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How many UFO hoaxes, deliberately constructed to impress someone, or gain fame or fortune, or just for kicks, go wrong and fall apart before anyone is fooled by them?
We'll never know. We only know about the ones that work. A dozen things could've gone wrong that night in the forest, but this is a rare case where everything went right. That's why we've heard of it.
How did the day unfold?
- For several hours that day, Travis and Mike disappeared and did not work.
- The crew worked later than usual, so it was dark when they left.
- The UFO was actually encountered several miles west along Rim Road, not a quarter-mile from the work site on a logging road.
How many UFO hoaxes, deliberately constructed to impress someone, or gain fame or fortune, or just for kicks, go wrong and fall apart before anyone is fooled by them?
We'll never know. We only know about the ones that work. A dozen things could've gone wrong that night in the forest, but this is a rare case where everything went right. That's why we've heard of it.
How did the day unfold?
Travis and Mike vanished
Travis's description of events leading up to the sighting describes how the entire crew worked hard all day as the afternoon cooled and the sun went down - a very typical day, ending at 6 o'clock. The second chapter of his book is titled "An Ordinary Day", and in interviews he has always stressed the same (incidentally, with no indication he was tired or sick that day after a night of partying - see below).
The evidence shows this day wasn't really typical for at least two of the crew:
[Travis] had been sick the day before, mostly from carousing too much, and he had slept in the truck quite a bit that morning, trying to recover. - Bill Barry, Ultimate Encounter (1978), p. 12
Steve Pierce (the 17-year-old on the crew) had a few pertinent comments to make three years later - confirming that Travis was sick all day and Mike was "down the mountain working":
(This and other typed excerpts are transcripts from two 1978 interviews with Philip Klass. PK placed what he considered important speech in all-caps.)
The evidence shows this day wasn't really typical for at least two of the crew:
[Travis] had been sick the day before, mostly from carousing too much, and he had slept in the truck quite a bit that morning, trying to recover. - Bill Barry, Ultimate Encounter (1978), p. 12
Steve Pierce (the 17-year-old on the crew) had a few pertinent comments to make three years later - confirming that Travis was sick all day and Mike was "down the mountain working":
(This and other typed excerpts are transcripts from two 1978 interviews with Philip Klass. PK placed what he considered important speech in all-caps.)
"Travis... stayed in the truck all day. He was sick... and Mike was gone that day." - Steve Pierce interviewed by Philip Klass, Jun 1978.
Steve Pierce told me (info he repeated on Facebook at the end of 2021 as well as on this podcast in June 2022) that Travis did not work much of the day and expanded on the reason. [Personal communication as quoted below, August 2021]
Steve's mother had made him take the job with Mike Rogers, and made him keep showing up even after his uncles and cousin quit because they didn't get paid on time. On Monday morning, his second week of work, Steve arrived at Mike's house for the drive to the site and found Travis and Allen Dalis fighting over a woman who had recently featured in Steve's life in a brief encounter on the football field. Allen ended up falling over doing a roundhouse kick, making Steve laugh. (The fight itself has often been recounted by witnesses in interviews, although it is sometimes relocated to Wednesday 5th, not Monday.) This magnified existing tensions between Steve and Allen (the longest-serving member of Mike's crew after Travis), again over a girl - this time the woman Steve would end up marrying three months later.
"[T]here were new guys on the crew and that's were I met John and Herman Munster [Dwayne Smith]. The day ended up being terrible because Herman didn't know how to do his job."
This was shaping up to be a bad week for Steve. On Wednesday at lunch time, he told Allen about that "touchdown" with Dana (Rogers), and Allen informed him she was Mike's sister, which Steve hadn't known.
Travis (who would end up marrying Dana) "got this look on his face and got all pissed off. He went to the truck and stayed there the rest of the day."
(In Travis's revised book Fire in the Sky [1996] he says the day before the incident he was off sick, and on the day itself he admits he was asleep when the truck arrived at the job site and that he "rested" in the truck for two hours because he'd been out with Mike's sister Dana the night before; p, 186. Conversely, Mike's wife told me in 2022 that while Travis had a huge crush on Dana at the time, she had no interest in him until after the UFO incident.)
How this incident ties into the UFO hoax being that very night is something only Travis can answer. Steve, for one, has repeatedly said that Travis constantly lies: "He can't even look you in the eye when he's talking to you to me that's the biggest giveaway." Steve has always been concerned with inaccuracies in Travis's book (for example, the assertion they drew straws to see who would go first for the polygraph), and angry that Travis refuses to fix the errors.
For the first time in 45 years, Mike corroborated part of Steve's account in a recent interview:
"Steve remembers me not being there for a good part of the time – that’s because I was doing two things. I was running flag line... and filing saws all the time [at the truck]. And of course I remember clearly that Travis slept in the truck, three hours or so that day in the middle of the day... he’d been carousing the night before..." Mike Rogers on the Observation Deck with Captain Ron, Oct 24, 2021
Steve Pierce also revealed some of the crew were smoking weed that day: "We all go back to work. Mike’s not standing there and neither is John – they’re off over visiting each other doing something by the truck. Just me and Dwayne Smith and Allen Dalis – cuz we got stoned. We got stoned at break. We had a thing called a sneaker toke. Mike used to get pissed when he catches us." [UFO Classified, Jun 24, 2022]
Steve's mother had made him take the job with Mike Rogers, and made him keep showing up even after his uncles and cousin quit because they didn't get paid on time. On Monday morning, his second week of work, Steve arrived at Mike's house for the drive to the site and found Travis and Allen Dalis fighting over a woman who had recently featured in Steve's life in a brief encounter on the football field. Allen ended up falling over doing a roundhouse kick, making Steve laugh. (The fight itself has often been recounted by witnesses in interviews, although it is sometimes relocated to Wednesday 5th, not Monday.) This magnified existing tensions between Steve and Allen (the longest-serving member of Mike's crew after Travis), again over a girl - this time the woman Steve would end up marrying three months later.
"[T]here were new guys on the crew and that's were I met John and Herman Munster [Dwayne Smith]. The day ended up being terrible because Herman didn't know how to do his job."
This was shaping up to be a bad week for Steve. On Wednesday at lunch time, he told Allen about that "touchdown" with Dana (Rogers), and Allen informed him she was Mike's sister, which Steve hadn't known.
Travis (who would end up marrying Dana) "got this look on his face and got all pissed off. He went to the truck and stayed there the rest of the day."
(In Travis's revised book Fire in the Sky [1996] he says the day before the incident he was off sick, and on the day itself he admits he was asleep when the truck arrived at the job site and that he "rested" in the truck for two hours because he'd been out with Mike's sister Dana the night before; p, 186. Conversely, Mike's wife told me in 2022 that while Travis had a huge crush on Dana at the time, she had no interest in him until after the UFO incident.)
How this incident ties into the UFO hoax being that very night is something only Travis can answer. Steve, for one, has repeatedly said that Travis constantly lies: "He can't even look you in the eye when he's talking to you to me that's the biggest giveaway." Steve has always been concerned with inaccuracies in Travis's book (for example, the assertion they drew straws to see who would go first for the polygraph), and angry that Travis refuses to fix the errors.
For the first time in 45 years, Mike corroborated part of Steve's account in a recent interview:
"Steve remembers me not being there for a good part of the time – that’s because I was doing two things. I was running flag line... and filing saws all the time [at the truck]. And of course I remember clearly that Travis slept in the truck, three hours or so that day in the middle of the day... he’d been carousing the night before..." Mike Rogers on the Observation Deck with Captain Ron, Oct 24, 2021
Steve Pierce also revealed some of the crew were smoking weed that day: "We all go back to work. Mike’s not standing there and neither is John – they’re off over visiting each other doing something by the truck. Just me and Dwayne Smith and Allen Dalis – cuz we got stoned. We got stoned at break. We had a thing called a sneaker toke. Mike used to get pissed when he catches us." [UFO Classified, Jun 24, 2022]
The crew worked unusually late
Walton (1978), p.21
What about working until dark - was that normal?
Travis writes his account as though 6PM was the usual clocking off time.
[Note: Sunset in Heber, AZ on that day was 5:27PM, and the sky would be gradually fading to darkness over the next hour. Travis writes they were in the truck setting out at 6:10PM (p.52). The moon set at 7:28PM.]
Travis writes his account as though 6PM was the usual clocking off time.
[Note: Sunset in Heber, AZ on that day was 5:27PM, and the sky would be gradually fading to darkness over the next hour. Travis writes they were in the truck setting out at 6:10PM (p.52). The moon set at 7:28PM.]
Steve disagrees:
"And that was about the first day that we ever stayed over that late" - Steve Pierce interviewed by Philip Klass, Jun 1978
Steve Pierce's Facebook post: at the end of 2021 he posted each day to describe his story exactly 46 years later.
Steve reiterated that they worked unusually late in his November 2021 recount of the incident on Facebook:
"Mike has disappeared, to where I don't know. When he does return, he has decided that we are working till dark. This is very much out of the norm for us to do."
The late finish is corroborated elsewhere:
The crew usually worked until 4PM, which at that time of year was 90 minutes before sunset. That day, however, they worked until sunset and didn't leave until after 6PM. Because seeing a fire lookout tower in daylight just isn't very impressive.
So, for perhaps the first time, Mike was driving the crew home in the dark.
"Mike has disappeared, to where I don't know. When he does return, he has decided that we are working till dark. This is very much out of the norm for us to do."
The late finish is corroborated elsewhere:
- a phone call between UFO investigators from NUFORC discussing the case, while Travis was still missing: the guys were working “a little extra late that night”.
- “We were behind in the contract because... we were short-handed. And that day that we went out... we were trying to work some overtime to get caught up.” - Steve Pierce, 2013
- “That day we were a little behind so we worked until it was starting to get dark.” - John Goulette, Travis [movie], 2015.
The crew usually worked until 4PM, which at that time of year was 90 minutes before sunset. That day, however, they worked until sunset and didn't leave until after 6PM. Because seeing a fire lookout tower in daylight just isn't very impressive.
So, for perhaps the first time, Mike was driving the crew home in the dark.
Work site location
To figure out exactly where the work site was located, there are clues in the book. As the crew sets out for home, Travis is aware of which way is west:
Mike started the old pickup and we climbed north* up the ridge toward the Rim Road... Just then my eye was caught by a light coming through the trees on the right, a hundred yards ahead. I idly assumed that the glow was the sun going down in the west. Then it occurred to me that the sun had set half an hour ago. (p. 52)
*Rim Road is south of Turkey Springs. Is the direction "north" a mistake? Since Travis says west is on his right, the truck must be driving south. So the work site is north of Rim Road. This makes sense because that last mile of Rim Road (between the turnoff and the Old Verde Rd junction) was the usual way in and out of the site:
All this zigzagging [along the "primitive" logging road] made the half mile from the Rim Road to the work site half again as long. (p.43)
So, Rim Road is half a mile south of the work site. How far east is the work site? Later in the evening, according to the book (but disputed by witnesses Steve and John), the crew will drive about one mile along Rim Road chasing a pickup before reaching the turnoff for home, and then turning around. The book is trying to tell us this turnoff is Old Verde Road (which leads to Black Canyon Road, which takes them to Heber/home - their usual route). So we know the logging road is about a mile east of this turnoff.
Mike started the old pickup and we climbed north* up the ridge toward the Rim Road... Just then my eye was caught by a light coming through the trees on the right, a hundred yards ahead. I idly assumed that the glow was the sun going down in the west. Then it occurred to me that the sun had set half an hour ago. (p. 52)
*Rim Road is south of Turkey Springs. Is the direction "north" a mistake? Since Travis says west is on his right, the truck must be driving south. So the work site is north of Rim Road. This makes sense because that last mile of Rim Road (between the turnoff and the Old Verde Rd junction) was the usual way in and out of the site:
All this zigzagging [along the "primitive" logging road] made the half mile from the Rim Road to the work site half again as long. (p.43)
So, Rim Road is half a mile south of the work site. How far east is the work site? Later in the evening, according to the book (but disputed by witnesses Steve and John), the crew will drive about one mile along Rim Road chasing a pickup before reaching the turnoff for home, and then turning around. The book is trying to tell us this turnoff is Old Verde Road (which leads to Black Canyon Road, which takes them to Heber/home - their usual route). So we know the logging road is about a mile east of this turnoff.
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And then there's this 2013 YouTube comment where a commenter shares correspondence from Travis Walton who gave directions to the abduction site. The YouTuber specifies the logging road turnoff from Rim Road is 0.9 miles along Rim Road:
I haven't been granting requests for the exact coordinates of the site, pending further on-site research. But if you drive down Black Canyon from Heber and take the left turn at the "T" and follow it to the Rim Road, then turn left for a mile or so you will be very close to the site. Take care. ~ Travis Looking at Travis's directions, we plot the route as shown (right). He doesn't give that last turnoff, but we know a final northward turn after about a mile is necessary and indeed there is evidence on satellite maps of a logging trail right there.
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Travis's directions to the UFO/abduction site. Click to enlarge.
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This satellite map shows where all sources tell us the work site (and UFO location) were, approximately:
Work site and "UFO/abduction" site north of Rim Road
The dark patch shows the approximate work site, with a logging road in blue leading south to Rim Road and the UFO appearing about halfway along to match the distances given in the book. On its mad-dash escape, the truck will end up 50 or 100 feet from Rim Road.
When did they see the UFO?
Charlie Wiser's Facebook page, Jul 31, 2021 [US date]
While we can be fairly sure we've accurately pin-pointed the official "abduction" site, approximately a quarter-mile from the work site and another quarter-mile from Rim Road, the evidence shows the actual UFO sighting was at Gentry Tower, almost 5 miles further west along Rim Road. How can this be?
The book is frustratingly vague about how long they'd been driving before seeing the glow of the UFO. In fact, the witnesses are generally vague to this day about how far they'd traveled:
The earliest report is from APRO (Aerial Phenomena Research Organization). They sent Raymond Jordan to investigate the case and published a report in their November 1975 Bulletin. (Unlike GSW, APRO concluded the case was not a hoax.) This report states: "they had travelled only a couple of hundred yards when [Allen] Dalis spotted a yellowish glow ahead of them and to the right..." This report was published after Travis's return - in other words, after the search party had been looking in the wrong place for five days. This location (close to the work site) had already been established as the location of the sighting, and so the story needed to conform. Travis says the glow was seen 100 yards ahead (p.53), putting the UFO 300 yards from the worksite.
Here's Mike giving us a rare figure we can cling to, only it implies a rather longer distance than 200 yards:
"It took about 10, 15 minutes to get up that road cuz it was steep, uphill, y’know? It was kind of a rough road." - Mike, Dark Fringe Radio, May 27th, 2021
Additionally, witness John Goulette (who still believes the official story) told me: "I don't know if it was 5, 10, or 15 minutes" [before they came upon the glow]. (Facebook, Jul 31, 2021, right)
Even taking into account the inaccuracies of memory, clearly John is not claiming it was only a minute. It should only have been 90 seconds at 5mph, if the UFO glow was seen 200 yards from the work site. 90 seconds isn't something you'd be vague about. That's remarkably quick, yet the witnesses never remark on it.
Mike Rogers seems to have realized this discrepancy, because in a recent interview he contradicts his own earlier story and reverts to the official story: "We hadn’t gone more than like 300 yards up the road" [when the light was seen]. Mike Rogers on the Observation Deck with Captain Ron, Oct 24, 2021
So that's only 2 minutes at 5mph. Not 15 minutes like he'd said earlier that year.
Anyway, at some point they come upon the UFO and they are heading due south, right?
Here's an excerpt from the initial report made by the witnesses to Ground Saucer Watch (GSW), a pro-UFO organization that was first on the scene to investigate the case - while Travis was still missing. The report itself is dated Nov 13 (2 days after Travis returned). It states they were heading due west when they saw the UFO "near Forest Service Road 300" [Rim Road].
The book is frustratingly vague about how long they'd been driving before seeing the glow of the UFO. In fact, the witnesses are generally vague to this day about how far they'd traveled:
- Just then... (p.53)
- We hadn't gone very far down the road... (Mike Rogers, 2019)
- We hadn't been driving very long... (Travis Walton, 2019)
- We didn’t go very far... (Mike Rogers, Mar 2021)
The earliest report is from APRO (Aerial Phenomena Research Organization). They sent Raymond Jordan to investigate the case and published a report in their November 1975 Bulletin. (Unlike GSW, APRO concluded the case was not a hoax.) This report states: "they had travelled only a couple of hundred yards when [Allen] Dalis spotted a yellowish glow ahead of them and to the right..." This report was published after Travis's return - in other words, after the search party had been looking in the wrong place for five days. This location (close to the work site) had already been established as the location of the sighting, and so the story needed to conform. Travis says the glow was seen 100 yards ahead (p.53), putting the UFO 300 yards from the worksite.
Here's Mike giving us a rare figure we can cling to, only it implies a rather longer distance than 200 yards:
"It took about 10, 15 minutes to get up that road cuz it was steep, uphill, y’know? It was kind of a rough road." - Mike, Dark Fringe Radio, May 27th, 2021
Additionally, witness John Goulette (who still believes the official story) told me: "I don't know if it was 5, 10, or 15 minutes" [before they came upon the glow]. (Facebook, Jul 31, 2021, right)
Even taking into account the inaccuracies of memory, clearly John is not claiming it was only a minute. It should only have been 90 seconds at 5mph, if the UFO glow was seen 200 yards from the work site. 90 seconds isn't something you'd be vague about. That's remarkably quick, yet the witnesses never remark on it.
Mike Rogers seems to have realized this discrepancy, because in a recent interview he contradicts his own earlier story and reverts to the official story: "We hadn’t gone more than like 300 yards up the road" [when the light was seen]. Mike Rogers on the Observation Deck with Captain Ron, Oct 24, 2021
So that's only 2 minutes at 5mph. Not 15 minutes like he'd said earlier that year.
Anyway, at some point they come upon the UFO and they are heading due south, right?
Here's an excerpt from the initial report made by the witnesses to Ground Saucer Watch (GSW), a pro-UFO organization that was first on the scene to investigate the case - while Travis was still missing. The report itself is dated Nov 13 (2 days after Travis returned). It states they were heading due west when they saw the UFO "near Forest Service Road 300" [Rim Road].
Excerpts from the initial report to Ground Saucer Watch: witnesses say they were traveling due west and saw the UFO near 300 (Rim Road). Taken from two different pages of the report.
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This is corroborated by the APRO report (right), which states the object was seen in the northwest. If the truck was traveling south, as the official story wants us to believe, the object up ahead on the right would be in the southwest.
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APRO Bulletin Vol. 24, no.5 (Nov 1975) states the glow of the object was seen to the northwest.
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Also in the GSW report excerpted above you'll see their speed is given as 3-5mph. Yet before encountering the UFO, Travis says Mike increased his speed to "what little speed the pickup could still achieve on the incline." (p.53) About 30 seconds from now, the truck will be doing 35mph on that logging road when the driver is panicked, but here we have the truck accelerating to 5mph as the very best it can do.
None of this lines up. I suspect the 3-5mph on the report is simply the speed Mike was driving as he slowed down and Travis jumped out before the truck came to a stop.
Travis gives us more clues that they are already traveling on Rim Road and not the logging road by the time they see the glow: the multiple "thank-you ma'ams", or water-bars, which the truck keeps bouncing over, are built by the Forest Service to channel rainwater off the surface and thus maintain the roads for traffic. Logging roads hacked by loggers to move their equipment in don't have water-bars.
None of this lines up. I suspect the 3-5mph on the report is simply the speed Mike was driving as he slowed down and Travis jumped out before the truck came to a stop.
Travis gives us more clues that they are already traveling on Rim Road and not the logging road by the time they see the glow: the multiple "thank-you ma'ams", or water-bars, which the truck keeps bouncing over, are built by the Forest Service to channel rainwater off the surface and thus maintain the roads for traffic. Logging roads hacked by loggers to move their equipment in don't have water-bars.
Runoff from water-bars on Rim Road, south of the Turkey Springs work site, Google Maps satellite image
And here's something curious: in the map in his book, Travis forgot to label Rim Road altogether! The map does label "Mogollon Rim", drawn as a ridge (see all the little lines beneath it?), but does not label the [Mogollon] Rim Road itself, either by name or as [Forest Service Road] 300 - even though it's mentioned in the text, even though the other routes are numbered, and even though the report of the sighting says it was seen near "FS Road 300".
It's almost as if Travis doesn't want us to be thinking about that trusty ol' truck bouncing along Rim Road at this point in the tale...
I've rectified the situation with a revised map:
It's almost as if Travis doesn't want us to be thinking about that trusty ol' truck bouncing along Rim Road at this point in the tale...
I've rectified the situation with a revised map:
"X" marks the "abduction site" - taken from Fire in the Sky, 1996, with addition of Rim Road and Gentry Tower.
I've drawn Rim Road (300) over the jagged line on Travis's map, since the road basically follows the ridge. The map is not accurate - see Google Maps - but I've added Gentry Tower in the approximate location 4.8 miles (by road) from Turkey Springs.
But returning to this vague impression from the witnesses that they encountered the UFO “soonish” (official story) but also up to 15 minutes after setting out: I asked Steve Pierce about this in July 2021 and he did not address it. I believe the innocent witnesses know that 1 or 2 minutes just doesn't feel right - their memories are telling them it was much longer than that, and indeed John Goulette said 5 to 15 minutes. They conform to the official story... but in a vague way, to resolve the cognitive dissonance.
Remember Mike said 15 minutes to travel 300 yards, because the road was an "obstacle course" (per Travis, p.43)? Yet in about 30 seconds he's going to be tearing down that same road at 35mph.
So it couldn't have been that rough.
Or, he was only able to do 35mph because they weren't on the logging road anymore. They were on Rim Road.
Here's another interview where Mike admits it took much longer than the map suggests it should...
"When we left where we were working, it was a little bit of light in the sky because we worked as late as we could, which was actually a little bit past sundown [i.e. twilight]. So when we headed out of there, it took a while to get up this winding dirt road, until where we came upon the UFO it was just all but dark." - Mike, interview with Jack Frost, March 24th, 2021.
Sunset was 5:27PM that night, but an hour of twilight would leave a little light in the sky, gradually fading. So, when the crew left the site shortly after 6PM there was indeed light in the sky - yet it was "all but dark" when they saw the strange glow ahead... only 300 yards later?
Clearly they drove a lot further than 300 yards.
In summary: There is evidence the truck was traveling west along Rim Road, and had been for some minutes, before encountering the UFO. This is impossible if the official "abduction site" described in the book is where the encounter happened.
The encounter happened further west along Rim Road, at Gentry Tower.
But returning to this vague impression from the witnesses that they encountered the UFO “soonish” (official story) but also up to 15 minutes after setting out: I asked Steve Pierce about this in July 2021 and he did not address it. I believe the innocent witnesses know that 1 or 2 minutes just doesn't feel right - their memories are telling them it was much longer than that, and indeed John Goulette said 5 to 15 minutes. They conform to the official story... but in a vague way, to resolve the cognitive dissonance.
Remember Mike said 15 minutes to travel 300 yards, because the road was an "obstacle course" (per Travis, p.43)? Yet in about 30 seconds he's going to be tearing down that same road at 35mph.
So it couldn't have been that rough.
Or, he was only able to do 35mph because they weren't on the logging road anymore. They were on Rim Road.
Here's another interview where Mike admits it took much longer than the map suggests it should...
"When we left where we were working, it was a little bit of light in the sky because we worked as late as we could, which was actually a little bit past sundown [i.e. twilight]. So when we headed out of there, it took a while to get up this winding dirt road, until where we came upon the UFO it was just all but dark." - Mike, interview with Jack Frost, March 24th, 2021.
Sunset was 5:27PM that night, but an hour of twilight would leave a little light in the sky, gradually fading. So, when the crew left the site shortly after 6PM there was indeed light in the sky - yet it was "all but dark" when they saw the strange glow ahead... only 300 yards later?
Clearly they drove a lot further than 300 yards.
In summary: There is evidence the truck was traveling west along Rim Road, and had been for some minutes, before encountering the UFO. This is impossible if the official "abduction site" described in the book is where the encounter happened.
The encounter happened further west along Rim Road, at Gentry Tower.
Read on...
You know how tales sometimes grow taller in the telling?
This tale grew taller in the telling.
This tale grew taller in the telling.
(c) Charlie Wiser 2021
