The Baigong Pipes

Do modern metal pipes buried in ancient Chinese stone prove that aliens must have visited?

Should you happen to visit Tibet anytime soon, be sure to stop by the city of Delingha. It’s a town of most extraordinary beauty, nestled on the edge of the Qaidam Basin below a range of Himalayan hills. There you’ll find the local residents proudly displaying their most famous distinction. For a few yuan you can probably get someone to take you to see it. Only a short journey outside of town is said to be a cave, and in this cave are a series of ancient metal pipes. These pipes predate all known history, and are embedded into the rock itself. They are said to lead through the very mountain, and connect to a nearby salt lake. The explanation? Ruins of a construction project 150,000 years ago, by alien visitors.

The Baigong Pipes are an example of what paranormal enthusiasts refer to as “out of place artifacts”, modern objects discovered in ancient surroundings. The Baigong Pipes are described as a sophisticated system of metal pipes, buried in geology in such a way that precludes the possibility of having been installed in modern times. They are located on Mt. Baigong in the Qinghai province of China, about 40 kilometers southwest of Delingha. Most accounts describe a pyramid-shaped outcropping on the mountain, and the cave containing the pipes is on this pyramid. 80 meters from the mouth of this cave is a salt lake (the twin of an adjacent freshwater lake), and more pipes can be found poking up along the shore. Most of the information you can find online about the Baigong Pipes appears to be originally sourced from a 2002 article from the Xinhua News Agency, talking about preparations by a team of scientists about to embark to this remote area to study the pipes. “Nature is harsh here,” said one. “There are no residents let alone modern industry in the area, only a few migrant herdsmen to the north of the mountain.”

The two lakes are broad, shallow sinks at the low point of the vast Qaidam Basin. Searching for Mt. Baigong is likely to be fruitless: First, the area is largely flat and the nearest mountains are 20 or 30 kilometers away; second, baigong is a local word for hill and could mean anything in this context. The southernmost of the two lakes, Toson Hu or Lake Toson, has some low bluffs here and there along its southern and western sides (Google Maps link), and it is in one of these bluffs (about 50 or 60 meters in height) that author Bai Yu once happened to find what he described as a small cave, according to his book Into the Qaidam.

Bai was traveling the area in 1996, and described a lifeless lake surrounded by cone-shaped hills. The cave appeared to have been artificially dug, and was triangular, about six meters deep. Nearby were two similar caves, but they had collapsed and could not be entered. But what struck Bai was the array of manufactured metal pipes protruding up through the floor of the cave and embedded within its walls, one 40 cm wide. Following their path outside, Bai discovered more pipes protruding from the surface of the conical hill, and even more of them 80 meters away from the cave along the shore of the lake. Excited, he removed a sample and sent it to the Ministry of Metallurgical Industry. The result was 92% common minerals and metals, and 8% of unknown composition.

Bai proceeded about 70 kilometers to the Delhi branch of China’s Purple Mountain Observatory, a high vantage point from where he knew he could get a birds-eye view of the whole region. He saw great expanses of flat, open terrain, and putting two and two together, he concluded that this would make for a fine alien landing site. Unknown minerals and plentiful landing space meant that the Baigong Pipes had to be of alien origin.

Scientists from the China Seismological Bureau visited the lake in 2001 to examine the pipes. Samples brought back to the Beijing Institute of Geology were examined by thermoluminescence dating, a technique that can determine how long it’s been since a crystalline mineral was either heated or exposed to sunlight. The result came back that if these were indeed iron pipes that had been smelted, they were made 140-150,000 years ago. Human history in the region only goes back some 30,000 years, and so the alien theory seemed to have been confirmed. The following year the Xinhua news story was published, and the Baigong Pipes entered pop culture as, supposedly, genuine, tangible evidence of alien visitation.

If you visit the area today, you’ll find a locally-built monument to the aliens off the main highway, replete with a mockup metallic satellite dish. Internet forums buzz with the absence of followup articles by Xinhua; the natural conclusion is that it turned out the alien explanation was the true one and the Chinese government is suppressing any further reporting. Cracked.com touts the Baigong Pipes as one of Six Insane Discoveries that Science Can’t Explain.

And although that’s where most reporting of the Baigong Pipes stops, it’s also where responsible inquiry should begin. When you settle on a paranormal explanation, it means you’ve decided there is no natural explanation. In fact, when you don’t yet know the explanation, you don’t yet know the explanation; so you can’t reasonably decide that the time is right to stop investigating. But so many do.

Skeptical hypotheses have already been put forward, seeking a natural explanation for the Baigong Pipes that doesn’t require the introduction of a wild assumption like alien visitation. The first thing we turn to are geological processes that might explain them. The Chinese have put forth several such hypotheses, including one involving the seepage of iron-rich magma into existing fissures in the rock.

A 2003 article in Xinmin Weekly described how this might work. Fractures caused by the uplift of the Qinghai-Tibet plateau could have left the ground riddled with such fissures, into which the highly pressurized magma driving the uplift would have been forced. Assuming this magma was of the right composition that, when combined with the chemical effects of subsequent geological processes, we might very likely expect to see such rusty iron structures in the local rock. But evidence of this has never surfaced, and the Chinese dismissed this theory. They also noted that the Qaidam oil field would not be able to exist if there were active volcanism in the area as recently as 150,000 years ago.

It was their next theory that ultimately led to a satisfactory explanation, and this theory involved the same hypothesized fissures in the sandstone. But, instead of being filled with iron-rich magma, the fissures could have been washed full of iron-rich sediment during floods. Combined with water and the presence of hydrogen sulfide gas, the sediment could have eventually hardened into the rusty metallic pipelike structures of iron pyrite found today. This theory was not fantastic, in part because there was no logical reason why the sandstone might happen to be laced with pipe shaped fissures. But the idea of flooding did make sense, given the geological history of the Qaidam Basin.

Three years before Bai Yu took his first peek into the cave at Lake Toson, researchers Mossa and Schumacher wrote in the Journal of Sedimentary Research about fossil tree casts in Louisiana. They found cylindrical structures in the soil, thermoluminescence dated from 75-95,000 years ago. The chemical composition of the cylinders varied depending on where and when they formed and in what type of soil. The authors found that these were the fossilized casts of tree roots, formed by pedogenesis (the process by which soil is created) and diagenesis (the lithification of soil into rock through compaction and cementation). The result of this process was to create metallic pipelike structures, which by comparing the descriptions offered by researchers, appear to be a perfect match for the Baigong Pipes.

The Chinese scientists eventually did come to the same conclusion, according to the Xinmin Weekly article. They used atomic emission spectroscopy to conduct a detailed chemical analysis of the rusty pipe fragments, and found them to contain organic plant matter. Under the microscope they found tree rings, consistently throughout the samples. Once they established that the Baigong Pipes were simply fossilized tree casts, they set about to discover how they got there.

The Qaidam basin was once a vast lake, which has disappeared as the Qinghai-Tibet plateau uplifted the basin to its current elevation of about 2800 meters. Over the millennia, various floods filled the sink with runoff, alluvium, and debris including such fossils. They can now be found wherever such ancient flows deposited them, and it seems that Bai Yu was lucky enough to discover just such a pocket.

And so we end up with a complete story of how rusty iron pipes, tens of thousands of years older than any people who might have forged them, can end up embedded in solid sandstone in such a way as to baffle the average observer. Like many amateur researchers, Bai Yu stumbled upon an extraordinary discovery, but through his lack of applicable knowledge, misinterpreted what he saw. Those who underestimate the Earth’s ability to produce fascinating effects are often left to grope for goofy explanations like alien construction projects. I find that the Baigong Pipes are one of the better examples of the folly of stopping at the paranormal explanation, compared to the rich rewards offered by following the scientific method to uncover what’s really going on.

The "Starchild"


We finally have a recovery of nuclear DNA from the Starchild!

This past weekend I met with the geneticist working on the Starchild’s DNA. He explained how he can now prove the Starchild is not entirely human, which has been our position for years. Now it is no longer a question of “if,” but of “when” and “how” we spread this astounding new reality beyond the mailing list. First, though, let me bring the list’s newcomers up to speed.

In 2003 we had a DNA analysis that used human-only primers to recover the Starchild’s mitochondrial DNA, the DNA outside the nucleus, which comes from the mother and her genetic line. That meant its mother was human. But we could not recover its nuclear DNA, which comes from both mother and father, which meant its father was not a human. Unfortunately, with the recovery technology of 2003 we couldn’t prove what he was, which left us in scientific limbo. The “no result” from the search for the nuclear DNA clearly meant Dad wasn’t human, but we could not prove that fact beyond all possible doubt.

Now, in 2010, there have been many improvements in the recovery process, and those improvements have been applied to the Starchild skull with the stunning result you see below. This is a gel sheet that shows a clear recovery of its nuclear DNA, which could not be done in 2003.

The next two screen shots are taken from the national genetic database at the National Institute of Health, NIH. That public-access database is a centralized repository of all genetic information generated by geneticists all over the world, and now covers essentially all living organisms on Earth, from various kinds of viruses and bacteria, to various kinds of crustaceans and fish, to all kinds of animals and plants, including great apes and humans.

For many species, humans included, there are already nucleotide sequences covering entire genomes. Therefore, sequences from the Starchild’s DNA can be directly compared against this vast database to look for any matches. In one such comparison below, you see the text below the blue line at the bottom (if you can read it, sorry it’s so fuzzy) that 265 base pairs (a good length) of recovered Starchild nuclear DNA matches perfectly with a gene on human chromosome 1. This verifies beyond any degree of doubt that some of the nuclear DNA seen in the gel sheet is from a human being.

In the one below, and again at the bottom, you see the stunning report that in a string of 342 base pairs (another good length), “No significant similarity (is) found.” To recover a stretch of base pairs as long as that with NO reference in the NIH database is astounding because it means there is no known earthly corollary for what has been analyzed! This incredible anomaly will put the Starchild in history books!!!

Please understand that this result has now been verified several times, and a few more different fragments have been identified that cannot be matched in this database to anything known. Despite that fact, mainstream skeptics will be obligated by their positions to try to say it’s some kind of gibberish or some kind of mistake because in their world view it simply can’t be true.

Luckily, their bleating protests can be easily overcome with continued repetition of the result, finding more and more similar fragments in the library that will be created from the Starchild’s DNA, which is what the geneticist is confident will happen over the next weeks and months—nothing but verification that a significant part of the Starchild’s genome is not found on Earth.

I should add that I still can’t reveal the name of the geneticist or where he works until we are ready to formally present his results to the world. However, trust me, he is a well-established professional and his facility is large and very credible. They don’t want to be bombarded by media until they are prepared for it, and neither do I for that matter. Just know that you are a part of the “inner circle” of those who have put your faith in a dream that is now coming true.

Two more issues of importance:

(1) I still don’t know where the recent “MonsterQuest” episode “Lizard Monster” can be viewed on the internet by people outside the U.S. If anyone knows how that can be found, please let me know and I’ll share with the list. Thanks!

(2) The expenses for materials doing our research has now outstripped the amount donated by the list. It is now coming out of my pocket and I could use some help to bridge that gap. However, look on the bright side. This should be the last time I ever have to ask for your help in this way.

Mexican Alien Baby

Mexican TV revealed the almost unbelievable story – in 2007, a baby alien was found alive by a farmer in Mexico. He drowned it in a ditch out of fear, and now two years later scientists have finally been able to announce the results of their tests on this sinister-looking carcass.
At the end of last year the farmer, Marao Lopez, handed the corpse over to university scientists who carried out DNA tests and scans. He claimed that it took him three attempts to drown the creature and he had to hold it underwater for hours.
Tests revealed a creature that is unknown to scientists – its skeleton has characteristics of a lizard, its teeth do not have any roots like humans and it can
stay underwater for a long time.
But it also has some similar joints to humans. Its brain was huge, particularly the rear section, leading scientists to the conclusion that the odd creature was very intelligent.
But it has seemingly left experts stumped.

And in a further mystery, Lopez has since mysteriously died…
According to American UFO expert Joshua P. Warren (32), the farmer burned to death in a parked car at the side of a road.
The flames apparently had a far higher temperature than in a normal fire!
Now there are rumours that the parents of the creature Lopez drowned were the ones who in turn killed him out of revenge.
There are frequent UFO sightings and reports of crop circles in the area where the creature was found. Perhaps it was left behind deliberately by aliens.
Mexican UFO expert Jaime Maussan (56) was the first to break the story. He claimed it was not a hoax. Farmers also told him that there was a second creature but it ran away when they approached.

The puzzle has caused intrigue amongst BILD’s readers. Some say it is a mutant, others wonder why aliens would leave a baby behind – and one reader asked why aliens don’t wear clothes…

Band of Holes near Pisco Valley, Peru

These strange holes, stretching for a mile over uneven mountain terrain, were here for so long that the local people have no idea who made them, or why. Funny thing is no one really saw the big picture until the area was seen from the air.

Thousands of man-sized holes are carved into the barren rock near Pisco Valley, Peru on a plain called Cajamarquilla.
Click on the image to enlarge.


Satellite photo of the Pisco Valley with marked location of
the “Band of Holes” . Click on the image to enlarge.
Archeologists have speculated they were dug to store grain in. Two problems with this, say the folks thinking out of the box: there were a lot easier ways to create storage containers than the hard work and decades it must have taken to chip out all of these, and it would have made more sense, if these were to store grain, to build several huge chambers.
Ok, said the archeologists. Perhaps they were used as one-person tombs? Vertical graves of some sort? But no bones, artifacts, scraps, inscriptions, jewelry…not even a tooth or strand of hair has been found in them. They have no covers to seal them as you might a tomb and no sacred history or even myth was passed down to label them as such. Some sections have holes in rigid and perfect precision; some run in rows that curve up in arches, some staggered lines. They vary in depth to about 6-7 feet deep yet some are merely shallow indents as if not completed – though surrounded by those that are. To date, no one has a clue why they’re here, who made them or what they were.
Satellite photo of the “Band of Holes” near Pisco Valley.
Note: The location of the band of holes is highlighted brown.
Click on the image to enlarge.
Even von Daniken’s work begins to take on a realness when one finds an old National Geographic from 1933 corroborating the “Band of Holes,” that he personally inspected a few years ago. Each hole is a meter wide and just as deep. There are eight holes spanning 24 meters in width, marching in repetitive uniform fashion, from the Pisco Valley rolling over a mile through mountain terrain — finally disappearing in the misty mass of Peru. These holes remind this old West Texas boy of the traces left by a massive drilling rig moving along methodically, testing the geology of the Andes for precious metals. Lasers have also left such tracings in the ground. Archaeologists say they represented defensive positions or graves for the ancient ones, except why would you bury anyone on a slope in rocky soil at more than a 45-degree angle? If you look at the most northern part of the band, you will notice that it ends within unnaturally darkened area (it almost looks like a remnants of an explosion)… see the photo below:
Strangely dark area where the “band of holes” ends.
Click to enlarge
Few miles east from the band, satellite photo shows structures that look like a remnants of an ancient settlement (these formations do not look natural and there is nothing similar in the entire area): 13 42’36.80″ S, 75 51’4.07″ W
Remnants of an ancient city?
Click on the image to enlarge
For the reference here is satellite photo of Machu Picchu:
Ruins of Machu Picchu, Peru (click to enlarge).

The Nazca Lines, Peru

The Nazca Lines are giant sketches drawn in the desert of western Peru by ancient peoples. The drawings were created on such a large scale is such that the shapes can be readily discerned only from the air, leading to a variety of theories about their purpose.
The Nazca Lines were created in the time of the Nazca Indians, who flourished in the area from 200 BC to about 600 AD. Graves and ruins of their settlement have been found near the lines.
The lines would have taken a long time to create, perhaps several generations, and many people contributed to their creation. As to the purpose of the Nazca Lines, see below for some of the theories.
The area of the Peruvian desert in which the Nazca Lines were drawn is called the Pampa Colorada (Red Plain). It is 15 miles wide and runs some 37 miles parallel to the Andes and the Pacific Ocean. The desert is not sandy, but made of dark red surface stones and soil with lighter-colored subsoil beneath. The Lines were created by clearing away the darker upper layer to reveal the lighter subsoil.
It seems incredible that such simply-made drawings have survived for so many hundreds of years, and some have seen a mysterious element to this. But there is also a natural explanation: the surface is made of stone, not sand, and the climate of the area is such that there is practically no erosion. The Nazca peoples chose an excellent place for an enduring monument.
The Nazca Lines include straight lines and geometric shapes as well as stylized depictions of animals, humans and plants. The figures include:
  • monkey
  • condor
  • round-headed, rather friendly-looking human (known as “the astronaut”)
  • another human figure
  • spider
  • hummingbird
  • hands
  • tree
Theories of the Nazca Lines mainly attempt to explain why these remarkable drawings were created, and some theories seek to address the “how” question as well. Especially in the earlier years of study, it was difficult for many anthropologists to believe that the ancient Nazca peoples could have created the Lines without help from a more advanced society – or species!
Perhaps the most famous theory of the Nazca Lines is that of Swiss writer Erich von Däniken. In his 1968 book Chariots of the Gods, he suggested that the lines were built by ancient astronauts as a landing field. He identifies the pictures as “signals” and the longer lines as “landing strips.”
In 1977, Jim Woodman accepted that the Nazca people made the lines themselves, but puzzled over why they would make them so big that they couldn’t even seen them. He hypothesized that the Nazca people used hot-air balloons for “ceremonial flights” to view their creations.
Woodman attempted to demonstrate the validity of his theory by constructing a hot-air balloon out of the materials that would have been available to the Nazca. Using cloth, rope and reeds, Woodman and his colleagues assembled the balloon then risked their lives on a balloon ride that reached a height of 300 feet. The balloon soon descended rapidly; the balloonists bailed out 10 feet above the desert before it crashed some distance away.
In recent years, the professional skeptic Joe Nickell has demonstrated that the drawings would not have been hard to accomplish with only the tools available to the ancient Nazca. Nickell has also shown that although the size of the figures suggests they were intended primarily for the enjoyment of the gods, the drawings can be appreciated from the ground as well.
The general consensus of archaeologists, anthropologists and scientists is that the Nazca Lines were created by the Nazca people themselves, without help from celestial visitors or aerial views. The figures drawn in the desert correspond with images found in other examples of Nazca art, such as pottery.
It is almost certain that the Nazca Lines had a sacred purpose, because: other artifacts of the Nazca culture show a preoccupation with death; other major monuments of the ancient world are known to be ritual in nature; and no plausible practical purpose has yet been discovered.
The Nazca Lines may have been ritual centers for helping the dead achieve immortality; they may have been an offering to the gods; or they could have been a major pilgrimage site.
We may never know why the Nazca peoples put so much time and care into a project that they could barely see. In spite of all that we have learned about them in recent years, the Nazca Lines remain a fascinating mystery.

Secrets of Roswell memory metal revealed

Was the Roswell memory metal secretly “seeded” to industry and to others who could exploit its potential benefits? How was the technology transferred while keeping its origin disguised? Why were bizarre “mind-over-matter” tests performed by government psychics on the shape-recovery metal Nitinol? What is the hidden meaning of the morphing metal? Newly developed information provides the stunning answers to these questions.

Prior articles in this series showed that Wright Patterson Air Force Base contracted Battelle Memorial Institute -in the months immediately following the Roswell crash in 1947- to conduct studies on memory metal based on a Nickel and Titanium alloy. Similar material that could “remember” its original shape when crumpled or deformed was reported at the Roswell crash debris site. Wright Patterson -the base that contracted Battelle- was the very base to which the Roswell debris was flown after the crash.

Evidence for the Roswell-Battelle Connection was drawn from:

Footnotes that were located within military studies to a Battelle report on memory metal conducted by the Institute for Wright Patterson in the late 1940s

The fact that -although footnotes citing these reports have been found- the actual reports are “missing” despite repeated efforts

Supporting information provided by two USAF Generals (including one from Wright Patterson) on the composition of the debris and the existence of the analysis reports

A senior-level Battelle scientist’s confession that he had analyzed the UFO crash debris when employed at the Institute

A historical “backtracking” of the technical literature on the development of shape-recovery metals- leading back to the doors of Battelle and Wright Patterson, to late 1940s exotic metal reports and to the Roswell Incident

A telling examination of the life of Battelle’s Dr. Howard Cross as both metallurgist and UFO researcher- showing his likely involvement in the debris analysis

In this last installment, the memory metal’s secret history is further exposed- and the hidden meaning of the metal is finally revealed:

MEMORY METAL’S “OFFICIAL HISTORY” IS FALSE

Europeans in the 1930s conducting metal “bendability” and stress tests noted that some alloys (containing Aluminum) could exhibit a type of “pseudo-elasticity.” In fact -since man began forging metal by fire- the “state of metal” was known to be “changeable.”

But the Battelle studies conducted for Wright Patterson in the late 1940s represent something entirely different. They show that this was the very first time that a metal system that had the potential for genuine “shape recovery” was ever examined by the U.S. military. And these studies began immediately following the Roswell crash where similar material was reported to have been found. Importantly, even after decades, the Nickel-Titanium metal system (Nitinol) remains the material that defines “morphing metal.” Any earlier observation of “pseudo-elasticity” was with a metal alloy that did not utilize Nickel and Titanium- and that was not developed for that property. Nitinol, however, has gone on to be used in a variety of things from eyeglass frames to aircraft to medical implants.

It is traditionally held that the Nickel-Titanium memory alloy (known as Nitinol) was “discovered by accident” in the early 1960s at the U.S. Naval Ordnance Lab in Maryland, by co-inventors Drs. Wang and Buehler. But the true history of Nitinol is purposely obscured- and it is riddled with holes and discrepancies.

The truth is that the first efforts at examining this remarkable Nickel-Titanium alloy had ocurred years previously, in the late 1940s after the Roswell crash. And the work was performed by someone else- Battelle Memorial Institute in Ohio. This work was contracted by Wright Patterson- the very base where the crash material was taken.

YEAR OF DISCOVERY UNCLEAR

One of the problems immediately evident with the “official” history of Nitinol is the exact year offered for its discovery. Simply “Google” the word Nitinol with any of the following years: 1958, 1959, 1960, 1961, 1962 or 1963. Search results will show links to sites that give each of those years as the “year of discovery” for Nitinol. Even Nitinol’s “official” co-inventors Buehler and Wang have offered different years of discovery when at the Naval Lab. Scientific journals and articles found in the popular press give different years. When reached by this author and asked what was the exact year he “co-invented” the material, Wang gave a strange laugh and admitted that he wasn’t exactly sure and that he would have to look it up!

DIFFERENT REASONS OFFERED FOR WHY IT WAS DEVELOPED

We are given at least three completely different reasons on why Nitinol was being investigated in the first place. In an oral history, Buehler said that he was conducting studies on intermetallic alloys for use in re-entry aeronautic nose cones. But a 1968 Time Magazine article quotes him that they were trying to find a non-magnetic, non-corrosive material for use as a tool in mine dismantling. Recently, a former Lawrence Berkeley scientist has related that to this author that he examined Nitinol while at that National Lab. He was told that the material was developed when trying to create new submarine ship hull material.

DIFFERENT EXPLANATIONS GIVEN FOR THE CIRCUMSTANCES SURROUNDING ITS DISCOVERY
In most re-tellings, the explanation for how Nitinol was “accidentally” discovered is something to the effect that “someone was bored and decided to take a match to it to see what heating would do.” Nitinol requires energy -like heat- to morph.

But in another recounting, a researcher “RCW Wiley” had placed a Nickel-Titanium alloy into a hardness testing machine and a dent was made. Wiley then decided to warm up the block to see the effect of heat treatment- and to his surprise- the dent vanished. No mention is made if the Titanium was purified to the ultra-high levels required to make Nitinol.

Yet another reason is given in an oral history by Nitinol co-inventor Buehler. He says that for some reason he took a strip of the alloy into a managment meeting at the Naval Lab one day. He was “fidgeting” with the material and an associate named David Muzzey (of whom no record as ever been found) was compelled to take a pipe lighter (in some versions a cigarette match) to the material to see what would happen…and Voila, Nitinol!

Buehler is conflicted and offers two diametrically opposed explanations about the material. He at one time refers to it as a “planned discovery” and yet to another reporter he said that it came about as a result of “serendipity” or an accidental discovery. In an historical retelling late in life, Buehler exclaimed almost metaphysically that he was “drawn” to the alloy. When he struck it, Buehler says, “it rang out brilliantly” and he states that the “equiatomic Nickel Titanium was acoustically signalling that it was unusual or unique.” Just how he knew that the Titanium must be of nearly 100% purity- or that the temperature, pressure and other dynamics must be precisely in place to create Nitinol and energy then introduced into the metal is a specific way- is never made clear.

BATTELLE PROVIDED THE U.S. NAVY WITH ROSWELL MEMORY METAL TECHNOLOGY

As described in a previous article, Battelle’s Dr. Howard Cross -a metallurgist and secret Project Blue Book UFO researcher- was likely directing the Roswell debris analysis. Cross was “feeding” technical information on specially-processed Titanium (which is required to make Nitinol) as early as 1948. Cross is the author of a technical summary report entitled, “Titanium Base Alloys.” It was presented by him to the Office of Naval Research in December of 1948. The Naval Lab is the very lab where Nitinol was “officially” discovered many years later.

In fact, a research paper from Nitinol’s “official” co-inventor, Dr. Wang, gives us confirmation that he was “fed” needed information on the alloy from the early Battelle report on memory metal done after Roswell. In footnote No. 6 in his “On the NiTi (Nitinol) Martensitic Transition, Part 1 1972 Naval Ordnance Laboratory, White Oak, MD” Wang cites the Battelle 1949 “Second Progress Report” on Nickel-Titanium system authored by Battelle scientists Craighead, Fawn and Eastwood.

This author reached Dr. Wang to ask him some questions about his research. When I eventually brought up the subject of the 1949 Battelle report that he had footnoted in his study on Nitinol, Wang got very “cagey” and appeared to not want to answer. When pressed, he said that “it must have related to a Phase Diagram on Nickel and Titanium.” A phase diagram provides information on the “mixability” of metals that is needed to create an alloy. It details the individual metal’s “boundaries” when attempting to combine them. Temperature, pressure and other dynamics are measured to determine the successful combination to create an alloy. Such information would absolutely have been required to create the memory metal Nitinol.

When I asked Wang who it was that had provided him with the Battelle report, he would only answer that he got it “from my superior, who may have gotten it from another agency.” When I told Wang that this Battelle report was “missing” despite all attempts to locate it, he offered weakly, “well, I wouldn’t know anything about that.” When I asked if Wang knew one of the Battelle report scientists (Craighead.) Wang admitted, ” I knew of Craighead.”

I then “eased in” to telling the elderly scientist that his Nitinol seemed very much like the morphing metal that was reported by many people to have been recovered from the crash of an unidentified object at Roswell, NM in 1947. The scientist did not reply to me that he he was unfamiliar with the Roswell crash -or that he did not know to whIch event I was referring. Nor did he say that the idea of such a scenario was ridiculous or misguided. Instead, Wang was stunned silent. After a long pause he said, “I don’t have any comment on that.” With nothing to loose, I then quickly outlined my findings on the Battelle-Roswell connection. He only reiterated, “I told you that I am not going to discuss that.” .

KEEPING THE SECRET WHILE TRANSFERING THE TECHNOLOGY KEEP THEM IN THE DARK

The key to keeping the origin of such a technology secret is “compartmentalization.” You only give out pieces or parts -never the whole thing. And sometimes you provide only the technical information that was gained by others on the parts- not the parts themselves. You release these to different places. This is not done at once, but rather over periods of time. You give it to those holding high-security clearance, and then only to those with a “Need to Know.” But most importantly, you never tell any of them the “backstory” about where it came from. “Blend” this technology so that it does not appear to be anything other than part of existing areas of research. Over the passage of decades, the truth remains even further and more easily buried. It is in this way that scientists today working on shape-recovery alloys are prevented from realizing the hidden history of their work. It is likely that even the Naval Lab’s “official” inventors of Nitinol did not know the “Roswell impetus” of their research (though they may well have wondered.)

A report that bluntly and openly states “this is material that was recovered at Roswell” will never be found. It is only through carefully reviewing the “history of science” many decades later that these connections about the Roswell metal’s history would be made. Only obscure footnotes found buried in military studies -coupled with sleuth work- would lead to the truth about the study of the Roswell metal.

It now appears that much of the work on the Roswell debris was skillfully and conveniently “folded into” military contracted work on “traditional” aeronautical or naval metals engineering projects of the time. It was the perfect guise. Nobody would put “two and two” together that this advanced materials work -actually inspired by Roswell- was anything “special.” It would be seen as just “part of the program.” Selectively “farming out” portions of this work assured that nobody would make any “connections.” The “paper trail” on the study of the material could also be confused as “normal military work” that they were “already conducting.”

MOVING THE METAL TO NASA AND INTO SPACE

One of the ultimate goals of the work on the memory metal was to return it to Outer Space. It came from a spacecraft at Roswell- and it would ultimately be used for this very purpose by us- through NASA.

This is confirmed by:

– Nitinol’s “official” co-inventor William Buehler tellingly states in an oral history that after his “discovery” it was NASA that “independently retained Battelle to conduct further “characterization studies” on Nitinol. Buehler reveals two things as an elderly man recollecting his past: Battelle was still involved in directing the study of the material in the 1960s and that it was NASA that was “pulling the strings” about the direction of research on the material.

– An individual who was contracted by the U.S. Naval Lab to perform “mental influence” tests to attempt to bend Nitinol with the mind’s energy said that NASA was there. He told me in a recent interview that “People in plainclothes from NASA were present at all times during these tests. I couldn’t understand why.” Why would NASA be at the US Naval Lab overseeing psychic tests on a metal? See this article’s next section for details on these bizarre Mind-Over-Matter tests conducted on Nitinol.

– NASA sought to develop shape-recovery material for use in their own spacecraft. A “self-healing” material, or a material that can “remember” itself for future function would be very valuable. If the metal could morph, the shape of the craft could be changed to best suit the environment it is traversing. If the metal responds to direction given by the mind’s energy, new control and navigation systems could be developed. This would be the ultimate in Mind-Machine interface.

– An extraordinarily telling video that can now be viewed online proves that NASA is perfecting such shape-recovery metals as “intelligent,” adaptive materials of construction for spacecraft. This (short) video can be seen by “Googling” the phrase (in quotes) “NASA Morphing Metal.” Any of the seven search results that appear will link to sites that show this technology-transfer film from NASA’s Center for Excellence in Materials. You can then visually grasp just how amazing memory material can be: It can absorb the impact of a crash, like at Roswell. It can function as a novel actuator. It can even be used to create advanced craft with “flappable” or adaptable wings! And a craft that appears small when seen from the outside -once entered- can then appear very large when inside. Actuators and panels made of memory metal can create this effect by expanding the interior walls and floors and extending the craft’s frame. Interestingly, this very effect has been reported by some who claim to have entered “flying saucers.”

MIND, MATTER AND MORPHING
This unique metal combination holds a significance so special that it was tested by the U.S. Government to see if it could be altered by the human mind! This is revealed in a decades-old technical summary report found completed by the U.S. Naval Lab. In the early 1970’s the U.S. government tested Nitinol to see if it could “morph” using only the mind’s energy. Could “psychokinesis” affect this shape-recovery material? Would an “intelligent metal” like Nitinol respond to the energy generated by the intelligent mind?

Physical scientist Eldon Byrd was employed by the U.S. Naval Lab and other government agencies for decades. In his paper “Influence on Metal Alloy Nitinol” (1973 Naval Surface Weapons Center, White Oak Laboratory, Silver Spring, MD) Byrd outlines tests that were performed that year using “psychics” to try to change the hardness of the material, deform it in some distinct way or to alter its magnetic properties. The tests were in part successful. A permanent “knot” was induced in the material preventing its famous “snap back.” Within this knotted section, unusual microscopic changes in its the material’s structure were observed. The introduction of energy is required to create a morphing change in the metal. Typically this “introduced energy” is heat. But it appeared that the mind’s “energy” could also create the morph.

Incredibly, it was none other than Dr. Fred Wang, Nitinol’s “official” co-inventor who conducted these Mind-Over-Memory Metal tests, according to Wang’s colleague Eldon Byrd! As mentioned earlier, it is also this very Dr. Wang who cites by footnote the (now missing) 1949 Battelle report on Nickel and Titanium in one of his own Nitinol studies! The scientist who conducted psychic influence tests on the material is the same scientist who had access to the “missing” late 1940’s Battelle reports on memory metal likely inspired by the Roswell crash debris!

Some years ago in talking to skeptic Martin Gardner, Wang denied being present at the Naval Lab when these strange tests were conducted. But Eldon Byrd begs to differ. In a 2001 interview Byrd says that the scientist is lying. Byrd charges that Wang “yielded to the pressure put on him” and adds “he did the tests. I had the results in the form of photos and X-rays.” When I asked of Wang what he thought of Byrd’s assertation, Wang this time did not deny his presence at the tests but instead replied, “Byrd says a lot of things.”

THE HIDDEN MEANING OF MEMORY METAL

Morphing metal may well be the stuff from which today’s often-seen “morphing UFOs” are made. Such materials of construction may help to explain the “shape-shifting” craft. And it is likely that similar material accounts for some of the debris that was found at the crash at Roswell.

But there is an even deeper meaning to memory metal. It is found within the Morph. It represents “the potential for change.” Such material reflects the value of adaptation. Without it, life ceases. The best material adapts itself to best suit its environment. The shape-memory qualities of the Roswell debris speak to the metal’s “rememberance” of a malleable and ever-changing Universe. It reveals the Universe as Infinite Potential. And this Change is created by the unique and eternal interplay of Matter, Energy and Mind.

Giant Skeletons

The mystery surrounding reports of “giant skeletons” has always intrigued and fascinated me. Specifically, how it seemed to be a common ocurrence that human-like bone remains, often of giant proportions, were known for popping up everywhere in the mid-to-late 1800s, as featured in reports like these:

During an 1879 excavation of an Indian mound near Brewersville, Indiana, a nine-foot eight inch skeleton was found buried within. Around the same time, George W. Hill, M.D., also unearthed a skeleton said to be “of unusual size” while excavating a mound in Ashland County, Ohio. In 1880, American Antiquarian, volume three, reported that a Doctor Everhart allegedly found another large skeleton “reported to have been of enormous dimensions” in a strange clay coffin along with a sandstone slab marked with unidentified hieroglyphics near Zanesville Ohio. In 1881 in Medina County, Ohio, a succession of nine bodies were found below the cellar of a house, buried as though the corpses had been “dumped into a ditch.” Albert Harris, one of the residents, was twenty years old at the time of the grave’s discovery, and removing one of the large skeletons, said that he could literally fit the piece over his entire head and allow it to rest on his shoulders like a large helmet, even while wearing a cap underneath! Still, we’ve all heard of how even well known authors of the era, including Mark Twain, contributed to the telling of “whoppers” in their day; that is, many writers who got their feet wet as newspaper writers for dailies would occasionally cook up tall tales when local news just wasn’t doing it (see a great example of this here). Eventually, I decided to try and find out if there might be any reports that could be verified with more certainty, and after some digging around in public domain archives, I found a couple.

In their 1894 report to the secretary of the Smithsonian Institute, Cyrus Thomas and Thomas Powell of the Bureau of Ethnology wrote of several discoveries where large human skeletal remains were found, the first ocurring in Roane County, Tennessee:

“Underneath the layer of shells the earth was very dark and appeared to be mixed with vegetable mold to the depth of 1 foot. At the bottom of this, resting on the original surface of the ground, was a very large skeleton lying horizontally at full length. Although very soft, the bones were sufficiently distinct to allow of careful measurement before attempting to remove them. The length from the base of the skull to the bones of the toes was found to be 7 feet 3 inches. It is probable, therefore, that this individual when living was fully 7½ feet high.”

And yet another instance, this time in presumed Indian burial mounds at Dunlieth, Illinois:

“Near the original surface, 10 or 12 feet from the center, on the lower side, lying at full length on its back, was one of the largest skeletons discovered by the Bureau agents, the length as proved by actual measurement being between 7 and 8 feet. It was clearly traceable, but crumbled to pieces immediately after removal from the hard earth in which it was encased….”

Indeed, it seems that the Smithsonian at one time reported oddities like these which they uncovered, especially during the “giant boom” of the late nineteenth century. Still, I can’t help but ask; if these kinds of discoveries were ever at all commonplace, why aren’t skeletons and other anomalies like this found more frequently in modern times… or are they?

During an email exchange I had last year with my good friend and mentor, Brad Steiger, we began discussing a few similar reports which he had included in his book Worlds Before Our Own, where a few such skeletons were said to exist in private museums. ”After the book was published, I learned of even more and included photos of them in my lectures,” he told me. ”Soon, individuals beseeched me to cease; the private museums were mysteriously suffering unexplained fires.” One is left to ask; what about anomalous relics of this (or any) sort could be so worthy of censorship on such a level?

Further complicating the mystery of missing giant bones is the following exerpt from an article I wrote which included the inquiries of the late zoologist Ivan T. Sanderson, best known for his interest in the legends regarding America’s Bigfoot and the Abominable Snowmen alleged to reside in the Himalayas:

“Sometime in the 1960s, Sanderson wrote about an odd letter he received regarding an engineer who, during World War II, had been stationed on the Aleutian island of Shemya. While building an airstrip, the bulldozing of a group of hills in the area led the engineer and his crew to unearth several sedimentary layers of human remains. They noted the extraordinary length of the crania and leg bones at the site, having apparently belonged to people of gigantic proportions. The skulls were said to have measured up to 24 inches from base to crown, far greater than the length of an average human skull. Also of interest was that each was said to have been trepanned, the strange process of drilling or cutting a hole and removing a top center portion of the skull, thought by some ancient cultures to enable a variety of alleged “benefits”, including psychic abilities, etc. Sanderson actively began to search for more proof of this incident, and later was able to contact another member of the unit who also confirmed the bizarre story. By all accounts, the remains were said to have been gathered by the Smithsonian Institution, but no record of where they were taken was ever issued. Sanderson seemed convinced that the institute did indeed retrieve them however, going so far as to ask ‘is it that these people cannot face rewriting all the textbooks?’ “

Do I honestly think that there are MIBs out there spiriting away giant skeletons into an unmarked warehouse someplace? Not at all… but I think it’s safe to suppose (at least for the sake of a good pun) that someone may have a few “skeletons in their closet” that they just aren’t talking about!

‘Alien skull’ spotted on Mars

At first glance it looks like a rocky desert – but this image of the Mars landscape has got space-gazers talking.

An oddly shaped space boulder appears to show eye sockets and a nose leading to speculation it might be a Martian skull.

Internet forums are full of chatter about the picture, taken by a panoramic NASA camera known as Spirit.

One alien-spotter speculated: “The skull is 15 cm with binocular eyes 5 cm apart. The cranial capacity is approximately 1400 cc.

“There appears to be a narrow pointed small mouth, so this creature most likely is a carnivore.”

Another joked: “The coronal ridge shows ample structure to support the musculature of antennae, although none are visible in this view.

“The nose area is broad and blunted as you would expect to see in a cold and windy landscape. Is he decapitated or is he buried up to his neck?”

Previous images of a skull spotted on Mars in 2006 were believed to have been the result of tampering.

The famous Face on Mars, snapped by the Viking 1 spacecraft in 1976, which showed the shadowy likeness of a human face was late, was found to be a trick of the light when the area was re-photographed in 1998.

Wondjina

In Aboriginal mythology, the Wondjina (or wandjina) were cloud and rain spirits who, during the Dream time, painted their images (as humans but without mouths) on cave walls. It has been said if they had mouths, the rain would never cease. They also lacked limbs and had a skull-like face. Their ghosts still exist in small ponds. Walaganda, one of the Wondjina, became the Milky Way. Paintings of this style that represent the mythological beings involved in the creation of the world are called “Wondjina style”.

The Aboriginal people are part of a hunting-gathering society, located in the outback of Australia. Objects found on geographical sites may suggest that this area had been inhabited as long ago as 174,000 B.C. Imagery and myth were a big part of this culture. They believed that “dreamtime” is cosmological time and is the order of the universe from beginning to end. There were ritualistic acts performed during dreamtime, which included the making of rock art. The Wandjinas have common colors of black, red and yellow on a white background. Wandjinas are believed to have made the sea, the earth and all its inhabitants. The existing rock art found, has depicted them as having huge upper bodies and large heads. Their faces show eyes and nose, but typically lack mouths. Around the heads of Wandjinas there appears to be lightning and feathers. The Wandjina is thought to have special powers and if offended, can cause flooding and intense lightning. The paintings are still believed to have special powers and therefore are to be approached cautiously.

In the culture of the Worora, Ngarinyin, and Wunumbul tribes, which make up the Mowanjum community outside Derby, Western Australia, the Wandjina is the supreme spirit being.

The tribes came together early this century at the Kunmunya Presbyterian mission and the government settlement at Munja. Since 1950, they have endured many forced moves, first to Wotjulum, then to the old Mowanjum site and, finally, to the present day Mowanjum site about 15 kilometres outside Derby.

As with most complex cultures, opinions about creation can differ. According to David Mowaljarlai (dec), a highly respected Mowanjum elder, the Worora, Ngarinyin and Wunumbul people are the three Wandjina tribes. Only these three tribes see the Wandjinas as the true creators of the land. Many other Australian Aboriginal tribes believe that the Dreamtime snake or Rainbow Serpent was the main creative force.

According to Mowanjum artist Mabel King, during Lai Lai (the creation time), Wallungunder, the “big boss” Wandjina, came from the Milky Way to create the earth and all the people. These first people were the Gyorn Gyorn – what some gudiya (white) people call Bradshaw figures, named after the gudiya to first see them in 1891. The Gyorn Gyorn had no laws or kinship and wandered around lost.

Wallungunder saw that he could do good with these people, so he went back to the Milky Way and brought many other Wandjinas with the power of the Dreamtime snake to help him bring laws and kinship to the Gyorn Gyorn people. The Dreamtime snake represents Mother Earth and is called ungud. Each of the artists has his or her own ungud birthplace or dreaming place.
The Wandjinas created the animals and the baby spirits that reside in the rock pools or sacred ungud places throughout the Kimberley, and continue to control everything that happens on the land and in the sky and sea.

Sam Woolagoodja (dec), a distinguished and eminent Worora leader and law man, described the Wandjina image by saying ‘their power is so great that they don’t need to speak, so they have no mouth. Their eyes are powerful and black, like the eye of a cyclone. The lines around a Wandjina’s head can mean lots of things – clouds, rain, lightning. The Wandjinas, he said, painted their own images on the cave walls before they returned to the spirit world.’
In addition to being the sole holder of many sacred laws, one of Sam’s most important responsibilities (and one that now belongs to his son, Donny) was the upkeep and repainting of hundreds of Wandjina cave images along the Kimberley coast. This ensures that the Wandjinas’ power remains strong.
Almost 20 years ago, David Mowaljarlai told local Derby District High School art teacher Mark Norval that the elders were very worried about the young people forgetting about the Wandjinas and their true homelands. “They should build a big place out of rocks, like a cave, at Mowanjum and we should do paintings all over those rocks to teach all the kids about our culture,” he said.
Today, through the efforts of the Mowanjum elders and artists and many dedicated local people and businesses, the Wandjina culture is not being lost. Rather, as the artists continue to paint and the Mowanjum children begin to rediscover their own beliefs and heritage, the culture is evolving.

Thanks to the generosity of the Mowanjum people, the world now has the opportunity to learn about one of the oldest and most powerful images in Aboriginal art and the stories that have been passed on for more than 100 centuries.

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The Stone Spheres of Costa Rica

The stone spheres of Costa Rica are a collection of some three hundred polished stone orbs, the first of which were discovered in the Diquis Delta of Costa Rica during the 1930s. The spheres range in size from a few centimeters to over two meters in diameter, and weigh up to 16 tons. Most are sculpted from granodiorite, an igneous rock similar to granite. Their precise date of construction is uncertain, but they are believed to have been carved between 200 BC and 1600 CE. They have been uncovered in a number of locations, including the Isla del Cano.

  • History
The story of the spheres’ discovery began in the early 1930s as the United Fruit Company was searching new grounds for banana plantations. A disease threatened the health of their crop on the Caribbean side of the isthmus. Searching the Pacific side, they found promising land within the Diquis Valley, not far from the coast where exports could be undertaken. They moved their headquarters from Limón to Golfito.
When the United Fruit Company arrived, the town of Golfito was a simple fishing village on the eastern periphery of the Golfo Dulce. However, it was soon connected by rail line to the larger town of Palmar Sur, some eighty kilometers away.
The stone spheres came to light during early cultivation of the farmland. Most were discovered by workmen as they cleared and burned the jungle in preparation for planting. Recognizing the stones as man-made, the workmen pushed them aside with bulldozers and heavy equipment. At some point thereafter, they returned to the stone balls, and, inspired by stories of hidden gold, began to drill holes into them.
Within the drilled holes they inserted sticks of dynamite, which they would use to remove stubborn roots and stumps. Unfortunately, several of the spheres were destroyed before authorities intervened. Some of the dynamited spheres have been reassembled and are currently on display at the National Museum in San José.
The first scientific investigation of the spheres was undertaken shortly after their discovery by Doris Stone, a daughter of a United Fruit Co. executive. These were published in 1943 in American Antiquity, attracting the attention of Dr. Samuel Lothrop of the Peabody Museum, Harvard University. In 1948, he and his wife attempted to excavate an unrelated archaological site in the northern region of Costa Rica. The government of the time had disbanded its professional army, and the resulting civil unrest threatened the security of Lothrop’s team. In San José he met Doris Stone, who directed the group toward the Diquís Delta region in the South-West and provided them with valuable dig sites and personal contacts. Lothrop’s findings were published in Archaeology of the Diquís Delta, Costa Rica 1963.

  • Myths
Numerous myths surround the stones, such as they came from Atlantis, or that they were made as such by nature. Some local legends state that the native inhabitants had access to a potion able to soften the rock. Another calls for the center of the spheres to contain a single coffee bean.
It is wrongly believed that the spheres are perfect. However they do have a surprisingly smooth surface. According to laser measurements by researchers from the University of Pennsylvania, the spheres were 96% perfect.
The stone spheres have been found in clusters of up to twenty, and often in geometric patterns such as triangles, rectangles or straight lines. Such alignments often point to the earth¹s magnetic north. A large number of the spheres have been located in the Diquis River Delta, with other popular sites being the southern cities of Palmar, Sur, Buenos Aires and Golfito as well as in the province of Guanacaste to the north and in the central valley. Archaeologists have been able to date the stones by the artefacts that have been found lying alongside them. Some of them have, thus, been dated as far back as 400 B.C.E.
The majority of them have, however, been dated between 800 and 1200 B.C.E. Many of these stones have been found near the remains of dwellings and in close proximity to grave sites. Some believed that the stones contained some hidden treasures and a few of them have been smashed to try to get at this supposed treasure. None has been forthcoming, however. Despite these losses, however, the National museum of Costa Rica has catalogued some one hundred and thirty existing stone spheres. However, many of them are not catalogued. This is because of the fact that many of the spheres have been removed from their original sites and used as ornaments in private homes, gardens and churches. Clearly, there are also many stones that still lie undiscovered.
Just how the ancient people of Costa Rica made these perfectly cylindrical stone spheres, remains largely a mystery. It is clear that some sort of mechanical procedure was needed in order to attain the precision displayed by the stones. Statues emanating from the same period show that the ancient Costa Ricans were very skilled sculptors. The existence of gold artefacts from about 800 C.E. also show that the people living at that time were experienced at working with high temperatures. It is, therefore, believed by some researchers that the stones were moulded into their perfectly cylindrical shapes by extreme heating followed by cooling, to remove any outer layers of rock. The rocks could have been finished by polishing with sand or leather.
The larger stones were clearly crafted by the most skilled sculptors. These stones are so perfectly shaped that the tape and plumb bob measurements of diameters reveal no imperfections. This shows that the makers of the stones must have had a degree of mathematical ability as well as advanced knowledge of stone carving and the use of tools. The ancient Costa Ricans, however, had no written language. There is, therefore, no written record of just how they made the stones spheres.
Many of the spheres are made of granite like rock. Yet the granite rock quarries were often twenty five to thirty miles away from the location of the largest stone spheres. How, then, did the sculptors move such heavy stones? Some of the stones, after all weigh sixteen tons. If the granites rocks were moved before they were sculpted, then the nine foot cube that would be needed to sculpt a sphere eight feet in diameter would weigh a whopping twenty four tons. To even get such a massive stone to it¹s final location the natives would have to cut large tracks through very dense bush.
Other stones were made of coquina, a limestone like material which is found on the beaches near the mouth of the Diquis river. This stone was probably rafted up river about thirty miles to it¹s final location. Some of these stone spheres have been found on Cano Island, which is located about twelve miles off the Pacific coast. As to why the stone spheres were made, there are, as yet, no explanations. It is possible that they were used as a symbol of rank or importance for a tribal chief or a village. Then again, they may have been used as religious or ceremonial symbols. Perhaps further study by archaeologists will unravel the secrets of the stone spheres of Costa Rica.