0:08

In 1994, a private school in Zimbabwe

0:10

released their students into the yard for recess.

0:13

During their playtime, a total of 62 children

0:16

saw what they believed to be an extraterrestrial

0:18

presence in the distance. Even to this

0:20

day, those involved maintain their

0:22

belief in what they saw. So today,

0:25

we take a look at the puzzling Ariel School

0:27

UFO incident. This

0:29

is Red Web.

0:38

Welcome

0:38

back Task Force to another episode

0:40

of Red Web, the show all about the unsolved

0:42

here in this world from paranormal to true crime

0:45

and a little bit of everything in between. I'm

0:47

your resident mystery enthusiast, Trevor Collins,

0:49

and joining me, hearing this mystery for the

0:51

very first time,

0:52

Alfredo Diaz. This mystery

0:55

took a turn a hard left.

0:58

I was like, whoa, okay, a whole bunch of school kids

1:00

and aliens. What? How

1:02

does everything find its way to aliens? I

1:04

mean, I feel like it's the way of life. It's

1:07

just that one of the natural laws that I

1:09

feel like Red Web

1:11

law number one, everything

1:13

comes back to aliens. I mean, it's

1:15

kids, you know, you could see like you can

1:17

have like three kids that see something and

1:19

then all of a sudden, I mean, six, he's a lot of kids, a lot of kids.

1:22

So you're letting the whole school out.

1:24

But I could definitely see how

1:27

like three kids, like maybe like the three

1:30

influence of like influential kids in the class,

1:32

right? So they see something and it's like a wave

1:34

that washes over all the other kids and they're like, we

1:37

see it too. And

1:38

also like how fit in? Yeah.

1:41

They're the cool kids. How young are these these kids? Because

1:43

you could, it's primary school. Primary.

1:46

Okay. So it has a range of grades. Okay.

1:49

So it's still fairly young. You had that again. It's

1:51

like, I like her in high school. I'm like, Oh, you

1:54

guys are getting all laid out of class now. Yeah,

1:57

it's true. Why didn't we get recess

1:59

time in high?

1:59

It would have just been like standing

2:02

around on our phones. Yeah,

2:04

pretty much. Okay,

2:07

so I mean, they're young though. Yeah, it's

2:09

kids. Kids see and say the

2:11

darndest things. But

2:14

yeah, I mean, I'm excited

2:16

to see if they're, you know, what we have

2:18

that has to do with like, what,

2:21

like any type of evidence or anything

2:24

tangible or whatnot. I see there

2:26

are papers flipped upside down. So I'm thinking there's

2:28

photos which... I've got some photos for

2:30

you. Okay, now we're cooking.

2:33

It also just kind of reminds me of the scene from Signs

2:35

where they had the videotape footage from

2:37

Brazil. Oh, from that birthday? And the birthday

2:39

party and they were like, it's fine.

2:42

And the thing walks out. And I'm like, ooh. Yeah,

2:44

ooh, that was good stuff. I mean,

2:46

except for when I was a kid watching that for the first time in my

2:48

basement alone with the lights off. Why

2:50

I did that stuff to myself. Blair Witch

2:52

did that. Oh man. Yeah, this is an interesting

2:55

case. And I say that because when it comes

2:57

to UFO stories, I love covering

2:59

these. And each one has their own

3:01

kind of footprint. They tend to follow

3:04

a similar pattern where something

3:06

comes down from the sky, a witness sees it, they

3:08

sketch it. And then that's kind of the story.

3:11

Or lights. Or lights. Sometimes

3:13

you get extra additions of like,

3:15

there's radiation in the area or there's a burn

3:17

mark or other kind of unique

3:20

elements. And then when it comes to the theories,

3:22

task force, if you've been around the block with us, you know

3:24

that it tends to then be, is this a hoax

3:26

or is this real? And we're going to discuss

3:29

a third theory on this particular

3:31

case that I think is really fascinating.

3:33

And it has a lot to do with the local

3:36

culture of this particular sighting.

3:39

And it kind of throws a wrench in things. Like for me, I was like,

3:41

the first theory seems to be interesting, right?

3:43

Like they actually saw what they saw. And the next theory is, ooh,

3:46

scientific. Let's break it down. And then this

3:48

third theory could, and I was talking

3:50

to Christian before we recorded, could answer

3:53

a lot. And that's where I have some more photos for

3:55

you.

3:56

But again, I'm just out here teasing the

3:58

end. Before we get to the theory.

3:59

Let's talk about the incident there

4:02

and as always if you want a list

4:04

of any of the sensitive topics We're going to cover in this episode.

4:06

You can check out our description. All

4:09

right, so September 16th 1994 the

4:12

Ariel school released its students into

4:14

the yard for recess Just a good

4:17

little time Ariel school is

4:19

located in Ruwa Zimbabwe Which is about 30

4:22

kilometers or 18 and a half miles southeast

4:24

of the capital Harare at the

4:26

time of this story Ruwa was not officially

4:29

recognized as a town and was primarily

4:31

populated by farmers Ariel is

4:33

a private school with many of its students coming

4:36

in from Harare So many of the students

4:38

do come from wealthier

4:39

backgrounds just some backstory on

4:41

the school

4:42

now on this particular day only

4:44

one teacher Was outside monitoring the

4:46

children during recess as all the

4:48

other teachers were having a staff meeting

4:50

at around 10 a.m Some of the children

4:53

at this time saw a silver disc

4:55

land on the hillside of the school

4:57

ground about a hundred meters away 330 feet

5:01

away or so less than a football field. That's

5:04

not far very far at all What

5:06

would you do if you were outside? Let's say you're 8

5:09

to 12 somewhere in there and you see

5:11

this happen that close to your

5:13

playground 8

5:14

to 12 I'm questioning

5:16

it. Oh really right? Yeah, you haven't

5:18

got the fight or flight. No Yeah,

5:21

the 34 right now you when you turn around ask

5:23

me the question. I'm halfway down the block Would

5:26

you gone upon? Yeah,

5:30

you know I mean like I can find out

5:32

from a distance Like

5:39

you've got the childlike immortality,

5:41

but now as a man you've got self-preservation

5:43

I don't need to see it. Uh-huh like

5:46

in real life. So you you you have

5:48

me right? I'll be there I'll

5:50

phone out Oh,

5:53

hey look someone's got a survive

5:55

to remember you guys The

6:00

memorial. The memorial.

6:01

Alright.

6:02

So anyway, very close to the playground. And

6:05

so, of course, the children ran to the

6:07

edge of the property to see if they could get a closer

6:10

look. It was described as a conventional

6:12

classic UFO look. You know, the very silvery

6:14

disc, saucer shaped as you would describe.

6:17

Yeah. What is it? A

6:19

plate with an upturned cup on it? Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.

6:21

Two plates. Mm-hmm. You

6:24

know. Two saucer plates. Two saucer plates

6:26

just cupped onto each other. Yeah. And

6:28

then a teacup on top. Turn on. I love that

6:31

Task Force sent photos of that. Yeah, sent me a lot of photos of that. Yep. So

6:33

it was kind of that look. And some

6:35

of the children said that they could see a glinting

6:38

in the trees before this

6:39

craft landed down.

6:41

Many of the students then claimed to see small

6:44

gray figures dressed in all black

6:46

exit the craft. The children said

6:48

that the beings had extremely large eyes,

6:51

once again, kind of matching that classic

6:53

description that we've seen of,

6:55

as they're called, the grays, right? Big heads,

6:58

lower eyes, elongated black,

7:01

kind of oval eyes.

7:03

Yeah. So, I mean, these are just, this

7:05

is wild,

7:06

right? You're

7:08

telling me these aliens pulled

7:11

up broad daylight. Right.

7:13

And then the whole crew got

7:16

out and started exploring. Kicking

7:18

it, you know? Man.

7:21

Yeah. So, you

7:23

estimated that of the 250 students that were

7:25

out in the schoolyard that day, an

7:28

estimated 250 students. They

7:30

had one teacher watching, 250 students. I'll

7:32

be honest, man. It's like you had a full-time job. Yeah, you

7:34

know what I'm doing. I'm leading the charge to get that teacher. I'm doing it. So,

7:43

we're all witnessing this craft land down and

7:45

you're taking on the teacher with a grouping of 250

7:49

other students. Okay. So, you're

7:51

going to witness

7:52

it. Now, of these 250 students, an estimated 62 children between the

7:54

ages of 6 and 12 witnessed this

7:59

craft land. craft landing witnessed these

8:01

beings exiting the craft and

8:04

we'll get into kind of the details of each of their experiences

8:06

but there's some snags

8:09

in the story as you kind of indicated I

8:11

think your gut instinct is always is right on

8:14

children are impressionable and when they hear the story

8:16

of others you know the story can

8:18

spread but suffice to say a lot

8:20

of people saw that craft when

8:23

the students explained what they saw to their teachers of course they

8:25

were met with skepticism but when they went home

8:28

and continued to talk about these things with their parents

8:30

their parents then became rightfully worried

8:33

some of them extremely upset they contacted

8:35

the teachers and some of them even came to the school the next

8:37

day to say hey what is going on are

8:40

we losing control here or I'm just worried

8:42

that my kids are some are scared

8:44

some are seeing things it's you know a little

8:46

problematic now the incident was then

8:48

reported on ZBC radios in Bawe

8:50

Broadcasting Corporation soon

8:52

after the incident and local UFOologist

8:55

and representative of MUFON or

8:57

MUFON we've talked about them before but the mutual

9:00

UFO network Cynthia Hind asked

9:02

the school for more information so immediately

9:05

this is published on the radio talked

9:08

about and then immediately as always kind

9:10

of caught on like a wildfire other

9:13

sources other news networks other individuals that were

9:15

interested in this kind of thing flocked

9:17

over to kind of hey what's going on here can

9:20

we get your stories let's let's dig in

9:22

so this prompted more of a thorough investigation

9:25

by Ariel School BBC

9:27

was actually involved and Hind as well

9:30

and this was just a few days after the sighting so memories

9:32

are still relatively fresh the sightings

9:35

sketches that people were making but again

9:38

some snags and I'll get to those I'm curious

9:40

to see if they went to the landing

9:43

site if they saw any type

9:45

of like I don't know divots

9:48

or anything like that you know

9:50

compressed ground if they

9:53

took radioactive readings

9:55

or whatnot anything of the sort

9:58

yeah not often that people take it

9:59

seriously enough to go out to the spot

10:02

and go, okay, like in the Barney and

10:04

Betty Hill case, right, they were driving along,

10:07

they saw UFO land. I think they

10:09

also saw other aircraft scrambled and

10:11

things. And so immediately investigators are looking

10:13

at the radar, I think they went out into

10:15

the woods and started using Geiger counters

10:17

to see if they could measure any sort of radiation. I love

10:20

when they do that, they take it seriously, and they investigate.

10:23

I will spill some of the beans. A lot of

10:25

this is interviews and

10:28

anecdotal experiences. You didn't

10:30

get a lot of tangible evidence. I'm not gonna like,

10:33

he's that piece because that just doesn't come into play

10:35

here, unfortunately. But this is where

10:37

the investigation and the stories kind of start to

10:39

expand. So on September 19, three

10:42

days after the incident, you have Tim Leach of BBC,

10:45

he visits the aerial school, and he interviewed

10:47

student witnesses. Apparently, the interviews

10:49

were so intense that Leach has

10:51

been quoted as saying, quote, I

10:54

could handle war zones, but I could not handle

10:56

this. I don't know exactly what he means, Christian,

10:58

I don't know if he expands on that further. I know there's

11:00

an active article that you can read, but

11:03

is it the fervor that the children have

11:05

with the kids just like telling the

11:08

most intense emotional stories.

11:11

From what we could find, he didn't

11:13

elaborate on what exactly he meant by that. So I

11:15

don't want to speculate as to right, okay,

11:18

beyond that. But looking at the just

11:20

anecdotally speaking, for me, having watched

11:22

some of the interviews,

11:24

they seem fairly normal

11:27

kids, right? From the one in my mind, you

11:29

know, the dude walks up like, what's up, little man,

11:31

what'd you see? And the kid is just like, and

11:36

I saw a thing in the sky and goes,

11:38

I like aliens. Because

11:41

the new I like turtles. I was talking to my friend,

11:43

we're playing a handball at that I saw like reflection

11:45

in the sky. Yeah, stuff like that. You know what I mean?

11:47

That was what I was getting from when I was watching

11:50

the interview. I didn't see them all. I just wanted

11:52

to be cool that the actual interviews are watchable. Yeah,

11:54

I just wanted to dig into that because it does sound very alarmist.

11:57

And I just wanted to kind of acknowledge that

11:59

but

11:59

Otherwise it could just be a journalist being

12:02

a journalist and trying to get their click. Yeah,

12:05

this was really, you know, it's hard to say.

12:07

But coming back to Hind, she asked

12:09

the students to draw what they saw

12:11

on,

12:13

well, actually on the 20th. So just a few days later,

12:15

and I have a few of those sketches. These

12:18

are also in the BBC

12:20

article entitled the school kids who said they saw

12:22

aliens. So a couple of these sketches have been

12:24

floating around, but you can kind of get an idea

12:27

of the trees they saw, the shape

12:29

of the aircraft, as well as the

12:31

aliens themselves.

12:32

As always task force as he digest these photos.

12:35

Yeah, you can see these on our social media at

12:37

red web pod. I mean, the first

12:39

one was like a drawing that I would draw, you

12:42

know, stick figures of a bunch of kids

12:45

and then the trees and

12:47

then an alien. For

12:50

sure.

12:50

You've got some text, I guess, off

12:52

to the side through some clouds.

12:55

Another one looks like a

12:59

like a plate on disc. I

13:01

mean, like a plate on like

13:03

stilts, actually. Yeah, like the landing

13:05

gear. Yeah,

13:08

so like, yeah, very long

13:10

and thin legs spider like that

13:12

seem like a common trend. That bottom drawing someone's

13:15

an artist. Yeah, they

13:17

got a little bit of shading happening. Yeah.

13:21

Yeah, that looks like someone that is like the

13:24

UFOs in the tree lines and

13:26

it looks like someone's ready to take on that

13:28

UFO or like is ready to greet

13:31

the UFO. Yeah. And I couldn't tell

13:33

if that was one of the aliens that they saw like silhouetted.

13:35

Oh, true. But it looks like it's

13:37

facing. Yeah. Yeah. It

13:40

almost like to that's me confronting it. Yeah,

13:42

exactly. Yeah. But

13:44

again, they're kids, you know, right? Exactly. I got

13:46

a sign their name, Brian.

13:48

Like when I would draw Spiderman, I would make

13:50

sure, you know, Jupiter was in play. That's

13:53

where my mind was that I'm thinking, you know, sometimes

13:55

he's swinging off buildings, but why is he not like clattering

13:57

into the windows? He must be shooting straight up.

13:59

And what's straight up? You got space. You

14:02

swing off planets and stuff. So,

14:04

so a base? I don't think Spiderman has

14:06

the technology. None of the way in the world. But

14:10

what I'm seeing is, sometimes

14:12

you start with like, I'm gonna draw this, but

14:14

by the time the drawing is done, you know,

14:16

these six year old, seven year olds have filled

14:18

in a lot of gaps that their minds just kind of wandered.

14:21

I mean, I'm just thinking about the number of times I've played like

14:23

a party games, like Jackbox

14:26

and Drawful, right? I'll have like a minute

14:28

to draw. I draw this childlike

14:31

photo and then I go, I still got 30 seconds

14:34

and then I start adding stuff. You know what I mean?

14:36

And then all of a sudden, like multiple scenes

14:38

happening. Yeah. Cause you

14:40

just keep elaborating because why not? Yeah.

14:43

You already had your

14:44

canvas. I also want to add just for the fun of

14:46

the lore, I drew an anatomically

14:48

correct Spiderman who was swinging

14:50

by his butt.

14:52

So his butt was stuck out of his suit. I

14:54

got in trouble. That's what spiders

14:56

do. Comes out the butt, not their little

14:59

hands. Man, it's just a logical finger.

15:02

I'm a philosopher, you know, drawing

15:04

spider butts. Punished for it. So

15:07

misunderstood. They're holding me back. But let's

15:09

get back to the real drawings at hand, okay?

15:12

But as was seen, and as you kind of saw,

15:14

I don't have all their photos, but

15:16

most of the students drew something eerily similar

15:18

to each other. Even if they weren't drawing them in the

15:21

same room or in the same vicinity, they came up

15:23

with very similar looks. Oh, well

15:25

that's interesting.

15:28

I mean, that in itself,

15:29

I mean,

15:31

these two saucers look different. Yeah,

15:34

yeah. One little rounder with a dome

15:36

on top with some round windows like a submarine.

15:39

But I mean, I will say,

15:42

if

15:43

I was in that situation and there was a ton of kids

15:46

drawing the

15:48

same thing,

15:51

I'm questioning it. I'm sick for

15:53

a week. I'm only

15:55

flimming. You're going home and pinning these on your court. Find

15:57

out what the hell's going on here. Right.

15:59

Like what like they are slightly different but only

16:02

if you look really detailed because what really

16:04

stands out to me is none of these are like a triangle, none

16:06

of these are like an airplane, none of these have all

16:08

their engines at the back like

16:10

they're all

16:11

broadly similar shapes and I think that

16:13

that stands out because then you can kind of like soften

16:16

the artistic ability of various children

16:18

and

16:19

find a similar trend.

16:21

Now one of the kids, Guy G, told

16:23

Hind that he quote, could see the

16:25

little man about a meter tall was dressed

16:27

in a black shiny suit that he had long

16:30

black hair in his eyes which seemed lower

16:32

on the cheek than ours were large and

16:34

elongated. That's

16:35

the first time I ever heard about like aliens

16:39

having hair really. Yeah. Like

16:41

when you ever hear like yeah the alien walked

16:43

out and it was like a Pantene ProV commercial

16:45

and it was luscious and long. You know what

16:48

I mean? Aliens on the hair? That's

16:50

questionably more gross though. Honestly

16:53

a little bit. For some reason I don't know why. Like

16:56

gray skin like yeah boy

16:58

like it just seems grosser to me that it has

17:01

hair. Right. Oh yeah.

17:03

Pantene commercial though. I like the shiny

17:06

it's got the what is that

17:08

glisten on it. Now what's

17:10

interesting and I do appreciate the

17:13

attempt to kind of address

17:15

this from a cultural perspective because Hind believed

17:17

that depending on the children's cultural background and ethnicity

17:19

they interpreted the sighting differently. Now

17:22

it is worth noting that this school had

17:24

a large as she says quote

17:27

cross section of Zimbabweans. There

17:29

were black African children from several tribes.

17:32

There were Asian children whose grandparents were

17:34

from India and there were white children mostly

17:36

Zimbabwean born but whose parents were

17:39

either from South Africa or Britain. And

17:41

of course within that there were various mixed

17:43

races. And so from that she

17:46

what she's trying to do and I'm trying to remove

17:48

her biases from the picture to be totally transparent.

17:51

But I think what she's trying to do is say everyone

17:53

has different belief systems and different like cultural

17:56

backgrounds. And how does that impact

17:58

their experience. with what they saw

18:00

that day?

18:01

Or is there a unified kind

18:03

of experience despite that?

18:06

And

18:06

I think that that's an interesting kind

18:08

of attempted angle. Also just like the religions

18:10

that could come into play too, right? 100%. Absolutely.

18:13

Like oh it's something from heaven or

18:15

something from this god or etc.

18:18

Right. For example, some of the black

18:20

African students believed the beings that

18:22

they saw were called Tokolosh

18:25

or other folklore creatures from the area. Tokolosh

18:28

are evil beings typically depicted like goblins

18:31

and come from South African mythology and

18:33

they are said to be summoned to wreak havoc on others

18:35

but are said to scare children.

18:37

And so

18:38

there you have like an example where they're kind

18:40

of grounding in reality or

18:43

in their folklore what these beings might

18:45

be. So maybe they aren't aliens but instead

18:47

they're like essentially kind

18:49

of simplifying it like a cryptid.

18:51

Right.

18:52

I mean look

18:53

I don't

18:54

know cryptid cultures

18:57

or ways or whatnot but I got

18:59

the main ones. I cryptid as far fetched as

19:02

it is already. You're telling me a cryptid is rolling

19:04

up in a vehicle. Now if Bigfoot

19:06

rolled up you know I'm talking like

19:08

on a Harley Davidson or like a big old... Then I'd understand

19:11

why he was hidden for so long. You didn't

19:13

read it? No I'm just kidding. But one

19:15

I go why show yourself now Bigfoot

19:17

and why show yourself to me. But like I'd

19:19

be like okay like you have

19:25

a decently high IQ

19:27

and you just were playing it

19:29

smart hiding all your ears.

19:31

I think it's an interesting point like no matter what's

19:33

rolling up in a big shiny saucer like vehicle

19:35

I think

19:36

I'm with you. I'm keeping a distance. I

19:38

don't know what they're about. I don't know what they're for and I don't

19:40

know why they're revealing themselves now. Some high

19:42

tech smart gremlins. You normally

19:44

see gremlins as like low IQ

19:47

just kind of minions. Right making a mess

19:49

of things. Now another

19:50

individual came in November.

19:52

This was Dr. John E. Mack a psychiatry

19:55

professor from Harvard and he visited Ariel

19:57

School to investigate and interview some of the students. students.

20:00

Now in the 90s, Mack became

20:02

interested in the psychology of UFO and

20:04

extraterrestrial sightings, once again kind of bringing

20:07

the psychological scientific

20:09

element to common sightings. Interestingly,

20:12

Mack was under investigation by Harvard at

20:14

the time of the aerial UFO incident

20:17

due to his research on UFO witnesses.

20:20

For what it's worth, this investigation ceased after 14 months

20:22

because Mack had not committed any sort of ethical

20:25

or legal misconduct to even warrant

20:27

an investigation in the first place. Perhaps

20:30

that when you start speaking about UFOs,

20:32

a lot of traditional, whether it be schools,

20:34

sciences, or other companies

20:37

start to get a little like, hmm,

20:40

you're starting to tread into pseudoscience or

20:42

you're starting to tread into something that could

20:45

put a damper on our reputation. So maybe

20:47

that's why they put an investigation

20:49

on them. Either way, he was there to talk

20:52

to some of the children about their experiences. In

20:54

fact, when he was talking to them, some of the children told

20:56

Mack about, quote, messages

20:59

that were sent by these beings. One

21:01

girl said, quote, he never said anything.

21:04

It was just the eyes. And when

21:06

asked about what sense she got

21:08

from the eyes, she simply said, quote,

21:11

he was interested.

21:13

And I think, and I'm not sure if I said this earlier,

21:15

but I think some of the kids had

21:18

shared that they had received messages

21:21

telepathically when they had witnessed

21:23

these beings kind of exiting the

21:25

vehicle or kind of around the vehicle. So

21:27

these are things. These aren't things that have been spoken to

21:29

them. These are kind of messages that

21:32

they said that they were receiving.

21:33

There was another student named Emma who told Mack,

21:36

quote,

21:36

I think they want people to know that we're actually

21:38

making harm on this planet and we

21:41

mustn't get too technology. Basically

21:44

say like less than the technology, but

21:46

that's the word that she used, technology.

21:49

Then there was another student named Francis and they

21:51

claimed that they said, quote, pollution

21:54

mustn't be.

21:55

I mean, it's all still kind of in the same genre,

21:59

right? Which is. like the

22:01

planet mm-hmm

22:02

and that's something interesting to me I mean on

22:04

one hand that does seem

22:06

to lend some credence like there is a

22:09

thesis here there's a focused message it

22:11

wouldn't be super eclectic if they if

22:13

some entity showed up they wouldn't start hitting everybody

22:16

with different directions yeah but on the other

22:18

hand there's something to look into why

22:20

are all the kids having the same like I

22:22

would want to be like what's the topics

22:25

in school right now are they primed for this

22:27

topic yeah you

22:29

start looking around to just make sure is

22:31

this an authentic message or does this come from something

22:33

else I mean now

22:35

kids are very heavily influenced

22:37

by others and their surroundings

22:40

that being said this is very

22:43

succinct mm-hmm and then there'd

22:46

be some real organized kids

22:48

like it's getting to the point where I'm like these

22:50

kids are really organized and I don't think like they're

22:53

six to twelve year old yes I pulling

22:56

this type of thing off um so yeah

22:58

now we're getting into the realm of like okay like

23:02

maybe there's something here there could be something

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28:19

now that's kind of the end of

28:22

the eyewitness accounts investigation and the story

28:24

of the craft there isn't much about it taking

28:27

off anything else going down but

28:30

now

28:31

there's more information to talk about and that's

28:33

where I want to start talking about the theories of course I

28:36

kind of teased as to each one we're gonna start

28:38

with one of the major theories which is that

28:40

these were aliens because to this day the

28:43

aerial UFO incident remains a convincing

28:45

extraterrestrial sighting to

28:48

many believers and with 62 total witnesses

28:51

many of those people are still sharing their stories

28:53

to this very day as in this

28:55

year 2023 and just having 62

28:58

total witnesses in general is pretty

29:01

unique for any sighting gotta

29:03

be like the

29:04

huh well I guess there's some there's some

29:07

signs we've covered or like

29:09

flew over town and stuff like that sure I mean

29:12

that's gotta be the largest gathering of people yeah

29:14

it's definitely one of the larger ones I mean

29:16

the other ones I think of a like Roswell or a

29:19

fight for LA or whatever that's called where they

29:21

started firing on the sky at night because a lot of

29:24

something but not terrifying would that be if

29:26

you just like walk outside the parking lot you saw

29:28

like 15 jets scrambling across dude

29:31

terrifying for any reason I

29:33

mean sometimes they fly over a football game and I go hold

29:35

on what's going on yeah but uh

29:38

you know I mean just scrambling cuz it could be anything

29:40

right yeah an attack on

29:43

your soil it could be

29:45

sci-fi I start to go well

29:47

it's the military they gotta know more than me and

29:49

if they're scrambling flying around I'm not

29:52

driving that way I'll tell you that right I'm in the opposite

29:54

right I'm going northbound if they're southbound

29:56

or whatever so hind

29:58

I again a lot of the

29:59

that investigate these kind of cases do

30:02

have their biases, whether they're believers

30:05

themselves and want to kind of prove that, or whether they're

30:07

more skeptic, or whether they're more scientifically driven.

30:10

That's something I kind of want to recognize before we really

30:12

dive into some of these theories. But with that said, Hind

30:14

believes that their experience was legitimate, and

30:17

claimed that due to their rural location,

30:19

they likely would not have had access to

30:22

movie theaters and alien media. However,

30:25

many of the students were in fact from wealthy families,

30:27

as Ariel was a private school and probably did

30:29

have televisions. Don't need just

30:31

movie theaters. Oh, not at all. It's also that

30:34

a lot of the students commuted from Harare, which

30:36

is the largest city in Zimbabwe. One can't

30:38

simply assume that just because this school is in a rural

30:41

area, that they don't have access to some

30:44

types of media. I mean, there's radio, comics,

30:46

television, even physical copies of movies

30:49

can readily make themselves available to

30:51

a lot of these students.

30:53

So

30:54

there is, again, we're going to address the wrinkles with some

30:56

of the theories, but we'll continue on. She interviewed

30:58

the students in groups. And this is something

31:01

I kind of, I think we both kind of stepped

31:03

into earlier. Like when you are

31:05

working with a bunch of students, especially

31:08

young kids, and you're interviewing them in

31:10

groups, you're going to start priming

31:13

them in different ways, whether you

31:15

mean to or not. Memory conformity

31:18

is like an actual thing that happens. And that

31:20

can occur when people are interviewed in groups. It

31:22

could lead to memory errors, false

31:25

memories. It can lead you to be suggested

31:28

that your memory had other elements to it.

31:30

In fact, simply recalling things

31:33

in the moment, your emotional state,

31:35

where you're at, recontextualizing

31:37

your memory can actually change it.

31:39

Our brains are very flawed, but we're also very pattern

31:42

driven.

31:43

And so all of those psychological

31:45

elements included, you start to think,

31:47

well, very active minded,

31:49

creative children, all hearing these stories together,

31:52

you start to unify around a story. Well,

31:54

even like even as an

31:56

adult, right? Like if I'm to see something

31:59

already. starting to forget the details.

32:03

And then on top of that, if I sit down with a group

32:05

of people who we've all seen the

32:07

same thing, and I'm sitting there saying,

32:09

well, I kind of remember seeing this and someone

32:11

else says with confidence that they saw a

32:14

different version of what I saw. I'm

32:16

more inclined to kind of follow that up because

32:18

it's like, for me, it's like, well, a little hazy

32:21

on it, but this person, clear as day, is like, this

32:23

is what I saw, the confidence right there.

32:25

And so I'm starting to lean towards that camp

32:28

in the way I'm thinking. And already that's

32:30

starting to add pieces of their memory

32:33

to the hastiness of my memory, et cetera. So yeah,

32:36

no, I see that. It's weird that they

32:38

interviewed them as groups. I mean, it's a lot of kids,

32:41

but then again, to do it as groups.

32:44

I think it's just a baseline knowing

32:46

that kids are so influenced by each other. So

32:48

why is it a group? It

32:51

would have been nice that if even just a handful of

32:53

kids were interviewed more individually to get

32:55

some sort of baseline. But

32:58

you're right. We'll talk more about this particular angle

33:00

in the next theory. But another wrinkle,

33:03

the stories of the aliens' environmental messages

33:06

were only reported on after the children

33:08

had met with Dr. Mack.

33:10

And once again, that was a few days later, but

33:12

Mack had an interest in environmentalism

33:14

himself and arrived months. I

33:17

said days, he arrived months after the

33:19

incident. It's worth noting that memories

33:21

and recall fade with time. Of course, I think we

33:23

all

33:24

hopefully know that. I hope there's no one confident

33:26

enough to be like, never. But

33:28

anyway, every time you remember an event,

33:31

your brain alters the memory.

33:32

It's kind of like a game of telephone. And this

33:35

can lead, like I said, in the previous kind of wrinkle

33:37

to some false memories. Donna Bridge,

33:40

the lead author of an article on the topic in

33:42

Journal of Neuroscience told Northwestern

33:45

Now, quote, "'If you remember something in the context

33:47

"'of a new environment and time, "'or if

33:50

you are even in a different mood, "'your

33:52

memories might integrate the new information.'" Though

33:54

it can be argued that because Mack specialized in childhood

33:57

psychology, they may have felt more comfortable

33:59

opening up to him. him. Mac also believed in UFO

34:01

stories in the past. And so he does have a

34:03

biased angle. Right. All this is to say,

34:06

he might have been a warm presence to the kids.

34:08

He might have imposed his bias in there. And

34:11

also because he had a lot of interest in environmentalism.

34:13

Did he impose that on what the kids said? Did

34:16

he ask leading questions? Or was

34:18

this coming from the kids? It's really hard to say. But

34:20

these are all factors that are worth thinking about. I

34:23

mean, look, you can take like a skilled

34:26

government agent and

34:28

another grown adult and they could coerce

34:30

them into thinking a certain way, planting

34:33

seeds, right? To that grow

34:36

and have that certain ideologies, whatnot.

34:39

You know what I mean? You could do that

34:41

to a kid. Right. Right.

34:44

They're very moldable in terms

34:46

of like you're just growing up. So like you're absorbing

34:48

everything, you're influenced by everything.

34:50

If a grown person can be

34:52

influenced by a skilled agent, like,

34:55

yeah, for sure. You know, he's environmentalist.

34:58

He's

34:59

a believer of aliens. There's

35:02

going to be leading questions there. Sure.

35:03

Or conclusions drawn that fit

35:06

perhaps a motive. Instead of like, what did

35:08

you see? It could be as

35:10

simple as like,

35:12

what did the aliens look like? Yeah.

35:14

And that's very, it's taking the kid down

35:16

a very different lane. Right.

35:19

Right. Or I mean, there's a lot of other leading

35:21

questions. I didn't need to have any more examples, but

35:23

let's say, yeah, right. The

35:26

last thing I want to say on this, it's worth noting that many

35:28

of the students have not reported other sightings before

35:30

or since this event in 1994, which

35:33

is very common in the UFO alien

35:36

kind of eyewitness accounts and stories

35:38

that we've covered in the past. I don't know if that

35:40

lends credence to the story or if that like pulls

35:43

kind of substantial belief from

35:45

it, but it is interesting to me at

35:48

least if someone sees something that

35:50

they don't repeatedly see it's not like a boy that cries wolf

35:52

thing. Nobody else has seen anything of

35:54

those 62 kids since then. Moving

35:57

on to our next theory. Many

35:59

believe that that the aerial UFO incident

36:01

is a classic case of mass psychogenic illness,

36:04

popularly known as mass hysteria.

36:06

We've talked about this in a previous episode on the dancing

36:09

plague of 1518, where a lot

36:11

of people were suddenly dancing and they couldn't stop themselves

36:13

and seemed to spread like an epidemic without

36:16

much answer until it kind of just petered out.

36:19

A whole episode on that if you wanna check that out. But suffice

36:21

to say, it is a mass psychogenic

36:23

illness and it refers to a situation where

36:26

people in a group start feeling sick, usually

36:28

sick, at the same time, even though

36:30

there's no physical or environmental reason

36:32

for them to feel sick. Sometimes it could

36:34

be other things like the dancing or perhaps

36:36

seeing an alien craft.

36:38

Now this scenario can be diagnosed when symptoms of

36:40

an illness start to spread around the population

36:43

without a source. In such cases, despite

36:45

the lack of an origin, the symptoms

36:48

seem to spread like an epidemic. In

36:50

fact, I think in the case of the dancing plague

36:53

of 1518, that's more of a psychogenic

36:55

illness and it

36:56

seems that a

36:58

common thread for these and their origin

37:00

is

37:00

either having

37:02

preexisting superstitious populations

37:05

or having a population that is in a

37:07

time of high shared stress. In

37:10

the case of Ariel, the source of stress

37:12

is unknown. However, as mentioned previously,

37:15

some of the population of Ruwa does have

37:17

superstitious beliefs. And this could have

37:19

been a situation that kind of like started

37:21

to fold onto itself as kids

37:24

believe other kids and it kind of spread.

37:26

I think your take on how kids are impressionable,

37:29

especially if they have other friends that they trust,

37:31

it can easily spread. Yeah. According

37:34

to Damobli Kokota, a research psychologist

37:37

from the University of Malawi, cases

37:39

of mass psychogenic illness are common in

37:41

African schools. They say, quote, the

37:43

psychosocial environment plays a crucial role

37:45

in the occurrence of mass hysteria in developing

37:48

countries. End quote. So in his

37:50

mind, this may explain why the students

37:53

still believe what they saw as being extraterrestrial

37:55

beings that day, despite perhaps

37:57

having more understandable. explanation

38:00

underneath. As pointed out by Brian

38:02

Dunning of Skeptoid just two days before

38:04

the aerial sighting, this is really interesting.

38:07

There was an influx of UFO sightings already

38:10

reported in Zimbabwe, but there's a perfectly

38:13

rational explanation for that. Okay,

38:15

to tell. Yeah, so around 9pm

38:17

on September 14th, the Zenit II

38:20

rocket re-entered the atmosphere. It

38:22

caused a fire across the sky as it broke up into pieces.

38:25

ZBC Radio reported that there were countless

38:27

UFO reports that night, so

38:29

extraterrestrials and UFO craft

38:32

could have kind of been on people's

38:35

minds leading into this incident.

38:37

Yeah, a primer. Exactly. These

38:39

kids might have been primed because it hit, like,

38:43

their national radio. Yeah. But

38:45

again, it had a very reasonable explanation.

38:47

A rocket coming into the atmosphere, it broke up, people saw

38:49

that, extrapolated conclusions, and

38:51

then that spread through the populace. Researchers

38:54

believe that what the children at aerial school saw

38:56

was the result of a prank. Some former

38:59

students have claimed that they started it, and

39:01

the fear experienced by students might

39:03

have been so strong as a result of this prank

39:06

that it resulted in people believing

39:08

that this was a UFO sighting that it was substantial,

39:11

and then then it spread. The fear kind of took

39:13

hold and made it more real. I

39:16

mean, but to that, it's like, okay,

39:18

you're telling me that you started this. This

39:20

is a prank. Cool. Where's the

39:22

materials? Right. That you use

39:25

to create this prank? Yeah. Where's

39:28

the wig? Where's the, I don't know, the

39:30

cardboard wrapped in foil? Mm-hmm. Where's

39:33

all that? What's interesting about this is

39:35

that it starts to

39:37

open the door to the final theory that I want to talk

39:39

about that we're going to talk about in just a moment, but it

39:41

starts to give a more

39:44

grounded human-based answer

39:46

and moves away from the psychology and moves away from

39:48

extraterrestrials, and it starts to go, no,

39:51

something a little bit more practical could be happening,

39:53

whether it be a prank or something else. And

39:56

I'm very excited that, like I said, to get to that answer

39:58

to get you are taking it. Either way, as

40:00

we conclude this particular theory,

40:03

a lot of people still genuinely believe what they saw that

40:05

day. And the main wrinkle

40:08

in it being an actual event is

40:10

that the teacher that was out that day didn't

40:12

see anything. And while 62 students

40:15

did, you have almost 200 other

40:17

students that were outside with them that didn't see

40:19

anything that day. Doesn't necessarily

40:22

mean that the other 62 students didn't see anything,

40:24

but it does start to make you wonder,

40:26

was it a real event or is there something like an

40:28

explanation behind it? I mean, you still

40:30

had a good percentage of those kids

40:33

seeing it, right? Right. I

40:35

mean, the kids, they're not sitting around waiting for

40:37

something to happen.

40:38

They're running around with their friends, they're

40:41

playing games, they're focused on other

40:43

things. Sure. And

40:45

so granted, this event took place

40:48

close enough, but not

40:51

danger close, right? It wasn't just outside

40:53

the fence where it's like, how could not

40:55

everyone have seen this or

40:58

something like that? Right. And so

41:00

I don't know to say that, like, well,

41:03

the rest of the kids didn't see it. I'm like, I don't know. We

41:05

all grew up. You're not focused on what's

41:08

beyond anything that's in front

41:10

of you. Uh-huh. For sure.

41:13

Yeah. Now that leads us to the

41:15

final theory. Interesting. And it is grounded

41:17

in reality and it has a perfectly reasonable explanation.

41:21

Unlike a lot of other UFO stories that we've encountered,

41:23

it leaves it up to the listener to go, is this real?

41:26

Are you a believer? Are you a skeptic? And that's

41:28

kind of the bifurcation. Now I had

41:30

no idea about this kind of this

41:32

more grounded background because

41:34

it was more of a recent theory. So

41:37

blogger Gideon Reed proposed in 2022 that

41:39

the aerial students saw puppets that day and confused

41:45

them for aliens based on the UFO mania,

41:47

if you want to call it that, that was going on at that

41:49

time. Kind of again, taking an element

41:51

from the previous theory that they might've been primed

41:54

to see and talk about that in that day, but they're

41:56

actually seeing something real. So

41:59

interestingly. Starting in 1987, there

42:01

was an organization called the African Research

42:04

and Educational Puppetry Program and

42:06

they used puppets to demonstrate lessons.

42:09

In particular, they used their puppets to teach

42:11

children about AIDS in a more accessible

42:13

way. They toured puppets against AIDS

42:15

across South Africa to bring awareness to the

42:17

disease and clear up some misconceptions about

42:20

its transmission. The puppets used strongly

42:22

resembled the description that the children had

42:25

for the beings that they saw. They were painted

42:27

with dark gray skin and had large

42:29

cartoonish eyes. And some of the drawings,

42:32

actually I have a couple of photos of them for

42:34

you in just a second, but in some of the drawings of

42:37

the UFOs, they had windows that

42:39

greatly resembled the windows of the van

42:41

that the A-R-E-P-P team

42:43

drove. And to be clear, now

42:46

you can take a look at those photos. While some

42:48

of these puppets were puppets as most of

42:50

us in the task force might be thinking of, traditional

42:52

like hand puppets, some of them

42:54

were also large costumes that resembled

42:57

puppets, but were worn by individuals.

42:59

They'd be like people sized entities,

43:01

if you wanna say that. But like they would

43:04

have large cartoonish heads on an otherwise

43:06

human body, and at a distance

43:09

could create some interesting proportions.

43:11

And so basically succinctly is

43:14

to say that this van pulled up not too

43:16

far away from the school,

43:17

the people in these costumes with their

43:19

puppets got out and because

43:22

these kids were primed to see a UFO or

43:24

it was already in the kind of the zeitgeist, they

43:26

saw this and thought that it was

43:29

a UFO with aliens coming out. Well,

43:31

why were they parked outside? Could

43:34

have been a planned demonstration, though Christian,

43:36

I would imagine the school would

43:38

have had something planned. Yeah,

43:40

that's the wrinkle. We couldn't find anything about

43:42

a confirmed appearance that they were having

43:45

at the school or some type of demonstration.

43:47

That's where it gets a little murky. Got it. I

43:50

feel like they would have just came one if this was a demonstration.

43:53

They would have came forward and be like, hey, oh, sorry, that was

43:55

us. They had anything to do with the school, the school that

43:57

came forward, especially because they were getting back.

44:00

clash from the parents. That's an easy

44:02

way to squash that concern. Yeah, that's true. So

44:04

I think for me, it's just like, what

44:07

the hell? If that van was

44:09

there and those puppets were

44:11

there, what were they doing there? Yeah.

44:14

So

44:14

you don't believe. I mean, I can see it from

44:16

a description angle. I can see from a description angle.

44:19

It's spot on. But I think your...

44:21

We need a reason why they're there.

44:23

I feel like if nothing else, and I'm maybe

44:26

being cynical,

44:27

that this group could have

44:30

taken this as a moment to say, hey, we

44:32

can get this group, this education, this awareness

44:34

to spread by saying, hey, this isn't an alien

44:37

encounter. We

44:38

just roll up in the area, and it was a misunderstanding.

44:41

So suddenly, national radio is going,

44:43

oh, no, guys. It's the A-R-E-P-P. And

44:46

this is what they stand for. This is what they're talking about.

44:48

It would have been taken easily. Were

44:50

you right? The school could have been like, nah, it

44:53

was just this. And they had costumes. And

44:55

the kids are creative. I mean, this

44:58

visually matches perfectly.

45:00

There's just the big wrinkle of, what the

45:02

heck were they doing? It's that human element that you're

45:05

totally right.

45:06

Someone should have just been like, oh,

45:08

no, that was this. And it's a school with younger kids.

45:10

So it's less, I don't

45:12

know, maybe the highest school I could see them

45:14

rolling up randomly and just be like, we're doing

45:17

a demonstration, and we want to surprise

45:19

them or whatever. But

45:20

kids that young is usually very well organized

45:23

and documented because of younger kids.

45:26

To play devil's advocate, because

45:28

this theory was only proposed last year in 2022,

45:32

what if the agency,

45:35

the A-R-E-P-P and the school just never

45:37

made the connection? Never made the connection. They never saw a

45:39

reason to claim, hey, that was us. Because

45:42

based on what the students saw, maybe they dismissed

45:44

it. He's got me back. He's got me back. Yeah,

45:46

just like there hasn't been enough time for this to

45:49

have spread around. And for, I mean,

45:51

obviously some of the students are now adults. And so they can

45:53

still speak to their experience. I don't know where the teachers

45:55

might be because age is a thing. But

45:58

yeah, I would be very... Fascinated if any

46:00

of these individuals from this organization or from

46:03

the school could be like oh That

46:05

makes sense. Yeah has documentation to maybe show

46:08

for it

46:09

It was being shown everywhere though Even

46:12

then yeah, I don't I don't know how it's like it was

46:14

I mean that that's still to say then

46:16

that like Even

46:19

if they didn't know if they were there for

46:21

the school then the school faculty

46:24

would know And the school faculty

46:26

was aware of the alien situation So

46:28

you just put two and two together. I just we had these

46:31

people here this day. Yeah. Yeah, you

46:33

saw I mean this is This

46:35

is a very big

46:37

like what if they just happened to me driving

46:39

by On your mind for like

46:42

a week. Yeah, you had people over with costumes

46:44

and doing a demonstration And so

46:46

it wouldn't be I don't know like

46:48

you make that connection pretty quick

46:51

Yeah, what if they were just driving

46:53

by and hopped out did a thing saw

46:55

a bunch of kids They're like we're gonna get out of here. I just wish

46:57

the teacher outside saw something and could have

46:59

really put two and two together Yeah, I was hoping

47:01

for that fan cuz this this particular

47:04

sketch There's one that the that we

47:06

have a photo of the a r epp van and

47:08

then we have a sketch That's a

47:10

similar boxy shape and

47:12

we have human proportions on this this

47:15

another silhouetted creature

47:16

Yeah, I just don't see them doing like a random

47:19

pop-up announced little

47:22

like demonstration and

47:24

So if it had to do with the school

47:26

then the faculty would have been involved and the faculty

47:29

would have put that together Because

47:30

you get I mean the

47:32

school had media swarming

47:35

them. They had parents warming

47:37

them They had

47:39

all kinds of different professionals

47:42

coming in You know I mean

47:44

at that point it's consuming your

47:47

thoughts your life your week Yeah,

47:49

and so you'd be like I don't know maybe

47:52

it was the people that we hired to come in this

47:54

week for an event Yeah, even if they

47:56

themselves didn't make the connection

47:58

with what the kids were saying and what the van

48:01

was, or what the van could have been, it could have been just like

48:03

people are swarming them and they go, I don't think

48:05

we had this going on that week, I guess,

48:08

that's about it. You're looking at what

48:10

was going on that week. And it's usually like maybe

48:13

one thing, right? That's very fair. Like

48:15

I do see your POV,

48:18

but I think the wrinkle for me has been the faculty would

48:20

know. Right, right. And

48:22

they would have put that together.

48:23

Dang, now

48:24

I hope that, you know, a

48:26

couple months go by and then people

48:29

start to hear more about this particular theory

48:31

and we can either debunk or verify. This

48:34

is, I just have to say it's refreshing and it's

48:36

nice when there is not like a,

48:38

you either believe it or you don't, when there's something a little

48:40

bit more practical or just a different angle

48:43

that's taken. But otherwise,

48:45

this has been the aerial school

48:47

UFO incident very fast, I

48:49

love covering me some aliens. That's a very

48:51

unique UFO sighting. Yeah. And

48:54

again, I love covering

48:57

aliens because I'm big on sci-fi.

48:59

Yeah. I love that genre, whether it be entertainment

49:02

or stories or whatnot. And

49:05

I've like, I've said it a million times,

49:07

like, come on, we can't

49:09

be the only living

49:12

creature in the

49:14

universe. Yeah. There's

49:16

gotta be a living creature out there somewhere. Like intelligent

49:18

enough to like find us and interact with

49:20

us. I don't know about that. You

49:23

know what I mean? Like that's a big ass. That's a lot of evolution

49:25

and a lot of nature and like nurture. Oh

49:28

yeah. But like there are creatures out there somewhere. Why

49:30

haven't we heard of them? No, there's one. The

49:33

Fermi Paradox. I'll leave you

49:35

with one dark thought.

49:37

And I read this over the weekend because this is what

49:39

I do in my free time sometimes.

49:41

There was a

49:42

theory that tried to answer the Fermi

49:44

Paradox. And I'm sure there's a name for it, but it basically said

49:47

that what if there's a sufficiently advanced species

49:49

out there, right? Like some species, and

49:51

we've seen this on this planet, when they come across

49:54

something that scares them or could

49:56

threaten them, could,

49:58

they immediately attack the thing, right?

50:00

A lion sees another lion and they just go

50:02

for each other. What if there's an

50:04

advanced species out there, that as soon

50:07

as they catch a signal of an advanced species,

50:10

they just take a planetoid-shaped

50:12

object, like they just take a moon and then chuck it

50:14

at light speed at that planet or at that direction

50:17

just to get rid of them,

50:18

right? And so we haven't heard from anybody because someone's

50:20

out there picking them all off and maybe there's

50:22

something already heading our way because our signals have

50:24

been out there and we don't hear from

50:27

them because they're going to come pick us off. I mean,

50:29

technically you could apply that to the dinosaurs,

50:32

right? Maybe they realize that

50:34

lots of living creatures and then they chuck

50:36

a meter right out of it. Oh God! You

50:38

know what I mean? I'm just saying, I don't

50:40

know, I'm with you. I absolutely believe there's

50:43

something out there. Yeah. I

50:45

do think it's a little dangerous for us to be just sending

50:47

messages out there. Right. All right. Let's

50:49

like, you know... That's

50:52

wandering into the dark house and going straight up to the attic

50:54

and going, is there anyone in here? Right. Whether

50:56

you saw something or not, I would... I'd bring

50:58

a bright flashlight. Yeah. I

51:01

would explore silently.

51:03

...to come to me. You're flying on the wall. You

51:05

don't... Yeah, exactly. You don't walk into a giant

51:07

dark house and go, Hello? I'm

51:11

here on the first floor. I

51:14

can't see anything. But

51:16

I'm very well lit at the front door. Very

51:18

exposed. Right. I'm right here.

51:21

You can see me. I cannot

51:23

see you. Yeah.

51:26

Yeah, that's how I feel we are.

51:28

Right now, in space. But, with

51:30

that

51:30

said, Fredo, I'll see you right back here next

51:33

Monday. For yet

51:34

another mystery.