The Special Box

One of my projects for this weekend is to put together my Official MUFON Field Investigator's Kit. The kit is compose of everything I will need to conduct a UFO investigation, and according to the MUFON Field Investigator's Manual, "it would be advantageous to store these items in a special box, suitcase or briefcase."

I should have put my Kit together long ago, I know, but until last month I didn't really know for sure whether I was going to pass the test and become a Certified MUFON Field Investigator, and, well... I only have one special box and I didn't want to empty it out and put all my MUFON Field Investigator's stuff in it if I wasn't going to be a MUFON Field Investigator.

This special box has been with me a long time.

But now I know, and this weekend I must fill my special box with insect repellant, an inclinometer, a first aid kit (personal use only), a color chart, a disposable polyethylene glove, binoculars (with image stabilization), a digital audio recorder, a calculator, digital and film cameras, a small garden trowel and shovel, a star finder or computer astronomy program...

(You can stop reading and skip to the end if you like. I wouldn't blame you.)

...a knife/Leatherman (multipurpose tool), a string, tarp, tent and stakes (what, no poles?), a magnifying glass, area maps or computer mapping capability, tweezers, clipboard or 3-ring notebook, pencils, pens, permanent markers, flashlight (extra batteries), headlamp, compass (good quality) tape measure (100 foot), ruler, sample containers (ziplock bags), MUFON Questionnaire Forms, MUFON Field Investigator's Manual, MUFON Photo Identification Card (not expired).

I'm still puzzling over "headlamp."

The only headlamps I own are attached to my cars. Pretty firmly, too. Not only do they not fit in my special box, but I've noticed that once you remove them from the car they don't light up anymore. Not even on low beam.

I'm going to have a lot of questions for my State Director at our next meeting...

A Slow Week For UFOs

By now I thought I would have my first UFO sighting investigation under my belt, but forces beyond my control have forced me to change my timetable. The gentleman who reported the sighting has had to deal with a family emergency, so we have had to put off our talk until sometime next week.

He did have a 10-minute window to talk last weekend, but in my judgement 10 minutes was not nearly long enough of a time slot for me to have conducted any meaningful investigative work. It takes me eight or nine minutes alone to gain someone's trust (I've timed it with my wife), so how much could I really have gotten done in one to two minutes? Not much, in my opinion.

So, because one of the special powers bestowed upon me when I became a Certified MUFON Field Investigator is "judgement," I decided to postpone the talk until we can really spend some time going over all the details. Which may be just as well, because I still have not received my MUFON Field Investigator ID badge, or my supplemental ethics training. Or my alien detector.

It takes more than just a baseball cap to be ready to investigate UFO sightings. But not much more.

I Must Be Doing Something Right

Usually I don't bother to blog much on a three-day summer holiday weekend. People have much more important and fun things to do on Memorial Day weekend than to read about UFOs. Like watching 72 hours of non-stop war movies on AMC, stuff like that.

But today something notable happened: my blog went over 10,000 page counts! If I had a dollar for every page view my blog has gotten, I would have... let's see... Holy crap, I would have $10,000!

But even though I don't actually get a dollar for every page view, I do get a dollar's worth of pride and satisfaction from every page view, and I thank all you page viewers out there for that gift.

I know there are many other pages you could be viewing, but you chose to view mine, and that means a lot. And, from now on, if you could send me a dollar every time you view one of my pages, it would mean so much more.

If page views were money...

The Mole

I am usually very careful about redacting the names of real people I mention here at HighStrangeness, but in this case I must make an exception. I was going through MUFON's Wisconsin membership files this morning and came across a most unusual name...

There is an "Inactive" Wisconsin Field Investigator in the MUFON database with the name "M. Saucerman."

Saucerman? Saucerman??!! How could this go unnoticed? Please, MUFON, tell me you are not this clueless!

This is what we call a mole. A mole is a person from the other side who infiltrates our side and pretends to be on our side while secretly passing our sensitive information back to his or her friends on the other side. And in this case, that could be the other side of the galaxy!

How much of MUFON's secret inner workings has M. Saucerman leaked to the other side? Are any of the Wisconsin Field Investigators safe? What am I getting myself into?

M. Saucerman, mole.

The Ballester-Guasp Evaluation

How did I miss this when I studied for the MUFON Field Investigator Examination?

When I am sent out on a case, I am to fill out a Ballester-Guasp Evaluation, or BGE for short. This evaluation scheme was thought up by a couple of MUFONers as a way for UFO sighting reports to "self-asses." In other words, as I fill in the details of the sighting report, numerical values are automatically given to various aspects of the report, and these numerical values are multiplied together to determine the "final certainty index" of the sighting. I don't have to think at all!

The BGE weighs three aspects of the UFO incident:

1. The volume and quantity of the data recorded
2. The inherent abnormality or "strangeness" of the event
3. The credibility of the witness

Okay, all well and good, but assigning numerical values to "strangeness" and "credibility" as a means of assessing "certainty" seems to me like a fool's game. And believe you me, I know a thing or two about fool's games.

Is this UFO sighting credible? Not if it was reported by a farmer.

Let's look at these three criteria and try to understand what they really mean...

Number 1: When MUFON talks about "the volume and quantity of the data recorded," what they are really talking about is where I spoke with the witness and for how long. In MUFON world, if I interview the witness at the site of the incident it is more likely that the incident actually occurred than if I interview the witness over the phone. This is cool, because my actions actually affect the credibility of the story! If I'm too lazy to drive to the witness' house to do the interview face-to-face, the less credible the witness' story is! Also, if the interview takes longer than a half hour, it is more likely that the incident occurred than if the interview takes less than a half hour. Duh, MUFON, I'm just going to talk slower and ask the same questions over and over.

Number 2: Determining the "inherent abnormality or 'strangeness' of the event" is surprisingly simple. All I do is count how many of these seven factors were present and I have a value:

1. Anomalous appearance
2. Existence of anomalous movements
3. Apparition of physical-spatial incongruities
4. Technological detection
5. Close encounter
6. Presence of beings associated with UFOs
7. Finding of traces or production of effects

The more I check off, the higher the value, and the less likely the phenomenon is to have a "natural explanation." This seems like a slippery slope to me. I have seen some "natural" occurrences that have seemed pretty blasted strange, and I have seen some "unnatural" occurrences that have seemed pretty damned not strange, so I'm not sure where to go with this.

Number 3: This is pretty cut-and-dried. If I interview a farmer or a housewife (both of whom are assumed to have no more than a high school education) who was alone when he or she saw a UFO, the story is not very credible. If I interview a Psychiatrist who was with many other people who are related to him or her when he or she saw a UFO, the story is very, very supremely credible. Never mind the possibility that the Psychiatrist was at the insane asylum at the time of the sighting, and the people he was with were patients (who just happened to be blood relatives); the sighting happened, and that's that.

Who are Ballester and Guasp anyway, and why does MUFON give their evaluation system so much weight in a sighting investigation? All it's going to take is one housewife with a Ph.D. reporting a UFO sighting to blow the whole racket sky-high.

Missing The Boat

I thought it was the perfect photo for an ID badge...

I was wearing my new suit and looking all Agent K when the picture was taken, and it seemed appropriate for a MUFON ID badge, so I sent it to International HQ.

They were not amused:
 

Dear Mark;

We have received your photo for the Field Investigators ID card. However, it is unusable.

These ID cards are for the purpose of identification. Therefore, photos with sunglasses are not acceptable.

Please submit a photo without the sunglasses. Once received we can issue your card.

Sincerely;

MUFON HQ

 
First of all, how does "MUFON HQ" sign its own letters? Second of all, they are completely missing the boat. If my ID badge has a picture of me without sunglasses and I show up at an incident site with sunglasses, there will be utter confusion. I don't see how this can possibly work.

I will just have to hope that the witnesses I interview score extremely low on the Ballaster-Guasp Evaluation (BGE). This is something I studied up on for the MUFON Field Investigator Examination, but the significance of it didn't really sink in until I got my first case assignment and was told by my State MUFON Director that I will "need his age, education level and profession for the BGE (Ballaster-Guasp Evaluation) that sets a value for his credibility."

Does that seem a little creepy? It does, doesn't it? I will try to keep an open mind, but I am not altogether comfortable with judging a person's credibility on the basis of his or her education and profession. I would much rather be free to judge their credibility on the basis of the first thing that pops into my head, but rules is rules...

The Sxxx Hits The Fxx

Date: Sunday, May 20, 2012
Location: Somewhere in Wisconsin
Mission: Investigate My First UFO Case

You read that right. As of this morning, I have been assigned my first UFO case. Trouble is, I can't write about it here, because of this whole confounded confidentiality thing. Apparently, by accepting the position of Certified UFO Field Investigator I have agreed to keep all my reports secret. Why the hell did I do that?

Oh well, all is not lost, because once the case report is accepted, it will be available on the MUFON database. In the meantime, I will try to figure out ways I can talk about my cases here without violating anyone's anonymity. I think I can do this.

I know it's completely safe to describe what this case doesn't involve. At least, I can try to describe what I think this case doesn't involve, from what little I know so far. So that still seems pretty safe. This case doesn't involve an abduction. This case doesn't involve a UFO landing. This case doesn't involve cattle mutilations. It didn't take place anywhere outside the city of Milwaukee. It did not occur on any other day besides Sunday. It did not involve any more or less than four witnesses, who did not see anything besides a light in the sky that was any other color but orange...

I'm sorry, but I can't say anything more than this. Yet.