August 10, 2018 • 56 mins
On September 16, 1994, teachers and school officials at the Ariel School in Ruwa, Zimbabwe were amazed when the school's students reported that a flying object had landed on the school grounds. What makes this sighting unique? What differentiates it from other UFO reports? Join the guys as they interview Randall Nickerson about his investigation of the sighting, and his upcoming documentary on the Ariel School UFO encounter.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn the stuff they don't want you to know. M
(00:24):
Welcome back to the show. My name is Matt noel
Is on Adventures. They called me Ben. We are joining
with our super producer Paul Decant. Most importantly, you are you,
and you are here, and that makes this stuff they
don't want you to know. Matt. At the top of
the show, here we are, I have to say thank
(00:46):
you for bringing this episode to Fruition because you and
I have talked in previous previous shows about UFO sightings. Right,
oh yeah, one of the most fascinating things that I
think can occur in this world. And over the years
(01:07):
we've covered various aspects of it, and we've often found,
um we we've often found people who will attempt to
explain a genre of sighting, like a type of sighting,
or will attempt to explain a single incident. But what's
fascinating and startling to both of us, I believe is
(01:30):
that even in the modern day, there are so many
huge sightings that have been sort of lost to history.
You may have you may be listening now, and you
may think I vaguely recall hearing something about something like
a specific incident, but too often we lose the details,
(01:51):
and too often we as a civilization forget to investigate
the actual nuts and bolts, specifics, the timelines, what happened
to win. Yeah. Absolutely, And and the most fascinating genre
within the UFO sighting of that type, for me at least,
(02:13):
is the mass sighting where it's not just you know,
a small group of people like a family or something
that saw something something like the Phoenix Lights, where there's
almost an entire town that has this sighting at one time,
or something like what we're going to discuss today. And
we have someone very special on the show today who
(02:34):
is currently directing and producing an entire film, a documentary
about one particular UFO sighting and encounter. His name is
Randall Nickerson. Welcome to the show, sir. Thanks guys, I
appreciate being here. Well, thank you for being on the
show with us. Come on currently. Currently, as as we speak,
(02:57):
there are questions that remain about a specific mass sighting
of an unidentified flying object in in Zimbabwe at a
place called the Aerial School. Could you tell us and
the listeners just a just a little bit about the
gist of this what people usually mean when they referred
(03:20):
to this phenomenon. It was an event that took place
in at the aerial school in a in a rural
area of Zimbabwe in Africa, UH where a schoolyard of
children UH had seen miss craft of some kind silver
(03:41):
that had come down and UM sat down in the
back of the schoolyard about a d two hundred yards
back and they saw these creatures in black that got
that came out of this object and had some of
(04:04):
them many of them had eye contact with it and
one of them, at least one had approached the the playground.
There are other witnesses also adults that were had witnessed
either the object itself in the sky. There was a
lot of anomalies at the time also, but the main
(04:25):
incident seemed to be this school UM in Zimbabwe. So
these are students that were outside and they experienced something.
How old are these kids that saw this thing and
roughly how many of them were there? Well, there were UM.
(04:45):
It was a school had a children between the ages
of six and thirteen. UH. The the number of children
that drew drawings had the headman Sir of the school
had after the incident happened and there are the children
are all shook up. Uh. And initially the children were
(05:09):
not believed by the teachers, teachers or the headmaster. But
after that they have gone home to their parents and
shared the story with their parents with their appropriate emotional
impact and all that. Um. The headmaster had had them
come come back and draw what they saw. So there
(05:30):
were sixty drawings made, but through the research and meeting
a lot of these people, um, there were quite a
few more than that. So that's that's a fascinating point then,
because it sounds like the sixty plus children were talking
about and the drawings these all are only the witnesses
(05:52):
and the depictions of which we're currently aware. Um. There
there's one interesting thing we found here, which is that
in the aftermath of the sighting, the children were interviewed
by the BBC Bureau chief for Zimbabwe. Is that correct?
That's correct. Yeah, he was the first one to interview
(06:14):
the children. He was the first uh UM person with
a camera. Um. And he happened to be with a
you know what was the BBC uh to um to
show up at the school and actually start asking questions,
what what did m would that initial reporting? You know
a lot of times when UFO sightings make the news,
(06:38):
it's almost in a joking way, or there's a there's
a bit of um it's it's not looked at with
really any type of seriousness, even in UM perhaps especially
in how was it treated when it initially hit the news. Uh,
it was treated similarly that it wasn't taken seriously. Uh
(07:01):
in the beginning. I think the BBC reporter didn't take
it seriously. He was trying to you know, when he
was interviewing the children's like, sir, it wasn't a helicopter.
He's sure it wasn't, you know, normal standard things. Um.
So Yeah, there was a lot of skepticism, um by everybody,
the teachers, the parents, um, for the whole event. Um.
(07:26):
So it was difficult for the for the witnesses, which
often I think after meeting a lot of other witnesses
from other incidents around the world that involved you know,
uh UFOs or um unidentified aerial phenomena, you know they're
(07:47):
it's they're not It's hard for people to to find
a place where they can actually share their experience Yeah.
And one thing that's fascinating about the timeline here with
this sighting in particular, is while while many mass media
outlets so often, as you and Matt pointed out, so
(08:09):
often treat these reports with anywhere from skepticism to a
dismissive tone. Uh, this story did not did not disappear.
In fact, Harvard psychiatrist Dr John mack became involved. Correct,
That's true. Yes, he came. He was called by the
(08:30):
BBC reporter to UM because the BBC reporter was felt
like he was out of his way, out of his
territory and needed UM more professional guidance. UM. Dr John
Mackie's a Harvard psychiatrist, he had won the Pulitzer Prize.
He had UM spent twenty years as a child psychiatrist
(08:52):
psychoanalyst and so had a lot of experience with children. UM,
and he was he went traveled to Mbabwe to UM
to investigate this this incident, and I was very interested in,
you know, seeing seeing what it's legitimacy was, if it
(09:12):
if it was legitimate, and what that meant, you know. UM.
He was looking into at that time UFO, UM reports
and witnesses and he at that point was starting to
look globally, you know, not just about incidents in the
United States, but incidents in South America, Africa, UH, European
(09:38):
countries to see how widespread the phenomenon was because Dr
mac had started to take it seriously after he had
met UM some what UH to think about ten witnesses
that he UM was introduced to in his he. When
Dr mac first approached this, he thought that this was
(09:59):
some kind of psychiatric phenomena, some kind of the psychiatric
that it was coming from the person, not an external
actual reality. But when he started to meet people that
UH and he that he put through psychological psychological screening tests, UM,
he found that they were telling the story that was
(10:23):
had all the ear marks of real experience. I think, UM,
you know this, this whole phenomena is I think generally
the public is not highly educated about you know, things
that are normal, you know, astronomical events, UM. And the
(10:49):
reason I'm bringing that up is because there are a
lot of reports that are just you know, everyday objects
that astronomers know or other people are aware of, you
know that that specialized in those fields, UM, But there's
a lot that we don't know. There's been many studies
about the unidentified aerial phenomena UH that show like, you know,
(11:16):
out of all the reports, probably five are legitimate mysteries
because largely the general public is not educated in a
way UM to know, UM, you know what what what
occurs normally in the sky. Astronomers know, people that spend
(11:36):
a lot of time out at you know, in in
in the environments at night, or educated in that department,
UM to know and if it's venus rising on the
horizon or are setting on the horizon and or some
other objects fireballs or space to breathe. There's there's so
many different things that can be misidentified UM and be
(11:58):
be a shock to somebody who's never seen them or
isn't aware of of of you know, the I S
s the space station when it crosses over, it's pretty
amazing site. So I just wanted to bring that up
because I think it's important that you know that there
(12:19):
are reports that you know, a lot of them that
are just can be relegated to um things that are
just normal, you know, things that just happened. But then
there's that five percent, which is what interests anybody looking
into this, that are truly legitimate, you know, I'm really
(12:42):
glad you you talked about that because a lot of
a lot of writing I've seen online about this just commenting.
You know, anyone who has an Internet connection can comment
now on anything, and some of the more derisive comments
I've seen about this particular event are about, Hey, these
are kids. These are kids who saw something. They were
(13:04):
probably making stuff up. Maybe they just saw something and
they're all, you know, it was a helicopter or something,
and they decided to make a game out of it. Um.
In particular, these children are, these are well spoken kids.
You you got your hands on the documentary, all of
the footage, basically the news footage, and you're using it
(13:26):
to craft your documentary. Can you talk to us a
little bit about just what these kids sound like? Why
what it's you know, they sound credible just to me
sitting here watching a trailer for the aerial phenomena. But
talk to me about being immersed in that just for
as long as you have been. What are these kids like? Uh,
They're they're highly intelligent, all of them. It's in the
(13:49):
school itself is a christ is a Christman school still, um,
And you know, they they're very highly educated children and
partly due to the teaching staff and how much love
and care they give their students. UM. Being immersed in
(14:10):
it and meeting these children as adults has been UM, yeah,
it's been a really beautiful experience just on a personal level,
like getting meeting meeting just another person, but they have
actually happened to have a story that I'm interested in
(14:30):
and seeing I guess part of it. Uh, you know,
people say, well, why you know, yeah, these kids may
have made something up or I just find that really
difficult to believe because I have are all the archival
of you know, they've been interviewed half a dozen times
by you know, several of these different news outlets and reporters,
(14:52):
you know when it happened, immediately after it happened, and
the consistency in those reports, it's just riveting. It's just
it's fascinating just on that level of the consistency that
children that young can tell the same story from their
own perspectives that you know, corroborates every other one and
(15:18):
they're not like getting together. I've never I haven't seen
that we're getting together and you know, coming up with
something or you know that doesn't seem to be that way,
and as adults, they're still they still think of that
day out of any day in their life, what happened
on that day. It's it's it's fresh to them. UM.
(15:41):
So I went through my own struggle of like, well,
did this happen or did this not happen? What? What
are the other possible explanations for this? And um, But
I've over time become pretty convinced that something really occurred there.
Um that these and it comes through small details, small
(16:02):
details that even as some of the adults remember that
they don't even know about the archival that I have,
but they'll mention something, you know, as a as adults
now that they don't even know about that I have
in the archival from some other child who mentions that detail.
(16:26):
It's it's just it's that kind of thing where there's
a there's a lot of uh, corroborating evidence. I guess
you could say that's what that's that speaks to the validity,
that's that this occurred, and it's not. It wasn't like
a normal event, you know, it wasn't like a typical
(16:47):
UFO thing that they could have read out of a book.
It was very very different than the standard you know,
or I don't know if there's a standard encounter, but
you know what, what others have run into was very
unique UM encounter with whatever this UH intelligence is. And
this is a tremendous point that you have hit upon,
(17:10):
and it's one of the first questions that a lot
of people who consider themselves more on the skeptical end
of the spectrum will have. The idea of children reporting
stories leads into the concept of kids without meaning to
be misleading, manufacturing memories, or getting details wrong, and so
(17:35):
it's tremendously important to emphasize that in this case, the
children's details. I love how you point out that the
details are one of the things that really UM really
set you on on a path of discovery here, because
(17:55):
we can always as human beings, misrem are things or
get things wrong. But if multiple people are having the
same accounts, and if they have come to these accounts
through their own experiences, you know they are not, as
you said, getting together off camera or something and and
(18:16):
making sure their stories match. If they are all reporting
from their own perspective a similar or identical event, then
it builds a much stronger case. And in an additional
thing that I know all of us out in the
audience are wondering is something that came about as we
(18:36):
were exploring the communication with the children or should we
say the former children who were involved, because they are
now as you said, they were adults right in their
twenties or thirties, and and now that there's this time
that has passed, I feel like there's there's part of
the story we also need to explore here, which is
(18:58):
your part? Randall? How did how did you become involved
in this UH investigation? How did you become the documentarian
who is exploring this event and bringing it to the world. Well,
I started UM actually September eleven. That was down in
(19:20):
New York City, two blocks away from the World Trade
Center when when the building came building to came down,
and that was kind of my inspiration to UM get
into film and tell stories, you know, share real stories,
because that was a very real event for me and
(19:41):
and like everybody, struck everybody in a way that probably
made most people to make changes in their lives. UM
and I started making short films and one was on
the the value of silence and listening in in the world, community,
(20:01):
personal relationships, therapy, therapeutic relationships. UM and I had showed
it to a friend of Dr John Max, and she
had asked me if I was interested in making a
film about this Zimbabwe case, UM, and I I said sure,
(20:24):
And I was very fascinated with just seeing the children
being interviewed. I'm like, my first impression, I think everybody
sees that is that they're telling the truth, what what
they saw or whatever. I didn't know at the time,
like exactly what that truth was, but they were telling
the truth. They felt honest and truthful, and you know,
(20:45):
it was originally supposed to make a thirty minute DVD
for the John mac Institute. And I just I felt like, uh,
that John Max material was very good, but I felt
like there was there had to be more to the story.
I wanted to know more. I wanted to know more
(21:06):
about well, were there other sources that I can compare
his interviews to, you know, to see where he was
coming from, where the kids were the story was consistent.
So I found the school back in two thousand and eight,
and uh, as soon as I found it, and that
(21:27):
came to a reporter in South Africa, I um immediately
went there and discovered a whole bunch of different things
that that the BBC was there, and then there was
a big hunt to find that reporter and to um
get his archival footage and uh of of and and
(21:49):
I continued to do this for years, to um find
all the archival because that that, to me was important.
If I could compare Dr Max footage with with all
the other people that had interviewed these children, that would
convince myself, you know, more so and be more of
a convincing story if the consistency was there, which it was,
(22:12):
And so that's um that's kind of led me to
thinking of it like this is such an important story,
not only um about the fact that this happens alone,
that that some school in rural Africa had this full encounter,
(22:33):
but the story of this Harvard psychiatrist going over there
and then the the repercussions he got for for dealing
with the phenomena at all. So that it's a very
which you know, at some point I reached, I reached
the point like this is this is a feature documentary.
There's just you can't tell this in a short form
(22:56):
or in a small way. This is a really big story.
And um, you know, I would say, and other people
have said it before I know is just you know,
these incidents happening all over the globe. Every single country
has reports, and uh, it's just one of those reports,
(23:18):
is true. It changes everything. And there's been tens and
thousands of reports going back, you know, to the sixties,
even before that, fifties and sixties. UM. So I think
that's part of the drive that I've had. It's like, well, this,
this is a very important story as a whole, uh,
(23:39):
for us, you know, as a as a species on
this planet. To understand that, or to to start looking at, well,
maybe there's something to all this stuff, you know that
that and if and if there is, we really should
be paying attention to that because that means that there's
(24:01):
a higher order species, something with a higher level of
technology than us, that is interacting with us. And then
the real concern for me is, well, that means that
something else could potentially decide our fate. That concerns me,
you know, And that's why I feel like we should
(24:24):
know as much as possible. UM. And I hope this
subject begin begins to be taken seriously, um, because it's important.
It's not just important. It's not the wow wow ufo,
who you know, aliens who can. I don't even care
about that. I care about the fact that there is
an intelligent species that's more involved than us potentially, Uh,
(24:50):
that that could have a huge effect on our direction
as a as are as us as human beings. And
we're going to pause here just for a moment. We'll
be back after a word from our response. What it
brought to my mind is a clip from one of
(25:10):
the little girls who was being interviewed, I believe by
John mac and she said something to the effect of
the being communicated a message to her. And I think
it was John that was trying to get her to
talk more about how the being communicated to her, and
she ended up saying something that there was a message,
(25:31):
a very specific message. Do you remember what that was? Yeah? Yes.
Several of the children UM reported when they were in
close contact with this one being or there was another
one that reported to UM. But during that there was
an intense connection between the kids at the playground and
(25:53):
the being that approached them. And during that moment, and
all the kids say it was like times just stopped.
But several of the kids got this uh sort of
I don't know how it was. They didn't know how
to explain how it was communicated. But you know, in
(26:14):
in you and I would know that as telepathy, you know,
something that was transferred mind to mind. And the message
was about our own environment. And several not not not
the majority of the witnesses, but several of them, um,
at least a half a dozen, maybe more, because a
(26:34):
lot of them in the present day and are are
not they feel a little uh nervous to share that, um.
But the message was about what we're what we were
doing to our planet, or what what what our direction
was with our own environment. UM. I don't know. I've
(26:58):
wonder about, wonder about that little bit. I wonder, well,
if somebody sees something traumatic, you tend to think about,
you know, particularly something from out of this world, that
may be a response to to a try. I mean,
you may think about your own place more. I'm just
thinking of alternative reasons why that would come out, or
(27:21):
it really happened, you know, or it was really communicated
to these kids. And then the question is why. In
the footage Randallly, he's you know, I think it's Dr
Mac and he's saying, you know, repeatedly saying, well, did
you think about this before is this a thought you've
had before? Why? Why did you think about this? And
he he would allow for more questions in between, then
he would ask her again, is this something you were
(27:42):
thinking about or that you know you've been taught or told?
And just repeatedly she'd like, no, No, I didn't think
about until I got home and afterwards. Yeah, And uh,
one thing I'd like to go back to is we're
talking about the kids accounts. Is something that I know
has piqued the interest of a lot of our listeners here,
(28:04):
and that is that the event as described by again
these more than sixties school children, has aspects that do
not match the you know, the stereotypical UFO encounter story
that we have heard. Right, you said there were some
unique things that occurred and that the kids pretty much
(28:27):
universally agreed on some of these things. Um, we've also
heard some reports that there were some small differences in
children's accounts. But but what what set this apart in
your mind? From uh, the typical again I hesitate to
use the phrase typical, but the the super familiar, stereotypical
(28:48):
UFO encounter story, like what really stood out? I think
what really stood out? Well? Number one was the fact
that they showed up at a playground at a at
a emary school. It's one big one and sort of
from all the reports were it seemed to be to
have approached the playground and observed the children. There was
(29:12):
no action taken, There was no you know, um, nobody
was taken or anything there there. You know, it was
it was almost like an observation. UM. That that that
I find really interesting. The other thing that's unique is
that they were all wearing black, like a black skin
(29:32):
tight suit, these creatures. And there's only I think three
times in in the history of of this phenomena that
that's been reported, so that was unique. Um. The message
part is nuts. I mean, some of the research I've
(29:54):
done with other cases that's not terribly on common that, um,
people that have had encounters with these things get some
kind of message about our own environment in our own
direction as a species. So I think, yeah, I mean,
those are the two big things that stand out for
me are are are how it where it took place,
(30:18):
how it took place, and what they were particularly wearing
made it unique. And and of course the message transmission
and all that. Um. Also, Oh and we we should
point out most importantly, not only was this at a
on a playground, but this was also and this will
(30:39):
seem unusual too many people. This was during the day,
during the school day, I believe was their mid morning
break at ten am or something. Yeah, thank you for
reminding me that. That's what also makes it unique. Very good.
Um it's uh, yeah, it happened at uh the ten
thirty break in the morning on Friday. And yeah, that
(31:03):
that also is unique. So I want to bring something
up here, and um, it's a it's a point of
contention that I've seen online. I just want to talk
about it. Um. Let's let's let's just go there, okay. Um.
I have heard some people suggest that perhaps this was
an elaborate prank by some of the teachers because of
(31:23):
a few things. Uh, most of the teachers were in
a meeting at the time, or at least uh they
I think they were having a teachers meeting of some sort.
There was one teacher perhaps outside that was manning basically
of snack stand kind of thing. That's correct. And then
(31:45):
it's been positive before that perhaps the teachers were having
fun with the kids and trying to do something in
that way. And it's been done before, it's been done afterwards,
where teachers have faked and invasion for the kids and
then they reveal it later. Um, really, this is just
in your mind. Is there any possibility that something to
(32:07):
that effect occurred that day? Um, of, well, I've seen
those reports of teachers so doing this sort of fake
UFO thing. That's that started happening I think into in
the two thousands, eight, two nine sort of. But the
kids were aware of it. I mean, it wasn't something
(32:28):
they you know, let's show the teachers pranked them on.
But I don't find any I mean, I've interviewed, I've
talked to all the teachers, and that they were shocked themselves.
They didn't know how to deal with it. So I
there's no validity to that that. There is none. I
mean I've interviewed all the teachers. I have all the
teachers interviewed in at the time. Uh, there's just no
(32:53):
way I can even see that as a possibility. It's
just not there because it because mainly because the teachers
were shocked. I mean they were they didn't believe the kids.
They you know, not not all of them, but many
of the kids. Teachers initially did not believe that the
kids until the kid's parents started showing up and saying, look,
(33:14):
something happened to my kids. What happened, you know? And
then it then it got you know, taken more seriously
by the staff and the headmaster and and they were
they became really convinced that something had occurred. You know,
It's it's a tough subject. I mean, they were all
(33:35):
of a sudden, they're all the teachers were were put
in a position of Okay, these children are reporting this,
but we don't believe this, and you know it goes
to um so I don't. I don't find any validity
to that argument at all. I found nothing there. And
I've looked at that, I've looked at hoaxes, you know,
(33:56):
and you have to I gotta say, I don't think
enough will do this in the UFO field or the
unidentified Arrow Phenana field. Uh. You know, you gotta look
at everything. You know, you can't take a report as
just the way it is, you know, like I looked
at everything, like what was going on with the teachers,
(34:17):
what was going on in the country with their military,
with you know, what was going on in space at
the time. You gotta and what were, what where was
the sun rising that day? What was the you know
at night, what was the where it was venus? I
mean you all these questions you need to ask to
do a thorough to get a thorough take on something too, um.
(34:40):
And I think it's really important. I don't think enough
people do that. Um. And the other thing, you know,
like with the teachers, this these children coming to the teachers.
The teachers had a certain worldview and this is a
lot of things John Mac talks about and other is
like that. And this is what really this whole phenomena
(35:05):
is about really, um. Is that you know is our
world view? You know that these things aren't supposed to exist. Um,
So we just they're not they they're not real, They're
not they don't exist. So the most of the teachers
were in that world views and they were approached by
(35:27):
the children and being challenged in a in a big
way from them by saying, no, this is what we saw. Um.
But the world view, like for all of us is
you know, we most of us have this world view
that that you know, there's nothing more than intelligent than us.
(35:49):
And we like to keep that worldview because it makes
us feel good, makes us continue to want to do things.
Uh uh, But there's different world is Like in Africa,
people in the native populations, um, that's that's not they
don't have the same worldview. They are open to um
(36:11):
understanding that yeah, we're we'rethy you know, dominant species here
um or we think we are. And but there are
other other species out in this vast ocean that we
look at at night with stars. So I just think
that the world, our world views is what's being challenged
(36:34):
with this whole phenomena, Like it's something we really don't
want to look at because it challenges our our our
ego really well, you know you. This just brings up
so much that I've been reading recently because of this
interview about Dr John iMac, And honestly, I didn't know
a whole lot about this gentleman um And we've discussed
(36:56):
before that he has a PhD from Harvard School of
Medicine and he's a psychologist psychoanalyst. He is also a
self described parapsychologist and has done some fascinating work in
that field. And for someone with such accolades and such
(37:16):
an education and and just a brilliant person to immerse
himself in that field that is so socially I would
say maligned, maybe socially unaccepted, controversial at least yes correct. UM.
For to have someone like this UM look into this
whole phenomena, this this one event, and then to have
(37:40):
UM that group seek you out to produce a documentary
on this subject, it's just it lends such credibility to it. UM.
I don't know. I think that's one of the main
reasons why I personally am so excited about this documentary UM,
not just the resources, but because there is this UM,
(38:00):
this man who then kind of became an institution. Can
you tell us a little bit about how you You
mentioned something about repercussions with John iMac for his beliefs
and kind of what we've been talking about here. What
what happened? What were those repercussions? I mean John mac
was he was brilliant and I think, uh, you know
(38:23):
you one had one of the Pulitzer Prize uh and
I believe it was nine. Uh. He was brilliant as
a psychiatrist, psychoanalyst, and I think what happened this is
my take that he got bored with, you know, the
standard model of looking at a person in a therapeutic environment. UM,
(38:47):
and got very interested in anomalous experiences that people didn't
you know, extraordinary experiences that were difficult to believe. UM.
And I think he was looking at different models of
of UM psychotherapy to explore the unconscious, the unconscious UM
(39:14):
and UM and then he had dealt with people who
had near death experiences and UM witnesses to UFOs or aliens,
and and being such a high level person and he
started the Cambridge Hospital. He was you know, uh a
(39:36):
psychiatrist on at the Harvard Medical School, UM, a professor
and UM. He started to get flak from the university
for his looking into these these cases and the repercussions.
They really went after him. They were threatening to take
(39:58):
away his tenure and basically we fire him, which is
never in the history of Harvard University been done. There's
never been a person threatened like that in the whole
entire history of Harvard, and that goes back to the sis.
So it was really that was very unique. And they uh,
(40:20):
you know, it was a whole uh not a trial,
but essentially one behind closed doors. And you know, their
concern was that he was you know, that these patients
actually had psychological illnesses, yet they displayed none of them.
But that was their angle, that the concern for patients,
(40:43):
and which is understandably I could totally understand their angle. Um,
But honestly, my take on it now as I felt
like they were really trying to tarnish his reputation and
intimidate him. And you know, I he had lot you
know through this whole Harvard inquisition, which was had many
(41:06):
people involved, including Alan Dersuwitz, and you know it's just
a cast of of some famous people. And you know
that he had lost his circle of friends at Harvard.
Nobody wanted to be around him, you know, during this time. Um.
And so I think the Harvard he really achieved a
(41:28):
goal in sort of just you know, hurting his credibility. Um.
So it's quite a hero's journey in a way. I
mean it was the man, a man who was had
a conviction that these people are are telling the truth.
You know, different people that are reported, including these children
(41:51):
in Africa, they're telling the truth. And um, what does
that mean? Asking the question of what does that mean?
If this is the truth and this is not thing psychological,
what does that mean for us as a as a species.
And we're gonna take a quick break. We're just gonna pause.
We'll be right back. Regardless of how someone encounters this
(42:18):
story or what what they personally believe, right, the the
crux of the issue is the following. There are things
that have yet to be explained about this event, which
was not that long ago. I mean, maybe we're dating
(42:38):
ourselves a little bit here, but is that you know,
it's it's the past, but it's relatively recent and there's
still things that that we can find out through rigorous investigation,
through on the ground interviews, through the work that you
are doing. But all of it leads us to again
(42:58):
the question you just pause, did, which is what does
this mean? What does this mean for the future? What
what will humanity overall discover from this event? And you know,
we haven't even we haven't touched on the the other
events across the world that you have mentioned, um, that
(43:20):
you alluded to that have some of the same threads
running through them. Right, So this is a question that
we at least I don't know if you've got something
up your sleeve, met, but this is a question that
we don't have the answer to yet, at least at
least us there's some stuff in here, but I don't
(43:41):
think it's answers to that question though. Ah well, what
we would like to do is, um, I guess our
our next question for the show here then, is to
ask if you could tell us a little more about
the state of the documentary as it stands now, what
our listeners can do to help UH, and where they
(44:04):
can learn more about the piece. Sure, can I say
one thing first? Absolutely? Yes. So during this UH filming
and interviewing, I mean, I've traveled to Africa three times
and all over Europe finding all these witnesses in the
United States, Canada. Um, you know, I've been approached by
(44:26):
several people, you know, dozens and dozens of people that
have heard I'm doing a movie about UFOs and they
come and they share their experience with me, and you
know not and and these are people. This is what
always strikes me. There are people that have I mean,
they come to me and they say, don't tell anybody,
because I haven't told anybody, or they've only told their
(44:47):
immediate family, and they share these stories that nobody knows about.
They're just they keep it to themselves. They're afraid of ridicule,
They're afraid of you know, UH, they're afraid of a
lot of things to uh, to be to to for
somehow to go public, fraid of losing their friends, all
(45:10):
kinds of fears. Um. Yet their stories are you know,
they sounded and their feelings expressed. Something really happened. UM.
I just find that heartbreaking in a way that we
there's this whole culture out there that is not being heard,
(45:30):
that you don't see at UFO conferences, that you don't
see anywhere. They've just had these experiences and they're keeping
it to themselves and that and if if it's just
considering the number that I've run into and just doing
the math of how many people there has to be
like that, uh is just it's a lot of It's
(45:51):
a lot of people that uh could be helping us
solve this mystery. UM. And there just doesn't seem to
be enough of a drive from us or our media
or our culture to really want to find out what's
going on here. Because I think it's pretty important that
we that we do try to understand it and try
(46:14):
to um uh find out more. Because as far as
I want to personally, I want to know what's going on.
I want to know what situations humanities in, Like, I
want to know that if there's something out there, I
really want to know about it. I want to know
how it can impact me. I want to know what
I should be afraid of or need to be afraid of.
(46:36):
I don't know, I just I or not um, but
I would like as much information as possible. I I
know about all the wildlife that lived in the forest
that I'm in, and I'm very curious, you know, to
find out a lot about them. If there's something else
out there, it's it's another form of wildlife. It just
(46:58):
happens to be smarter than us. I want to know
as much as possible, particularly because it's smarter than me.
So I don't know, I just it just strikes me that,
you know, I'll be glad when the day comes, and
it will come when universities have programs that are really
doing intense research about this, you know, and eliminating the
(47:18):
Charlatans and whatever the b s stories that are out
there and getting to the real stories and piecing this
puzzled together because we need to know agreed, Okay, Ranald,
So tell us tell us how we can learn more
about the aerial phenomenon documentary. Where can we learn about it?
(47:38):
Where can we watch a trailer for it? When do
you think it's coming out? Just tell us everything. Okay,
So the film we're at a rough cut right now,
working toward a final. Uh. It's it's fantastic and mean,
I can't say enough, and it's my I wouldn't usually
do that. Uh, I'm just really excited because it's it
took it's taken a long time, but I've done it right.
(48:01):
I've gotten some of the best people to work on
and I've got an editor that worked with Michael Moore
did Fahrenheit, and Leven did Sicko and has done other
brilliant films. So I've gotten really great people to work
on it. And um, we're working toward a final. Um.
You can check it out at aerial phenomenon dot com.
(48:23):
We have a trailer there, and we have a trailer
where Dan Ackroyd um plugs the film and he's very
aware of this case and he was just wonderful supporting
the just trying to get this the word about this
film out there. But you can see quite quite a
bit of information on the site. We're still taking donations
(48:45):
because it's been you know, it's been a project from
the heart kind of thing, and we um, it's been
up and down. You know. We get funding and then
the funding stops, and then I go back to work
to pay for more filmmaking, more editing. It's uh, it's
been hard to uh, you know, when you don't have
(49:06):
the funding right there and you have to play all
these roles to uh to keep it moving. And sometimes
it's the production stops and then get we move ahead again,
and then it stops again. Because anyway, it's been a
challenge for sure. But so yeah, we're we're looking at
um for being at a final within three months. So
(49:29):
it's coming. It's coming soon. And I think the reaction
because the other thing, this is not really a film
about UFOs in in a sense. I mean, it is
a film about this incident, but it's it's a lot
also about what happens to people, you know, what people
(49:49):
go through when they have reported something like this and
and um, how it sticks with them. And that's it's
kind of a lot of different things. But it's not
a traditional by any sense UFO film at all. It's
a it's very mainstream as far as a story and
(50:10):
there's really a lot about the people, you know, not
so much about the aliens or the woo woo stuff
about UFOs. And I kind of think that's where the
conversation needs to go, is in us getting out out
sort of out of the woo woo flash like aliens,
aliens alien stage two. Okay, well, you know what are
(50:31):
we looking at? Here? Is it? What is it? You know,
if as alien or some other creature from another planet,
it's another animal basically, you know what I mean. Um,
So I think it would be I really would like
to work toward, um changing the conversation to uh so
(50:52):
we can get to it, so we can really get
to the heart of heart of this matter issue and
learn from it, find out what it is. And um,
you know, the recent things that have happened that came
out in the New York Times, uh with the military
was absolutely fascinating. I don't know if you guys aware
(51:12):
of that. Yeah, we just did a couple of interviews
about that. Yeah, the Pentagon Advanced Aviation Threat Identification Program,
I believe Laslando. Yeah, that was a that was a
massive surprise too. I think everybody who even who even
(51:33):
casually follows this sort of news. What an about face.
You know, it's a dude named Jeremy Corbelle that we
talked to recently about that. Oh I just met him. Yeah. Fascinating, great,
fascinating guy. Um. Okay, look, Randall, I, like many people
listening right now, am very excited to watch the Aeral phenomena.
I know Ben is too. In his eyes. We'll go
(51:55):
ahead and also post the trailer that you can find
when you're done with this podcast. You can check it
out on our Instagram or Facebook and our Twitter. We'll
put that out there now. By the way, we are
conspiracy stuff at Twitter and Facebook and conspiracy stuff show
on Instagram. If you're out there and you want to,
you know, discuss this project further. Um, and again, go
(52:16):
to Aerial that's a r I E. L phenomenon dot com. Yeah,
and there you can find more information about the documentary.
You can watch the trailer, you can see some of
the news. You can also uh contact the project directly
with questions. And you know, one thing that one thing
(52:39):
that I think everyone listening should absolutely take away from
this episode is a point that you brought up, Randal,
that there are so many people that you have met
who feel that they have experienced something that would uh
that that they are un able to communicate with the
(53:01):
world because of fear of um social repercussions right or
social stigma. With that, and the most important one of
the most important things to remember here is that if
you were listening and you feel that some sort of
event has happened to you, if you feel that you
do not have a voice regarding this or that you
(53:24):
do not have the ability to share it, the good
news is well, the good news is that you are
you know that you are not existing in isolation. There
are hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of people around
the globe who have experienced something that they feel they
(53:44):
may not be able to explain, and it is very
important to remember that no person exists in isolation. And
depending on depending on what people may ultimately find out
about the aerial phenomenon and other sightings of this kind,
perhaps our species also is not an island and does
(54:06):
not exist in isolation. I'm waxing a little poetic. I apologize.
I'm glad you said that, though. I think that's that's
really important that people don't feel alone, you know, because
it's what the people I've met. It's it's it's hard.
That's what makes it hard, you know, they it just
sits in themselves alone, and it's it's yeah, all kinds
(54:30):
of things can happen from that place. Yeah. Yeah. So
thank you so much Randolph for joining us today for
this and thank you for all the work you're doing
on you know, this project. We're again, we're very excited
to see it and we can't wait to see how
it turns out. And you know, if you want to
descend us, maybe a screener or something. I'm saying Ben,
Ben and I are here and you know you're doing
(54:52):
well in all in all seriousness, yes, thank you so
much for your time, both on our behalf and on
behalf of our fellow listeners out there in the audience.
And if you are listening and thinking I have a
story to communicate, I would like to tell somebody I
know something that I haven't shared with the world yet. You,
(55:14):
of course, can reach out to us. We would love
to hear from you. You are the most important part
of this show. Go ahead and send us an admissive
communicate on your social media platform of choice, or if
none of that is your steam, you can call us.
That's right, three three st d w y t K.
(55:36):
And if there's one other method of communication you prefer
above all others, if that is email, you are in luck.
You can contact us directly. We are conspiracy at how
stuff works dot com
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn the stuff they don't want you to know. M
(00:24):
Welcome back to the show. My name is Matt noel
Is on Adventures. They called me Ben. We are joining
with our super producer Paul Decant. Most importantly, you are you,
and you are here, and that makes this stuff they
don't want you to know. Matt. At the top of
the show, here we are, I have to say thank
(00:46):
you for bringing this episode to Fruition because you and
I have talked in previous previous shows about UFO sightings. Right,
oh yeah, one of the most fascinating things that I
think can occur in this world. And over the years
(01:07):
we've covered various aspects of it, and we've often found,
um we we've often found people who will attempt to
explain a genre of sighting, like a type of sighting,
or will attempt to explain a single incident. But what's
fascinating and startling to both of us, I believe is
(01:30):
that even in the modern day, there are so many
huge sightings that have been sort of lost to history.
You may have you may be listening now, and you
may think I vaguely recall hearing something about something like
a specific incident, but too often we lose the details,
(01:51):
and too often we as a civilization forget to investigate
the actual nuts and bolts, specifics, the timelines, what happened
to win. Yeah. Absolutely, And and the most fascinating genre
within the UFO sighting of that type, for me at least,
(02:13):
is the mass sighting where it's not just you know,
a small group of people like a family or something
that saw something something like the Phoenix Lights, where there's
almost an entire town that has this sighting at one time,
or something like what we're going to discuss today. And
we have someone very special on the show today who
(02:34):
is currently directing and producing an entire film, a documentary
about one particular UFO sighting and encounter. His name is
Randall Nickerson. Welcome to the show, sir. Thanks guys, I
appreciate being here. Well, thank you for being on the
show with us. Come on currently. Currently, as as we speak,
(02:57):
there are questions that remain about a specific mass sighting
of an unidentified flying object in in Zimbabwe at a
place called the Aerial School. Could you tell us and
the listeners just a just a little bit about the
gist of this what people usually mean when they referred
(03:20):
to this phenomenon. It was an event that took place
in at the aerial school in a in a rural
area of Zimbabwe in Africa, UH where a schoolyard of
children UH had seen miss craft of some kind silver
(03:41):
that had come down and UM sat down in the
back of the schoolyard about a d two hundred yards
back and they saw these creatures in black that got
that came out of this object and had some of
(04:04):
them many of them had eye contact with it and
one of them, at least one had approached the the playground.
There are other witnesses also adults that were had witnessed
either the object itself in the sky. There was a
lot of anomalies at the time also, but the main
(04:25):
incident seemed to be this school UM in Zimbabwe. So
these are students that were outside and they experienced something.
How old are these kids that saw this thing and
roughly how many of them were there? Well, there were UM.
(04:45):
It was a school had a children between the ages
of six and thirteen. UH. The the number of children
that drew drawings had the headman Sir of the school
had after the incident happened and there are the children
are all shook up. Uh. And initially the children were
(05:09):
not believed by the teachers, teachers or the headmaster. But
after that they have gone home to their parents and
shared the story with their parents with their appropriate emotional
impact and all that. Um. The headmaster had had them
come come back and draw what they saw. So there
(05:30):
were sixty drawings made, but through the research and meeting
a lot of these people, um, there were quite a
few more than that. So that's that's a fascinating point then,
because it sounds like the sixty plus children were talking
about and the drawings these all are only the witnesses
(05:52):
and the depictions of which we're currently aware. Um. There
there's one interesting thing we found here, which is that
in the aftermath of the sighting, the children were interviewed
by the BBC Bureau chief for Zimbabwe. Is that correct?
That's correct. Yeah, he was the first one to interview
(06:14):
the children. He was the first uh UM person with
a camera. Um. And he happened to be with a
you know what was the BBC uh to um to
show up at the school and actually start asking questions,
what what did m would that initial reporting? You know
a lot of times when UFO sightings make the news,
(06:38):
it's almost in a joking way, or there's a there's
a bit of um it's it's not looked at with
really any type of seriousness, even in UM perhaps especially
in how was it treated when it initially hit the news. Uh,
it was treated similarly that it wasn't taken seriously. Uh
(07:01):
in the beginning. I think the BBC reporter didn't take
it seriously. He was trying to you know, when he
was interviewing the children's like, sir, it wasn't a helicopter.
He's sure it wasn't, you know, normal standard things. Um.
So Yeah, there was a lot of skepticism, um by everybody,
the teachers, the parents, um, for the whole event. Um.
(07:26):
So it was difficult for the for the witnesses, which
often I think after meeting a lot of other witnesses
from other incidents around the world that involved you know,
uh UFOs or um unidentified aerial phenomena, you know they're
(07:47):
it's they're not It's hard for people to to find
a place where they can actually share their experience Yeah.
And one thing that's fascinating about the timeline here with
this sighting in particular, is while while many mass media
outlets so often, as you and Matt pointed out, so
(08:09):
often treat these reports with anywhere from skepticism to a
dismissive tone. Uh, this story did not did not disappear.
In fact, Harvard psychiatrist Dr John mack became involved. Correct,
That's true. Yes, he came. He was called by the
(08:30):
BBC reporter to UM because the BBC reporter was felt
like he was out of his way, out of his
territory and needed UM more professional guidance. UM. Dr John
Mackie's a Harvard psychiatrist, he had won the Pulitzer Prize.
He had UM spent twenty years as a child psychiatrist
(08:52):
psychoanalyst and so had a lot of experience with children. UM,
and he was he went traveled to Mbabwe to UM
to investigate this this incident, and I was very interested in,
you know, seeing seeing what it's legitimacy was, if it
(09:12):
if it was legitimate, and what that meant, you know. UM.
He was looking into at that time UFO, UM reports
and witnesses and he at that point was starting to
look globally, you know, not just about incidents in the
United States, but incidents in South America, Africa, UH, European
(09:38):
countries to see how widespread the phenomenon was because Dr
mac had started to take it seriously after he had
met UM some what UH to think about ten witnesses
that he UM was introduced to in his he. When
Dr mac first approached this, he thought that this was
(09:59):
some kind of psychiatric phenomena, some kind of the psychiatric
that it was coming from the person, not an external
actual reality. But when he started to meet people that
UH and he that he put through psychological psychological screening tests, UM,
he found that they were telling the story that was
(10:23):
had all the ear marks of real experience. I think, UM,
you know this, this whole phenomena is I think generally
the public is not highly educated about you know, things
that are normal, you know, astronomical events, UM. And the
(10:49):
reason I'm bringing that up is because there are a
lot of reports that are just you know, everyday objects
that astronomers know or other people are aware of, you
know that that specialized in those fields, UM, But there's
a lot that we don't know. There's been many studies
about the unidentified aerial phenomena UH that show like, you know,
(11:16):
out of all the reports, probably five are legitimate mysteries
because largely the general public is not educated in a
way UM to know, UM, you know what what what
occurs normally in the sky. Astronomers know, people that spend
(11:36):
a lot of time out at you know, in in
in the environments at night, or educated in that department,
UM to know and if it's venus rising on the
horizon or are setting on the horizon and or some
other objects fireballs or space to breathe. There's there's so
many different things that can be misidentified UM and be
(11:58):
be a shock to somebody who's never seen them or
isn't aware of of of you know, the I S
s the space station when it crosses over, it's pretty
amazing site. So I just wanted to bring that up
because I think it's important that you know that there
(12:19):
are reports that you know, a lot of them that
are just can be relegated to um things that are
just normal, you know, things that just happened. But then
there's that five percent, which is what interests anybody looking
into this, that are truly legitimate, you know, I'm really
(12:42):
glad you you talked about that because a lot of
a lot of writing I've seen online about this just commenting.
You know, anyone who has an Internet connection can comment
now on anything, and some of the more derisive comments
I've seen about this particular event are about, Hey, these
are kids. These are kids who saw something. They were
(13:04):
probably making stuff up. Maybe they just saw something and
they're all, you know, it was a helicopter or something,
and they decided to make a game out of it. Um.
In particular, these children are, these are well spoken kids.
You you got your hands on the documentary, all of
the footage, basically the news footage, and you're using it
(13:26):
to craft your documentary. Can you talk to us a
little bit about just what these kids sound like? Why
what it's you know, they sound credible just to me
sitting here watching a trailer for the aerial phenomena. But
talk to me about being immersed in that just for
as long as you have been. What are these kids like? Uh,
They're they're highly intelligent, all of them. It's in the
(13:49):
school itself is a christ is a Christman school still, um,
And you know, they they're very highly educated children and
partly due to the teaching staff and how much love
and care they give their students. UM. Being immersed in
(14:10):
it and meeting these children as adults has been UM, yeah,
it's been a really beautiful experience just on a personal level,
like getting meeting meeting just another person, but they have
actually happened to have a story that I'm interested in
(14:30):
and seeing I guess part of it. Uh, you know,
people say, well, why you know, yeah, these kids may
have made something up or I just find that really
difficult to believe because I have are all the archival
of you know, they've been interviewed half a dozen times
by you know, several of these different news outlets and reporters,
(14:52):
you know when it happened, immediately after it happened, and
the consistency in those reports, it's just riveting. It's just
it's fascinating just on that level of the consistency that
children that young can tell the same story from their
own perspectives that you know, corroborates every other one and
(15:18):
they're not like getting together. I've never I haven't seen
that we're getting together and you know, coming up with
something or you know that doesn't seem to be that way,
and as adults, they're still they still think of that
day out of any day in their life, what happened
on that day. It's it's it's fresh to them. UM.
(15:41):
So I went through my own struggle of like, well,
did this happen or did this not happen? What? What
are the other possible explanations for this? And um, But
I've over time become pretty convinced that something really occurred there.
Um that these and it comes through small details, small
(16:02):
details that even as some of the adults remember that
they don't even know about the archival that I have,
but they'll mention something, you know, as a as adults
now that they don't even know about that I have
in the archival from some other child who mentions that detail.
(16:26):
It's it's just it's that kind of thing where there's
a there's a lot of uh, corroborating evidence. I guess
you could say that's what that's that speaks to the validity,
that's that this occurred, and it's not. It wasn't like
a normal event, you know, it wasn't like a typical
(16:47):
UFO thing that they could have read out of a book.
It was very very different than the standard you know,
or I don't know if there's a standard encounter, but
you know what, what others have run into was very
unique UM encounter with whatever this UH intelligence is. And
this is a tremendous point that you have hit upon,
(17:10):
and it's one of the first questions that a lot
of people who consider themselves more on the skeptical end
of the spectrum will have. The idea of children reporting
stories leads into the concept of kids without meaning to
be misleading, manufacturing memories, or getting details wrong, and so
(17:35):
it's tremendously important to emphasize that in this case, the
children's details. I love how you point out that the
details are one of the things that really UM really
set you on on a path of discovery here, because
(17:55):
we can always as human beings, misrem are things or
get things wrong. But if multiple people are having the
same accounts, and if they have come to these accounts
through their own experiences, you know they are not, as
you said, getting together off camera or something and and
(18:16):
making sure their stories match. If they are all reporting
from their own perspective a similar or identical event, then
it builds a much stronger case. And in an additional
thing that I know all of us out in the
audience are wondering is something that came about as we
(18:36):
were exploring the communication with the children or should we
say the former children who were involved, because they are
now as you said, they were adults right in their
twenties or thirties, and and now that there's this time
that has passed, I feel like there's there's part of
the story we also need to explore here, which is
(18:58):
your part? Randall? How did how did you become involved
in this UH investigation? How did you become the documentarian
who is exploring this event and bringing it to the world. Well,
I started UM actually September eleven. That was down in
(19:20):
New York City, two blocks away from the World Trade
Center when when the building came building to came down,
and that was kind of my inspiration to UM get
into film and tell stories, you know, share real stories,
because that was a very real event for me and
(19:41):
and like everybody, struck everybody in a way that probably
made most people to make changes in their lives. UM
and I started making short films and one was on
the the value of silence and listening in in the world, community,
(20:01):
personal relationships, therapy, therapeutic relationships. UM and I had showed
it to a friend of Dr John Max, and she
had asked me if I was interested in making a
film about this Zimbabwe case, UM, and I I said sure,
(20:24):
And I was very fascinated with just seeing the children
being interviewed. I'm like, my first impression, I think everybody
sees that is that they're telling the truth, what what
they saw or whatever. I didn't know at the time,
like exactly what that truth was, but they were telling
the truth. They felt honest and truthful, and you know,
(20:45):
it was originally supposed to make a thirty minute DVD
for the John mac Institute. And I just I felt like, uh,
that John Max material was very good, but I felt
like there was there had to be more to the story.
I wanted to know more. I wanted to know more
(21:06):
about well, were there other sources that I can compare
his interviews to, you know, to see where he was
coming from, where the kids were the story was consistent.
So I found the school back in two thousand and eight,
and uh, as soon as I found it, and that
(21:27):
came to a reporter in South Africa, I um immediately
went there and discovered a whole bunch of different things
that that the BBC was there, and then there was
a big hunt to find that reporter and to um
get his archival footage and uh of of and and
(21:49):
I continued to do this for years, to um find
all the archival because that that, to me was important.
If I could compare Dr Max footage with with all
the other people that had interviewed these children, that would
convince myself, you know, more so and be more of
a convincing story if the consistency was there, which it was,
(22:12):
And so that's um that's kind of led me to
thinking of it like this is such an important story,
not only um about the fact that this happens alone,
that that some school in rural Africa had this full encounter,
(22:33):
but the story of this Harvard psychiatrist going over there
and then the the repercussions he got for for dealing
with the phenomena at all. So that it's a very
which you know, at some point I reached, I reached
the point like this is this is a feature documentary.
There's just you can't tell this in a short form
(22:56):
or in a small way. This is a really big story.
And um, you know, I would say, and other people
have said it before I know is just you know,
these incidents happening all over the globe. Every single country
has reports, and uh, it's just one of those reports,
(23:18):
is true. It changes everything. And there's been tens and
thousands of reports going back, you know, to the sixties,
even before that, fifties and sixties. UM. So I think
that's part of the drive that I've had. It's like, well, this,
this is a very important story as a whole, uh,
(23:39):
for us, you know, as a as a species on
this planet. To understand that, or to to start looking at, well,
maybe there's something to all this stuff, you know that
that and if and if there is, we really should
be paying attention to that because that means that there's
(24:01):
a higher order species, something with a higher level of
technology than us, that is interacting with us. And then
the real concern for me is, well, that means that
something else could potentially decide our fate. That concerns me,
you know, And that's why I feel like we should
(24:24):
know as much as possible. UM. And I hope this
subject begin begins to be taken seriously, um, because it's important.
It's not just important. It's not the wow wow ufo,
who you know, aliens who can. I don't even care
about that. I care about the fact that there is
an intelligent species that's more involved than us potentially, Uh,
(24:50):
that that could have a huge effect on our direction
as a as are as us as human beings. And
we're going to pause here just for a moment. We'll
be back after a word from our response. What it
brought to my mind is a clip from one of
(25:10):
the little girls who was being interviewed, I believe by
John mac and she said something to the effect of
the being communicated a message to her. And I think
it was John that was trying to get her to
talk more about how the being communicated to her, and
she ended up saying something that there was a message,
(25:31):
a very specific message. Do you remember what that was? Yeah? Yes.
Several of the children UM reported when they were in
close contact with this one being or there was another
one that reported to UM. But during that there was
an intense connection between the kids at the playground and
(25:53):
the being that approached them. And during that moment, and
all the kids say it was like times just stopped.
But several of the kids got this uh sort of
I don't know how it was. They didn't know how
to explain how it was communicated. But you know, in
(26:14):
in you and I would know that as telepathy, you know,
something that was transferred mind to mind. And the message
was about our own environment. And several not not not
the majority of the witnesses, but several of them, um,
at least a half a dozen, maybe more, because a
(26:34):
lot of them in the present day and are are
not they feel a little uh nervous to share that, um.
But the message was about what we're what we were
doing to our planet, or what what what our direction
was with our own environment. UM. I don't know. I've
(26:58):
wonder about, wonder about that little bit. I wonder, well,
if somebody sees something traumatic, you tend to think about,
you know, particularly something from out of this world, that
may be a response to to a try. I mean,
you may think about your own place more. I'm just
thinking of alternative reasons why that would come out, or
(27:21):
it really happened, you know, or it was really communicated
to these kids. And then the question is why. In
the footage Randallly, he's you know, I think it's Dr
Mac and he's saying, you know, repeatedly saying, well, did
you think about this before is this a thought you've
had before? Why? Why did you think about this? And
he he would allow for more questions in between, then
he would ask her again, is this something you were
(27:42):
thinking about or that you know you've been taught or told?
And just repeatedly she'd like, no, No, I didn't think
about until I got home and afterwards. Yeah, And uh,
one thing I'd like to go back to is we're
talking about the kids accounts. Is something that I know
has piqued the interest of a lot of our listeners here,
(28:04):
and that is that the event as described by again
these more than sixties school children, has aspects that do
not match the you know, the stereotypical UFO encounter story
that we have heard. Right, you said there were some
unique things that occurred and that the kids pretty much
(28:27):
universally agreed on some of these things. Um, we've also
heard some reports that there were some small differences in
children's accounts. But but what what set this apart in
your mind? From uh, the typical again I hesitate to
use the phrase typical, but the the super familiar, stereotypical
(28:48):
UFO encounter story, like what really stood out? I think
what really stood out? Well? Number one was the fact
that they showed up at a playground at a at
a emary school. It's one big one and sort of
from all the reports were it seemed to be to
have approached the playground and observed the children. There was
(29:12):
no action taken, There was no you know, um, nobody
was taken or anything there there. You know, it was
it was almost like an observation. UM. That that that
I find really interesting. The other thing that's unique is
that they were all wearing black, like a black skin
(29:32):
tight suit, these creatures. And there's only I think three
times in in the history of of this phenomena that
that's been reported, so that was unique. Um. The message
part is nuts. I mean, some of the research I've
(29:54):
done with other cases that's not terribly on common that, um,
people that have had encounters with these things get some
kind of message about our own environment in our own
direction as a species. So I think, yeah, I mean,
those are the two big things that stand out for
me are are are how it where it took place,
(30:18):
how it took place, and what they were particularly wearing
made it unique. And and of course the message transmission
and all that. Um. Also, Oh and we we should
point out most importantly, not only was this at a
on a playground, but this was also and this will
(30:39):
seem unusual too many people. This was during the day,
during the school day, I believe was their mid morning
break at ten am or something. Yeah, thank you for
reminding me that. That's what also makes it unique. Very good.
Um it's uh, yeah, it happened at uh the ten
thirty break in the morning on Friday. And yeah, that
(31:03):
that also is unique. So I want to bring something
up here, and um, it's a it's a point of
contention that I've seen online. I just want to talk
about it. Um. Let's let's let's just go there, okay. Um.
I have heard some people suggest that perhaps this was
an elaborate prank by some of the teachers because of
(31:23):
a few things. Uh, most of the teachers were in
a meeting at the time, or at least uh they
I think they were having a teachers meeting of some sort.
There was one teacher perhaps outside that was manning basically
of snack stand kind of thing. That's correct. And then
(31:45):
it's been positive before that perhaps the teachers were having
fun with the kids and trying to do something in
that way. And it's been done before, it's been done afterwards,
where teachers have faked and invasion for the kids and
then they reveal it later. Um, really, this is just
in your mind. Is there any possibility that something to
(32:07):
that effect occurred that day? Um, of, well, I've seen
those reports of teachers so doing this sort of fake
UFO thing. That's that started happening I think into in
the two thousands, eight, two nine sort of. But the
kids were aware of it. I mean, it wasn't something
(32:28):
they you know, let's show the teachers pranked them on.
But I don't find any I mean, I've interviewed, I've
talked to all the teachers, and that they were shocked themselves.
They didn't know how to deal with it. So I
there's no validity to that that. There is none. I
mean I've interviewed all the teachers. I have all the
teachers interviewed in at the time. Uh, there's just no
(32:53):
way I can even see that as a possibility. It's
just not there because it because mainly because the teachers
were shocked. I mean they were they didn't believe the kids.
They you know, not not all of them, but many
of the kids. Teachers initially did not believe that the
kids until the kid's parents started showing up and saying, look,
(33:14):
something happened to my kids. What happened, you know? And
then it then it got you know, taken more seriously
by the staff and the headmaster and and they were
they became really convinced that something had occurred. You know,
It's it's a tough subject. I mean, they were all
(33:35):
of a sudden, they're all the teachers were were put
in a position of Okay, these children are reporting this,
but we don't believe this, and you know it goes
to um so I don't. I don't find any validity
to that argument at all. I found nothing there. And
I've looked at that, I've looked at hoaxes, you know,
(33:56):
and you have to I gotta say, I don't think
enough will do this in the UFO field or the
unidentified Arrow Phenana field. Uh. You know, you gotta look
at everything. You know, you can't take a report as
just the way it is, you know, like I looked
at everything, like what was going on with the teachers,
(34:17):
what was going on in the country with their military,
with you know, what was going on in space at
the time. You gotta and what were, what where was
the sun rising that day? What was the you know
at night, what was the where it was venus? I
mean you all these questions you need to ask to
do a thorough to get a thorough take on something too, um.
(34:40):
And I think it's really important. I don't think enough
people do that. Um. And the other thing, you know,
like with the teachers, this these children coming to the teachers.
The teachers had a certain worldview and this is a
lot of things John Mac talks about and other is
like that. And this is what really this whole phenomena
(35:05):
is about really, um. Is that you know is our
world view? You know that these things aren't supposed to exist. Um,
So we just they're not they they're not real, They're
not they don't exist. So the most of the teachers
were in that world views and they were approached by
(35:27):
the children and being challenged in a in a big
way from them by saying, no, this is what we saw. Um.
But the world view, like for all of us is
you know, we most of us have this world view
that that you know, there's nothing more than intelligent than us.
(35:49):
And we like to keep that worldview because it makes
us feel good, makes us continue to want to do things.
Uh uh, But there's different world is Like in Africa,
people in the native populations, um, that's that's not they
don't have the same worldview. They are open to um
(36:11):
understanding that yeah, we're we'rethy you know, dominant species here
um or we think we are. And but there are
other other species out in this vast ocean that we
look at at night with stars. So I just think
that the world, our world views is what's being challenged
(36:34):
with this whole phenomena, Like it's something we really don't
want to look at because it challenges our our our
ego really well, you know you. This just brings up
so much that I've been reading recently because of this
interview about Dr John iMac, And honestly, I didn't know
a whole lot about this gentleman um And we've discussed
(36:56):
before that he has a PhD from Harvard School of
Medicine and he's a psychologist psychoanalyst. He is also a
self described parapsychologist and has done some fascinating work in
that field. And for someone with such accolades and such
(37:16):
an education and and just a brilliant person to immerse
himself in that field that is so socially I would
say maligned, maybe socially unaccepted, controversial at least yes correct. UM.
For to have someone like this UM look into this
whole phenomena, this this one event, and then to have
(37:40):
UM that group seek you out to produce a documentary
on this subject, it's just it lends such credibility to it. UM.
I don't know. I think that's one of the main
reasons why I personally am so excited about this documentary UM,
not just the resources, but because there is this UM,
(38:00):
this man who then kind of became an institution. Can
you tell us a little bit about how you You
mentioned something about repercussions with John iMac for his beliefs
and kind of what we've been talking about here. What
what happened? What were those repercussions? I mean John mac
was he was brilliant and I think, uh, you know
(38:23):
you one had one of the Pulitzer Prize uh and
I believe it was nine. Uh. He was brilliant as
a psychiatrist, psychoanalyst, and I think what happened this is
my take that he got bored with, you know, the
standard model of looking at a person in a therapeutic environment. UM,
(38:47):
and got very interested in anomalous experiences that people didn't
you know, extraordinary experiences that were difficult to believe. UM.
And I think he was looking at different models of
of UM psychotherapy to explore the unconscious, the unconscious UM
(39:14):
and UM and then he had dealt with people who
had near death experiences and UM witnesses to UFOs or aliens,
and and being such a high level person and he
started the Cambridge Hospital. He was you know, uh a
(39:36):
psychiatrist on at the Harvard Medical School, UM, a professor
and UM. He started to get flak from the university
for his looking into these these cases and the repercussions.
They really went after him. They were threatening to take
(39:58):
away his tenure and basically we fire him, which is
never in the history of Harvard University been done. There's
never been a person threatened like that in the whole
entire history of Harvard, and that goes back to the sis.
So it was really that was very unique. And they uh,
(40:20):
you know, it was a whole uh not a trial,
but essentially one behind closed doors. And you know, their
concern was that he was you know, that these patients
actually had psychological illnesses, yet they displayed none of them.
But that was their angle, that the concern for patients,
(40:43):
and which is understandably I could totally understand their angle. Um,
But honestly, my take on it now as I felt
like they were really trying to tarnish his reputation and
intimidate him. And you know, I he had lot you
know through this whole Harvard inquisition, which was had many
(41:06):
people involved, including Alan Dersuwitz, and you know it's just
a cast of of some famous people. And you know
that he had lost his circle of friends at Harvard.
Nobody wanted to be around him, you know, during this time. Um.
And so I think the Harvard he really achieved a
(41:28):
goal in sort of just you know, hurting his credibility. Um.
So it's quite a hero's journey in a way. I
mean it was the man, a man who was had
a conviction that these people are are telling the truth.
You know, different people that are reported, including these children
(41:51):
in Africa, they're telling the truth. And um, what does
that mean? Asking the question of what does that mean?
If this is the truth and this is not thing psychological,
what does that mean for us as a as a species.
And we're gonna take a quick break. We're just gonna pause.
We'll be right back. Regardless of how someone encounters this
(42:18):
story or what what they personally believe, right, the the
crux of the issue is the following. There are things
that have yet to be explained about this event, which
was not that long ago. I mean, maybe we're dating
(42:38):
ourselves a little bit here, but is that you know,
it's it's the past, but it's relatively recent and there's
still things that that we can find out through rigorous investigation,
through on the ground interviews, through the work that you
are doing. But all of it leads us to again
(42:58):
the question you just pause, did, which is what does
this mean? What does this mean for the future? What
what will humanity overall discover from this event? And you know,
we haven't even we haven't touched on the the other
events across the world that you have mentioned, um, that
(43:20):
you alluded to that have some of the same threads
running through them. Right, So this is a question that
we at least I don't know if you've got something
up your sleeve, met, but this is a question that
we don't have the answer to yet, at least at
least us there's some stuff in here, but I don't
(43:41):
think it's answers to that question though. Ah well, what
we would like to do is, um, I guess our
our next question for the show here then, is to
ask if you could tell us a little more about
the state of the documentary as it stands now, what
our listeners can do to help UH, and where they
(44:04):
can learn more about the piece. Sure, can I say
one thing first? Absolutely? Yes. So during this UH filming
and interviewing, I mean, I've traveled to Africa three times
and all over Europe finding all these witnesses in the
United States, Canada. Um, you know, I've been approached by
(44:26):
several people, you know, dozens and dozens of people that
have heard I'm doing a movie about UFOs and they
come and they share their experience with me, and you
know not and and these are people. This is what
always strikes me. There are people that have I mean,
they come to me and they say, don't tell anybody,
because I haven't told anybody, or they've only told their
(44:47):
immediate family, and they share these stories that nobody knows about.
They're just they keep it to themselves. They're afraid of ridicule,
They're afraid of you know, UH, they're afraid of a
lot of things to uh, to be to to for
somehow to go public, fraid of losing their friends, all
(45:10):
kinds of fears. Um. Yet their stories are you know,
they sounded and their feelings expressed. Something really happened. UM.
I just find that heartbreaking in a way that we
there's this whole culture out there that is not being heard,
(45:30):
that you don't see at UFO conferences, that you don't
see anywhere. They've just had these experiences and they're keeping
it to themselves and that and if if it's just
considering the number that I've run into and just doing
the math of how many people there has to be
like that, uh is just it's a lot of It's
(45:51):
a lot of people that uh could be helping us
solve this mystery. UM. And there just doesn't seem to
be enough of a drive from us or our media
or our culture to really want to find out what's
going on here. Because I think it's pretty important that
we that we do try to understand it and try
(46:14):
to um uh find out more. Because as far as
I want to personally, I want to know what's going on.
I want to know what situations humanities in, Like, I
want to know that if there's something out there, I
really want to know about it. I want to know
how it can impact me. I want to know what
I should be afraid of or need to be afraid of.
(46:36):
I don't know, I just I or not um, but
I would like as much information as possible. I I
know about all the wildlife that lived in the forest
that I'm in, and I'm very curious, you know, to
find out a lot about them. If there's something else
out there, it's it's another form of wildlife. It just
(46:58):
happens to be smarter than us. I want to know
as much as possible, particularly because it's smarter than me.
So I don't know, I just it just strikes me that,
you know, I'll be glad when the day comes, and
it will come when universities have programs that are really
doing intense research about this, you know, and eliminating the
(47:18):
Charlatans and whatever the b s stories that are out
there and getting to the real stories and piecing this
puzzled together because we need to know agreed, Okay, Ranald,
So tell us tell us how we can learn more
about the aerial phenomenon documentary. Where can we learn about it?
(47:38):
Where can we watch a trailer for it? When do
you think it's coming out? Just tell us everything. Okay,
So the film we're at a rough cut right now,
working toward a final. Uh. It's it's fantastic and mean,
I can't say enough, and it's my I wouldn't usually
do that. Uh, I'm just really excited because it's it
took it's taken a long time, but I've done it right.
(48:01):
I've gotten some of the best people to work on
and I've got an editor that worked with Michael Moore
did Fahrenheit, and Leven did Sicko and has done other
brilliant films. So I've gotten really great people to work
on it. And um, we're working toward a final. Um.
You can check it out at aerial phenomenon dot com.
(48:23):
We have a trailer there, and we have a trailer
where Dan Ackroyd um plugs the film and he's very
aware of this case and he was just wonderful supporting
the just trying to get this the word about this
film out there. But you can see quite quite a
bit of information on the site. We're still taking donations
(48:45):
because it's been you know, it's been a project from
the heart kind of thing, and we um, it's been
up and down. You know. We get funding and then
the funding stops, and then I go back to work
to pay for more filmmaking, more editing. It's uh, it's
been hard to uh, you know, when you don't have
(49:06):
the funding right there and you have to play all
these roles to uh to keep it moving. And sometimes
it's the production stops and then get we move ahead again,
and then it stops again. Because anyway, it's been a
challenge for sure. But so yeah, we're we're looking at
um for being at a final within three months. So
(49:29):
it's coming. It's coming soon. And I think the reaction
because the other thing, this is not really a film
about UFOs in in a sense. I mean, it is
a film about this incident, but it's it's a lot
also about what happens to people, you know, what people
(49:49):
go through when they have reported something like this and
and um, how it sticks with them. And that's it's
kind of a lot of different things. But it's not
a traditional by any sense UFO film at all. It's
a it's very mainstream as far as a story and
(50:10):
there's really a lot about the people, you know, not
so much about the aliens or the woo woo stuff
about UFOs. And I kind of think that's where the
conversation needs to go, is in us getting out out
sort of out of the woo woo flash like aliens,
aliens alien stage two. Okay, well, you know what are
(50:31):
we looking at? Here? Is it? What is it? You know,
if as alien or some other creature from another planet,
it's another animal basically, you know what I mean. Um,
So I think it would be I really would like
to work toward, um changing the conversation to uh so
(50:52):
we can get to it, so we can really get
to the heart of heart of this matter issue and
learn from it, find out what it is. And um,
you know, the recent things that have happened that came
out in the New York Times, uh with the military
was absolutely fascinating. I don't know if you guys aware
(51:12):
of that. Yeah, we just did a couple of interviews
about that. Yeah, the Pentagon Advanced Aviation Threat Identification Program,
I believe Laslando. Yeah, that was a that was a
massive surprise too. I think everybody who even who even
(51:33):
casually follows this sort of news. What an about face.
You know, it's a dude named Jeremy Corbelle that we
talked to recently about that. Oh I just met him. Yeah. Fascinating, great,
fascinating guy. Um. Okay, look, Randall, I, like many people
listening right now, am very excited to watch the Aeral phenomena.
I know Ben is too. In his eyes. We'll go
(51:55):
ahead and also post the trailer that you can find
when you're done with this podcast. You can check it
out on our Instagram or Facebook and our Twitter. We'll
put that out there now. By the way, we are
conspiracy stuff at Twitter and Facebook and conspiracy stuff show
on Instagram. If you're out there and you want to,
you know, discuss this project further. Um, and again, go
(52:16):
to Aerial that's a r I E. L phenomenon dot com. Yeah,
and there you can find more information about the documentary.
You can watch the trailer, you can see some of
the news. You can also uh contact the project directly
with questions. And you know, one thing that one thing
(52:39):
that I think everyone listening should absolutely take away from
this episode is a point that you brought up, Randal,
that there are so many people that you have met
who feel that they have experienced something that would uh
that that they are un able to communicate with the
(53:01):
world because of fear of um social repercussions right or
social stigma. With that, and the most important one of
the most important things to remember here is that if
you were listening and you feel that some sort of
event has happened to you, if you feel that you
do not have a voice regarding this or that you
(53:24):
do not have the ability to share it, the good
news is well, the good news is that you are
you know that you are not existing in isolation. There
are hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of people around
the globe who have experienced something that they feel they
(53:44):
may not be able to explain, and it is very
important to remember that no person exists in isolation. And
depending on depending on what people may ultimately find out
about the aerial phenomenon and other sightings of this kind,
perhaps our species also is not an island and does
(54:06):
not exist in isolation. I'm waxing a little poetic. I apologize.
I'm glad you said that, though. I think that's that's
really important that people don't feel alone, you know, because
it's what the people I've met. It's it's it's hard.
That's what makes it hard, you know, they it just
sits in themselves alone, and it's it's yeah, all kinds
(54:30):
of things can happen from that place. Yeah. Yeah. So
thank you so much Randolph for joining us today for
this and thank you for all the work you're doing
on you know, this project. We're again, we're very excited
to see it and we can't wait to see how
it turns out. And you know, if you want to
descend us, maybe a screener or something. I'm saying Ben,
Ben and I are here and you know you're doing
(54:52):
well in all in all seriousness, yes, thank you so
much for your time, both on our behalf and on
behalf of our fellow listeners out there in the audience.
And if you are listening and thinking I have a
story to communicate, I would like to tell somebody I
know something that I haven't shared with the world yet. You,
(55:14):
of course, can reach out to us. We would love
to hear from you. You are the most important part
of this show. Go ahead and send us an admissive
communicate on your social media platform of choice, or if
none of that is your steam, you can call us.
That's right, three three st d w y t K.
(55:36):
And if there's one other method of communication you prefer
above all others, if that is email, you are in luck.
You can contact us directly. We are conspiracy at how
stuff works dot com
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Hosts And Creators
Matt Frederick
Ben Bowlin
Noel Brown
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