The Tricky Ethics of Intergalactic Colonization

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The Tricky Ethics of Intergalactic Colonization

• By Charles C. Mann  
• 11.20.14  |  
• 6:30 am  |  

Leif Podhajsky

Zheng He! Zheng He! Is there a better icon for interstellar voyaging?
Between 1405 and 1433, Zheng set out from China on massive naval expeditions that reached as far as Mecca and Mombasa, journeys with more than 300 vessels and 28,000 crew, excursions far bigger and longer than those of Columbus more than a half century later. Staggering in price, formidable in technical sophistication, unprecedented in level of national commitment—Zheng’s voyages remain the closest functional equivalent to the cost, effort, and risk required to travel into deep space. Trying to picture what settling other planets might entail? One place to look is 15th-century China.

Zheng was an unlikely candidate for a life of far-flung adventure. At the time of his birth, China was torn by war between the Yuan dynasty and surging Ming rebels. Zheng was born into a Muslim family in the remote Yunnan province, then a battleground between Yuan and Ming. When he was about 10, invading Ming forces captured him and slaughtered most of his family. The boy was castrated. Forced to serve the Ming crown prince, Zheng eventually became his confidant and trusted adviser. After the last Yuan emperor fled in 1368, Zheng became part of an elite group of eunuch adventurers and troubleshooters at the Ming court in Beijing.

The Ming government backed Zheng for decades. Seven times the emperor arrogantly overruled his accountants and summoned the vast amounts of material necessary to provision thousands of people on years-long voyages. Ultimately, Zheng took the Ming banner as far as West Africa and the Middle East. These areas were poorer than China, but they were thriving and productive. Alas, traveling to Africa to buy its iron, no matter how high the quality, would be like driving a hundred miles to pick up a gallon of exceptionally good milk—not a sensible use of time, money, or effort. In 1433, the voyages abruptly ceased; Ming bureaucrats had finally convinced the elite that they didn’t make economic sense.

Zheng He’s ship undertook one of mankind’s greatest explorations into the unknown. Chris Philpot

If we traveled to other worlds, could we avoid the Zheng He problem? Back in 1978, the Nobel-winning economist Paul Krugman, a science fiction fan, playfully laid out the basic economics of interstellar trade. To justify the cost, Krugman pointed out, would-be starfarers must bring back something worth more than what they would have made by putting the same money in an interest-bearing account and staying on Earth. Going to distant planets, in other words, means fighting one of the greatest forces in human affairs: compound interest.
Today, the cheapest rockets available charge a little less than $1,000 to send 1 pound of material into low-earth orbit. Sending that pound to other planets, let alone the stars, would cost vastly more. To be sure, time and expense might be reduced by building space elevators and (should the laws of physics permit) taking advantage of handy wormholes. But the lesson of Zheng He remains: Exploration of distant lands will be a short-lived venture unless it yields something really, really valuable.

If future space voyagers decided to exploit a barren, lifeless planet, few would be upset. But such an endeavor is unlikely. As far as we know, a world without life would be a world without oxygen, a stable climate, or the possibility of growing food. Barring the discovery of some immensely valuable substance that doesn’t exist on Earth, there would be no reason to set up shop there, let alone despoil it. A world with functioning ecosystems would be more attractive. But if local species were valuable, it would be more sensible to carry back to Earth a snippet of their DNA than whole animals. The entire Alien series can be considered as a proof by negative example of this assertion.

The real jackpot, of course, would be finding a nonhuman civilization: a planetful of new ideas, techniques, and expression. Here the temptation to interact—that is, to intervene—would be enormous. China again provides an example. Travel costs today are low compared to those in the 15th century. West Africa, meanwhile, is still full of valuable resources, products, and land, so Chinese ships are again going to Africa. In the past decade, the nation has shipped in a million or more migrants. Buying and leasing swathes of land to grow food for export to the homeland, grabbing deals to extract minerals, locking up local water supplies—the newcomers have been throwing their weight around. Even though the Chinese have built many badly needed roads, bridges, and power plants, their moves have created a furor. “Landgrab!” cry African newspapers. Chinese workers have been attacked in Zambia, Cameroon, Niger, Sudan, and Angola.

History suggests that if anything of value is involved, contacts between distant societies are fraught. Think of Spain and the Aztecs. Cortés could have traded peacefully for Aztec gold and silver, but that would have involved the expense of ferrying over goods from Spain for barter. Conquest was more attractive (economically, if not morally), and greatly abetted by an epidemic of smallpox introduced to the Aztecs by the Spaniards. Stuck at the end of a trillion-mile supply chain, voyagers from Earth might be less likely to replicate the triumph of Cortés than the fates of Thomas Drummond and William Paterson. The two men were leaders of Scotland’s biggest mission to the Americas: the attempt to implant some 2,500 highlanders in Panama starting in 1698. A grandiose effort for a poor country, the expedition sucked up as much as half of the nation’s available investment capital. It was that rarest of events, an unmitigated disaster. The locals in Panama weren’t interested in trade. Unable to grow food in the unfamiliar ecosystem and beset by diseases they had no experience with, the Scots died by the hundreds. Drummond vanished; Paterson lost his wife. As the few survivors limped back to Edinburgh in 1700, Scotland’s economy collapsed, forcing it to merge with England.

Is interstellar travel too risky and economically irrational ever to happen? Turn again to Zheng He. His voyages were sponsored by the brutally ambitious emperor, who ignored his flunkies’ complaints about the cost. Key to most great leaps is at least one overconfident investor; in 15th-century Asia, the emperor played that role. Our society, vastly richer than early-modern China, has no lack of would-be successors. Look at the billionaires jumping into commercial spaceflight: Jeff Bezos with Blue Origin, Richard Branson with Virgin Galactic, Naveen Jain with Moon Express, Elon Musk with SpaceX. Eventually humankind will push into space no matter what the expected cost-benefit ratio. Those first adventurers will have one advantage over their early-modern predecessors. Future starfarers will know about Zheng, Cortés, Drummond, and Paterson. They will understand that the outbound voyage, no matter how complicated and expensive, is only the beginning.

Charles C. Mann (charlesmann.org) is the author of 1493: Uncovering the New World Columbus Created.

The Kardashev Scale – Type I, II, III, IV & V Civilization

Posted on July 19, 2014 by Joe Garland in Physics

 

Theorists assert that, as a civilization grows larger and becomes more advanced, its energy demands will increase rapidly due to its population growth and the energy requirements of its various machines. With this in mind, the Kardashev scale was developed as a way of measuring a civilization’s technological advancement based upon how much usable energy it has at its disposal.

Credit: Chris Cold

The scale was originally designed in 1964 by the Russian astrophysicist,  Nikolai Kardashev (who was looking for signs of extraterrestrial life within cosmic signals). It has 3 base classes, each with an energy disposal level: Type I (10¹⁶W), Type II (10²⁶W), and Type III (10³⁶W). . Other astronomers have extended the scale to Type IV (10⁴⁶W) and Type V (the energy available to this kind of civilization would equal that of all energy available in not just our universe, but in all universes and in all time-lines). These additions consider both energy access as well as the amount of knowledge the civilizations have access to.
Firstly, it is important to note that the human race is not even on this scale yet. Since we still sustain our energy needs from dead plants and animals, here on Earth, we are a lowly Type 0 civilization (and we have a LONG way to go before being promoted to a type I civilization). The famous physicist Michio Kaku believes we will reach Type I in 100 – 200 years time. But what does each of these categories actually stand for in literal terms?

A Type I designation is a given to species who have been able to harness all the energy that is available from a neighboring star, gathering and storing it to meet the energy demands of a growing population. This means that we would need to boost our current energy production over 100,000 times to reach this status. However, being able to harness all Earth’s energy would also mean that we could have control over all natural forces. Human beings could control volcanoes, the weather, and even earthquakes! (At least, that is the idea.) These kinds of feats are hard to believe, but compared to the advances that may still be to come, these are just basic and primitive levels of control (it’s absolutely nothing compared to the capabilities of societies with higher rankings).

A Dyson Sphere (Credit: Slawek Wojtowicz)

The next step up – a Type II civilization – can harness the power of their entire star (not merely transforming starlight into energy, but controlling the star). Several methods for this have been proposed. The most popular of which is the hypothetical ‘Dyson Sphere.’ This device, if you want to call it that, would encompass every single inch of the star, gathering most (if not all) of its energy output and transferring it to a planet for later use. Alternatively, if fusion power (the mechanism that powers stars) had been mastered by the race, a reactor on a truly immense scale could be used to satisfy their needs. Nearby gas giants can be utilized for their hydrogen, slowly drained of life by an orbiting reactor.

What would this much energy mean for a species? Well, nothing known to science could wipe out a Type II civilization. Take, for instance, if humans survived long enough to reach this status, and a moon sized object entered our solar system on a collision course with our little blue planet–we’d have the ability to vaporize it out of existence. Or if we had time, we could move our planet out of the way, completely dodging it. But let’s say we didn’t want to move Earth… are there any other options? Well yes, because we’d have the capability to move Jupiter, or another planet of our choice, into the way – pretty cool, right?

A Cyborg (Credit: Justin Lee)

So we’ve gone from having control over a planet, to a star, which has resulted in us harboring enough “disposable” energy to essentially make our civilization immune to extinction. But now, onto Type III, where a species then becomes galactic traversers with knowledge of everything having to do with energy, resulting in them becoming a master race.  In terms of humans, hundreds of thousands of years of evolution – both biological and mechanical – may result in the inhabitants of this type III civilization being incredibly different from the human race as we know it. These may be cyborgs (or cybernetic organism, beings both biological and robotic), with the descendants of regular humans being a sub-species among the now-highly advanced society. These wholly biological humans would likely be seen as being disabled, inferior, or unevolved by their cybernetic counterparts.

At this stage, we would have developed colonies of robots that are capable of ‘self replication’; their population may increase into the millions as they spread out across the galaxy, colonizing star after star. And these being might build Dyson Spheres to encapsulate each one, creating a huge network that would carry energy back to the home planet. But stretching over the galaxy in such a manner would face several problems; namely, the species would be constrained by the laws of physics. Particularly, light-speed travel. That is, unless they develop a working warp drive, or use that immaculate energy cache to master wormhole teleportation (two things that remain theoretical for the time being), they can only get so far.

An artist rendering of such a civilization (Credit: Sid Meier’s Civilization IV)

Kardashev believed a Type IV civilization was ‘too’ advanced and didn’t go beyond Type III on his scale. He thought that, surely, this would be the extent of any species’ ability. Many think so, but a few believe there is a further level that could be achieved. (I mean, surely there is a limit?) Type IV civilizations would almost be able to harness the energy content of the entire universe and with that, they could traverse the accelerating expansion of space (furthermore, advance races of these species may live inside supermassive black holes). To previous methods of generating energy, these kinds of feats are considered impossible. A Type IV civilization would need to tap into energy sources unknown to us using strange, or currently unknown, laws of physics.

Type V. 

Yes, Type V might just be the next possible advancement to such a civilization. Here beings would be like gods, having the knowledge to manipulate the universe as they please. Now, as I said, humans are a very, very long way from ever reaching anything like this. But it’s not to say that it cannot be achieved as long as we take care of Earth and each other. To do so, the first step is to preserve our tiny home, extinguish war, and continue to support scientific advances and discoveries.

Rocket Explosion Prompts Doubts about Commercial Spaceflight

 

Rocket Explosion Prompts Doubts about Commercial Spaceflight

 

This week’s fiery failure of Orbital Sciences’s Antares rocket has some wondering if the company has the right stuff to support NASA’s goal to outsource orbital flights 

 

October 31, 2014 |By Lee Billings

 

The Orbital Sciences Corporation's Antares rocket suffers a catastrophic anomaly seconds after lifting off from NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia on October 28. 2014. The rocket and the uncrewed Cygnus spacecraft it carried were on a resupply mission to the International Space Station.
Credit: NASA/Joel Kowsky

When, seconds after liftoff on October 28, an Antares rocket built by the Orbital Sciences Corp. fell back and exploded over its launch pad at a NASA facility in Wallops Island, Va., much more than its payload of small satellites and International Space Station cargo may have been lost.

The rocket did not carry a crew, and no one was injured, but damage to the surrounding launch infrastructure was significant. A cursory inspection revealed shattered windows, imploded doors and broken equipment around the launch pad that will require extensive repairs. How much damage has been dealt to Orbital Sciences’s reputation, and perhaps even NASA’s quest to outsource orbital flights, is less certain.

Orbital Sciences is one of two companies NASA now relies on to fly supplies to the space station. Four previous Antares flights, including three to the station, had launched successfully, and five resupply flights remain in the company’s $1.9-billion NASA contract. Orbital Sciences’ stock price has fallen by some 15 percent in recent days and the rocket mishap potentially complicates its planned merger with another aerospace company, Alliant Techsystems. “This is a big problem for NASA,” says Roger Handberg, a space policy expert at the University of Central Florida. “They are now dependent on the commercial sector to lift payloads to the space station, and their own rocket, the Space Launch System, is at least three years out and is intended for other purposes. So what happens if Orbital Sciences can’t get its rockets fixed? Then what do you do?”

The space agency does have some options. NASA officials said the station’s crew was in no danger of running out of supplies for several months, and on Wednesday a Russian Soyuz rocket launched a resupply mission that docked with the station to deliver even more. SpaceX, the other company NASA uses to resupply the station, is slated to launch its fourth delivery in December and has eight more scheduled. Orbital Sciences’s next Antares launch, previously set for April, is likely to be delayed for several months.

According to John Logsdon, a space policy expert at The George Washington University, if Orbital cannot return its Antares rockets to flight in time to fulfill the remaining resupply missions in its contract, NASA could buy additional flights from Russia—or SpaceX, if the company proves to have sufficient “surge capacity.” In “extreme cases,” Logsdon says, NASA could even buy launches from the space agencies of Europe, India or Japan. “This just reinforces NASA’s good judgment in having two providers, both Orbital and SpaceX,” says Eric Stallmer, president of the Commercial Spaceflight Federation, an industry association. If Orbital was the only provider, there might be a six-month or even a year before a return to flight. But SpaceX looks ready and will probably launch [its next resupply mission] in early December, so this redundant system will work.”

This is not Orbital Sciences’s first high-profile launch failure. In 2009 a malfunction in the fairing separation of its Taurus XL rocket destroyed NASA’s Orbiting Carbon Observatory satellite; in 2011 a similar problem doomed NASA’s Glory spacecraft. Even so, in the aftermath of the Antares failure a variety of NASA officials, congressional representatives and senators, and industry experts have issued statements in support of Orbital Sciences and the company’s ongoing service to the space agency.

The cause of this latest failure is not yet known but investigators will be closely examining the Antares rocket’s twin main engines as a possible culprit. Russia designed and built hundreds of the liquid-fueled engines in the late 1960s and early 1970s for a giant rocket to send cosmonauts to the moon but shelved them after NASA’s successful Apollo missions. An American company, Aerojet Rocketdyne, purchased many of the engines in the late 1990s, refurbishing them and offering them to private companies. Orbital Sciences bought 20, some of which were discarded after test-firings revealed flaws.

In a conference call with investors, Orbital Sciences’s CEO David Thompson said that if the Russian main engines were found to have contributed to the accident, the company could attempt to accelerate the estimated two-year development time for an already planned replacement engine.

The fact that Orbital Sciences chose to purchase the old Russian engines for Antares, Logsdon says, “is symptomatic of the fact that the United States has underinvested in its space program and failed to develop a modern propulsion engine.” The Atlas 5, a workhorse U.S. rocket, also uses Russian engines that, albeit newly manufactured, were designed in the 1960s. Another American rocket, the Delta 4, uses domestic-built engines designed in the early 2000s. These Delta 4 engines were the sole large liquid-fueled engines designed in the U.S. since the 1970s until the recent debut of SpaceX’s all-American engines, which the company designs and builds in-house.

The gap in U.S. engine development, Handberg says, was a product of wishful thinking in a post–cold war world. “We’re keeping Russian technologists working, building these things, but we’re not doing the same for ourselves. We can do better, obviously, since the Deltas are flying and SpaceX is building engines. We have the technology and the people, but we don’t seem to have much political will.”

According to Lori Garver, a former NASA deputy administrator who helped mastermind the agency’s outsourcing strategy, political support for more commercial space development is on the upswing, particularly as NASA ramps up its efforts to use private companies not only to transport cargo to the space station, but also crew. In September the agency revealed its selection of SpaceX as well as the aerospace giant Boeing to each ferry astronauts to the space station in coming years. “There are just so many people supporting commercial space now,” Garver says. “It’s really seen as the Russians versus American companies like Boeing and SpaceX. I don’t think there’s a single member of Congress who would vote for the Russians in that matchup.”

FYI: Air Force's mysterious X-37B space plane nears one year in orbit

CBS NEWS

By Leonard David   Space.com

 

December 6, 2013, 8:00 AM

Air Force's mysterious X-37B space plane nears one year in orbit

This NASA Marshall Space Flight Center image shows on-orbit functions for the reusable X-37 space plane. NASA/MSFC

 

The U.S. Air Force's mysterious X-37B space plane is nearing a major milestone — one year of travel in Earth orbit, performing duties in support of long-term space objectives.

The unmanned X-37B spacecraft — flying a mission known as Orbital Test Vehicle 3 (OTV-3) — launched into space atop an Atlas 5 rocket from Florida’s Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on Dec. 11, 2012. What payloads the space plane is toting and the overall mission goals on its confidential cruise are classified.

But it is known that the OTV-3 mission signals a milestone for the X-37B program. [See photos from Air Force's 3rd mystery flight of the X-37B space plane]

This same vehicle was flown on the X-37B program's inaugural flight back in 2010. That OTV-1 mission lasted nearly 225 days in orbit, gliding back to Earth on autopilot over the Pacific Ocean and touching down at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.

An OTV-2 mission, which used a different X-37B space plane, was lofted in 2011. That vehicle flew for 469 days, more than doubling its sister ship’s space stay, concluding its mission by also making a Vandenberg landing.

Altitude changes

A global network of skywatchers has been keeping an eye on the robotic space plane's movements during its three flights to date. Some veteran observers, like skywatcher Kevin Fetter of Brockville, Ontario in Canada, have even captured video of the X-37B space plane in the night sky.

"All three OTV missions maneuvered to change altitude at least once between launch and landing. Between maneuvers, they made frequent small thruster firings to counteract the effects of atmospheric drag, to maintain a nearly constant altitude," said Ted Molczan of Toronto, a leader in the worldwide community of satellite trackers.

Taking a look at the military space plane's past flights and the present-day mission, Molczan told SPACE.com that OTV-1 occupied a half-dozen different orbital altitudes during its 225-day mission. OTV-2 occupied two different orbital altitudes during its days aloft, accomplished by a series of small thruster firings over a seven-week period. [Photos: Spotting Satellites & Spaceships from Earth]
"OTV-3, as of day 343 in flight, has occupied two different orbital altitudes, accomplished using standard Hohmann transfer maneuvers about 11 weeks after launch," Molczan said in a Nov. 22 email.

Lifting-body design

 The two known X-37B space planes have been built for the Air Force by Boeing Government Space Systems, with flights conducted under the auspices of the Air Force’s Rapid Capabilities Office.

The 11,000-pound (4,990 kilograms) X-37B is one-fourth the size of an orbiter in the now-retired NASA space shuttle fleet but relies upon the same type of lifting-body design.

The vehicle is 29 feet (8.8 meters) long and nearly 15 feet (4.5 m) wide and has a payload bay that measures 7 feet (2.1 meters) long and 4 feet (1.2 meters) wide. Traveling in low-Earth orbit, the space plane operates from 110 miles (177 kilometers) to 500 miles (805 km) in altitude.

Next-generation technology

According to a Boeing fact sheet, each space plane is built with lightweight composite structures, rather than traditional aluminum. A new generation of high-temperature leading-edge tiles for the wings is utilized, distinct from the space shuttle’s carbon leading-edge segments.

The X-37B is outfitted with toughened uni-piece fibrous insulation impregnated silica tiles, which are significantly more durable than the first-generation tiles used by the space shuttle. Advanced conformal reusable insulation blankets are used for the first time on the X-37B.

The Boeing fact sheet also points out that avionics on an X-37B are designed to automate all de-orbit and landing functions. Additionally, there are no hydraulics onboard the winged vehicle; flight controls and brakes use electromechanical actuation.

Air Force mission control 

 Mission control for OTV flights are handled by the 3rd Space Experimentation Squadron at Schriever Air Force Base in Colorado. This unit is billed as the Air Force Space Command’s premier organization for space-based demonstrations, pathfinders and experiment testing, gathering information on objects high above Earth and carrying out other intelligence-gathering duties.

While details are scant about the X-37B program, a little light on the project may be shed during the National Space Club'’s 57th Annual Robert H. Goddard Memorial Dinner, to be held next March in Washington, D.C.

Slated to receive the General Bernard Schriever Award at the event is Major Joshua Chumley, USAF, Commander, Operating Location Alpha, 3d Space Experimentation Squadron, U.S. Air Force Space Command.

Chumley is on tap to pick up the prestigious award "for leading a selectively manned team responsible for operation of the United States’ first unmanned, autonomous, reusable space plane — the Orbital Test Vehicle, or X-37B," according to a National Space Club press release.

Landing location?

 Although there’s no official word how long the OTV-3 mission will go, there has been some talk that this craft may not land at California’s Vandenberg Air Force Base.

The Air Force has been evaluating auto-piloting the vehicle down at the space shuttle landing strip at NASA's Kennedy Space Center, next door to its Cape Canaveral departure site.

Making use of former space shuttle infrastructure is viewed as a possible cost-cutting measure for the program, officials have said.

Leonard David has been reporting on the space industry for more than five decades. He is former director of research for the National Commission on Space and is co-author of Buzz Aldrin's new book "Mission to Mars – My Vision for Space Exploration" published by National Geographic. 

Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook or Google+. Originally published on SPACE.com.

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Secretive X-37B space plane returns to Earth, two years on

CNET

• Sci-Tech

Secretive X-37B space plane returns to Earth, two years on

 

The Air Force says that the almost one-of-a-kind spacecraft "conducted on-orbit experiments" in the the longest-ever mission for the X-37B program.

 

• by Jon Skillings
  @jeskillings
• 17 October 2014 9:38 pm BST

The X-37B space plane and NASA's space shuttles have common roots, and it shows. Boeing

The intriguingly long mission of the unmanned X-37B has come to a conclusion at last. But the mystery of the mission lingers on.

The US Air Force space plane, one of just two X-37B vehicles in the Pentagon's inventory, landed Friday morning under the auspices of the 30th Space Wing at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California after 674 days in space -- that is, 22 months.

And that's about all that the space plane's handlers would say about the mission, aside from the terse statement that it "conducted on-orbit experiments."
"The mission is our longest to date and we're pleased with the incremental progress we've seen in our testing of the reusable space plane," the Air Force said in a statement.

The Air Force also said it plans to start the next X-37B mission sometime in 2015, launching from Cape Canaveral in Florida.

Almost as remarkable as the length and the hush-hush nature of the mission is one of the signature skills of the Boeing-built X-37B -- the unmanned spacecraft flies autonomously on its return trip to Earth.

The Air Force has said precious little -- ever -- about its X-37B missions, leading to wide-ranging speculation about what the diminutive space vehicle has been up to up there, or is building toward. Theories hit on everything from terrestrial surveillance to satellite launches (or, conversely, satellite killing) to weapons platform aimed at ground targets.

Or it could be more mundane: these could simply be shakedown cruises to see how a space plane, one with no human aboard, fares on extended junkets into orbit and back. It can't be easy to work all the kinks out of the algorithms that enable a space plane to maneuver in orbit, and in re-entry and landing, without a human at the controls.

The boilerplate description on the Air Force's fact sheet is not exactly illuminating: "The primary objectives of the X-37B are twofold: reusable spacecraft technologies for America's future in space and operating experiments which can be returned to, and examined, on Earth."

X-37B: The space plane of mystery (pictures) See full gallery

Measuring 29 feet long, with a wingspan of less than 15 feet and a cargo bay equivalent to that of a pickup truck, the 11,000-pound X-37B looks like a junior version of NASA's space shuttles. That's not really a coincidence, since both trace their roots to the space agency's research into lifting-body flying machines. In fact, the X-37B program was a NASA project until 2004, before it was shifted first to the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and then on to the Air Force.

This was the third spaceflight of an X-37B, also known as the Orbital Test Vehicle, since missions began five years ago. The first, which ended in December 2010, lasted 224 days, and the second, which ended in June 2012, endured for 469 days, or a year and four months.

This latest mission began December 11, 2012, when an Atlas V rocket carrying the space plane lifted off from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida.

There are two OTV craft in the X-37B fleet. The one that flew on the just-ended mission is OTV-1, which also carried out the first of the flights to date.

Confusingly the numbers in the the OT-x designations seem to be used loosely both for the spacecraft (-1 and -2) and for the missions (-1, -2, and now -3).
NASA last week said it has entered into an agreement with the Air Force's X-37B program for use of the Kennedy Space Center's Orbiter Processing Facility (OPF) Bays 1 and 2 -- former space shuttle hangars -- to process the X-37B for launch. Boeing is performing construction upgrades in those facilities that are targeted to be complete in December.

But the flights of the X-37B -- however many eventually take place -- could just be the groundwork for the next generation of space plane.

In July, DARPA took a first step back into the game, announcing the start of design work toward the XS-1, which also would be a reusable unmanned vehicle for "aircraft-like access to space." The agency didn't mind mentioning potential payloads: "XS-1 seeks to deploy small satellites faster and more affordably, and develop technology for next-generation hypersonic vehicles."

It's probably not too much of a surprise that Boeing is in the mix, winning a $4 million preliminary design contract for its concept of the XS-1. (Teamed with Boeing is Blue Origin, the spacecraft-minded company owned by Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos.) The other two Phase 1 contracts went to Northrop Grumman (working with Virgin Galactic) and to Masten Space Systems (working with XCOR Aerospace).

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About the author

Jon Skillings

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Jonathan Skillings is managing editor of CNET News, based in the Boston bureau. He's been with CNET since 2000, after a decade in tech journalism at the IDG News Service, PC Week, and an AS/400 magazine. He's also been a soldier and a schoolteacher, and will always be a die-hard fan of jazz, the brassier the better. See full bio

Mysterious X-37B Space Plane Returns to Earth After Nearly Two Years

Mysterious X-37B Space Plane Returns to Earth After Nearly Two Years

By Devin Coldewey
 

No one seems to know much about the Air Force's X-37B secret space plane except that it seems to be working exactly as designed. The unmanned Boeing-built craft, which resembles a miniature space shuttle, returned to Earth on Friday after nearly two years — 674 days, to be exact — in space. It's the X-37B program's third mission to space and by far the longest.

The plane landed at 9:24 a.m. local time on Oct. 17 at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, the Air Force's 30th Space Wing announced. 

"The 30th Space Wing and our mission partners, Air Force Rapid Capabilities Office, Boeing, and our base support contractors, have put countless hours of hard work into preparing for this landing and today we were able to see the culmination of that dedication," Colonel Keith Balts, 30th Space Wing commander, said in a release. "I'm extremely proud of our team for coming together to execute this third safe and successful landing. Everyone from our on console space operators to our airfield managers and civil engineers take pride in this unique mission and exemplify excellence during its execution." 

But just what did the X-37B do up there? The Air Force isn't telling. 

To be fair, experimental military-funded space projects aren't exactly the kind of thing you expect the brass to talk about in public. Inquiries over the years, and this week by NBC News, have always been met with polite but firm "no comment." 

What is known is that the X-37B has no human pilot, or at least not one in its windowless cockpit. It's operated remotely and lands on its own. The details of its launches aren't secret, but nor are they particularly interesting: it rode an Atlas V booster on Dec. 12, 2012, and assumed orbit about 180 miles above the Earth. That last part, notably, was figured out by a network of curious astronomers, not released publicly by the Air Force. 

The plane's size means there isn't room on board for much except avionics equipment, fuel for the thrusters, and a mysterious cavity about the size of a truck bed that could contain all manner of sensors, experiments, hardware — perhaps even a plant or some bacterial colonies. Of course, no one can be sure what's inside. 

Until the Air Force decides it's time to spill the beans, the X-37B will keep its secrets, even if they happen to just be ordinary testing of still-classified radio hardware or radiation-resistant materials. For now, the X-37B (and its siblings, however many there may be) will be locked away at Vandenberg Air Base in California, waiting, perhaps, to break its own record for days in orbit. 

First published October 17th 2014, 1:59 pm

 

Devin Coldewey

Devin Coldewey is a contributing writer at NBC News; he started his role in April of 2013. Coldewey is... Expand Bio

Little Sticky Legs: Alien Abductee Portraits by Steven Hirsch

Little Sticky Legs

Alien Abductee Portraits by Steven Hirsch

" I've got to meet numerous types of beings."

When I was in my thirties I found out from my father the truth about a government experiment that I was part of in which they were using other alien DNA to create me. I also have been on the ships most of my life off and on. I've had lots of contacts. Most of my contacts began when I was a teenager although I had it when I was younger. I was being taken. I've been taken on ships quite a bit.

I've also been on various ships. Mother ships and transporter ships. I've got to meet numerous types of beings. I've met Salamander beings and I've met Greys, various different types of Greys. I've also met the Blue Arcturians which are incredible. They all have their own personalities and their own purposes. So I've met Blue Arcturians. I've met Andromedans, the Assyrian Warriors of Light. I've met the Sirius Nephrons. I've also met the Cat People that are from Sirius. I've met many. I've actually seen people that can shape shift from human looking to Reptilians.

As far as the abductions. I've had numerous of them where they've shown me around various ships. They've also explained to me about the Hybrids and about the Starseeds that are here on planet Earth, why they're here and how they're here to help humanity. My job primarily is to awaken the Starseeds to remember why they're here on planet Earth. I have communication with beings of all different races. I've had communication with Reptilians as well as those that look like werewolves. They look like werewolves on steroids. I've also had communication with the human looking ones, with Ashtar, with Sananda, with Archangel Michael. I've also been able to help others go to the ships. Part of my mission is to help people get to the ships that need to be on the ships. There's a lot of what you would consider updating when it comes to with what's happening to planet Earth and when strategies have to change then many of the Starseeds that are here on special missions are taken to the ships where they are then informed of the changes in the strategies and so forth of what is going to be happening in the future. I've never yet ever met a being that was malevolent. I've always meet the benevolent ones. I've never experienced unconditional love till I've met them face to face and had conscious contact with them. They have taught me the importance of living with unconditional love and working with the light of source. This is the power that rules the universe.

Cynthia

UFO Crash site at Dreamy Dam

"They are able to transmogrify and morph."

Most important life that I’m living is me from the future zenathia, the future of Earth. Sent back in time to find out who contributed to the culture of earth at the time of the end of the Mayan calendar, December 21st. 2012. For forty years I’ve done this work, I’ve done my job. I’ve been given phenomenal research abilities to find out from people and beings. I interview aliens, lots of aliens. Thirty normal type aliens. Two hundred super normal aliens. Way beyond. I can talk to them and talk to their people on earth, find out who contributed what. Everything from Miss America to who wins the Super Bowl. Who made the medals, who made new tractors, factories, technologies. Who’s running for president. What revolution happened. What books were written. What thoughts are thought. Anything the culture has, had to be marked and labeled and historians in those times didn’t deliver the goods. I was been sent back in time to do the work. I’ve done the work. The job is done. The Mayan calendars happened. Our auras have gone to the third dimension. That’s my most important life.

At Mount Rainier, December 24th. 1973, I made telepathic contact with a flying saucer that was a bright light in the sky. We tried to find it. How big it was and it got bigger and bigger the light and people would map on the windows the light and I went out and tried to know where the stars were, since then I’ve learned all the main stars, because that’s how you tell if it’s a star or a flying saucer. And they sent us pictures and had a briefing session and communicated, but the beings did it telepathically. They really didn’t want to show us their equipment or the door or the rooms. They did it telepathically, it was a briefing session and it really since then mainly it’s been mind to mind. Not sitting in a chair. Not laying in a table. although I’ve done that. I can tell about that one. But that was my first contact. 

Well they were hidden because they are able to transmogify and morph, like they can take on different shapes looks and sizes. They can be, look like, brown skin, black skin, red skin, white skin. They’ll have a skin thats pleasing to you. What they said was that. They told me, they showed me the sinking of the Lusitania. And that the captain was forced to down the Lusitania against his will. They showed me scenes from World War Two that weren’t shown to the public. They showed me the revisionist history that they believe is true which I’ve investigated since then. They said yes, we’ll answer your questions and show you some stuff and they showed me pictures and histories. They were super intelligent, beyond human intelligence. And they were compassionate and caring. They were not malevolent they were benevolent. These are the benevolent aliens although I have talked to many of what the humans would consider malevolent, but I’ve come to a have a compassion for the aliens. I read their soul. I see their spirit. I hear their problems. I know why they’re here. I interview them. I interview all of the ones I come in contact with and find out theres many. There’s hundreds of levels of aliens.

James

Talking to Alien Beings

Superstition Mountain

"You will know when it's time."

I saw the three little Greys standing next to my bed. And they were telling me if you don't move we're not going to hurt you and they never hurt me. but they did float me off the bed, and through the window. They took me to their craft which was outside. Laid me on the table. 

This went on two, three times a year. I got to where I knew they were coming. I would see them come through a wall or through a door and I would just  mentally say do what you have to do as long as you don't hurt me and I'd pass out. Then about four years ago I just got tired of it. I said, "Look you guys you shouldn't be doing that" because I felt like they're down in areas they shouldn't be in you know. Down around the genitals and stuff. They said, "We have the right." I don't know what they meant by that but. Then I said to the one that was working on me which was a taller one with the big head and big face and he always put it right up against my face. All I could see was his big black eyes. And I said, "But why are you doing all this all the time?" And he said, "You will know when it's time." And that was the only message I got and from then on they stopped coming four years ago. I'm disappointed. I liked them coming. I was hoping to learn something. But they never talked to me or anything except to give me a message if I asked something. And the message was basically, shut up.

Terrance

"I was taken aboard."

November 5, 1975, me and six other men were leaving work in a remote forrest and we encountered an unidentified flying object and I was taken aboard. My co-workers were accused of murdering me and making up a story to cover up for why I was missing. The state police gave them a lie detector test, but even though they passed ever since then it's been one sort of attempt to explain it away anyway they could. If you're going to pass judgement on it get the facts first.

When I regained consciousness on board I encountered some definitely non human entities and also some beings that resembled humans to a high degree. It was a very traumatic experience.

Travis

UFO debris from Plains of San Agustin

"I had a hole in the back of my head."

There was a knock at the door and there was a Grey being standing there. And this being handed me this small baby. I looked up to him and he handed me a second one that shouldn't have been there. I woke up screaming and so angry. Come back with bruising or woken up I guess with bruising that shouldn't have been there. I had a hole in the back of my head that under black light glowed with a triangle around it. I like to tell myself that they were dreams but somewhere inside myself I know it was more than that.

Lisa

" Zeta Reticulians."

These beings that call themselves pure light beings and they were a collective of beings that were here to assist humanity. And they came through with this message that had about shifting conscious for human kind at this time. I sensed the wholeness of them that there were many and they came through with information every time. And I also felt other beings that were present. The little kind of classical beings but kind of silvery light. They would be doing things to my aura or to my energy and I could feel them. I could see visual images of them activating something in my conscious. That's how I perceived it, they basically said that into my mind that they were activating things. So they could communicate better with me. 

There's beings from everywhere out there. And it's fascinating. Some of them were also the Zeta Reticulians. The messages from the Zetas are basically that they're helping us in our evolutionary process and all of these events that are happening, that people are experiencing such as abductions are to help us evolve.  Help us evolve as a species. Into a more luminous being, a lighter being. Our actual DNA is being shifted so our physical bodies are actually becoming lighter in frequency and they're helping us to do this. And to activate abilities that we have inherently but that have been basically been shut off. Not activated. So we have this extra DNA that we're not using. Or another level to our DNA that we're not using. And we're supposed to be as a species moving in evolutionarily speaking into a lighter dimension actually. They also say it's an awareness. A new level of awareness. So all of the being Zetas are on one level or another from different perspectives. And the Zeta beings that often are experienced as abduction, experiences are here specifically, they were asked to help with this process because they're actually experts in genetic, I'd say manipulation, but it's really not what they would call it. They have the ability or they've developed the ability to work with genetic structures. It's beyond what we think of as genetic because there's an energetic level, that I'm not a scientist so I don't know what to really call it but there always comes that message that there's an energetic component to this. That the frequency of our DNA is part of this factor. So they're trying to help us to make aure we can move into this next level of awareness which is an expansion of our abilities as human beings. SO that's what they're here to do. We don't necessarily comprehend them on a 3D level. Many people see them. Some don't see them. Some experience them in dream states and it seems like a dream and it is a real dream, but they're actually in a dimension, a dimension that we're moving into. So they are of the lighter frequency that we will be moving into. Of course we will be at the very baby steps of that, the very first level of that dimension and they've been there for millions of years and are actually ready to move on to their next level.  

Jill    

"They had big white heads."

I had a sighting with my boyfriend. We were walking the dog and the dog was barking at this squirrel that had run up a tree and we were looking up. We were looking at the squirrel. This was in Silver Lake section of Los Angeles. And we saw this thing in the air that was black and it wasn't moving. It was a bright blue sky day and I remember looking at him and saying, "It's a UFO".

A blue light had come through my ceiling. It was this very particular turquoisey kind of blue. And it was very solid like a column with like a bottom but it didn't flare out, it was like a solid beam. And it came into my room and when it touched me I was frozen and I curled into a ball and I went through the ceiling. And the next thing I know I'm in this white misty room on a table. I saw this row of beings to my left that were tall. They had white robes on with high collars. They had some kind of emblem here. I wanna say it was like a triangle inside a circle. They had big white heads and big black wrap around eyes. They all looked the same. I was terrified.

Camille

"They're so ugly."

About two thirty in the morning there were four little Greys at the foot of my bed. They were all just alike and I was looking at them and saying, "They're so ugly. Why am I not afraid?" But they had done something to calm me down. And one of them came around to the side of the bed and did something. They were showing me pictures on either side of the bed. Some type of a hologram.  I knew it was something about my past life but I didn't know exactly what is was they were showing me. What they said was that had been coming to me ever since I was a child and they were not doing anything against my will and I used to be one of them and I had agreed to be this bridge between the pleiades. It's where they said they came from and the earth. And they had been teaching me things that I was supposed to bring through and teach to others here on Earth and I hadn't been doing a very good job of it. So they were been giving me a review of what they'd taught me. Which were the holograms on both sides of the bed. They were telling me things about cleaning up the environment, being nicer to each other and having more brotherly love. And also the big thing that was important to them was getting rid of nuclear power plants. They said it was contaminating the earth. And it also had the potential for harming them too.


Vivian

"it's got little sticky legs"

Me and my partner decided we were going to go for a walk up on Bell Rock in Sedona. Bell Rock is known for being a vortex, an energy vortex. I didn't  know what that meant. I just thought we would go up there and feel some energy changes or something. My partner doesn't feel anything so we basically we're going for a walk in a nice area and see if we can feel anything. I had no idea there was any connection with alien activity there at all. Zero. Didn't even cross my mind. We had to walk a distance, maybe three miles to get there. I started to notice out of the corner of my eye there's a figure next to me and the figure, we call them the shirt boxes because if you can imagine a man's shirt box it's that shape except that the thing is about four feet tall and it's got little sticky legs, its got two eyes and something that's a little off center and kinda looks like a turkey gobble for a mouth. It's made of white plasma material in some kind of square membrane and it's lit up. Anyway it appears to be about four feet tall something like Sponge Bob. So Sponge Bob was walking with me and I'm getting tired. I said, "I don't think I'm going to make it to Bell Rock today." And Sponge Bob says, by the way we communicate telepathically, I've never ever heard a voice, Sponge Bob says, "Yes you are, you're going".  All right. All right, I'm going. So I walked a little bit farther and I said, "You know I really am getting tired." And Sponge Bob says, "No you're not, you're going, you're going". All right, I'm going, I'm going. So I go a little bit farther and I'm really tired now and I turn to Sponge Bob and I say, "Look it, I don't know who you are but I think I'm done". "You're not done" and Sponge Bob starts pushing me, physically pushing me, from the behind. Oh my God. "All right, all right I'm going". And then I notice there's another one of these guys. Now there's two of them and they're walking with me. Wait there's another one. I walk a few more, maybe ten or thirty feet and there's ten of them now.

The whole thing's so bizarre I don't know what to think of it anyway but I'm walking. So I'm walking and there's ten of them now, then there's more and there's more and by the time we get to Bell Rock there are literally thousands of these guys. And I see other humans walking around and nobody sees them but me. They are laughing and singing and dancing. The happiest most loving little creatures. And I asked them, "Why me?" and they said, "You're one of us." In the back of Bell Rock there's a Stargate. There was a pipe going up. I could see their little bodies were being sucked up in the vortex in the pipe. Sucked up into the heavens.

Andrea

"It was a mantis being."

We were taken to an underground base near the Sedona area. At the underground base, my friend and I were separated from the rest of the group that had been abducted. Which was my two daughters, my husband and another woman that was staying next door. My friend and I were seated in kind of these egg shaped seats. Some kind of apparatus was put around our head. And there was this long cylinder kind of device that had a blue, looked like a blue flame that was coming out of it and they put this up around my head, around this other golden device and a alien came in. It was a mantis being. And they said, there was this little teardrop, kind of looked sort of like a pendulum upside down. What they wanted me to do was move it with telekinesis through this hoop and literally jump through this hoop and I couldn't do it so the mantis helped me put it. Then they did this blue flashing thing and then they said now you try it and I was able to move it through the hoop. I was told at that time they were upgrading my pineal gland for intuition so i have more physic ability.

Jocelyn

"I saw this ET."

It was like three years ago. I saw this ET. It woke me up in the middle of the night, while I was mediating. They exist. If some could go like this and open your eyelids while you're mediating, while you're in deep man there's something out there. It looked like a little kid except it had big eyes, it looked just like a little kid except it had big eyes, small nose and a little mouth. Big eyes, small nose and a little mouth.

I'm thinking that because, Einstein was right about something. Albert EInstein was right about something. How there's different dimensions and different realities and stuff. I'm thinking they went through time if you will you know.  If their out there if they know all this and they have all this technology and all this stuff, what are the odds of them coming back you know?


They didn't probe me, they didn't do nothing. They just opened up my eyes. It was kinda crazy because before that I just asked for something like that to happen just for proof and I just got it you know? It was there. It happened. I was a little bit scared at the moment. It was something crazy.


How did it leave? Just like that it disappeared. You think what you want but that's what happened to me.


Sabastian

"They're gonna knock me out with that white light again."

Anyway this particular night this was around the time of the full moon and the Hale-Bopp Comet was very prominent in the sky and I had just come home from a fire walking ceremony so that was an intense evening and II kind of awakened in the middle of the night with feeling this weird heat down around my sexual area and I was waking up going, "What in the world" and then all of a sudden I could feel these long skinny bony fingers drawing circles on my right ovary and I felt the paralysis and I thought, "Oh shoot they really are here, oh my God." I'm not sure how I saw them. If it was you know tuning in and seeing them on what level. My room looks dark and I always sleep with my light on. I've done that since I was a child. So when I'm realizing they're with me the energy feels different. It was totally unnerving to me to recognize that they really were visiting with me and I could see there was a smaller Grey on my right hand side and a slightly taller one on my left and I remember telepathing to the Grey, "Please stop doing that, I don't want you to touch me." I asked him three times. It didn't stop so I'm not sure if it was my astral arm that came out and I reached over and I grasped his long skinny bony fingers with my left hand and said, "I asked you not to touch me, please do not touch me." And then I noticed the Greys on each side of my bed looked at each other and I thought, "Ah shoot, they're gonna knock me out with that white light again." 


I have seen myself on ships. Either driving them with somebody who is a well known abductee or I was in a huge mother ship one time where I was being taken by, guided by a taller Grey that had on a bright red robe. He's more or less like my teacher. Then I went into this conference room and there was all these different beings from wherever and then there was a seat that I knew was just for me. So then I sat next to this being that had a body that looks similar to, I wanna say like a beef jerky stick, beef stick. It had that shape and then he had just a round head and three tubular extensions. And when he looked and little tiny skinny arms and legs and he looked at me and I heard this energy, I could see it go "wit were wit." And I laughed because I knew he was saying hello to me, "How have you been?  I haven't seen you in a long time."


Jeanie

"They were all humanoid."

I was lying breathing deep and fast to the powerful evocative music and there I was. My consciousness was in the middle of this huge dome like structure. The inside of the structure was white and then there were coves in it that were big enough for people to sit in meditation and they were sitting cross legged. Some of them wore white robes. Some of them had long hair. They were all humanoid. There were some I couldn't quite tell what they were. But I got the feeling they were a type of human. Some of them were huge. Some of them were small and they were all in their coves and it was all part of this huge dome and the atmosphere in this place was absolutely beautiful. It was golden light and the background was white, like it was whitewashed and it was a place of meditating on peace and love. 

Sasha

"The car was totally immobilized."

In the summer of 1961 when I was twelve years old, I was at my girlfriends house  and we were playing and her father yelled for us to come outside, he wanted us to see something. When we walked outside we immediately saw a giant silver craft. It was silently hovering above a tree. It had red, green and white lights that I thought at the time were rotating but I realize they were pulsating. Someone called the police. Two Novi police came. Her father actually brought a telescope out and he asked me to look through the telescope, I said, "Why? It's right there." I didn't even understand why I would even look through a telescope. It was so close. And then there was a car coming down the road. There was a tree here and a craft here and a car coming down the road and as it got right underneath the craft, a beam of light came out of the bottom and it went right to the roof of the car and as soon as it touched the car the car was totally immobilized. I just remember screaming and being excited and jumping up and down. I remember tugging on one of the police officers arms and saying, "Do something. Do something."  After that I remember being home and Mom and Dad telling me to not talk about it, forget about it, hoping that I would forget about it and it would go away. So for fifty years I never shared it with anyone, not with family or friends or anyone.


Six months ago I met Dr. Harry Wellness and I told him my story  because he was a Ufologist and I knew he would believe me and not think I was crazy. He found a regression therapist for me. I had no idea I just wanted to remember the incident more clearly. And at the end of the first regression I remember seeing that my body was rumbling, was a word I never used. My body was rumbling and waving to the low hum of the craft and that was the end of the first regression. In the second regression, I actually remember being aboard and a procedure that was performed on me. There were three Greys. They performed a laparoscopy on me. In 1961 in the medical field there were no laparoscopy. They explained to me that they wanted to see inside. They described themselves as teachers. They promised they would get me home safely. I remember in that regression that as the craft was leaving they let me see them leaving and they wanted me to see them leaving. The reason being that they promised and they telepathically told me, "See we told you we would get you back safely." That was important  to them to relay that message to me. 


In the third regression I remember communication that I had with, I called him Mr., because that's how we refer to adults, Mr. and Mrs. back then. And I remember my conversation with him as I was leaving the craft. And he corrected me that it was called a ship and the reason it was called a ship was that it goes in the water as well as in the air. And I watched how the doors shut. They shut like this. They wrapped around. All the instruments that they use on me when they did the laparoscopy were retractable. They all came out of the wall. It was all neat and clean. There was nothing in there. It was just silver, white floor, a silver table that I was on. Three Grey beings. The pilot looked like a normal anybody's dad. I said Mr. why did you let them hurt me. And he said, "Your pain was perceived." And I got really mad at that remark. I realize that my pain. I realize now that my pain was perceived.  They didn't hurt me. They didn't want to hurt me. But I was watching the needle and seeing the needle. My pain was perceived. 


I remember the first night that I got home after I was taken, staring out my bedroom window forever. And wishing for them to comeback. "Please come back, please comeback." I'm here. Come get me.


Nancy

"I've been in contact with six different beings."

Wherever I go I have encounters. To my knowledge I've been in contact with six different beings or races from other planets. Some actually look very human and there's two races that look quite different. One is very insectoid looking kind of race another is the guy I call doctor, he has a very leathery look to him. I've had contact with the tall Greys and short little white guys. And the guys in brown hooded robes that use to surround my bed when I was a little girl.

My most recent encounter was December 11th of 2011.  It was a very sexual, sensual experience. And it was delightful actually. It was like having a full body orgasm. All I can say is every cell in my body felt alive and vibrating and filled with life and love. It was a very expansive feeling. I was also floating. It was  what I would imagine the experience of making love with God would be like.

In September I met two daughters that I didn't know that I have that are hybrids. They're not on this planet. Im not sure if they're on another planet or on a craft.

One of my encounters happened in New Mexico when I was living out in the middle of nowhere. I was walking up the driveway to lock the gate. The only thing I can figure there was a portal on either side of the driveway. A tall Grey being with very large black eyes ran across the driveway, turned and looked at me and telepathically asked me if I had seen his mate cause they apparently had crashed up the road.


Saundra

"They would just disappear into another dimension."

In 1982 when I was sitting home one evening, I felt a very powerful presence come to my home, my home. And I knew they were star beings that had contacted me years before. And when they showed up I could actually feel them physically putting a hand on my shoulder and communicating with me. And they were communicating with me telepathically. And what they were saying to me is that they had come back to me to remind me of my origins, that I was not of Earth. That a large portion of me is actually ET. And that they wanted me to do work that would wake people up. And when they showed up at my house there were crazy things that started happening. Clocks started spinning. The hands of the clock started spinning in all kinds of directions. I had a toaster hit up, it was not plugged in. I actually touched it and it burned me. And also within that same week a transmission came through onto my answering machine. And it was a very strong transmission. And when I went to tape record it it was erased. So didn't obviously want that on tape. Within the next couple of weeks, they talked to me about doing healing work with me and helping to shift my DNA. That they would be raising my frequency so I could better fulfill my purpose here. 

When I was in bed I heard telepathically, they were saying, "We're going to be taking you somewhere and working on you and we're going to be actually helping to um, rewire you in some ways."

That happened actually two or three times within a month. That they were taking me to another place, a spacecraft and actually to another planet or star that's more ethereally based. So they were continuing to raise my frequencies. I was very telekinetic for awhile. Sometimes I would actually pickup objects and would  disappear into another dimensions. A huge door opened after that. I started communicating  with many different types of star being or ET groups. So what they have actually led me into is now guiding other people into helping them to get in contact with their original star family.   

Jacquelin

"You're on one of the moons of Saturn."

When I was seven years old, i went to sleep one night in Indiana. I was a corn feed farm boy. In the middle of the night I woke up just basically cause my nose was itching and I went to scratch my nose and there was glass over my face and it startled me for a second and I couldn't understand what was happening so I reached up and I was kind of panicking, when someone reached out and took my arms, folded them across my chest and held them down across my chest and said, :Relax you're perfectly fine, just stay calm" and I said, "What's happening?" He said,"If you're ready I'm going to let you loose and show you something." Well he let me loose and I sat up and I was on some kind of metal stand and I was wearing a space suit and in from of me was a guy wearing a space suit. And I couldn't see his face cause his shield was gold in color. And I said "What am I doing here" and he said, "Well we wanted to show you something that human beings have never seen and we wanted you to see this/"  So I said, "Really this is cool." You know this is a little boy having and experience of a lifetime you know, I said "Great." So he said, "Follow me." So he goes off and he opens the door, he reaches up on the panel, activates this thing. These doors open. This ramp goes down and I follow this guy out, down this ramp. I was standing on dirt and I was wondering where I was at. And right in the sky to my left was a huge moon like body and in the immediate background was Saturn. And I could see hundreds and hundreds of rings. And I said, "Where am I?" and he said, "You're on one of the moons of Saturn." I said, "Why did you bring me here?" And he said, "Because these two moons are going opposite directions. They get to a certain point and they revolve around each other and go back the opposite direction. I just wanted you to see that." Well the thing is after he showed it to me, they took me back in, he knocked me out and when I woke up the next morning I was in my bed.

I looked off in the distance and I saw a light over the mountains. It clearly looked like a UFO to me. So I said out loud, "If you're coming for me, you outta get your asses over here and get it over with." And as soon as I said that, this thing leaped at supersonic speeds, it went zoom and just stopped right over my head. It was huge. It was circular, anywhere from fifty to seventy five feet across. And it was surrounded in light. And this thing was ebbing, this light at a slow ebb. And it had all these colors in the rainbow like pink and teal green and red and orange and yellow. It was just sparkling at this low ebb. But it didn't do anything. It just stayed there. So I'm sitting there looking at this thing and about ten  the higher it got the brighter it got then ten minutes came and went and nothing happened. Then suddenly this thing starts ebbing way, way up and the higher it got the brighter it got untill it got almost white hot looking and when it went bright white looking it suddenly disappeared right in from of my eyes. It didn't fly off it didn't shoot off it literally just went, "sheeeeeesh", disappeared.

Bruce

"It was a small spaceship."

All my life I've had visions which I could never control. I was originally abducted when I was sixteen years old. I was lifted up in the air. There was no gravity. I was lifted straight up and eventually I basically turned this way on my back and getting into a spaceship. It was a small spaceship, round. It was basically like a vertical opening. Rectangular shape. I didn't see any doors and as I was basically brought into the spacecraft, I saw about seven tall Grey aliens with small mouths and big eyes, black. I was in that position and I wasn't really feeling any fear. I wasn't scared. I was seeing  

like a lightbulb emanating, like blue light on the left hand side. I didn't see any surgical instruments. I was fully clothed throughout what I can remember. And while laying down I could see these tall Grey aliens on my righthand side talking to each other. To me it was pretty clear that they were communicating in our language between themselves not ignoring me completely while laying there. It was more of a gargling sound, it was very hard to describe.

Sebastien

"We were put into a little beam ship. "

December 1995 I landed on Johnson atoll which is an island eight hundred miles southwest in the pacific ocean and I was a civilian working for the military and when I landed there a man came over and said, "You've landed on a joint US military ET base." And I said, "Oh really?" So a year later in 1996 I was sleeping ion my bed and suddenly I'm being carried by six of the traditional ET's with the large heads and large eyes. There are there military on either side walking and I'm screaming  bloody murder. What I notice is the fingers are all open. Three fingers with one opposing finger. And I'm just screaming because this is so unreal. I was sound asleep. I'm also being carried. This is so unreal. I'm screaming bloody murder. Why isn't anybody rescuing me. This island is only a half mile by three miles wide. 

And the Grey on the right hand side the one that was carrying my foot  said, "Go ahead and scream all you want.You're in an energy field and no one could hear you." So at that point I was carried down to the beach and I had a boyfriend and he was carried down from the opposite side and we were put into a little beam ship and launched out past the coral reef into the underwater facility. and there I was made to sit in a chair and I watched my little boyfriend as they were doing something to him. He was screaming. There was nothing I could do so I just sat there watching. And I don't know how much time went by but they returned me to my bed and I assume they took him to his bed. They sprayed something, it sounded like a hiss and I was paralyzed. I couldn't move. But the moment they left I was able to move. I sat up right in my bed. I was angry. They're supposed to make you forget. I was just angry because I had to go to work that day. I had to act normal. 

  

Janet 

"I've had a lot of experiences with Reptilians."

I have had experiences since I was a child. I had a series of dreams which was sort of unusual for a seven or eight year old child, which in my forties began to unravel into experiences with Reptilians and that eventually culminated with showing them my child. Full grown by the time I met him. But such a feeling of love and well being when I saw him. He was just golden and glowing and beautiful. He's Reptilian. You know. He's not human. He's sort of golden. Reptilian kind of head. Sort of mottled skin. Kind of of more claw like hands and feet. A Reptilian. Not human like me. But I had such a beautiful feeling from him that it didn't freak me out at all when all of it unraveled and became something else. It was something I really didn't have any kind of  experiential framework for at the time at the time I recovered the memories nobody was really talking about the Reptilians. That kind of came later and a lot of it was negative. I just have to say they're not all negative.

As a child, this was like when I was like seven or eight years old. I don't really think I was impregnated, they took my DNA. I only saw him one time. By the time I saw him he was full grown. I don't know. Whatever realm they live in. Because I think it's more of a dimensional sort of thing. 

I've had a lot of experiences with Reptilians. Some of them not very nice. But the ones from my childhood were all pretty ok. They never hurt me or did anything to frighten me or anything like that until; much later.  

They were a race that colonized this planet. They still think they own it.  The kind of negative ones want to get rid of us. The more positive ones, you know they'll live here with us.  They kind of already do. They live along side of us but we don't see them because they're in another dimension. You know they occupy other places. Yeah but we don't see them. Even within this reality our perception of what is here is very small as humans. Our visual acuity, the kinds of light that we can perceived is very small compared to say a cat or another creature. So theres a lots that's here that we don't even see. Later on I did have encounters with people who said they had, one guy said he was a Reptilian ambassador and what I saw, basically was a seven foot tall Repitilain with kind of a cobra head. They were in communication and sort of symbiosis of some sort. And I can see it. I could sense everything about it and describe it to him. 

And later I saw someone shape shift. You know go from human to Reptilian and back to human again. That was kind of freaky.  And the deal with them is they know when you see them, they know. They're very telepathic and they know. 

Rita

"I don't want to go."

I was on a mother ship. I was walking along a gantry and I was looking down to the left and my right and a little Grey had my hand and I could see different types of spacecraft all below. I could see different human looking people and aliens coming and going on these crafts. The Grey brought me into a little room, the door slide open and he just told me in my mind, "Sit here and wait, I'll be back." So then I sat down. It was just all white and then he came back. Got me a little bit and then he brought me to another bigger room. It was an auditorium and with stadium seating. There was a podium down at the bottom and he led me to a seat to sit and all around me  were some humans here and there but there was a lot of all different types of alien beings. Next thing I'm leaving, bringing me down the aisle again. I'm telling them, "I want to stay, "I don't want to go." I start crying. I say, "I like it here, I belong." And they said, "No it's not your time. You have to help save this planet Earth." That's all I remember.

Stephen

"This thing is just hovering in the air."

I was working down at the forest department. I was trimming trees down for fire protection. Stacking them up and burning it and when I was working late we all piled up in to the truck and started heading home. There was a bright object to the right of us and we couldn't tell what it was. First we thought it was something the hunters made up, you know for hunting season cause it was hunting season. We couldn't tell what it was then when we got closer we stopped in front of it and just saw this thing hovering in the air. Travis Walton he gets out and gets up to it. Everyone was hollering at him to come back. And Allan Dallas he's on the right of me and there was seven of us in a pickup truck and there was three in the front and four in the back. Allan Dallas he hits the floorboard and I get a perfect view. Travis goes up there, he's in front of it. Ducks behind some dead branches and stuff and he just raises up and this thing is just hovering in the air and it starts rocking back and forth. It has a beeping noise to it going, "Beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep." And then this blueish, well there was a humming, high pitch too. I can't explain the pitch. It started rocking back and forth and Travis stands up. A blueish green light comes out and zaps him. He flys back about twenty feet where it zapped him I said, "It got him." When I said, "It got him" Mike takes off and leaves him. We were going down the highway. We stopped down the road.

It was a bright white like two cake cans on top of each other. It was a really bright white light. The light that came out and zapped him was blueish green. I didn't see nobody. We stopped down the road a little bit to talk about what happened. And we back to look for him and couldn't find him. So we went into town. Kenny Peterson called the cops and the cops came out there and we told them the story. He didn't believe us. He thought we were drunk or something. Three of us went back. Michael went back, Allan Dallas and Kenny Peterson went back with the cops to look for him. Me and John Goulette and Dwayne Smith. We went home cause I thought he was dead. So the cops went out there to look for him and thought they were gonna find a body. And then the next morning the cops were at my door. They just got a hundred man posse to go look for him. So my moms out there talking to them and telling my mom that they think we killed him. So I snuck out the back door and I hid all day while they were out looking for him cause everybody else went out there with em with the cops. So I figured the cops were gonna find the body and there was no way in hell I was gonna go out there and look for him and find the body. You know. So I hid all day till they came back. And the when they came back I came out of hiding.

Steve

"He just kind of vaporized in front of me."

I saw a very clear scene of them being in the delivery room when I was born. Then the next experience after that I was three years old. These beings came into my room. We walked through the wall out into the woods and there were two deer in suspended animation and then this, as I learned these were Zetas, I didn't know what they were called at the time brought me over to this tree. We sat down, he was drawing in the dirt; the earth and the moon and then all these lines way over to the far end of the patch of dirt and that told me that was where they were from. So after all that she says, "Well come back to that stain glass window, what was that?" And the next thing I know I see myself on a ship and the stain glass window started off being what looked like a window out into space and it was looking at the earth and the moon but then it turned to the stain glass window and every time the colors changed I got zapped with energy.

I see a silhouetted being standing at the side of my bed, looked like a Zeta. I get zapped with a blue beam. Say about an inch in diameter this beam. Went right into my solar plexus area. I said to him out loud, "Can you show me the ship?" and with that he just disappeared. He just kind of vaporized in front of me.

John

"Maybe I'd say four foot tall."

So you know I was heading home. My best friend and my sister were waiting for me. We were supposed to go out to dinner. Then on my way home I see an object off in the distance. And I realize the object was just hovering over my apartment complex. I quickly ran upstairs. Grabbed my camcorder. Grabbed my friend and my sister. We actually never made it out to dinner that evening. We talked about what had just happened.


2 o'clock in the morning there was a knock at the door. They must have been knocking a long time because they woke me up. Well I went to the door to see who was at the door. My sister had already answered the door. And she was staring at the ceiling like you know with her mouth open like she was still asleep just staring at the ceiling wondering what the heck is going on. And I see three people standing outside and I thought they were young teenagers, messing around but as I got closer, "Well crap they're wearing masks. It's like why are they wearing masks? Oh my God they're going to rob us" is the first thing that popped into my head.


I realized then what was standing before me wasn't human at all. And it's not like your typical ET people talk about on TV. It wasn't like this grey little guy with big eyes. These things had very large eyes. They weren't  grey. They were actually so blue they were almost violet and there was a female and two males. She had a female figure and two males. They were very skinny. They were about maybe I'd say four foot tall but they didn't have, they weren't grey and they had kind of pale skin but they had almost cancer patient or like very old people hair. Very scraggly hair. And I remember this female kind of lunged forward at me and I stepped back. She grabbed my wrist. I got so frightened, apparently I snapped out of whatever trance I was in. I grabbed one of the males and I was going to throw him off a balcony and I felt a tap on the back of my head and I woke up somewhere else.   

And that's kind of when things started.  How do I explain this? It wasn't like a room I had ever been in before. I was literally stuck to a wall. Not; like chained to a wall or glued to a wall. It's like those centrifugal force kind of rides at an amusement park. It was like that. And there was like a lit panel off to the side. And I remember this when I came to. I could move my head and my hands but I couldn't move my body. And this female whatever she was came up and hit a panel on the side of this wall and it released me and I'm standing there just totally freaking out. I remember this male came with this box hanging over his shoulder. It looked like it was lit internally with a tube at the end of it. At the end of this tube for lack of a better description it looked like a melon ball. And they turned me around and started doing something to my back that was absolutely excruciating and so then because of the pain I felt a tap on the back of my head again and I woke up in the middle of a table. And I'll never forget this as long as I live. Every time I had a concern a thought would pop in my head. And I got to tell you it's very unnerving when it's not your own thought. Like who are you? How did you get here? And this thought would pop in my head of all these different symbols. And there was one point where I was sitting on this table and this being kind of stepped forward and tilted her head to one side. You know how dogs kind of cock their heads to one side? And literally an explosion of thoughts, literally knocked me off the table. Well I came to she kind of looked at me like she's saying, "OK you poor slob, lets try this slower because you're special."


I woke up in my bed the next morning thinking oh my God I had the most freaky dream in my life. Even though I remembered everything and I wasn't asleep when this  happened. I was so freaked out because i was such a skeptic that I tried to convince myself it was a dream. And the next morning I was just about to tell her I had this weird dream. And she said, "What the hell happened to your back?" And I didn't feel any pain but when I reached around I felt these holes. And all this memory started flooding back. And I literally just hit the floor and started sobbing because I was so freaked out from what happened.


Stan