October 13, 2023 |
PHOTO – Lights over Ft Steele – Courtesy anonymous listener
Maybe it’s just Halloween, or maybe there’s something out there. Recent reports from Carbon County about strings of lights in the night sky have led to reports of UFO sightings.
Last weekend, multiple posts appeared on the Rawlins News and Chatter Facebook page from people who claimed to witness a long row of lights following one another across the sky. One poster said they saw seven lights in a straight line. The same poster said the lights disappeared when they went to take a picture.
Other Facebook users are typically quick to point out that the lights are most likely not aliens, but Starlink satellites. Starlink is the world’s largest satellite constellation and is used to deliver highspeed internet to remote locations on the planet. The service was launched by Elon Musk’s Space X in 2018. Using over 31 launches of the Falcon 9 rocket, Space X has placed over 2,900 of the 11-foot-wide satellites into low Earth orbit.
On September 28th, similar reports of lights prompted a Bigfoot99 listener to call the station to report a UFO sighting. The listener said his brother-in-law took a picture of a string of lights north of Fort Steele. The listener, who preferred not to be identified, sent Bigfoot99 reporter Matt Copeland the picture his brother-in-law allegedly took. The photograph shows five differently colored dots in a rough sawtooth pattern in the night sky.
Later that same day, the picture was sent to the Wyoming Office of Homeland Security for identification. A representative from the state’s homeland security office said, “Though it’s not super clear in the picture, it looks very similar to what I saw last night with my kids on the telescope. We were tracking the Starlink Satellite train through the sky. The lights are generally in a pretty straight line, and move pretty quickly. It does look pretty odd as it’s not something we normally see in the sky.”
The Wyoming Office of Homeland Security representative encouraged people to visit findstarlink.com. Users of the website can input their location and find out when the satellites will be visible to them.
While the mystery of the strings of lights seems to be solved, many other UFO sightings aren’t so easily explained away. For instance, in September of 1976, local rancher Pat McGuire claimed to have seen orange lights screaking across the night sky. McGuire said after seeing the lights he found some of his cows missing or mutilated. McGuire even claimed that his friend, Jimmy Ashley, touched a grounded alien craft.
In the early 1980’s McGuire was put under hypnosis by University of Wyoming psychologist Leo Sprinkle. During many hypnosis sessions, McGuire explained that the “Star People,’ as he called them, instructed him to have 13 children and run for governor of Wyoming.
McGuire stuck to his claims of alien encounters despite emotional isolation and financial ruin. He died, penniless, in 2009, at the age of 67.
The listener who contacted Bigfoot99 two weeks ago said he personally had seven UFO sightings beginning in 1978. McGuire’s tale makes it clear why many people who have strange encounters with what they feel are extraterrestrials are unwilling to speak publicly about it.
