PORTAL SEEN, CREATURE CRAWLS OUT ;

It is here that an entire team of researchers watched in awe

as a bright door or portal opened up in the darkness and a

large humanoid creature crawled out before quickly vanishing.

And it is here that several animals--cattle and dogs--

were mutilated, obliterated or simply disappeared.

http://www.aliendave.com/Article_PathoftheSkinwalker_p1.html

"pre-cognitive intelligence" roams here", & the phenomena

seems to play with and test the NIDS researchers courage and

ability to 'record' or observe the activity or unknown events.

One NIDS scientist says, "It isn't as simple as saying that

ET's or flying saucers are doing it. It's some kind of

consciousness, but it's always something new and different,

something non- repeatable. It's reactive to people and

equipment, and we set up the ranch to be a proving ground

for the scientific method, but science doesn't seem

amenable to the solution of these kinds of problems."

http://www.aliendave.com/UUFOH_TheRanch.html

The area is also noted to have a Vortex or Portal where doorways to other realms or dimensions are seen as glowing tubes, and random holes or rips in the sky.

http://www.parascope.com/nb/articles/bigelow.htm

http://www.binnallofamerica.com/boaa2.4.6.html

Background

The Sherman family (also named the Gorman family in some news articles) bought the ranch, from absent owners, in the Fall of 1994. The precise location of the ranch has never been publicly announced, but Kelleher and Knapp note that it is relatively close to the Utah cities of Roosevelt and Vernal. <ref name="kelleher">Kelleher, Colm & Knapp, George: Hunt for the Skinwalker: Science Confronts the Unexplained at a Remote Ranch in Utah (Paraview Pocket Books, 2005 ISBN 1-4165-0521-0)</ref>

However, after experiencing what they believed to be paranormal activity, and citing personal stress, the family tried to sell the ranch in 1996. News of the alleged phenomena was picked up by some regional press outlets shortly afterward.

The National Institute for Discovery Science (NIDS), having read media reports, purchased the ranch from the family for, it is claimed, $200,000. Sporadic investigations by NIDS started at the ranch shortly thereafter. The ranch emerged in the press again in 2002, when NIDS allowed George Knapp, a reporter for the Las Vegas Mercury, access to the ranch. Knapp wrote a two-part article (perhaps somewhat sensationalist in tone) which was published in November 2002<ref name="lvmercury">Path of the Skinwalker, George Knapp, November 28, 2002</ref>

December 2005 saw the publication of a detailed book about the ranch and the NIDS investigation, written by NIDS researcher Colm Kelleher and journalist George Knapp<ref name="kelleher">Kelleher, Colm & Knapp, George: Hunt for the Skinwalker: Science Confronts the Unexplained at a Remote Ranch in Utah (Paraview Pocket Books, 2005 ISBN 1-4165-0521-0)</ref> The authors insist that standard scientific protocols were followed in the investigation at the ranch, and that scientists and researchers witnessed some of the bizarre phenomena noted below. <ref name="kelleher">Kelleher, Colm & Knapp, George: Hunt for the Skinwalker: Science Confronts the Unexplained at a Remote Ranch in Utah (Paraview Pocket Books, 2005 ISBN 1-4165-0521-0)</ref>

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Reported phenomena

Some of the alleged phenomena encountered at the ranch include:

* UFOs - a range of objects have been reported on or near the ranch. These include:

o Vehicles that look like an advanced version of the F-117 stealth fighter and/or resemble Black triangles.

o A large refrigerator-shaped object with a white light at the front and red at the back which hovers and seemingly disappears. This bears some resemblance to a Chupa.

o Glowing blue orbs described as being larger than a baseball, made from some kind of hard, clear substance and containing some swirling blue liquid. These were allegedly capable of inducing fear and affecting electrical items (in particular lights) merely by their presence, and when attacked by dogs they (the dogs) were reduced to a grey butter-like substance (which was eaten with toast). The description of this orbs bears resemblance to the ball lightning phenomena.

* Cattle mutilation which seem to show common traits: cutting off of an ear, excision of genitals, coring out of the anus and exsanguinations, some of which took place in very tight windows of time (20 minutes on one occasion). Locals report that this kind of activity has occurred in the region, intermittently, since the 1960s.<ref name="kelleher">Kelleher, Colm & Knapp, George: Hunt for the Skinwalker: Science Confronts the Unexplained at a Remote Ranch in Utah (Paraview Pocket Books, 2005 ISBN 1-4165-0521-0)</ref>

* A number of paranormal creatures, which are frequently collectively explained as being Skinwalkers - shape-shifting beings of local Ute folklore. Alleged sightings include:

o Giant wolves that are apparently impervious to bullets

o Dogs that looked to be deceased, but were animated

o Dog-headed men smoking cigarettes

o Bigfoot-like creatures - the local Ute Indians believe some of these may be actual creatures but consider some of them to be skin-walkers - the Ute often seem to use the term Skinwalker/Sasquatch interchangeably.<ref name="kelleher">Kelleher, Colm & Knapp, George: Hunt for the Skinwalker: Science Confronts the Unexplained at a Remote Ranch in Utah (Paraview Pocket Books, 2005 ISBN 1-4165-0521-0)</ref>

o Reptilian humanoids

o A large, hyena-like beast whose description had some resemblance to both the Beast of Gévaudan and the Shunka Warakin.

o A flock of small red birds.

* A large orange portal in the sky which appears to open into another place (blue sky can be seen through it at night). According to the Sherman family black vehicles were seen entering and leaving the portal.

* Magnetic anomalies

* Trickster or Poltergeists-like activity- including the stuffing of four large bulls into a small cattle truck. This included a whole range of objects going missing and appearing in strange places after a long search. Doors were also said to open and slam shut, and in the most frequent example, the salt and pepper would be found in the wrong pots.

* Teleportation

* Large aquatic serpents in the nearby Bottle Hollow are alleged to be behind a number of deaths at the lake. The Hollow is, according to eyewitness testimony, also the site of a number of sightings of balls of light entering and exiting the water.<ref name="kelleher">Kelleher, Colm & Knapp, George: Hunt for the Skinwalker: Science Confronts the Unexplained at a Remote Ranch in Utah (Paraview Pocket Books, 2005 ISBN 1-4165-0521-0)</ref>

* Invisible or stealthy creatures – one of which (that attacked at 50 to 60 mph) was later identified as looking almost identical to the stealth blurring seen in the Predator films. Others were “seen” by their effect on a herd of cattle and compass needle or in one case as it walked through a stream.

* An ice disc in the pond.

* "Cookie cutter" holes in the ground removing several hundred pounds of soil at a time.

* Strange sounds including:

o underground noises as if heavy machinery was at work below the ranch.

o voices speaking from out of the air in an unintelligible language

* A large Masonic symbol carved on an inaccessible part of Skinwalker Ridge, possibly connected with the presence of the Buffalo Soldiers in the area (a Prince Hall lodge was attached to the 9th Cavalry which was stationed in nearby Fort Duchesne in 1896)

A lot of these phenomena were transient, sometimes happening only once, or often reported as just appearing for a couple of weeks and then disappearing forever, making it difficult for investigators to get results or draw firm conclusions.

[edit]

Proposed explanations

A range of explanations have been put forward to explain the strange phenomena. These include:

* A hoax on the part of the Sherman family, NIDS, or local reporters. Knapp and Kelleher regard a hoax explanation as highly unlikely <ref name="kelleher">Kelleher, Colm & Knapp, George: Hunt for the Skinwalker: Science Confronts the Unexplained at a Remote Ranch in Utah (Paraview Pocket Books, 2005 ISBN 1-4165-0521-0)</ref>.

* The ranch being a testing area for advanced United States military technology.

* The Ute, by building homes on a Buffalo Soldier graveyard have, in an ironic twist on the popular horror movie trope, disturbed the soldier's spirits.

* A Navajo curse that sent Skinwalkers to punish the Ute. The ranch is off limits to the Ute as they are reported to say "the ranch is in the path of the skinwalker." Junior Hicks, a retired schoolteacher and local researcher, claims contacts amongst the Ute have told him that the Skinwalker lives in Dark Canyon, beyond the ranch, within a cave decorated with centuries-old petroglyph depicting Skinwalkers.

* The intrusion of alternate realities, parallel universes, or higher dimensions, which may be connected with the orange portal. Both the Apache and the Hopi have folk traditions which might be interpreted as depicting travel between different dimensions. <ref name="kelleher">Kelleher, Colm & Knapp, George: Hunt for the Skinwalker: Science Confronts the Unexplained at a Remote Ranch in Utah (Paraview Pocket Books, 2005 ISBN 1-4165-0521-0)</ref>Louis L'Amour’s Haunted Mesa is a best-selling novel dealing with similar concepts.

* That our understanding of reality is fundamentally flawed. This may be explained by Michael Talbot’s ideas that this is a Holographic Universe. Equally it could be explained by the simulation argument, as put forward by philosophers like Nick Bostrom, which posits that we are living within a very convincing computer program (as popularised by The Matrix).

* Unique geology which ties in the concept of Earthlights<ref name="persinger">Persinger, M.A. & Derr, J.S. (1985) Geophysical variables and behavior: XXIII. Relations between UFO reports within the Uinta Basin and local seismicity. Perceptual and Motor Skills. 60. 143 - 52.</ref> (aka Ghost lights). The fact that the Uintah Basin is the only known major concentration of Gilsonite (also known as uintahite or uintaite) may or may not have some bearing on this.

* The presence at the ranch of a small wormhole, time travel portal, or rip in space-time that allows technologies and genetically enhanced beings from another time to be transported into the present. This scenario would explain the diverse array of phenomena encountered at the ranch, but is problematic given current doubts about the viability of time travel.

[edit]

Similar sites

Skinwalker ranch is nearly unique but there are other hot-spots with a wide variety of paranormal phenomena (although researchers and investigators often focus on UFO activity):

* Dulce, NM. NIDS established a presence in the area in 1998 and 1999, based at Mount Archuleta, and interviews with local people, especially the Jicarilla Apache, revealed large numbers of similar reports (UFOs, Bigfoot, cattle mutilation and far stranger things).{{fix

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* The Yakama Indian Reservation, an area of increased alleged UFO activity. One family reported voices, strange noises, poltergeist activity, shadow men, flying balls of light, strange flying vehicles, disappearing people and telepathic voices.<ref name="yakima">Long, Greg: Examining the Earthlight Theory: The Yakima Ufo Microcosm (J. Allen Hynek Center, 1990 ISBN 0-929343-57-3)</ref>

* Elbert County, CO where one family encountered strange aircraft, numerous Bigfoot sightings, cattle mutilations, mysterious voices and encounters with humanoids and flying vehicles as well as a strange small box which stole a tree.<ref name="good">Good, Timothy: Alien Contact: Top-Secret Ufo Files Revealed. Chapter 3: Colorado Breakthrough (Quill, 1994 ISBN 0-688-13510-2)</ref>

* San Luis Valley where local journalist Chris O’Brien has charted a wide range of unusual phenomena and describes the area as a “paranormal Disneyland” [1]

* Sedona, Arizona which, as well as its famous vortex and New Age beliefs, has one ranch, belonging to the Bradshaw family, that has reported similar events including strange lights, Sasquatch, encounters with grays, cattle and dog mutilation and a portal through which they could see another world.<ref name="dongo">Dongo, Tom & Bradshaw, Linda: Merging Dimensions: The Opening Portals of Sedona (Light Technology Publications, 1995 ISBN 0-9622748-4-4)</ref>

It is worth noting that these locations share some of the following characteristics:

* Rural

* Lower than average incomes

* Nearby army bases

* Strong local presence of Native Americans; certain tribes have connections with a number of sites. The Navajo once occupied the San Luis valley, and the Ute allied with the Jicarilla Apache to displace them. The Ute homeland once stretched across Colorado, including Elbert Country to San Luis Valley, and crossed into New Mexico and Arizona. In fact, the majority of these hot-spots are closely connected to the Ute.

“Even as a long time user, I get amazed….” Kat King ;