January 14, 2002: An Astronomer Examines the Science of UFOs - Dr. William R. Alschuler
The conversation covers the growing catalog of extrasolar planets, then numbering around 70 confirmed discoveries. Alschuler estimates roughly two-thirds of nearby sun-like stars likely harbor planetary systems and argues that carbon-based life is almost certainly widespread given the chemical uniformity of stellar compositions. He and Art discuss detection methods, from spectroscopic wobble measurements to emerging laser-based SETI searches led by Paul Horowitz at Harvard.
Art also reads a chilling letter from a trucker named Mark who encountered a burning, overturned car on an icy pass near Flagstaff, Arizona. Despite his efforts to free the trapped couple, the flames suddenly vanished along with the entire vehicle, leaving only a rock where he had knelt. A waitress later told him a couple had burned to death at that exact spot years earlier.
Key Moments
Trucker Mark's vanishing burning car on I-40: Art reads a long listener letter from a Brayman, Oklahoma trucker who in 1999 stopped on icy I-40 outside Flagstaff to free a couple trapped upside down in a burning car, only to have car, smoke and victims vanish. A waitress later told him a couple had burned to death in that exact spot years earlier.
300 billion suns, two-thirds with planets: Alschuler walks through how spectroscopic detection has now confirmed about 70 extrasolar planets and estimates that roughly two-thirds of nearby sun-like stars have planetary systems, with 300 billion stars in our galaxy.
Alschuler describes how a warp-drive UFO would look: Asked what a craft using a space-warp drive would look like to an observer, Alschuler describes a luminous rim where stars are pulled toward the hull, fading to red as it accelerates away. Art replies that this matches countless reports he has heard.
Art retells his Pahrump triangle sighting: Art recounts the night he and Ramona pulled over near Pahrump and watched a silent black triangle, two football fields across, drift overhead at about 30 mph and 150 feet up, blocking out the moon and stars without a sound or a breath of wind. Nellis later claimed it was a C-130.
First contact will come by message, not handshake: Asked how first contact will likely happen, Alschuler says he believes it will be by detected signal, not a physical visit, because he is not convinced any feasible way to travel between the stars actually exists.