When residents of Morris County, NJ saw bright lights in the night sky Jan. 
5, many thought it was a UFO. But Joe Rudy and Chris Russo perpetrated the 
hoax with helium balloons and flares as part of a social experiment to 
create a media event.

http://www.livescience.com/common/media/video/player.php?videoRef=LS_090402_ufo_hoax

FO Hoax Was a Social Experiment
Benjamin Radford
LiveScience's Bad Science Columnist
 Thu Apr 2, 6:30 pm ET
Strange lights appeared over Morris County, New Jersey, on Jan. 5 this year. 
The bright red lights were first noticed in the night sky by an 
eleven-year-old girl, who pointed out three lights grouped together, and 
another pair some distance away.

The lights moved silently and slowly, then disappeared one by one.

The girl's father, a pilot, said he was baffled: "I've been in aviation for 
20 years and never seen anything like it." Police fielded calls from alarmed 
residents, and the supposed UFO made national news.

I examined the case the next day, noting striking parallels between this 
sighting and the infamous 2008 Phoenix Lights hoax in which flares were tied 
to balloons. I provided a detailed, point-by-point analysis showing that the 
New Jersey lights were almost certainly a copycat hoax.

However, many people refused to accept the skeptical explanations offered by 
myself and others, concluding that alien spacecraft was more likely.

Skeptical of the skeptics

Some UFO buffs ridiculed the idea that this was a hoax, claiming that the 
movements of the lights ruled out the possibility of flares.

One writer stated that "thousands of eyewitnesses said they saw a giant, 
solid, triangular object fly over their heads." Often the UFO-theory 
defenders cherry-picked their evidence and eyewitnesses, for example 
dismissing those who saw balloons tied to flares as mistaken while giving 
credence to others who didn't see balloons. (For a fascinating glimpse into 
the rabid denials offered against the flares explanation, see the readers' 
comments section of my initial column.)

The case was even profiled on the popular History Channel show "UFO 
Hunters." Bill Birnes, the lead investigator (and publisher of "UFO 
Magazine") also dismissed the flare explanation. According to the show, 
"police say the unidentified flying object was nothing but flares - a theory 
"UFO Hunters" has already tested and proven implausible."

The show was very influential, with many viewers accepting their conclusions 
without question.

The case remained open (among many UFO groups anyway), until this week when, 
on April Fool's day, two 20-something college kids, Chris Russo and Joe 
Rudy, admitted to the hoax.

"We set out into the woods ...carrying one helium tank, five balloons, five 
flares, fishing line, duct tape, and a video camera," the duo explain now. 
"After filling up one 3-foot balloon with helium, we tied about five feet of 
fishing line to the balloon, secured the line with tape, then tied and taped 
the flare to the other end of the line. Once all five balloons were ready, 
we struck the 15-minute flares and released them into the sky."

Realizing that, in the conspiracy-minded UFO community, hoax admissions are 
suspect, they carefully documented their prank in a series of videos. For 
all but the outer fringe of UFO buffs who may suspect that those videos 
themselves were faked, their explanation is iron-clad and proven, case 
closed.

Social experiment

In a posting at Skeptic.com, the pair said the hoax was a "social experiment 
on how to create your own media event surrounding UFO sightings...to show 
everyone how unreliable eyewitness accounts are, along with investigators of 
UFOs."

Indeed, that point was well made.

On the "UFO Hunters" show, investigator Birnes and his team reviewed footage 
of the lights, concluding that "these lights are moving without any 
independent movement... you can almost make out a frame." Yet we know this 
analysis was completely wrong: the lights were in fact moving independently 
(tied to balloons in the wind), and there was no frame at all, triangular or 
otherwise. As Russo and Rudy note, "If a respected UFO investigator can be 
easily manipulated and dead wrong on one UFO case, is it possible he's wrong 
on most (or all) of them?"

From red lights in the sky to red faces at the History Channel, this solved 
UFO case proves that you can't always believe what you see, either in the 
skies or on TV.


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Pucker your lips for the Apocalypse!

Johnny Asia, Guitarist from the Future


http://johnnyasia.com
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