perhaps the biggest
Speaker 1: question of them all is the truth out there or
Speaker 1: is it merely in our heads? This episode of Unexplained
Speaker 1: was produced by me Richard McClane smith. Unexplained is on
Speaker 1: Twitter at Unexplained Pod, and you can find out more
Speaker 1: about me and the show at Unexplained podcast dot com. Now,
Speaker 1: it's time to take care of yourself. To make time
Speaker 1: for you, teledoc gives you access to a licensed therapist
Speaker 1: to help you get back to feeling your best. Speak
Speaker 1: to a licensed therapist by phone or video anytime between
Speaker 1: seven a m. To nine pm local time, seven days
Speaker 1: a week. Teledoc Therapy is available through most insurance or employers.
Speaker 1: Download the app or visit teledoc dot com Forward slash
Speaker 1: Unexplained Podcast today to get started. That's t e l
Speaker 1: a d oc dot com Slash Unexplained podcast