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The following is the combined account
of four eyewitnesses who saw the crash at Southaven Park. The dialogue,
the events, and the descriptions of what happened are taken word for word
from these individuals, who personally saw one UFO explode in the sky,
shot down, and the other lose control and crash.
Two teenage boys and their female friend saw the crash. It wasn't as if
any of them were UFO aficionados or had any particular interest in science
fiction, Richard Corman grade B movies, psychics, or anything to do with
space travel or astronauts. In fact, none of the three had ever seen a
UFO or taken any notice of such things, except maybe an occasional glance
at a tabloid while waiting in line to buy groceries yet that very night
they would be thrown together to witness a "mother ship" from
somewhere in the Andromeda galaxy reduced to atoms by a highly classified
plasma beam, and then watch as one of the other ship's defense shields
collapsed and it plummeted into the nearby public park, setting the surrounding
area on fire. '
There was something significant about Jennifer Biels the teenage girl,
that would prove to be very helpful in the future investigation of the
Southaven Park incident. Her mother worked at the nearby Brookhaven Lab,
and this was the "hotly disputed" place where the recovered
bodies of the aliens were taken, as well as the
craft itself.
Because her mother worked at the lab, it was not uncommon to see Jennifer
flirting with the security personal; one especially susceptible to her
charms was Bob, who was inclined to allow her in areas that normally required
a security clearance. Actually, security was difficult, because of the
hundreds of corporations, individuals, and scientists with access to the
immense, two thousand acre area of Brookhaven Lab.
Mona Rowe, the public spokesperson for Brookhaven, is about as nice and
as charismatic a person as you would ever want to talk to. We spent many
hours talking on the phone, and she and the Department of Energy sent
me reams of information on Brookhaven Lab as well as some clippings on
Brookhaven's involvement with UFOs over the years. When the swarms of
newspeople arrived and began asking many, many questions about the crash,
Mona Rowe was the perfectly trained, educated, and extremely concise Brookhaven
representative, smiling but shaking her head in total sincerity. There
had been no crash, no fire, and sorry, there were no aliens in the basement,
no craft being analyzed in the lab, nor had anything like that ever occurred.
Of course, she had seen a bright formation of lights in the sky while
driving to work, and a year earlier there had been talk of an actual battle
between the American military and a UFO near the bay, which was later
described as just lights produced by an air sea rescue operation. But
of course, that was outside the realm of her position as official spokesperson
for Brookhaven Lab.
At the time of this event Jennifer, a good friend of Mona Rowe's, was
a 17 year old straight A student, sure to be a biochemist, and about to
engage in a few activities that would make the security staff at Brookhaven
very unhappy. Richard Grayson and Todd Phillips, humble part time Togo
sandwich assemblers, and Jennifer were soon to become three very dedicated
and rather adventurous UFO investigators. And this all started the very
day that the love of Richard Grayson's life, Joanne, had most indelicately
looked Richard straight in the eye and told him their relationship was
over.
Togo's sandwich shop was at the base of hill, next to a business complex,
just a few blocks from the high school. It was generally busy except in
the late afternoons and evenings. There wasn't a whole lot happening in
Brookhaven Hamlet on week nights. Richard and Todd worked part time on
the five to closing shift. Oddly, the time at the shop seemed to pass
very quickly. It really wasn't that busy, but Todd had a lot of new "you
know you're in trouble when" jokes he had heard on the David Letterman
show the previous night. And despite his foul mood, Richard even found
himself laughing a few times. The owner of the Togo's shop called at about
8:00 P.m. to ask how business was doing. Todd, who answered the phone,
told him the truth. It was dead. Truly dead. They hadn't had a customer
in almost an hour.
"Go ahead and close up," said the owner. "I'll pay you
two up through nine but no point in staying open if no one's out. Just
too damn cold tonight. You'd think it would snow or something. But it's
just too damn cold. No one wants to come out when they can order pizza
and sit home and watch cable TV."
"Gotcha," said Todd, relieved. Todd hung up the phone and yelled
over his shoulder. "Hey, the old man's gonna let us off early. That's
great!"
Todd always gave Richard a ride home. They had been friends since second
grade. They headed north up the highway. It was cold, bitterly cold. Todd
shivered, pulled the fur collar of his flight jacket up around his neck
and pulled onto the main stretch of the highway. He adjusted his red baseball
cap, lit up a cigarette, and flipped on the CD player. The small cab of
the truck was instantly filled with the screeching sounds of Nosferatu.
"Will you turn that racket down!" growled Richard. "I'm
not in the mood for it." Todd ignored him, reached out, and turned
the volume up.
"I said, turn that shit down!" Richard angrily punched a glowing
red button, turning the CD player off.
"Hey," growled Todd. "Don't do that. It's my truck."
"Let's just not talk," said Richard. "Just let me sit here
in silence and feel sorry for myself. I'm depressed. And I intend to be
depressed for several days. Your music just doesn't fit, that's all."
"Sure," said Todd. He looked over at his friend Richard, who
did look genuinely miserable. "Females can sure mess you up,"
he said sympathetically.
The highway paralleled the bay, which continued for a few miles north
of Southaven Park. It was a clear night. There wasn't a lot of pollution
on this part of Long Island, and there was a beautiful, cloudless
night sky, with brilliant shining stars from horizon to horizon. Richard
jumped as he noticed a V shaped formation of glowing lights moving across
the water.
"Holy shit!" said Todd, holding his arm in front of his face.
The objects were moving toward Southaven Park. "What are those?"
Suddenly he gasped as a huge glowing sphere became visible in the sky.
"I can't watch this and drive!" Todd rammed his foot down on
the brake. The truck skidded to a stop at the side of the freeway. Both
boys jumped out of the truck.
"Whoa!" said Richard. "I've never seen anything like this."
Above the trees of Southaven Park, a glowing ball hung motionless in the
sky, streams of yellow, orange, and dark crimson flames swirling around
it, the unnatural hue of those colors reflected off the storm clouds moving
in from the east. Three smaller craft darted about the sphere and then
were motionless. They were much smaller, each perhaps the size of a commercial
plane. They were triangular, with rounded edges like a Stealth jet. But
the sphere, or mother ship as Richard later would call it, was immense.
It was some 60 to 80 feet in diameter, the size of a four to five story
building. What made it all the more unusual was the almost complete silence.
The two boys looked up, mesmerized by the bright objects and the magnetic
resonant hum that they felt more than heard. The lights of the truck flickered,
blinking in an odd strobelike rhythm to the humming sound. The CD player
turned back on, and Todd, looking genuinely scared, pulled the ground
wire to shut it off.
"Hey! Hey!" A young girl was jumping up and down on the other
side of the road and pointing at the sky. "Do you see that?"
Besides a blue Camaro parked on the side of the highway, a tall, slender
brunette excitedly motioned then impulsively ran across the road and grabbed
Richard's arm, shaking him.
"This is not my kind of thing," said Todd. "But I think
we are seeing some type of UFOs, um . . ." he stammered, not knowing
the girl's name.
"Jennifer," she said, without turning to look at him. "Jennifer
Biels
"Richard," Todd said, pointing to his friend. "And I'm
Todd, the crazy one." He grinned. "But that," he continued,
"is definitely no airplane. I don't know if those are our planes
circling it or what." "There's four of them." Jennifer
pointed toward the objects, which now seemed to glide above the park.
"And they are all moving together."
"It looks like they are looking for something or someone," said
Richard. "And they are moving in a definite formation."
Suddenly the air was filled with the sound of helicopters approaching
from the north.
"Well, one thing is for certain," said Jennifer. "Our military
is not going to like this one bit." A small band of black Cobra helicopter's
approached, still keeping a respectable distance from the UFOs. The objects
continued to circle over the park, moving slowly in a V formation. From
one of the UFOs a shimmering electric blue beam streamed down, barely
touching the tops of the trees. As the light appeared, the magnetic resonant
hum rose in pitch and intensity. Jennifer could feel the hairs of her
neck bristle as static electricity seemed to sweep over them. The lights
of the truck flickered again.
The motor of the truck turned on and
off, and then suddenly the hum stopped and the scanning light from the
craft vanished. Richard, Todd, and Jennifer all jumped as a huge diesel
truck pulled up behind the Camaro.
"Hey, Red Eye, you off again on one of your flying saucer hunts!"
A coarse female voice came from inside of the cab. They could hear the
static of a CB blasting out the double semi. A thin, wiry older man stepped
out. He had crew cut salt and pepper hair and intelligent, observant gray
eyes. He grinned as he saw the kids and then held up the mike of his CB.
"Gotta go, Hot Stuff. Got a grade
A Uno UFO staring right at me. Four of them, in fact. Man, oh man. This
is really something." He walked over to the group of teenagers. "I'm
Mike," he said, turning toward Todd. "If you have a camera you
better grab it. I don't think you realize how exceptional what you are
looking at is."
Todd shook his head sadly.
"Me neither," said Jennifer. "But God, I wish I did. This
is incredible." She gasped as the sphere became much brighter, as
if some type of energy field had been turned on.
"That's the mother ship, guys," said
Mike, pulling out his camcorder and fumbling with the digital light sensors.
"Jeez just don't take off on me until
I get you on video," he said, looking up, expecting it all to disappear.
"Jeez," said Richard. "That's some camera."
"Yep, almost broke me. My old lady, Hot Stuff, had a fit. But when
you are trying to shoot in the dark and you want get something like this,
ain't a bit sorry it cost me an arm and a leg." He centered the larger
object in the viewfinder. "Man, this is really something else."
Suddenly the lights along the highway dimmed, and began to go out one
by one. A wave of darkness swept across the rows of houses that were just
a few hundred feet from the highway. "It's a blackout," said
Mike. "Somebody's drawing power from the main lines, and I don't
think it's those UFOs." There was one last surge of power and then
all the lights in the town for several miles around went out. The giant
sphere glowed as a beam of energy shot from the ground several miles north
of them. There was a low rumble, and the craft shimmered, became incandescent,
and then exploded. Two of the other craft streaked across the sky, leaving
a shining trail of vapor behind them, and then shot straight up into the
night sky.
The remaining craft just hovered, as if whatever was piloting it was completely
stunned by the destruction of the larger vessel. Before it could make
a move to escape, another beam of light pulsed up from the ground a few
miles away at Brookhaven National Laboratory. Energy swirled around the
object. The crippled ship veered at a 45 degree angle, and then plummeted
down into Southaven Park. The earth trembled as the object crashed and
huge flames shot up from behind the trees.
"Sweet Jesus," said Mike, his hands shaking. "I got it!
I actually filmed the damn thing." The sound of helicopters was louder
now, and they moved quickly over the water toward the crackling flames,
where the craft had sheared off the tops of trees and then burst apart.
"Military, and I bet they are helluva shook up. This is not all that
far from Washington, D.C., you know." As helicopters moved by, two
police cars pulled up and a scowling officer approached. The other officer
stood by his patrol car, watching the fire in the distance.
"Show's over," said Officer Grisholm. "One of our test
aircraft
crashed. Nothing more to see."
"Hey, is that your dispatcher I just heard?" said Mike as a
wave of chatter echoed from the patrol car.
As the officer turned, puzzled, Mike quickly hid his camcorder and walked
rapidly to his truck.
"Hey," said the officer as Mike pulled back on the highway.
"You truckers think you can do what you damn well please." He
turned to the teenagers. "All right, kids, I got no quarrel with
you. You have two choices. We can do license, registration, and a vehicle
equipment inspection" he looked at Todd's tires, which were a bit
bare even for an off road vehicle "or you can just stay clear of
this area for the rest of the night."
"Didn't you see that?" said Jennifer. "That was no test
plane."
"I see nothing," said Grisholm, "except three teenage kids
who are about to have some very unhappy parents picking them up down at
the station."
"Yeah, right," said Todd surlily. "We got the message .
. . officer." He said the word officer with obvious sarcasm.
"Hey, hey," said Jennifer, poking Richard's arm. "You want
to go somewhere for coffee and talk about this?"
"Nah, I don't think I'm up to it. I'm still pretty shook up about
a lot of things. This has just been too much of a day for me," said
Richard.
"Okay." Jennifer frowned.
"We work at Togo's, weeknights," said Todd, giving Richard a
"boy, are you messing this one up" look.
"Well, then," she paused, giving Richard a smile. "See
ya, okay?"
"Should we go over and check it out?" said Richard.
"Not too swift an idea," said Todd. "Place is probably
crawling with SWAT teams and police and stuff"
"We could send my little brother over on his bike and have him snoop
around."
Richard felt strange. Much like after an auto accident when you have to
help out and it doesn't hit you until it's all over. And the impact of
what had just happened was beginning to hit him.
"Did we just see a flying saucer get shot down by our military and
crash right in our very own Southaven Park?"
"Maybe, maybe not," said Todd. "I'm not really sure what
I saw."
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