Excellent book! Recommanded reading:



Kevin Randle:
Scientific Ufology
Avon Books, New York 1999
p.17-32
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  Lelleland, Texas

  November 2, 1957


As noted earlier, eyewitness testimony is never going to be
sufficient in and of itself to prove the UFOs are
extraterrestrial craft. Witnesses, though they don't realize it,
allow their perceptions, their beliefs, and their experiences to
color their testimony. There is nothing to examine in an
eyewitness account except the background of the witness, to see
if he or she has a habit of telling tall tales, has trouble
distinguishing between real objects and the imagined, and if he
or she is a solid citizen not given to flights of fantasy.

  If all avenues for explanation have been exhausted in single-
witness cases, there is little else that investigators can do.
There is no way to learn if the witness was fooled by an unusual
meteor late at night, a private plane that filed no flight plan,
or a hundred other reasonable explanations that could fit the
facts.

  But sometimes there is a case with multiple witnesses in
widely separated locations who are unknown to one another and
who basically tell the same tale. Their timing makes it clear
that one witness had neither heard the story of another nor been
unduly influenced by media reports. These sorts of cases, made
of eyewitness testimony, can expand our knowledge and provide us
with valuable clues.

  The series of sightings that began around Levelland, Texas, on
the night of November 2, 1957, prove this point. Some have
claimed that they might have been inspired by the launch and
announcement of 'Sputnik II', but no similar outbreak of flying
saucer reports accompanied the launch of the first Soviet
spacecraft about a month earlier. Besides, the sightings seem to
have begun before the Soviets announced the launch - at least,
according to the Project Blue Book files.

  The first people to see the object were two farmers working
fields in the early evening near Pettit, Texas. Both grain
combines, each with two engines, used by the men failed as a
glowing object passed overhead. When it disappeared, the
equipment began to function again.

  At 9:30 that evening, a single witness traveling between
Seminole and Seagraves, Texas, southwest of Levelland, spotted
a light on the highway ahead. As he drove closer, his engine and
headlights failed. A few seconds later, the light rose into the
sky, and his car began to operate properly again.

  The first of the sightings reported directly to Levelland
police was made by Pedro Saucido (or Saucedo, depending on the
source), who, with Joe Salaz (or Palav, Palaz, Salav, or Salvaz,
depending on the source), saw a glowing object sweep across the
highway in front of his truck. As it landed near them, the
headlights died and the engine failed. Saucido dived out the
door and rolled out of the way. Salaz sat terror-stricken, his
eyes glued to the object.

  The blue-green glow shifted into a red so bright that Salaz
could no longer look directly at it. There seemed to be noise
coming from inside the craft. It sat on the ground for about
three minutes, and then, still glowing bright red, it shot
suddenly into the sky.

  Saucido crawled from under his truck. Now that the UFO was
gone, both the lights and engine began to work again. Afraid
that he would run into the object if he continued to Levelland,
he drove to another town to call the Levelland police. A deputy
sheriff listened to his report but laughed it off as just
another flying saucer story, ignoring the obvious distress of
the witness.

  A few days after the sightings, the Air Force investigator on
the case, Staff Sergeant Norman P. Barth of the 1006th Air
Intelligence Service Squadron, made a short trip into Levelland
to interview Saucido, among others. He wrote a lengthy report,
which was forwarded to Blue Book headquarters some time later
and provided additional details. Although he interviewed
Saucido, that name does not appear in the case report. When the
Blue Book files were released to the public in 1976, the Air
Force removed the names of the witnesses. However, by reading
the statements of the witnesses provided to the press and
comparing the details, it is possible to match the reports to
the names with some accuracy.

  It would seem that Barth gave Saucido a low reliability rating
as a witness. Barth wrote, "SOURCE [Saucido] appeared to be
[deleted by Air Force officers] He stated his occupation was a
barber, however, Sheriff Clem ... stated that SOURCE was a part-
time farm laborer, dishwasher, barber, etc. SOURCE had no
concept of direction and was conflicting in his answers."

  Saucido provided a written statement for Barth. It said, "To
whom it may concern, on the date of November 2, 1957, I was
traveling north and west on route 116, driving my truck. At
about four miles out of Levelland, I saw a big flame, to my
right, front, then I thought it was lightning. But when this
object had reach [sic] to my position, it was different, because
it put my truck motor out and lights. Then I stop, got out, and
took a look, but it was so rapid and quite [sic] some heat, that
I had to hit the ground, it also had three colors, yellow, white
and it look like a torpedo, about 200 feet long, moving at about
600 to 800 miles an hour."

  Saucido didn't provide the third color in this statement. In
his interview with Barth, he did say the object was blue and
that "the object had a yellow flame coming out of the rear and
white smoke surrounding the flame."

  Near Shallowater, Texas, two married couples saw a flash of
light in the southwestern sky. Their car radio and the
headlighlights dimmed while they watched the light. The couples
reported that there were no thunderstorms around them at the
time.

  About an hour later, just after midnight on November 3, Jim
Wheeler saw a red glowing object sitting on the road. As he
approached it, his car engine died and his lights went out. The
egg-shaped object then lifted off swiftly and silently. As it
disapeared, Wheeler's car engine started again and the lights
came on. He, too, called the Levelland police.

  Almost as soon as the police hung up the telephone from
talking with Wheeler, Jose Alvarez called to report that he had
seen an egg-shaped object, which had killed his car's engine.
And, a few minutes later, Frank Williams walked into the station
to report the same sort of thing.

  There had now been several reports, spaced over a couple of
hours, about a large, egg-shaped craft. Most of the witnesses
had talked about the bright red color, said that their engines
had died and lights had dimmed as the object approached, and all
said that when the object lifted off or disappeared, their cars
began to function properly again. Someone estimated the size as
200 feet long, but that seemed to be extreme.

  The reaction of law enforcement in Levelland was that someone
was playing some sort of an elaborate joke. No one there
believed that a glowing red egg was terrorizing the populace.
Besides, the weather was poor, with mist and drizzle, and there
had been thunderstorms in the vicinity, off and on, all evening.
As the police officers discussed it and tried to laugh it off
Jesse (also identified as James) Long called to report that he
had been driving on a country road northwest of Levelland when
he'd come upon a landed, bright red craft. His truck engine had
died and his lights had gone out. Unlike the others, Long had
gotten out of his truck and started to walk toward the object.
Before he could get too close, the UFO took off. Long reported
that after it was gone, his truck engine had restarted easily.

  By this point Levelland sheriff Weir Clem decided that
something strange was happening, but he didn't like the idea of
chasing lights in the night sky, especially with the weather as
bad as it was. Thunderstorms were still in the area, and though
they had caffsed some problems earlier, it was no longer raining
in town. There was no excuse for not trying to find the object.

  To top it off, Ronald Martin, a college student, was nearing
Levelland when he glanced at the dashboard ammeter. Martin told
the Air Force investigator, Barth, "I was driving home from
Lubbock on state highway 116 at approximately 12:00 P.M. when
the ammeter on my car jumped to complete discharge, then it
returned to normal and my motor started cutting out like it was
out of gas. After it had quit running, my lights went out. I got
out of my car and tried in vain to find the trouble. When I
found nothing I closed the hood and looked for a passing
motorist to obtain help. It was at this time that I saw this
object. I got back into my car and tried to start it, but to no
avail. After that I did nothing but stare at this object until
it disappeared about five minutes later. I then resumed trying
to start my car and succeeded with no more trouble than under
normal circumstances. I then proceeded home very slowly and told
no one of this sighting until my parents returned home from a
weekend trip to Hobbs, New Mexico, for fear of public ridicule.
They did convince me that I should report this and did so to the
sheriff around 1:30 P.M. Sunday November 3rd."

  In his interview with Barth, Martin would provide some
additional details. He said that the object was oval shaped, and
that he thought it was about the size of a baseball held at
arm's length. He estimated that the object was about 75 to 100
feet long given the distance it was from him. He said it was
white, with a greenish tint, which Martin thought might have
been the result of his tinted windshield.

  Later, Barth would evaluate Martin's reliability, writing,
"SOURCE [Martin] seemed ... to be very sincere about his
sighting. He was appalled at the amount of publicity given him
and was anxious to have the sighting resolved. He was
unhesitating in his replies; however, during the course of
further questioning, he admitted uncertainty in some of his
answers. SOURCE can be considered reliable."

  About an hour after Martin's sighting, Sheriff Clem decided he
would have to investigate. He left the office with deputy
Patrick McCullogh and drove the back roads and the highways in
the Levelland area. At about 1:30 they saw the glowing UFO in
the distance. They couldn't seem to get very close to it.

  Barth found Clem to be "fairly reliable." He wrote, "SOURCE
impressed the investigator as being of average intelligence. He
was eager to cooperate in resolving the sighting and frequently
asked the investigator for advice on releases to the press. He
was rather pleased with the sudden importance of the county."

  In their interview, Clem told Barth that he was out looking
for the object that had been reported, and while traveling south
on Oklahoma Flat Road at about 20 miles an hour, he saw the
streak of light. It had a reddish glow and moved from south to
west. Clem thought that it was about 800 feet long and about 400
yards away.

  McCullough also provided Barth with a statement. He said he
"was driving on the unmarked roadway known as the Oklahoma Flats
Highway, and was attempting to search for an unidentified object
reported to the Levelland Police Department. When I saw a
strange looking flash to be down the roadway approximately a
mile to a mile and one half, the flash went from east to west
and appeared to be close to the ground. The flash lasted only a
fraction of a second, and was red to orange red in color. This
flash occured approximately 1:15 A.M. on the morning of November
3, 1957."

  About that same time, two highway patrol officers and
Constable Lloyd Bollen saw the UFO. They were unable to get very
close to it and reported the same sort of thing that Clem had -
a red glow in the distance. Thus there were five law enforcement
officers who thought they had seen the object, though none got
very close to it and none saw much more than a streak of light
in the distance.

  Also in the vicinity about that time was Ray Jones, the
Levelland fire marshal. He was searching for an explanation for
the many UFO reports that were being made that night. He saw a
streak of light not far from him. His lights dimmed and the
engine sputtered until the object was gone.

  Barth found another witness, an Air Force tech sergeant who
lived in Lubbock and was stationed at Reese Air Force Base.
Barth rated the man as "of above-average intelligence and
experience. He stated that he was giving his information only to
aid in resolving the sighting. SOURCE can be considered
unusually reliable."

  In his statement, the Source said, "On the night of 2 November
1957, at approximately 2318 [hours], my wife, two children and
myself departed my father's home in Sudan, Texas. At about 2330,
in the vicinity of Anton, Texas, my wife and I noted occasional
lightning and at the same time static on our radio. At
approximately 2350 or 2355, I turned south (at Shallowater,
Texas) on State Farm Road 1073. In just a few minutes, later
this bolt of lightning occured [sic] to our southwest. At the
same time, my radio and car lights went out for approximately 1-
3 seconds, and then came back on. My wife and I remarked that
was certainly a strong bolt of lightning to put out our lights
and radio. We didn't think anything about this until we heard
the radio report (Sunday night) of this phenomenon, with its
location and time factor, certainly coincidence with this flash
of lightning that my wife and I observed."

  Also part of the Air Force file on Levelland was a report from
man living in Whiteface, Texas. He told Barth, "While driving
north about 7 miles north of Sundown, Texas, I saw a light about
the size of a basketball about 200 or more feet above the ground
traveling from east to west. I stopped by side of road with my
wife and we watched the object, a bright red light giving off a
glow. It apparently stopped and began swinging north to south
about a quarter-mile distance while getting higher slowly and
fire or sparks similar to a cutting torch cutting iron scraping
out with visible smoke. An object above it seemed to hold up the
light on a cable or hose appearing to link between the light and
the baloon object above it. It continued swinging north to south
3 or 4 minutes by then at a fast rate of speed it went up into
the clouds and disappeared then light went out."

  As noted by the Air Force investigators, these sightings
received national attention the next day. Newspapers around the
country carried the stories of the mystery lights that seemed to
stall cars and dim headlights. The Air Force, because of the
number of reports, responded with an investigator apparently
based at Ent Air Force Base in Colorado Springs, Colorado. This
was, of course, Sergeant Barth.

  Newspapers in the area reported on the Air Force interest, but
they were less than complimentary about the investigation. An
Associated Press story, written on November 15, with a dateline
of Washington, D.C., reported, "The Air Force has looked into
five recent reports ... and there isn't a flying saucer in the
lot."

  The local press took that and noted, "_Five_ reports out of
scores of hundreds received? Was the Air Force perhaps
practicing frugality? We might think so, in light of another
Washington dispatch ('Science Sevice', Nov. 7 [1957]), which
said, 'Each major track-down costs about 10,000 Dollar,
including senidng out investigating personnel, paying
transportation expenses, sending planes aloft to investigate
intruders and taking pictures of, perhaps, Venus - plus
administrative work.' But on this point there is some
instructive evidence."

  The article continued, noting, "At Levelland, Texas, the
luminous egg-shaped object 200-300 feet long that stopped car
motors and radios was identified as 'a natural electric
phenomenon called ball lightning or St. Elmo's fire.' Apparently
the technical investigators who conducted this particular 10,000
Dollar investigation were not aware that these are _two entirely
different_ electric phenomena; or that the average diameter of
ball lightning is 8 _inches_; or that a good many scientists
deny that ball lightning even exists; or that St. Elmo's fire is
invariably attached to some solid object. As for the stalled car
motors, continued the AF, the same weather that produced St.
Elmo's lightning might have - MIGHT have, notice - 'soaked the
ignition systems of cars.' And what might have dried them out so
quickly once the light departed? And _did_ anyone's ignition in
fact become soaked? Were the witnesses asked this? (One report,
said the AF, arose from 'an automobile mechanic's mistake'; no
details given.)"

  Those details were available in the Blue Book files. In a
message that was transmitted to the assistant chief of staff,
Intelligence, at headquarters of the Air Force, it was reported,
"Investigation proved that a rotor had been changed on the
farmer's [Saucido's] truck the previous day. One piece of the
old rotor had not been removed and had wedged in between the
points causing the electrical system to be now nonoperative.
This statement was obtained from the mechanic who had repaired
the truck."

  Of course, there were other reports of car engines being
stalled, including that of Ronald Martin, which had been
investigated by the Air Force. The broken-rotor scenario doesn't
explain that case.

  The local paper continued, reporting, "The investigators said
further [note the plural] that they could find only three
witnesses who actually saw the big light. The miracle is, they
found as many as _three_. For we know, in this case, exactly
what the Air Force investigation amounted to. On November 6 the
Levelland 'Daily Sun News' reported, 'Air Force "Mystery" Man
Leaves City; Actions, Identity Cloaked in Secrecy' The anonymous
visitor drove an AF vehicle, wore civilian clothes, and 'said he
_could not give his name or any identification_' (italics ours
[meaning in original]). Around noon on the 6th he spent 30
minutes in Sheriff Weir Clem's office. He returned about 2:30
P.M. for another half hour. About 3 P.M. he headed for Lubbock
(30 miles away); came back about 6:30, said to Sheriff Clem,
'Well, I'm gone,' and drove off into the dark, drippy night.
Adds the paper, 'There was never any hint as to what he found
out or whether he was really a civilian or an Air Force
officer.'"

  We know, of course, that he was neither a civilian nor an Air
Force officer. He was, in fact, Sergeant Barth. The reason he
wouldn't identify himself was that to do so would reveal the
existence of another Air Force investigation of UFOs that was
not part of Project Blue Book. In 1957, and as late as 1985, the
existence of this other investigation, originally conducted by
the 4602d Air Intelligence Service Squadron, which evolved into
the unit to which Barth belonged, was considered secret
information.

  The newspaper analysis ended with the question "Does the Air
Force call this a 'major track-down'? We won't even bother to
laugh. Do they say that the activities of the mysterious
gentleman's 7-hour day cost $10,000 or anything like it? Then
the taxpayers had better start yelling bloody murder, for they
are being well bilked. Yet it was on the basis of this feeble
parody of an investigation that the Air Force, on November 15,
uttered its 'conclusions' about the Levelland object!"

  The criticism seemed to be justified. The Air Force
investigator did not find, nor did he apparently try to find,
some of the witnesses who were in Levelland on November 2, but
who had returned to their homes by November 6. It is clear from
the file that Barth didn't speak to Jesse Long, of Waco, Texas,
who said the object had killed his engine. Nor did he find or
interview Jim Wheeler, Jose Alvarez, Ray Jones, or Frank
Williams, the farmers near Pettit, the two couples near
Shallowater, or the man driving from Seminole to Seagraves, all
of whom said the proximity of the object had killed their car
engines and dimmed their lights.

  In a different unclassified message to the commander of the
Air Technical Intelligence Center, it was noted that "Contrary
to [Donald E.] Keyhoe's [Director of NICAP] and Washington press
reports only three, not nine persons witnessed the incident.
Object observed for only few seconds, not lengthy period as
implied by press. Mist, rain, thunderstorms and lightning
discharges in scene of incident, fact not quoted in newspaper
releases."

  The message also provided a number of explanations for the
sighting. "(1) Burning gas from oil operations in the area
reflected off low cloud ceiling existing at time. (2) Downed
power line giving off spark display in contact with the ground.
(3) Electrical discharge or similar phenomena like St. Elmo's
Fire caused by right combination of weather and other
conditions. (4) 'Ball lightning' a rare, but nevertheless,
possibility in view of lighting [sic] discharges in vicinity."

  Barth, near the end of his classified report, concluded by
writing, "1. A check with Lowry Flight Service [Lowry AFB,
Denver, Colorado], Carswell Flight Service [Carswell AFB, Fort
Worth, Texas], Reese AFB Operations [Lubbock, Texas], and
Lubbock CAA for any [aircraft] traffic in the area produced a
negative reply.

  A check for balloon operations showed that Amarillo and
Midland, Texas, weather stations released balloons at 1200Z and
2400Z daily. However, these balloons were not likely to be in
the area."

  Barth went on to propose a number of possible explanations,
which were speculative in nature. "The amount of rain in the
area, together with the condition of the crops, could have
developed a phenomenon similar to St. Elmo's fire.... The
possibility of burning excess gas from nearby oil operations
reflecting off low clouds existed.... The possibility of
lightning stalling a car and extinguishing the lights existed;
however, the possibility decreases as the number of such
incidents increases.... A check with the oil companies in the
area revealed that a limited amount of excess gas from oil
operations was being burned. Most of the gas is returned to the
ground.... A check for downed power lines during the period was
made with negative results.... The other witness reported in
newspaper accounts as having observed the object had either
disappeared or returned to their homes, leaving no forwarding
addresses."

  What we see is a great deal of irrelevant material. There were
thunderstorms, but they had dissipated by the time the sightings
began. Oil refining operations created gas that was burned and
might have been reflected by the clouds, though the residents of
the area would be familiar with those operations and would
probably have no motive to suddenly see strange objects in the
reflections. There were no downed power lines that the one Air
Force message had postulated. Although the Air Force didn't
interview them (and so, to the Air Force, they didn't exist),
there were a number of people, all named, who did report that
their car engines and lights were affected by the proximity of
the UFO. Rather than search for the additional witnesses, the
Air Force ignored them.

  Contrary to what the Air Force reported internally and
suggested to the press were the number of witnesses claimed by
Keyhoe. In fact, Keyhoe had underestimated the number.
Furthermore, the length of the sightings varied from a few
seconds to several minutes. Thc Air Force was attempting to
suggest that the witnesses had seen, and misinterpreted,
lightning flashes.

  The Air Force did, to their satisfaction, solve the Levelland
case. According to the Blue Book files, "After very extensive
checks and detailed investigations by the Air Force and with
complete collaboration with both Air Force and non-governmental
scientists it was concluded that the sighting was due to a very
rare phenomena [sic], ball lightning."

  It must be noted here that the nongovernmental scientist was
Dr. Donald Menzel. In fact, part of a galley proof for one of
his books was included in the project file. Menzel wrote, "The
evidence, however, leads to an overwhelming probability: the
fiery unknown at Levelland _was_ ball lightning."

  Curtis Peebles also mentioned the Levelland case in 'Watch the
Skies'. His entire investigation seemed to be founded on the Air
Force files. His footnotes refer to the Project Blue Book
microfilm, Roll 29 (which, of course, is part of what I used to
assemble the information here). There is little or no critical
comment about the Air Force investigation in either the book by
Menzel or the one by Peebles.

  Peebles noted in his book, "The Air Force solutions were made
public on November 14 (thirteen days after the flap began). The
summaries of the five widely publicized sightings were very
brief. The Levelland account was only sixty words long. (The Air
Intelligence Information Report was nineteen _pages_ long)."

  The implication here is that the Air Force had a great deal
more information than they released publicly, but the nineteen-
page report contains at least two one-page drawings and several
pages where only the witness statement is recorded, taking up a
third of the page or less. Peebles didn't acknowledge the fact
that the Air Force investigator spent only seven hours in
Levelland and talked to only three of those who claimed their
cars had been stalled.

  Peebles also relied on Air Force statements that the object
was seen for only seconds and that most eyewitnesses saw only a
streak of light. Neither statement is true. Martin said the
object was in sight for 4 or 5 minutes. The Air Force
investigator didn't find any of the other witnesses except Pedro
Saucido. The Air Force was convinced that mass hysteria, the wet
conditions, and ball lightning were responsible for the
sightings.

  What is important in this case is the number of independent
witnesses who told of the object in the area and added the
dimension of dimmed lights, radio failure, and the stalling of
car engines. Many of the claims were made to the sheriff or
police before there was any media attention to the sightings.
Those suggesting some sort of mass hysteria have a major
stumbling block in the way of their argument: How did these
witnesses tell the same story within an hour or so of one
another?

  Menzel and the Air Force make much of the fact that within
days of the sighting, hundreds of others were telling tales of
low-level flying saucers and their electromagnetic effects. Once
the story was out - in the newspapers, on the radio, and on
television - then a "mass hysteria" could kick in. But that
doesn't explain the sightings in Levelland late on the night of
November 2 and very early in the morning of November 3.

  One Air Force officer suggested that all the reports they
received in November of that year stemmed from the "mass
hysteria" that grew out of Levelland. He noted that hundreds of
sightings were made after November 2. But a statistical analysis
of the sightings reported to Project Bluebook showed this wasn't
case. Instead we see that the number of UFO reports to the Air
Force began to grow in the late summer of 1957. That growth
peaked on November 6 and then dropped off rapidly.

  It could just as easily be suggested that Levelland marked not
the beginning of a wave of UFO reports but the middle of it. The
increased number of reports to the Air Force after the Levelland
sighting might be explained in a simple fashion: People,
realizing that the Air Force was gathering the information, now
felt an obligation to report what they had seen. The story
sparked not a series of sightings but a series of reports.


  Conclusions

Eyewitness testimony is only as good as the eyewitness. Its
value increases when it is corroborated by other, independent
witnesses. During the Oregon sightings in 1947, there were many
independent witnesses to something in the sky. They were
separated by time and distance, but they were connected by radio
and telephone. Many of those reports were sparked by a police
radio broadcast that something unusual was in the sky. Police
officers and harbor patrolmen went out to look. In many of the
cases they were rewarded when they saw something.

  Could it be that they were inspired by that first radio call?
Could it be that they were inspired by a knowledge of what they
were supposed to see? In psychology this is called priming. You
expect to see something specific, and when presented with a non-
specific stimulus, you see what you expect to see. In other
words, those who heard the broadcast went outside with an
expectation of seeing something. That expectation could have
been enough to cause the men to see disk-shaped objects where
there really were none. They would have seen something -
possibly a natural phenomenon or the radar chaff postulated by
the Air Force - but because they thought they were looking for
flying disks they saw, in those twinkling shapes, flying disks.

  It could also be that because they were outside, looking into
the sky, they saw disks as they flew over. This means, simply,
that they saw what was in the sky and accurately reported it. We
have no way of knowing, today, which explanation is correct, or
even if either is correct. There could be a third possibility
that would explain these sightings to our satisfaction.

  The Air Force listed most of them as insufficient data for a
scientific analysis. We could argue that point, but today, more
than fifty years later, there isn't much that we can do. The
objects were seen high in the sky, moving from horizon to
horizon. They produced no photographic evidence, no interaction
with the environment that can be explored, no traces of
themselves. We have only the multiple eyewitness testimony that
is intriguing but little more.

  The Levelland sightings are also multiple eyewitness. There
was no physical evidence of the object's passing. It did,
however, interact with the environment. It stalled car engines
and dimmed the lights. It affected the instruments in the cars
and blocked the radio signals. It was eyewitness testimony with
a twist.

  When reviewing the case, the Air Force would like us to
believe that this was an example of mass hysteria. One report
that received national attention brought in other reports. But
on reviewing the case carefully, we notice that many of the
reports of interaction between the object and the electrical
systems of the vehicles were made to authorities before there
was any media attention. The reports are independent of one
another and tend to corroborate one another.

  Levelland is one of the few examples of multiple-witness
sighting cases in which it can be demonstrated that there was no
previous contamination. The new twist - of UFOs stalling cars -
had not been well publicized until the Levelland case. If any of
the witnesses had heard of it prior to their own experiences
that night, it would be surprising.

  Yet, even with these perplexing sightings, with the newspapers
providing names of witnesses, with both the Levelland police and
sheriff involved, the Air Force investigation seemed to be more
interested in explaining the reports than investigating them. To
the Air Force investigator, if the witness didn't speak to him,
that witness didn't exist. That attitude is evident throughout
the Air Force file on the case. The final Air Force report said,
"Only one observer ... said an object hovered over or on the
ground. One observer said an object moved over his head at a low
altitude ... one observer saw an object hovering and swinging in
a pendulum motion [a] considerable distance above the ground.
The other observers saw a light streak across the sky or a bolt
of lightning."

  What we see is an interesting group of sightings that suggests
something unusual was observed. There is no evidence of hoax.
The conclusion is that something was in that area on that night.
It interacted with the environment and seemed to create an
electrical field that could, upon close approach, suppress the
functioning of regular electrical systems, stalling cars and
dimming lights.

  This does not mean, however, that what was seen was
extraterrestrial in origin. It means that what was seen demands
that further research be conducted. If the scientific community
requires physical evidence, doesn't the Levelland case, with its
multiple and independent eyewitness testimony of an object that
has interacted with the environment, demand another look? Isn't
this the first of the links in the chain of evidence?