On May 20, 1967, an industrial mechanic and amateur geologist named Stefan Michalak was prospecting for quartz near Falcon Lake in Whiteshell Provincial Park, Manitoba. Around noon a flock of geese went up in alarm. He looked up and saw two glowing objects descending. One flew off. The other landed on a flat rock about 150 feet away.
Michalak sat and sketched it for half an hour. He described a disk about thirty five feet across with a dome on top, giving off heat and a smell like burning electrical wire. He heard voices from inside and, thinking it was an experimental American craft, called out in English, then Russian, German, Italian, French and Ukrainian. No answer. He walked up to it and put his head through an open hatch and saw panels of blinking lights. The hatch closed. The craft turned, and a grid of vents on its side blasted him with hot gas that set his shirt on fire.
Then it was gone.
Michalak staggered out of the woods sick and vomiting. His shirt was burned through. On his chest and stomach was a pattern of burns laid out in a grid of dots, matching the vents he had described. He was treated at a hospital in Winnipeg. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police, the Royal Canadian Air Force and the United States Air Force all investigated. Soil from the landing site tested radioactive.
In 2018 the Royal Canadian Mint struck a silver coin commemorating the encounter. Michalak told the same story until his death in 1999.
The truth may be far stranger than we have been told.
A hoax a man took to his grave, or Canada’s best UFO/UAP case?
What do you think about this? The Dropa Stones, 716 grooved stone discs said to be found in Chinese caves in 1938 beside small bodied skeletons, telling of a crash 12,000 years ago. The 1978 book that spread the story was admitted to be a hoax. Pure fiction, or a truth wrapped in lies?
What do you think about this? The Paiute of Nevada told of red haired giants they trapped in a cave and burned, written down in 1883. In 1911 miners near Lovelock opened a cave and found red haired mummies and a layer of ash. Legend that matched a cave, or memory of real enemies?
What do you think about this? In 1987 a Wisconsin family bought a used bunk bed. Within weeks their kids were sick, a radio changed stations by itself, and a chair rocked with no one in it. They fled in the night in 1988 and burned the bed. Old house, or something that came with it?
What do you think about this? In 1904 an American dredged the Sacred Cenote at Chichén Itzá and pulled up gold disks, jade, wooden idols and the bones of more than 200 people, many of them children. The Maya called such wells doorways to the underworld. Prayers for rain, or an open door?
What do you think about this? Norse settlers lived in Greenland for nearly 500 years, with farms, a cathedral and a bishop. The last record is a wedding at Hvalsey church on Sept 16, 1408. Then nothing. The church still stands, roofless and empty. Starved out, or walked away?
What do you think about this? In 1615 a Spanish pearl ship is said to have sailed into an inland sea that then dried up. In 1870 a Los Angeles paper reported its hull found in the desert near the Salton Sea. Every searcher since has lost it to the sand. Mirage, or a galleon in the dunes?
Field reports, theories, and intel from the X-Files straight to your inbox. No filler, no algorithms, just the work.
Phone is optional. If you add it, we may text you tour drops, book launches, and breaking news from the X-Files up to 4 messages a month. Reply STOP anytime. Msg & data rates may apply.