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UFO over O'Hare

And I get annoyed with people who don't bother to research the facts and simply shout "liar!" or "stoned!" when someone reports what they saw. If someone saw something that looked like a structured craft then why on earth should they not say so? Is it a crime to be mistaken, or to honestly report an experience? Should they keep their interpretations secret for fear of offending those who are positively up themselves with righteous indignation at the thought of phenomenon they can't immediately explain.
 
You are most welcome!
Again, I'm sure you're right - I just get thoroughly annoyed with people who see something odd and immediately jump to the least likely conclusions, especially when they give lie to themselves with claims like, "I'm a really scientific person." then don't even consider the likely optical or meteorological illusions, but go straight to, "Oh my god! A UFO!"

Or, "I'm normally a skeptical person, but this was totally unexplainable...".
 
From both the OP link and the CNN story:

"Our theory on this is that it was a weather phenomenon," Cory said. "That night was a perfect atmospheric condition in terms of low (cloud) ceiling and a lot of airport lights. When the lights shine up into the clouds, sometimes you can see funny things."

Works for me.
 
And I get annoyed with people who don't bother to research the facts and simply shout "liar!" or "stoned!" when someone reports what they saw. If someone saw something that looked like a structured craft then why on earth should they not say so? Is it a crime to be mistaken, or to honestly report an experience? Should they keep their interpretations secret for fear of offending those who are positively up themselves with righteous indignation at the thought of phenomenon they can't immediately explain.

True, I agree that shouldn't be a skeptics first thought. A thought out examination of evidence and list of possible explainations would be a better thing to bring to them. Of course, there are a lot of believers who will see something, and say they saw a spacecraft, instead of they think what they saw was a space craft, and typically those are the people who won't accept any other explaination than their own.

Should we call them "lairs" or "stoned"? No, everyone is entitled to make mistakes, but I do think they should be willing to acknowledge that mistake instead of clinging to it for fear of being wrong.
 
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...everyone is entitled to make mistakes, but I do think they should be willing to acknowledge that mistake instead of clinging to it for fear of being wrong.

That's true. However, as supposedly critical thinkers we shouldn't concern ourselves too much with that aspect. If, when a satisfactory solution has been presented, the witness decides not to accept it, then that's their business.

Also, bear in mind that in this instance not only have there been no reports of people acting in this fashion, there have been no reasonable explanations put forwards as to what the witnesses saw. The "weather phenomenon" is so vague and ridiculous it doesn't even warrant discussion. Swamp gas, anyone?
 
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And just to be clear about the photo. Of course it's a fake. However, it's not a cloud that's been pasted in, it's simply a single pen stroke painted onto the copied photo. I can even tell you the pen settings they used.

I'm not sure I understand what you mean, baron, by "a single pen stroke painted onto the copied photo", or "pen settings". If you don't mind, I'd appreciate it if you'd elaborate. What do you think they did, and how did they do it?

I'm always interested in learning something new :)

Plus, I'm half heartedly contemplating going over to that forum and confronting them on the fake pics. Any ammo you could provide would be most useful, I'm sure.

Meg
 
I'm not sure I understand what you mean, baron, by "a single pen stroke painted onto the copied photo", or "pen settings". If you don't mind, I'd appreciate it if you'd elaborate. What do you think they did, and how did they do it?

To start from basics (apologies if you know some of this already) there are a number of software packages on the market designed for digital manipulation and painting. One of the most popular is Photoshop although there are several others (e.g. Painter, which I use for all my own work)

When you paint using one of these products you can create your own virtual "brushes" or use the ones provided. Brushes are essentially collections of pixels that you drag round the screen and "paint" with, and they have various attributes that emulate traditional painting, e.g. transparency, opacity, resaturation. In Photoshop and Painter there are literally dozens of attribues that can be tweaked to emulate almost any painting style and medium.

To take full advantage of these features you need to paint with a pressure sensitive pen and tablet (not a mouse) although in this case I doubt that was necessary :D

Basically what I'm saying is that this is a simple squiggle, done in Photoshop or similar, likely with one of the default brushes. It would have taken in the region of three seconds to produce.

(BTW - I noticed I said "pen settings" when I meant "brush settings" - slip of the brain)
 
Hi Crazycowbob,

Yeah. I think it looks like a lenticular cloud, too. (Way cool pictures on that funtigo.com site, btw).

However, I'm quite sure that blob of what ever it is was photoshopped into this photo from wikipedia:

View attachment 4855

I think the photo at wikipedia pretty much puts this image into the "fake" category. What would be the odds that the photographer of the UFO would get the same perspective of the towers and the tail of the same airplane visible in his photograph?
 
Is it just me, or does the second picture here:
http://forums.uforesearcher.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=3;t=000177

look strikingly similar to the picture found here?:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/O'Hare_International_Airport

What are the odds of that ;)
Good catch!. That seals the case definitely as a fake (surprise?).

Here are both pics side by side for better comparison (I resized and cropped the Wiki photo a bit). Superimposing the pictures they fit exactly on one another.

hareufo2yp7.jpg
 
Good catch!. That seals the case definitely as a fake (surprise?).

It does? AFAIK the photos are not related to the witnesses. Someone sent them to a forum anonymously at a later date, did they not? If so they have no bearing on the case. (I may be wrong - there may be a connection - I'm a bit rushed ATM so apologies if I missed anything)
 
It does? AFAIK the photos are not related to the witnesses. Someone sent them to a forum anonymously at a later date, did they not? If so they have no bearing on the case.
Could be. They don't mention on that forum where the pictures come from, but they say:
We have received documentation about the alleged sighting, which satisfies us as to the veracity of the report, and as to the credentials of the party reporting the incident.
So it is to expect, since they don't state otherwise, that the pictures are part of such documentation.

EDIT
Also note that the caption to the second photo reads: "Second independant photo of same object taken of disc above control towers same event - O'Hare.". It clearly sates that it was taken on the event, and not not a mere illustration of the sighting.
 
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O'Hare UFO Cover-Up Revealed

O’Hare UFO Cover-Up Revealed

By Barney Hill
Tribune staff reporter
Published January 2, 2007

Previously classified files regarding the November 7th UFO incident at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport have been obtained by the Tribune. Despite official denials, FAA logs indicate that air traffic controllers and Department of Homeland Security officials did indeed communicate with extraterrestrial beings that had requested clearance to land their ship.

Clearance was denied due to security concerns, according to the documents. Nevertheless, the alien craft hovered briefly above concourse C of the United Airlines terminal while awaiting instructions for a departure route through the crowded airspace. During those minutes DHS agents learned that the aliens had intended to negotiate with a UAL passenger for ownership of a weeping Madonna painting that he was planning to transport to his home.

Upon questioning, Hector Valenzuela, 43, of Roswell, New Mexico revealed he had come to Chicago knowing it contained the largest number of weeping Madonnas in the world. He claimed to have purchased one in Millennium Park in exchange for $100 and an undisclosed substance. However, after the extraterrestrials contacted him on his cell phone while he was in the airport security waiting line, Valenzuela said he quickly agreed to an offer of a sip of water from the Fountain of Youth and a guided tour of the alien ship in exchange for the artwork. Federal officials noted a greenish tint to Valenzuela’s complexion, suggesting a close relationship with the extraterrestrials. However, the agents accepted his explanation of having recently consumed a hefty portion of green Loch Ness monster meat.

President George W. Bush, after being advised of the incident, chastised his agents for not allowing the flying saucer to land. Bush lamented, “These were obviously creatures of faith who should have been treated with greater respect.”

Meanwhile, the Tribune has learned that witnesses to the UFO’s movements near O’Hare have hired Johnny Cochran to handle their defamation of character lawsuit against the US government, claiming that early dismissals of their sighting as that of a weather phenomenon were making them laughing stocks among their friends and families. Witness and UAL baggage handler, Chester Wooster, 38, who is a member of the Mutual UFO Network, told the Tribune that Cochran has proven that he can get people to believe the most preposterous things, making him “our kind of guy.”

Actor Dan Aykroyd, a life member of MUFON, took the opportunity to again denounce what he believes is the government’s blanket cover-up of extraterrestrial visitations. The highly regarded celebrity plaintively asked, “How can they continue to deny what we all know in our hearts must be true?”
 
I think there are two separate events going on here. First, some people did see some unusual phenomenon over O'Hare and reported it. Fine.

Secondly, and quite separately, some UFO nutbar (or maybe a playful hoaxer) created some fake photos, sent them to MUFON and made the case that this was documentation of the O'Hare incident. MUFON bought it hook, line, and sinker.

Note on the link Patricio provided that there is a post from one of the witnesses AFTER the photos were posted. But he never referred to those photos. If the photos were, in fact, documentation, I would have expected him to say, "Yeah, that's what I saw."

ETA: Nope, I have that timing wrong. The quote from the eyewitness is before the pictures were posted. But I stand by my theory.
 
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O’Hare UFO Cover-Up Revealed

By Barney Hill
Tribune staff reporter
Published January 2, 2007

Previously classified files regarding the November 7th UFO incident at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport have been obtained by the Tribune. Despite official denials, FAA logs indicate that air traffic controllers and Department of Homeland Security officials did indeed communicate with extraterrestrial beings that had requested clearance to land their ship.

Clearance was denied due to security concerns, according to the documents. Nevertheless, the alien craft hovered briefly above concourse C of the United Airlines terminal while awaiting instructions for a departure route through the crowded airspace. During those minutes DHS agents learned that the aliens had intended to negotiate with a UAL passenger for ownership of a weeping Madonna painting that he was planning to transport to his home.

Upon questioning, Hector Valenzuela, 43, of Roswell, New Mexico revealed he had come to Chicago knowing it contained the largest number of weeping Madonnas in the world. He claimed to have purchased one in Millennium Park in exchange for $100 and an undisclosed substance. However, after the extraterrestrials contacted him on his cell phone while he was in the airport security waiting line, Valenzuela said he quickly agreed to an offer of a sip of water from the Fountain of Youth and a guided tour of the alien ship in exchange for the artwork. Federal officials noted a greenish tint to Valenzuela’s complexion, suggesting a close relationship with the extraterrestrials. However, the agents accepted his explanation of having recently consumed a hefty portion of green Loch Ness monster meat.

President George W. Bush, after being advised of the incident, chastised his agents for not allowing the flying saucer to land. Bush lamented, “These were obviously creatures of faith who should have been treated with greater respect.”

Meanwhile, the Tribune has learned that witnesses to the UFO’s movements near O’Hare have hired Johnny Cochran to handle their defamation of character lawsuit against the US government, claiming that early dismissals of their sighting as that of a weather phenomenon were making them laughing stocks among their friends and families. Witness and UAL baggage handler, Chester Wooster, 38, who is a member of the Mutual UFO Network, told the Tribune that Cochran has proven that he can get people to believe the most preposterous things, making him “our kind of guy.”

Actor Dan Aykroyd, a life member of MUFON, took the opportunity to again denounce what he believes is the government’s blanket cover-up of extraterrestrial visitations. The highly regarded celebrity plaintively asked, “How can they continue to deny what we all know in our hearts must be true?”

That is made up!
I know Hector, and he lives in Artesia, not Roswell--so somebody is lying!
[/duh! mode off}:D
 
Also note that the caption to the second photo reads: "Second independant photo of same object taken of disc above control towers same event - O'Hare.". It clearly sates that it was taken on the event, and not not a mere illustration of the sighting.

Reading that forum again it's probably best to discount anything that appears on it. I mean "Second independant photo of same object taken of disc above control towers same event" isn't even English. The account as a whole is contradictory and utterly unclear. To compound it, the person who wrote it is clearly stark staring mad, as evidenced by his last post.
 
Yeah. I wouldn't say this proves the *case* is a hoax, only that image.

The same image is displayed here, http://www.nationalufocenter.com/artman/publish/article_121.php , the only difference being that here it is captioned "Illustration of disc above control towers." Indeed, the name of the imagefile is 51ohareillustration.jpg

That report is credited to Peter Davenport, Director of www.ufocenter.com however, it does not say who made the "illustration". As there is no "illustration" added to the ufocenter report, I tend to think it was added/created by the holders of the above site.

I suspect that Steven on the forum board we were first looking at just copped the pic and put it up and called it a "photo".
 
I wouldn't say this proves the *case* is a hoax, only that image.
I agree. I guess I jumped to a conclusion too fast.

I suspect that Steven on the forum board we were first looking at just copped the pic and put it up and called it a "photo".
Just note that Steven seemingly speaks on behalf of "uforesearcher.com" and is a forum Admin.
 

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