Memphis UFO Conference Draws Believers by Sara Patterson

Memphis UFO conference draws believers: Speakers share stories of abductions By Sara Patterson

Posted March 10, 2012 at 11 p.m., updated March 10, 2012 at 11:07 p.m
From http://www.commercialappeal.com/news/2012/mar/10/ufo-conference-draws-believers/

Photo by Kyle Kurlick

Travis Walton, who claims to have been abducted by an unidentified flying object in 1975, spoke on his experience at “UFO Abductions Unveiled” on Saturday at Southwest Tennessee Community College.

Travis Walton said it was more like an ambulance call than abduction.

Darkness had fallen over the Apache-Sitgreaves National Forest in Arizona as his crew headed home after a day of felling trees. A bright beam of blue light caused the driver to stop, and Walton said curiosity took him toward the hovering spacecraft.

“I was hit by a bolt of energy,” he said, recounting his experience at the Tennessee Mutual UFO Network conference at Southwest Tennessee Community College’s Macon Grove campus Saturday.

Small hairless creatures with large eyes greeted Walton when he awoke, in pain, inside the craft that he said was reminiscent of a hospital.

“I don’t think their intention is to hurt us,” he said, adding that he thought he suffered a blow to the head as he walked toward the spacecraft and was subsequently taken in to be treated.

Walton wrote a book based on his experience called “Fire in the Sky,” which was made into a movie in 1993.

“I heard Travis Walton was going to be here and I knew I had to come,” said Annette Rohla, a conference attendee who said she believes aliens are demons.

Conference organizer Eddie Middleton said he invited speakers who could educate the public about alien encounters.

One of the more local speakers, Tom Reed of Knoxville, told his story of childhood abduction. Reed says he has evidence – multiple eyewitness accounts, polygraph tests and readings from electromagnetic equipment — that proves the existence of extraterrestrial life.

“I can give you proof, and you can do what you want with it,” said Reed

Though Reed acknowledged that many alien stories online and onscreen have no factual basis, he said he has met other abductees, like Walton, whom he believes.

“We can’t find closure,” he said. “We’re still trying to make sense of it.”

Former Temple University professor David Jacobs told his audience of about 50 Saturday that he has used hypnotherapy for several decades to help abductees remember what happened to them.

He said many of the stories he hears involve experimental breeding of aliens and humans. Recently, he said, he’s heard that the hybrid creatures have come down to earth and passed for human.

“In the ’90s my patients began to say, ‘Change is coming, soon everyone will know this place,'” he said. “I didn’t know how long ‘soon’ meant – 10 years, 100 years…

“The change is upon us.”

— Sara Patterson: (901) 529-2542