June 13, 2023 • 33 mins
In this month's episode, editor Adam D. Young joins our agriculture and environmental reporter Brandi D. Addison to discuss recent cow mutilations in Central-East Texas and UFO mysteries in our region.
Find the Weird West Texas series on our website.
To read individual stories, visit the links below:
Got an idea for a topic? Send an email to BAddison@gannett.com with "Weird West Texas" in the subject line.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
S1 (00:04):
Howdy. My name is Brandi Addison. I'm the regional agriculture
and environmental reporter for the USA Today Network's West Texas region.
And this is weird. West Texas, the podcast. Each month
we'll explore some of the most odd, eccentric and sometimes
just plain weird things in our region, from the northernmost
town of Hitchland down into the big country, eastward into
the rolling plains and all the way to El Paso.
(00:26):
In this month's episode, we're talking about the region's UFO
mysteries and cattle mutilations in Texas. Once again, I am
joined by my editor, Adam D Young. Super excited to
have you here, Adam.
S2 (00:38):
Good to be here. I'm particularly interested in these topics.
S1 (00:42):
You say that every episode.
S2 (00:43):
Yeah, but I don't know if somebody who used to
listen to a lot of overnight conspiracy radio, these ones
really stood out to me.
S1 (00:49):
Yeah. Yeah, for sure. So I don't know if you recall,
despite the cattle mutilations not happening in West Texas, I
reached out to you and I was like, We have
to do this regardless, right? Because it could be us soon, right?
You know, we have a big cattle farms up here,
ranches up here, a big industry of beef up here.
So that's why I felt it was necessary. But it's
(01:09):
still a really interesting topic that I know pretty much
everybody would care about. And I got shared on the
USA Today flagship paper, so I thought that was really cool.
But yeah, I mean, what did you think about that story?
I mean, you.
S2 (01:20):
Just kind of the typical scenario with, you know, I
think the thing that stood out the most is that
having the blood drained out of it and an animal
and no other predators going after, it's a not rotting corpse.
Just some unusual stuff kind of makes you think about
(01:40):
either an extraterrestrial possibility or some other supernatural thing, or
it's probably perfectly explainable.
S1 (01:48):
I don't know. This has happened for 50 years now, right?
50 years now. And it hasn't been explained yet. So
for those of you who do not know what we're
talking about yet, last month, so in late April, they
discovered six dead cows and bordering counties down in central Texas,
I guess.
S2 (02:06):
Yeah, we're in the Bryan College Station area. Okay.
S1 (02:08):
So central Texas, Central East Texas, whatever. We want to
consider that area. But it finally went into under investigation
when one unexpected death of a cow in Madison County
occurred and it was all along the same highway they were,
each cow was from a different herd, from a different ranch.
And they were in three different counties. So one was
(02:29):
Madison County. This is the one that really sparked the
national conversations on it. Another one, some more happened in
Brazos County's county and Robertson counties. Right. Or county, rather.
So basically what happened is that they're finding these cows
completely drained of their blood with select body parts missing.
(02:50):
So this has been genitalia, anuses, tongues, whatever. And there
has been no blood spill around them. Right. No signs
of disturbing like disturbed grass, no signs of tracks or struggle, whatever.
And not only that, but as Adam mentioned, no predators
have had any interest in scavenging the remains, like they're
just decaying on their own. Right. So, of course, everyone's like,
(03:12):
what the heck is happening here? Right? It's a really
weird thing. So. And did I mention no blood spill?
You did.
S2 (03:18):
Okay. You said no predators have gone after the remains.
That's assuming that the predators didn't go specifically after the
anuses and the genitalia and nothing else.
S1 (03:28):
Yes, exactly. Exactly. But I mean, what's the plausibility of
that to you know, there.
S2 (03:33):
Are just some weird creatures out there.
S1 (03:36):
Yeah. And you know, I did get an email from
someone saying that it was a possum because the way
Possum Chew is like with pretty precise cuts. And they
said that they like to chew through soft tissue. I
don't I don't know if a possum could take a
cow down, though. Like they would have to get that
cow down first. Yeah.
S2 (03:53):
Would have to be an orchestrated effort among multiple possums
with the intention of removing those select parts for dining
purposes or other purposes. I don't know if they ate
them or not. They were. They were gone and we
don't know what happened. There was no ring doorbell video
to show evidence here.
S1 (04:15):
Yeah. So, I mean, I like Adam's theory that it's
like some sort of like, possum mafia or something like that,
but I don't know if that's believable. So I was noted.
This is a really weird situation. And so the news
release from the sheriff's office said in quotations, a straight,
clean cut with apparent position had been made to remove
(04:36):
the hide around the cow's mouth on one side, leaving
the meat under the removed hide untouched. The tongue was
also completely removed from the body with no blood spill. Okay,
so this is super interesting that there's no blood spill
because I also don't know how a possum would I
don't know, maybe they have Clorox wipes with them.
S2 (04:56):
I can't do simple splinter removal without significant blood spill.
I think. I don't know how you would do that.
Remove those parts from a large animal.
S1 (05:06):
Yeah. Yeah. So there's a bunch of weird theories, right?
And something that I want to know. This also happened
back in the 70s, right? With literally hundreds if not
thousands of cattle. You know, I think it was close
to 300 in Colorado. And the theories back then were
that it was the federal government. I actually did watch
an Unsolved Mysteries thing on this. And what was interesting
(05:26):
back then was like 90% of these cases were along
the 37 degree line on latitude. Right? So I thought
that was really. The interesting across the US. So it
was right at that line. Obviously we are not at
37 degree latitude, but I thought that was interesting. And
so when I was watching Unsolved Mysteries, one guy suggested
that it was basically our government trying to take the
(05:49):
DNA from cattle because mad cow disease happened in the
UK at this point. Right. And what happened was they
they called all these cattle and they turned them into ash, right?
They killed them. And then they put that in fertilizer. Right?
So I thought that was a really interesting theory. And
so then they distributed this fertilizer all across the world.
And so I heard like this guy. His theory is
(06:11):
that basically US government is just like testing the DNA
of the cattle to make sure that we are not
about to have a mad cow disease outbreak. But of
course mad cow disease happened in the 90s. This happened
in the 70s, so that doesn't add up. There are
theories of cults that some people are like injecting needles
to drain the blood and then they're removing it like
the organs. I don't know. That was a theory when
(06:32):
it happened. I think it was last year in Oregon,
right within the last couple of years in Oregon. That
was a theory when it occurred at a major ranch
in Oregon that it was a cult. And of course,
we have people saying that it's aliens. That's my guess.
I'm just going with aliens at this point.
S2 (06:49):
It's usually a good default guess if you're not sure
about something.
S1 (06:52):
Yeah, I mean, yeah, at least you know, the Pentagon's
even they haven't acknowledged the presence of aliens yet, but
at least UFOs and that unexplained things are out there.
And this story is definitely one of them. I do
not buy the possum theory whatsoever because that cow would
have to be dead first, right? Like for that possum
(07:12):
to even take its organs or chew through the organs.
S2 (07:15):
Agree. That's not a leading theory. I can't rule it out.
You can't take it off the table. But it's it's
not a tier one theory.
S1 (07:24):
Well, and so when this has been in the 70s,
I know a lot of theories that were circulating that
said people they saw like black ops, like helicopters flying
low with like lights off and whatever, which I'm also
not ruling out. I won't rule that out. I mean,
the US government definitely has some high quality technology out there,
but I feel like no matter how good of technology
(07:45):
you have, certainly like you would hear something or someone
would see something, right? Maybe not. These are pretty, you know,
rural areas too, right? So maybe not.
S2 (07:54):
Yeah. Just I don't know what the end game is
on this.
S1 (07:57):
I know. I'm honestly surprised that there wasn't theories of
it being China or Russia. Right. Because we did have
all these what people describe it as Chinese spy balloons,
but they were really weather balloons. Right. Floating specifically over
cattle ranches in like Montana. So I'm surprised we haven't
heard those theories yet.
S2 (08:16):
Yeah. I mean, wasn't that something that you saw floated
out there?
S1 (08:20):
No, no.
S2 (08:21):
Just maybe that were just in the back of my mind.
S1 (08:23):
Yeah. That was me remarking to you that I was surprised.
No one suggested that yet.
S2 (08:28):
And I figured there were probably might even be some
illicit market for those particular body parts that or some
human use for them, perhaps. And that's how they were
being rendered in the draining of the blood.
S1 (08:42):
Yeah. I mean, that makes sense. And I just feel
like if it was like humans anyway, like certainly there
would be some sort of track. Yeah. So that was
an interesting story, I really thought. And like I said,
it like totally took over national news, like every major
newspaper was reporting on it. The New York Times, The
New York Post, New Yorker. And I'm going to actually
read an excerpt from The New Yorker real quick, because
(09:03):
they had a really detailed feature on it. I thought
it was super great. And so they reached out to
Chuck Sikorsky, a paranormal investigator. Right. He's done this for years.
He did not actually approach the scene because I think
he was on the way to a cruise or a
vacation to celebrate his anniversary with his wife. But this
is the excerpt that The New Yorker said. So Zukowski
has several go bags on hand so that when he
(09:25):
receives a report of something mysterious, he can get out
the door as quickly as possible. His kit for animal
mutilations includes an electromagnetic field meter, a Geiger counter, a
motion sensing camera, a night vision lens, jars of formaldehyde
for biological samples, and a p100 Nikon with a 3000
millimeter zoom optic. In his quote, he said, It's designed
(09:46):
for birdwatching, but it's great for UFOs. I think that's
really funny because bird, bird, birds or UFOs? Nowhere in between. Right?
So that's funny. Continued Zukowski is an engineer by training,
and in his decades of mute investigations, he said he's
encountered phenomena he cannot scientifically explain, such as high EMF
readings and atomic changes in the nearby soil. He believes
(10:07):
that a high energy source, possibly of extraterrestrial origin, is responsible,
although he knows that some people will find this suggestion ridiculous.
And again, in his quotes, we have what they call
the giggle factor. And the giggle factor is when other
people basically make fun, he said. But that's changed a
lot now that the Pentagon is involved, involved in doing
UFO investigations. I mean, I'm going to trust the expert,
(10:30):
not expert. So I'm going to trust the expert on this. Right? Like,
who would know better than Chuck Stokowski?
S2 (10:36):
Yeah, just more. More than anything, I'm curious how one
becomes an expert in this topic. That's how one gets credentialed.
I don't know if, like, perhaps Tech has a degree
offering in this or just some expertise. I really need
to pursue that. That might be another career path for me,
perhaps in Atlanta.
S1 (10:58):
Something Atlanta might do someday.
S2 (10:59):
Oh, our business reporter.
S1 (11:01):
Yes, I would trust her theories on this as well.
So yes, that said, this leads seamlessly into our next
topic about UFOs and Lubbock, right? Not even UFOs in Lubbock.
UFOs in West Texas. Okay. So why are there so
many UFO sightings reported in our region? What are your theories?
S2 (11:22):
Well, I just just based on their definition, it's not
necessarily an extraterrestrial object. It's just something that can't be explained.
So there definitely are UFOs, whether they're extraterrestrial or not
is another matter. But yeah, just anything you can't explain.
But I think for our region, perhaps one reason we
see so many of them is because we have this
flat terrain. So we can see things way off in
(11:45):
the distance and whatnot.
S1 (11:47):
It is like it doesn't have to be extraterrestrial. It
could literally be a plane. And the fact that you
can't personally identify it makes it a UFO in your mind, right? Like,
I think that's really interesting. Like, I just it's funny.
It's so vague that it could be literally like a bird, right?
S2 (12:00):
Yeah. I mean, just because it's not extraterrestrial doesn't mean
it can't be a little terrestrial.
S1 (12:06):
What a great dad joke. And you know what? Now
that you say, Bird, this brings me back to a
story I read a couple of weeks ago about how
this guy is now, like stuffing birds, like dead birds
and turning them into drones. Like, it was like, I
don't even know how to explain it. It's pretty wild.
S2 (12:27):
I can see that I made my own UFOs before
back with when I'd have a 110 film camera. Growing
up in Abilene, I would wrap a big potato in
aluminum foil and throw it up in the air when
the sun was sitting just right and capture photos of it.
A few of them turned out fairly well and convincingly,
but I'm sure an expert could probably judge based on
(12:47):
the shadows or something like that that, you know, you know,
it's proximity or approximate size or something like that. But
I don't know. I've always been fascinated by stuff like that.
S1 (12:57):
I don't know. I just like it seems really weird.
I don't know, like the bird thing is weird. I
would freak out if like. A dead bird just like
fell on me. And I had a camera on it
that freaked me out. But then that goes back to like,
the birds aren't real theory. That's funny.
S2 (13:13):
I mean, this day and age, if something like that
happened to me, I'd just shrug it off and said.
S1 (13:18):
Where do things have happened? Yeah, yeah, exactly. Right after 2020,
Like nothing's off the table anymore. But I mean, have
you heard just just a side note. Have you heard
the birds aren't real theory yet?
S2 (13:31):
I have. I haven't really. I've never even clicked on
one of those stories before.
S1 (13:35):
Oh, it's so funny.
S2 (13:35):
It's usually more of a parody, right? Oh, yeah. Nobody.
It's just like the flat earth. There's nobody significant or
seriously believes it's a thing.
S1 (13:44):
Some people do believe that Earth is flat, but the
birds aren't real thing. That's hilarious. You know, it's basically
like just a running joke. The birds are like government
spies and not like actual animals. So I think that's funny. Um, okay,
but back to the UFO sightings. Okay, so of course,
in Lubbock, one of the most well known UFO sightings
(14:05):
in the nation. Right? 1951, three professors see this V
formation that they could not explain. And then it was
later dubbed as Lubbock Lights. This happened over several months, right?
Like several sightings. Right. That dubbed it as a Lubbock light.
And seriously, one of the most famous UFO encounters in
the nation.
S2 (14:25):
Yeah. And what stood out about that one was just
the reputation of the people who observed it and believe
we even have a photo that looks mysterious now. I mean,
I know in that time period we were testing a
lot of new flying technology and things like that that
folks weren't used to seeing. But still everything all the
reading I've done on this and the stories you shared
(14:45):
in your weird West Texas piece. And so that really
never was.
S1 (14:49):
A Yeah, I was never solved. And it's one of
hundreds that have never been solved, right? So certain, you know,
similar encounters have now led the Pentagon, as I noted earlier,
to like unveiling a report that says, hey, we can
identify these. So, yeah, UFOs are out there. Right. Which
that's a major deal that that is now happening. And,
you know, this has been something that government has just
been talking about for several years, like a former president.
(15:11):
The late Ronald Reagan did this in a speech talking
about alien threats and one time at White House.
S3 (15:17):
Perhaps we need some outside universal threat to make us
recognize this common bound. I occasionally think how quickly our
differences worldwide would vanish if we were facing an alien
threat from outside this world. And yet, I ask you,
(15:38):
is not an alien force already among us?
S1 (15:42):
I think that's just really interesting that this is like
a running thing that's just now getting acknowledged, what, 40
years later? And so yeah, I West Texas has pretty
much the majority of UFO sightings in Texas. And Texas
is the fourth most sightings of all the states in
the country. So according to the database from the National
(16:07):
UFO Reporting Center, Lubbock's had 60 reported sightings since the 1950s.
So one that since 1995 they've had like 70 since
the 1950s, at least those reported right? So far this year,
there have only been two reported in the Lubbock area,
one in Wolf Earth, which said there were blinking lights,
but not a place for about three minutes. And then
(16:29):
another one said that it was a V shaped formation
with five lights traveling low and fairly slow. So I
think this is interesting because this is the most common
sighting that we see in Lubbock is a V formation
as well as Amarillo. They're saying the same thing. It's
either in a V formation or triangular. So I think
that's really interesting. That's happened several times. But there were
(16:51):
some other instances, such as a fireball seen in the
sky hovering, glowing objects strategically line up and travel west.
And then there was some more dramatic cases where in
August 2021, one witness said that a saucer shaped craft
surrounded by pulsating, expanding and contracting white and green lights
followed him for about 30 minutes and wanted him to
see it. I don't know. I don't know what that to.
S2 (17:13):
Me stands out as or strikes me as more of
a hallucination.
S1 (17:16):
Yeah. And, you know, see, that's also my my theory. Why?
Maybe Lubbock has one more reported sightings. Because people like
to have fun out here.
S2 (17:25):
I don't know that we are the hallucinogenics capital of
the state or anything like that. I don't.
S1 (17:31):
Know for sure.
S2 (17:32):
By any means. I mean, really, my college experiences wouldn't
lend to that, but they probably wasn't the the target
demographic for that either.
S1 (17:40):
Probably not. But you know, also one less light pollution
to less obstruction. We don't have skyscrapers, you know, blocking
our view. And honestly, maybe it is like some extraterrestrial life, right?
And they don't want to be noticed. So they are
coming to more rural areas, right? Or it's easier to
enter and out like whatever portal they come through, right?
(18:03):
Like and of course, the crop circles that they create,
I mean, you know, that's their homes right there, the
crop circles, that's their impact. Not at all the pivots
and the plowing that occurs year round, definitely aliens. And
one of the more interesting things to me was also
like Scenarios was the one back in 1957. KMC Did
it or it came back, however we want to pronounce it,
(18:23):
wrote about this, and one alleged witness in 1957 was
driving near Loveland, and he said he saw a bright
flash of blue light before his truck engine sputtered, then
died as they felt something passed overhead. There were multiple
witnesses of this, so multiple people experience. Maybe they weren't
all driving, but they did all see the same light.
And investigators called it ball lightning and just fully debunked
(18:47):
the widespread UFO theory, Air Force investigators write. I thought
that was really interesting because, like, why would ball lightning
make your truck die, though? That's what gets me.
S2 (18:57):
Yeah, that sounds like EMP kind of situational. Yeah, I
don't know. I mean, if I assume if lightning struck
my my Honda Civic, it probably wouldn't function anymore.
S1 (19:06):
Yeah, it didn't strike it, though. It just passed over it.
You know what I'm saying? Like, I don't know. I
don't know. I don't even know what ball lightning is.
I should look more into that. And I know that
Carmack did actually asked, like an atmospheric professor at Tech,
and he was like, Well, you know, the science checks out.
I'm not going to argue with Air Force investigators. And
he said something like along the lines that people's memories
(19:27):
changed throughout the year. Maybe they exaggerate a little bit
more or they're a little bit dramatic. And this guy
was talking to like came back in a few years ago, right.
Within the last decade, maybe sooner, more recent. But it
was with, you know, that would have been decades later.
So yeah I mean I can see that, too, that
maybe the experience wasn't necessarily what he actually experienced like
(19:50):
in Remembered, right?
S2 (19:52):
Yeah. I mean it starts as two lights easily becomes four.
S1 (19:55):
And makes your truck engine sputter and die. Yeah I
don't know or maybe he he didn't get his oil
changed and forgot that part. I don't know.
S2 (20:04):
I don't know. And then one that I added into
your your story was the some of the reporting I did. And,
you know, it just seems like every couple of years
one of these stories comes up where we start getting
calls or start seeing social media chatter about lights and
the sky in an evening and start looking into that
check with our weather service. And it ends up being
an observation balloon released in eastern New Mexico. And they're
(20:25):
so high up that they catch some serious sunlight up there. Yeah.
S1 (20:29):
Yeah.
S2 (20:30):
I think the one that we saw here back in
2011 that said it was doing some research for for
NASA and 400ft in diameter. And the reports from up
from Amarillo down here to Lubbock and Clovis and Mule
shoe and everywhere in between, people wondering what that was.
It was kind of nice to figure out what that
(20:51):
thing was.
S1 (20:51):
Yeah, that is interesting. And, you know, as I noted,
like an Abilene pilot, he was not actually in Abilene
at the time. He was flying from, I believe, as
Phoenix to Abilene or somewhere along those lines. And when
he was passing over Roswell, which is well known for UFOs. Right.
(21:13):
He said that he and his co-pilot, they basically the communicators. Right.
The air traffic controllers were like, hey, be on the
lookout for something because we're seeing something right here. He
was like, all right, you know, And he ended up
seeing it. And he said it was about 2000 to
3000ft above them in their airplane. Right. So it was
(21:33):
even higher. And that one was never explained either. He
I mean, it could have been a, you know, balloon
as part of a NASA experiment. But I feel like
maybe our airlines and now so probably have better communication
than that for that to happen without any sort of,
you know, understanding on that.
S2 (21:54):
Yeah. Back then, I think, you know, obviously folks were
dealing with rapidly changing technology and advancements in jet aircraft
perhaps weren't familiar with that or Sure. Where they were
looking at there. So some of those things are probably
explained better that way.
S1 (22:10):
Yeah. And you know, so I'm looking this is like
the quote that he said. So like I said, he
said that I was 2000 to 3000ft above air traffic
and then said in quotations it was very bright, but
it wasn't so bright that you couldn't look at it.
What was weird about it, normally if you have an
object and the sun is shining this way, the reflection
would be on this wayside. But this was bright all
(22:32):
the way around. It was so bright that you really
couldn't make out what shape it was. So he basically
is just like, I have no clue. And I would
think he was also an Air Force pilot, a retired
Air Force pilot. Right. So he's seen some various aircrafts. Right.
So for someone who's an expert like this and is
well aware of aircrafts to just straight up be like, Yeah,
I don't know what this is. That's pretty crazy to me,
(22:53):
especially with it being over Roswell. And of course, we
have the other notable sightings in Abilene. Are you familiar
with them? I know you grew up there. So did
you hear about the ones in 1973 and 81 growing up?
S2 (23:05):
No, I really didn't. I mean, we would occasionally have
like a stealth fighter visit Abilene or the Blue Angels
doing it.
S1 (23:11):
Yeah, I know. Yeah.
S2 (23:13):
That wasn't something we talked about as a young man
growing up in Abilene.
S1 (23:19):
Yeah, we had Blue Angels, too, because, you know, at
the job in Fort Worth. So I got to see
them a lot too. So yeah, I mean, the archives
from the Abilene Reporter News said that for employees of
the radio station, local radio station reported three unidentified objects
southwest of town just after dusk. One of the men
reported that one of the objects was solid white and
(23:40):
swung like a pendulum, while the other two objects flash red,
green and blue. They then appeared to come closer and
remain stationary before backing up. So I also think that
this is really interesting because if you go look at
the database, a lot of them say that these aircrafts,
whatever these objects are stationary. So I think that's really
cool that this still checks out from 1973. Like similarities here,
(24:02):
like it's not moving. And of course, like, okay, an
airplane cannot just be stationary, right? Like, that's just not
something that's going to happen. So I thought that was interesting.
And then in 1981, another one in Abilene said a
luminous object appeared to hang in the sky west of
Abilene for several minutes around 7 p.m. before disintegrating into
a sparkling shower of debris. I have no clue what
(24:25):
that is, but I thought that was really interesting. And
it's interesting to me that Amarillo and Lubbock are reporting
basically the same sightings, like basically triangular or V-shaped, but
Amarillo or Abilene, just having these weird, like totally different sightings.
So that's also interesting to me.
S2 (24:41):
Yeah, the ones where the object moves in ways that
aircraft usually don't or that, I mean, that makes sense
now where we've got a lot of drones, but when
we see these reports from decades ago, it was either
some really advanced technology that that our government still hasn't
disclosed or perhaps something.
S1 (24:58):
Else that our government will never disclose, not still disclosed,
but never disclosed. Yeah, that's what I'm talking it up to, either,
you know, extraterrestrial or our government. Right. There's no in
between there. Although there was a case where there was
something flying over the Jones. Right. AT&T Stadium in Lubbock
Football Stadium. And it turned out being someone's guy, some
(25:21):
guy's drone pretty much like that's basically what it was.
It was like he worked for a production agency and
he was just trying to catch aerial photos of the drones.
S2 (25:31):
That wasn't an errand Patrick Mahomes passed.
S1 (25:34):
No, no.
S2 (25:36):
It was ruled out.
S1 (25:37):
Well, it was in 2013, so. Okay. Pre Mahomes. Yeah,
he was the one in high school that I think
or 2011 actually one of the two I think it
took a couple of years for the story to get
updated regardless it was pre Mahomes it was this Michael
Crabtree era the no that would pose Crabtree Prima Holmes.
S2 (25:58):
We're dealing maybe with the Sheffield era at Texas Tech.
S1 (26:01):
Okay. Okay. I wasn't here then. I was I too
was in high school then. So you know what's there
to do. But yes, so I mean, what are your
theories here? What do you what do you think about
the UFOs? What do you think about the cows? What
do you think about any of it?
S2 (26:15):
I mean, usually most of these things are there's some
sort of explanation for them, which is, you know, somewhat disappointing.
I like when there's a little bit of mystery. I
I'm perfectly content not understanding everything because I never will.
But I mean, if if there is an explanation, I
like to dig into it like a couple of the
ones I have here. But when it's something that's fairly obvious,
(26:35):
but I don't know, I've increasingly become an extraterrestrial skeptic
just because of the thinking about the difficulties of travel
and the distances. But I'm very suspicious or I'm skeptical
that we'd get extraterrestrials coming here just to remove cattle genitalia.
S1 (26:59):
Well, actually, I don't know if you recall, but when
I was planning on doing that UFO story, that's when
the cattle mutilation thing happened. Right? So that was super interesting.
Like the timing there was really interesting. Do you remember that?
S2 (27:10):
Yeah, it was a bit eerie.
S1 (27:11):
Yeah, but I had just to disclose it. I did
not do it. I did not do that to the cattle, okay?
It was not me just for this story. Okay. So
full disclosure there.
S2 (27:23):
On the list. We haven't really. Oh, okay.
S1 (27:24):
Okay. Well, whatever. So, you know, I ended up watching
this unsolved mystery thing about the cattle mutilations, and then
I ended up watching one about basically UFOs and these
people who said that they saw aliens and were captured
by aliens, like the morning that I received this email
from a reader before my UFO story was published. Right.
(27:47):
This was strictly after the cattle mutilation happened. The UFO
story was not published yet. And this guy Kevin, and
sent me three emails. He said, I remember reading about
the cow mutilations in Colorado in 1976, among others. Back
then two, they occurred in conjunction with UFO sightings. The
top theory was back then that it was aliens who
were harvesting the cow parts to study the DNA. After all,
(28:11):
the cow share much of the same DNA with humans,
maybe as high as 90%. Now, I haven't substantiated this.
I don't know if that's true, but this is from
an email. Maybe the aliens come back every 50 years
to see where our DNA is heading to. Life on
planet Earth may just be their little science experiment. And
this is the second email. The aliens could be concerned
that the bovine growth hormones, amongst other chemicals used by
(28:33):
farmers and ranchers on cattle, are eventually consumed by humans,
by the eating of meat and drinking of milk. We
could possibly be killing off bovine and human life on
planet Earth. And the aliens are concerned for our welfare.
And then the final one I got from him. There
are so many human abductions back in the 72 with
aliens poking and prodding every orifice on the human body.
Some humans remembered right off, others only remembered the trauma
(28:56):
of their anal probes. Under a hypnotic regression, one would
assume there are many who just don't remember if alien
abduction is also on the rise again, in conjunction with
this new round cattle mutilation, then aliens must have perfected
a way to keep the humans from remembering same. So
I think that's really, really interesting because I literally watched
like a docu series of this human abduction and everything
(29:18):
he just described, like the morning I received this email.
So I thought that was super weird. All this to say,
you know, there are theories that aliens aren't necessarily from
a different galaxy, right? But they're from a different time
or a different portal. Right? So our different dimension, rather.
So like we're in third dimension, right? And I think
there's like experts acknowledge, 12 dimensions, maybe 11. And basically,
(29:41):
like with the way evolution occurs, like aliens are the
future humans, right? So, I mean, I guess it's this
theory that aliens are coming back from the future, like
slowing us down and being like, Hey, this is what
you're going to become because of all the hormones you're consuming, right?
(30:01):
So and maybe they're trying to prevent that. I don't
know that theory.
S2 (30:05):
That I am not that I am not intelligent enough
to grasp, but I know there are things that are
greater than my ability.
S1 (30:13):
But still but still. Isn't it weird that one, while
I was planning on the UFO story, the cattle mutilation
thing happened. And then two right after I watched this
little docu series that this guy emailed, like with the
exact information that I watched. That's pretty weird, right?
S2 (30:26):
No, absolutely.
S1 (30:27):
I don't know.
S2 (30:28):
I liked the timing there.
S1 (30:30):
I didn't.
S2 (30:30):
I'm also skeptical that that's and unless the aliens know
something that we don't know about how to render DNA,
I mean, usually from visiting with a record reporter, I
gather they usually go for like bone marrow or something
like that. I don't think they go for the junk
to get the DNA, but maybe that's a best practice
(30:51):
that will at some point figure out.
S1 (30:54):
Yeah. I mean, I don't know. I don't know what's happening.
They're growing lab grown meat at this point, Right? So
maybe that's what they're doing. They're trying to prevent lab
grown meat from happening. I don't know. I have no clue.
I wonder what they get. The DNA for the lab
grown meat. Maybe that's. You know what? This just happened
a couple of weeks ago, right? And then lab grown
meat just, like, became a big thing within the last
(31:14):
couple of weeks. So that's my theory right there. They're
taking the DNA to make meat in labs.
S2 (31:21):
That's a possibility. They could also just be very select tastes.
I don't know if they checked like a local butcher
shop in the College station area and saw that that
was that was an offering that they had a special.
S1 (31:35):
We'll go sneakily kill a cow for you and sell it. Ya.
You sell its tongue sneakily.
S2 (31:44):
So smoke it with post oak. Yeah. Yeah.
S1 (31:48):
We'll go do it as discreetly as possible. Yeah, maybe.
I don't know. I don't know. But yeah. So. I
don't know. Do you have anything else to add, Adam?
S2 (31:57):
No. I'm just thoroughly disturbed after this conversation.
S4 (32:00):
Yeah, well, don't.
S1 (32:02):
Don't let the girls listen to this one. Yeah, but.
All righty. Well, thank you all for listening to episode three.
Probably our most, as Adam described, disturbing yet, but certainly
not the most disturbing that will get through all these
mysteries we unravel and weird West Texas. And you know what?
Still the biggest mystery out there in West Weird West
(32:22):
Texas is the story behind the children.
S2 (32:26):
Equally unexplainable and equally capable of producing hallucinations.
S1 (32:30):
True, but a lot more satisfying, right? You don't have
to worry about being abducted. Maybe. Maybe. It depends on
what you're talking about here. So anyway, all this to
say thank you again. Let's get weird, y'all. Do you
(32:50):
have a different tale to tell about any of our topics?
Don't hesitate to tell us. You can reach out to
the Lubbock Avalanche Journal or Amarillo Globe News on Facebook
or Twitter. You can also send an email to be
Addison at Lubbock Online with the subject line Weird West
Texas or shoot us a text at 806496 4073.
Howdy. My name is Brandi Addison. I'm the regional agriculture
and environmental reporter for the USA Today Network's West Texas region.
And this is weird. West Texas, the podcast. Each month
we'll explore some of the most odd, eccentric and sometimes
just plain weird things in our region, from the northernmost
town of Hitchland down into the big country, eastward into
the rolling plains and all the way to El Paso.
(00:26):
In this month's episode, we're talking about the region's UFO
mysteries and cattle mutilations in Texas. Once again, I am
joined by my editor, Adam D Young. Super excited to
have you here, Adam.
S2 (00:38):
Good to be here. I'm particularly interested in these topics.
S1 (00:42):
You say that every episode.
S2 (00:43):
Yeah, but I don't know if somebody who used to
listen to a lot of overnight conspiracy radio, these ones
really stood out to me.
S1 (00:49):
Yeah. Yeah, for sure. So I don't know if you recall,
despite the cattle mutilations not happening in West Texas, I
reached out to you and I was like, We have
to do this regardless, right? Because it could be us soon, right?
You know, we have a big cattle farms up here,
ranches up here, a big industry of beef up here.
So that's why I felt it was necessary. But it's
(01:09):
still a really interesting topic that I know pretty much
everybody would care about. And I got shared on the
USA Today flagship paper, so I thought that was really cool.
But yeah, I mean, what did you think about that story?
I mean, you.
S2 (01:20):
Just kind of the typical scenario with, you know, I
think the thing that stood out the most is that
having the blood drained out of it and an animal
and no other predators going after, it's a not rotting corpse.
Just some unusual stuff kind of makes you think about
(01:40):
either an extraterrestrial possibility or some other supernatural thing, or
it's probably perfectly explainable.
S1 (01:48):
I don't know. This has happened for 50 years now, right?
50 years now. And it hasn't been explained yet. So
for those of you who do not know what we're
talking about yet, last month, so in late April, they
discovered six dead cows and bordering counties down in central Texas,
I guess.
S2 (02:06):
Yeah, we're in the Bryan College Station area. Okay.
S1 (02:08):
So central Texas, Central East Texas, whatever. We want to
consider that area. But it finally went into under investigation
when one unexpected death of a cow in Madison County
occurred and it was all along the same highway they were,
each cow was from a different herd, from a different ranch.
And they were in three different counties. So one was
(02:29):
Madison County. This is the one that really sparked the
national conversations on it. Another one, some more happened in
Brazos County's county and Robertson counties. Right. Or county, rather.
So basically what happened is that they're finding these cows
completely drained of their blood with select body parts missing.
(02:50):
So this has been genitalia, anuses, tongues, whatever. And there
has been no blood spill around them. Right. No signs
of disturbing like disturbed grass, no signs of tracks or struggle, whatever.
And not only that, but as Adam mentioned, no predators
have had any interest in scavenging the remains, like they're
just decaying on their own. Right. So, of course, everyone's like,
(03:12):
what the heck is happening here? Right? It's a really
weird thing. So. And did I mention no blood spill?
You did.
S2 (03:18):
Okay. You said no predators have gone after the remains.
That's assuming that the predators didn't go specifically after the
anuses and the genitalia and nothing else.
S1 (03:28):
Yes, exactly. Exactly. But I mean, what's the plausibility of
that to you know, there.
S2 (03:33):
Are just some weird creatures out there.
S1 (03:36):
Yeah. And you know, I did get an email from
someone saying that it was a possum because the way
Possum Chew is like with pretty precise cuts. And they
said that they like to chew through soft tissue. I
don't I don't know if a possum could take a
cow down, though. Like they would have to get that
cow down first. Yeah.
S2 (03:53):
Would have to be an orchestrated effort among multiple possums
with the intention of removing those select parts for dining
purposes or other purposes. I don't know if they ate
them or not. They were. They were gone and we
don't know what happened. There was no ring doorbell video
to show evidence here.
S1 (04:15):
Yeah. So, I mean, I like Adam's theory that it's
like some sort of like, possum mafia or something like that,
but I don't know if that's believable. So I was noted.
This is a really weird situation. And so the news
release from the sheriff's office said in quotations, a straight,
clean cut with apparent position had been made to remove
(04:36):
the hide around the cow's mouth on one side, leaving
the meat under the removed hide untouched. The tongue was
also completely removed from the body with no blood spill. Okay,
so this is super interesting that there's no blood spill
because I also don't know how a possum would I
don't know, maybe they have Clorox wipes with them.
S2 (04:56):
I can't do simple splinter removal without significant blood spill.
I think. I don't know how you would do that.
Remove those parts from a large animal.
S1 (05:06):
Yeah. Yeah. So there's a bunch of weird theories, right?
And something that I want to know. This also happened
back in the 70s, right? With literally hundreds if not
thousands of cattle. You know, I think it was close
to 300 in Colorado. And the theories back then were
that it was the federal government. I actually did watch
an Unsolved Mysteries thing on this. And what was interesting
(05:26):
back then was like 90% of these cases were along
the 37 degree line on latitude. Right? So I thought
that was really. The interesting across the US. So it
was right at that line. Obviously we are not at
37 degree latitude, but I thought that was interesting. And
so when I was watching Unsolved Mysteries, one guy suggested
that it was basically our government trying to take the
(05:49):
DNA from cattle because mad cow disease happened in the
UK at this point. Right. And what happened was they
they called all these cattle and they turned them into ash, right?
They killed them. And then they put that in fertilizer. Right?
So I thought that was a really interesting theory. And
so then they distributed this fertilizer all across the world.
And so I heard like this guy. His theory is
(06:11):
that basically US government is just like testing the DNA
of the cattle to make sure that we are not
about to have a mad cow disease outbreak. But of
course mad cow disease happened in the 90s. This happened
in the 70s, so that doesn't add up. There are
theories of cults that some people are like injecting needles
to drain the blood and then they're removing it like
the organs. I don't know. That was a theory when
(06:32):
it happened. I think it was last year in Oregon,
right within the last couple of years in Oregon. That
was a theory when it occurred at a major ranch
in Oregon that it was a cult. And of course,
we have people saying that it's aliens. That's my guess.
I'm just going with aliens at this point.
S2 (06:49):
It's usually a good default guess if you're not sure
about something.
S1 (06:52):
Yeah, I mean, yeah, at least you know, the Pentagon's
even they haven't acknowledged the presence of aliens yet, but
at least UFOs and that unexplained things are out there.
And this story is definitely one of them. I do
not buy the possum theory whatsoever because that cow would
have to be dead first, right? Like for that possum
(07:12):
to even take its organs or chew through the organs.
S2 (07:15):
Agree. That's not a leading theory. I can't rule it out.
You can't take it off the table. But it's it's
not a tier one theory.
S1 (07:24):
Well, and so when this has been in the 70s,
I know a lot of theories that were circulating that
said people they saw like black ops, like helicopters flying
low with like lights off and whatever, which I'm also
not ruling out. I won't rule that out. I mean,
the US government definitely has some high quality technology out there,
but I feel like no matter how good of technology
(07:45):
you have, certainly like you would hear something or someone
would see something, right? Maybe not. These are pretty, you know,
rural areas too, right? So maybe not.
S2 (07:54):
Yeah. Just I don't know what the end game is
on this.
S1 (07:57):
I know. I'm honestly surprised that there wasn't theories of
it being China or Russia. Right. Because we did have
all these what people describe it as Chinese spy balloons,
but they were really weather balloons. Right. Floating specifically over
cattle ranches in like Montana. So I'm surprised we haven't
heard those theories yet.
S2 (08:16):
Yeah. I mean, wasn't that something that you saw floated
out there?
S1 (08:20):
No, no.
S2 (08:21):
Just maybe that were just in the back of my mind.
S1 (08:23):
Yeah. That was me remarking to you that I was surprised.
No one suggested that yet.
S2 (08:28):
And I figured there were probably might even be some
illicit market for those particular body parts that or some
human use for them, perhaps. And that's how they were
being rendered in the draining of the blood.
S1 (08:42):
Yeah. I mean, that makes sense. And I just feel
like if it was like humans anyway, like certainly there
would be some sort of track. Yeah. So that was
an interesting story, I really thought. And like I said,
it like totally took over national news, like every major
newspaper was reporting on it. The New York Times, The
New York Post, New Yorker. And I'm going to actually
read an excerpt from The New Yorker real quick, because
(09:03):
they had a really detailed feature on it. I thought
it was super great. And so they reached out to
Chuck Sikorsky, a paranormal investigator. Right. He's done this for years.
He did not actually approach the scene because I think
he was on the way to a cruise or a
vacation to celebrate his anniversary with his wife. But this
is the excerpt that The New Yorker said. So Zukowski
has several go bags on hand so that when he
(09:25):
receives a report of something mysterious, he can get out
the door as quickly as possible. His kit for animal
mutilations includes an electromagnetic field meter, a Geiger counter, a
motion sensing camera, a night vision lens, jars of formaldehyde
for biological samples, and a p100 Nikon with a 3000
millimeter zoom optic. In his quote, he said, It's designed
(09:46):
for birdwatching, but it's great for UFOs. I think that's
really funny because bird, bird, birds or UFOs? Nowhere in between. Right?
So that's funny. Continued Zukowski is an engineer by training,
and in his decades of mute investigations, he said he's
encountered phenomena he cannot scientifically explain, such as high EMF
readings and atomic changes in the nearby soil. He believes
(10:07):
that a high energy source, possibly of extraterrestrial origin, is responsible,
although he knows that some people will find this suggestion ridiculous.
And again, in his quotes, we have what they call
the giggle factor. And the giggle factor is when other
people basically make fun, he said. But that's changed a
lot now that the Pentagon is involved, involved in doing
UFO investigations. I mean, I'm going to trust the expert,
(10:30):
not expert. So I'm going to trust the expert on this. Right? Like,
who would know better than Chuck Stokowski?
S2 (10:36):
Yeah, just more. More than anything, I'm curious how one
becomes an expert in this topic. That's how one gets credentialed.
I don't know if, like, perhaps Tech has a degree
offering in this or just some expertise. I really need
to pursue that. That might be another career path for me,
perhaps in Atlanta.
S1 (10:58):
Something Atlanta might do someday.
S2 (10:59):
Oh, our business reporter.
S1 (11:01):
Yes, I would trust her theories on this as well.
So yes, that said, this leads seamlessly into our next
topic about UFOs and Lubbock, right? Not even UFOs in Lubbock.
UFOs in West Texas. Okay. So why are there so
many UFO sightings reported in our region? What are your theories?
S2 (11:22):
Well, I just just based on their definition, it's not
necessarily an extraterrestrial object. It's just something that can't be explained.
So there definitely are UFOs, whether they're extraterrestrial or not
is another matter. But yeah, just anything you can't explain.
But I think for our region, perhaps one reason we
see so many of them is because we have this
flat terrain. So we can see things way off in
(11:45):
the distance and whatnot.
S1 (11:47):
It is like it doesn't have to be extraterrestrial. It
could literally be a plane. And the fact that you
can't personally identify it makes it a UFO in your mind, right? Like,
I think that's really interesting. Like, I just it's funny.
It's so vague that it could be literally like a bird, right?
S2 (12:00):
Yeah. I mean, just because it's not extraterrestrial doesn't mean
it can't be a little terrestrial.
S1 (12:06):
What a great dad joke. And you know what? Now
that you say, Bird, this brings me back to a
story I read a couple of weeks ago about how
this guy is now, like stuffing birds, like dead birds
and turning them into drones. Like, it was like, I
don't even know how to explain it. It's pretty wild.
S2 (12:27):
I can see that I made my own UFOs before
back with when I'd have a 110 film camera. Growing
up in Abilene, I would wrap a big potato in
aluminum foil and throw it up in the air when
the sun was sitting just right and capture photos of it.
A few of them turned out fairly well and convincingly,
but I'm sure an expert could probably judge based on
(12:47):
the shadows or something like that that, you know, you know,
it's proximity or approximate size or something like that. But
I don't know. I've always been fascinated by stuff like that.
S1 (12:57):
I don't know. I just like it seems really weird.
I don't know, like the bird thing is weird. I
would freak out if like. A dead bird just like
fell on me. And I had a camera on it
that freaked me out. But then that goes back to like,
the birds aren't real theory. That's funny.
S2 (13:13):
I mean, this day and age, if something like that
happened to me, I'd just shrug it off and said.
S1 (13:18):
Where do things have happened? Yeah, yeah, exactly. Right after 2020,
Like nothing's off the table anymore. But I mean, have
you heard just just a side note. Have you heard
the birds aren't real theory yet?
S2 (13:31):
I have. I haven't really. I've never even clicked on
one of those stories before.
S1 (13:35):
Oh, it's so funny.
S2 (13:35):
It's usually more of a parody, right? Oh, yeah. Nobody.
It's just like the flat earth. There's nobody significant or
seriously believes it's a thing.
S1 (13:44):
Some people do believe that Earth is flat, but the
birds aren't real thing. That's hilarious. You know, it's basically
like just a running joke. The birds are like government
spies and not like actual animals. So I think that's funny. Um, okay,
but back to the UFO sightings. Okay, so of course,
in Lubbock, one of the most well known UFO sightings
(14:05):
in the nation. Right? 1951, three professors see this V
formation that they could not explain. And then it was
later dubbed as Lubbock Lights. This happened over several months, right?
Like several sightings. Right. That dubbed it as a Lubbock light.
And seriously, one of the most famous UFO encounters in
the nation.
S2 (14:25):
Yeah. And what stood out about that one was just
the reputation of the people who observed it and believe
we even have a photo that looks mysterious now. I mean,
I know in that time period we were testing a
lot of new flying technology and things like that that
folks weren't used to seeing. But still everything all the
reading I've done on this and the stories you shared
(14:45):
in your weird West Texas piece. And so that really
never was.
S1 (14:49):
A Yeah, I was never solved. And it's one of
hundreds that have never been solved, right? So certain, you know,
similar encounters have now led the Pentagon, as I noted earlier,
to like unveiling a report that says, hey, we can
identify these. So, yeah, UFOs are out there. Right. Which
that's a major deal that that is now happening. And,
you know, this has been something that government has just
been talking about for several years, like a former president.
(15:11):
The late Ronald Reagan did this in a speech talking
about alien threats and one time at White House.
S3 (15:17):
Perhaps we need some outside universal threat to make us
recognize this common bound. I occasionally think how quickly our
differences worldwide would vanish if we were facing an alien
threat from outside this world. And yet, I ask you,
(15:38):
is not an alien force already among us?
S1 (15:42):
I think that's just really interesting that this is like
a running thing that's just now getting acknowledged, what, 40
years later? And so yeah, I West Texas has pretty
much the majority of UFO sightings in Texas. And Texas
is the fourth most sightings of all the states in
the country. So according to the database from the National
(16:07):
UFO Reporting Center, Lubbock's had 60 reported sightings since the 1950s.
So one that since 1995 they've had like 70 since
the 1950s, at least those reported right? So far this year,
there have only been two reported in the Lubbock area,
one in Wolf Earth, which said there were blinking lights,
but not a place for about three minutes. And then
(16:29):
another one said that it was a V shaped formation
with five lights traveling low and fairly slow. So I
think this is interesting because this is the most common
sighting that we see in Lubbock is a V formation
as well as Amarillo. They're saying the same thing. It's
either in a V formation or triangular. So I think
that's really interesting. That's happened several times. But there were
(16:51):
some other instances, such as a fireball seen in the
sky hovering, glowing objects strategically line up and travel west.
And then there was some more dramatic cases where in
August 2021, one witness said that a saucer shaped craft
surrounded by pulsating, expanding and contracting white and green lights
followed him for about 30 minutes and wanted him to
see it. I don't know. I don't know what that to.
S2 (17:13):
Me stands out as or strikes me as more of
a hallucination.
S1 (17:16):
Yeah. And, you know, see, that's also my my theory. Why?
Maybe Lubbock has one more reported sightings. Because people like
to have fun out here.
S2 (17:25):
I don't know that we are the hallucinogenics capital of
the state or anything like that. I don't.
S1 (17:31):
Know for sure.
S2 (17:32):
By any means. I mean, really, my college experiences wouldn't
lend to that, but they probably wasn't the the target
demographic for that either.
S1 (17:40):
Probably not. But you know, also one less light pollution
to less obstruction. We don't have skyscrapers, you know, blocking
our view. And honestly, maybe it is like some extraterrestrial life, right?
And they don't want to be noticed. So they are
coming to more rural areas, right? Or it's easier to
enter and out like whatever portal they come through, right?
(18:03):
Like and of course, the crop circles that they create,
I mean, you know, that's their homes right there, the
crop circles, that's their impact. Not at all the pivots
and the plowing that occurs year round, definitely aliens. And
one of the more interesting things to me was also
like Scenarios was the one back in 1957. KMC Did
it or it came back, however we want to pronounce it,
(18:23):
wrote about this, and one alleged witness in 1957 was
driving near Loveland, and he said he saw a bright
flash of blue light before his truck engine sputtered, then
died as they felt something passed overhead. There were multiple
witnesses of this, so multiple people experience. Maybe they weren't
all driving, but they did all see the same light.
And investigators called it ball lightning and just fully debunked
(18:47):
the widespread UFO theory, Air Force investigators write. I thought
that was really interesting because, like, why would ball lightning
make your truck die, though? That's what gets me.
S2 (18:57):
Yeah, that sounds like EMP kind of situational. Yeah, I
don't know. I mean, if I assume if lightning struck
my my Honda Civic, it probably wouldn't function anymore.
S1 (19:06):
Yeah, it didn't strike it, though. It just passed over it.
You know what I'm saying? Like, I don't know. I
don't know. I don't even know what ball lightning is.
I should look more into that. And I know that
Carmack did actually asked, like an atmospheric professor at Tech,
and he was like, Well, you know, the science checks out.
I'm not going to argue with Air Force investigators. And
he said something like along the lines that people's memories
(19:27):
changed throughout the year. Maybe they exaggerate a little bit
more or they're a little bit dramatic. And this guy
was talking to like came back in a few years ago, right.
Within the last decade, maybe sooner, more recent. But it
was with, you know, that would have been decades later.
So yeah I mean I can see that, too, that
maybe the experience wasn't necessarily what he actually experienced like
(19:50):
in Remembered, right?
S2 (19:52):
Yeah. I mean it starts as two lights easily becomes four.
S1 (19:55):
And makes your truck engine sputter and die. Yeah I
don't know or maybe he he didn't get his oil
changed and forgot that part. I don't know.
S2 (20:04):
I don't know. And then one that I added into
your your story was the some of the reporting I did. And,
you know, it just seems like every couple of years
one of these stories comes up where we start getting
calls or start seeing social media chatter about lights and
the sky in an evening and start looking into that
check with our weather service. And it ends up being
an observation balloon released in eastern New Mexico. And they're
(20:25):
so high up that they catch some serious sunlight up there. Yeah.
S1 (20:29):
Yeah.
S2 (20:30):
I think the one that we saw here back in
2011 that said it was doing some research for for
NASA and 400ft in diameter. And the reports from up
from Amarillo down here to Lubbock and Clovis and Mule
shoe and everywhere in between, people wondering what that was.
It was kind of nice to figure out what that
(20:51):
thing was.
S1 (20:51):
Yeah, that is interesting. And, you know, as I noted,
like an Abilene pilot, he was not actually in Abilene
at the time. He was flying from, I believe, as
Phoenix to Abilene or somewhere along those lines. And when
he was passing over Roswell, which is well known for UFOs. Right.
(21:13):
He said that he and his co-pilot, they basically the communicators. Right.
The air traffic controllers were like, hey, be on the
lookout for something because we're seeing something right here. He
was like, all right, you know, And he ended up
seeing it. And he said it was about 2000 to
3000ft above them in their airplane. Right. So it was
(21:33):
even higher. And that one was never explained either. He
I mean, it could have been a, you know, balloon
as part of a NASA experiment. But I feel like
maybe our airlines and now so probably have better communication
than that for that to happen without any sort of,
you know, understanding on that.
S2 (21:54):
Yeah. Back then, I think, you know, obviously folks were
dealing with rapidly changing technology and advancements in jet aircraft
perhaps weren't familiar with that or Sure. Where they were
looking at there. So some of those things are probably
explained better that way.
S1 (22:10):
Yeah. And you know, so I'm looking this is like
the quote that he said. So like I said, he
said that I was 2000 to 3000ft above air traffic
and then said in quotations it was very bright, but
it wasn't so bright that you couldn't look at it.
What was weird about it, normally if you have an
object and the sun is shining this way, the reflection
would be on this wayside. But this was bright all
(22:32):
the way around. It was so bright that you really
couldn't make out what shape it was. So he basically
is just like, I have no clue. And I would
think he was also an Air Force pilot, a retired
Air Force pilot. Right. So he's seen some various aircrafts. Right.
So for someone who's an expert like this and is
well aware of aircrafts to just straight up be like, Yeah,
I don't know what this is. That's pretty crazy to me,
(22:53):
especially with it being over Roswell. And of course, we
have the other notable sightings in Abilene. Are you familiar
with them? I know you grew up there. So did
you hear about the ones in 1973 and 81 growing up?
S2 (23:05):
No, I really didn't. I mean, we would occasionally have
like a stealth fighter visit Abilene or the Blue Angels
doing it.
S1 (23:11):
Yeah, I know. Yeah.
S2 (23:13):
That wasn't something we talked about as a young man
growing up in Abilene.
S1 (23:19):
Yeah, we had Blue Angels, too, because, you know, at
the job in Fort Worth. So I got to see
them a lot too. So yeah, I mean, the archives
from the Abilene Reporter News said that for employees of
the radio station, local radio station reported three unidentified objects
southwest of town just after dusk. One of the men
reported that one of the objects was solid white and
(23:40):
swung like a pendulum, while the other two objects flash red,
green and blue. They then appeared to come closer and
remain stationary before backing up. So I also think that
this is really interesting because if you go look at
the database, a lot of them say that these aircrafts,
whatever these objects are stationary. So I think that's really
cool that this still checks out from 1973. Like similarities here,
(24:02):
like it's not moving. And of course, like, okay, an
airplane cannot just be stationary, right? Like, that's just not
something that's going to happen. So I thought that was interesting.
And then in 1981, another one in Abilene said a
luminous object appeared to hang in the sky west of
Abilene for several minutes around 7 p.m. before disintegrating into
a sparkling shower of debris. I have no clue what
(24:25):
that is, but I thought that was really interesting. And
it's interesting to me that Amarillo and Lubbock are reporting
basically the same sightings, like basically triangular or V-shaped, but
Amarillo or Abilene, just having these weird, like totally different sightings.
So that's also interesting to me.
S2 (24:41):
Yeah, the ones where the object moves in ways that
aircraft usually don't or that, I mean, that makes sense
now where we've got a lot of drones, but when
we see these reports from decades ago, it was either
some really advanced technology that that our government still hasn't
disclosed or perhaps something.
S1 (24:58):
Else that our government will never disclose, not still disclosed,
but never disclosed. Yeah, that's what I'm talking it up to, either,
you know, extraterrestrial or our government. Right. There's no in
between there. Although there was a case where there was
something flying over the Jones. Right. AT&T Stadium in Lubbock
Football Stadium. And it turned out being someone's guy, some
(25:21):
guy's drone pretty much like that's basically what it was.
It was like he worked for a production agency and
he was just trying to catch aerial photos of the drones.
S2 (25:31):
That wasn't an errand Patrick Mahomes passed.
S1 (25:34):
No, no.
S2 (25:36):
It was ruled out.
S1 (25:37):
Well, it was in 2013, so. Okay. Pre Mahomes. Yeah,
he was the one in high school that I think
or 2011 actually one of the two I think it
took a couple of years for the story to get
updated regardless it was pre Mahomes it was this Michael
Crabtree era the no that would pose Crabtree Prima Holmes.
S2 (25:58):
We're dealing maybe with the Sheffield era at Texas Tech.
S1 (26:01):
Okay. Okay. I wasn't here then. I was I too
was in high school then. So you know what's there
to do. But yes, so I mean, what are your
theories here? What do you what do you think about
the UFOs? What do you think about the cows? What
do you think about any of it?
S2 (26:15):
I mean, usually most of these things are there's some
sort of explanation for them, which is, you know, somewhat disappointing.
I like when there's a little bit of mystery. I
I'm perfectly content not understanding everything because I never will.
But I mean, if if there is an explanation, I
like to dig into it like a couple of the
ones I have here. But when it's something that's fairly obvious,
(26:35):
but I don't know, I've increasingly become an extraterrestrial skeptic
just because of the thinking about the difficulties of travel
and the distances. But I'm very suspicious or I'm skeptical
that we'd get extraterrestrials coming here just to remove cattle genitalia.
S1 (26:59):
Well, actually, I don't know if you recall, but when
I was planning on doing that UFO story, that's when
the cattle mutilation thing happened. Right? So that was super interesting.
Like the timing there was really interesting. Do you remember that?
S2 (27:10):
Yeah, it was a bit eerie.
S1 (27:11):
Yeah, but I had just to disclose it. I did
not do it. I did not do that to the cattle, okay?
It was not me just for this story. Okay. So
full disclosure there.
S2 (27:23):
On the list. We haven't really. Oh, okay.
S1 (27:24):
Okay. Well, whatever. So, you know, I ended up watching
this unsolved mystery thing about the cattle mutilations, and then
I ended up watching one about basically UFOs and these
people who said that they saw aliens and were captured
by aliens, like the morning that I received this email
from a reader before my UFO story was published. Right.
(27:47):
This was strictly after the cattle mutilation happened. The UFO
story was not published yet. And this guy Kevin, and
sent me three emails. He said, I remember reading about
the cow mutilations in Colorado in 1976, among others. Back
then two, they occurred in conjunction with UFO sightings. The
top theory was back then that it was aliens who
were harvesting the cow parts to study the DNA. After all,
(28:11):
the cow share much of the same DNA with humans,
maybe as high as 90%. Now, I haven't substantiated this.
I don't know if that's true, but this is from
an email. Maybe the aliens come back every 50 years
to see where our DNA is heading to. Life on
planet Earth may just be their little science experiment. And
this is the second email. The aliens could be concerned
that the bovine growth hormones, amongst other chemicals used by
(28:33):
farmers and ranchers on cattle, are eventually consumed by humans,
by the eating of meat and drinking of milk. We
could possibly be killing off bovine and human life on
planet Earth. And the aliens are concerned for our welfare.
And then the final one I got from him. There
are so many human abductions back in the 72 with
aliens poking and prodding every orifice on the human body.
Some humans remembered right off, others only remembered the trauma
(28:56):
of their anal probes. Under a hypnotic regression, one would
assume there are many who just don't remember if alien
abduction is also on the rise again, in conjunction with
this new round cattle mutilation, then aliens must have perfected
a way to keep the humans from remembering same. So
I think that's really, really interesting because I literally watched
like a docu series of this human abduction and everything
(29:18):
he just described, like the morning I received this email.
So I thought that was super weird. All this to say,
you know, there are theories that aliens aren't necessarily from
a different galaxy, right? But they're from a different time
or a different portal. Right? So our different dimension, rather.
So like we're in third dimension, right? And I think
there's like experts acknowledge, 12 dimensions, maybe 11. And basically,
(29:41):
like with the way evolution occurs, like aliens are the
future humans, right? So, I mean, I guess it's this
theory that aliens are coming back from the future, like
slowing us down and being like, Hey, this is what
you're going to become because of all the hormones you're consuming, right?
(30:01):
So and maybe they're trying to prevent that. I don't
know that theory.
S2 (30:05):
That I am not that I am not intelligent enough
to grasp, but I know there are things that are
greater than my ability.
S1 (30:13):
But still but still. Isn't it weird that one, while
I was planning on the UFO story, the cattle mutilation
thing happened. And then two right after I watched this
little docu series that this guy emailed, like with the
exact information that I watched. That's pretty weird, right?
S2 (30:26):
No, absolutely.
S1 (30:27):
I don't know.
S2 (30:28):
I liked the timing there.
S1 (30:30):
I didn't.
S2 (30:30):
I'm also skeptical that that's and unless the aliens know
something that we don't know about how to render DNA,
I mean, usually from visiting with a record reporter, I
gather they usually go for like bone marrow or something
like that. I don't think they go for the junk
to get the DNA, but maybe that's a best practice
(30:51):
that will at some point figure out.
S1 (30:54):
Yeah. I mean, I don't know. I don't know what's happening.
They're growing lab grown meat at this point, Right? So
maybe that's what they're doing. They're trying to prevent lab
grown meat from happening. I don't know. I have no clue.
I wonder what they get. The DNA for the lab
grown meat. Maybe that's. You know what? This just happened
a couple of weeks ago, right? And then lab grown
meat just, like, became a big thing within the last
(31:14):
couple of weeks. So that's my theory right there. They're
taking the DNA to make meat in labs.
S2 (31:21):
That's a possibility. They could also just be very select tastes.
I don't know if they checked like a local butcher
shop in the College station area and saw that that
was that was an offering that they had a special.
S1 (31:35):
We'll go sneakily kill a cow for you and sell it. Ya.
You sell its tongue sneakily.
S2 (31:44):
So smoke it with post oak. Yeah. Yeah.
S1 (31:48):
We'll go do it as discreetly as possible. Yeah, maybe.
I don't know. I don't know. But yeah. So. I
don't know. Do you have anything else to add, Adam?
S2 (31:57):
No. I'm just thoroughly disturbed after this conversation.
S4 (32:00):
Yeah, well, don't.
S1 (32:02):
Don't let the girls listen to this one. Yeah, but.
All righty. Well, thank you all for listening to episode three.
Probably our most, as Adam described, disturbing yet, but certainly
not the most disturbing that will get through all these
mysteries we unravel and weird West Texas. And you know what?
Still the biggest mystery out there in West Weird West
(32:22):
Texas is the story behind the children.
S2 (32:26):
Equally unexplainable and equally capable of producing hallucinations.
S1 (32:30):
True, but a lot more satisfying, right? You don't have
to worry about being abducted. Maybe. Maybe. It depends on
what you're talking about here. So anyway, all this to
say thank you again. Let's get weird, y'all. Do you
(32:50):
have a different tale to tell about any of our topics?
Don't hesitate to tell us. You can reach out to
the Lubbock Avalanche Journal or Amarillo Globe News on Facebook
or Twitter. You can also send an email to be
Addison at Lubbock Online with the subject line Weird West
Texas or shoot us a text at 806496 4073.
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