How easy is it to fool UFO believers? Easy, if you have a flare for it

[Ian David]

How easy is it to fool UFO believers? Easy, if you have a flare for it

(Update (April 3, 2009): The two men who perpetrated this hoax have been charged by a local prosecutor as "disorderly persons", evidently a minor offense. Not surprising, and I’m sure it won’t be a big deal. Still, don’t try this at home, folks. Thanks to Kevin Conod for the tip.]

This story almost speaks for itself: by tying some long-lasting flares to helium balloons and releasing them, two skeptics from New Jersey made fools out local and national media, including the thoroughly awful "UFO Hunters" show on the increasingly ill-named History Channel.

I love this story! It has all the features told breathlessly in UFO reports: distant lights, flying in formation, appearing to hover, then suddenly taking off. All of this from flares tied to a balloon! My favorite part was testimony from a pilot (who claimed on camera the lights shot off to the side), because UFO experts love to trot out pilots, saying they spend so much time looking at the sky there’s no way they could be mistaken.

Right.

More:
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2009/04/02/how-easy-is-it-to-fool-ufo-believers-easy-if-you-have-a-flare-for-it/

[Orrex]

1. Oh that's magnificent!

I've often wanted to execute some of hoax along these lines, or even just a crop circle, but I've never had the nerve to risk getting caught.

It also amazes me how society has enshrined certain professions as Keepers of the Truth, at least when convenient. Pilots, military personnel, and police are considered unimpeachable expert witnesses in these matters, no matter how quickly those same experts are suspected of cover-up in other circumstances.

[onager]

4. Expert pilots? They've obviously never seen Discovery Channel's "Air Crash Investigation..."

:rofl:

Which in the USA, goes by the name "Air Emergency," for some reason. Probably pressure from the commercial airlines, though I'm just guessing.

Anyway, it's a great show and often does display incredible piloting skills. Then there are the OTHER guys...like the Aeroflot pilot who let his 15-year-old son fly the brand new Airbus on a Moscow-Hong Kong flight...

"Is it OK if I move this just a little?"

[Heddi]

5. Oh man my husband and I LOVE that show

Air Emergency and Seconds from Disaster.

The one with the Kid in the Cockpit ha ha ha What a maroon.

[Orrex]

8. That's expert *witnesses* not expert pilots

Heck, they might be expert pilots, but UFOlogists are much more interested in their expert witness abilities. You know, because by their very nature they are honest and sincere and 100% correct about mysterious sightings in the distant night sky.

[onager]

9. I posted too quickly again, thanks...

One episode of that show SEEMED to be veering off into woo-woo land, but happily they just did that to get our attention.

Commerical airliner saw "strange lights in the sky." Then millions of little twinkling lights around the plane, and "vortex trails" of strange fiery light over the wings.

Then all the engines quit! Obviously the plane was being attacked by aliens...

No, it was flying directly into the path of an erupting volcano, which accounted for the "fiery light" phenomena. The engines quit because they were choked by the volcanic ash suddenly filling the air.

[Orrex]

12. But have you considered that HAARP caused the volcano?

Really, it was right in front of you the whole time.

[onager]

13. No, but I considered they might be flying into a chemtrail...

:hi:

[realisticphish]

15. As I recall

that's basically the plot from Michal Crichton's "Airframe"

The pilot's son was flying the plane, and reacted to a minor problem incorrectly, turning it into a major incident

[cosmik debris]

2. They will just conclude that the flares attracted a UFO

Remember all the excuses made after the crop circle hoax was revealed? And there are still plenty of people who believe crop circles are the results of UFOs.

This is certainly fun, but I doubt if the UFOlogists will bat an eyelash before making an excuse.

[Orrex]

6. Sad but true

It's the same as when double-blind experiments fail to prove the existence of ESP; they claim that the researchers' negative psychic energies are suppressing the ESP.

[TZ]

7. Isn't that the case with any paranormal research?

As soon as a skeptic shows up they mess up all the vibes with their negative energy/scare the ghosts/aliens off. I wish I knew earlier that skeptics had such power...could've ruled the world if I'd known...;)

[bluedawg12]

3. "two skeptics from New Jersey"

:rofl: ahh, those busy skeptics.

[muriel_volestrangler]

10. A little disingenuous of the hoaxers

The police looked at them through binoculars, and correctly thought they looked like flares suspended from balloons. But the hoaxers appeared on TV to say "no way! They zipped over our car". Misreporting what you see, on purpose, is over-egging the pudding.

[EvolveOrConvolve]

11. That's how a lot of hoaxes are spread

An actual eyewitness account, no matter how questionable the witness, always seems to give these stories a credibility they shouldn't have.

[Orrex]

14. It's the difference between a pious fraud and just being a smartass, though

You're correct in that a lot of hoaxes are spread that way, but those are most commonly (IMO) spread by people who really believe in the underlying phenomenon and are trying to give it credibility and/or draw broader attention to it. In the current case, the intent was apparently (again IMO) to make believers in the phenomenon look silly--a more malicious motive, I think. It's still just a prank, and I doubt that anyone was actually harmed, but it risks making skeptics in general look like assholes.

In the end, the result isn't all that different; the bogus event still draws attention and scrutiny. But it seems to me that UFO believers can be made to look silly enough just by debunking a particular sighting in its own terms. No need to go out and create a spectacle just so that skeptics can point and laugh from the sidelines.