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Alien UFO Podcast
Canada's UFOs: Declassified
00:58:28
In this episode Chris Rutkowski is talking about his book 'Canada's UFOs: Declassified'.
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- [00:01]
Chris Rutkowski
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- [03:00]
Simon Bown
This is an Alien UFO Podcast classic episode and I'm your host, Simon Bown. There are a number of UFO episodes that I released on the podcast a few years ago that are full of great information and I thought it would be a good idea to share them for listeners who may have missed them the first time around. This week I'm talking to Chris Rutkowski about his book Canada's UFOs Declassified. Hi, Chris, thanks a lot for coming on the podcast.
- [03:29]
Chris Rutkowski
Glad to be here.
- [03:30]
Simon Bown
So we're going to be talking about your book. It's called Canada's UFOs Declassified. So when you say declassified, can you tell us what that's all about?
- [03:40]
Chris Rutkowski
Well, this book is sort of a deep dive into many of the UFO reports and cases that were found in the documents available in libraries and Archives Canada that are part of a collection known as the National Research Council UFO files, the non meteoric files, as they used to call them. And many of these documents come from the Royal Canadian Air Force, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and a number of other organizations at and many of them were classified as high as secret, but over the years had their classifications reduced for one way or another. And a number of individuals, including myself, filed what in the United States is called freedom, Sorry, the FOIA Request 3 of Information Request. In Canada, it's simply called the access to information request of the government to try and obtain files that would otherwise not have been made public. And it's unique in that I also in the book reproduce many of the documents. I think more than 50 documents are reproduced in the book so that the reader can get a chance to see for his or herself exactly what we're talking about.
- [05:06]
Simon Bown
When were they released? Has it been over the decades or was it in one lump?
- [05:12]
Chris Rutkowski
Well, Canada actually is a bit of a conundrum when it comes to UFO files in the United States. Most people into ufology are familiar with Project Blue Book and some of the other projects that the United States Air Force was involved with. And Project Blue Book ceased functioning in 1969. And after that point, there's very little information as to what was being done by the United States military up until fairly recently when I'm sure everybody has seen the videos of tic tacs and whatnot flying around off the coast of California and on the east coast of the United States. And they come from the mid 2000s to relatively recently. But up until that point between roughly 1970 to, let's say, the mid-2000s, there really was no information on what was going on. Although a lot of diligent researchers have managed to track down some government records and military records of sightings in Canada. The various official agencies were relatively transparent in that when the National Research Council was receiving UFO reports from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the Royal Canadian Air Force, every year it would turn its records over to the Archives of Canada, which were then made available to the public. So we actually have a complete record of what was being reported as UFOs and before then, flying saucers in Canada from the 1940s right up until today. And it's quite a remarkable record when we see the state of the investigations, the state of the reports, what was being done, who was reporting them, and what agencies were involved. So it's quite fascinating to see the difference between the Canadian scene and the United States.
- [07:21]
Simon Bown
Have you read all of these files? I mean, how many are there?
- [07:24]
Chris Rutkowski
There are quite a few. For this book, I went through somewhere around 10,000 separate documents that were scanned and made available online by libraries and archives Canada about 10 years ago. What had happened is that the archives were available to the public if they wanted to drop in to the archives itself in Ottawa. And I had visited there a number of times to look through the UFO files. But because there was such an interest and a demand, and because it was sort of a culturally interesting thing, the Archives of Canada decided to embarked on quite an effort to scan as many of the UFO records as they could. And so they ended up doing somewhere around 9,000 separate documents covering a period between the 1940s and 19, if I'm not mistaken, 1980. And they are. They're quite an interesting treasure trove. Many cases that most people have never heard of or never seen, even though the files themselves were made available or they're not the easiest to navigate online. And even in person, you'd have to go through many boxes to try and find some interesting data. So it's. It's quite a challenge. But I've managed to pull out some of the more interesting cases, I think.
- [08:53]
Simon Bown
And did you find military reports, or do you feel that they were just sent in another direction? And there's a military kind of, you know, like the Blue Book, but Canadian version, but actually it's classified, so we've never heard of it.
- [09:11]
Chris Rutkowski
Well, there were two Canadian projects sort of parallel to Blue Book. There was one called Project Magnet, and the other one Project Second Story. Second Story was under the Defense Research Board of Canada and had a number of members that were part of the Department of Transport and other agencies and they were looking at UFO reports that were being filed with the department back then. It was still flying saucers of course, and a lot are military records. In fact, I would have to say that the vast majority of the sightings reported in, in many of the instances were from military observers from Royal Canadian Air Force personnel, Canadian Forces personnel and Royal Canadian Mounted Police who all themselves reported unusual experiences and sightings. So there's many reports from citizens and the public. But I was actually quite impressed and astonished with how many cases there were of reports by pretty good observers, pilots, air traffic control operators, police and so forth.
- [10:29]
Simon Bown
Did you get the idea reading them, that there's that kind of viewpoint where they say, I think the British government had this thing where they said the military doesn't investigate UFOs because they're not a defense concern. I think the Americans say the same sort of thing. Sorry, Americans, I should say the usa because you're American, aren't you?
- [10:51]
Chris Rutkowski
No, yeah, Canadian is a subtle difference from Americans, but yeah, there is a policy like that. In fact, if you were to ask the national defence in Canada today, they would respond with something similar that they consider the subject of UFOs or as Americans call it, UAPs now not of significant security interest. But at the same time there are a lot of interesting cases within these files and that show the Royal Canadian Air Force was doing some in depth investigations, quite in depth investigations of quite a few cases. And to this day there are some military cases that do pop up that were received by the Canadian Air Force and the Canadian Forces that we're curious enough for them to take a closer look at. But I don't believe there's actually an investigating agency currently in Canada at any level that we know of anyways that would parallel anything that would be something in the past. The Canadian experience was a little bit different than the United States. In the United States, the view that UFOs were some sort of threat or military threat or threat from a different country, perhaps the Russians really prevailed. The Cold War had a tremendous effect on the study and research into UFOs in the United States. What happened was that the, the National Research Council of Canada was given the responsibility of looking into UFO reports in the 1960s when the Royal Canadian Air Force kind of because of its close affiliation with the United States, I mean in North America NORAD is shared by and partnered by both countries that when the National Research Council took over the investigation, I mean it would be the equivalent say of the British Museum taking Over the investigation of UFO reports and their viewers, at least in Canada, was that it was a scientific problem, not a defense issue, but a scientific problem. So a lot of the people involved in the investigation and receipt of reports were scientists themselves, astronomers, meteoriticists, cosmologists, and so forth. And so their approach to the problem was quite different than the American experience. And I think that contributed to the fact that we have such a good record of the cases that were being received. But I think what happened is because the scientists were investigating, they were taking it less seriously than they would if there was a defense concern in the United States, for example. And in fact, I would have to say that the approach of many of the scientists in Canada was that of antagonism towards witnesses, where they would actively respond to witnesses with questions about their sobriety, for example, and investigations reports. And some of the files actually contained notes about some of the witnesses, you know, may have had, you know, of low quality character and things like that. So it's quite interesting to read some of that documentation and a little disturbing in some ways too.
- [14:40]
Simon Bown
So I wanted to talk to you about one or two of the cases in the book. There's one that stood out to me which was talks of fragments of a space vehicle found near Wollaston Lake in 1968. And there's a quote in the book that says examination revealed the exhibit had likely formed part of a vehicle that traveled in outer space. So what happened there?
- [15:05]
Chris Rutkowski
The Wallace Lake cases is quite interesting where that in a fairly rugged area of, of Canada in the west and northwest, some hunters, I believe, came upon these large pieces of metal that had structure to them, sort of like not quite a honeycomb, but certainly the appearance of cushions. And they were very unused. They were just found in the middle of a forest. And when they were reported and eventually examined by the Royal Canadian Air Force at the time, there was some concern as to what this. These pieces were. The photographs that are available on file do show something very unusual. And with all the interest these days of UFO crashes and metamaterials. And what are UFOs really made of and what would happen if a crash was actually reported? What, what would the officials do? We have actually case studies in Canada, actually several case studies of, of pieces of things that were found and thought to be UFOs. The prevailing notion, after some testing and examination, that the Wollaston Lake pieces were probably from a satellite, either American or, or Russian, that happened to come down over Canada and had broken apart upon reentry. And it entailed quite A lot of discussion and documentation. There are several photographs and some detailed analysis of the incident. This happened in the, in the 1960s, right during you know, again the Cold War. And it really makes, makes some interesting reading to think that you know, these pieces of something came down and thankfully in a, in a not very populated area, but one can imagine if something had come down in you know, closer to a city, what, what the consequences might have been.
- [17:18]
Simon Bown
So were there many reports from commercial airline crew?
- [17:23]
Chris Rutkowski
One of the interesting things about these cases is that there's many reports from pilots. There are reports of, from military pilots as well as commercial pilots who had reported seeing UFOs over Canadian airspace. There's cases of American pilots seeing UFOs over Canadian airspace. And those reports actually became part of the, the Canadian documentation, not actually blue book. And conversely there's cases in blue book that were actually not part of the Canadian UFO report system. So it's, it's sort of a, a mixture in trying to piece together the jigsaw puzzle of what actually was going on in terms of UFO reports in Canada.
- [18:11]
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- [19:19]
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- [19:50]
Simon Bown
If there's so many pilots seeing stuff, it seems weird that the, the authorities, the people who control pilots and, you know, airlines don't take it more seriously. I mean, just basically for a fact that it could be dangerous if there's things flying around up there and they don't know what they are.
- [20:09]
Chris Rutkowski
Well, it turns out that in Canada, we do have a very consistent record of what pilots have been seeing. In fact, an agency called Transport Canada, which is involved in all the aviation aspects of commercial and non commercial transport, requires pilots. And we actually found the documentation that attests to this, that all pilots should report any sightings of unidentified flying objects. And the documentation and the regulation actually says unidentified flying object to Transport Canada and other relevant agencies such as the airports themselves, the airports authorities, with the idea that there might be some concern in terms of security and safety. And just even over the past 20 years or so, there's at least 500 separate incidents that are reported by pilots in Transport Canada files that attests to many pilots are seeing some unusual objects, ranging from lights in the sky to something more structured, to things that are described as drones, but clearly are not drones. Drones flying at astounding altitudes such as 15,000ft and things like that. So there is a consistent record in this regard and, and even with regard to commercial pilots, just last year in 2021, there was a Delta Airlines pilot, commercial pilot, who was flying a regular route from Anchorage, Alaska, down to Minneapolis in the United States. And to do so, they actually, of course, have to fly directly over Canada. In this case, over Saskatchewan. And while this pilot was over Saskatchewan, he reported seeing unusual lights at an altitude further above him that he was flying at. I believe he was at 35,000ft. So he radioed air traffic control in Saskatchewan asking what the lights were that he was seeing. And air traffic control promptly reported that there was nothing on radar, there is nothing that should be anywhere near him. And the pilot and the air traffic control operator puzzled over this for a while. And this pilot's experience was duly filed and noted with Transport Canada. And we have the record that attests that, you know, something was reported by this pilot over Canada. And your issue about safety and concerns and security is well taken. Because if, for example, the pilot was mistaken and there really was nothing there, then we have to wonder what the training for pilots is, Especially if commercial pilots are transporting hundreds of passengers and they're. They're not completely aware of their surroundings. If there's something wrong with the technology, the radar is malfunctioning, for example, that's certainly a concern. And if there is a. An actual object there that shouldn't be there, whether it's even in the case that it's some sort of wayward drone at 35 or 40,000ft, that should be of a concern. And in any of those situations, I think one could note that the subject of UFOs and unidentified aerial phenomena should be taken much more seriously, which, in fact, is being done today.
- [23:51]
Simon Bown
The lights that he saw, that could have been a craft and it was not picked up on radar. But there are cases in the book that were picked up on radar.
- [24:00]
Chris Rutkowski
Indeed, there's some fascinating cases of pilots over, I believe, Quebec a number of years ago, where the objects were seen on radar from the ground and also from aircraft. And commercial pilots were querying the air traffic control as to what these objects are being seen. And these objects would move ahead of the aircraft, literally fly circles around the aircraft, and then take off again. And when you've got many cases like that of pilots making these reports, again, one must really question as to whether there was something really there or not. And in either case, that's something to be concerned about.
- [24:45]
Simon Bown
It's weird, isn't it, thinking about if this is extraterrestrials and what is happening with their technology, if sometimes we can get them on radar and sometimes we can't.
- [24:57]
Chris Rutkowski
Well, it is. And that's one of the great paradoxes of ufology, that sometimes the UFOs behave in ways that don't make any sense whatsoever. I'm sure people have seen the videos of the Tic Tacs and the Nimitz reports from the United States going back a few years now. And in those situations, according to the witnesses, those objects behaved in ways that. That were literally impossible to the laws of physics. Now, whether that is actually true or not, or perhaps it was just an illusion caused by the distances and the way the camera and radar were functioning, we're not sure, but it does still say that there's something that should be looked into in a little more detail.
- [25:45]
Simon Bown
There's that idea that if you see a ufo, it's because they want to be seen. They're perfectly capable of hiding themselves.
- [25:53]
Chris Rutkowski
Well, and even things like why do UFOs have lights whatsoever? Aircraft have lights because it's regulated by the various aviation industries. But there would be no reason whatsoever why UFOs would have to have different colored lights and lights at all, especially if they didn't want to be seen. So it certainly is part of the fascinating mysteries associated with ufology.
- [26:19]
Simon Bown
You mentioned just now about how the UFOs do some weird things. And there's a great story in the book you have with Nurse Kendall, who's working a night shift at Cowichan District Hospital.
- [26:32]
Chris Rutkowski
Yeah, this goes back to, I believe it was 1970 or 1980. I don't, my memory's going. But it was on New Year's Eve. The nurse was, was working a late shift and she was attending to a patient, looked out the window, I was going to draw the blinds and saw for all intents and purposes was a flying saucer literally outside the window of the hospital. And she was on one of the upper floors. And this object was so close that she could see into it. It was, you know, a classic Hollywood style flying saucer with a clear dome. And in this dome she could see two humanoid creatures that seemed to be operating some control devices that were flying. This object, it didn't seem to have any exhaust or wings or anything. And she called one of the other nurses to come look. One managed to come in time before this thing flew away. A few others managed to see something, you know, a little further in the distance. And she drew a, you know, some very detailed drawings. She herself was fascinated with the control device because she came from a, an automotive family that were very familiar with race cars and so forth and didn't quite understand the, the steering and flying mechanism that was clearly visible through this, this dome on the, on the top of the disc. But these, these two entities that looked vaguely humanoid in some sort of one piece suits. One looked at her and realized that they were being seen and uh, quickly adjusted the flying distance and flew off. And this case was investigated by Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the Royal Canadian Air Force as well in some detail. They interrogated every one of the nurses who was on duty that day. The area was checked out. Actually, I visited the site a few times, most recently just I think five years ago, just to get the lay of the land. And you know, I really have no idea what, what to make of the case myself. The nurses were absolutely convinced that what they had seen. And we're left with these very strange close up encounters with, with something that didn't Seem to be explainable as anything from this earth.
- [29:23]
Simon Bown
Yeah, it's so weird, isn't it? I mean, if you think about it, why would a UFO be so close to a hospital? And then the occupants seemed to be a bit freaked out when they were spotted and they wanted to get away, but it just seems weird that they were there in the first place.
- [29:39]
Chris Rutkowski
Yeah, I would have to agree. What would be the purpose of that? What would be the, the, the reason for, for any of that? So it's, it's again, it's part of the mystery and I think that's what, what attracts people to the phenomenon that there are so many unusual, very unusual aspects of this that, that don't make any sense. And yet we have such, you know, such interesting testimony and
- [30:13]
Simon Bown
the.
- [30:14]
Chris Rutkowski
Where people were absolutely convinced that something had seen before their eyes. Just go back. This was 1970, New Year's news, even in today of 1970. So it's a, you know, it goes back a few years. We haven't had any interesting cases like this in Canada since then. But you know, one has to wonder what exactly went on back then.
- [30:34]
Simon Bown
And that was a multiple witness sighting, which is always better for researchers, isn't it, to get all these different viewpoints?
- [30:41]
Chris Rutkowski
Absolutely, yeah.
- [30:43]
Simon Bown
How many of all the files that you read were multiple witness sightings?
- [30:49]
Chris Rutkowski
Oh dear goodness. I'd have to say at least half. There are, you know, quite a lot of cases where RCMP officers were. Police officers are usually two officers to a car. And there are cases where they were together and had seen a ufo. There's many cases where civilians were driving a car full of, you know, a family, for example, on vacation. They would seen things, had seen things. There are pilots and co. Pilots are usually flying together in an aircraft. So multiple witness sightings are actually very plentiful in these files.
- [31:30]
Simon Bown
Did you get a feeling that the people who were taking the reports say if it was policemen or whoever had a kind of. They thought it was a joke. Not so much the person we were reporting it was trying to make a joke, but they just thought, I don't know why I even bother writing this stuff out because I think you say if the report did not seem to be a meteor, they just pretty much ignored it.
- [31:55]
Chris Rutkowski
Certainly that was the attitude with the National Research Council of Canada. I mentioned that scientists generally weren't all that impressed with reports of UFOs. However, what had happened was that the National Research Council of Canada really didn't have access to a lot of investigation bodies or investigators across the country. Canada of course, is quite large, much larger than Britain. And, you know, the distances involved are several thousand miles or kilometers across from where a UFO might be seen to where one is reported to the organization. So the National Research Council of Canada enlisted the aid of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police because of course, there were police detachments literally across Canada from coast to coast and into the north. And so that it was the actual police who were doing the investigating of the reports and then sending the reports to Ottawa for analysis by the National Research Council. Now, if a report was received directly to the National Research Council, they did relatively little with it. But very often the RCMP were concerned enough that they took the time to interview the witnesses. Sometimes in the files there's documentation several pages long of question and answers from the RCMP constables interviewing some of the witnesses. And for the most part, there's very little editorializing on the part of the rcmp. But occasionally, you know, some would say, you know, that Mr. Jones seemed reliable, or he's well known and respected in the community and would have no reason to make up the stories. And one can just imagine that someone sees a UFO and makes the report and a police officer shows up. Well, one would be well advised not to make up fanciful stories to a police officer who's standing right in front of you or sitting in your living room. And that lends to the credibility of the cases themselves. There are certainly some very, very unbelievable, literally unbelievable cases in the files, but those are very few and far between. Most are very matter of fact testimony from many people who are very good observers in some cases, making eyewitness testimony reports to police investigators on behalf of the scientists in Ottawa.
- [34:42]
Simon Bown
One of the cases that really stood out for me was the Falcon Lake case.
- [34:47]
Chris Rutkowski
The Falcon Lake case is probably one of the best documented cases in Canada, and I would argue anywhere in the world. What happened was that back in 1967, in May of 1967, a fellow, a nice chap by the name of Stefan Mihalik, was doing some amateur prospecting. He was a bit of a rock hound. He just liked collecting rocks. And he traveled to an area close to the Ontario border in Manitoba. Very, very rugged part of the Canadian Shield. Many rocks that needed climbing and heavily forested. And he had set out from his hotel room in a small town called Falcon Lake, which is actually a resort area, walked into the forest and had spent some time that morning poking around at interesting rocks. Around lunchtime, he stopped for lunch on a bit of a cliff overlooking a beaver pond and on which there were a Lot of geese. And all of a sudden the geese were startled by something and took off. And he thought perhaps there were bears nearby because there actually are bears in that area. And he looked around, couldn't see bears, but in the sky there were two very bright objects moving in the sky, one of which was descending. And when it finally descended and appeared to land on a flat rock somewhere around 150ft away from him or so it was disc shaped, classic Hollywood style flying saucer. 35ft across, 12 to 15ft high, domed, with a light coming from its top. And he watched this as he crouched down behind some bushes and wondered what this was. He was actually a military person, had a military background and wondered if this was some sort of American secret space device. This was just at the very beginning of the Apollo Moon program. I think the tragic Apollo 1 accident had occurred perhaps just a few months earlier. And he was convinced it was some sort of American craft because, you know, what else could it been? And he thought perhaps this was a test run of a landing craft from the United States that went off course and ended up in Canada. He watched this for a while, sketched it on his sketching pad. And as he did, he saw that there was a, a little door that opened in the side of this craft. And from inside he thought he could hear the sound of some voices. So he thought, well, perhaps these are the Americans. So he stood up and bravely walked towards this craft and shouted out, hey you Yankee boys, come on out. I'll give you a hand fixing your broken down flying machine. And the voices stopped and he thought, oh, maybe it's not American. So he happened to be a bit of a polyglot. And he called out in Russian the same greeting, and no response. And he called out in a few other European languages and got no response. And by this time he was right in front of this object and he reached out and touched it with his gloved hand and the glove actually started burning and melting. And. And there was also a kind of an exhaust vent like you would find from a radiator just to the side of this little doorway or window. And when he had touched the side of it and looked inside this door shut, the entire craft rotated. So this exhaust vent or radiator was right in front of him. And a blast of hot gas hit him in the chest as this thing took off, set fire to the pine needles and leaves that were nearby, and the thing took off and flew away. Well, Mr. Mihalik's clothes were on fire. He quickly took off his shirt and his undershirt, Started feeling very, very ill. Had the wherewithal to stamp out some of the smoldering leaves and pine needles. Managed to make it back to civilization. Ended up at a hospital in a Canadian city nearby where he was examined by emergency room doctors there and found to have first degree burns. His chest hair was burned. And then also there was some unusual red dots on his lower abdomen that were also very raised and painful. He reported this duly and within a matter of hours, the Royal Canadian Air Force investigated, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police investigated. In fact, there's something like 300 pages of documentation that we have from these two agencies that took this case very seriously. They interviewed Mr. Holik himself in his sick bed. We have the medical records, we have records of interrogators who also interviewed his family, his workplace. His children were followed home from school by investigators too, just in case they were trying to break the story. It's quite remarkable. But then there's all the physiological and physical evidence. There was actually radioactive material found at the site when investigators managed to find the site. And again, as we mentioned with the case to the Walliston Lake, there's a lot of discussion these days about pieces of UFOs and what do you do and how do you investigate it and how are these pieces handled and metamaterials and so forth? Well, these are. This case had radioactive debris found at the site. In fact, there are pieces of radioactive silver that seemed to be melted into a crack in the rock over which this UFO had hovered. These pieces were tested by metallurgists both in the United States and at Canadian institutions. And we have full reports on those and we have the medical records. As I mentioned, Mr. Mihalik also went for a complete medical examination at the famous Mayo Clinic in the United States. We have those records, including a psychiatric evaluation. And even the psychiatrist made the observation that Mr. Mihalik isn't the type of person to make up stories. You put all this together and you have really quite an amazing case that has not really been appreciated by the ufological community. And the site is still visitable. In fact, it's possibly Canada's version of Roswell, with the exception that we actually know exactly where this happened and there's been GPS pinpointing of the site and people can come to this site and visit it. It's actually in an isolated area. You have to go by horseback through the Canadian wilderness for about 45 minutes to get there. So that even that suggests that it wouldn't be the easiest to Fake or hoax. But at the same time, the, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the Rockney Air Force both made statements in their records that there is no explanation for this particular case.
- [43:01]
Simon Bown
And the silver was very pure, wasn't it? And it looked like brackets because you've got pictures of it in the book.
- [43:09]
Chris Rutkowski
Yeah. In fact, very curious as radioactive silver material was almost pure silver, commercial grade silver. I mean, there would be, in the Canadian Shield there are some veins of silver here and there, but they would be very raw and they certainly wouldn't be refined. This was, you know, refined silver, commercially grade silver. One that looks like a W shaped bracket, but there's very few brackets that would be made that would be pure silver, of course. So again, why would a, a UFO land and shed off pieces of itself and take off again in the middle of the Canadian wilderness? Especially something that would leave behind radioactivity. It's a very, very strange case.
- [44:01]
Simon Bown
I believe when he first headed out from the wilderness, he was on a road and he met up with a policeman. And the policeman thought he was drunk and didn't help him.
- [44:11]
Chris Rutkowski
Yes. And we have the investigation records are very thorough. There's interviews with the, with the police that met him on the road. He. He stumbled out of the wilderness onto a highway where a policeman encountered him. And the policeman just thought that he was drunk because he was naked from the waist up. He was very, very dizzy. You can just imam. He had apparently vomited just previous to that, so he didn't present a very appealing sight. So the fact that the policeman thought that he was perhaps inebriated is understandable. But there is some inconsistencies in the policeman's testimony. The policeman said that Mr. Mhalek's HAP was, was gray when it in fact was brown. And the policeman also thought that Mr. Mihalik looked like he had just rubbed his face with ashes and didn't seem to be injured. Whereas when he went to the hospital, he was definitely treated by the emergency physicians for some serious burns. So there's some very unusual things even in the testimony of some of the investigating officers.
- [45:35]
Simon Bown
And one of the things I think you mentioned earlier was about if the reports were coming in from people, they question them, like, how much have you been drinking? And this is something about UFO sightings. People might often say, oh, he was probably just drunk. But you know, in my younger years I might have got very drunk sometimes, but I never hallucinated anything.
- [45:58]
Chris Rutkowski
And I agree that's the fact that some witnesses were questioned as to whether they had Too much to drink. It doesn't seem consistent. What we know about witness testimony that hallucinations, unless you're, you know, have had close to fatal ingestions of alcohol, wouldn't be necessarily hallucinating. You might be a little bit happier than usual, but you certainly wouldn't necessarily be making up stories of, of such incredible detail. That's, it's really quite remarkable. And I have to say, in all my years of investigating UFOs and I've been looking into reports since the 1970s, very rarely have I come across a witness who obviously had been drinking. And it was very easy to tell from the testimony and from the witness, his or herself, that something was not quite right. And those cases are very, very few and far between. Most witnesses that come forward with UFO sightings really are just puzzled. They want to know what they've seen and are actually turning to UFO investigators and ufologists as kind of therapists to reassure them that, you know, they weren't crazy, that they had actually seen something and perhaps there is a reasonable explanation for what was seen.
- [47:23]
Simon Bown
So can I ask for your opinion on what Paul Hellyer said? Because you've got this quote in the book from 2013 at the Citizens Hearings on Disclosure and if I'll just read for the listeners what he says and just tell us what your opinion of his of this is. He said at least four species of alien and have been visiting Earth for thousands of years. Some of the aliens hail from the Zeta Reticuli, the Pleiades, Orion, Andromeda and Altair star systems and may have different agendas. And he says that There are live ETs on earth at the present time and at least two of them are working with the United States government. Now, from Paul Hellyer, who was high up in the Canadian military, that's quite a thing to say.
- [48:11]
Chris Rutkowski
It is. And that's one of the very curious aspects of ufology where you get authorities speaking about things that, that seem incredible, but they have to be put into perspective in that Paul Hellyer was in fact the Minister of National Defense for Canada up until 1967. In fact, he had. Left his position as Minister of National Defence just previous to some of the cases in 1967 in Canada. I think he was still ministered when Stefan Michalik had his experience, but was gone by some of the later investigations. And after that point he had certainly not had his security clearance. And so for a period of 50 years almost, he really did not have any knowledge of any classified information regarding UFOs. He admitted in fact, in one of his books that his own UFO experience, which occurred in Ontario was probably due, oddly enough, considering we were just talking about alcohol to drinking too much alcohol. And so he had been a bit of a skeptic for many years. And in fact, when he was questioned about his time in office in national defense about UFOs, he said that he had never seen anything interesting cross his desk. However, and I note this in the book, that we found evidence that he had actually ordered a ministerial inquiry into at least one UFO incident and evidence that he had been involved in in others. So we wonder why he had not been truthful in this regard. And then we get to 2013 and he had actually been already public talking about UFOs and his opinions and making very unusual statements about aliens from various star systems, but calling one of them Andromeda. And Andromeda is a galaxy, of course, and it's not a star system, but. And we really have no evidence that such things exist. And he, because he had lost his security clearance many, many years before, it would be very puzzling as to how he would be apprised of this information at all. So here we have somebody who, you know, many years in the past certainly would have been in a good position to understand and have access to information on UFOs many years later, making statements that didn't make any sense whatsoever. So it's, it's something that, that really concerns a lot of individuals, a lot of people. Look at his record, but, you know, after his time as Minister of Defense, he really had no involvement in ufology whatsoever.
- [51:27]
Simon Bown
When you were going through the files, did you come across anything that you really did not expect? I thought I wasn't expecting that.
- [51:36]
Chris Rutkowski
Well, I think one of the most amazing set of documents that I came across was a briefing.
- [51:46]
Simon Bown
And
- [51:49]
Chris Rutkowski
quite recently in Canada it was made public that the then current Minister of National Defense was given a briefing on the subject of unidentified aerial phenomena at a fairly high level. And this was just in 2021. And there were some slides that were presented in a PowerPoint presentation describing much of what we've just talked about, how the Canadian government had been involved in UFO investigations and then later investigations, including mention myself at one point because of my investigations. But we don't have any information on the actual discussion and some of the additional documentation. Well, it turns out that in 1967, after Paul Hellier, by the way, the new Canadian Minister of National Defense apparently needed a briefing on the subject of UFOs. The one was prepared and in the files we have the documentation, 28 page document of what was presented to the minister, but not the slides that accompanied it. And they might have shed some more light on what was actually said. But the document itself, 28 pages long, actually states very, very, very clearly the number of UFO cases that were reported in Canada at that time in 1967. The ones that they thought were puzzling, how many they thought had explanations, how many needed further investigation. And then there were details given on six cases which the Department of National Defense considered the best cases on record and had no explanation. And for a document like this to be found in these files is to me quite remarkable because it stated again quite explicitly that the Department of National Defense, the highest ranking military officials, had no explanation for six cases out of the many hundreds. Whether that may seem low for some people. But these cases were quite remarkable in themselves. One, of course, was the Falcon Lake case, which we've just discussed. Another was called Shag Harbour, which is sometimes called Canada's Roswell, where a UFO was seen to fall into the ocean off the coast of Nova Scotia. There was a photographic case in Alberta. There was a case of close encounter in Ontario by a family that was boating on a lake. And then there was even a radar case where radar operators in Manitoba at a military radar base had detected objects that were definitely thought not to be malfunctions and not to have been any other objects that they were aware of. So there are some interesting cases that were detailed in. And for the reader of the book, I actually reproduced all 28 pages so that you can clearly see what the Canadian military was doing with regard to UFOs back in 1967.
- [55:15]
Simon Bown
And did you come across files that seem to describe abductions or just files where people did have close encounters with ETs on the ground?
- [55:26]
Chris Rutkowski
There were a few cases where people reported entities. One case in particular happened where a fellow was driving with his girlfriend very late at night, coming home from a movie. And as they're driving past a field, they saw a very large a UFO in the middle of the field with, had a number of antennas on top of it and flashing lights. And this chap wanted to impress his girlfriend, so he stopped the car and said, I'm going to go and take a look at what's what this is. So he started to get out of the car, but his girlfriend was, was very afraid and pleaded with him to get back in the car. So he got back in the car, drove her home, came back to the field, and by this time this UFO was in a Different field. But as he drove towards it, he was astonished to see a silver suited creature walk directly in front of his car. And he described that in some detail. And there's, I think this particular case amounted to something like 20 or so pages of documentation investigation by the National Research Council and by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. So we, you know, there's some interesting documentation in there of close encounters.
- [56:51]
Simon Bown
One of the things you say in the book is you acknowledge that alien visitation is only one explanation, but the solution might be more psychological or sociological. So what did you mean by that?
- [57:04]
Chris Rutkowski
Well, there's no question that some of these cases must represent physical objects. And the fact that we can in fact explain the vast majority of UFO cases, more than 90%, upwards of 95%, either have possible explanations or definitive explanations or simply don't have sufficient information to evaluate. So we know there are objects there in most cases. There's no question that the UFO phenomenon does present some other aspects that, that may need some involvement by other avenues of research. There would be psychological aspects, certainly sociological aspects, where I posited in one of my other books something called Alien Abduction syndrome, where under certain conditions and depending if, if individuals have had traumatic experiences in their lives, sometimes they may disassociate and believe they've, they're encountering UFOs or aliens, when in fact they're, they're actually having, covering memories because of something else in their past. And this actually we verified in a, in a number of cases. Remember one, one woman had come to us because she believed that she was attacked by aliens in her bedroom. And through counseling and we had the cooperation of counselors and with her permission, it turned out that she had actually suffered a rape in her own home and her mind was unable to fathom that it was a human and translated into, into aliens. Now I have to emphasize that this is very, very rare, that the vast majority of cases do not ascribe into this. But at the same time, you know, there are aspects that, you know, fall into ufology from mythology and belief systems that if one is absolutely convinced that aliens are here and that they're being followed by aliens in their car, that's what they're going to believe. If in fact it turns out that the object or light that they believe has been following them turns out to have been a star planet or moon or aircraft. And that has been found to be true in a number of situations. So belief has a very profound effect on witnesses and their testimony as well. And ufology really walks a very careful line. Where we're looking for a physical reality, but there may be some non physical reality involved as well. And in terms of mythology, here in Canada, as in many other countries, there are indigenous witnesses who believe that some of the lights and objects seem may have to do with some of the more religious icons and images that are inherent in their culture. So there are some aspects of ufology that require some examination by sociologists, psychologists, and certainly people involved in and religious and spirituality aspects.
- [60:43]
Simon Bown
Well, it's been great talking to you. The book's called Canada's UFOs Declassified and that's on Amazon, isn't it? People can get it everywhere.
- [60:52]
Chris Rutkowski
Absolutely. Amazon and fine bookstores.
- [60:55]
Simon Bown
And your other books are there as well?
- [60:57]
Chris Rutkowski
Yes, this is actually my 10th book. Can you believe that I've been writing about cases around the world for this long? But I, I find the. The subject fascinating and I hope that your listeners find the subject fascinating too.
- [61:12]
Simon Bown
And do you have a website?
- [61:15]
Chris Rutkowski
I do. I have a number of sites. The Canadian UFO survey is found by simply going to canadian uforeport.com all one word canadian uforeport.com I also have a blog, euphorum uforum.blogspot.com where I talk about some interesting cases and have some additional reports and documents that aren't yet in any book. And I'm certainly on social media. I'm on Facebook and Twitter and Instagram, so people can follow me if they wish.
- [61:52]
Simon Bown
It's been great talking to you and thanks again for coming on the podcast.
- [61:56]
Chris Rutkowski
Thank you, Simon. It's been a pleasure.
- [61:58]
Simon Bown
And that was an interview with Chris Rutkowski about his book Canada's UFOs Declassified. My book titled Aspects of Alien Abduction is on Amazon. You can get it on paperback audiobook or Kindle. And a great way to support the podcast is to sign up to Patreon, where you can get exclusive access to the extended version of the episodes. Just go to patreon.com absolutely alien UFO podcast and if you enjoy this episode, please leave a review and be sure to subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or via your favorite podcast app to make sure that you don't miss out on any episodes. And thanks for listening.
- [62:49]
Chris Rutkowski
Sa.