UFO-Aktuellt issue 1, 2006

A short summary in English, by Stefan Isaksson, of the contents in UFO-Sweden's quarterly magazine.

Page 2: Caught on Webcam

Article by Clas Svahn, about a series of pictures sent to UFO-Sweden taken with a webcam in the Swedish town of Växjö. The same brightly shining object in the sky returned on a nightly basis several nights in a row in early 2006, and the owner of the webcam was puzzled. However, UFO-Sweden solved the case and the culprit was: the moon.

Page 3: Editorial

Chairman Svahn devotes this issue’s editorial to talk about conspiracy theories. More and more people start getting interested in such theories; theories that usually are in one way or another connected to major and not seldom quite violent events, such as the assassinations of JFK and Swedish prime minister Olof Palme. And that’s, according to Svahn, easy to understand since we all during such tumultuous events try to find answers to the unimaginable. Since the governments sometimes classify certain aspects of the investigations or even mishandle the situation it’s easy for believers to come up with various conspiracy theories. These theories might seem probable at first glance, but that’s usually not the case after a little sober research has been carried out.

Pages 4-8: Mr. Ancient Astronaut Himself

A few months back Svahn went to Switzerland and visited Mystery Park, Erich von Däniken’s own theme park, based on his bestselling books about ancient astronauts and their visits to planet Earth. Däniken has been highly criticized over the years by devoted skeptics, but he has also gained thousands and thousands of supporters, and after all, his books have sold more than sixty million copies and been translated to 32 different languages. When in Mystery Park met with von Däniken and conducted a lengthy interview with the now 70-year old Swiss.

Pages 9-11: von Däniken’s Not-So Strong Evidence

Article by Danish ufologist Ole Henningsen, who tells of his own investigations into von Däniken and his sometimes outlandish claims. One day Henningsen found, in a German discussion group on the internet, a discussion about a cave painting from Fergana in Uzbekistan. The painting, as it’s depicted in several of von Däniken’s books, shows something that most definitely looks like a traditional flying saucer together with its occupant. Amazing? Well, the thing is that in the 1970s Henningsen conducted an investigation into this particular cave-painting, and his research revealed that it wasn’t a cave painting at all, but rather a contemporary illustration for a magazine. So it has nothing to do with an Ancient Astronaut and everything to do with a Modern Artist. (The article has previously appeared in Danish magazine Ufo-nyt.)

Page 11: Don’t Tell the Reader

Short article by Svahn, which is the third and final von Däniken related article in this issue. Here Svahn informs the readers about certain aspects of the case in Henningsen’s article that von Däniken never bothered to tell his readers. Good thing Svahn felt up for it, then.

Pages 12-13: Media Watch

C. Göran Norlén gives a review of news clippings from Swedish media, this time from the end of October up until the end of December 2005. As always, there have been both very good and very bad things said in Swedish media about the UFO phenomenon, and as always, Norlén isn’t afraid to speak his mind. For instance, famous pop singer Robbie Williams and his dreams about extraterrestrial landings get his share of Norlén’s harsh words. I wouldn’t want Norlén to be mad at me, that’s for sure…

Pages 14-15: Reviews

Not only books are reviewed in this issue
Two books reviewed by Stefan Isaksson this time, The Truth about Uri Geller (James Randi, Prometheus Books 1982) and Join My Cult! (James Curcio, New Falcon Publications 2004). Isaksson is very pleased with the former book, except for the low-quality pictures, but he didn’t understand the latter book at all and wonders whether or not it’s possible to review a book that was so weird it made no sense whatsoever. Svahn reviews Illuminating the Darkness (Dale Kaczmarek, Ghost Research Society 2003) and Swedish DVD UFO – En Fascinerande Gåta (Scanenter 2005). Svahn is rather please with the book, but the DVD (English title UFO – A Special Dossier With New Insights) is, in Svahn’s own words, “one of the worst” he’s ever seen.

Pages 16-17: Why NSA Won’t Tell

Article by Svahn, about a former classified 21-page document from NSA, which now has been declassified and made available to the public thanks to efforts made by American organization Citizens Against UFO Secrecy. The document is, however, not completely declassified yet, and contains several passages where much information is blurred out. Does this mean NSA and the American government have information about extraterrestrials and UFOs that the public mustn’t know about? Not necessarily, because as Svahn explains, the NSA is, among other things, involved in listening on other countries’ communication in their search for terrorists and other threats to national security, and revealing every single bit of information would result in them revealing how they got this information. Which obviously would seriously damage their secret work. So just because you won’t learn about doesn’t necessarily mean it’s UFO related.

Pages 18-20: The Creepiest of Creepy Animals

UFO-Sweden’s expert on fortean phenomena, Richard Svensson, writes (and as always, draws beautiful pictures) about bizarre things, not necessarily UFO related. This time it’s all about a particularly nasty animal in American folklore, the “Fearsome Critter” known as the Hodag. The Hodag came in three different; the black Hodag (the most fearsome of the three), the cave Hodag (which had at least three eyes), and the one which in Latin was called Nasobatilus hystrivoratus and which was the largest one of the three. As the story usually goes, no specimen has ever been scientifically investigated, and the pictures supposedly showing killed specimens are likely to be clever hoaxes. But, as always, they sure do make good stories to tell.

Pages 21-23: The Swedish Seer

The second part of the section Swedish Mysteries (initiated in last issue). This time it’s Anders Persson who has written the text, and he tells the story of Anton Johansson, an obscure Swede who in the early 20th century claimed to be able to predict, among other things, the Great War. Johansson’s predictions were later published and some of they were indeed true. However, upon closer examination, it has turned out that the predictions were never quite as accurate as people believed.

Pages 24-25: A Website With Difficulties

Article by Andreas Ohlsson, about the popular website UFO Evidence. The website, (http://www.ufoevidence.org), has tons of information, but Ohlsson tells of how the site is riddled with problems. On the site one can find 2000 documents, 340 pictures, and 4500 UFO cases. However, one of the issues that critics of the site have highlighted is that the articles and pictures aren’t published with the consent of the original authors. With the internet overflowing with websites about the paranormal and mysterious it’s good to know what sites are worth checking into, and thus Ohlsson’s article is very much welcomed among serious researchers.

Pages 26-27: International Ufology

Stefan Roslund has sixteen short news about the international UFO, and forteana, scene. Among other things, Roslund mentions famous ufologists who have passed away, abduction researcher Susan Clancy, Stanton Friedman’s UFO lecture in China, famous lake monster Ogopogo, and so on.

Pages 28-29: News from the Report Central

Strange things are indeed taking place in the skies. The Report Central run by UFO Sweden receive several hundred reports annually, and in this issue of UFO-Aktuellt Clas Svahn presents three cases, from 1990, 2004, and 2005.

Pages 30-31: The Archive Gets Bigger and Bigger

Article by Anders Liljegren, about the Archive for UFO Research (www.afu.info) and some of its activities during the year 2005. the Archive is truly one of the wonders of contemporary ufology, and Liljegren’s article is filled with information for both newcomers to the archive and those who have heard about it before. No serious ufologist can afford not to use and help out with the archive, and while the Archive keeps expanding more and more projects and ideas are being planned and carried out.

Back page: It’s a… Bunch of Balloons

Short article by Svahn accompanied by a large color photograph. The photograph was taken by a Swedish family in Madeira in January 2006, and UFO Sweden’s conclusion is that it’s probably a picture of a bunch of balloons make it’s way across the sky.