Awesome or Off-Putting is a weekly delve into cryptozoology, ufology, aliens, medical marvels, scientific wonders, secret societies, government conspiracies, cults, ghosts, EVPs, ancient artifacts, strange facts, odd sightings or just the plain unexplainable.

Roswell’s big problem is it’s all word of mouth. There are these tremendous claims of what went on there, but why believe a low-brow farmer? The same goes for Kecksburg. Sure, we’ve heard the military hauled out a tarp-covered something-or-other that was shaped like a gigantic acorn, but show us the pictures.

That said, there’s finally a UFO-crash discovery that was caught on film – and we owe it all to commie-riddled Russia!

There are only two pieces of news that ever come out of Russia. The first is that Joseph Stalin’s nipples used to bleed every Easter. Some say it was a heavenly reminder of his parents’ religion that he so casually cast aside. This news re-breaks every two years or so. Wait for it – you’ll see.

The second news story that always breaks from the formerly red country is that their babies are born with temporary-but-reappearing Koranic tattoos. They’ve got some crazy stuff going on over there – we’re tellin’ ya.

Imagine our surprise then, when we discovered this third story came out of the country where we thought they only had a two-template newspaper. It happened in 1968.

No doubt you’d like us to cut to the chase. Here it is as All News Web puts it:

“The Soviet Defense Ministry wrote in March 1969, Order No. 481 addressed to the Commander of the Air Defense Forces in the Sverdlosvsk Military Region Lieutenant General A.G. Ponomarenko. He was ordered to assist in every way the local KGB authorities in the operation “Sverdlovsk Midget” (small aliens), signed by the Deputy Commander in Chief of the USSR Air Defense Forces, Colonel General S.D. Lebedey, Seal stated, General Staff of the USSR Defense Ministry.

“In a second letter from November 3, 1969 on the KGB letterhead addressed to Deputy Chief of the Scientific Research Department KGB USSR, Colonel Grigoriev. The letter stated that on March 5, 1969 information was received about discovery of the unidentified object wreckage, 3 meter high and 5 meter in diameter with remains of small unknown human like creature, Operation called “Sverdlovsk Midget”.”

 

Awesome or Off-Putting is a weekly delve into cryptozoology, ufology, aliens, medical marvels, scientific wonders, secret societies, government conspiracies, cults, ghosts, EVPs, myths, ancient artifacts, religion, strange facts, odd sightings or just the plain unexplainable.

Well don’t tell Jodie Foster, but she needn’t have made that one movie where she made love to her dead alien father on an other-planet beach. That’s because the premise of that movie – Contact we think it was called – was about how the world would react if it ever received contact from another planet.

Problem is that film was made 20 years after the fact.

SETI is a wonderful organisation that does nothing all day but listen for signals emitting from the radio antennas protruding well-above the crust of other planets. In fact their name is an acronym for Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence, and they take their job quite seriously.

Imagine their surprise then, when on August 15, 1977, they received something that Space.com describes like this:

Of the many “maybes” that SETI has turned up in its four-decade history, none is better known than the one that was discovered in August, 1977, in Columbus, Ohio. The famous Wow signal was found as part of a long-running sky survey conducted with Ohio State Universitys “Big Ear” radio telescope.

The Wow signals unusual nomenclature connotes both the surprise of the discovery and its sox-knocking strength (60 Janskys in a 10 KHz channel, which is more than 50 thousand times more incoming energy than the minimum signal that would register as a hit for todays Project Phoenix.)

Now we know what you’re thinking – just because the sound was picked up by an antenna sweeping outer space doesn’t mean the sound came from there. We agree with you – until we read this next bit on our ol’ pal Wikipedia:

[An expert] has stated his doubts that the signal is of intelligent extraterrestrial origin: “We should have seen it again when we looked for it 50 times. Something suggests it was an Earth-sourced signal that simply got reflected off a piece of space debris.”

He later recanted his skepticism somewhat after further research scientifically relegated an Earth-bound signal to be astronomically unlikely, due to the requirements of a space-borne reflector being bound to certain unrealistic requirements to sufficiently explain the nature of the signal. Also, the 1420 MHz signal is problematic in itself in that it is “protected spectrum” or bandwidth in which terrestrial transmitters are forbidden to transmit. In his most recent writings, [the expert] resists “drawing vast conclusions from half-vast data.”

Your sitting there still sceptical, aren’t you? Would it help any if we told you this isn’t the only time an apparently alien signal has been received? For this next bit we are going to delve back into Hecklerspray’s own memory – to a time we took an ill-fated vacation to Puerto Rico right when 2004’s Tropical Storm Jeanne was deciding to ravish the island.

A few weeks before our trip, you see, we read a news report that the Arecibo Observatory, a huge antenna located on the island, had received what appeared to be an extra-terrestrial signal as well. While on island we took the visitors tour of the site, expecting a massive display explaining their recent good fortune in intricate detail. Instead, there was nothing.

Just before leaving we asked a worker there about the signal – and they knew exactly what we were talking about. The worker told us (and we paraphrase) that there was a system in place where people all over the world could volunteer their computers to sift through data received by the great antenna. Due to the massive amount of info received and the small-ish amount of hard drive to search through it, they hadn’t realised they’d received a signal until years after the fact. What they did get though, was three bursts of signal when you only need two to verify it wasn’t a glitch.

Furthermore, the signal was coming from a place where there was no planet to make it. As we understood it, this was implying it was coming from something intelligent made as it floated through space. Maybe it was a satellite, maybe it was a spaceship.

We’d have loved to use some sort of official quote for that last bit, but we just couldn’t find one.

Anyway – for more on the Wow! signal, enjoy this next video clip. And while you do, enjoy that nice scientist’s earring towards the end there. It’s how you know he’s not afraid to think way outside the box.

You! Follow hecklerspray on Twitter!

Except for the people who already knew of mortals flying beyond the stratosphere. They'd not be surprised by our space-flight accomplishments at all. There's allegedly evidence that some people cite to prove astronauts were around a long, long time ago.

Some might argue that at least hundreds of years ago our ancestors cruised through outer space in crude, wooden spaceships powered by either sail or steam. Most would argue that we made that up just now.

There really are, though, vocal proponents that argue for something called an 'Ancient Astronaut' theory. They cite quite a bit of evidence for this too. Of course none of the evidence is so grand it will knock you on your duff, proving once and for all that cavemen knew how to make oxygen tanks – compiled, however, it does make a thought-provoking list.

Wikipedia sums up part of the 'pro' arguments:

"Proponents of ancient astronaut theories point to what they perceive as gaps in historical and archaeological records and also what they see as an absence of definitive explanations in certain contexts from the archaeological sciences. Advocates of these theories put forward as evidence their interpretations of various archaeological artifacts, which they deem to have been anachronistic or beyond the presumed technical capabilities of the historical cultures they are associated with. Another common theme relies upon the interpretation of depictions in certain ancient artworks as being representations of actual extraterrestrial visitors as realized by the contacted cultures."

Some of the artwork talked about there are just anciently drawn pictures or sculptures that in retrospect, look an awful lot like today's basic image of an astronaut. Examples of this can be found in some giant Italian landscape-paintings from around 10,000 BC that seem to depict two beings wearing a circular helmet, or in 'the Great Martian Gods,' which is a picture drawn in the Saharan Desert floor of a gigantic cyclops surrounded by what looks like disk-shaped UFOs.

The alleged ancient visitations resulted in more than just pictures – the greater portion of the ancient Astronaut theories would seem to be that we are the end result. A long time ago either our ancestors or our owners came to earth, then left us behind.

Again, Wikipedia has the skinny:

"Ancient astronaut adherents often claim that humans are either descendants or creations of beings who landed on Earth millennia ago. An associated theory is that much of human knowledge, religion and culture came from extraterrestrial visitors in ancient times: ancient astronauts acted as a “mother culture.”"

So our folks basically left us, but check in from time to time to make sure we're not at each other's throats. But of course we are at each others throats, so they're not doing a very good job.

Perhaps we are a grand experiment being studied from afar, planted here ages ago for the sole purpose of seeing the evolution of consciousness and what its development makes us do.

Or perhaps really ancient people were just into sci-fi too.

They probably had a Roddenberry in a moose-skin or something. Yes, it's all clear to us now.

Ancient Astronauts

Oh, and the fact that Hollywood hasn't come up with any original ideas for years. And when they do they want to make the most of it. But sometimes sequels can actually eclipse the original.

It's certainly rare. For every Godfather Part II there is a Speed 2, Ocean's 12 and Another 48 Hours waiting in the wings. For God's sake, this was going to be a a top 10, but we could only think of five.

But anyway, here goes:

5. The Empire Strikes Back (1980)

Irvin Kershner

Geeks all around the world have been battling with this tricky question for years (or is that light years?) Is The Empire Strikes Back better than Star Wars?

Frankly, get a life.

We would say, as a kid, we probably preferred the original. It's got more action in it; it's got less Yoda talking nonsense in it; and, let's face it, you never forget your first love. But as we get older we start to appreciate the second film a lot more.

There's more Darth Vader; it has the bit in the snow; and it has Boba Fett in it (Don't start, Fett was only added to Star Wars later.)

It's a much darker film, and we can remember as a kid being angry when it finished, which is usually a good sign.

Of course, if we'd have known then that it was going to finish with a teddy bears' picnic (bloody Ewoks!) we would probably have been grateful.
 

4. Terminator II: Judgement Day (1991)

James Cameron

More thrills, more spills and more terminators. It's as simple as that.

You have all the best elements of the first one, but with better special effects. No argument as far as we're concerned.

In fact, the only thing bad about Terminator II: Judgement Day is that it led to the turd that is Terminator 3.
 

3. Dawn of the Dead (1978)

George Romero

After annoying all of the sci-fi fans, we may as well try and irritate the horror fans too.
Okay, there is no denying that Night Of The Living Dead is a true horror classic.

However, Dawn of the Dead is far more shocking, it's funnier and you get to see all of the gruesomeness in colour. Bonus.
 

2. Aliens (1986)

James Cameron

This is another one that has been argued over for far too long.

Okay, look Aliens is just better. It's got more action, more stunning death scenes and more, errr, Aliens.

Why go for one face-sucking, stomach-bursting alien (alright, so that's strictly two) when you can have an army of them?

Case closed. No, argument won.

However, we do feel a bit unclean for nominating two James Cameron films.
 

1. The Godfather II (1974)

Francis Ford Coppola

This was a tough one. Huge fans of the original Godfather.

But the fact that you have got two of possible the finest screen actors around for the price of one just swings it for us.

Al Pacino is, as always, brilliant. But Robert De Niro, who isn't always so brilliant (The Fan and Analyse This anyone?), just shades it.

And anyone who wants to argue could find themselves sleeping with the fishes.

In 1947 many would tell you a UFO crashed in Roswell, New Mexico and ignited ET-mania across the globe. It was a major case in which hundreds of pieces of evidence – be they physical or otherwise – have been held up in an attempt to prove to the world that the crash really happened, and the government most definitely doesn't want you to know.

Well the United States isn't the only place where something like this happened. In Mexico, for instance, a civilian airplane is said to have collided with a UFO, sending both machines plummeting to the ground. A difference in this case though, is that according to a History Channel special on the event – all the Mexican military who were involved in retrieving and transporting the object died en-route.

Perhaps Wikipedia puts it best: 

"Coyame, Mexico is a small town not far from the US border. It's home to three thousand people and possibly the best-kept secret of all-time. In August of 1974, the USA military was tracking a mysterious object over Mexico; then suddenly it disappeared from radar near Coyame. At the same time a civilian plane headed in the opposite direction is reported missing. What follows next is the stuff Hollywood blockbusters are made of: a crash site, a spacecraft, dead bodies, a covert recovery mission, and a government cover-up."

The story goes that the US did see the UFO on radar, and they were monitoring Mexico's military transmissions to find out more. Once the ship was discovered by Mexico, radio silence was ordered and the US was left in the dark. America isn't fond of being kept out of the circle, so they sent in a handful of helicopters to get more information (and probably to steal what they could).

When the Americans got on the scene wearing their hazmat suits, they found all the Mexicans dead. The disc was choptered to the US, and the civilian plane, the Mexican military vehicles, and the bodies were all destroyed. No cause of death was determined.

From there the story dissolved into Mexican folklore. Nobody seriously investigated it until the nineties when there was an explosion of UFO sightings in the country – an explosion that continues to this day, if you recall.

Where the US allegedly took the saucer is unknown. What is known is that a lot of people claim to have evidence – even physical evidence – of the crash. So did it happen?

We have no idea. 

Read Watch More:

 [HST] UFO Files – Mexico's Roswell-2 – Youtube