September 7, 2002 – Edited: December 30, 2008

According to news reports ranging from August 11 to August 20, 2002, people in Uttar Pradesh State in India and south western Nepal were left extremely alarmed by fireballs that glowed with red and blue lights. (1)(2)

Local people felt that they were being attacked by this phenomenon, which caused serious burns and surface wounds. At least seven people died of injuries in the week before Aug 20, 2002 in Uttar Pradesh. (3)

Raghuraj Pal said that the object ripped open the stomach of his neighbour, Ramji Pal, who died in Shanwa, India.(3)

Residents in Nepalgunj in Nepal said the object would attack people while they slept outside (http://www.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,4882129%5E1702,00.html) to avoid the summer heat. (5)

One woman in Darra, showed the blisters on her forearms and compared the object to a big soccer ball with sparkling lights. (3) Others compared it to a tortoise.(6)

The name given by local people for this object is “muhnochwa” (meaning “face-scratcher” or “something that claws the face”). (4) (7)

Example:

“Asma, a resident of Wazirganj (district) in Lucknow, said: ‘I was asleep at home on Tuesday (August 6, 2002), at around 2:45 a.m. I woke up with a start to find a bright red blinking object attacking my face and trying to pull me away. I screamed. But before my husband woke up, it vanished into thin air and left scratches on my face.'” (6)

The way I heard this phenomenon reported at first, it seemed like the same UFO (unidentified flying object) kept attacking and disappearing, and then coming back. In one account, residents saw a fireball fly down to attack the same woman for the second night in a row, and it disappeared when they rushed towards her house. Apparently they believed it was the same object. (5)

But the reports in general make it clear that people considered these events as involving multiple “attackers”. On Thursday Aug 15, 10,000 people gathered in Sitapur, India to demand that authorities capture the “attackers”. One person died when police fired shots to disperse the crowd. (3)

As a result of the attacks, in Mirzapur, India, people stopped sleeping outdoors, and villagers in Shanwa formed protection squads. (3)

The word “attackers” also implies that the local people considered them to be intelligent entities or intelligently guided machines.

Amrit Abhijat, district magistrate in Mirzapur, claims to have captured the UFO on film. He also said that people were blocking the roads and attacking the police for inaction whenever there was a death or injury. (3)

Investigators

Five visuals are said to be captured on videotape, three of which were recorded by a team of investigators from the Indian Intelligence Bureau. The team went through videotapes provided by the wife of a lawyer in Mirzapur (must be Amrit Abhijat), and another frame recorded by someone in Sitapur. (8)

The intelligence team arrived in Sitapur on Wed Aug 7. After listening to descriptions of the object, the agents built their own replica from the base of a mixer-grinder, fitted with coloured lights, and waited. The lights varied from orange, yellow and green (apparently also seen by witnesses but less common) to the most common red and blue. The idea was that the ETB (presumed “extraterrestrial body”) might notice something resembling itself and come close. They waited in the dark, and eventually, a flash of light neared the apparatus. (8) (4)

The team also did a study by filling out questionnaires based on the experiences of victims. Out of a sample of 100 victims, ten were found to have an insect bite or scratch, another 10 suffered injuries indirectly.

“The remaining (80) had one or more of the following:
“(1) Experiencing electric shock;”
“(2) Seeing sharp light; ”
“(3) Feeling a hard round object.”

“Out of 80 people, 65 were found to have suffered physical injuries, and there were three who tried to overpower the ETB.”

“‘All three had suffered hundreds of scars, as if caused by a blade, on the palm …'”(8)

 

Explanations

A police superintendent speculated that it might be a large-winged insect, because residents in one village found insects they had never seen before. (3)

However, Professor Ravindra Arora, at the Indian Institute of Technology-Kanpur, believes it was balls of lightning that often fall on earth during dry spells. Large parts of the state of Uttar Pradesh were suffering drought. He said:

“dry spells increase the soil resistance while decreasing its conductivity, and in the process attract lightning balls …”

“… in all cases people can see a ball-like object travelling sideways in the air that can produce up to 100 watts of current and emit red, blue, yellow or green lights …”

“…The ball causes burn injuries when it comes in contact with the human skin, while it extinguishes on falling over non-living things.” (7)

Conclusion

The electric shock and the burns make sense and fit with this explanation. However, some people described it as a hard object that cut them when they tackled it. Also, it gave off multi-coloured lights, which is surprising, because I always think of lightning as bright white.

Also, it seemed to be attracted to human beings, but so is lightning. People took down their television aerials (4) to keep it away. After all, they had been sleeping on their roofs.

On the other hand, the light came close to the lure. Why would it do that? Well, it was set up high, so why wouldn’t it attract lightning?

Overall, the ball lightning explanation seems pretty good, but the phenomenon must be rare, and I wonder how much scientists know about it.

I’m kind of disappointed with this conclusion, and I wouldn’t mind if there turns out to be more to this story. It’s incredible enough in itself anyway – as an unintelligent natural phenomenon.

If this explanation is correct, then this story also illustrates the perception people have of the world when lacking education, and as a result, how a news story starts off sounding less believable than it should. But who knows anything about ball lightning? There would have been less fear and rioting if they had treated it as a form of lightning, but the “face-scratcher” would still be lethal.

 

Notes

1. http://abc.net.au/news/newsitems/s645737.htm
ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) News Online, Sunday, August 11, 2002 Fireball terrorises south-western Nepal

2. The Toronto Star, Saturday, August 17, 2002, Earthweek: Diary of the Planet, by Steve Newman, “Unidentified Hot Object”

3. http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/space/08/20/india.ufo.ap/index.html
CNN.com, India villagers blame UFO for attacks, August 20, 2002, A.P.

4. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-389122,00.html
India calls in X-Files agents to unmask face-scratching alien, by Catherine Philp, August 20, 2002

5. http://www.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,4882129%5E1702,00.html
NEWS.com.au Fireball in sky terrorises Nepalese, From an AFP correspondent in Kathmandu, Nepal

6. http://www.ufoinfo.com/roundup/v07/rnd0734.shtml
UFO Roundup, Volume 7, Number 34, August 20th, 2002, “Seven killed by a UFO in northern India”

7. http://www.rediff.com/news/2002/aug/14sharat.htm
Thursday August 15, 2002, IIT scientist solves mystery behind ‘UFO’, Home: http://www.rediff.com

8. http://www.ufoinfo.com/roundup/v07/rnd0735.shtml
UFO Roundup, Volume 7, Number 35, August 27, 2002, Indian Intelligence Sets a Trap for Roving Alien

Other References

http://www.msnbc.com/news/793179.asp?pne=msn&cp1=1UFO#BODY
MSNBC, Aug 12, 2002, UFO reports cause a panic in India

http://unknowncountry.com/news/?id=1856
Whitley Strieber’s Unknown Country (UnknownCountry.com), Aug 19, 2002, UFOs Attack in India

http://www.rense.com/general28/filers81502.htm
Rense.com, Filer’s Files #33 8-15-2, Nepal Fireball in Sky Terrorizes Nepalese (George A. Filer’s website at: http://www.filersfiles-ufo.com/)