On November 9, 1974, in the tiny town of Carbondale, Pennsylvania, three teenage boys reported witnessing a “red, spinning ball” falling from the sky and striking a mud pond near Russell Park.
According to accounts from the time, the evening was unremarkable until the boys arrived. The object, described as glowing orange or red, was seen flying over Salem Mountain before falling into the pond, causing it to sizzle as if it were on fire.
The police were called, and a spectacle ensued with local law enforcement, military personnel and a crowd of curious onlookers. The pond began to give off a strange glow, sturdy for almost nine hours.
“The boys didn't know what to make of it. They said that when they were thrown into the water it sizzled, it was a glowing orange ball of fire,” he said. he said Mary Ann Savakinus, director of the Lackawanna Historical Society.
Hundreds of people gathered near the pond, waiting to see what the glowing object was.
“This goes on for a few days, as the story progresses, and then a diver is called to go in and extract what it is, he's in a rowboat and he calls other people from Carbondale to come and help. them,” Savakinus explained.
The search for the mysterious object ended with the recovery of an old railway lantern from the depths of the pond. Authorities quickly dismissed the event as a hoax, attributing the glow to the lantern batteries and the excitement to youthful mischief.
One of the boys later admitted tossing the lantern into the pond as a prank to scare his sister, supposedly closing the case. However, the recovery of the lighthouse did little to quell the speculation; the story took root.
Documents released by the United States Air Force under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) do not indicate any official interest in the Carbondale incident as a genuine UFO sighting.
In a statement issued in 1975, the Air Force indicated that the event did not require further investigation because the evidence suggested that no foreign object of interest had been found. This assessment follows historical precedent set by UFO investigations in the 1970s, during which the Air Force generally refrained from investigating incidents for which there was no physical evidence.
Despite the police report and scientific skepticism, some in the UFO research community maintain that the Carbondale incident was indeed an extraterrestrial event.
Further support for this theory comes from the testimony of those present at the scene. Over the last 20 years, witnesses have come forward and claimed that what they saw was a UFO.
“Others who said yes, they saw something glowing in the sky that night, people living in Waymart, people living in Midvalley, they were leaving the restaurant that day, they saw something,” Savakinus says.
Others recalled that during the chaos, a flatbed truck arrived on the scene and left with something covered with a tarp.
Gillette, now 64, hung around the hotel during Saturday's “alien landing anniversary and celebration” and now claims what he told the newspaper years ago was not true.
“My girlfriend broke up with me, so I was in a bad mood,” he said he said. “I just told them what they wanted to hear, that it was a beacon. It wasn't a lantern. Something was pulled out of the pond.
Kay Pope, who was 15 at the time and is now 66, remembers riding her bike near Russell Park and seeing the area surrounded by troops. She also saw what appeared to be something large being removed from the area.
“We always rode our bikes there,” said Pope, who now lives in Blakely. “(I saw) a big flatbed truck on the road with something big and covered on it, and there were a lot of people in (military) uniforms.”
David Morris was one of dozens of people who took a public transit cart from the Carbondale Grand Hotel to the old mine pond on Saturday to satisfy their curiosity. This was part of an event held at the hotel to commemorate the incident, which then became international news.
After seeing the pond and talking to local residents, Morris didn't believe the story that there was a lighthouse behind it all. He was disappointed that Gillette did not speak at the event as he wanted to clarify some details.
“Why call in people and heavy equipment to remove the lantern from the pond?” – he wondered. “It just doesn't make any sense. I think something definitely happened there.”
Although local authorities have concluded that the incident was a teenager's prank with a lantern, witness accounts and established local lore suggest that elements of the story may remain unexplained, even if the official account points to an innocent explanation.
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