The Phoenix Lights revisited

[quillius]

I have asked that question many times. In a city the size of Phoenix, it seems inconceivable that not one person was a photographer, or worked in the film industry, and could not capture something decent, let alone something grainy. All that we do have are pictures and films or flares from the later event, which I would think indicates the earlier lights might not have been as spectacular, or lasted as long as is claimed.

For me, this one is another Roswell and BOLA, I feel mass hysteria is a certain component.

I also have a sneaky suspicion that the number of claims is somewhat exaggerated. I think quite a few were counted twice.

yes this part does bug me.......although I dont feel its the same as BOLA at all...but thats another story.

[quillius]

Well, she saw the same CONFIGURATION (not shouting, big hint LOL) so of course she would feel happy at having her observation confirmed by the man with the best view in the house! What else would you expect hun?

so Mitch had the best view due to his scope, hence being able to see formation of planes.........so how did she observe the formation with her eyes? (remember to note Mitch said they were small planes and they were very high...and remember it was dark)

[Just Dave]

Given perceptual errors abound in every human on the planet, as exemplified by psyche's earlier post with this image:

How then can you be so sure that there even was a craft (singular)?

Because around 1000 people reported an OBJECT flying above phoenix, and like i said people wouldn't care if there was an airplane or more flying in formation nor would they care if they were from the nearby base... Something massive flew over Phoenix that night that caught peoples attention from all over the city... There is no evidence...if there was it would be confiscated by US army.... Still if you want evidence drop by NORAD they would probably show you pretty nice radar images but unfortuanly they can't they just don't work for public. There is plenty of evidence but we ( public ) don't have access for that... Since first man evolved brains he saw stuff he couldn't explain in history, but as he evolved he began to understand that some phenomena is not natural...( sorry for going offtopic abit ).

So until there is a reasonable theory about that night , the object was UFO... simple..and there is no reasonable theory supporting otherwise..

And airplanes for real? 5 airplanes flew in formation so close to the ground with only 1 light and no red or blue BLINKING lights... People reported MASSIVE OBJECT not seperate objects..They even described it abit and it was no airplane what they saw...

[Just Dave]

Do you think it is at all significant that probably more than one million people didn't report seeing anything unusual that night?

Would it surprise you that less than one percent of people can look into the sky and not know what they are looking at?

More ignorance please, where can i order some? What part are you ignoring here? The 1000 people who actualy saw something huge out of the ordinary or the part that they are used to airplanes and bases and their dirlls and exercises?

[Hazzard]

I believe that the "craft" was a connecting the dots phenomenon.

[Just Dave]

Hi Nuke

Mitch Stanley is one of us, you whatever you want to call it. He is one of the people. 21 years old with a telescope.

You know who you are supporting? Fyfe Symmington. 19th Governor of Arizona.

So when did you stop listening to the people and start listening to the Government? I have never known you to do so.

Until now.

Food for thought?

I am not looking at him from gov. perspective i'm looking at him from a witness perspective...I bet when the first reports started to flow in about this, he got contacted from someone higher than hes paygrade, and hes been probably told to make a prank/hoax/trick at press conference so it would divert people minds from an actualy event..

[synchronomy]

Having read much of Steven Greer's material, I thought it important to provide this little anecdote which clears up a lot of the mystery surrounding the Phoenix Lights.

Apparently, the incident was brought on by his own initiative:

I flew into Phoenix on a U.S. Airways flight and as we were landing, I began the CE-5 protocols. I went into an expanded state of consciousness and into space and began vectoring extraterrestrial vehicles into the Phoenix area. I told the ETs, "It'd be great if you can do something undeniable while we're here that we can put into this footage to share with Congress whom we will be briefing in a couple of weeks." This was on March 13th, 1997, and the briefing for Congress was in early April.

So there you go folks. Mystery solved.

It's too bad Jaime Maussan and his film crew hadn't been there to report first hand!

[Babe Ruth]

FWIW, Symington's testimony to set the record straight, AFTER he had been out of office for some time, is most interesting. I'm pretty sure that has been linked to on one of these threads.

As a USAF pilot, he made it clear that what HE saw that night was not in the USAF inventory. It was not a human craft.

[booNyzarC]

Gidday Psyche, I dont actually think Mitch is lying to be honest. With regards ot having a consistant story throughout is debatable. I have seen no real first hand account from Mitch, what does he say exactly straight after? all the articles from people like Ortega have come months after. Did Micth see lights he pressumed were planes? did he then exaggerate slightly to say he actually saw planes as opposed to lights he was sure were planes? The accounts below even in their limited second hand format show enough inaccuracies IMO. I will go through them below.

At least you don't call Mitch a liar. That much is good.

It was plain to see, Stanley says. Under magnification, Stanley could clearly see that each light split into pairs, one each on the tips of squarish wings. Even under the telescope's power, the planes appeared small, indicating that they were flying high. Stanley says he followed the planes for about a minute, then turned his telescope to more interesting objects.

"They were planes. There's no way I could have mistaken that," he says.

From Tony Ortega, The Hack and the Quack, page 2

From this I get that the planes must have been up high as opposed to just in the distance then? why do small planes indicate height?

The most interesting portion fo this is the bolded....

Yes, the smaller that the plane appears the further it would be from the observer. This could have been due to a combination of altitude and horizontal distance. I don't know that we have seen any indication of the exact angle that Mitch made his observation from, but in Tim Printy's article we find that the observation was made while the lights were low on the horizon. With that I'd say it was a combination of horizontal and vertical distance. At any rate, this drawing of what he saw should give us some idea.

His description of squared-off wings gibed with a type of ground-attack airplane called an A-10 Warthog, the same type the military said had been in the area that night. I didn't see the famed Phoenix Lights, but it makes sense to me that if they might have been A-10s, they probably were.

From Ray Stern, Air Traffic COntrollers Who Saw UFO Muzzled by FAA

hmmm so Stanley saw the A10s that dropped flares at 10pm after training.....I guess you see the issues here straight away.... whos now confusing events...this is the problem with second hand accounst by reporters.

Two things are important to note here.

First, this article was actually regarding a completely different sighting that happened in 2008, and this sighting ended up being a hoax.

Source 1 - Pictures, Video, Commentary

Source 2 - Hoax Explained

The second important note is that Ray's commentary in relation to Mitch Stanley and the similarity of A-10 Warthogs is purely speculative, and not at all a quotation of Mitch. Surely you can tell the difference between speculation and the quoting of a witness?

I witnessed on March 13 what Mitch Stanley observed through his telescope. But I didn't need a telescope to observe the configuration, which appeared unbalanced at five. That was my first clue that it was interterrestrial. As I watched before it disappeared, I observed it peel off into the great beyond. To what country it belongs, I don't know or really care.

I just know those pilots are having a good laugh at our expense, especially when an individual on the Phoenix City Council calls for an all-out investigation utilizing the "Arizona air force." Maybe Frances Emma Barwood is the alien since she is not aware that Arizona doesn't have an air force. Oh, well. It is nice to know there are still some of us who are not misled by mass hysteria or by the movie Independence Day and have their power of reasoning intact. Thanks for printing this story and clearing up what has turned into a colossal mess.

Rose Kauffmann

Scottsdale

From Letters

wow....so much wrong here where do I start....

how did she figure out what Mitch witnessed she did also....??/ time? part of sky? etc etc or is she just speculating? hmm It sounds a little more like a claim to me bet she didnt do her homework to be able to make such a claim!!!

Also great eye sight.....hundreds cannot see the configeration of planes but she can.....wonderwoman maybe?

first clue it was terrestrial? is she kidding?

This is as biased an approach as Ive seen. alternative motive perhaps? cant wait to put the boot in? perhaps 'If Frances Emma Barwood wants to do something constructive during her 15 minutes of fame, she might draft rules to curb light pollution'

also good to note her constant use of the word 'it' rather than ' they' when talking about planes?!?!?! shall we give her teh benefit of the doubt and say she means 'formation' hence the word 'it'

Interesting questions you have here Quillius, but forgive me if I find them extremely nit-picky and of little relevance.

First of all, she refers to "it" because she is talking about "the configuration." You wouldn't mention "the configuration" and then refer to "it" as a "they" unless you also delineated what "the configuration" consisted of.

Secondly, why is it so hard to believe that someone could see the lights from a formation of planes without actually seeing the aircraft and conclude that what they were seeing was in fact airplanes? I've experienced this many times at night, seeing a formation of planes and knowing that they were planes. Does she really need to be wonderwoman to accomplish such a feat?

Third, you bring in the possibility of ulterior motives here again. Is this raising of a conspiratorial hint an effort to discredit this witness that has come forward and provided her name in support of a mundane conclusion?

Finally, the level of scrutiny you are applying to Mitch, Rich, and now Rose (intense scrutiny) is not balanced by the level of scrutiny you are applying to the supposed "thousands" of other witnesses which you seem to believe supports an otherworldly conclusion (virtually no scrutiny). Why is that?

The fact of the matter is that we only have a handful of people, comparatively, who have provided detailed accounts, their names, the times of their sightings, and their locations. In addition to that we have been told that there were "thousands" of other witnesses to the event, and that these ambiguous "thousands" are in support of an otherworldly conclusion. How many of these actually were witness to the 10 PM flare event? Where exactly were they when they had their sightings? What time was it? What direction were they looking? How many lights did they see? How fast were the lights moving? After hearing about the possible explanations, how many of these "thousands" of witnesses said to themselves, "Hmm, that makes sense and seems to perfectly fit with what I actually saw." ?

These "thousands" of witnesses were apparently unable to identify what they were looking at. They didn't know what they saw.

Mitch, Rich, and apparently Rose, say that they knew what they saw.

Which carries more weight? A position of certainty? Or a position of uncertainty?

the if that is the case disproving who they claimed to be should be easy....i.e. snowbirds? this is the claim, which we know isnt true so why the claim?

Lastly three seperate articles on Mitch all say he turned away from scope as didnt want to look at planes...

Above one says he turned scope onto more interesting things? which is it? which article has this correct

Why do you say that it wasn't the snowbirds? I agree that it is possible that it wasn't, but I don't think this has been confirmed, despite the fact that their public relations offices stated that it wasn't them. Imagine the public relations nightmare that might follow if they came out and said that yes, 5 of their pilots decided to perform a hoax on this night because they expected a lot of people would be out looking for the Hale-Bopp. Would anyone reasonably expect them to fess up to such a thing?

As for the verbiage used in the articles, I see no discrepancy. If someone describes the scene in terms that he was looking through the scope for a minute, and then turned away to tell his mother that he was looking at planes, that doesn't mean he couldn't have turned right back and pointed the scope at something he found more interesting.

So I finally ask for any proof that shows Mitch was looking at the same area of sky as Rich Contry was?

I also ask for any words from Mitch soon after the event, preferably before June?

I also ask that someone proves that the pilot did not say 'canadian snowbirds' or show they were in the sky?

I don't know that you are going to get answers to these questions. In fact, I doubt if you will. Is acceptance of the testimony they've provided hinging on their answering of these questions in your mind?

Would you like to try applying this same level of scrutiny to the disparate "thousands" of witnesses who said that they saw anywhere from 3 to 9 lights in various formations as pointed out by psyche? Where were they exactly? What time were they making their observations? What direction were they looking? How do we know they weren't lying?

If you can't provide me with those details, I think I may just have to brush what they supposedly said under the rug. Maybe they were all plants for the ETH Propaganda Machine. With the name Stephen Bassett being linked as Barwood's "UFO political consultant" it seems plausible...

Hopefully you can see how ridiculous that stance would be. And hopefully you can see how similar it is to the stance you and bee seem to be taking in relation to these particular witnesses who have reached conclusions that you apparently dislike.

Bottom line for me at this stage is Mitch did see planes but they were military. I also speculate that the Military interupted call and made claim of 'snowbirds'

Speculation can be an entertaining exercise, but it may not bring us closer to the truth. That said, at least you agree that Mitch did in fact see planes as he has stated.

Cheers.

[booNyzarC]

Having read much of Steven Greer's material, I thought it important to provide this little anecdote which clears up a lot of the mystery surrounding the Phoenix Lights.

Apparently, the incident was brought on by his own initiative:

I flew into Phoenix on a U.S. Airways flight and as we were landing, I began the CE-5 protocols. I went into an expanded state of consciousness and into space and began vectoring extraterrestrial vehicles into the Phoenix area. I told the ETs, "It'd be great if you can do something undeniable while we're here that we can put into this footage to share with Congress whom we will be briefing in a couple of weeks." This was on March 13th, 1997, and the briefing for Congress was in early April.

So there you go folks. Mystery solved.

It's too bad Jaime Maussan and his film crew hadn't been there to report first hand!

Absolutely brilliant!

[booNyzarC]

More ignorance please, where can i order some?

What part are you ignoring here? The 1000 people who actualy saw something huge out of the ordinary or the part that they are used to airplanes and bases and their dirlls and exercises?

I'm sorry Nuke_em, but whenever you comment about this case you expose the fact that you seem to have no idea what you're talking about.

I believe that the "craft" was a connecting the dots phenomenon.

Exactly Hazzard. The mind is an incredible thing and has a tendency to fill in the gaps for us when we are presented with something we find mysterious.

[booNyzarC]

I am not looking at him from gov. perspective i'm looking at him from a witness perspective...I bet when the first reports started to flow in about this, he got contacted from someone higher than hes paygrade, and hes been probably told to make a prank/hoax/trick at press conference so it would divert people minds from an actualy event..

If you ever paid attention to Fyfe's actual statements you'd realize that he wasn't ordered to do anything of the kind. He and his staff decided to pull that stunt all on their own, but not for any sinister reasons. They were only trying to lighten the mood because people were getting overly worked up by the events. They seemed to think that bringing some brevity to the situation would help, and only after the fact did they realize that it had the exact opposite effect.

FWIW, Symington's testimony to set the record straight, AFTER he had been out of office for some time, is most interesting. I'm pretty sure that has been linked to on one of these threads.

As a USAF pilot, he made it clear that what HE saw that night was not in the USAF inventory. It was not a human craft.

I'd just like to point out that even though you are correct that he had the impression that it wasn't a human craft, in reality he just wasn't able to identify what he was looking at, just like many of the other witnesses. In the purest sense, he saw what would be categorized as a UFO.

[Just Dave]

Again long,huge lines of speculation... you are as right as i am boon... You have one mans questionable theory and you have many others saying a diffrent story... This plane theory? Where does he mention blinking lights which planes normaly have, no one even mentioned that... why did people report a huge object if there were only planes? How could they mix planes with something strange, the city stands for 120 years and no one before has seen anything like it, have they reported anything strange now? Weird the same planes fly over the city as we speak... No one is reporting strange huge object.. i mean ... planes in formation, they didn't report those A-10s which were probably flying in formation...as a huge object.

[booNyzarC]

Because around 1000 people reported an OBJECT flying above phoenix, and like i said people wouldn't care if there was an airplane or more flying in formation nor would they care if they were from the nearby base... Something massive flew over Phoenix that night that caught peoples attention from all over the city... There is no evidence...if there was it would be confiscated by US army.... Still if you want evidence drop by NORAD they would probably show you pretty nice radar images but unfortuanly they can't they just don't work for public. There is plenty of evidence but we ( public ) don't have access for that... Since first man evolved brains he saw stuff he couldn't explain in history, but as he evolved he began to understand that some phenomena is not natural...( sorry for going offtopic abit ).

Correction, people reported what they perceived to be a large object. As Hazzard and others have pointed out, this is an easy conclusion to reach when you have multiple points of light in a specific configuration. It is very easy to connect those dots, joining them together as part of a single object, even if they are actually individual objects completely distinct from one another.

So until there is a reasonable theory about that night , the object was UFO... simple..and there is no reasonable theory supporting otherwise..

Just because you either disagree with or do not understand the reasonable explanations which have been provided, it does not mean that those explanations are incorrect. From the standpoint of many of the witnesses, however, I wholeheartedly agree that they saw what can only be categorized as a UFO, in the purest of definitions, because they were unable to identify it.

And airplanes for real? 5 airplanes flew in formation so close to the ground with only 1 light and no red or blue BLINKING lights... People reported MASSIVE OBJECT not seperate objects..They even described it abit and it was no airplane what they saw...

Yes, airplanes for real. But no, not flying close to the ground. Flying at a pretty high altitude most likely, high enough that their low throttle engine noise would be virtually imperceptible. Cast against the darkness of the night sky and with brilliant lights shining downward, seeing the spaces between these aircraft would be difficult. And at the altitude they were likely flying, a combination of exhaust and contrails in the otherwise clear atmosphere would potentially create the wavy and translucent effect that so many witnesses described.

It really isn't that hard to picture how this is not only viable for explaining the accounts, but is actually a very good fit. Unless, of course, one isn't open minded enough to truly consider the possibilities.

[booNyzarC]

Again long,huge lines of speculation... you are as right as i am boon... You have one mans questionable theory and you have many others saying a diffrent story...

Dear oh dear. This indicates to me that because I may have been overly verbose at times, you haven't taken the time to actually read what I've had to say. It is very likely that you haven't taken the time to actually review all of the information in support of the conclusions I and others have reached. Too many words, perhaps?

This plane theory? Where does he mention blinking lights which planes normaly have, no one even mentioned that... why did people report a huge object if there were only planes? How could they mix planes with something strange, the city stands for 120 years and no one before has seen anything like it, have they reported anything strange now? Weird the same planes fly over the city as we speak... No one is reporting strange huge object.. i mean ... planes in formation, they didn't report those A-10s which were probably flying in formation...as a huge object.

Had you taken the time to actually read all of the information which has been provided, you would be able to answer these questions on your own. Rather than further confuse you with even more words, I'll respectfully ask that you go back through the answers that have already been given, at length, repeatedly, time and again. Take your time, there is no rush.

[Just Dave]

I choose not to... i don't see you as a person who is worthy of disccusing such things... I'll only reply to those who take in all the possibilites you don't... you are so closeminded that words can't describe that, you believe probably everything that you see on TV News even thou it might be wrong but you are firm in your state of mind... It is ok keep it that way... i told you like months ago that i won't reply to you since you offer loads of worthless info, which is a fact to you and people like hazzard, you chose to believe Mitch and.... yeah i choose believe to many others who seen something they don't see every day..

And drop this attitude of yours it really is annoying... rather start listen to others and stop listening to yourself for a change..at least try ...

[booNyzarC]

I choose not to... i don't see you as a person who is worthy of disccusing such things... I'll only reply to those who take in all the possibilites you don't... you are so closeminded that words can't describe that, you believe probably everything that you see on TV News even thou it might be wrong but you are firm in your state of mind... It is ok keep it that way... i told you like months ago that i won't reply to you since you offer loads of worthless info, which is a fact to you and people like hazzard, you chose to believe Mitch and.... yeah i choose believe to many others who seen something they don't see every day..

And drop this attitude of yours it really is annoying... rather start listen to others and stop listening to yourself for a change..at least try ...

Well that's convincing. Who can possibly disagree with such compelling logical arguments and solid references?

I'm sorry Nuke_em, but there is a reason that I address you in the way that I do, and it is the result of our history. I've tried to help with explaining things to you many times, but you don't even bother to read it. What more do you want me to do? I can't force you to read, but when you come at me with a position of blatantly obvious ignorance, how else do you expect me to respond to it?

Accusing me of being closed minded is simply incorrect. Had you ever taken the time to go through my position on this subject, and actually understand my point of view, you'd realize that I am fully open to the possibility of alien visitation. You'd also probably realize that I've spent a lot of time and effort looking for some way to validate such a possibility. Perhaps my standards for proof are more stringent than yours, but that hardly makes me closed minded, it just makes me more discerning.

Enough about all of this though.

If you have something of value to add to the discussion related to the Phoenix Lights, I'd like to hear it.

[quillius]

At least you don't call Mitch a liar. That much is good.

Well agreeing on one point out of ten is progress, right?

Yes, the smaller that the plane appears the further it would be from the observer. This could have been due to a combination of altitude and horizontal distance. I don't know that we have seen any indication of the exact angle that Mitch made his observation from, but in Tim Printy's article we find that the observation was made while the lights were low on the horizon. With that I'd say it was a combination of horizontal and vertical distance. At any rate, this drawing of what he saw should give us some idea.

Yes obviously the further a plane is the smaller it appears, this however is not the question posed. The article said:

Even under the telescope's power, the planes appeared small, indicating that they were flying high

So I ask why does appearing small mean flying high? Can’t horizontal distance give the same result?

And I have read that he has all the details, but thats for another time as that itself is an issue.

Two things are important to note here.

First, this article was actually regarding a completely different sighting that happened in 2008, and this sighting ended up being a hoax.

Source 1 - Pictures, Video, Commentary

Source 2 - Hoax Explained

The second important note is that Ray's commentary in relation to Mitch Stanley and the similarity of A-10 Warthogs is purely speculative, and not at all a quotation of Mitch. Surely you can tell the difference between speculation and the quoting of a witness?

Of course I can and this is putting words in my mouth Boon.

The article clearly isn’t talking about another incident at this point but Mitch’s sighting. Granted Mitch didn’t say this but I never suggested he did, I used this to highlight the problem of second hand accounts by reporters not understanding things properly....didnt you highlight teh same but in reverse in another post?

Here it is in black and white....the reporter suggesting the A10s probably were what Mitch had seen...... I trust this helps you see what I am saying

These new lights may be more mysterious than the V-shaped formation over Phoenix that caused a stir in 1997. After that sighting, the military confirmed there were aircraft dropping flares near the Phoenix area, and New Times reported that a local guy named Mitch Stanley looked at the source of the lights with his telescope and saw -- airplanes. His description of squared-off wings gibed with a type of ground-attack airplane called an A-10 Warthog, the same type the military said had been in the area that night. I didn't see the famed Phoenix Lights, but it makes sense to me that if they might have been A-10s, they probably were.

Interesting questions you have here Quillius, but forgive me if I find them extremely nit-picky and of little relevance.

Nit-picky? Really? Well that is your opinion...and I can’t change that, although one could argue opinions at this point are of lesser relevance than the points I am picking out.

First of all, she refers to "it" because she is talking about "the configuration." You wouldn't mention "the configuration" and then refer to "it" as a "they" unless you also delineated what "the configuration" consisted of.

Yes granted, I did follow by saying let’s give her the benefit of the doubt.

Secondly, why is it so hard to believe that someone could see the lights from a formation of planes without actually seeing the aircraft and conclude that what they were seeing was in fact airplanes? I've experienced this many times at night, seeing a formation of planes and knowing that they were planes. Does she really need to be wonderwoman to accomplish such a feat?

No its not hard to believe that someone could draw that conclusion without seeing ‘planes’ but that doesn’t prove her conclusions are correct...far from it. To an extent she is not even a witness if she didn’t see planes J

Third, you bring in the possibility of ulterior motives here again. Is this raising of a conspiratorial hint an effort to discredit this witness that has come forward and provided her name in support of a mundane conclusion?

Like I said not quite the witness she is made out to be, and as for ulterior motives...the same as those with book deals, right?

Finally, the level of scrutiny you are applying to Mitch, Rich, and now Rose (intense scrutiny) is not balanced by the level of scrutiny you are applying to the supposed "thousands" of other witnesses which you seem to believe supports an otherworldly conclusion (virtually no scrutiny). Why is that?

2 (maybe 3) witnesses that go against what was perceived by the many hundreds....need scrutiny....don’t think it’s that intense myself...again I guess this is your opinion.[/font]

As for scrutinising the others, all in good time, at the moment I want to know if there were planes in the air and who’s they were and lastly if they correlate to the many other reports of a UFO[/font]

Edited October 15, 2012 by quillius

[quillius]

The fact of the matter is that we only have a handful of people, comparatively, who have provided detailed accounts, their names, the times of their sightings, and their locations. In addition to that we have been told that there were "thousands" of other witnesses to the event, and that these ambiguous "thousands" are in support of an otherworldly conclusion. How many of these actually were witness to the 10 PM flare event? Where exactly were they when they had their sightings? What time was it? What direction were they looking? How many lights did they see? How fast were the lights moving? After hearing about the possible explanations, how many of these "thousands" of witnesses said to themselves, "Hmm, that makes sense and seems to perfectly fit with what I actually saw." ?

I agree that all these questions need answering before putting forward the claim of a large craft....

These "thousands" of witnesses were apparently unable to identify what they were looking at. They didn't know what they saw.

Mitch, Rich, and apparently Rose, say that they knew what they saw.

Well if you have never seen something before how do you identify it......you don’t do this by not seeing something and jumping to a conclusion...or do you Rose?

Which carries more weight? A position of certainty? Or a position of uncertainty?

Neither, unless we have clear definitions of certainty which obviously at least Rose does not, and at best it is no different to some witnesses who claim to be certain that they saw a large craft.

Why do you say that it wasn't the snowbirds? I agree that it is possible that it wasn't, but I don't think this has been confirmed, despite the fact that their public relations offices stated that it wasn't them. Imagine the public relations nightmare that might follow if they came out and said that yes, 5 of their pilots decided to perform a hoax on this night because they expected a lot of people would be out looking for the Hale-Bopp. Would anyone reasonably expect them to fess up to such a thing?

hmmm don’t we finish on a discussion about speculation? What about bringing in conspiratory intent?

As for the verbiage used in the articles, I see no discrepancy. If someone describes the scene in terms that he was looking through the scope for a minute, and then turned away to tell his mother that he was looking at planes, that doesn't mean he couldn't have turned right back and pointed the scope at something he found more interesting.

no it doesn’t mean he couldn’t have done that, it just again highlights the issue with second hand accounts by reporters that have a specific agenda tone to their article. I would point out that this happens from both sides..as Boon highlighted in his transcription earlier

I don't know that you are going to get answers to these questions. In fact, I doubt if you will. Is acceptance of the testimony they've provided hinging on their answering of these questions in your mind?

no accepting testimony is ok but linking it to the other witness reports is another....again I ask how are these linked?

Would you like to try applying this same level of scrutiny to the disparate "thousands" of witnesses who said that they saw anywhere from 3 to 9 lights in various formations as pointed out by psyche? Where were they exactly? What time were they making their observations? What direction were they looking? How do we know they weren't lying?

I agree these need answering, from all witnesses.

If you can't provide me with those details, I think I may just have to brush what they supposedly said under the rug. Maybe they were all plants for the ETH Propaganda Machine. With the name Stephen Bassett being linked as Barwood's "UFO political consultant" it seems plausible... file:///C:UsersEFSTAT~1AppDataLocalTempmsohtmlclip11clip_image001.png

no comment J

Hopefully you can see how ridiculous that stance would be. And hopefully you can see how similar it is to the stance you and bee seem to be taking in relation to these particular witnesses who have reached conclusions that you apparently dislike.

No I do not see how that stance is even remotely similar, and I expected more from you Boon.

Oh and who says I don’t like their conclusions?

Speculation can be an entertaining exercise, but it may not bring us closer to the truth. That said, at least you agree that Mitch did in fact see planes as he has stated.

Cheers.

Me agreeing doesn’t make it so though, does it? J

[S2F]

Because around 1000 people reported an OBJECT flying above phoenix...

These figures of '1000's' seeing a V shaped craft really need to be validated before I can take them seriously. It sounds an awful lot like people lumping all of the witnesses into one category when I know that is false. I can accept that 1000's of witnesses saw something but how many reported a craft and how many reported just lights?

Edit: Furthermore, how can we be certain that those who reported a craft weren't susceptible to illusory contours?

Edited October 15, 2012 by Slave2Fate

[quillius]

Apologies to anyone reading my posts, I had to do some 'funky' things to get it to post and havent the time to fix it properly so please put up with the bold italic writing

[synchronomy]

These figures of '1000's' seeing a V shaped craft really need to be validated before I can take them seriously. It sounds an awful lot like people lumping all of the witnesses into one category when I know that is false. I can accept that 1000's of witnesses saw something but how many reported a craft and how many reported just lights?

I don't think there's really any firm numbers on "who saw what". There seems to be a lot of differing opinions on the numbers.

[booNyzarC]

Apologies to anyone reading my posts, I had to do some 'funky' things to get it to post and havent the time to fix it properly so please put up with the bold italic writing

I can't be expected to put up with this bold italic writing. Fix it or I won't respond to the points.

No worries Quillius, the formatting is all good.

[quillius]

I can't be expected to put up with this bold italic writing. Fix it or I won't respond to the points.

No worries Quillius, the formatting is all good.

I wouldnt mind but I am quite behind now for the day and the post still looks messy

[S2F]

I don't think there's really any firm numbers on "who saw what". There seems to be a lot of differing opinions on the numbers.

Which in essence is my point. If the true nature of the content of the reports can't be verified then is is borderline dishonest to use them (as a whole) in support of either side.