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ENCOUNTERS |
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UFO close encounter case on Schuss Mt. Road, Antrim County, MI.
Interview with James C., September 13, 1973 by undersheriff Bacstrom and deputy W.O. Smith. This report has to do with the interview of an observer and the appearance of a quote "FLYING SAUCER" in the Antrim County area Sep. 13,1973.
| Bacstrom: | What time of day did you observe this object? |
| Observer: | 11:45 p.m. it was a moonlight night. It was very bright and one could see without headlights or anything. I was returning from a friends home in Swiss Village. I made a left-hand turn from Cedar River Drive, onto Schuss Mt. Rd. heading south. Got approximately 500 feet south of the river, when everything electrical on my truck quit; headlights, tape player, engine, everything came to a stop. The truck slowly rolled to a stop, when I stepped out to see what was happening, truck being placed in "park", taking me by surprise when it started rolling backwards and I had to get back in to stop it. At this time I sighted an aluminum - like object much the shape of the planet Saturn, a ball with rings around it or there about with either windows or lights around the lower perimeter of the things. It made no noise. It was approximately 30 to 45 feet in diameter and it flew away silently. I saw no indication of any landing in the road, no marks, no noise, nothing to be seen through the windows or lights (which ever the may be) yellow glowing objects around the bottom of it. After the thing left, the truck restarted on its' own key. But I had no taillights, no headlight, the fuse was blown from the taillights, the headlights, the bulbs themselves were blown and part of the wiring harness was burned. I was a little shaken up, I did have bright lights (headlights). I went on to the corner of Schuss Mt. And M-88 and I pulled off to the side of the road. I removed the cigarette lighter fuse and came up with taillights. Nothing wrong with the taillights except the fuse was blown. I still have had a few electrical problems wit the wires. The truck in no way needed a tool or battery. It started on it's own battery, it ran good, the only problem being the lights. I saw no beings nor hear any noise. |
| Bacstrom: | About what year is this truck and approximately how many miles are on it? |
| Observer: | It is a 1972 Chevrolet and it has 24,000 miles on it. |
| Bacstrom: | When this unknown object took off, in what direction did it go? At what height did it apparently travel? |
| Observer: | It went right up the powerline easement and crossed the river and then gained altitude and went over the hills. I would say about 100 feet in the air as far as I could see. |
| Bacstrom: | That was in a norhterly direction, correct? |
| Observer: | Northeast, I believe. |
| Bacstrom: | Northeast direction, was there any evidence in the dust of the road of any exhaust as a propulsion type blowing? |
| Observer: | Nothing that I saw, Howard Runyan was talking to me and went out the next morning with a camera and was going to see if he found any signs and he found nothing. |
| Bacstrom: | The question is; how far was this object from you, when you first saw it? When it took off? |
| Observer: | I really didn't see it until the truck started to stop and I approached it under momentum to approximately 300 feet. |
| Deputy: | O.K. I was wondering why you didn't observe it until after you got out of the truck. It's odd you didn't notice it until after you got out of the truck. |
| Observer: | The reason as far as I know is that it had no bright lights about it to draw my attention and in that area I generally watch the river and power line easement, because I see a lot of deer in that area and I wasn't really looking up the road. |
| Deputy: | I think you mentioned before, it was about the full width of the road and you mentioned it was a ball shape. It looked like a saucer. |
| Observer: | No, it was like I said, it looked like planet Saturn or a ball with a ring around it, not a separate ring, but more like a half ball above and below a solid ring. The windows or light which ever they may have been on the underside of the ball, not the ring but below the ring. |
| Deputy: | These were yellow colored or amber colored? |
| Observer: | Right. |
| Bacstrom: | You weren't able to see in them or? |
| Observer: | No there was nothing to make me think I was looking inside this thing or that I would see people or anything like that. It was hard to discern if they were really lights. It could have just possibly been lights. |
| Deputy: | Were they only one color that you could remember, the yellow? |
| Observer: | Yes, they were bright as to distract you or draw your attention. More like a house window or something but they did not project a beam or nothing like that. Like you have a light burning in the house, you would have a beam of light in the surrounding area. This really didn't happen there. Things happened rather fast. Felt rather foolish when the truck rolled back down the ill towards me as I got out and I had to scramble there to get it back in park. |
| Bacstrom: | You had an automatic transmission then, right? |
| Observer: | Yes it had an automatic transmission. |
| Deputy: | Do you remember how far apart your reflections were? |
| Observer: | I would say an off hand figure, they were probable two feet up and across two feet, two feet across with three feet between and three feet high, oblong with rounded corners. Probably half as far between them as they were wide. |
| Bacstrom: | How old are you? And do you do more than average drinking? |
| Observer: | (Laughing) I don't drink as much as average I would say. I had went to a Zoning Commission meeting that night with Mr. Ed.______who lives in Swiss village and we had went to his house and the only thing I had to drink was a Pepsi. |
| Deputy: | Do you by any chance have the old headlights you had taken out? |
| Observer: | I took them out myself at the Mancelona Gulf station. I'm sure they're gone. Like I say there are two or three spots on the truck wires and have given me trouble since then. The insulation, the truck was repaired on a Saturday. He claimed when he drove the truck from Mancelona and turned on my road the lights went out. It's got snowplow lights on it, so he switched over to the snowplow lights and drove right to the house and I went out the next morning and they burned but the breaker kicked out and they shorted and I had to take a piece of wire. The truck has never had a fire, there is no reason for it to keep coming up with, it's never had problems. To this day there is no problems wit turn signals, or stop lights or anything like that. I haven't had to put another fuse in the taillights. We both had light bulbs burn out, I had got around to thinking straight again I had brights but I was running on low beams at the time and the brights worked on the snowplow lights. There have been no problems with those circuits of the truck lights. But the truck lights have shorted four or five times in the past month. |
| Deputy: | How about the ignition? You said the motor stopped. |
| Observer: | The tape player quit and everything electrical just went dead. |
| Deputy: | Was the key in the "off" position? |
| Observer: | The key was "on" and when this thing left I didn't shut the key off. |
| Deputy: | After it got out of sight? |
| Observer: | The tape player came back on in the truck, the generator, the oil light and regulators came on, all on the dashboard but no headlights or taillights of course. The truck started on it's own battery. |
| Deputy: | Did it start normally? Did you have problems? |
| Observer: | No. No problems. The key on it started as usual. The following Monday I did talk to Pat Pugsley, sales engineer for consumers Power, he was acutely interested to pin it right down to the exact time, to see maybe they were having something funny going on that they couldn't explain. Ed. Reese, later I believe it was Sunday and he said ½ hour after I left his house, his t.v. messed up for a minute or so, real bad. This would coincide pretty well, because leaving his house I went to Swiss village club House. I had a fuel tank up there for the machinery and I got 20 gallons of fuel oil and 5 gallons of gas in a can and probably two miles of travel involved so give or take a minute, it should have been about the same time. |
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