Have people really been abducted by aliens?
Let's talk about that!
♪ (theme music) ♪
- (nasally) Good... Mythical... Morning! - The universe is a huge place.
- (normally) Oh, yes. - We don't even know how huge it is
or how big it's becoming. Current estimates say there are
- one hundred octillion stars. - That's quite a few.
- That's one with 29 zeros after it. - Big number.
So odds are there's some other life out there.
- But the question is: Has that life... - Found us?
... come in contact with us? There's a lot of people who say "Yes." Now, personally,
- I don't believe this has happened, but... - Me neither.
a lot of the stories that I've heard before are like uncle Hank... you know,
the guy who has no hair on top of his head but he has a lot of hair in the back, and
he has a koozie with him all the time. He's got an alien abduction story.
- Yeah. - But not all alien abduction stories are
- like Uncle Hank's. - Mm-mm.
They are sometimes more sophisticated and harder to just dismiss. And we're gonna be
talking today about-- we each have a story that we think is more difficult to dismiss
- than your uncle with the koozie. - Mm-hm. Yeah. So I'll start. I've found...
This is one of the first alien abduction stories, and I'm gonna go with this one
because I think there's some convincing things to it. Postman Barney Hill and his
wife Betty were driving back from Canada. They were in New Hampshire. It was at
night around 10 P.M. They see this star that's moving erratically.
- Okay. - (gruffly) That ain't no star.
(normally) So they pull over at a rest area. Now let me point out--
- That's nice. - Here's a picture of the couple. They're
not at the rest area in this... this is a posed picture, not at a rest area.
- Okay. - (Link) Would this couple lie to you?
- (Rhett) They seem trustworthy! - (Link) They seem trustworthy. Look at
- the dachshund in Betty's lap. I mean-- - (Rhett) Okay, he's not gonna tell a lie.
And he's not gonna suffer any liars or sit in the lap of a liar, so that's point
- one right there. - That is scientific!
- They stop at the rest area. - They have a dachshund.
Barney gets out his binoculars and starts looking at this thing. He estimates--
- He had binoculars? - Yeah, of course he did.
- Were they around his neck already? - Of course. He's a postman
- with a dachshund. - (Rhett and crew laugh)
He estimated it was a 40-foot-long craft with flashing colors and it had windows.
As it was getting closer to him-- because yes, it was getting closer to him--
he could see that there were beings inside of it.
- Okay. - Gets back in the car and says, "They're
gonna capture us!" And then they start driving off. They start to experience
beeping, buzzing, and then there's like a tingling sensation and a vibration
- of the car... - They were at Brookstone in the
- massage chairs. - (crew laughs)
- No, they were in their car. - (silly voice) We're in Brookstone, baby!
(laughs) They were driving! They were driving down the road and then all of a
sudden, they go into what they describe as a state of their minds being dulled.
- Oh! - So their minds are dulled. And then...
- Okay. - There's a second set of beeping and
buzzing, and I'm telling you what I think happened is that they were-- (slurps)
- sucked up in-- - That's what you think happened, huh?
- sucked up into the, into the craft. - Well that's what they think happened.
No, they didn't know at this point. So then they keep driving, but they realize
that they are now, seemingly instantaneously, 35 miles south of where
- they had started. - Whoa.
With no recollection of traveling those 35 miles.
- That's not Brookstone. - They arrive at home and then they start
to notice that they have some uncontrollable impulses and thoughts.
Like, Betty's packing a suitcase and putting it by the door. She's having
nightmares of UFO abductions. Barney was compelled to check his genitalia.
- Pshhh! - (giggles)
Okay, all right. That's quite a compulsion.
That is a healthy compulsion to check it every now and again...
- Yeah, yeah, yeah, it is. - (crew laughs)
- But... (laughs) - You should check it. I mean...
He didn't find anything, but he was compelled to check it.
- Yeah. - And only after the beeping and the
- buzzing and the... - Yeah, right, okay.
- So, get this. - I get ya, Barney. I understand.
- Betty calls the local Air Force base. - Why not?
- And they answer! - (silly voice) Hello, Air Force!
- I mean, like... - We don't have any massage chairs!
(laughs) How is this possible? But seriously, she calls the Air Force base.
- Major Paul W. Henderson says... - (normally) Real guy.
"The UFO was also confirmed by our radar." After she describes their experience.
And that just means "unidentified flying object."
He said, "The UFO was also confirmed by our radar."
- Okay, all right. - Then they decide to undergo...
They try to account for what they believe to be two hours of lost time and 35 miles.
They go into regressive hypnosis and they both have the same stories. They're
drawing sketches. This is a sketch that Barney drew of "the leader," he called it.
- (Rhett) Hm! It's a snake with a beret! - (laughs) Yeah.
- (French accent) It's a French snake! - He's a postman, he's not a--
- Ooh la la, Barney! - He's not an artiste.
So, basically, they come to the conclusion that they've been abducted by aliens.
They remember through regressive hypnosis that they took their skin, hair, nail
- samples, bodily fluid samples... - Oh!
- Here's the thing, guys. - I get you, Barney.
This is a typical alien abduction story, except it was the first one!
- Right. - And they kinda had to figure it out.
They weren't building on other previous stories.
- Other people emulated them. - Even that picture, that picture of the
- snake with the beret. Totally original. - Totally-- seriously, totally original.
- Yeah. - The Air Force confirmed that there was
something on the radar! And the da-shund. The datsun, people!
- How do you say that... dog? - You say datsun, you don't say da-shund,
- I don't think. - That's how you spell it, though!
- I mean, believe... - So that's what it comes down to for them.
- (dramatically) Believe the dashund. - They have a dashund.
- All right, I've got a story. - They corroborated, you know?
- In their regression! - This is the Travis Walton story.
A very famous-- probably the most famous UFO abduction, alien abduction story
back from November of 1975. He's clearing trees, kind of a blue collar guy.
- He's clearing trees. - Literally, he's wearing a blue collar...
- (Rhett) Yes. - (Link) and the plaid shirt.
(Rhett) Yeah. He was a logger. He's clearing trees in Arizona with seven
other guys. They finish their shift, they get into a truck. Big pickup truck,
seven guys. They're heading down the road and they see, quote, "a luminous object
- shaped like a flattened disc." Travis-- - Saucer. I call that a flying-- (snaps)
Saucer. Travis gets out and approaches the saucer.
Of course he does because he's a lumberjack.
And the rest of the guys stay in the truck. They see a-- speaking of blue collar--
a blue beam hit him. Beam of light knocks him down. They freak out, the other six
guys. They drive off. After a while, they're like, maybe we should go
- get Travis! - They ditched him.
Wouldn't you!? They're scared! They go back. He's nowhere to be found.
So they immediately go to the police in the nearest town. They say, "Our buddy--"
They tell 'em the whole story. "Our buddy was hit with this beam of light."
And they're like, "These dudes are nuts! But maybe something's going on."
They start a manhunt. It ends up being the largest manhunt in Arizona history.
- Travis-hunt. - Five days of looking for Travis, but at
the same time, they're like, "Of course these guys didn't really experience a UFO
- situation," right? - They killed him.
They suspected that they murdered him. They teamed up on him and murdered him
in their typical logger way of telling the story was, (southern accent) "Hey man,
let's say he got abducted by aliens. That'll be believable."
(southern accent) Blue beam o' light... Let's get our story straight.
(normally) So they polygraph them, give them a lie detector test. Five out of six
- of the guys pass the test. - (normally) Oh, so the sixth one
- killed him. - No. And one of the guys who was there--
it was just inconclusive. He didn't finish the test because he was kind of
- emotionally shaken up. - Of course he was.
- Now, the guys who administered-- - He just killed a man.
administered these tests said, "We are thoroughly convinced that these men
believe that he was abducted by aliens. They saw-- they did not kill him. They
- believe that this is what has happened. - Okay.
Meanwhile, what happens to Travis? Well, five days pass and all of a sudden he
wakes up in front of a local gas station with an incredibly detailed story--
- Naked. - of what had happened.
I think he still was clothed. He still had that blue shirt on, I'm pretty sure.
Here's what he remembers: First of all, it's an incredibly detailed story.
I'm just gonna give you some of the highlights.
First of all, they didn't kill him, because he's back.
- He's back. - So there you go.
He remembers being on a table thinking he's in a hospital room, but the he looks
up and he sees aliens that, quote, "looked like fetuses..."
- Ew. - caring for him. So the old fetus alien,
you know? He gets scared, not because they're aliens, but because they're
- fetus aliens. - Oh, yeah.
And he picks up a glass cylinder on a shelf and begins yelling at them and
- waving the glass cylinder. - A flask?
And they leave. Just a glass cylinder. I don't know what that's for.
Like a luminary that you put like a little...
I don't have a picture. It was on the alien ship.
- Okay. - I'm going off Travis's testimony here.
- Got it. - He waves it at them like a magic wand.
They go out of the room, and then he says, (claps) "I got this spaceship to myself."
- (laughs) - He walks down a hallway,
- goes into a room... - (crew laughs)
- He's a penguin! - And there's a room with a chair in the
- middle with a lever. - Of course there is!
Or a lever. This is like a cartoon. I gotta say, Travis, at this point it sounds
like a cartoon. But you know what? I'm gonna keep going.
- A barber chair! - He gets into the barber chair.
He pulls the lever and all of a sudden it starts a light show of stars like he's at
- the planetarium, basically. - (laughs)
He should've had a woman with him, 'cause this would've been a great first date.
You know, one of my best first dates was at the planetarium.
- Learn her a little something. - Yeah, it's like, (silly voice) Oh, look
at the stars. Look how small we are. We're so small, but me and you are right here
- next to each other in the planetarium. - No one will know anything we do.
(laughs) (normally) Yeah, that's right. That's what happened. There was no
date, though. Eventually he starts thinking, "Maybe I should get out of here."
He starts walking around the craft a little bit more. He finds this, quote,
"tall human character wearing blue overalls and a glassy helmet," I don't
know what that was about. But then he finds more of those guys. They end up
- putting a gas mask-- - Farmer. Farmer aliens.
Yeah, with glass helmets. They put a gas mask--
- Deep sea diving farmer aliens. - gas mask on him. He gets knocked out
and the next thing he remembers, he wakes up at the gas station. Gas mask, gas
- station, I don't know, maybe, ha ha. - But he still-- maybe not.
(laughs) And he thinks that two hours have passed, but five days have passed.
Whoa. Does he still have the flask in his hand? Like he comes to and...
He did not bring the glass cylinder with him. Not a flask, Link.
And he did not have the lever with him. But he had a story that he turned into a
- book called The Walton Experience, - He had quite a story.
that then was turned into a TV show, a long-running TV show called The Waltons.
(multiple voices) Good night, Jim Bob!
No, actually it was turned into a movie called Fire In the Sky back in the 90's.
This guy is a celebrity amongst this community. You can go online, you search
this guy on YouTube and there's him talking at UFO conventions. He's still like
a celebrity who tells his story. Most of these guys, as part of the crew, have
maintained their testimony. There's one guy that's a little squirrelly, but most
- of them have maintained their testimony. - He's still in prison for murdering him.
And he's trying to get Fire In the Sky remade...
- Sequel? Or a remake? - 'Cause he wants it to be accurate.
- He wants it to be accurate. - Like, visually accurate?
- Or the story wasn't right? - He wants all the details to be--
- He wants the flask to be just right. - (laughs)
- He wants the fetal aliens to be right. - Why should I believe this one?
I mean, there were no binoculars. There's no dachshund.
Well, there is a movie, though. I mean, he made it into a movie and wrote a book.
- Right, right, right, okay. - And he has a mustache. He has a very,
- very thick mustache. - So there's nothing--
He has maintained his mustache over the past 40 years in the same way he has
- maintained his story, Link. - Oh?
I mean, if the mustache started to give a little bit, I'd be, "Oh, I don't believe
you," but if you keep the mustache strong, the story stays strong.
- I don't know. I'm grasping. - But he wears a suit now.
- I'm grasping at... glass cylinders here. - Yeah, let's--
- And levers. In the planetarium. Pthbbt! - So, Barney and Betty, you got my vote.
- I don't know. Debate away. - Ha! Debate away!
- Thanks for liking and commenting. - You know what time it is.
I'm Doug from Mesa, Arizona and it's time to spin the Wheel of Mythicality.
Nine out of ten people report that wearing a Good Mythical Morning t-shirt while
watching Good Mythical Morning gives them a better experience!
Click through to Good Mythical More, where we say what it would take for us
- to actually believe in alien abductions. - Wow, you got a lot going on over there.
Get a Mythical Mug... wear the shirt this way if you want to.
- (Rhett) In a world... without pancakes. - Oh.
(dramatically) In a world without pancakes...
Eat a waffle. I mean...
it's pretty... obvious.
[Captioned by Caitrin: GMM Captioning Team]