Original subtitles

NARRATOR: Tonight on "Beyond Skinwalker Ranch"...

Whatever you see, it's a very good chance

that it can do something so dramatic that,

you'll know without a doubt.

Well, look, look, everybody, look, look.

-Whoa! -Wow. I saw that.

I began to see what looked like the sun.

When it appeared, it shot.

The fear just rolled over me. You see it coming?

-Here it comes. -This is unprecedented,

to capture it in real time. Nobody has done this before.

For years, scientists have been working

to reveal the secrets of Skinwalker Ranch.

♪

But is it possible that the clues to unlock the mystery

are located beyond the borders of this hub of high strangeness?

-Now... -Whoa.

...an ex-CIA agent

and a veteran journalist

have been recruited by the Skinwalker team

to go on a high stakes mission across America.

Look at all this activity that's happened.

-That's unbelievable. -Oh, my gosh.

Look at that. Look at that, look at that, look at that.

The goal--uncover evidence that may finally expose the truth.

-What is that thing? -It's getting more intense.

PAUL: You ever seen anything like this before?

ANDY: No.

♪♪

This is just the beginning.

♪♪

Paul and Andy, it's good to have you back at the table again.

Can't wait to see what you've got in store.

Well, this one's a little different.

This is really about a story of high strangeness

that originates not with a place, but with a person.

Oh, that's interesting.

So, you know Colonel John Alexander?

-Mm-hmm. -ERIK: I do.

TRAVIS: He was with NIDS and BAASS, right?

ERIK: Yeah.

So, Colonel Alexander connected us

with an individual by the name of Chris Bledsoe.

So, during Colonel Alexander's time as a researcher,

he came across a story

in which Bledsoe had some kind of encounter.

And do you have a description of what that encounter entailed?

As we understand it,

uh, there was some sort of experience that Chris had

in a river valley close to his home in North Carolina.

Right. The Cape Fear River.

And from that experience that was documented

and reported by multiple eyewitnesses,

there were orb sightings,

there were potential other life forms

that were on site as well.

And Chris had hours of lost time during this experience

where he was missing, and others were looking for him.

What was the time period when this encounter took place?

The initial encounter that Chris experienced was in 2007.

Okay.

And then very shortly thereafter, just days after,

he seemed to have a continuing, predictable,

and recurring relationship with some kind of orb activity.

PAUL: Here's a guy who purports to have some kind

of connection with UAPs or orbs.

And then what's really striking is,

once Colonel Alexander and Bledsoe had connected,

they went back to the scene of Bledsoe's original experience,

and Colonel Alexander had his own experience.

-Right? -Hmm.

ERIK: Now, that's interesting.

John's never said anything about that to me.

So, after Colonel Alexander introduced us to Chris,

Chris actually welcomed us to come out and visit,

and then he sent us a clip of a recording that

he had made just days prior. -Okay.

And I wanna share that with you.

[keyboard clicks]

[whispers] See?

That was an orb in the tree.

Oh, look at--oh, wow.

TRAVIS: I mean, that looks like it's behind a tree limb

right there. -Mm-hmm.

But before you do that, it doesn't.

ERIK: Now, admittedly,

the focus isn't great in this particular piece,

but whatever that thing is, it's bright.

Yeah. I mean, and the question is,

is there data that we can gather

while he's, you know, having this experience,

while he's, you know, making this connection

to these orbs that he reports?

I'll just tell you, based on your results to date,

if anyone can begin with a narrative like that,

where we've got anecdotal information

and then take it into the data-generating regime,

you're the guys to do it.

-ANDY: All right. -Great, guys.

Go forth and come back with great stuff.

-All right. -Sounds good. Thanks, guys.

♪♪

♪♪

PAUL: Sunny Fayetteville.

[laughter]

-But I'm excited about this. -Yeah, you know,

this is the first time that we've had a chance

to take our investigation to a person instead of a place.

And it's really interesting because,

you know, Chris has been researched before

by very legitimate scientists-- NASA, CIA investigators,

DIA investigators, FBI investigators.

He's probably the most credible person

in the experience or space to have ever been studied.

The thing that also is interesting about Chris is

he is clearly not someone

who is in this for the publicity, right?

This has been going on for him since 2007--16 years.

He is very private about this,

and so this is a unique opportunity for us.

It's almost like we're really, I think,

the first camera crew that he's spoken to in years and years.

♪

-ANDY: All right, man. -PAUL: Oh, there he is.

ANDY: Yeah. There's Chris.

[truck doors close]

♪

-Hey, Chris. -Hey, hey.

-Paul. -Paul. A pleasure.

-I'm so excited to meet you. -Yeah, same here.

-Andy. It's great to meet you. -Andy, good to meet you.

I'm honored.

Can you describe what types of phenomenon it is

that you're experiencing

and what types you see the most often?

90% of it is light-- balls of fire, what I call orbs.

I basically reported these 40-foot balls of fire.

-40-foot? -40 foot around, yeah.

-Wow. -That's massive.

That was on this very river.

In 2007,

it came out of the sky, and...

Were you still seeing it on a daily basis

and trying to just come to terms with what was happening?

Yeah. It's been a 16-year journey

of experiencing this,

and it's only been uplifting to me,

even though it set my life upside down

for the first five years...

and our whole family.

And I got rejected from everybody in the community,

so it kind of isolated my family.

Everyone began to make fun of my kids.

People would pick on 'em in school

and church and all around town,

which actually pulled us together closer.

They've never wavered.

I've never wavered from-- from that point.

We normally carry out investigations

with a lot of science and a lot of technical tools.

You know, we've got a truck full of--of gear,

but in a way, it's really

gonna be a different posture that Andy and I take.

You know, we're really gonna follow your lead

and try to just participate.

Whatever you see,

reserve judgment and humble yourself.

It's a very good chance that it can do something

so dramatic that, you'll know without a doubt.

♪

NARRATOR: After their initial meeting,

Andy and Paul head down the Cape Fear River

with Chris, his son, Chris Jr.,

and longtime friend Colonel John Alexander.

Chris is taking the team

to the location where he and Chris Jr.

encountered strange phenomena on January 7, 2007.

[whirring]

Now, how often do you guys still, as a family,

come down to the Cape Fear River?

I haven't been on this water since, uh,

it happened 16 years ago.

But John and I went to the river.

The night that we had the experience together,

we didn't go on the water.

We just drove down and walked down to the bank.

We didn't have any expectations.

Chris just took us down to the river and said,

"Here's where this happened,

and here's where that's happened."

And then we had walked back up to the car

that was parked up near the field,

and we were continuing there

with what I thought was a benign conversation

until he said, "Oh, I think they're here."

And with that, this thing pops into view

and goes zipping off to the south.

-I had heard the story. -Right.

The difference now was it happened to me.

Okay. I mean, that--that says something.

You see how the trees up on that bank are clear behind it?

-Yeah. -That's kind of the way it was

when the orbs landed. -PAUL: It was like that?

Yeah. Right up on top of that hill.

♪♪

It was a cool day,

and it was my son, Chris Jr., and three other guys,

and they asked me, "You wanna go fishing today?"

My mind wasn't into fishing at all.

I was worried about everything.

I had lost my business,

and I was worried about supporting my family.

But Chris Jr. wanted to go,

so I agreed to take him to the Cape Fear River.

They set their poles up and was just enjoying the day.

I asked 'em. I said, "Do you guys wanna go home?

They're like, "Hey, we wanna fish.

We're just gettin' started."

I said, "Well, it's gonna be cold tonight,

so we might better get a fire started."

They were sitting there, fire going, and I said,

"I'll be back about dark.

I just want to go out and look for wildlife,"

never telling them what was happening,

what I was thinking and struggling with.

♪

I left 'em, and I got 50 feet into this road leading out,

and the whole time, I'm crying out to whoever can hear me,

"What do I do? I need help. I don't know what to do."

[motor rumbling]

Right there, right on that bank to our left.

♪

I walked away from them to head up to the field,

which is that way west of here.

The minute I started walking down that path

is when I heard somethin' in the woods.

♪

Maybe 20 feet from the top of the hill,

I began to see what looked like the sun.

And this fire was swirling,

and these little flames were shooting off of it,

and it's--it's going, uh, in this direction.

And the higher I got, the--

my peripheral vision began to widen.

I began to see the top of this thing,

and suddenly I'm seeing a top of a second one.

♪♪

I have a commercial pilot's license,

and that matters because

I've seen a lot of stuff in the sky,

that I never-- I never thought about UFOs,

but I knew it wasn't anything that we had.

And the fear just-- just rolled over me.

I was thinking it was going to harm me.

I didn't know. I didn't know what it was.

♪♪

As I made it to the top of that hill,

I walked up on these two 40-foot glowing balls of fire.

♪

The first thing I thought of was my son.

"I'd better get back to him. I have got to run."

And when I made that decision to run,

I turned my body, and I looked back.

When I did, it saw me.

Within a second, there was a third

40-foot glowing orange ball of fire

sitting beside the other two.

When it appeared, it shot.

♪

We were all doing our thing, fishing,

and, uh, next thing you know, Dad was gone.

He decided to go his own way.

I started to worry about him.

He'd been gone a while,

and I wanted to know where he was, so...

And I ended up in the woods alone.

I, uh, walked up the embankment and was looking down this path.

I saw what to be two red balls of light glowing,

just hovering above the ground.

I couldn't move or-- or scream or yell,

and I was trying to do all those things.

I was freaking out inside.

♪

It knew I was there.

You know, I thought they were gonna come--come get me.

The next thing I remember...

♪

...is I'm about 50 yards from the fire.

So, as I'm trotting up to these guys standing there,

they're not fishing anymore.

They're just standing around the fire, looking down,

talking quietly.

I come trotting up to 'em.

I'm like, "You guys won't believe what I just saw."

And one said, "Where in the world have you been?

We've been looking at you all night."

And I said, "Oh, my Lord. Where's Chris Jr.?"

They said, "Well, he went back the same way

you did earlier in the day.

He went back on foot looking for you."

I took off running, shouting for Junior.

I remember my dad yelling my name,

and I was able to run out.

He was, uh...

um...he was a mess.

[sniffles]

And when I found him, um,

The first thing he said is,

"Why'd you leave me?

Where you been, Daddy?"

♪

I said, "I didn't leave you, son.

I've only been gone 20 minutes."

He said, "No, dad, you've been gone all night.

All night. I've been looking for you."

And he was--he was in shock.

I told Dad--I was like,

"You won't freaking believe what I just saw."

We both said at the exact same time,

"I saw a UFO." We were both saying that at the same time.

I wasn't afraid of it.

Um...after I came back,

I couldn't understand why it didn't frighten me

like it did before.

I actually wanted to see it again every night of my life.

I described it as 45 to 50 feet long,

hovering sideways, crossways of the road.

And then when it did--

There's an orb right here, coming at us right here.

See it? Everybody got it? It's pretty bright.

-Oh, yeah. -Right above us.

-Yeah. -Yeah. Yeah.

You see it right there?

I would ask if you would give us some sort of sign,

brighten up for us or flash us and...

There's another one. Yeah, here's another one.

Look, there's one coming straight at us.

There's two. Oh, it just-- It dimmed out on us.

ANDY: I did. I saw that, too.

The other one was coming straight at us,

and it faded away as well.

PAUL: When I first met Chris,

I was really taken by his manner.

He just seems like such a genuine person.

But I got to say, I was still a little skeptical

about the whole phenomenon.

You know, I need to see this to believe it.

And sure enough, these orbs are appearing.

I don't know what we're seeing, but it's happening.

♪♪

Whoa. That was a very powerful shooting flash.

It just wanted us to see it briefly

and see, it just answered my voice, I'm sure.

-I call him streaker. -Streak.

It's exactly what it looked like.

♪

After visiting the location on the Cape Fear River

where Chris Bledsoe had his first experience seeing

what he believes were multiple UFOs,

Andy and Paul have chosen a neutral site

20 miles away from Bledsoe's home

to test his claims

of a continued connection

with orbs in the sky.

You said it took you a while to kind of process

what you had experienced.

Did you start having visits?

It--It--It never stopped.

It immediately came home with me.

That very night it came home,

and I experienced it in the backyard.

This is when things started.

See that?

There's an orb right there.

Orbs are showing up, hovering over my backyard.

Is it moving?

It was way up here at the top of the trees.

Orbs, some of 'em big as beach balls,

just floating through the trees.

Never before could I do that before this event.

For tonight's experiment,

Andy and Paul will be using an AI-powered camera

called a UFODAP.

This system of two cameras puts nonstop eyes on the sky

and can track objects to identify

whether it's captured a plane, satellite, or star,

or if it's locked on to an unknown aerial phenomenon.

♪

So, what I'm doing...

♪

...is I'm broadcasting

my intentions in every direction.

♪

And I'm asking 'em to come

and share their experience tonight with us.

And, um...

and sometimes immediately, they come,

and then sometimes it might be a few minutes.

[beeping steadily]

We have to be ready.

♪

I just saw a flash right there.

Look. Here it comes. I'm pointing at it.

-Yeah. -See it?

I-I see it.

♪

CHRIS: I send out a thought, and, um...

♪♪

And sometimes, immediately they come.

Hmm.

And then sometimes it might be a few minutes.

Andy and Paul are with Chris Bledsoe at a neutral site

alongside the Cape Fear River,

where they will try to observe and record

his claimed interactions

with orb phenomena in the sky.

They're also using an AI-powered camera

that can detect anomalous aerial objects.

CHRIS: It's getting close to time.

♪

Not sure.

♪♪

It's...It's time right now.

♪♪

Here it comes.

♪

You see it coming? I'm pointing at it.

-ANDY: Yeah. -See it?

I-I see it. Oh, wow.

Yeah.

♪

PAUL: What the hell?

ANDY: I don't know what this is.

♪♪

Paul and I have done a lot of experimentation,

and it takes a long time for things to happen.

That's kind of how experimentation works.

But for some reason with Chris, within just a few minutes,

I am already seeing some sort of unknown aerial phenomenon.

And it's not just me. It's not just my two eyes.

CHRIS: Now we got one right here. Ooh!

-MAN: Ooh, look. -ANDY: Wow. I saw that.

-CHRIS: You see that? -MAN: Yeah, that was...wow.

CHRIS: Orb all the way across the sky.

PAUL: Our entire camera crew

is watching with our jaws on the floor.

That was...

[laughter]

That was an incredible thing to see.

It's just beginning. Do you all see it?

MAN: It's back.

CHRIS: This is what we're looking for,

and so I suspect we may see a whole lot more.

♪

And do you see the--

That's an airplane there. I'm sorry. It's the airplane.

ANDY: It looks nothing like the aircraft at all.

PAUL: It's extremely bright.

CHRIS: Yeah, the aircraft's on the bottom.

♪

That's why I was facing this direction.

I just sensed this is where it was gonna start.

It's not dark enough to see a satellite.

CHRIS: No, no, it's not a satellite. I saw it appear.

Thank you.

Always give 'em thanks. They hear your thoughts.

They know what you're gonna say before you say it.

They know the direction you're gonna look before you look it.

Look.

-See it going away? -Absolutely.

I don't think they're coming from some other far place.

They're here. They're part of this earth.

We have the clouds setting in again.

-Right. -But it makes me wanna take

a peek at what the UFODAP may have collected

while we had the clear skies. -We could.

-All right. So, Chris? -Yes, sir.

What we're going to do is look at each camera

and see what they may have captured.

-Okay. -All right.

One of the benefits of this technology

is if it can rule out that it's unidentified,

if it can rule it as something known, it'll stop recording.

-It won't-- -Get outta here. Really?

It won't take any space on something that's known.

-It's high-tech. -[laughter]

-We try to keep it that way. -Let's see here.

All right.

♪

-Look at that. -Wow.

Yeah, it captured it right there.

And you can see the red block, Chris?

-Tracking it. -The red box is the UFODAP

collecting and tracking the object in the sky.

Wow. Incredible.

This is how we learn what we're dealing with

through science--is important.

Yeah.

What we've got here, Chris, is watch--

it tracks it across,

And then final composite ID-- unknown.

So, it doesn't know what that is.

Right. We know what it was.

[laughter]

This is--This is unprecedented.

To capture it in real time, actually, by request...

-Yeah. -...from you,

analyzing it real time and confirming that it is not--

it is not in a known database of aerial phenomenon,

nobody has done this before.

It's just the beginning.

♪♪

Chris' relationship with this phenomenon is uncanny.

-Yeah. -Every time he's taken us out,

he's been able to establish some kind of connection

and create a scenario where we can

see the phenomenon right there with him.

I have to point out that, uh...

There's an orb right here coming at us right here.

See it? Everybody got it? It's pretty bright.

Tracking right toward Orion right now.

If you think about it, he has had multiple experiences

where he's been able to share

his experience and share his-- his gift with others.

-Yeah. -See? It's coming.

And this is it. I've been putting out my thoughts

in this direction.

That is high, and it's just dimming out now,

but it's just starting.

So, I think what I wanna try to understand now,

I mean, now that we've seen this,

is what is happening for him internally?

Right.

What is he thinking and feeling

during this unique experience, right?

But then he also has this very deliberate process

by which he connects to trigger the phenomenon.

-Right. -And that seems like something

that we should be able to dig into with science.

We can get inside his head literally

in real time, and we run some kind of brain scan.

Whatever it is he's doing,

we'll be able to put some data to that experience.

Yeah. The best tool for any kind of brain energy is called

the electroencephalogram. -Right.

-The EEG. -Right.

We can create an experiment with an EEG

that allows him to execute his process as normal,

and we can actually see the activity in his brain.

Right.

If we can validate his experience,

we have a completely new data set

that we can send back to the team at Skinwalker.

That's what I'm really curious to see.

Is there a way to quantify

what is happening when he makes this connection?

I think we've got our plan.

♪

Hey, that's a star right there, right?

Is that Jupiter popping out?

-Yeah. -Nice and steady and bright.

The team has called in

neuroscientist Dr. James Thompson

to help monitor Chris' brainwaves

and look for scientific evidence

of a correlation when the orbs appear.

-Hello, sir. How are you? -Oh, good to meet you.

-Faruk. Nice to see you. -Faruk, thanks for being here.

Thanks for helping us out with this.

Absolutely.

So, this is an electroencephalogram headcap

able to measure electrical activity in the brain.

So, as messages and neurons are firing in the brain,

we get all that information in real time,

and we'd be able to see changes

that occur in the brainwave patterns.

So, hearing--we'll start to see temporal lobes.

Visual will be in the back of the head.

So, we'll start looking at what,

uh, areas of the brain are lighting up,

whether they're active, or even shut down.

-Right. -So, the--the bottom line here

for all this, Chris, is just do your thing.

-Okay. -That's it.

An electroencephalogram, or EEG,

uses electrodes on the scalp to detect and record

the location, frequency, and strength

of electrical signals sent to different areas of the brain.

This will give Andy and Paul a real-time analysis

during Chris's potential interaction with the phenomenon.

Would you like to sit down so we can place this on you?

-Right here? There, too? -How about right there?

Okay.

When these things first started, we were using pastes and glue,

and you'd have to clear areas of the hair...

-Wow. -...get inside,

and they would be stuck on the head.

-Wow. -With new technologies,

new amplifiers, these dry sensors can pick up

high resolution activity deep within--through the skull.

I mean, that's a huge advantage for us in kind of

understanding what Chris is experiencing

through data instead of just through personal observation.

And what we'll be able to look at is how he's processing.

-Right. Right. -So we don't know

what he's thinking, but we know how he's thinking.

The muscles are all regulated through electrical flow as well.

So, I've asked Chris to try and reduce any muscle tension

through his forehead and his jaw and things

as we do the recording. -Right.

So if you can see the signal now...

This is live.

We have 19 points that we're recording from on the scalp.

We can actually correlate the points

and start to look at deeper structures...

Mm-hmm.

...to see where the energy is being sourced.

There. Now he's starting to relax.

-The musculature. -Wow, you can--

You can really see it. Look at that.

There's energy flowing

throughout all regions of the brain.

The brain is communicating within itself

and within different regions, but different regions are doing

what we would expect them to be doing,

where he's calm, relaxed, not overthinking.

ANDY: So, by all means, what we're seeing right now

is a very normal brain. -Very normal brain.

So, Chris, if you could give an indicator

as we do the recording,

maybe a hand up or something... -Okay.

...without disrupting the-- the signal in your scalp,

that'll give us cleaner signals.

-Oh, I'll do my best. [laughs] -Yes.

Yeah, just give us a couple of beats,

and we'll track wherever you're pointing.

So, we'll keep recording. We can have Chris move out

and start to observe some orbs and interact.

-Great. -Okay.

I'll stay here. I'll start working with this.

♪

ANDY: You're comfortable?

We're gonna leave you alone for a little bit.

-We'll follow your hand signals. -Right.

-Okay. -Right? Good luck, sir.

Thanks.

Now that Chris's baseline readings have been established,

the team places him out of earshot

and eyeshot of the EEG evaluation area.

So, he's doing a good job for us, now, staying still,

and you can see the frontal lobes

are actually not too active right now.

His eyes are open. His visual cortex is alert.

-He's probably... -He's scanning.

Yeah, he's scanning it.

What I'm saying in there is that he's very relaxed,

and he's not overthinking.

-Which is exactly what we need. -Exactly.

Interesting. Okay.

♪

Just had a sighting. We just had a sighting.

-He's pointing. -Oh, wow.

Bunch of movement there.

Here we go. He's very engaged with his visual cortex.

-Yep. Yep. -Interesting.

The left hemisphere and right hemisphere

are differently active.

The right hemisphere is a little more...engaged.

PAUL: It sounded like in your voice that that sounded unusual.

DR. THOMPSON: That's right. So, the frontal lobes

have these higher cognitive functions,

but they're also responsible for emotion.

So, when we see changes in there, he might be having

an emotional connection to what he's--or a feeling here...

-Mm. -...that he's then processing.

He often talks about having a relationship

with the entity, with the phenomenon around him.

And this is demonstrating that that's not a story.

-No. -That he very, really feels

an emotional connection.

♪

♪

ANDY: Just had a sighting. We just had a sighting.

-Wow. -Interesting.

The left hemisphere and right hemisphere

are differently active.

So, the frontal lobes have these higher cognitive functions,

but they're also responsible for emotion.

He might be having an emotional connection

to what he's-- or a feeling here...

-Mm. -...that he's then processing.

One thing that I still can't figure out is how Chris

can predict so accurately when the orbs will start appearing.

I mean, he calls it within just one

or two minutes at a time before we have our first sighting,

and he can't explain why, and so far, the only thing

that seems to give us any insight is the EEG

and the fact that he seems to have some kind

of energy-based neurological connection

with the phenomenon around him.

That's in his left frontal region,

an idling state in the left frontal bone.

ANDY: You said that's an idling state?

-Yeah. -But in this moment,

he's actually calling. He's requesting, right?

DR. THOMPSON: He's requesting.

It's almost like he goes into a meditative state...

-That's what I'm-- -...to requests.

That's what I'm thinking. He kind of shuts it down.

That's interesting, where normally, if you were

to request something, you would see more activity

in the communication center of the brain.

You've heard of athletes going into the flow state?

-Right. -I would equate it to that.

What's fascinating about watching Chris's EEG

is as he makes these requests,

his brain actually calms down,

which implies that there is something going on there

that is unusual, because you would expect,

as he makes an effort to do this, to see increased activity.

It's actually the opposite for Chris.

And so we're all trying to figure out

what is really happening there. What does this mean?

ANDY: He's searching.

Look. Just as you said. Look at all that effort.

PAUL: Really intense effort there right now.

♪♪

He's pointing now.

So, maybe he's focusing on one. That would make sense.

ANDY: He has one. He's got one in the tree line.

♪

When we started seeing that intense effort,

he spotted an orb in the tree line.

Well, that certainly matches up, because everything spiked.

Mm-hmm.

And it appears that when we see him

actually having the experience, these temporal lobes

and the different regions that process language

and generate language, when he's not actually speaking,

what we saw is those regions starting to be active.

-So essentially, he's listening. -One of those regions

in the temple. -He's listening to something.

Right. That's really interesting.

Seems that he is receiving and interpreting

verbal communications... -Yeah.

And then would be looking to generate speech.

All of that is indicative of a genuine relationship

with a phenomena that presents itself to him.

So, we'll look at the data. We'll do some deeper analysis.

We'll start comparing baselines to some of the activity we saw,

and we'll see what comes up. -Yeah.

So, Chris, one of the things that we were looking at

is in your temporal lobes,

in that region, you have these areas that receive

and understand verbal communication,

but there was a mental point

at which we actually know you were quiet

'cause we were watching,

but these areas of your brain became quite active,

like you were receiving verbal communication

and like you were preparing to respond.

I know when they're communicating,

but it's hard to understand how to explain it.

But you just explained it to me what I have been feeling.

-Well, you showed us, actually. -[laughter]

So, I can tell you for sure, Chris,

it was absolutely fascinating to watch your brain

instinctively cycle through deep, relaxing states

and states of active energy.

Wow.

You show an opposite reaction to the phenomenon

than what we would expect to see from any other person.

Really?

They seem to put you into a flow state,

into a more meditative state.

Whereas I think my reaction would be to--

-More excitement. [laughs] -Yeah. Clamp down on it,

try to understand it, and you seem to have a more sort of

intuitive response, which is really interesting.

I know there are a number of struggles that your family

has had with people challenging you

and people accusing you,

and people just saying terrible things about you,

but from the data that we've seen tonight,

you've been absolutely honest, you've been very transparent,

and everything is totally natural.

That seems to be occurring here.

Can only imagine what you struggle through.

That's--That's a big thing.

♪

We were open game to harassment from everybody.

Everywhere we went, they would point fingers

and laugh and snicker and make jokes

as my kids are coming home crying.

It nearly destroyed my family.

But I had no clue 16 years ago would lead to this, you know,

to--to all the people I've met or seen.

Just kind people that really reached out when we needed 'em.

And I'm telling you, I've never been the same, period.

It...

It only magnified everything.

It just started getting greater and greater until today.

Long time coming.

-But thank you. -PAUL: Thank you.

ANDY: Thank you for letting us be here.

How did this guy get this ability to do this,

is the question.

If he does truly have a superpower,

we have evidence of what it looks like.

This is probably one of the most profound things I've seen.

♪

Guys, y'all are back from North Carolina, I see,

and I can't wait to find out what actually

happened when you met Chris Bledsoe.

This is pretty wild.

I mean, it's literally mind-blowing.

ANDY: Yeah. Really saw some incredible things.

Having that first night there where I think we were

both kind of struck a little bit when we were trying to observe

the phenomenon in person with Chris.

He senses something,

and he will say, "Look in this direction,

and then 30 seconds to sometimes four or five minutes...

-Yeah, it's there. -...in that direction.

-Okay. -So, here's some

of the highlights from our first night.

See, it's coming, and this is it.

I've been putting out my thoughts in this direction.

That is high, and it's just dimming out now,

but it's just starting.

So, what you're looking at here,

this is, uh, footage through a recording camera

that's looking through

a military grade night vision goggle.

Okay. Now, at this early stage, I can't distinguish this

from other things that I might see in the night sky.

I'm not convinced yet from looking at this

that it's not orbital mechanics.

They look like satellites.

I'm not--I'm not saying that I'm 100% convinced it's a satellite,

but right now the question is, what's causing it?

Did he manifest it somehow,

or is whatever this manifesting it?

And who's to say, you know, what we're seeing yet?

You know, we don't have enough data

to say one thing or the other.

So, our mission with this trip was really to try to

bring data to help contextualize a history of stories.

-Right? -Mm-hmm.

And one of the things that we all agreed

we wanted to lean into was medical data first.

-So, we did set up an EEG. -Oh, great.

And we had a fantastic opportunity to study Chris

in the field while he was having

an active relationship with the phenomenon.

You've already said a lot. I'm on the edge of my seat.

Wait. Did something happen while you have the EEG connected?

-It did. Yeah. -I cannot wait to see this.

Yeah, it's very cool. It's very cool.

So, we've actually asked the neuroscientist

that we had on site to do the analysis

that he was able to do while we were coming back here.

-So, we've got him live... -Oh.

...on standby, ready to talk to you.

-Oh, great. -Okay.

-Cool. -Dr. Thompson, good to see you.

Hi, everyone. Great to see you again.

-Travis Taylor. -Erik Bard.

They are really excited, as are we, to see your results.

You know, we've explained to them that we saw the experiment

in real time, but that you've got a lot more data

and a lot more analysis to share with us.

That's correct.

We've got some deeper analysis that we performed on the data.

We're excited to share that with you.

So, I was curious if you noticed any markers

that were out of the ordinary,

or did it just seem like a normal brain?

With Chris, we did not note any markers

that we would flag as-- as abnormal

or out of the ordinary.

You know, at rest,

Chris has the balanced frequencies and brainwaves

that we would expect to see in the majority of the population.

So when you read the EEG,

the squiggly lines represent electrical activity as you're

having these discharges throughout the brain.

We know that during this period of time,

there were not any significant encounters with the orbs,

and we can use this as a baseline metric.

What we then did is we timestamped specific encounters.

There was a specific moment where we instantaneously saw

in the raw data that the waves became absolutely huge.

Some sort of event must have triggered these.

ANDY: Just had a sighting. We just had a sighting.

DR. THOMPSON: And the only event that was occurring at that time

were the presence of the orbs.

There was a direct correlation

with the time of when an orb was present in our vicinity,

and Chris's shift into that state.

Interesting.

And if we look now at the right hand side of the screen,

what we can see is a distinct difference

in how the brain is reacting

and what was happening with Chris.

During the encounters,

Chris instantaneously switched into this flow,

or meditative state.

How do we interpret that?

This red represents an intensity

three standard deviations

outside of his baseline,

and they represent dominance

of the theta and the alpha brainwaves.

And those are the relaxed, calm, meditative states.

So, it's not like Chris is talking to these orbs.

Those centers are actually shut down.

The way I interpret this is that he's more

sensing information than just receiving language.

The state change that occurs

in the presence of the orb, which is instantaneous,

it's really only held by the highest level meditators.

You look at a Buddhist monk, they can move into this state.

They focus, they relax,

and they shut out the external world.

For Chris, this happens instantaneously.

♪

Have you ever seen anything

other than drugs or hypnosis or meditation

induce this effect onto the brainwave patterns?

No, and that sudden shift is not explainable

outside of what you just described.

It's a very unique, unique pattern.

So, I've heard the word "orb" spoken several times

in this conversation, and I can't wait to see

the corresponding video record

to--to get an idea of what we're talking about.

There was one in the forest. Do you guys wanna speak to that?

Stand by one second. Here we go.

[keyboard clicks]

He's pointing now, so maybe he's focusing on one.

That would make sense.

ANDY: He has one. He's got one in the tree line.

I saw a flash there.

It's about head high in the woods.

TRAVIS: Now, did you guys see this with your naked eye?

-PAUL: I--Yeah, we saw-- -ANDY: We did.

TRAVIS: What color did it appear to you?

-Orange. -Yeah. Sort of an amber.

ERIK: Deep into the woods, or was it actually close to you?

ANDY: I perceived it to be in the woods,

passing behind some branches and in front of other branches.

PAUL: Exactly.

ERIK: It appeared that that bright light

was in front of what I'm interpreting to be a tree.

-Right? -Okay.

I can't explain the thing in the woods.

-Right. -I have no explanation for that.

But the interesting piece to this is the entire brain,

it looks like, for Chris,

whenever this phenomena is occurring,

goes into this state.

-Mm-hmm. -That tells you something.

-Mm-hmm. -What it's telling you,

I don't know yet, but it's telling you something,

and that is very significant.

This is great data to something much more complex

of an experiment that we need to think of.

This is probably one of the most profound things I've seen,

at least it's hinting at it.

I'm excited by, uh, what it could mean.

Great start, then, I think.

Yeah. Thank you so much, Dr. Thompson.

Great meeting everybody, and let's continue.

-TRAVIS: Absolutely. -Thanks again, Dr. Thompson.

[keyboard clicks]

I don't know what I was expecting,

but I wasn't expecting this. The big piece of it that's

that is high strangeness is, how did this guy...

-Mm-hmm. -...get this ability to do this,

is the question.

I want to do more experiments with this guy.

-Yeah. -I find that really interesting.

It's generated some kind of phenomena in him

that's created him to be able to control his brain state

almost instantaneously, like a switch.

Right. We may have discovered something that,

if he does truly have a superpower,

we have evidence of what it looks like.

-Mm-hmm. -And I would suggest

that you could train to gain that superpower yourself,

because we know what type of brain state

you would have to be in... -Mm-hmm.

...to be able to do those things.

It's not an everyday thing that we see that,

but there are individuals who've demonstrated the ability.

That's why we're doing this. Hey, part of my--part of my goal

since I was in the third grade was to be a scientist,

an astronaut, and a superhero.

-[laughter] -Right.

-Two out of three so far. -And I'm--so, you know,

This is part of the quest.

Guys, you have conducted what may be

the most important science that we're going to--to touch.

-All right. -So, great work as usual, guys.

-Yeah. -And there's more to come.

-All right. -All right. Thanks, guys.

TRAVIS: We'll see you next time.

-ANDY: Yeah. -PAUL: Yeah, man.