UFO enthusiasts will find a lot of like-minded alien nuts at Lowcountry, a Charleston area that has recorded a number of alien sightings. Digging into the archives, you can even list them, according to experts.
The earliest recorded UFO sighting seems to have been in 1973, Sept. 30. There were 10 excited calls to the police as well as The News and Courier on that day, 43 years ago. The unfamiliar object seemed to be as big as a star and was visible to the naked eye. However, the City Fire Department members were focusing a telescope on it.
It began to shine high in the sky, and then it moved northward. It was bright, with red and green lights around it.
Later, in a 1986 article published in the Feb. 2, 1986, edition, a witness confirmed having seen it. But "the reporter didn't say whether he thought spacemen were inside," the 1986 article said.
Secondly, in the May 31, 1978 edition of the Charleston News and Courier, an article written by a North Charleston mechanic called William J. Hermann talked about UFOs and sent a picture of a strange alien too. In the following year, he told the daily that he had been kidnapped twice by aliens between October 1977 and March 1978.
"Their skin was the color of a marshmallow. Their eyes were long and dark with a brown iris. Their heads looked like overgrown human fetuses with no ears or hair. I heard a voice telling me to have no fear..." Hermann said.
However, Herman did not remember the first incident till the ETs sent an odd metal bar inscribed with the word "MAN" to him. That made Herman recall the March 1978 abduction
"I'm the token UFO guy," Hermann told The Post and Courier in 1981. However, two years later, he wrote a letter to the editor, calling the UFO phenomena "satanic in nature, demonic in origin."
Thirdly, in 1989, seven people saw an object zipping in the sky, even as they stood in a parking lot near Rivers Avenue and Remount Road late on a summer evening. Initially, it looked like an aircraft, but witnesses soon changed their minds.
They described the object in an article that was published in a July 17, 1989 feature: "It was a dark shapeless object 300-500 feet long, and fiery white and yellow sparks were shooting out of what seemed to be its tail end. Its front end appeared to be glowing."
Being completely dark, without windows or lights, it went just 1,500 feet in the air. It was slow and soundless as it passed by them from north to south. It could be seen flying through the sky in Myrtle Beach.
Leo Martin, one of the witnesses, said: "I looked up and saw an enormous ball of fire with a tremendous tail. I'm former Air Force and have never seen anything like that."
He shot a video of the object and sold it to ABC for a price that was not revealed.
So far, UFOs in Lowcountry seem to just be a collection of memories. When will they assume more tangible and concrete shape?
