Strangeness

My interest was peaked when MUFON received a report of unusual occurrences on a farm in Hancock County, Indiana. The report referred to a large formation of black helicopters, strange lights, ghosts and other phenomena I decided to take on at least the initial investigation myself because the farm was only ten minutes from my house.

A little more than a year ago I presented at several speaking engagements in the Central Indiana area to promote membership in MUFON. The Central Indiana area has been a hot spot of reported UFO activity of all varieties but I was the only field investigator. My efforts resulted in the formation of the MUFON Indy Group, a unit of MUFON based in Indianapolis. In very short order six members became certified field investigators and that number is growing.

Our group has become very interested In the events at the Skin Walker Ranch in Utah. I wondered if a similar area of activity might be located in Indiana. This has happened before. Lucky Point was a location of intense activity in southern Indiana in the 70s. This included balls of light, UFOs of several types, big foot sightings, and other things. It was investigated by Past State Director, Jerry Seivers and a link to the details of this investigation can be found on the MUFON Indiana web site.

Unfortunately the farm in Hancock County does not appear to be quite so promising, at least so far.

The initial report referred to strangely deformed trees, ghost activity, sightings of strange people, possibly spirits, who appeared out of place in the modern world and vanished mysteriously, and on one occasion, a fleet of black helicopters.

The trees were quickly explained. My wife is a certified master gardener. She recognized the appearance of the trees to be natural tree growth formation and grape vines. While they had an interesting and somewhat spooky appearance, there was nothing unusual or unnatural about them.

My intention was to visit the farm with field Investigator, Roger Pingleton. Roger is far more interested in ghost phenomena that I am and I wanted to keep this balanced. Frankly, while I try to keep an open mind about everything, I'm pretty skeptical about the whole concept of an afterlife. Roger arrived for our appointment at the farm on time. I was running late so instead of taking the county roads I decided to save time by using I-70. A Fed-Ex tandem rig crashed ahead of me and spilled all of it's fuel. I was trapped in traffic for the next seven hours and never made it there that day. I could see the farm from the interstate and couldn't get there. At my request Roger surveyed the area with a Geiger counter and magnetometer. I was hoping that if there was any UFO activity at the farm, trace radiation or magnetic anomalies would remain. He concentrated on the locations the owner identified as places where strange sightings had occurred over the years. The results were negative.

He was, however, very impressed with the ghost activity the owner reported.

I was able to visit the farm about a week later. The owner had lived on the farm most of her life. She showed me several sites. There was the tree where a lynching had allegedly occurred possibly by the KKK who were powerful in Indiana in the 1920s, the location of a suicide, a place by a stream, now quite close to I-70, where an Indian village was believed to have been massacred by white settlers, and the place over the farm where she had recently seen a formation of ten black helicopters hovering stationary over her farm.

There was no UFO activity reported.

This investigation is ongoing. Since MUFON Indy has a significant group interested in spiritual phenomena I will leave most of this investigation to them. Historical records can be searched for references to the Indian village, the suicide, and the lynching to see if they can be verified as historical events.

I have to say I'm not impressed with the helicopters. While I have heard many reports of black helicopters they are not mysterious. Black is a popular color for privately owned helicopters. Ron Ursay, owner of the Colts, used to own a black Bell 222. LifeLine, Indiana's oldest medical helicopter service now flies five black and red EC-145s. I have also seen Army helicopters literally hundreds of times. Shelbyville, Indiana is only a few miles south of the farm and it is the home of a National Guard helicopter base. Against a bright blue sky or in gray overcast army green helicopters will appear black and unmarked. Their markings are black. So will almost any other color. The bright sky will cause your iris to contract. The farm is also very close to Indianapolis Regional Airport where the Mount Comfort Air Show is held every year. This is the scene and many military demonstrations and war reenactments. If ten attack helicopters were flying in the area it would be unique but not unusual.

Investigators with MUFON Indy will continue to monitor the farm. We've discussed having an overnight session at the farm. We'll see.