John A. Keel WHY UFOS

dimmed and brightened, and the object swooped twiceover a field and then went back into the air." This tookplace about 3 miles northwest of Norfolk, Nebraska.On the ninth and tenth of July, there were sightings inNorth and South Dakota, the states north of Nebraska.On July 11 there were several sightings in Iowa, the statebordering Nebraska on the east. The South Dakotasightings took place in the southwest corner of the state,close to the northwest corner of the Nebraskan border. Ifwe had been able to collect this data fast enough, we couldhave successfully predicted that a flap was due inNebraska, and statistically the odds were that it would takeplace on a Wednesday night at 10 P.M.Shortly after 10 P.M. on Wednesday, July 13, 1966, ablazing object hurtled across the skies, heading southwardfrom the northwest. About 10:10 P.M. scores of people inMuny Park, Cozad, Nebraska, saw "a very bright objectwith multicolored smaller bright stars trailing it."If it had remained on that course, it would have angledstraight across Kansas, and all of the later Kansan reportswould have described a northwest to southeast course.However, a flood of reports from Kansas, includingsightings by policemen, attorneys, and many others,described the "meteor" as passing from northwest tonortheast. This meant it had to be skirting the Nebraska-Kansas border.There was a particularly heavy concentration of reportsfrom central Nebraska from small communities such asScotia, Ord, Burwell, Comstock, Arcadia, and NorthLoup. All of these were consistent, describing the object aspassing from southwest to southeast. Another cluster ofsightings was reported from the Omaha area on the easterntip of the state. These all stated that the object was goingfrom southwest to southeast.A larger picture can be drawn from this. The "meteor"came from the northwest, perhaps from Wyoming orSouth Dakota; it then executed a turn somewhere south ofCozad, bringing it over Kearney, Nebraska, and movedalong the Nebraska-Kansas border toward Missouri-Iowa.Then it turned again and headed northward towardIllinois.The sheriff of Warren County, Illinois, was sitting infront of the police station in Monmouth, Illinois, that nightwhen he observed a fiery orange ball arcing across the skytoward the northeast. A few minutes later he received an