To see the footage, jump to about 06:45 in the video.  Otherwise, watch the whole thing.  ;)

Three others, and myself, saw an unidentified flying object on Friday, Nov. 18. We were hiking up the Snow Flake Talc Mine Road and had made camp for the night. We were headed to the ghost town of Beveridge City.

It was a clear, moonless night and we were overlooking Saline Valley. While discussing the constellations, which were ridiculously bright that night, we noticed across the valley in one of the mountain passes a bright white light flying around, making weird circles and lighting up the mountain sides. It began to move counter-clockwise (think of the valley as a circle), it then stopped and started moving clockwise, hugging the mountains and getting closer to us. I saw the reflection of the light in the salt lake as it flew over it.

There was a mountain ridge next to us, and the light moved out of sight. We estimated in about 10 minutes it would appear in front of our canyon. Sure enough, it did in approximately 10-15 minutes. It appeared to be hovering just above the valley floor, and shining a beam forward, it would move in a strafing motion (left and right), forward and backward, and even up and down. It started moving up the canyon we were in, but then veered again and continued on past us.

We were at an elevation of 3,500 feet, it was below us at an elevation of roughly 1,300 feet (near the valley floor). It made no sound. We think it may have been some sort of rover or other experimental scientific craft. We figured a military craft wouldn’t bother with having a light.

Good news, though. I did video tape it, it’s in the above video. Unfortunately, it was so dark out that what I captured on film just looks like a white light against a black background, but I did narrate to give it some context.

I’m a journalist, the other three people were a biologist, a geology expert (biologist with a geologist background), and a historian. We were all understandably freaked out by this.

Andrew Perry
The REAL Desert Dogs
http://www.youtube.com/redchango

George Kohler, courtesy of DMV

George Kohler of San Francisco was participating in a 318-mile cycling tour of Death Valley.  He had only gone 52 miles when he mysteriously disappeared about a week ago on March 12.  It was the first day of the tour.

Kohler and other cyclists were camped near Mesquite Springs and at about 8 p.m. he said he was getting tired and left, presumably for his tent.  That was the last anyone ever saw of him.  The next morning his tent appeared unused, and his bike and the rest of his gear was still there.

Currently, helicopters, foot patrols, and specially trained canines are searching for the missing man.  However, there is speculation as to why or how he could have went missing.  Kohler is fairly experienced at outdoors activities like this.  Mesquite Springs has relatively mild temperatures and the area is not particularly rugged or dangerous.

As with any desert scenario, he may very well have just got lost and accidentally went too far during the course of the night.  One interesting theory that is being speculated on is if Kohler decided to go missing on purpose, scheduling a pickup at a designated location nearby and then hightailing it out of there, leaving all his belongings behind.

If he’s still missing by the time the search parties quite, Kohler’s disappearance will be one of the intriguing Death Valley vanishing to occur in recent years.

F-35 Lightning II. Photo from www.jsf.mil

It’s the newest and perhaps will prove to be the most awesome jet in our arsenal.  The F-35 Lightning II is stealthy, sexy, and armed to the teeth.  But honestly, will we ever really need to use it?  Some say maybe.

Of course, the U.S. has been sinking its teeth in the Middle East for decades and playing with our toys in the sand.  But if this type of warfare continues, the F-35 much like its sister the F-22 Raptor, are just going to be overkill.  Perhaps that’s why the Obama Administration has scaled back its projected production.  Still, this impressive piece of hardware has just passed its latest test flight in the Mojave Desert, flying for the first time with external weaponry.

Currently, the Pentagon wants to buy 2,443 of these bad boys at a cost of $382 billion!  That’s in the ballbark of $156 MILLION per plane.  Wow!  There’s no way to justify this kind of spending given the type of warfare we’ve been waging, which is largely against Third or Second World countries, with vastly inferior military technology.

The only way to justify this type of spending is if somewhere down the road, our military is anticipating a war against a more technologically advanced nation, like China.

While our relationship with China is mostly good, there’s no doubt that they are threatening our global ranking as both a military superpower and as an economic superpower.   But seriously, why waste this money on military spending?  Shouldn’t we be investing in science and technology?

Research and development is the engine by which economies thrive; not endless wars.  Listening to the news, however, hints that research and development is not a top priority.  Instead, it’s still war – specifically with Iran now – that seems to be on the agenda these days.