The sun had almost completely set behind Skinwalker Ridge as the three comrades set off on their walk towards the west end of the ranch. They were in high spirits as they sauntered along the dusty trail, joking about some of their past missions and reminiscing about what had brought them to this strange place. They had flown from the East Coast the previous day and were on Skinwalker Ranch in Utah at the invitation of Bigelow Aerospace Advanced Space Studies (BAASS). All three were seasoned warriors who had spent time in the war torn reaches of Afghanistan and Iraq.
Jonathan Axelrod was the acknowledged leader of the trio. A senior aerospace engineer in Naval Intelligence, his career had already spanned an upward trajectory, and his calm demeanor and infectious sense of humor enabled him to move easily in Pentagon circles. That same year, 2009, Axelrod was also the lead investigator of the now infamous "Tic Tac" case that had embroiled the Nimitz Aircraft Carrier Strike Group in a series of cat and mouse high stakes games off the coast of San Diego a few years previously. The so-called Tic Tac had out-maneuvered and out-performed multiple F/A-18 Hornets, leaving these top gun fighters from the Nimitz in the dust. Axelrod had personally interviewed all the pilots involved in the incident as well as the several radar operators on the USS Princeton and others on the USS Nimitz itself.
At the time of Axelrod's arrival at Skinwalker Ranch in Utah, he had not yet completed the sub rosa Nimitz investigation. He had no inkling that his covert UAP investigation would explode onto the front page of The New York Times in December 2017. Axelrod was well versed in investigating anomalies, utilizing a thoroughly professional approach. His demeanor instantly put skittish military aviators at ease; he reassured them that there would be no negative career consequences for their testimony. Axelrod was, and is, the consummate military professional, but on that serene evening on Skinwalker Ranch he had no idea what he was about to run into.
Lacatski, James; Kelleher, Colm; Knapp, George. Skinwalkers at the Pentagon: An Insiders' Account of the Secret Government UFO Program (pp. 23-24). RTMA, LLC. Kindle Edition.
During a second call about a month later, Axelrod reported an alarming escalation in anomalous activity at his home. All of the activity appeared to be directed against his family. On several occasions, Axelrod was out of town. Axelrod reported that while he was on one mission overseas, his 16-year-old son, Paul, woke at night with multiple small blue "orbs" flying around his room; occasionally, one would fly very close to him. According to Paul, the orbs appeared to be moving under some kind of control. When he began yelling, his mother ran in the room, but the orbs were instantly gone. Even after the bizarre night with the orbs, Ruth continued seeing shadow-like figures in her home, and she routinely heard loud noises down in the kitchen after everybody had gone to bed. Ruth and Jonathan Axelrod were certain that these events had begun after he had returned home from his trip to Skinwalker Ranch.
Later, an even more bizarre event with strong links to the Skinwalker Ranch erupted in the Axelrod home. Again, Jonathan was out of town on a work assignment. It was after midnight, and Ruth had turned off all the lights in the kitchen and was preparing to go upstairs when her eye caught a movement out in the yard. She walked over to the window for a better look, then froze as she witnessed one of the most bizarre sights she had ever beheld. Standing upright and leaning against one of the trees at the perimeter of her yard was a huge wolf-like creature. She saw the creature plainly in the dim night light. It had long hair and looked like a wolf. But it was standing on two legs. Ruth stood paralyzed, feeling both confusion and a kind of dread.
The creature appeared to be staring right at her; its gaze was not friendly. She continued to stare at this eerie sight, trying to fathom the impossibility of an upright wolf-like creature in a quiet, upper middle-class suburban Virginia neighborhood. The creature then took one last look at her, turned, and walked slowly on two legs further into the tree line. Within minutes, she had lost sight of it. She stood there a long time trying to determine if she had just had a very intense hallucination, or if her mind was beginning to go. The scene had been so bizarre and frightening she decided not to call her husband or to tell her kids. The kids were stable and well-adjusted, but Ruth had noticed that they were on edge from the unexplained events that had happened in their household. Ruth went to bed and tried to put the surreal vision out of her mind.
Three days later, at about 10:30 on a bright Saturday morning, the two teenage Axelrod sons were downstairs in the living room. When Paul got up to stretch his legs, a movement in the yard caught his eye, and he gasped in astonishment at the sight of a huge wolf-like creature standing on two legs in the backyard staring straight at him. Alerted by his brother's gasp, Michael jumped up and saw the seven-foot-tall "wolf" gazing menacingly at them. The animal appeared to be completely comfortable standing on two legs. Both Axelrod boys felt a sense of fear. Suddenly the beast took off running towards the tree line, its long brown, black hair blowing in the rapid movement. The beast ran easily and fluidly on its hind legs with long strides seemingly impossible for normal canine anatomy. Both boys stood in silence as the wolf was soon lost in the trees that bordered the Axelrod property. The thick insulated windows had prevented them from hearing any sound from the beast's transit across their yard. A couple of hours later when Ruth came back, the boys breathlessly told their mother about the event. Ruth felt a deep chill as they excitedly described in detail an apparition identical to what she had seen a few nights previously and that she was still hoping was a hallucination.
Lacatski, James; Kelleher, Colm; Knapp, George. Skinwalkers at the Pentagon: An Insiders' Account of the Secret Government UFO Program (pp. 28-29). RTMA, LLC. Kindle Edition.
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