Description

If you're not familiar with the Falcon Lake UFO case, there's a rundown on Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falcon_Lake_Incident) - it has been dubbed Canada's "best documented case".

When you read about this case, the photo below is often used to illustrate the grid pattern of burns Michalak suffered in May 1967, from the exhaust screen of a UFO as it took off.

When I realized this photo is actually from a Jan 1968 article, I wondered what evidence there was for this grid burn being present in May '67 after the incident.

\\"Burns Back, Says Michalak\\", Winnipeg Free Press, Jan 17, 1968 (https://preview.redd.it/thmlsd8lmay91.jpg?width=1500&format=pjpg&auto…)

There is no evidence.

None of his doctors, investigators, or reporters noted a grid burn on his skin (only on his undershirt, where it's over the chest not the stomach). The burn he suffered in May '67, which was photographed at the time, consists of irregular, blotchy first-degree burns in a different location (below). In his late-1967 book, Michalak reproduces *this* photo and even he does not state he got a checkerboard of burns on his skin.

May\/June 1967 photograph of Michalak's burns (University of Manitoba, 2019). B&W version appeared Michalak 1967, p. 21 (https://preview.redd.it/65p47vskoay91.jpg?width=407&format=pjpg&auto=…)

Then in January, 8 months after the incident, he called a reporter to announce the welts were back in an "identical" configuration (Hodgson 1968). For the article, the first photo above (and at least one other) were taken. I've not found any evidence he sought medical treatment for this "recurrence", though he told the reporter he was dizzy and bedridden and under a doctor's care.

Other evidence in this case never panned out: he did not have radiation sickness and the site was not abnormally radioactive. He allegedly found silver bars melted into the rock one year later, which numerous other investigators had somehow missed, and they were coated in radioactive material. Investigator Chris Rutkowski, who wrote a book on the case with Michalak's son, speculates the bars were planted (though not necessarily by Michalak). (Stan Michalak & Rutkowski 2017)

Michalak made a sketch, he says, during the half hour or so that the UFO was landed in front of him (Michalak 1967, p.11) , but evidence indicates this is likely untrue and the sketch was made the next day:

1. The sketch includes a label "fast closing exit" and he did describe the hatch closing suddenly when he approached the UFO - *after* he'd made the sketch. As James Easton pointed out in a Facebook discussion this week, that label is anachronistic.
2. He flagged down a highway patrolman named Solotki after stumbling out of the bush with chest burns, and the officer asked him to make a sketch of the UFO - which he did. Why did he not show him instead this awesome sketch he'd just made at the site an hour earlier? Because it didn't exist yet? (Solotki 1967)
3. Michalak was a landscape artist. He wrote measurements on the UFO but drew it out of proportion, an odd mistake for an artist to make while the object was landed, stationary, 160 feet away from him for at least half an hour. (It should be 3.5x as wide as it is tall.)

Sketch of the UFO that Michalak says he made on the day, at the site (Michalak 1967, p.11) (https://preview.redd.it/y517zx1fpay91.jpg?width=1180&format=pjpg&auto…)

Michalak produced a burned undershirt for a reporter the day after the incident (Chisvin 1967), but had refused to show it to the highway patrolman who asked to see it (Solotki 1967). It's possible these fabric burns also did not exist until the day after. In any case, they do not match the pattern or location of the burns on Michalak's 1968 "recurrence of the burns" photo. The dots are level with the armholes, whereas the burns on his skin are much lower.

Michalak's burned undershirt which he said caught fire after being blasted by the UFO exhaust. (https://preview.redd.it/8wcfk31dqay91.jpg?width=1500&format=pjpg&auto…)

To be honest I think they were made by a waffle iron or similar. This vintage waffle iron, for example, would make a burn with a border around the dots, as seen on the undershirt (though missing from Michalak's 1968 burns, for which we have no evidence they *were* burns; they could have been inked on):

https://preview.redd.it/3xw0yd03say91.jpg?width=957&format=pjpg&auto=…

Going back to the first photo - to me, this demonstrates how important it is to *not* rely on modern retellings, on the myth, but to go back to the original evidence and place it on a timeline. For this case, I used newspaper articles and photos from the time, as well as Canadian Government files with the police, Air Force, and medical reports, and other correspondence.

When you read a modern retelling, including modern witness interviews for old cases, make sure you know where and *when* every single claim originated.

If Michalak was actually burned by a UFO exhaust, the evidence should stand alone. There was no need to fake anything unless he was... promoting his recently released book or something.

ETA: *I commented with a link to* my website article (https://threedollarkit.weebly.com/falcon-lake.html) *that has a more in-depth article, screenshots, citations for every claim and reference list, but it seems to have been lost in a deleted thread or something (I can no longer see it). I've added citations above and a reference list below.*

SOURCES:

Bissky, P (Jul 4, 1967). Letter to Chief of Defence Staff, Canadian Forces HQ, Ottawa.

Chisvin, H (May 22, 1967). *I was burned by UFO.* Winnipeg Tribune.

Davis, G J (May 26, 1967). *Stefan Michalak – Report of Unidentified Flying Object, Falcon Beach, Man*. (https://www.bac-lac.gc.ca/eng/discover/unusual/ufo/Documents/1967-05-…) Royal Canadian Mounted Police

Davis, G J (Jun 26, 1967). *Stefan Michalak – Report of Unidentified Flying Object, Falcon Beach, Man* (https://www.bac-lac.gc.ca/eng/discover/unusual/ufo/Documents/1967-06-…). Royal Canadian Mounted Police

Edmonton Journal (May 24, 1967). *Foul Smell Persists: UFO Sighter Suffers Chest Burn.*

Hodgson, D. (Jan 17, 1968). *Burns Back Says Michalak*. *Winnipeg* *Free Press*.

Hunt, S. (Sep 13, 1967). *Determination of Possible Radiation Hazards to the General Public from the Alleged Landing Site of an Unidentified Flying Object near Falcon Lake, Manitoba*, in letter to A. K. DasGupta.

Mayo Clinic. (Aug 6, 1968). *Psychiatric Report on Mr. Stephen Michallack* [sic].

McPhillips, L. (Nov 10, 1967). Winnipeg City Policeman and UFO enthusiast. Letter of UFO sightings sent to Defence Minister Leo Cadieux.

Michalak, Stan & Rutkowski, Chris (2017). *When They Appeared: Falcon Lake 1967: The inside story of a close encounter*

Michalack, Stephen (1967). *My Encounter with the UFO* (reproduced in Stan Michalak & Rutkowski, 2017)

Oatway, R D (Mar 22, 1968). Letter to Dr. Horace Dudley.

Michalak, Stan (1989). *Unsolved Mysteries* (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aNRUAJAuJKw) (TV show).

Rutkowski, C. (1989). *Unsolved Mysteries* (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aNRUAJAuJKw) (TV show).

Rollason, K (May 18, 2017). *Close encounter of the Manitoba kind* (https://www.winnipegfreepress.com/featured/2017/05/18/close-encounter…). *Winnipeg Free Press*.

Scott, D J (May 26, 1967). Deputy Base Surgeon of CFB Winnipeg. Memorandum to Squadron Leader P. Bissky, RCMP.

Solotki, G A (Jun 16, 1967). Royal Canadian Mounted Police Report, D Division, Falcon Police Highway Patrol. *Stefan Michalak: Report of Unidentified Flying Object, Falcon Beach, Manitoba* – 20 MAY 67.

University of Manitoba (Oct 31, 2019). The Falcon Lake UFO Files (https://news.umanitoba.ca/the-falcon-lake-ufo-files/). Archives and Special Collections. 

For the reports cited above in the Canadian government UFO files, download PDFs #17 & #18 from Archive.org (https://archive.org/details/CanadaUFO/Canada%20-%20FOIA%20Part%2001%2…).