Expedition Team: Dave Miller
Date: July 4, 2022
This is where the UFO phenomena began. That’s right, back on June 24, 1947, pilot Kenneth Arnold was flying by Mount Rainier on his way to Yakima, Washington. His trip was delayed one hour as he flew in search of a marine transport plane that reportedly crashed near or around the southwest side of the mountain. A “mirror bright” flash reflected on his airplane, and he saw a fleet of nine peculiar looking objects flying north at supersonic speed at about 9,500 feet. Every few seconds two or three of the objects would change course or dip. The sun would then reflect brightly off these objects. Mr. Arnold described the objects as being flat or crescent appearing like saucers skipping on water. Newspaper men began calling them “flying saucers”. Below is a photo of Mr. Arnold and his original report and drawing of the UFO’s.
Hiking the mountain foothills and trails it made me think of what Arnold saw 69 years ago. There have been UFO sightings reported in recent years but the past two days and nights it was so foggy at the campground so I could not see the night skies and clouds.
On day three it was sunny as we left Mount Rainier and drove east. We saw a large bigfoot statue at a gas station in Morton reminding us that we were in “Squatch” country. Hundreds of bigfoot sightings have been reported over the years not only in this tri-county area but throughout the state.
