Note as well you can start fires with these extremely bright torches, although it takes a bit of time and effort.
Lots of other ways to char a piece of bark, of course.
The 2025 paper has two photos of "Common types of trees in the area" (Fig.3) but, strangely,
no photos of trees at the claimed site.
Concerning the Cs-137 levels, these samples date from the 1960s, so should have contained some fallout, like everything else in that era (including me).
Absolutely. The authors do consider this, and do some calculations to estimate the radioactivity at the site due to nuclear test-related Cs-137 fallout:
External Quote:
The two bark samples we have in our custody were recovered from the same tree: Sample A from the exposed, blackened face, and sample B from the unaltered side.
... ...
By applying the coefficient displayed in (eq. (8)), two years before the UAP event in Haynesville, the activity is around 3141 Bq m2. We will keep the order of magnitude 3000 Bq m2 in December 1966. We could therefore assume the 137Cs on the blackened bark was from the global fallout if it was clearly detected on sample B. Which is not the case.
Because Cs-137 isn't detected in the uncharred sample B, the authors seem to rule out contamination from nuclear tests. I feel it is
implied that the Cs-137 has been deposited (or somehow synthesized in situ?) by the light source, and perhaps any other areas of charring would demonstrate this (in fairness they do not state this).
But the author's calculations are essentially irrelevant. They have not visited the site to check radiation levels, nor do they quote radiation levels that might have been recorded by anyone else who visited the site in the past. Their estimates of radiation due to Cs-137 are based on 1965 estimates of Strontium 90 distribution across the US on a national scale; this
might be a reasonable surrogate (I don't know) but local levels will vary.
They cannot compare their estimates of expected on-site Cs-137 contamination with the actual levels, because they don't know, and haven't researched, the actual radiation levels on site or the prevalence of Cs-137 at the site in 2025 or at any time since 1966.
And anyway, regarding their sample,
External Quote:
Determining the activity of the 137Cs is not feasible here due to the non-standard geometry of the sample.
I'm vaguely reminded of a 2022 paper co-authored by Vallee (
thread), where after a discussion about (extremely) hypothetical nuclear reactors in flying craft that have to jettison radioactive material once in a while, the authors accept that their samples don't have the isotopes that might indicate this. So why the theorising about airborne nuclear reactors? (The authors write
External Quote:
This discarded material would contain Al-27, P-11, iron from the original melt or housing erosion, plus isotopes of nuclei close to aluminum and phosphorus such as Mg, Na, Si and S... ...Iron and Silicon were indeed found in our Council Bluffs samples, but the other elements were not present
...but the author's own clearly published figures in that paper show that Al-27 was not only present in substantial quantities, it was perhaps the most common constituent of their samples).
As
@Eburacum points out it's possible there was caesium 137 in the area originating from nuclear tests. The authors tell us caesium 137 was detected in the charred but not in the uncharred bark sample, and leave the rest to our imaginations. But perhaps (assuming their were other charred trees) there would not be detectable caesium 137 in other (hypothetical) samples of charred bark, and perhaps there might have been in other uncharred samples.
The provenance of the samples is not demonstrated. It is unclear if the originate with the claimant, Dr. Galloway, coincidentally a professor of nuclear physics, or with the "civilian investigators" of 1969, and if so if Jacques Vallee was one of them. Vallee claims he got them from a "US atomic facility", which presumably did not collect the samples. Who sent them to the "US atomic facility", with what intention, is not mentioned.
The evidence of anything unusual happening at Haynesville, 30 December1966 seems to be largely anecdotal.
The 2025 paper has an IR aerial photo (presumably of the site?) and photos of trees like those at the site, but no photos of trees at the site.
Dini, Mastchersky and Vallee choose to accept the anecdote as accurate.
Their analysis of claimed physical evidence is utterly inconclusive, but the trace presence of Cs-137 in one sample but not the other is taken to be evidence it can't be from terrestrial fallout. Vallee has entertained theories about flying craft with nuclear reactors dumping radioactive waste in the past.
I think the Haynesville incident might be a nothing-burger.
