Belgium: Is it really an actual photograph of a flying triangle?
During the 1989-1990 UFO wave in Belgium, there were several videos and images produced of UFOs. Investigation revealed that all but one were of aircraft or crude hoax images (one video that keeps showing up on the Internet turned out to be a video of a landing aircraft). This was a photograph taken by a young worker in the Petit-Rechain area of Belgium, which is near the large city of Liege. The image was taken using a 200mm zoom lens (apparently set at 100-150mm) F4 lens and ISO 200 film with an exposure time of 1-2 seconds. Despite the slow shutter speed, the photograph shows very little vibration that one would expect even if the photographer used a nearby post to steady his aim. The major problem in analyzing this image is that it is highly cropped and shows no objects for scale. Add to this that the exact date of the event is not known and we find that the photograph is almost impossible to analyze. The object could easily have been a close-up of a model or a balloon with lighting. Indeed, Wim Van Utrecht was able to recreate the image using simple materials bringing into question the authenticity of the image. As with the Trent images, the photographer had simply thrown his slide in a drawer until a journalist convinced him that it was "important". If he had actually photographed an alien spaceship, wouldn't he have considered taking more care of the slide? Again, if he had conducted a hoax and was not satisfied with the results, the image would have ended up being mishandled as this slide was. Perhaps it was the publicity surrounding the UFO events in November 1989, which prompted the young man to attempt a hoax photograph of an "authentic" Belgian triangle. The Belgian UFO wave's only good photographic evidence evaporates under close scrutiny as a likely hoax.
UFO landing at Carp: Too good to be true?
In 1989, the Canadian UFO Research Network (CUFORN) received a package from a mysterious "guardian" that stated a UFO crash had occurred near Ottawa. Initial response was that it appeared to be a hoax but some locals did investigate and determined where the possible landing/crash site was. For about two years it remained that way when more packages appeared, one of which contained a video of the crashed UFO. The images are not that impressive and appear to be some large object that is lit with flares nearby and a flashing light on top. However, this video began to make the rounds in the UFO community as something authentic. After the winter of 1991-1992, CUFORN began to investigate the case. An American Ufologist, Bob Oechsler, became involved in the investigation because he also received a version of the tape, which he showed to Dr. Bruce Maccabee. Both felt a UFO was present and needed investigation. Oechsler's behavior during the investigation of the area seemed suspect. The Canadian UFOlogists were amazed at how Oechsler seemed to know his way around and then managed to find the location of the video shoot while they decided to go to a restaurant to get a bite to eat. Oechsler then proceeded to find witnesses of the incident. Apparently, the UFO crashed in 1989 and, in August 1991, there was a subsequent landing that was recorded in the same area.
While Oechsler was busy looking for evidence of the UFO crash/landing, CUFORN began to investigate the more likely case of this being a video of a landed helicopter. Even though they could not find any helicopter landings that had occurred during the time period, CUFORN still was skeptical about the video. Back in the United States, Bob Oechsler had set up the television show "Unsolved Mysteries" to air the video bringing more people into the case. At one point, Dr. Maccabee referred to it as the "best footage of a landed UFO he'd ever seen" (Brookesmith 101). Maccabee's and Oechsler's opinions began to differ with those who were closely investigating the case.
Over the next few years, Oechsler's qualifications began to become suspect and Dr. Bruce Maccabee's connection with the case indicated he was either duped by Oechsler or that his analytical techniques were less than satisfactory. According to Tom Theofanous & Errol Bruce-Knapp:
Bruce Maccabee's motive and actions throughout the course of Oechsler's investigation are highly suspect and we feel that Maccabee owes an explanation to all those in our field who have trusted his judgment over the years.
The question is, is Maccabee being manipulated by Oechsler? Is he being conned or have his judgement and analytical capabilities become desperately impaired?
...Oechsler used his manipulative ability to build a story even though he knew of the circumstances and exactly what was going on and together with Bruce Macabbee, intentionally misled the public, the media and ufology using unethical means, and bad judgement in order to benefit financially and personally. (Theofanous & Bruce-Knapp):
With these closing remarks it was clear that Maccabee and Oechsler's opinions no longer mattered to people closely involved with the investigation of this case.
CUFORN/MUFON Ontario continued their investigation and began to seriously doubt the eyewitness stories. They began to suspect that the vehicle in the video was a truck with lights on top and the day-glow type wiper blades extended. Apparently, the nephew of the witness owned this type of vehicle. Further investigation revealed that the "guardian" might have been a friend of the family. The case began to unravel and the conclusions of CUFORN/MUFON Ontario were that the witness, the nephew, and friend were all involved in the hoax. In writing about the video, the MUFON Ontario bulletin stated, " That the Guardian video of a 'UFO landing' has, after analysis, proved inconclusive and likely is either a pick-up truck or (according to the RCMP investigation) a helicopter." (Theofanous & Bruce-Knapp). The case was rightly declared a hoax even though several prominent UFOlogists wanted to maintain the opposite opinion.
Mexico City: The best video on the planet of an actual flying saucer?
In 1997, a new piece of photographic evidence surfaced from the home of the latest UFO wave, Mexico in the form of videotape. Despite the fact that the wave had been precipitated in 1991 by videotapes of the planet Venus during a solar eclipse, many UFOlogists continued to believe that there was a hotbed of UFO activity here. A video was produced which showed a disc rising above the city moving behind a building. The images were so clear, warning flags were quickly raised by many in the UFO community. Television show host and UFO investigator, Jaimie Maussan began his investigation of the matter. He soon uncovered several witnesses who had seen the UFO, including a young girl. With such witnesses, Maussan assumed the video must have been authentic but other UFO groups felt the tape was too good to be true
Within a few months, MUFON photo analyst Jeff Sainio had completed his analysis of the tape. One of the telltale signs of a hoax involved the smearing of the building when the videographer panned to follow the UFO while the UFO did not smear. According to Sainio, "This indicates the UFO wasn't in the video when the camera was shaking, but was added later" (Klass Sainio 5). Other signs were the relationship between the video and the buildings as the cameras viewing angle changed and attitude changes in the UFO in relation to the buildings in the frames. It took a frame-by-frame analysis to reach this conclusion, confirming William Hyzer's conclusions that it would be impossible, if not difficult, to prove a hoax in something that is well planned. The hoaxers in this case used computers to insert the UFO into the film of the buildings. Sainio's analysis demonstrated that it would take sophisticated techniques to detect sophisticated hoaxes.
It was interesting to note that Sainio was able to identify the hoax in this case since he was involved with some of the Gulf Breeze analysis done by Maccabee. He has endorsed Ed Walters photographs, which some UFOlogists consider to be fake (as stated in the previous section). However, in this case, nobody seemed to pin much of an endorsement on the tape other than Maussan. With no prominent UFOlogist to champion the images, it was easy to reject the video since nobody was going to argue with the analysis.
Lawton, Oklahoma 2002: Westminster 1970 American style!
In March of 2002, UFOlogist Jim Hickman received a digital photograph of what appeared to be a triangular formation of lights with a bright red UFO nearby. Hickman contacted Dr. Bruce Maccabee to help analyze the photographs. The witness was somebody simply identified as "J.W." in order to prevent him from losing his job, which required a security clearance. Hickman was enthusiastic after interviewing J.W. and stated:
I can't help but notice a few similarities between this case and the Hudson valley sightings back in the '80's. i.e.; A large object hovering overhead, multicolored lights, slow speed, then fast exit, altitude 100' or less, no sounds, animals affected, etc. As a side note; I was involved in a UFO incident near Lawton myself back in '83 where a huge triangle shaped object hovered overhead, (I was able to see structure), and then followed my vehicle for over 20 miles. This sighting was verified by the Kiowa County Sheriff's office who's dispatcher saw the object as I was in radio communication with him, and by Altus Air Force base, who sent up an aircraft to investigate. I have written a full account of that evening in my next book, I call that story "Encounter at Lost Lake". (Maccabee Lawton)
Dr. Maccabee seemed equally impressed after analyzing the image:
What could this have been? It certainly doesn't seem to be any military device or any type of object normally in the sky. Internally lighted blimps seem like very strange objects at night, but they have a distinctive shape. (There was a rash of blimp sightings and videos back in the early 1990's, so we have video "data" on the types of images they make...nothing like this.) Hence, unless someone has a better idea, I would have to classify this as a True UFO (TRUFO), which might be some sort of Alien Flying Craft (AFC) (or two such craft?) (Maccabee Lawton)
The images stood this way for several months, with little progress or attempt to further analysis.
In May of 2002, witness : TJ came forward to show his photograph of the same UFO arrangement taken near Lawton. The witness was again anonymous because he was associated with the military. Without any sort of confirmation, Hickman and Maccabee suggested that these two photographs were good evidence and dedicated web space to these images and their investigation. Maccabee is on record as stating:
"WOW! Got to pull out all the stops on this one! A rare event, two photos of the same (apparently) thing! The numbers of lights at the corners may agree (do agree at two corners) and the shape of the red "car" is as I had predicted (the left and right outlines of the "car" in the Lawton photo would be the actual shapes of the left and right sides of the red UFO image if photographed without camera smear)." (Filer)
Despite declaring that he had to pull out all the stops, Maccabee later would admit he only dedicated a few hours in researching this case! By August, he would not have to dedicate any more time because the real source of the images was revealed.
On August 4, 2002, Dr. Maccabee received word that there was a disturbing posting on USENET from skeptic Bruce Hutchinson. Carl Wilson revealed that he created the images by using a digital photograph of his optical mouse and some lights around his computer area. Needless to say, Dr. Maccabee seemed to have egg on his face and quickly published his response:
The hoaxer failed to prove what he intended, but he did do something else: he provided a warning to the UFO community that there are people willing to take the time to provide a sort of "disinformation." He proved that there are people willing to take the time to create photographic evidence and, of more importance, to follow through by creating a plausible sighting story and allowing themselves to be investigated. In doing so they waste their own time and the time of the investigators, time that that could be better spent investigating the sightings reported by honest people. (Maccabee Lawton)
Of course, Maccabee's interpretation is that Wilson was wasting everyone's time by creating such a hoax. On the contrary, Wilson exposed the same problem that was exposed in Warminster 1970. The credulous nature of UFOlogists makes them susceptible to hoaxes. Dr. Maccabee did expose several cases as hoaxes (Mexico) or misidentifications (Phoenix 1997). However, he needs to apply such "skepticism" to all his investigations. The first thing that comes to mind is his "involvement" with Ed Walters and the Carp case both documented in this article as likely hoaxes. Hickman's gullibility is noted by his interpretation of re-entering space debris as a UFO shootdown by military jets. Perhaps Maccabee and Hickman should re-examine their process to prevent being taken in by such fabrications.
As for Carl Wilson, he seemed satisfied with the results but disturbed by the response of the UFOlogists. He noted that Hickman reported him to the police for filing a false UFO report! Clearly, Wilson's expose' was more than a minor irritation to Hickman (One can find Wilson's web page on the matter at The only fault with Wilson's hoax is that he exposed it too soon. Had he waited a year and/or presented a few more photographs as evidence, I think there would have been some more solid endorsement of these images by Maccabee and others. There may even have been a repeat of the Warminster experience with UFOlogists finding all sorts of details in the photographs that weren't there.
The Lawton Triangle hoax again exposed the credulity of UFOlogists. If UFOlogists can not identify a hoax 100% of the time, what does it say for all these UFO photographs/films described as being good evidence of a TRUFO?
Conclusions
It seems the camera is not as foolproof as UFOlogists want everyone to believe. John Shaw, a member of the British Institute of Professional Photographers and the British UFO Research Association (BUFORA), wrote, "... it must be remembered that photographs on their own are very poor evidence... The camera has one lens, one viewpoint and a fixed field of view - a fact relied upon in the still and movie industries to record images in a particular way." (Spencer and Evans 217). It is also the fact that is relied upon by hoaxers to create images that appear to be "authentic" photographs of actual UFOs. What motivates the hoaxer? There are a variety of reasons. Some possible factors are money, publicity, or, as Dr. Frank Drake put it, "... a desire to pull the wool over other people's eyes and to do it very cleverly for surprising reasons" (Sagan and Page 257). With hoaxes being the source of most UFO photographs, what can it say for the remainder? Is it possible, as Mr. Hyzer noted that they are simply good hoaxes that have yet to be or can not be exposed as such? When one looks at the photographers and the events surrounding the images, it becomes apparent that even the best UFO images are suspect.
During the 1989-1990 UFO wave in Belgium, there were several videos and images produced of UFOs. Investigation revealed that all but one were of aircraft or crude hoax images (one video that keeps showing up on the Internet turned out to be a video of a landing aircraft). This was a photograph taken by a young worker in the Petit-Rechain area of Belgium, which is near the large city of Liege. The image was taken using a 200mm zoom lens (apparently set at 100-150mm) F4 lens and ISO 200 film with an exposure time of 1-2 seconds. Despite the slow shutter speed, the photograph shows very little vibration that one would expect even if the photographer used a nearby post to steady his aim. The major problem in analyzing this image is that it is highly cropped and shows no objects for scale. Add to this that the exact date of the event is not known and we find that the photograph is almost impossible to analyze. The object could easily have been a close-up of a model or a balloon with lighting. Indeed, Wim Van Utrecht was able to recreate the image using simple materials bringing into question the authenticity of the image. As with the Trent images, the photographer had simply thrown his slide in a drawer until a journalist convinced him that it was "important". If he had actually photographed an alien spaceship, wouldn't he have considered taking more care of the slide? Again, if he had conducted a hoax and was not satisfied with the results, the image would have ended up being mishandled as this slide was. Perhaps it was the publicity surrounding the UFO events in November 1989, which prompted the young man to attempt a hoax photograph of an "authentic" Belgian triangle. The Belgian UFO wave's only good photographic evidence evaporates under close scrutiny as a likely hoax.
UFO landing at Carp: Too good to be true?
In 1989, the Canadian UFO Research Network (CUFORN) received a package from a mysterious "guardian" that stated a UFO crash had occurred near Ottawa. Initial response was that it appeared to be a hoax but some locals did investigate and determined where the possible landing/crash site was. For about two years it remained that way when more packages appeared, one of which contained a video of the crashed UFO. The images are not that impressive and appear to be some large object that is lit with flares nearby and a flashing light on top. However, this video began to make the rounds in the UFO community as something authentic. After the winter of 1991-1992, CUFORN began to investigate the case. An American Ufologist, Bob Oechsler, became involved in the investigation because he also received a version of the tape, which he showed to Dr. Bruce Maccabee. Both felt a UFO was present and needed investigation. Oechsler's behavior during the investigation of the area seemed suspect. The Canadian UFOlogists were amazed at how Oechsler seemed to know his way around and then managed to find the location of the video shoot while they decided to go to a restaurant to get a bite to eat. Oechsler then proceeded to find witnesses of the incident. Apparently, the UFO crashed in 1989 and, in August 1991, there was a subsequent landing that was recorded in the same area.
While Oechsler was busy looking for evidence of the UFO crash/landing, CUFORN began to investigate the more likely case of this being a video of a landed helicopter. Even though they could not find any helicopter landings that had occurred during the time period, CUFORN still was skeptical about the video. Back in the United States, Bob Oechsler had set up the television show "Unsolved Mysteries" to air the video bringing more people into the case. At one point, Dr. Maccabee referred to it as the "best footage of a landed UFO he'd ever seen" (Brookesmith 101). Maccabee's and Oechsler's opinions began to differ with those who were closely investigating the case.
Over the next few years, Oechsler's qualifications began to become suspect and Dr. Bruce Maccabee's connection with the case indicated he was either duped by Oechsler or that his analytical techniques were less than satisfactory. According to Tom Theofanous & Errol Bruce-Knapp:
Bruce Maccabee's motive and actions throughout the course of Oechsler's investigation are highly suspect and we feel that Maccabee owes an explanation to all those in our field who have trusted his judgment over the years.
The question is, is Maccabee being manipulated by Oechsler? Is he being conned or have his judgement and analytical capabilities become desperately impaired?
...Oechsler used his manipulative ability to build a story even though he knew of the circumstances and exactly what was going on and together with Bruce Macabbee, intentionally misled the public, the media and ufology using unethical means, and bad judgement in order to benefit financially and personally. (Theofanous & Bruce-Knapp):
With these closing remarks it was clear that Maccabee and Oechsler's opinions no longer mattered to people closely involved with the investigation of this case.
CUFORN/MUFON Ontario continued their investigation and began to seriously doubt the eyewitness stories. They began to suspect that the vehicle in the video was a truck with lights on top and the day-glow type wiper blades extended. Apparently, the nephew of the witness owned this type of vehicle. Further investigation revealed that the "guardian" might have been a friend of the family. The case began to unravel and the conclusions of CUFORN/MUFON Ontario were that the witness, the nephew, and friend were all involved in the hoax. In writing about the video, the MUFON Ontario bulletin stated, " That the Guardian video of a 'UFO landing' has, after analysis, proved inconclusive and likely is either a pick-up truck or (according to the RCMP investigation) a helicopter." (Theofanous & Bruce-Knapp). The case was rightly declared a hoax even though several prominent UFOlogists wanted to maintain the opposite opinion.
Mexico City: The best video on the planet of an actual flying saucer?
In 1997, a new piece of photographic evidence surfaced from the home of the latest UFO wave, Mexico in the form of videotape. Despite the fact that the wave had been precipitated in 1991 by videotapes of the planet Venus during a solar eclipse, many UFOlogists continued to believe that there was a hotbed of UFO activity here. A video was produced which showed a disc rising above the city moving behind a building. The images were so clear, warning flags were quickly raised by many in the UFO community. Television show host and UFO investigator, Jaimie Maussan began his investigation of the matter. He soon uncovered several witnesses who had seen the UFO, including a young girl. With such witnesses, Maussan assumed the video must have been authentic but other UFO groups felt the tape was too good to be true
Within a few months, MUFON photo analyst Jeff Sainio had completed his analysis of the tape. One of the telltale signs of a hoax involved the smearing of the building when the videographer panned to follow the UFO while the UFO did not smear. According to Sainio, "This indicates the UFO wasn't in the video when the camera was shaking, but was added later" (Klass Sainio 5). Other signs were the relationship between the video and the buildings as the cameras viewing angle changed and attitude changes in the UFO in relation to the buildings in the frames. It took a frame-by-frame analysis to reach this conclusion, confirming William Hyzer's conclusions that it would be impossible, if not difficult, to prove a hoax in something that is well planned. The hoaxers in this case used computers to insert the UFO into the film of the buildings. Sainio's analysis demonstrated that it would take sophisticated techniques to detect sophisticated hoaxes.
It was interesting to note that Sainio was able to identify the hoax in this case since he was involved with some of the Gulf Breeze analysis done by Maccabee. He has endorsed Ed Walters photographs, which some UFOlogists consider to be fake (as stated in the previous section). However, in this case, nobody seemed to pin much of an endorsement on the tape other than Maussan. With no prominent UFOlogist to champion the images, it was easy to reject the video since nobody was going to argue with the analysis.
Lawton, Oklahoma 2002: Westminster 1970 American style!
In March of 2002, UFOlogist Jim Hickman received a digital photograph of what appeared to be a triangular formation of lights with a bright red UFO nearby. Hickman contacted Dr. Bruce Maccabee to help analyze the photographs. The witness was somebody simply identified as "J.W." in order to prevent him from losing his job, which required a security clearance. Hickman was enthusiastic after interviewing J.W. and stated:
I can't help but notice a few similarities between this case and the Hudson valley sightings back in the '80's. i.e.; A large object hovering overhead, multicolored lights, slow speed, then fast exit, altitude 100' or less, no sounds, animals affected, etc. As a side note; I was involved in a UFO incident near Lawton myself back in '83 where a huge triangle shaped object hovered overhead, (I was able to see structure), and then followed my vehicle for over 20 miles. This sighting was verified by the Kiowa County Sheriff's office who's dispatcher saw the object as I was in radio communication with him, and by Altus Air Force base, who sent up an aircraft to investigate. I have written a full account of that evening in my next book, I call that story "Encounter at Lost Lake". (Maccabee Lawton)
Dr. Maccabee seemed equally impressed after analyzing the image:
What could this have been? It certainly doesn't seem to be any military device or any type of object normally in the sky. Internally lighted blimps seem like very strange objects at night, but they have a distinctive shape. (There was a rash of blimp sightings and videos back in the early 1990's, so we have video "data" on the types of images they make...nothing like this.) Hence, unless someone has a better idea, I would have to classify this as a True UFO (TRUFO), which might be some sort of Alien Flying Craft (AFC) (or two such craft?) (Maccabee Lawton)
The images stood this way for several months, with little progress or attempt to further analysis.
In May of 2002, witness : TJ came forward to show his photograph of the same UFO arrangement taken near Lawton. The witness was again anonymous because he was associated with the military. Without any sort of confirmation, Hickman and Maccabee suggested that these two photographs were good evidence and dedicated web space to these images and their investigation. Maccabee is on record as stating:
"WOW! Got to pull out all the stops on this one! A rare event, two photos of the same (apparently) thing! The numbers of lights at the corners may agree (do agree at two corners) and the shape of the red "car" is as I had predicted (the left and right outlines of the "car" in the Lawton photo would be the actual shapes of the left and right sides of the red UFO image if photographed without camera smear)." (Filer)
Despite declaring that he had to pull out all the stops, Maccabee later would admit he only dedicated a few hours in researching this case! By August, he would not have to dedicate any more time because the real source of the images was revealed.
On August 4, 2002, Dr. Maccabee received word that there was a disturbing posting on USENET from skeptic Bruce Hutchinson. Carl Wilson revealed that he created the images by using a digital photograph of his optical mouse and some lights around his computer area. Needless to say, Dr. Maccabee seemed to have egg on his face and quickly published his response:
The hoaxer failed to prove what he intended, but he did do something else: he provided a warning to the UFO community that there are people willing to take the time to provide a sort of "disinformation." He proved that there are people willing to take the time to create photographic evidence and, of more importance, to follow through by creating a plausible sighting story and allowing themselves to be investigated. In doing so they waste their own time and the time of the investigators, time that that could be better spent investigating the sightings reported by honest people. (Maccabee Lawton)
Of course, Maccabee's interpretation is that Wilson was wasting everyone's time by creating such a hoax. On the contrary, Wilson exposed the same problem that was exposed in Warminster 1970. The credulous nature of UFOlogists makes them susceptible to hoaxes. Dr. Maccabee did expose several cases as hoaxes (Mexico) or misidentifications (Phoenix 1997). However, he needs to apply such "skepticism" to all his investigations. The first thing that comes to mind is his "involvement" with Ed Walters and the Carp case both documented in this article as likely hoaxes. Hickman's gullibility is noted by his interpretation of re-entering space debris as a UFO shootdown by military jets. Perhaps Maccabee and Hickman should re-examine their process to prevent being taken in by such fabrications.
As for Carl Wilson, he seemed satisfied with the results but disturbed by the response of the UFOlogists. He noted that Hickman reported him to the police for filing a false UFO report! Clearly, Wilson's expose' was more than a minor irritation to Hickman (One can find Wilson's web page on the matter at The only fault with Wilson's hoax is that he exposed it too soon. Had he waited a year and/or presented a few more photographs as evidence, I think there would have been some more solid endorsement of these images by Maccabee and others. There may even have been a repeat of the Warminster experience with UFOlogists finding all sorts of details in the photographs that weren't there.
The Lawton Triangle hoax again exposed the credulity of UFOlogists. If UFOlogists can not identify a hoax 100% of the time, what does it say for all these UFO photographs/films described as being good evidence of a TRUFO?
Conclusions
It seems the camera is not as foolproof as UFOlogists want everyone to believe. John Shaw, a member of the British Institute of Professional Photographers and the British UFO Research Association (BUFORA), wrote, "... it must be remembered that photographs on their own are very poor evidence... The camera has one lens, one viewpoint and a fixed field of view - a fact relied upon in the still and movie industries to record images in a particular way." (Spencer and Evans 217). It is also the fact that is relied upon by hoaxers to create images that appear to be "authentic" photographs of actual UFOs. What motivates the hoaxer? There are a variety of reasons. Some possible factors are money, publicity, or, as Dr. Frank Drake put it, "... a desire to pull the wool over other people's eyes and to do it very cleverly for surprising reasons" (Sagan and Page 257). With hoaxes being the source of most UFO photographs, what can it say for the remainder? Is it possible, as Mr. Hyzer noted that they are simply good hoaxes that have yet to be or can not be exposed as such? When one looks at the photographers and the events surrounding the images, it becomes apparent that even the best UFO images are suspect.
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