Ex-Astronaut Story Musgrave: ETs Exist, They're Just Not Visiting Earth

When former astronaut Story Musgrave addresses an expected huge throng of UFO believers in California next week, he'll delight the crowd when he tells them he believes we're not alone in the universe.

But then he's going to tell members of the Mutual UFO Network -- the largest UFO research organization in the world -- just what they don't want to hear: Earth has probably not been visited by extraterrestrials.

And that's bound to disappoint many of the paying crowd at the 42nd annual MUFON Symposium in Irvine, Calif. The gathering will feature nuclear physicist Stanton Friedman, former Air Force intelligence officer George Filer and other prominent UFO researchers.

"I'm going to tell them that, for me, and my interpretation of everything that's come my way, I cannot arrive at the idea that we have been visited -- either in the past or now," Musgrave told The Huffington Post.

Musgrave -- who logged 25 million miles during six space shuttle missions and who developed the spacesuit that was used by shuttle astronauts for space walks -- says that, despite dozens of military eyewitnesses, photos, films and corroborating radar reports, he's still not convinced.

"Some astronauts have been quoted as saying they think they're [aliens] out there -- I have seen their evidence, and for me, it's not evidence," he said. "Other astronauts were not able to provide me with any empirical evidence, either."

Musgrave is the keynote speaker at the MUFON event. During his many years with NASA, he says he actually looked for evidence of a UFO conspiracy from within the space agency and the government.

"I've been as deep in the military as you can go. I was Marine Corps and Air Force and spent all this time with the government -- I was on two classified department of defense missions, which got me as deep in the bowels of the military and the intelligence community as you can go," he insisted.

"I found no conspiracy in terms of covering up information about extraterrestrial visits. I simply didn't find it!"

The theme for the upcoming UFO symposium is "ET Contact: The Implications for Science and Society" and features a roster of speakers presenting subjects such as UFO disclosure, life on Mars, time travel, anti-gravity propulsion systems, government conspiracies and how alien contact would affect science, technology and religion.

MUFON's international director, Clifford Clift, isn't concerned that Musgrave's not supporting the aliens-are-here theory.

"Sometimes we get too close to the subject and should realize that we need to step back and look at the different approach to the science of this," Clift told The Huffington Post.

"I think Story will enlighten us that way. That doesn't mean that they don't exist, because I'm quite certain that he's going to say he's never seen [a UFO]. But that's okay. If he stays around for the rest of the conversations and talks to some of the witnesses, he might have a little different approach to it."

But while Musgrave doesn't think Earth has been a vacation spot on any alien itinerary, he's pretty adamant that intelligent beings are thriving elsewhere in the cosmos.

"I feel that they're everywhere out there and they're doing interstellar travel -- we'll think differently about ourselves once we accept that," he said.

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Comments

[horsenomad]

03:09 PM on 09/12/2011

It has been numerous years since the Roswel incedent, yet everyone is still stuck on the concept of reverse-engineering. It is only logical that the first step with a captured UFO would be to learn how to fly it. I am a firm believer that our goverment has already been using UFO's for years to travel about the galaxy doing research and robbing precious minerals from other planets. This would explain a lot of the secresy, as I'm quite sure that the other superpowers would be quite pissed off knowing that our goverment has been doing this for years.

[CarlIII]

10:50 PM on 09/17/2011

You aren't being serious right? The Roswell incident was the crash of a top secret high altitude balloon. it was made of aluminumized plastic (mylar). Yes we wrap our candy bars with the stuff but in 1947 it was highly top secret. There are no flying saucers. There is no evidence we have ever been visited by space aliens. It's all BS... like Ghosts, Werewolves, Vampires and Compassionate Conservatives. It is your right to believe stupid sh*t. But you are abusing that right.

[Listener43]

12:42 AM on 08/30/2011

You might want to check my recent post about these guys at http://iheardacouplethings.blogspot.com/2011/08/nazca-lines-and-antimatter.html

There's more going on out there than THEY will tell us!

[CarlIII]

11:01 PM on 09/17/2011

Nazca lines are not that mysterious at all. Primitive man worshiping their Gods. I studied all this space alien BS years ago. I got very interested in the lines. So I read every scientific paper i could find about them. It's fascinating archeology but it has nothing at all to do with aliens or antimatter or any of that "Ancient Astronaut" horse dump. You watched too much X Files.

[Koreboomer]

11:26 AM on 08/21/2011

Seems to be a small percentage of unexplained stuff that could very well be extraterrestrial.
If so, then they are WAY ahead of humanity in terms of scientific progress. If they are from distant stars, then they certainly have a completely different system of propulsion.

Humanity's still in the Dark Ages with fossil fuel. At the fastest speeds now attainable, it would still take thousands and thousands of YEARS for us to get to the nearest star!

You cannot overstate the vastness of space.

[rnatalli]

12:54 PM on 08/16/2011

Come on people. Don't you think if we had a UFO from over 50 years ago, we'd have something better than our now retired space shuttle? There's little Earth offers that an advanced civilization couldn't get somewhere else.

[cuoi]

02:21 PM on 08/18/2011

Think the obesity problem in US simply a bunch of people eating too much? Think again. My theory is that since 1947 aliens are deeply embedded in the corporate world of McD's and Krispy Kreme type businesses. They have almost perfected the plumpness they crave. Soon, all members of this Buffalo Tribe of super-sized humans will be harvested and taken to ET home for snacks. No problem with obesity before 1947, hmm.......

[mamacat]

03:39 AM on 08/19/2011

The most valuable commodity on Earth is the life on its surface and in its oceans, not its mineralogical resources. An advanced, space faring society can get its minerals from asteroids and moons. Making sure that Earthlings do not stay addicted to cruelty, as we develop space travel, might be a worthy goal.

[mamacat]

05:18 AM on 08/16/2011

I think that aliens more advanced than us have a stealth technology that allows them to go about their business near Earth unseen, at least most of the time. Speaking only for myself, I have witnessed way too many unexplained phenomena not to think that we are routinely, if not constantly, visited by beings who are not much like us.

I understand why anyone who has never seen anything or anyone who looks extra-terrestrial would be skeptical that such things or beings exist. However, there is a growing body of witnesses who are willing to testify to what they have seen. Eventually we humans, on the specie level, may accept that we are not the center of the universe. Until that point in time finally arrives, we are not ready to interact with technologically superior non-humans.

[Concerned Vet 5]

07:05 AM on 08/13/2011

Not surprised he would say this.

He wants to keep his job. He wants to continue being an astronaut!

Ask Charles Hall who has had a base here for probably hundreds of years longer than we've been here as homo sapiens.

Google Dulce and read the Dulce Papers by Branton.

Look at the ending of the Abyss.

No, we are not alone, nor ever have we been.

Too bad you can't see the light show from the shuttle perspective. From what I've seen on film, there is a sea of life out there...some of it biological. I'm sure this astronaut was amazed at what he really saw, if he wasn't tampered with and can remember.

[mamacat]

03:57 AM on 08/19/2011

A very long time ago I talked with an astronomy professor at a local college who told those of us in his class that he and his colleagues had taken pictures of UFOs, and had collected different types of incidental information about them. He said that he and other astronomers had determined that a large UFO had stationed itself over Los Angeles, at a height of about 50 miles, shortly after the satellite era started. He also said that the US Air Force was not interested in their information, although they attempted to get them interested by giving them copies of their pictures and their data. What was obvious was that if they published their findings independently they might lose their reputations and their jobs. He was quite comfortable in relating the findings he and his colleagues had collected, in the classroom in front of a large assemblage of students, but was not prepared to join the ranks of the unemployed by exposing himself to ridicule from the government.

It actually made me more comfortable to hear the professor talk like this. I now feel less insecure about some of the amazing things I have witnessed, and less insecure about some of the things that have been related to me by others.

[Concerned Vet 5]

05:15 AM on 08/19/2011

I really appreciate when instructors can step out of the box and do this.

You're one of the lucky ones!

Cheers.

[maigoro]

05:50 AM on 08/20/2011

I believe that the probability is there. There are way too many stars and planets out there to make it very likely. However, I am skeptical as to why the Aliens always pick the USA (LA above and Area 52). The Masai Mara or the Amazon would be a much more interesting place to study earth. If beings from another planet went so far as to create the technology to allow them to travel the great distances to earth, you would think that they are either very curious like we are or are looking for resources - either way they will have to expose themselves to get the job done.

It is probable that by incredible chance they found us and might have visited long before we could understand it and a round trip might be 600,000 years or more and so even if they decided to come back it might 100's of thousands of years in the future before they get here. The closest Earth could be to Mars is about 48 million miles and that is a neighbor planet in our own solar system.

[kingjohn1956]

04:56 PM on 08/10/2011

If there is something or someone out there an they have been here before,there is nothing to worry about. I'm sure that after they saw what we do to each other they won't come back. WOULD YOU??

[Melinda Kabat]

07:54 PM on 08/08/2011

Mr. Ex-Astronaut should be thanking the aliens for giving him a great career. We would have never had the technology to leave the Earth had it not been for the ET's. I'm doubting Musgrave would believe in the ET's visiting Earth even if they abducted & probed him. First he's saying that he believes there are ET's somewhere out in the Universe, for which he has no proof. But, despite proof from fellow astronauts, he disbelieves ET's are visiting Earth, for which he also has no proof to back up his theory.

[crayola 08b]

02:35 PM on 08/05/2011

i would imagine that instead of trying to traverse the vast distances themselves they would send probes. that's exactly what we're doing now. also, their technology could be so advanced that the probes may be partly biological, being so much more advanced than us we would naturally mistake them as the actual beings.

to me that scenario is less far fetched than thinking another advanced species would cram themselves into a tiny round spaceship for god knows how many trillions of miles just to take a gander at us.

[Melinda Kabat]

08:10 PM on 08/08/2011

What if that is exactly what they are doing? People who have actually seen ET's report that they almost seemed lifeless, robotic...what if those piloting these probe airships are really like "avatars" for whomever sent them?

[Pandoras Folly]

03:05 PM on 08/10/2011

hmmm and using entagled quantum communications procedures they could have FTL communications just not FTL travel, just near light speed. So they send the probe then have folks jacked into chairs on their home planet riding the biorobots here.

What would happen to the probe should the communications link be broke? hmmm runaway random probing that doesn't seem to make much sense? crashing probe ships?

[Nino Bookman]

09:32 PM on 08/02/2011

Gleep glub zag nather imp crysal flap horpthrot Musgrave - y'all.

[karen lyons kalmenson]

08:22 PM on 08/02/2011

if i were a spaceman
earth i would avoid
silly petty humans
running around,always
annoyed
killing each other
and animals rare
it surely does seem
that humans do not care

[Pks29733steel]

02:26 PM on 08/02/2011

If they exist, Earth must look like one of those 'Tourist Traps' advertised every 5 miles!

[petekwando]

05:31 PM on 08/17/2011

Earth - Come See Our Giant Ball of Yarn!

[Serge Imperio]

03:22 AM on 07/30/2011

he claims that ET's exist, but there's no empirical evidence that they ever visited earth. but what is his empirical evidence in believing that they exist?

[theveggiedude]

03:33 AM on 08/05/2011

Because in all of space, if we are the only things that exist with self awareness, then that is a lot of wasted space. It also means we are so egocentric - and i think we are beyond being that now.

[Pandoras Folly]

03:07 PM on 08/10/2011

he doesn't he is using basic probablity as the basis of his belief. given a near infinite amount of space and enough energy it is almost certain we are not the only life out there. Now the intelligent lifeform might be in the Andromeda galaxy or something crazy far away.

[joeyblessing85]

02:51 PM on 07/26/2011

I don't doubt one bit that Musgrave's been deep into Dept of Defense missions, and has had access to intelligence databases, but there's one great saying that gets floated around quite a bit, and especially when it comes to classified and highly sensitive materials: "You're on a need to know basis, and you don't need to know."
I'm sure that whatever missions Mr Musgrave has been on, and what intelligence he's seen hasn't had anything to do with UFO research, and despite his claims, he's not an intelligence director OR the President, and therefore wouldn't be given ANY access to the extremely volatile and precious materials he claims to have looked for. Just because you work for the government and you've been given highly sensitive info doesn't mean you were given ALL of the highly sensitive info. Me thinks this story should be taken with a large grain of salt......

And does anyone else think that this guy sounds like a know-it-all braggart with an overinflated ego?

"I've been as deep in the military as you can go. I was Marine Corps and Air Force and spent all this time with the government -- I was on two classified department of defense missions, which got me as deep in the bowels of the military and the intelligence community as you can go," he insisted.

[Pandoras Folly]

03:13 PM on 08/10/2011

the problem with people believeing they have been as far down the rabbit hole as you can go is that it isn't a rabbit hole its a massive Warren of secret tunnels, secrets inside of secrets. Even barring that there has never been ANY ET contact at any point in time this guy does not know everything that is in R&D, black ops, etc. Had a friend of an Uncle that had some crazy stories, he used to pick open his dads briefcase and look at the notes. His dad was Cold War spook back in the day and he always said, 75% of whatever you see in Popular Science and Mechanics has been in use in the military for a minimum of 15 years maybe a lot longer especially if it came out of a major company, government lab, military program, or university

[joeyblessing85]

05:00 PM on 08/10/2011

absolutely correct Pandora! I have a family member that used to work for the Armed Forces (technically I'm not supposed to say this) but over a decade ago, he was working on a missile defense system that he wasn't allowed to know anything about except for the work that he was commissioned to perform. To this day, he still hasn't seen or heard of this project being announced to the public. According to him, he still doesn't fully understand all of the work he had to do, but that some small bits and pieces of info have recently been published in some of the military and science magazines; but in relation to other devices and technologies. He's maintained for the last decade that when it IS announced, it'll be a breakthrough in defense and flight technologies, as well as tracking systems... it has a lot to do with new propulsion, but that's as far as he would go, even when I got him plastered one night to try and weasel more info out of him.

[riverhead]

07:51 PM on 07/23/2011

I never believed in ufo's or "flying saucers" either ... until I saw 3 of them for myself, as clear as day. Either they were of extra-terrestrial origin or they were the product of "black ops" programs in the government. I believe they were extra-terrestrial, because if we could build something that could move like I saw them move (extremely fast and unbelievably maneuverable), our military would be mass-producing them. What I saw defied the laws of physics. The appeared suddenly, performed moves that would kill any human being inside, and disappeared right in front of my eyes.