September 1, 2004 Everett, Washington – After I filed the August 28, 2004, Earthfiles and DREAMLAND Online reports about the Farnam, Nebraska, cow mutilation that occurred around the same time that a dozen residents heard a very loud, unidentified aerial sound, I received the e-mail below from Everett, Washington resident, Gary Val Tenuta. With his permission, I am reprinting here and hope that other viewers and listeners who might have had a similar experience will e-mail me: [email protected]
Update: I have received several e-mails from viewers and listeners which are now included in this updated report.
1)
August 30, 2004
From: Gary Val Tenuta
Everett, Washington, north of Seattle
“Hi Linda,
Just heard your report on Dreamland about the August 2004 cattle mutilation where several people heard a loud noise that remained unexplained. As I listened to those people describing what they heard, I was reminded of what goes on here in the Everett and Mill Creek area of Washington state.
I live in Everett (just north of Seattle). Back around 1996-97 (close as I can recall) I kept hearing a loud noise that would wake me up in the middle of the night. It sounded very much like the sound of a jet engine. It would start at a low volume and increase in volume and then gradually subside to nothing. The event would last for maybe 3 to 5 minutes. It happened maybe 3 or 4 times at night and then I began hearing it once in a while during the day. When it happened during the day I went out to see if I could see anything in the sky above my apartment. It sounded like a jet engine, very loud, seemingly coming from everywhere yet nowhere. I couldn’t see any planes in the air although it seemed loud enough that if it was a jet it would have to be flying very low.
Now some subsequent details:
After this happened a couple times one night (somewhere around 1 a.m.), it occurred to me that maybe they were testing jet engines at some facility near the north Boeing plant which is about 5 miles from my apartment. So I got up and made some phone calls to Boeing. One person I talked to said not only were they not testing engines but there was a city ordinance prohibiting the testing of jet engines after something like 9 p.m. I told the person that I could hear the sound even as we were speaking on the phone. The person then transferred me to a guard posted outside the building. I asked the guard to listen outside to see if he could hear the sound but he said he could hear no such sound. Soon the sound went away and I went back to bed only to be awakened by it again about an hour later. So I got up and called Boeing again but got the same response.
The next day, at work, I was telling one of our regular customers about all this and she laughed. I forget the exact circumstances now, but she happened to have some connection to a company near Boeing or perhaps located on the Boeing property. Maybe she was employed there. I just can’t recall for sure. The company in question does some kind of work for Boeing; fabrication work or something like that I think. Anyway, apparently word about my phone calls had gotten around and they were making jokes about “some guy who was hearing things in the middle of the night”. Then she, too, told me about the city ordinance regarding the testing of jet engines.
I told my girlfriend about all of this within the next day or so and she knew exactly what I was talking about! She lives about 20 minutes east of me and she said she and her daughters have heard the same thing many times. When they go out to see what could be causing it they can see nothing. The sound just comes and goes, starting at a low volume, then increasing in volume, then subsiding to nothing. It’s pretty weird because the rise and fall of the volume, combined with the fact that closest thing we can relate it to is a low flying jet plane, makes it seem like a plane is approaching from afar, then is directly overhead, then passes on out of sight, or in this case, out of sound. But I’ve paid close attention to the sound, trying to analyze it, and I realized it’s not really like a jet because when the volume is at its peak it lasts too long. A jet would be here and gone in seconds. The peak volume of this noise can last several minutes. If it was a jet it would have to be hovering in one place. And, no, it doesn’t sound anything like a helicopter. At least not like any helicopter I’ve ever heard. Besides, there’s absolutely nothing to be seen, no matter if its day or night.
Now I haven’t heard this sound around my apartment for perhaps a year or more. A few years ago it seems I would hear it at least a couple times a month. My girlfriend says she still hears it once in a while over at her place but not as often as before.
Don’t know if this relates to the phenomenon in your report or not but just thought I’d let you know about it.
Best,
Gary Val Tenuta”
2)
August 31, 2004
From: Steven R. Mohns
Mount Vernon, Washington
“45 miles North of Everett, Washington August 14th, I was awakened at 12:55AM by a jet sound. Being a commercially rated jet pilot myself for 30 years, it always gets my attention. I thought the Navy was conducting night operations, since were only miles away from Whidbey Naval Air Station. We see the Grumman A-6’s practicing all the time over town, but only during the day and the occasional flight of F-18’s on their way in with MD-80 Medivac and Lockheed P-3 Orion sub hunters around. But this was different.
It started as a low growl then grew to intense volume so much so, that it was vibrating the windows of the house. The culmination almost sounded like there were two jets that went supersonic, because I heard a double, but subdued boom that thudded the house so much you could feel it and it rattled the pictures on the wall as the sound rolled off the foothills of the Cascades like the reflection of sound waves from thunder. At first I thought we had an earthquake, we get one once in a while here, but this was again, different and there were no earthquakes in our area that night as reported. The Navy denies anyone went supersonic at a low altitude as it is prohibited because of airspace procedures over a population base and there are practice areas for that over way out over the Pacific and well marked inland training areas in the less populated desert interior of Washington State.
No one I talked to knew what it was. No bolides were reported that night either. I will admit one spring night a year ago, to seeing what I thought was the Aurora space plane, which as you know has never been a publicly admitted existence. This thing only flies at night and the only way you can tell is by its burn. It leaves a pulsed – long white steak of burned propellant as it passes by overhead very quickly. It traveled within my scope of view about 120 degrees of arc, totally silent through two burn pulses in about 4.5 seconds and was gone. If this was on a trajectory to enter the atmosphere and land at the military base in Idaho, it could possibly be low enough to hear this kind of sound as it entered the atmosphere over the cost and continued inland like the Shuttle.
It may be another mystery, but very similar to what you should hear and the experiences of Mr. Gary Val Tenuta if it was indeed the Aurora.
Sincerely,
Steven R. Mohns
Mount Vernon, Washington”
3)
September 1, 2004
From: Bob Wilson
Perth, Western Australia
“G’day,
Along the lines of your article I would like to report the following. Not sure of the date but would have been around 2002 in Perth, Western Australia.
Laying on the bed reading a book in the house alone with the door opened onto the balcony with the fly screen closed, I heard what could only be described as a jet fighter flying over the top of the house seemingly only about 100 feet above it. This spooked me a little and I went out on the balcony to check, but couldn’t see anything.
I carried on reading the book and five or so minutes later exactly the same, but this time – just after the noise passed – there was a pressure wave that rattled the fly screen in the frame and blew the curtains around surrounding the door. The sensation was akin to what I would imagine would be the pressure wave of an explosion or the back wash of a jet, but from a medium distance.
Again I jumped out onto the balcony, but couldn’t see anything, although there was no one else really around – no traffic had stopped and all appeared normal.
I cannot provide an explanation for what happened – for a jet’s backwash to blow curtains then I would have thought it would have to be pretty close and for something to rattle the fly screen it would need to be fairly powerful. I can’t explain it as a sudden very high gust of wind due to it’s synchronisation with the sound.
Not quite the same as your article I know but I have seen on the NUFORC report list a couple of similar reports and even one that was also from Perth, but a couple of years previously that was almost identical.
I am not underneath any standard flight path or close to any Air Force bases although regularly I see normal civilian traffic and occasionally a fighter jet – although always at a decent altitude. Also, I haven’t experienced anything unusual or similar since.
Regards
Bob Wilson”
4)
September 1, 2004
From: “Bicycle Bob” Soetebier
Maryland Heights, Missouri (Northwest St. Louis County)
“My wife and I have heard the EXACT same loud, jet-like noises as
described by both Gary Val Tenuta and the Nebraska folks, too, right
here in Maryland Heights, Missouri, (a suburb in n.w. St. Louis
County – about a half-dozen miles ‘as the crow flies’ from Lambert
International Airport) over at least the last decade.
We have frequently heard these loud noises both day and night as
recently as just a couple of days ago. The sound is MUCH louder than
any of the regular Lambert Field take-offs by commercial jets and/or
the daily Missouri Air National Guard jets flight runs — even when
the ANG jets execute their almost straight-up ‘Sikorski’ take-offs
and/or their always brief after-burner kick-ins!
Same as noted by Gary Val Tenuta, we NEVER see anything in the sky
(day or night) that could remotely be responsible for these loud and
prolonged (3 to 5 minutes) noises. Lambert Field also has a Boeing
(former McDonnell-Douglas) facility, too. NO WAY these are jet engine ‘test runs!’
Hope somebody, somewhere, somehow is able to come up with an
explanation for this perplexing enigma! Good luck.
Take care,
‘Bicycle Bob’ Soetebier”
5)
September 1, 2004
From: Jeremy C.
St. Louis, Missouri
“Wow, now I don’t feel like a freak!Occasionally here in St Louis, I hear a sound that sounds very much
like a big jet engine, but heard as if I’m standing on the tarmac (sp?)
itself!.. but I’d be at the park or something, and no jets around. Even
if there were a jet up in the sky, only a fool would think the sound
comes from the jet. It’s to far away to be so intense. When I say
intense, I mean the bass volume alone is so powerful I can feel it in
body, but it also has the distinct impression of being from very far away (Low frequency sounds as you know travel much further).
I’ve heard this sound maybe 4 times in 3 years, and it is very distinct. When I hear it, I instinctively know this is not a normal sound I should be hearing. I’m very familiar with jet sounds in my area, I know where the airport is, I know what I should and shouldn’t be hearing. This noise is too intense and BIG… the only way this sound comes from a jet engine is if I’m standing in front of it (and it’s much more intense on the low end than on the hi-end… keep in mind that hi frequencies don’t travel nearly as far as the low end.. more circumstantial evidence that this sound originates from quite aways away). And it does start slowly and build up to intensity.. then slowly goes away. It seems like it might be what a rocket taking off might sound like, from 20 miles away or something.I KNEW SOMETHING WAS WEIRD ABOUT THAT SOUND!
Thank you for posting that… now if you could only find out why street lights go off (and on) a lot when I get near them, that would solve a great mystery for me, ha ha!
Thanks again,
Jeremy,
PS: There is a major Boeing plant hear in St Louis too, like in your
report… I thought that might be an interesting coincidence to consider.
Although it may be nothing, there are Boeing plants in a lot of places.”
6)
September 1, 2004
From: M.B.
Sequim, Washington”
Linda,
Re the unexplained loud jet-engine type noises heard in the Everett area of WA state. I live almost directly west of Everett, probably 30-40 miles ‘as the crow flies’, in Sequim, WA. I hear these noises often and was frustrated by not being able to see anything when I go outside. However, since this was such a warm summer, I spent a lot of time lying in a hammock at night, staring up at the night sky. On several occasions (3 or 4 at least) I have seen a smaller jet, very fast-moving, very high altitude, zip overhead. A few seconds after it is completely out of sight, I would hear the familiar rumble, which would come and go in the direction of the plane. If I hadn’t been looking in the right direction at the right moment, I would never have seen it.
I am curious about what direction the sound in Everett moved. West and east around here tend to be commercial airline routes. The jets that travel from north to south are usually smaller, faster, and I have always thought, come from Whidbey Island Naval Air Station. (The signs on the island say “The Sound of Freedom”) approximately 20 miles east of Sequim. Twice I have seen what appeared to be a rather large, white fuselage traveling through the sky ( always from the north to the south) with no noise accompanying it at all, ever. This is always curious. They have always been so far away that I can’t make it out well enough to see if there are small wings, and I’ve never had my binoculars with me at the right time.
South of me are the Olympic Mountains…mostly National Park, with almost no inhabitants. West is the Pacific Ocean. There is a huge amount of uninhabited country around us so we would be an ideal spot to test anything…and Boeing is just a hop and a skip from here. We are a hot spot… McCord Field, Bangor and the lovely Tridents (Have you read A Nuclear Peace, by any chance, or heard of it? Not many people in this country have; It’s big in Europe), and Boeing. There are more; pretty depressing, eh? At any rate, I think if the writer of that post had been outside, looking up a few seconds before he heard the noise, he might have seen what caused it.
Thanks for Earthfiles.
MB”
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