The Kecksburg UFO Incident

On December 9th, 1965, something crashed  from the sky in Kecksburg PA. This object, was seen as a green fireball streaking across the early evening in surrounding states and even as far North as Canada. Eyewitnesses who claimed to have made it to the scene of the crash described an intact otherworldly object before the military swiftly arrived on the scene and whisked away this apparent UFO. Despite the official government story of this simply being a meteor, and the denial of the massive military involvement witnessed by many and a subsequent cover up, we still don’t known exactly what went on that night. Join me as I look to piece together the timeline of events, and the theories as to what the Kecksburg UFO really was.

Show Notes:


The Kecksburg UFO memorial

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:10):
Several ecnally nine flying gotor flying dip that are out
there of extra read Laura Larny, Uh, hairy creature with
arms and hang down. Besides it's you know, bore down
on the side, Cartoony Main and Marty. He said he's

(00:33):
called come not anything. You're listening to the Strangeology Podcast.
I'm your host, Jeff Florin, and this is your place
to explore the weird, strange and unexplained from cryptis and creatures,
the paranormal, aliens in UFOs, forbidden knowledge, ancient mysteries, conspiracies,

(00:54):
and more. Hey ell and welcome back to the show.
It has been a minute. Also, Happy New Year to
everyone out there, and thank you for bearing with me
while the show was on a bit of an unexpected hiatus.
I've been trying to post short form content over on

(01:16):
all of my socials as best as I can, but
the holiday has got busy. Home life and unexpected projects
around the house got busy and ate up a lot
of my free time over the last month and a half.
But it's good to be back in the saddle with
a new episode for you all. For this edition of
the show and the season four closer also side note,

(01:38):
I might just be going with numbered episodes moving forward
because I don't know, just kind of makes sense. Maybe
we'll see. But today's topic is going to be about
the Kexburg UFO incident. It's a case that I'm sure
many of you have heard of, but I felt like
it was a fitting topic to do a deep dive

(01:59):
into to find out out all the details and the theories,
especially because of recent events that have been happening in
New Jersey, elsewhere in the country and even the world.
And if you follow me on social media, you probably
know that I've done a little bit of coverage on this,
and I feel like I'd be doing a little bit
of a disservice to not mention it on a forty

(02:22):
in podcast. But essentially, right after my last episode dropped,
these strange objects started showing up in the skies over
New Jersey. They were described as these SUV sized drones,
which also people have started to codeword that as dr bags,

(02:43):
which I kind of hate. And state and local governments
had no explanations for these things, and the federal government
also seemed to either not know or were intentionally withholding information. Supposedly,
they know what they are because they're not being shot down,
but a lot of people were getting a bit worried.

(03:04):
Throughout December, some people would report seeing a large object
or several of them hovering over or near their homes
for hours and hours on end, which is uncharacteristic of
drones to be able to have battery life that long.
Nobody knew exactly where these things were coming from, but
some reports were suggesting that they were being launched from

(03:27):
a ship around sixty miles off the east coast of
New Jersey. Some politicians claimed that quote unquote, on good
authority that it was from foreign adversaries. But then these
things started to be seen in New York, Pennsylvania, New England, Maryland, Washington, DC, Virginia, Minnesota, Illinois, Michigan, Arizona, California, Florida.

(03:50):
I mean, it seems like every corner of the country,
and people have also elsewhere in the world have started
recording strange objects in the sky as well, So you
can imagine there's all sorts of theories that have sprung
up around these things. Now, a lot of these drones
look like airplanes and have FAA compliant lighting, so the

(04:12):
reality is that they are probably most of them, at
least or many are just planes that are misidentified, and
there's massessaria going on. Understandable, but a lot of people
are filming on their phones. They're zooming in and the
lights get distorted and the bouquet effect happens a lot
of people think that these drones are morphing into orbs

(04:37):
of light, and I get the confusion. But some of
these things aren't really explainable as just regular conventional craft.
It doesn't explain the objects that hover for hours and
hours on end, longer than a conventional drone could. So

(04:57):
it seems that there's all these theories, right. They could
be a foreign adversaries like China or Iran. They most likely,
it seems last I knew, seemed to be ours. It
seemed pretty clear after some time that it's likely human

(05:18):
technology at the very least, maybe from private companies, which
is why the government is saying that they don't know
what they are. They can't disclose more information, like there's
some kind of loophole there. But this event is still
ongoing even into January, so I'm not so sure about that.
Some people were saying, like, oh, maybe it was a test,

(05:40):
and it was going to end by Christmas, but people
are still filming these things, even if the news media
has stopped really covering the topic. Now, there were some
fear mongering posts and theories about these drones looking for
missing radioactive material like a dirty bomb that was smuggled
into the country, and these drones were outfitted with tech

(06:00):
that could sniff out radiation, although I think they would
have found something by now. It turns out that the
material in question, it seems from an official report of
the missing material, was something used in a medical setting
for imaging like pet scans, although other people have seen
these drones spraying something in the air, which is pretty suss.

(06:23):
But one of the more interesting things about this whole
event is that the drones or whatever they are, have
been seen in tandem frequently with actual glowing balls of light,
which many believe are something called plasmoids, which is a
coherent plasma structure with its own magnetic field that forms

(06:45):
into a torial shape. If you haven't listened to my
interview episode with doctor Robert Temple on a New Science
of Heaven, he talks all about this kind of stuff,
the Cordaluski clouds and everything of that nature. Super fast Chat,
so definitely go back check that out if you haven't yet,
so you know, maybe some of this is that, But

(07:06):
there are other theories that claim that plasmoids can seem
to be self aware or they're some kind of conscious intelligence,
and that they're said to be able to be a
source of huge amounts of energy. So somethink that the
plasmoids came through this interdimensional rift that maybe the military

(07:27):
was experimenting on, and maybe they're trying to harness the power.
But I don't know. There's just so much going on
with this story that it's hard to keep track of.
But as the story develops, I'll probably use some updates
here and there over on social media, and yeah, the
interesting stuff for sure. Twenty twenty five is ramping up
to be an absolutely bonker's year already. But enough of

(07:51):
that news update before I get started, make sure to
subscribe to this show wherever you're listening to and put
your settings to auto download so you never miss a
new episode, and so I don't go on too long.
I'll have all my other pertinent information at the end,
and of course follow me over on social media if
you haven't yet for more content and updates. I'll have

(08:12):
all those links in the show notes. All right. With
that out of the way, let's get into the story
of the Kexburg UFO incident. Imagine living in a small,
quiet town only to wake up one day to find
yourself at the center of one of the most debated

(08:32):
UFO incidents in history. This is the story of Kexburgh, Pennsylvania,
a place forever marked by the strange and unexplained. In
this episode, we're going to piece together the bizarre events
of December ninth, nineteen sixty five. The streaking fireball that
lit up the skies, the strange metallic object found in
the woods in this small western Pennsylvania town, and the sudden,

(08:53):
almost theatrical appearance of military personnel to secure the scene.
Was it a meteor, a Cold War experiment, or was
it something not of this earth. Before we dive into
the details, let's set the stage. It's the mid nineteen sixties,
a time of radical change and tension throughout the world.
The space race between the US and the Soviet Union

(09:13):
was in full swing. Cold War paranoia was running at
an all time high, and the skies were being washed
with intense scrutiny. This was a period when anything unusual
in the air wasn't just a curiosity coming off the
back of the Cuban missile crisis and the assassination of JFK.
Anything up there was a potential threat or a sign

(09:34):
of something bigger now. Kexsburg, Pennsylvania, is a quiet rural
community about thirty miles southeast of Pittsburgh and near Mount Pleasant,
a seemingly unlikely place for such an extraordinary event. But
on that evening of December ninth, nineteen sixty five, everything changed.
Witnesses across six states and Canada saw this fiery object

(09:55):
streaking through the sky, leaving a trail of smoke and
speculation in its wake. By the time the object came
down in the woods near Kexsburg, the world was already
asking questions. Locals rushed to the crash site, expecting to
find the remains of a meteor or perhaps a downed aircraft.
What they claimed to see instead was something far stranger,
a metallic acorn or bell shaped object covered in mysterious symbols,

(10:19):
And within hours the military arrived, cordoning off the area
and transporting the object away under heavy guard, And just
like that, the story of Kexsburg was born December ninth,
nineteen sixty five, the night something fell from the sky
and changed the quiet town of Kexburg forever. It all
started in the late afternoon, around four forty seven pm

(10:39):
Eastern Standard time. Across this vast swath of North America,
people started seeing something in the sky. Witnesses from Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania,
New York, and parts of Canada all reported seeing a
massive object. Many described it as being like a fireball
with blue green flames streaking across the sky. Looked like

(11:00):
a meteor. To others, it seemed almost like an aircraft
on fire going down. Some witnesses in the Pittsburgh area
even reported sonic booms, blaming the noise on this mystery fireball.
Others reported seeing strange wisps of blue green smoke rising
out of the forest where this object crashed down, and
they even felt vibrations and heard the sound of its
impact on the ground. But what stood out too many

(11:22):
witnesses was how this object behaved. It wasn't like a
typical meteor, which usually travels in a straight trajectory. Instead,
this object seemed to slow down, almost gliding, as it
neared the ground. Some even claimed it changed direction slightly
before disappearing behind the trees and the forest it crashed in.
Witnesses described it as controlled, almost deliberate, a characteristic meteors

(11:45):
do not possess. The fireball was seen descending into the
woods just outside of Kecksburg, and moments later a loud
thud echoed across the hills, followed by reports of a
strange metallic noise. Naturally, people in this small town immediate
grew curious. They didn't know what was going on. Was
it a plane crash, a meteor, or something else entirely.

(12:07):
One witness, a then twenty year old man in volunteer
firefighter named James Romanski, was among the first on the scene.
He and several others rushed into the woods expecting to
find direct aircraft. Instead, they claimed to see what was
unlike anything they had ever encountered. Nestled in the dirt
was this large metallic object shaped like an acorn. It

(12:29):
was about ten to twelve feet in height and eight
to ten feet in diameter, with a golden bronze sheen
that reflected the fading sunlight. According to James, this object
was large enough for someone to stand in it. Now.
This is where things get stranger. The object wasn't just
a chunk of metal. Along with its base were strange symbols.
Some described them as looking like Egyptian hieroglyphics or runes.

(12:51):
One witness like in the markings to ancient Sanskrit, while
another thought that they resembled mathematical formulas. The surface on
the object appeared smooth, almost seamless, with no visible rivets
or anything that you'd see on a conventional aircraft. Another
key detail that's important to mention is that the object
didn't appear to have crash landed in the traditional sense.

(13:13):
It wasn't buried into a crater or broken into pieces. Instead,
it seemed to have come to a controlled stop, almost
as if it had gently landed rather than plummeted to Earth.
Think of the SpaceX rocket tests, where instead of just
letting the rocket boosters crash back into the ocean, they've
engineered technology to guide them back for controlled and safe landing.

(13:33):
As more residents arrived, word of the crash began to spread.
Someone no one knows exactly who called the local authorities,
and soon the area was buzzing with activity. Police officers
more volunteer firefighters and curious townsfolk converged on the site
trying to make sense of what they were seeing. But
just as quickly as the excitement built, someone else showed up.

(13:57):
The United States military. Witnesses recalled a convoy of military vehicles, jeeps, trucks,
even flatbed trailers rolling into Kecksburg with purpose. Soldiers armed
and serious set up a perimeter around the crash site.
Local authorities and civilians were ordered to leave the area immediately,
and those who resisted were met with stern warnings or

(14:19):
outright threats. According to some accounts, soldiers were seen with
Geiger counters scanning for radiation, though this detail remains unverified now.
The presidence of the military raised immediate suspicions. Why would
the US government be so interested in what the initially
described as a meteor or later space debris. Witnesses claimed

(14:39):
they saw the acorn shaped object being loaded onto a
flatbed truck under heavy security. From there, it was reportedly
whisked away to an undisclosed location, never to be seen again.
In the aftermath, the locals were left in the dark.
Some were furious, feeling that their government was hiding something
from them. Others were simply bewildered. What had they just

(15:01):
witnessed and why was it being treated like a matter
of national security. The story didn't stay contained a kexpert
for long, much like the infamous case of Roswell, New Mexico.
The next day, local and national news outlets picked up
the story. Headlines read Unidentified object crashes in Pennsylvania, and
reporters speculated about what the mysterious object might have been.

(15:24):
Some newspapers quoted official sources who downplayed the event as
a natural phenomenon. Others focused on witness accounts that described
something far more unusual. One notable piece of coverage came
from John Murphy, who was a radio station journalist from WHJB.
Murphy interviewed several eyewitnesses and even visited the crash site

(15:45):
himself before the military coordinated off. He became convinced that
the object was something extraordinary and began working on an
investigative report titled Object in the Woods. However, before he
could air his findings, Murphy claimed that he was visited
by government agents who confiscated his materials and warned him
not to pursue the story further. Murphy's story added Fueld

(16:08):
of the fire, becoming one of the most cited examples
of alleged government's suppression related to the Kexsburg incident. Over
the years, the accounts of what happened in Kecksburg have
been scrutinized, debated, and in some cases even discredited. Critics
argue that witness testimonies are unreliable, influenced by time, media, sensationalism,
and the human tendency to embellish. For instance, some witnesses

(16:32):
described the object as glowing brightly, while others said it
appeared cold and lifeless. Similarly, the description of the strange
markings varies widely, with no consensus on their appearance or meaning.
But despite these inconsistencies, many witnesses have stuck to their
stories even decades later. For them, what they saw that

(16:52):
night was not a figment of their imagination. It was real,
and it was extraordinary. To fully understand the significance of
what happened, then, we also have to consider the broader context.
This was nineteen sixty five, the height of the Cold War.
The US and the Soviet Union were locked in a
technological and ideological battle that extended far beyond Earth's atmosphere.

(17:13):
Just four years earlier, Yuri Gagern had become the first
man to orbit the planet, and John F. Kennedy had
committed America to landing on the Moon By the end
of the decade. The space race wasn't just about exploration.
It was a show of power, innovation, and dominance. It's
no wonder then, that anything falling from the sky, especially
something unexplained, would attract immediate attention from the military. Could

(17:36):
the Kexburg object have been a Soviet satellite, a secret
US spacecraft, or was it something that neither side wanted
to admit knowing about. What we know for sure is
that something came down in Kexburg that night, and its impact,
both literal and metaphorical, has rippled throughout history. The details
of the incident, from the strange behavior of the fireball

(17:57):
to the swift and secretive actions of the military, raised
far more questions than answers. While let's dive deeper into
the government's role in the aftermath of the crash. Were
they simply cleaning up space debris or was there a
more sinister agenda at play? As the mysterious events of
December ninth, nineteen sixty five unfolded in Kecksburg. One of
the most striking aspects of the story was the swift

(18:19):
and decisive involvement of the US government. The official response
to the incident has become a cornerstone of the case,
fueling decades of speculation and allegations of cover up. Witness
accounts consistently described the arrival of heavily armed military personnel
from the Army and the Air Force, who arrived within
hours of this alleged crash. Local witnesses who had approached

(18:42):
the forest where the object went down, including members of
the news media who had also come out to the scene,
reported seeing unmarked trucks, jeeps, and armed soldiers converging onto
the wooded area where this object had supposedly landed. According
to locals, the military quickly took control of the site
and cordoned off the forest and ordered civilians and local
authorities to leave, although some civilians did report trying to

(19:05):
sneak into the woods to catch a glimpse of the
object that crashed, but were quickly intercepted and turned around
by the military, often at the threat of gunpoint. This
immediate and authoritative response raises a critical question, how did
the military know to mobilize so quickly. One plausible explanation
is that radar systems detected the object as it entered
Earth's atmosphere. During the Cold War, both the US and

(19:27):
the Soviet Union maintained extensive radar networks to monitor the
skies for potential threats such as incoming missiles or spacecraft,
and if the object's descent was tracked in real time,
that would explain the military's rapid deployment. However, this explanation
doesn't account for the secrecy that followed. Witnesses claimed that
soldiers refused to answer questions about their purpose, and some

(19:49):
described being threatened with arrest if they didn't vacate the area,
and this heavy handed approach only added to the suspicion.
One of the most compelling details of the Keckxburg incident
is the leedged removal of this acorn shaped object. Several
witnesses did report seeing some kind of object loaded onto
a flatbed truck covered with a tarp and escorted out
of the area under heavy guard. The destination, well, that

(20:12):
remains a mystery. Over the years, researchers have speculated about
where the object might have been taken to with Wright
Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio being the leading theory.
Right Patterson has long been associated with UFO lore, most
notably as the rumored repository for wreckage from the Roswell
crash in nineteen forty seven. Another possibility is that a

(20:34):
secret government lab or military base unknown to the public
could be where the object was taken to to be
analyzed without public scrutiny. But what happened to the object
after it was removed from Kecksburg Did it even exist
in the first place, Well, that depends on who you ask.
In the immediate aftermath of the incident, the US government
provided a straightforward explanation the fireball seen across the sky

(20:58):
was simply a meteor. The Air Force stated that nothing
unusual was found in Kexburg and that the alleged object
was likely just a natural phenomena. However, these explanations were
quickly pointed out for their inconsistencies. For starters, meteors don't
typically change direction or slow down as they approach the ground.
Witnesses also described the object as intact and having metallic qualities.

(21:20):
This is inconsistent with most meteorite debris, which would likely
shatter or vaporize on impact. This suggests something technological instead.
A second explanation emerged in the form of a possible
Soviet satellite. During the Cold War, the US kept a
close eye on Soviet space activity, and there was significant
concern about foreign technology falling into American territory. Some researchers

(21:42):
have suggested that the object could have been the Cosmos
ninety six satellite, a failed Soviet Venus probe that re
entered Earth's atmosphere on the same day of the Kexburg incident. However,
this theory has its own problems. According to NASA, the
trajectory of Cosmos ninety six doesn't match the fireball seen
over northern Nie America. Additionally, the timing of its reentry

(22:02):
doesn't align with the reported crash in Kexsburg. Cosmos ninety
six entered the atmosphere over Canada around three eighteen am,
where the Kexburg object was observed at four forty seven
PM over thirteen hours later. Even the Russians denied that
the Kexsburg object was their satellite. So if it wasn't
a meteor or Soviet technology, what was it now? Of course,

(22:24):
this incident happened during a pivotal time for UFO research
as well with the government. The Air Force's Project Blue Book,
a program established to investigate UFO sightings, was still active
in nineteen sixty five. Over its twenty two year history,
Project blue Book collected and analyzed thousands of UFO reports,
categorizing most but not all of them as misidentified natural

(22:47):
phenomena or conventional aircraft, but not all cases were explained. Interestingly,
the Kexburg case was included in Project blue Books records,
but the official conclusion was that it was unremarkable. It
was also claimed that there was not a significant presence
of military that evening in Kecksburg. Rather, a nearby radar
station in Pittsburgh only sent out three personnel to check

(23:08):
out what had crashed. However, we can quickly dismiss that claim,
as newspapers like the Greenberg, PA Tribune Review had headlines
the following day on December tenth, that read unidentified flying
object falls near Kexsburg and Army ropes off the area.
It also ran a headline that said searchers failed to
find object despite several witnesses seeing the Army leaving with

(23:31):
something large on a flatbed truck that was covered with
the tar and as we know, in the end, the
Air Force and army dismissed the incident as merely being
a meteor sighting, offering no further investigation. This minimal response
has been criticized by UFO researchers as either a missed
opportunity or a deliberate attempt to downplay and cover up
the event. Perhaps the most enduring aspect of the Kexburg

(23:54):
UFO incident is the belief that the government engaged in
this cover up. Witnesses described being silenced or intimidated by
military personnel, and key evidence such as photos, debris, and
official reports have seemingly vanished over the years, and one
of the most compelling pieces of testimony did come from
John Murphy, the WHJP radio journalist I mentioned earlier. Murphy

(24:19):
was among the first to report the crash and claimed
to have obtained photographs of this object. However, he was
later told by his colleagues that government agents had come
in and confiscated his materials, and they also pressured him
to drop the story. Murphy's reluctance to discuss the incident
publicly afterward only deepened suspicions that something else was in
play in Kexsburg. Even more troubling is the fate of

(24:42):
NASA's records related to the Kesburg incident. For fifty years,
NASA refused to release any documentation they had regarding this event,
which further fueled speculation that there was some kind of
cover up about a downed craft. In the early two thousands,
investigative journalist Leslie Keene, who would later become the reporter
who broke the Tic tac Ufo story through The New

(25:03):
York Times in twenty seventeen, filed a lawsuit against NASA
demanding the release of documents under the Freedom of Information Act,
and after years of legal battles, NASA admitted that some
records were quote lost or destroyed, a revelation that only
further fuels conspiracy theorists. So if the government was covering
something up, what could it have been. Well, we've gone

(25:25):
over a few so far, but let's dive a little deeper.
One possibility is that the object was a classified military
project of the United States. One possibility is that the
object was a classified US military project. During the nineteen sixties,
the US was heavily invested in developing advanced aircraft satellites
and reconnaissance technology. If the object was a failed experiment

(25:48):
or a prototype, the government would have had every reason
to secure and conceal it. Another theory is that the
object was indeed a Soviet satellite, but not the Cosmost
ninety six. Some researchers speculate that it could have been
an unrecorded or clandestine Soviet space mission. If the US
recovered Soviet tech, it would have been a significant intelligence coup.

(26:09):
Another reason for secrecy, and of course the most tantalizing theory,
is that the object was not of this Earth. Witnesses
descriptions of the acorn shaped object and its strange markings
aligned with what many imagine an alien spacecraft might look like.
If this theory is true, the government's response makes sense.
The recovery of an extraterrestrial craft would have been the

(26:29):
ultimate national security priority, and we'll get into some more
details about that shortly. Regardless of what this object was,
the government's actions raise a broader question why the secrecy.
Some argue that the Cold War climate demanded it in
a time when every technological advantage mattered. Revealing too much
about what was found, or even admitting that something was

(26:50):
found at all could have had serious geopolitical consequences, and
others believe the secrecy goes deeper, suggesting a coordinated effort
to suppress knowledge of extra tras terrestrial life. This idea
ties into broader conspiracy theories about government involvement in the
UFO phenomena, such as Roswell, Area fifty one and other
high profile cases. Now, whether you believe the Kecksburg incident

(27:13):
was a case of government overreach, cold war paranoia, or
something far more extraordinary, one thing is clear. The events
of that night left an indelible mark on the world
of UFO research. The military's swift and secretive actions, the
disappearance of key evidence, and the conflicting explanations all point
to a deeper mystery, one that continues to captivate and

(27:33):
confound investigators to this day. So what was this object?
First off, we have the most simple and widely accepted
explanation from the scientific and skeptic community. This object was
simply a meteor. Fireballs extremely bright ones are not uncommon,
and their appearance often generates UFO reports. As it turns out,

(27:55):
the American Media Society recorded hundreds of sightings of a
fireball streaking across the sky over North America on December ninth.
Witnesses described it as brilliant, fast moving, and accompanied by
a roaring sound consistent with meteors bringing up as the
enter Earth's atmosphere. Now, this theory explains some of the
aspects of the incident, but leaves significant questions unanswered. For one,

(28:17):
meteors typically travel in a straight line and don't alter
their trajectory. Yet many witnesses reported that the Kexburg fireball
appear to slow down, change direction, and even went into
a glide before crashing. Such behavior would be highly unusual
for a natural object. Additionally, meteors that make it to
the ground often vaporize or shatter into small fragments, but

(28:40):
the object that was seen in Kexsburg was described as intact,
in acorn shape, and there was no crater. These details
seem inconsistent with a meteor impact. Now, despite these inconsistencies,
skeptics argue that the meteor explanation aligns with the most
basic facts of the events. For those seeking a straightforward answer,
it is an attract theory, but for many it's not

(29:02):
nearly enough to explain all of the strange details of
that night. Next, let's consider the possibility that the object
was man made a satellite or some kind of spacecraft.
During the nineteen sixties, the US and the Soviet Union
were launching satellites at a rapid pace and competing for
dominance in the space race. Satellites would occasionally diorbit and

(29:23):
re enter Earth's atmosphere, creating these spectacular fireball like displays.
Now we know that Cosmos ninety six that Soviet Venus
probe failed to leave Earth and re enter the atmosphere
on December ninth. However, the timeline doesn't line up with
the object that was seen over Kexburg, and again Russia
denied that this object was theirs. But still the possibility

(29:47):
remains that the object was another piece of Cold War technology,
perhaps a secret US or Soviet satellite that was never
publicly acknowledged. In this scenario, the military's rapid response to
the situation does make sense. They would have been eager
to recover and secure their technology before it could fall
into the wrong hands. And it's also been proposed that

(30:07):
it could have been a piece of American technology as well,
either from crash, space debris or a piece of a
plane that broke off over Canada, eventually landing in western Pennsylvania. Interestingly,
when Project Bluebook investigated this case, it reported that no
US space or aircraft debris was reported on December ninth.
Next up is the most tantalizing theory of all, the

(30:28):
one that suggests that this mystery. Next up is the
most tantalizing theory of all, the one that suggests that
this mystery object was not from Earth, that it was
indeed an alien craft of some sort. Witnesses described the
object as having an almost otherworldly appearance. It was smooth, seamless,
marked with symbols they couldn't identify, and it looked certainly

(30:49):
like no conventional aircraft or piece of technology that we
had during that era. Additionally, it's observed behavior in the
sky by hundreds of people or more, seeing it slow down,
changed direction, and glide down is evidence that something intelligent
seemed to be controlling it. And let's consider the implications
of this theory. If this object was extraterrestrial, what was

(31:11):
it doing here? Could it have been a probe sent
to observe Earth, or was it perhaps a spacecraft that
malfunctioned and crashed. Either way, the military swift response in
subsequent secrecy could be explained by the discovery of alien technology,
and of course, recovering and reverse engineering such an object
would have been a top priority for any government. Prominent

(31:33):
Fortian researcher Stan Gordon was very involved in this case,
interviewing several witnesses and trying to get to the bottom
of what really happened back in nineteen sixty five. To
add to the evidence of this theory, one witness described
as Stan Gordon that they arrived at the scene and
found the object well before the military arrived. They also
described this object as acorn shaped as we know, and

(31:55):
large enough for an adult man to sit inside. The
color of it was a bronze gold, also had the
strange hieroglyphic type writing on it. But here's the kicker.
They swore that they could see an arm hanging out
of it that had three digits on its hand instead
of the normal five that a human would have, and
it also looked like it had lizard like skin. Another witness,

(32:16):
a man who was stationed at Wright Patterson Air Force Base,
later came forward claiming that he saw an alien body
laying on a workbench around the time that the Kexsburg
craft was brought in. He described it as being four
to five feet tall, looking like it weighed about eighty pounds,
and also described reptilian skin. In addition to that, a
man named Don Sebastian, who was in Kecksburg during the crash,

(32:38):
had attempted to go into the forest where it went
down to go find it, but before finding it, he
heard the blood curdling screams of some kind of creature
that frightened him out of the woods. Was it an alien? Well,
the answer is we don't know for sure. And of
course the theory also ties into a broader pattern of
UFO sightings and alleged crashes. Kecksburg isn't the only case

(33:00):
where witnesses reported military involvement and mysterious recoveries Roswell in
nineteen forty seven, Shag Harbor in nineteen sixty seven, and
other high profile cases that share all of these striking similarities.
And we have one final theory that was proposed by
John Venter and Owen Eichler in nineteen ninety one, which
says that the Kecksburg object was likely a ge Mark

(33:22):
two re entry vehicle. After the US government declassified documents
regarding this experimental crafts. The g Mark two was designed
as a nuclear test re entry body and was part
of a top secret program during the fifties and sixties
which focused on testing aerodynamics, materials, and survivability of objects
like ballistic missiles re entering Earth's atmosphere at high speeds.

(33:45):
Venter and Eichler believed that they found four similarities in
the ge Mark two compared to eyewitness descriptions of the
Kecksburg object. The ge craft had four control jets, which
could have explained how the object seemed to come down
in a control changing direction, slowing down or gliding down
so it didn't crash. It also was constructed out of

(34:06):
this copper alloy, which also lines up with the green
flames that were observed by the witnesses. The GEMRK two
also had a bell like or acorn shape designed to it,
making it very similar to what was described in Kecksburg,
and if this object truly was a ge Mark two,
which was top secret at the time, it also would

(34:26):
explain the massive military presence and recovery effort, as well
as downplaying and covering up the event, as they wouldn't
want word of it to get out to the wrong
people or the Soviet Union at the height of the
Cold War. However, there are some problems with this theory.
Despite extensive investigations and Freedom of Information Act requests, nod
to classified documents have ever conclusively linked the ge Mark

(34:49):
two or any other secret re entry vehicle to the
Kexsburg incident. Even to this day, the government still maintains
that it was simply a meteor and while the ge
Mark two had boosters on it, they likely would have
only been used in orbit and not during descent, and
it would suggest a level of control beyond the technology
of the time. Taking witness testimony into account is important

(35:11):
as well, as most witnesses described it looking unlike anything
they had ever seen, and although the ge Mark two
was an advanced piece of tech for its time and
did look kind of bell or acorn shape, it was
still very well into the realm of human engineering of
the time and would likely have still been recognizable as
the nuts and bolts object that the GEMRK two was.

(35:33):
And if it was a ge Mark two after the
documents on it were declassified in the nineties, why has
the Kexsburg object not been officially explained as being this craft. Ultimately,
if it was a secret technology program, it was likely
something else. Of course, not everyone is convinced that the
Kecksburg object was anything extraordinary. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence,

(35:57):
after all. Some skeptics argue that the entire event could
be explained by a combination of natural phenomena, human error,
and media sensationalism. They point out that eyewitness accounts are
often unreliable, especially in high stressed situations. Memories can be
influenced by time, emotions, and even the power of suggestion.
For example, some witnesses describe the object as glowing brightly,

(36:19):
while others said that it appeared cold and metallic. Similarly,
the markings on the object were interpreted in various ways,
from being something like hieroglyphics to random scratches, or even Sanskrit.
These inconsistencies have led to These inconsistencies have led skeptics
to dismiss the case as a mix of misidentified natural
phenomena and overactive imaginations. But for believers, these explanations fail

(36:43):
to address the core mysteries of the case, the object's
behavior and the military's involvement, and the apparent efforts to
suppress the information about it. Regardless of which theory you
find most convincing, The Kexburg incident raises profound questions. If
the object was a meteor or a satellite, why the secret.
If it was a military experiment, what were they testing
and why was it hidden from the public? And if

(37:05):
it was extraterrestrial, what does that mean for our understanding
of life in the universe. These questions are not just theoretical.
They touch on issues of transparency, accountability, and the role
of governments in managing knowledge about extraordinary phenomena. Much like today,
the Kexburg case reminds us that the truth, whatever it
might be, has implications that reach far beyond the boundaries

(37:27):
of one small Pennsylvania town. As we've seen, the theories
surrounding Kexburg are as varied as they are compelling, whether
you lean toward natural explanations, cold war technology, or alien origins,
One thing is certain. The events of December ninth, nineteen
sixty five continue to captivate and challenge us. But before
we wrap up, there are a few other things to

(37:48):
mention regarding the impact of this event within UFO lore
and its ongoing relevance in modern discussions about UFOs and UAPs.
It's been nearly six days decades after the events of Kexsburg,
and to this day, it remains one of the most
enduring and debated cases in UFO history. And while we
may never know the full truth of what happened that night,

(38:10):
the legacy of Kexburg has transcended the initial mystery. Today,
the legacy of the event lives on. As a small
rural town, the UFO incident has become a defining part
of Kexburg, like so many of the small towns that
experience high strangeness such as cryptid encounters or even other
UFO sightings. Every year, Kexsburg's volunteer fire department hosts an

(38:32):
annual UFO festival, which draws visitors from all over. The
festival features UFO themed brades, guest speakers, and there's even
a replica of the acorn shaped object described by witnesses
that can be found near the local volunteer fire station.
The story of the Kexburg UFO has embedded itself in
the town's culture, and it's a big way for this

(38:52):
little town to embrace its place in UFO lore and
beyond Kexsburg itself, the incident has left a significant imprint
on popular culture. The story's been featured in countless books, documentaries,
TV shows, each offering its own perspective on the events
that took place back then. One of the most influential
portrayals came from Unsolved Mysteries, the iconic TV show that

(39:15):
introduced a generation to the strange and unexplained. The Kexburg episode,
which was the season three premiere, aired on September nineteenth,
nineteen ninety and really brought national attention to this case
and introduced it to millions of viewers who would otherwise
have never heard about it, and really helped to put
Kexsburg on the map. Other shows like The X Files

(39:37):
have also drawn inspiration from Kexsburg. While the series didn't
directly reference this particular incident, its themes of government cover
ups extraterrestrial encounters were clearly influenced by cases like this.
Even films like Close Encounters of the Third Kind or
et dooh a debt of cultural groundwork laid by real

(39:58):
world UFO store like Kexburg. In Over the decades, the
incident has been cited by many researchers and people who
are enthusiastic about UFOs, as a prime example of alleged
government secrecy surrounding the UFO phenomena, and has laid groundwork
for researchers and other ufologists to move forward towards disclosure,

(40:20):
especially in the last few years, as a conversation around
UFOs has taken on a new level of seriousness and
the public has been officially made aware of certain programs
by the government that were previously unknown or classified that
have been studying UFO or UAP phenomena. Now, as far
as what I think, well, it's hard to say exactly.

(40:41):
I want to believe that it was a bonafide UFO
from another world that crash landed on Earth, But as
the saying goes, like I said before, extraordinary claims require
extraordinary evidence. But something was covered up by the military
and government that night. I highly doubt that it was
just immediate, So we're left with the other options. It

(41:03):
could have been alien, but it also very well could
have been a piece of our own experimental technology at
the time, especially with all of the Cold War paranoia.
It's something to consider. What's certain is that the Kexburg
UFO incident is that it's left a legacy far greater
than anyone could have imagined on that chilly night in
nineteen sixty five. Thanks so much for hanging out with

(41:28):
me today. My name is Jeff and this is Strangeology.
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take care of yourselves and each other and keep it strange,

(44:24):
all right, Thanks again so much for hanging out with
me today. I hope you enjoyed today's episode, and thanks
again for bearing with me during my holiday abstinence. But
we're going to be getting back on track and there
is a lot of great stuff that I want to
cover in twenty twenty five, so stay tuned for all
of that. And with all the UFO UAP activity happening

(44:46):
around the world right now, maybe we'll soon get a
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(45:07):
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(45:27):
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(45:51):
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(46:13):
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(46:58):
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(47:21):
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(48:04):
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(48:26):
for me for now. I'm gonna take a quick break here,
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(48:48):
yourselves and each other, and keep it strange. All right,

(49:44):
Welcome back to Strangeology Beyond Everyone, of course, your exclusive
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