Mexican Air Force Pilots Videotape UFOs

[Ivan Seeking]

Mysterious objects filmed by the Mexican military in March 2004 created a flurry of excitement and strange claims. A new analysis from a respected expert suggests that the images have a prosaic explanation-despite premature dismissals by skeptics and believers alike. [continued]

http://www.csicop.org/si/2004-09/campeche.html

 

[russ_watters]

I'll reiterate my earlier position:

It is the default position in science to assume a mundane explanation unless some compelling evidence can be presented to the contrary.

The article, I think, misses the point:

Unfortunately, many would-be skeptics made hasty pronouncements about the objects, thereby giving all UFO skeptics a bad name. The Urania Astronomical Society of the state of Morelos told the newspaper El Universal on May 13 that the UFOs filmed might be a group of weather balloons. [emphasis added]

A hasty dismissal (such as mine) isn't to be taken as an authoritative explanation, but as speculation of possible mundane explanations (and, obviously, an assumption that there isn't an extrordinary explanation).

Assuming that there is a mundane explanation, even without actually knowing what that explanation is, is the correct, scientific default position.

This also supports my point that hard research of these phenomena is not warranted: quite a bit of effort went into proving that this was a group of oil wells. This effort was wasted.

Either way, score one (more) for the skeptics.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

No, I mean from past discussions we've had on the subject, Ivan. You've said in the past I don't give enough consideration to non-mundane possibilities.

Not at all. My contention is that you dismiss cases without knowing the facts. Mundane explanations are fine as long as they explain the presumed facts. If they don't fit, it is not reasonable to twist the facts to fit the explanation. Nor is it reasonable to latch onto any mundane explanation that might seemingly do. For example, I have yet to see anyone reproduce this event. If it really is oil fires as many now claim, then it should be easy to duplicate. But we see the skeptics latch onto any unproven if not unlikely explanation, as soon as one is suggested. And again, these explanations often ignore the most significant aspects of the alleged event.

I guess, Ivan, but I have a low tolerance for B.S. The reason I don't give them consideration is the same reason the USPTO refuses to consider perpetual motion machine claims. That crowd has proven (in the USPTO's opinion) they are unworthy of consideration.

Your position is silly here. Events are what they are no matter how much you disapprove of one or a few particular opinions regarding that event. As I said earlier, anyone can choose to highlight the crackpots in any field. But if that's the best that you can muster...

 

[russ_watters]

13 months later? This thread really didn't need to be resurrected, and it's ironic that you'd choose to resurrect a thread in which to disagree with me further - where ultimately I was right!

Sorry, the discussion really was over then and it's still over now. I won't respond to your post directly.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

It happened to come up and I had missed your response, so I figured why not. And I don't see that you were right about anything...that is, you are lumping our discussion in with comments made by others.

 

[Chronos]

My point, as always, has been show me. No evidence has been presented that 'proves' or 'disproves' either conjecture. I see hoofprints.

 

[-RA-]

05/11/04 - Released by the Defense ministry of Mexico - originally published in Associated Press - MEXICO CITY - Mexican Air Force pilots filmed 11 unidentified flying objects in the skies over southern Campeche state. The lights were filmed on March 5 by pilots using infrared equipment. They appeared to be flying at an altitude of about 3,500 meters (11,480 feet), and allegedly surrounded the Air Force jet as it conducted routine anti-drug trafficking vigilance in Campeche. Only three of the objects showed up on the plane's radar.
- CNN Headline News, 05/11/04 - Associated Press

It seems unique as the actual footage was released by the military for everyone to see.

Edit by Ivan: Post moved from Napster. Being that the story is three years old, we already have a Napster link and a thread.

 

[russ_watters]

RA, you may want to have a quick read of Ivan's post # 36 and the attached article. These are oil wells.

Good YouTube video, by the way. Hilarious. CNN goes from "UFOs" to "extraterrestrial life" in 34 seconds and then goes on for another 6 minutes about how great this video is and how hard and high quality the evidence is that these are alien spacecraft . As I've said before - this is not a search for unsual natural aerial phenomena, it is a search for aliens, otherwise it wouldn't be interesting enough for people to be paying attention to. And unfortunately, these things quickly gain a life of their own and the errors are never corrected. They go immediately to their default conclusion of alien life and as the recent comments on the youtube link show, the stories never die and as you show, the debunkings become an unnoticed footnote.

 

[-RA-]

RA, you may want to have a quick read of Ivan's post # 36 and the attached article. These are oil wells.

Personally i would've said "These could be oil wells". The way you put it sounds as if that interpretation is definitive. If that was the case the mexican military would not still consider this a genuine unexplained sighting, they would have accepted that analysis.

I hate to start digging up old material, but i can see a number of issues with that oil well interpretation at http://www.csicop.org/si/2004-09/campeche.html . The common sense thing to do would be to contact the company who controlled the oil wells and ask them if they had released over 10 flares that day in that area, and if past flares they have released have been misinterpretted this way before (if this does occur as frequently as this annonymous source claimed). Who is this guy they quote? Why did they not corraborate his brief account in more detail from the people on the wells that should have seen the flares in the first place? The story was so big in the media that you would definitely expect numerous other eye witnesses from the rigs to come forward if flares were indeed released that day. Also their velocity seems constant, they are not slowing down at all or drifting in the wind, they are grouped together in a fixed formation with a set direction for a good few minutes. If they were all separate oil well flares the chance of them staying in that organized formation would be near impossible.

That article also comes from a debunking/skeptic website, the chance that a site like that would want to accept any interpretation other than one that is currently accepted by mainstream scientific opinion is highly unlikely. The Mexican DOD officially acknowledged that what these pilots saw and registered can not be explained by any know means. If it could be explained as oil well flares, I'm sure they would have also come to that conclusion. I'm more inclined to believe Secretary of Defense General Clemente Vega Garcia, commander of all armed forces in the country, when he says that it remains unexplained.

My basic point is if they were oil well flares there should be plenty of people from the oil wells to back that up, and the only person that did that was entirely annonymous. And he didn't even really back it up, he just said that there are flares on some of the wells.

just to clarify, I am not saying they are aliens, i am saying that I find that oil well interpretation highly unlikely. This video obviously isn't going to lead to anything, or it already would have, but this has to be one of the best evidences for intelligently controlled airial phenomenon that has been released to date. Although, of course, nowhere near conclusive proof.

 

[russ_watters]

Personally i would've said "These could be oil wells". The way you put it sounds as if that interpretation is definitive.

If we hold it to the level of scientific theory, there is no such thing as 100% proof. This is simply proven beyond any reasonable doubt (say, 99%). "Could be" is not strong enough wording to describe that level of certainty. I'd say "could be" would be 10% probability. 99% would be 'almost certainly'.

If that was the case the mexican military would not still consider this a genuine unexplained sighting, they would have accepted that analysis.

People don't like to admit being wrong because it makes them feel stupid, so they generally just let the issue die instead of issuing a correction or retraction. Or are you saying there has been a recent claim by them that they still consider this to be unexplained or aliens?

Also their velocity seems constant, they are not slowing down at all or drifting in the wind, they are grouped together in a fixed formation with a set direction for a good few minutes. If they were all separate oil well flares the chance of them staying in that organized formation would be near impossible.

I'm not sure what you mean by that. Oil wells are anchored to the ocean floor. The are fixed in place. When viewing them from a very long distance, they will appear to be moving with you and their relative position will change very slowly.

The Mexican DOD officially acknowledged that what these pilots saw and registered can not be explained by any know means. If it could be explained as oil well flares, I'm sure they would have also come to that conclusion.

"Can not be explained" is just plain not an acceptable conclusion. It is basically just an acknoweldgement that they weren't trying. So it is not surprising that they didn't think of the possibility of oil wells - it is pretty clear that they had simply ignored the possibility of a mundane explanation, when the evidence clearly points to one.

Bright lights seen at night are part of an entire class of extremely popular and generally badly interpreted UFO information. This thread (and that video) is full of unwarranted inferences about these lights. The fact of the matter is that you can tell almost nothing about the position or velocity of a point of light. You can't tell how far it is, you can't tell how high it is, you can't tell how fast (or if) it is moving. All you know is the direction that it is from you. The only piece of information available here that implies anything about its distance from the observer is the fact that it is visible in infrared and not visible light. Contrary to speculation in this thread, that does not imply that these objects aren't emitting visible light, it implies that they are so far away or just dim compared to the infrared that you can't see that visible light. Anyone who has ever played with the night vision setting on their camcorder knows this. It makes me wonder if these pilots had ever used a flir before!

I'm not sure if I want to put this much effort into this, but I may see if I can find some video of Gulf of Mexico oil rigs I shot while in the Navy. They look very similar to the video clip here.

I'm more inclined to believe Secretary of Defense General Clemente Vega Garcia, commander of all armed forces in the country, when he says that it remains unexplained.

Do you have a source for that?

My basic point is if they were oil well flares there should be plenty of people from the oil wells to back that up...

Why would that necessarily be true? Do we know for certain that all oil rig staff watch a lot of CNN? I didn't hear about this issue through the mainstream news, I heard about it here.

i am saying that I find that oil well interpretation highly unlikely

What from the evidence points to the oil well explanation being unlikely? The fact that no one has talked to oil rig staff is not evidence of anything.

 

[russ_watters]

Perhaps this will help:

On May 26, Capt. Alejandro Franz of the private Mexican UFO research organization Alcione, who is far more skeptical than Maussan and his colleagues, independently came to the same conclusion. A former pilot who has flown extensively in that region, Franz wrote on the widely-read UFO Updates online forum: "Cantarell Field or Cantarell Complex is the largest oil field in Mexico, located 80 kilometers offshore in the Bay of Campeche. . . . The objects (lights) are in a fixed position with a dark background (the sea) while the camera on board is following the lights that are showing in the screen as a very brilliant source of light . . . the lights are coming from steady oil platform flames (passive fire) located in the Gulf of Mexico between 50 and 90 Km from Ciudad del Carmen City where the objects, at least one light as the FLIR or RADAR operator tells is exactly over Ciudad del Carmen" [6]

On the Alcione Web site, Franz provides a great deal of information and many photos concerning the Cantarel offshore oil wells and their continuous flares. No reasonable person could see his photos comparing the flaming offshore platforms with the infrared UFOs from the video and reject the probability that the two are the same.

http://www.csicop.org/si/2004-09/campeche.html

 

[-RA-]

Or are you saying there has been a recent claim by them that they still consider this to be unexplained or aliens?

as my post said, i don't think it was aliens. There has never been any direct evidence of aliens visting Earth, so that remains the most unlikely option.

I'm not sure what you mean by that. Oil wells are anchored to the ocean floor. The are fixed in place. When viewing them from a very long distance, they will appear to be moving with you and their relative position will change very slowly. "Can not be explained" is just plain not an acceptable conclusion. It is basically just an acknoweldgement that they weren't trying. So it is not surprising that they didn't think of the possibility of oil wells - it is pretty clear that they had simply ignored the possibility of a mundane explanation, when the evidence clearly points to one.

I completely misunderstood the use of the word 'flare' in this whole debate, which is what confused me. I literally thought that it means flares that are launched into the air, signal flares, to show boats the position of the oil wells. My mistake That would explain why their formation seemed constant to each each other.

They look very similar to the video clip here. Do you have a source for that? Why would that necessarily be true? Do we know for certain that all oil rig staff watch a lot of CNN? I didn't hear about this issue through the mainstream news, I heard about it here. What from the evidence points to the oil well explanation being unlikely? The fact that no one has talked to oil rig staff is not evidence of anything.

There was a considerable effort by people to find out what really happened, and yet the only quote you can find online from anyone actually on the oil wells is completely annonymous, and does not actually tell you what was happeneing on that night. The very first thing that i would have done if i was one of the many skeptics investigating this would be to get in contact with the oil company and ask the manager, or any of the staff, how many were burning that night, because that would definitively prove it once and for all. But that seems to have not been done. From what i can see online anyway.

 

[russ_watters]

I completely misunderstood the use of the word 'flare' in this whole debate, which is what confused me. I literally thought that it means flares that are launched into the air, signal flares, to show boats the position of the oil wells. My mistake That would explain why their formation seemed constant to each each other.

There are actually two different definitions in use in this thread. *I* first suggested that they could be countermeasure flares - chunks of magnesium lit on fire and dropped from a plane. These would have to be close to the formation to be so bright, so you're right that they would show more relative motion. Bad logic on my part.

The other use is what oil rigs do to get rid of unwanted methane gas. Since methane is a much worse pollutant than carbon dioxide, it is burned instead of being released as methane. That's called "flaring".

as my post said, i don't think it was aliens. There has never been any direct evidence of aliens visting Earth, so that remains the most unlikely option.

Reread please - I wasn't suggesting anything about your opinion. What I was asking was if the Mexican DOD still regards this as an open case. Your post implied that they do, but perhaps you didn't notice how old this case is?? I didn't look hard, but after a couple of minutes could not find any more recent statements about the issue by the Mexican govt.

There was a considerable effort by people to find out what really happened, and yet the only quote you can find online from anyone actually on the oil wells is completely annonymous, and does not actually tell you what was happeneing on that night. The very first thing that i would have done if i was one of the many skeptics investigating this would be to get in contact with the oil company and ask the manager, or any of the staff, how many were burning that night, because that would definitively prove it once and for all.

With so many oil wells flaring so much gas, I don't see how that could be helpful. On any given night, any oil field is lit up like a Christmas tree - that's a given, so there is no need to call anyone to ask about it.

And agan, the lack of a piece of evidence for one conclusion does not constitute evidence that that conclusion is wrong. Do you have any actual evidence that the oil well conclusion is wrong?

 

[-RA-]

The other use is what oil rigs do to get rid of unwanted methane gas. Since methane is a much worse pollutant than carbon dioxide, it is burned instead of being released as methane. That's called "flaring".

That would seem the most likely explanation, i got a little confused with what exactly flares meant.

And agan, the lack of a piece of evidence for one conclusion does not constitute evidence that that conclusion is wrong. Do you have any actual evidence that the oil well conclusion is wrong?

No. its just i would have gone to more length to verify the oilwell interpretation with other people than appears to have been done. Of course, as you said, the lack of a piece of evidence for one conclusion does not constitute evidence that that conclusion is wrong. But i still would have got some more info from the actual people on the oil wells themselves.

Reread please - I wasn't suggesting anything about your opinion. What I was asking was if the Mexican DOD still regards this as an open case. Your post implied that they do, but perhaps you didn't notice how old this case is??

I guess the sites that state that are out of date now, but it was originally an unexplained sighting. Now I've realized my error in what was meant by flares this seems to make more sense, i retract my previous thoughts about this being one of the best cases. Still, it is a unique case though as the military released the footage thinking it was a ufo, even if it has been misinterpretted.

 

[f3rm1n]

Luck on this one...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uDOOZ_IPb6Y&eurl=