News and Comment
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News and Comment The 'Green Cloud' and relation can be made. Since most rocket the Soviet UFO Scene launchings from Plesetsk are made for officially nonexistent military projects, OVIET SCIENTISTS are continu the odds of any official announcement Sing to struggle with the question range from slim to none. of UFOs, and some recent official dis However, a slight inkling of the closures have helped clear up a number truth has begun to emerge from official of famous Soviet sightings of the past. Soviet sources. The breach in the wall But in a society as secretive as the Soviet of secrecy first appeared in mid-1983 Union, all sorts of man-made stimuli when Pravda published an article about may cause massive "flying-saucer UFO sightings caused by launchings panics" and still remain classified, arti from Plesetsk (SI, vol. 8, no. 2). This ficially inflating the number of unidenti was all the more remarkable because it fied flying objects in the skies of the was the first mention of the 20-year-old USSR. missile center ever to appear in the Another good example appeared Soviet news media. early this year with a published account The following year, as had been of a "green cloud" UFO that reportedly the case in 1980 and 1981 (SI, vol. 7, followed an airliner over the far western no. 1), more attention was drawn to USSR. The description of a bright yel Plesetsk when some launchings were low light that shot a white ray to the seen from—of all places—South ground and then turned into concentric America. The rockets routinely fire a cones of light seemed almost arche fourth stage after circling Earth halfway, typical of the pseudo-UFOs seen in that and on March 16 and July 3, 1984, region for more than a decade. The such firings left huge glowing clouds in earlier ones have been traced to unan the evening skies of Argentina and nounced space-shots from the super- Chile. Nationwide panic followed, secret rocket center near Plesetsk, north presumably much to the embarrassment of Moscow (57, vol. 2, no. 1; vol 3. no. of Soviet space-officials who refused to 2). They engendered many of the same confess to being the cause of it all. perceptions, including spurious cases of Late that year, two top Soviet sci "radar corroboration." entists involved in the official study of This latest case could well be "atmospheric anomalous phenomena" another such event but, since the date publicly admitted that other spectacular of the encounter was not given, no cor Soviet UFOs—such as the giant "jelly- 306 THE SKEPTICAL INQUIRER, Vol. 9 YORK TIMES. THE NEW Lore Soviet Adds to cans*. .mi*"", Cloud ****?> ov,e t :=s&3Cx^£; f ™ots EMS :Sf SS-'s-^S^gSa^i^#ay UFUFOO GaGavefe, s ££*-~£-Jftlrsflffhem Escort ffl£ r ts*^-, jisr- "-* ss^' r,o,»--3u~ fish" over Petrozavodsk in 1977, along fied to protect Soviet state-secrets. with cases on June 14, 1980, and May Western UFO groups continue to 15, 1981—were due to space shots. Their endorse the validity of this charade for impetus may well have been the circula their own propagandistic purposes. tion, in a Russian-language emigre Similar restrictions surround many magazine named Our Country and the other space events in the USSR. (For World, published in Munich, of a example, the new SS-X-25 ICBM, pos detailed study of precisely those sibly a violation of SALT-2, is tested at "pseudo-UFOs" and the near-comical Plesetsk and could have been the cause official Soviet position of denying the of the recently reported "UFO" sight reality of the rocket base. Since Pravda ing.) Hence it should not be surprising had disclosed the existence of Plesetsk if this Soviet UFO, as with so many a year earlier, noted scientists Vsevolod others in that country, remains "uniden Troitskiy and Vladimir Migulin evi tified"—because Moscow wants it so. dently felt safe in telling the truth about these incidents. —James E. Oberg The full story, however, is unlikely to come out. It is inconceivable, for CSICOP Fellow James Oberg, author example, that the official Academy of of Red Sky in Orbit, UFOs and Outer Sciences UFO study (the so-called Space Mysteries, and other books, is Gindilis Report) of 1979 will ever be an authority on the Soviet space pro repudiated, since the 1967 "flying-saucer gram. wave" so carefully endorsed by the sci entists was actually caused by fireball re-entries of Soviet space-to-earth California Intact, Psychics Too, nuclear warheads (SI, vol. 7, no. 3)— Despite Flubs on '84 Predictions which Moscow had just signed an inter national treaty outlawing. Those At the start of each year, the Bay Area "UFOs" must remain forever unidenti Skeptics issues a report on psychics' Summer 1985 307 predictions for the previous year. Here, excerpted from the January BASIS, the newsletter of the Bay Area Skeptics, is a condensed version of their report on predictions for 1984. As usual, it prompted much media coverage. HE CALIFORNIA COAST didn't Tdrop into the Pacific Ocean, and President Reagan wasn't shot during his re-election campaign. John Glenn didn't get the Democratic nomination, and Ted Kennedy didn't elope to Europe with his secretary. These are only a few of the bizarre things that had been pre dicted for 1984 by famous "psychics" but failed to happen. confidently told a reporter for the San As in past years, the batting Jose Mercury News that during J984 average of these "psychics" was near the California coast would drop into zero, reports the Bay Area Skeptics, a the Pacific Ocean. The coast was still group dedicated to the critical examina there the last time we looked. tion of paranormal claims. While a few The famous psychic Jeane Dixon, predictions did come true, especially of Washington, D.C., likewise predicted those that are not particularly difficult disasters for 1984 that failed to occur. to guess, and while many predictions This past January, she told a reporter were so vague that it is impossible to for the Baltimore Sun that her vision say for sure whether they came true or for 1984 was too grim to talk about. "I not, there was not a single correct pre hope you can take it, because this guy diction that was both very specific and Orwell knew what he was talking about. very surprising. The world isn't ready for all the things For example, many psychics pre 1 know," said Dixon, who refused to dicted the re-election of President be more specific. Her 1984 New Year's Reagan, but Reagan was of course a predictions published in the tabloid The heavy favorite. Likewise, you didn't Star were less ominous, predicting that really need psychic powers to predict Fidel Castro's agents would take over that Mondale would be the Democratic two small countries in Latin America, nominee. Not one psychic, however, that there would be naval battles in the predicted the genuinely surprising events Caribbean between U.S.-backed and of 1984, such as the assassination of Soviet-backed forces, and that athletic Indira Gandhi, the sudden death of scandals involving drugs would "leave Richard Burton, Gary Hart's surprising the outcome of the Olympic games in victories in the Democratic primaries, doubt." Dixon also predicted that and the massive poison gas disaster in Richard Burton was "very likely" to step Bhopal, India. back into Elizabeth Taylor's life, failing The most dramatic prediction made somehow to foresee Burton's death for 1984 by a psychic here in the Bay during 1984. Area was made by Woods Mattingley, In December 1983, San Francisco's who runs a group called "Seeker's prestigious Commonwealth Club invited Quest" in San Jose. Almost two years local psychic Barbara Mousalam, who ago, in January of 1983, Mattingley claims to have been 80 percent accurate 308 THE SKEPTICAL INQUIRER, Vol. 9 in the past, to present her predictions it back after this latest batch of failed for 1984. Mousalam did no better than predictions. one might expect to do by guessing. Dallas psychic John Catchings, She predicted an assassination attempt who claims to have helped the police against President Reagan on a campaign locate missing persons, predicted that a tour during October, that the Republi vaccine against AIDS would be cans would lose control of the Senate developed and that Ted Kennedy would in the election, that the draft would be elope in Europe with a secretary in his reinstated, the electoral college would office. be abolished, the U.S.-Soviet arms Miami psychic Micki Dahne pre agreement would be signed, Khomeini dicted that a huge earthquake in Cali would be out of power in Iran, and a fornia would unearth a major new gold "guarded but stable peace" would be vein, triggering a new gold rush, and achieved in the Middle East—none of that Mr. T would be struck by a light which happened during 1984. Mousa ning bolt attracted to his gold jewelry. lam did make one good prediction— Many predictions by psychics were that a woman would run for vice presi so vague that it is difficult to say for dent on the Democratic ticket. How sure whether they came true or not. ever, political analyst Jack Anderson For example, Jeane Dixon's prediction made the same prediction in his article that Nancy Reagan "will have one of in Parade magazine, "Headlines You the busiest and most trying summers of Could See in 1984," indicating the her life" is not clearly true or false.