An Apology

 ---------------------------------------

Date: Sun Apr 24 14:06:00

 1988

From: NEIL GOULD (aa330)

Subj: An Apology to Rick & Dale - NG

 

Rick & Dale,

 

I would like to offer apologies for two of my recent state- ments.

 First, I would like to thank you, Rick, for taking the

 

time to go through the uploads, as I had challenged, and  explain your

reasons for the statements that you made regarding conclusions that you

felt I had come to.  It did help me to understand what you were saying

to me over and over.

 

That leads me to apology #1.  It is now apparent that you may not have

 "deliberately misrepresented" my position, as I had accused, but may

 have only MISTAKENLY misrepresented me.  I am sorry to have accused you

 of this prior to having all of the facts regarding the situation.

 

The reason that I consider this a possibility is due to the connections

 that you made between my statements about ration- ality and emotional

 responses and your feeling that they necessarily refl ect delusion or

 illusion.  An example, using this experience, might help to clarify

 what I mean.

 

When I read your uploads, stating that I had concluded that the  Coast

Guard personnel and observers were deluded for so long, I related only

to the fact that I had not said anything about delusions/illusions

(which you recognized in your recent upload).  I had NOT considered that

the idea of illusion or delusion might have been a summation of yours,

based on you r interpretation of my statements regarding rational

actions and emot ional responses to situations.

 

Therefore, my EMOTIONAL response to your statements clouded my

 judgement, and lead to my IRRATIONAL accusation that your actions were

 deliberate. Now that you have presented more data, in the form of your

 explanation of your personal connection between irrational actions and

 delusion, it is apparent that my conclusion may have been incorrect

 (only you

 

know for sure whether your actions were deliberate). 

 

Now, does my emotional and irration al action mean that I was DELUDED

 about the situation?  I don't think so.  I was, perhaps, mistaken, but

 without the clarifying information which came later, I would not have

 been considered "fool(ed), as by false promise, mislead, deceive(d), or

 tricked" - from WEBSTER's  NEW WORLD DICTIONARY - parentheses mine).

 Just simply mistaken.

 

Was I under the ILLUSION that I had not come to a conclusion, but

 indeed, did so?  No.  Because those "conclusions" were clearly the

 result of YOUR interpretation of my statements. I

 

don't operate by the notions of causality between irrational or

 

emotional actions and delusions or illusions that you felt were

 

implied in my statements. 

 

I hope this helps you to understand why I reacted to your statements.

 

The second apology is for participating in mud-slinging.  Plain and

 simple, it was an irrational response, propelled by my emotional state

 resulting from my interpretation of your messages regarding my

 "position".

 

I sincerely mean the apologies, above.  And, I hope you c an app reciate

 my taking your latest advice to take a dose of  objectivity myself!

 

In the next upload, I offer my opinion about the  sightings.

 

- Neil

 

--------------------------------------- Date: Sun Apr 24 14:25:17 1988

From: NEIL GOULD (aa330) Subj: Eastlake Ufo - my opinion - NG

 

After having time to read and consider the uploads regarding  the

Eastlake Sighting, I would like to toss my two cents in, and offer some

opinion.  So as not to "tease" anyone reading this into thinking that I

have an exp lanation, prosaic or otherwise for the sighting, I'd like to

say now that such an explanation is not to be found in this writing.  I

still have no idea what these people saw.  BUT... I do have more

questions!!

 

The first thing that I would like to address is the discussion about

 accounting for ALL of the phenomena in a statement.  In doing so, not

 only must one address all of the issues, but must account for

 discrepancies, as well as similarities, in the reports of witnesses.

 

As some might fee l that those assigning the sighting to simple

 misidentification of celestial bodies inadequate to explain all of the

 phenomena, others (myself included) might feel that the discrepancies

 contained in the reports are not minor, easily dismissable elements.

 

       * REGARDING NICK SANDULEAK's explanation.  Nick is a highly

 trained, professional observer of celestial phenomena.  I doubt that

 any one of the witnesses can make tha t claim, and, if they could, that

 not one of them has celestial bodies named after them, as does

 Sanduleak (see the current issue of National Geographic  for an

       interesting article about one of Nick's discoveries).

       

 For this reason alone, his opinion can't be pooh-poohed  merely because

       it doesn't address all of the phenomena reported by the

       witnesses.  In fact, he does address the "flying triangles",

       though indirectly.  The potency, for me, is in his statement tha

       t observers of UFO s often link all unusual events - related or

       not - to their sighting.

       

I have addressed some aspects of the sightings, particularly, the

 absence of reports of sonic booms, which should have been a frequent

 and an outstanding part of the witnesses' testimony. [Sandy - while

 anything is possible, I doubt that sonic booms could have been mistaken

 for ice cracking for the duration of the sighting]. I'd like to go into

 this a little further.

 

The witnesses re ports indicate that the re were a number of objects

 (3-5) travelling at "REALLY fast" rates of speed.  Each of these

 objects would have produced a shock wave during each "pass" that would

 have been heard throughout the greater Cleveland area.  I recall the

 military supersonic tests during the 50's and 60's, where jets

 travelling miles away from Cleveland would rattle my windows.  This

 means that more people would have unusual phenomena to report.  There

 would be no mista king multiple, frequent, long-term (3-4hrs.) sonic bo

 oms for anything other than an unusual event.  Yet there are NO

 

such reports (with the impossible exception of the loud ice- cracking).

 From this, I can only conclude that:

 

    1. The witnesses were mistaken about the speed of these objects.

 This is possible due to the emotional excitement of the moment;

 misjudgement is a common phenomenon when one is emotionally aroused.

 

    2. The objects were not solid, and therefore did not 

 displace air as they "travelled" be twe en two distant  observed

       points.  In this case, no shock wave, and no sonic booms.

 

Which conclusion is most accurate is not able to be determined  with the

existing (up-loaded) evidence.

 

Further, I was also puzzled that the "mothership" decended into the

 lake.  This would have been immediately verifiable, as an- other

 pointed out, by aircraft.  I don't believe that an air- craft was not

 dispatched as a result of a cover-up.  I do believe that it was not

 perceived as a warranted action .

 

As it relates to Sandy's sonic-boom hypothesis, no plane in flight

 around the greater Cleveland area would be able to ignore the

 turbulence and sound of the sonic booms, if they existed.  Those in

 close proximity, i.e. taking off or landing at Lost Nation Airport,

 would have been quite concerned about the effect on their control of

 the plane.

       

Moreover, there are many aircraft in the vicinity that are not under the

 control of the Coast Guard. It seems unlikely that a phenomena su ch as

 t his would go unobserved by pilots, who would undoubtedly be taking

 advantage of the clear weather to get in

 

some flying.  The area of the sighting would have been highly  visible

to anyone on approach to or taking off from Lost Nation, Cuyahoga

County, Burke Lakefront, and in some cases, Hopkins airports.

 

I can tell you from many years of first hand experience in flying small

 planes into and out of all of these airports, that events which

 occurred exactly as described c ould not be simply missed. I therefore

 offer the following conclusions.  Either:

 

    1. The events didn't occur exactly as described.

       

    2. Testimony from pilots who did observe the phenomena has not been

 presented here, but is available.

          

No further evidence is available to me at this time to elaborate upon

 either conclusion.

 

I hope to add to this as more evidence becomes available.

 

- Neil

 

--------------------------------------- Date: Tu e Apr 26 17:23:47 1988

From: NICK SANDULEAK (aa346) Subj: EA STLAKE IFO (PART III)

 I believe I can now offer a highly plausible explanation for the one

remaining nagging "strange" aspect of the Eastlake IFO incident.What

were the small,yellowish,triangular-shaped objects which were seen to

move rapidly across the sky and maneuver in erratic ways unlike aircraft

(sharp right-angle turns,etc.)? Recall that the essentially full moon

rose just after 8 p.m. on the evening of March 4,1988.Thus at about 9

p.m.,when these rapidly moving objects were being viewed t oward the

direction of West-Northwest,the moon was situated low in the sky to the

right- rear of the observers.It was perfectly placed to reflect moon-

light directly back to the observers from physically small objects

flying in the immediate vicinity of the observers,i.e. at distances of a

few hundred yards or so. Now what kind of objects might be flying about

in the immediate vicinity of the CEI powerplant where there was likely

to be open water(breaks in the ice pack) because of a warm water

 

discharge.That's right-sea gulls going to roost in the safety of open

water away from predators. The local ufologists will,no doubt,scoff at

this possibility since they may be unaware that light reflections off of

birds have been implicated in numerous UFO sightings.I can testify that

I once saw a remarkably brilliant glint of sunlight from a high flying

gull which looked very much like a reflection from a polished metal

surface. The t riangular shape would,of course,result from the extended

wing s and body of the bird.The yellow color is reflected moonlight.The

rapid "angular" motion across the sky results from the proximity of the

birds(traveling at 30 m.p.h. they could traverse 30 degrees of sky in

about 6 seconds of time if they were about 200 yards away.Since the

birds were too far away to be recognized as such (or to have their calls

heard),the observers would have no way of accurately judging their

distance.If they were assumed to be miles away,t hey would be construed

to be the size of airpla nes and moving at very high(supersonic?)

speeds.

 

Birds can make all sorts of erratic manuevers and can appear to

 hover(flying into the wind).Depending upon the aspect or the profile

 that the bird presents to the observer,reflections off the birds might

 suddenly appear(launching from the "mothership") or disappear(recovery

 by the "Mothership").Birds might indeed be "scouting" the area.Needless

 to say,bird reflections would not account for moving colored

 (blue,red,etc.) lights.Those would have to be aircraf t.As I pointed

 out earlier,being excited and frightened,these witnesses were ready to

 causally connect any and all nocturnal lights in that part of the sky

 with the "mothership" which was,in fact,nothing more than the close

 conjunction of Venus and Jupiter. What about the searchlight which one

 object apparently shone downward on the surface of the ice? I believe

 that the landing lights on aircraft are mounted so that they can be

 swiveled in elevatio n.If a plane,making a landing approach to Lost

 Nation airport from the north,turned on its landing lights when they

 were in a downward pointing orientation, from a distance it might look

 like a searchlight probing the surface of the lake.Perhaps some pilot

 out there could comment on this possibility.

 --------------------------------------- Date: Tue Apr 26 22:15:01 1988

 From: NEIL GOULD (aa330) Subj: Re: Landing lights - NG

To address a question about whether the landing lights on planes can

 "swivel", the planes likely to be landing at Lost Na tions would not

 have this capability.  The landing lights, like the headlights on your

 car, are set for optimal illumination of the area in the glide path.

 This doesn't discount the possibility that the lights' angle wouldn't

 appear to be a "spotlight", or even the possibility that when suddenly

 turned on, would seem like the pilot "discovered" the observers.

Of course, seeing unlit objects from a distance in the air is not really

 likely, given that the pilots would be flying toward the moonlight in

 their ap proach to the airport.

- Neil --------------------------------------- Date: Wed Apr 27 18:49:06

 1988 From: DALE B. WEDGE (ae511) Subj: Re:Sanduleak:DBW

Mr. Sanduleak's explanation might seem plausible if it were not for

 other factors that have been uploaded on this fine system, and which

 Mr. Sanduleak and others have not addressed.

In earlier testimony, W2 stated that "they came five miles off shore and

 they were going about fifty feet above the ice, you could see the ice

 and stuff rippling behind them."  I have never known of a Sea Gull to

 have produced this type of phenomenon.  If it has happened, perhaps we

 should investigate that?

There is other evidence that is not addressed that reflects on the

 theory of the Sea Gulls.  From an independent witness, we have a

 picture that shows a definite triangle shape that

 

is "identical" to the object that was sketched by W1 and which was

verbalized by W2 in earlier uploads.  In addition, these objects were

seen in the southwest portion of the sky, w hich would not be consi

stent with the moon hypothesis.  We also have another witness, besides

the Coast Guardsmen who saw the triangular shaped object in the sky.

There is another factor which must be addressed.  Why won't the Coast

Guard allow us to discuss the sighting with the two Coast Guardsmen who

were at the scene of the phenomenon? We have been quite careful to not

devulge the names of wit- nesses, which oftens places these people into

highly visi- ble p ositions in the media, which is something that the

Skeptics often to allude to in claiming hoax.  Mr. Dell'Aquila and I are

also not going to write a book.  We would only like to talk to the Coast

Guardsmen in order to shed some light on the sighting from an additional

two people who were at the scene.

W1 and W2 were not "believers" of the phenomenon until after the

 sighting.  A believer in the sense that there is a phenom- enon that is

 worth investigating.  Therefore, who would they have known that reports

 of this kind would go to Wri ght-Patterson which was where Project Blue

 Book was located at one point in UFO history, and which some state

 still maintains a watch on the phenoenon? And how would they know that

 Detroit is the main Coast Guard station for the area?  How would they

 know this, unless they indeed did talk to an official at the Coast

 Guard station who also advised them that they were told by the Army and

 NASA to "keep out of it, and that this was out of their league."  Since

 when are reflections off of Sea Gulls a highly sensitive fi eld of

 study?  And since when are the close proximity of Venus and Jupiter a

 cause for such a response by the military of this nation?

There are many plausible and perhaps "prosaic" explanations when we take

 this report in bits and pieces. But, when you look at all of the

 evidence that has been listed and which is on file from all of the

 witnesses, talking and also not talking, what we end up with is a

 mystery that needs additional study both locally and also on a world

 wid e scale.

Dear Mr. Sanduleak, take all of the evidenc e, and not just treat this

 in a Klassian way by using those "bits and pieces" that fit your

 hypothesis, while ignoring all of the facts.

I believe that when you do, like Rick Dell'Aquila has suggested, you

 will tend to dismiss bits and pieces of the information, or will come

 up with a term from some psychologist which ex- plains their sensatory

 perceptions.  I should tell you though that psychologists are seen most

 often in their profession by psychologists, which should tell you somet

 hing about their me ntal attitudes.

Dale B. Wedge --------------------------------------- Date: Sat Apr 30

 15:44:13 1988 From: JAMES J. SPEISER (ae898) Subj: JJS: Lake Erie UFO

I can resist commenting on the Lake Erie discussion no more.

First, on Nick's explanation: I can see where much effort was

 

expended, and it certainly must be counted as a viable  hypothesis. The

main trouble I have with it is that he does not present it AS an

hypothesis, but as a raw, unchallengeable statement of fact. As a

scientist steeped in the tradition of objectivity, he should have

couched his remarks in such phraseology as, "While this hypothesis

doesn't address all the available data, I feel it is the most likely

under the circumstances." Instead it comes off as rather authoritarian

 

and condescending, to the point of sounding ex-cathedra. Nick,  you

WEREN'T there, you DON'T know for certain what was seen, and your

hypothesis certainly raises questions about the visual acuity of some of

the members of our armed services. I also must as k why this particular

phenomenon was reported over a small stretch of the east coast of Lake

Erie and nowhere else in the world.

To Rick and Dale: I hesitate to say it, but I feel some of your comments

 are no less inflamatory and detrimental to the cause of raising the

 scientific credibility of the field. It sounds as if you're saying,

 "You tried to explain it, and you can't, so its real, so there, nyah!"

 While Nick's presentation may have been po mpous, I saw no reason to

 attack Neil for asking what I thought were pertinent questions. Its

 merely his way of evaluating ordinary explanations in his own mind. If

 the

 

phenomenon is "real" (whatever that means) then you have  nothing to

fear from such questions. However....

Neil, its one thing to ask whether sonic booms were heard. Its quite

 another to discount the observations on the basis of the answer. Like

 it or not, the ET hypothesis remains viable, and its conceivable that

 an advanced race has found some way around the laws of ph ysics AS WE

 UNDER STAND THEM. I am not advancing the ETH, merely pointing out that

 it has not been ruled out as yet.

As a UFO investigator, I've had to tell many witnesses that what they

 were seeing was mere celestial bodies. Such cases are almost always

 fairly easy to decipher, as the descriptions,

 

though strange-sounding at first, can be fit to celestial  events quite

handily WITHOUT ignoring key parts of the story. In July of 86, for

instance, a couple drivi ng from Phoenix to Las Vegas at 4:15 in the

morning report ed seeing a large, pulsating, orange ball of light on the

Western horizon, that seemed to "jump off" the side of a mountain and

follow their car for several miles, before disappearing below the

horizon at 4:30. The case garnered quite a bit of publicity here in the

Valley, but everything in their description pointed to the

 

planet Mars, and I had the dubious task of playing debunker.  The Lake

Erie case, however, seems a bit more complicated than that, and I, for

one, would need to s ee more close-up i nvestigation done before I can

accept ANY explanation. What I'd REALLY like to see, however, is more

cooperation and a friendlier, "We're-All-Trying-To-Get-At-The-Truth"

attitude on both sides.

Jim

--------------------------------------- Date: Sun May  1 15:39:34 1988

From: NEIL GOULD (aa330) Subj: To JJS, re: UFO - NG

I fully concur with your "voice of reason".  I'd like to point out,

 however, that the sonic booms aren't the only part of the phenomena

 that f urrows my brow... Even if the sighting we re simply visual, with

no sound whatsoever, I can't imagine it not being reported by pilots

 landing at most of this areas airports.

On approach to Cuyahoga County, pilots would either fly right by the

 area of the sighting, or it would be directly ahead of them, depending

 on the wind. Lost Nations pilots would fly right over the area. Burke

 pilots would either fly very near, or would see the area directly ahead

 of them as they took off/landed.

 All of this adds up to some curiosities, at least.

Being a strong advocate of being parsimonious, I would not immediately

 jump to the notion that something happened in our physical realm that

 somehow defied our knowledge of the laws of physics.

For me, the most plausible explanation is that the observers misjudged

 the speed of the flying objects, and that they didn't exceed the speed

 of sound.  Of course, this directly refutes their testimony on the

 issue.

- Neil ---------------------------------------