Mystery Thread

[AstroWolfie]

Hey everyone! I was reading a bunch of Wikipedia articles related to mysterious things, such as ARGs, secret societies (not conspiracy theories), and other things like that. If you have any cool/interesting/paranormal mysteries that either you have read about, or have actually experienced, put it in this thread.

Here's mine:

Kryptos - Wikipedia

Kryptos, a sculpture made by Jim Sanborn for the CIA headquarters. It has it's own cipher that is made just for this, and also a bunch of other ones.

[AlamoVampire]

I have a genuine mystery event. It was several years ago. I was going out to get food or run some trivial errand in the evening. It was 30-45 minutes before sunset. I saw what can be described as a UFO. It (to me at the angle i had on it) was low to the horizon to my 10 oclock maybe 1/2 mile away and shaped like a jack-in-the-box head (the fast food jack head that is). I was looking at it as i passed some trees that obscured it from my line of sight for 5-10 seconds. By time i had a clear view it was gone. Was it alien tech? I doubt it. Was ATC aware of it? Probably if it was a vehicle. It truly to me was an UNIDENTIFIED Flying Object. Id wager dollars to donuts it was manmade, of this world and whomever was in control of it knew what it was. To this day I wonder what I saw. Its a mystery. One I am happy to have. Why? It lends a sense of wonder in a world where fantastic things can happen that we cant explain. I will never know what I saw, and I like that. I know for sure it was not aliens and very likely mundane but hey a mystery is more memorable! Hope this qualifies.

131012052023

[AstroWolfie]

Oh, it does. Related story: I saw a ufo at Disneyland once. A bunch of other people saw it, and it was this cloudy/rainy day, and there was this flying grey disc. I have no idea what it was.

[kerbiloid]

On 12/5/2023 at 8:45 PM, AstroWolfie said:

Kryptos, a sculpture made by Jim Sanborn for the CIA headquarters.

Quote

Sanborn also confirmed that should he die before the entire sculpture becomes deciphered, there will be someone able to confirm the solution.^[6] In 2020, Sanborn stated that he planned to put the secret to the solution up for auction once he dies.^[7]

According to wiki, the author is still alive.

So, instead of playing with the Vigenere and Transposition methods, they still are able to apply the proper decyphering technics, for the sake of Greater Truth.

Spoiler

Thermorectal cryptoanalysis.

Edited December 6, 2023 by kerbiloid

[Kerbalsaurus]

I live out in Nowhereville, Delaware Valley, and once I remember hearing a shrill scream from the woods. I immediately ran inside, and to this day I still rarely go outside at night. However, I recently figured out what the shriek was. A fox. I have been petrified by this moment for 6 years only to realize that it's some animal I see all the time. Maybe it's not an exciting mystery, as the solution was simple, but still. A mystery nontheless.

[SunlitZelkova]

I like going on the Wikipedia page for list of people who disappeared mysteriously sometimes. Some of the cases are pretty weird.

I also like reading about UFOs, ghosts and the like. But I think these are religious phenomena rather than something worthy of science so I won’t discuss it here.

One mystery I like that I’ll share is that of the Carroll A. Deering. The ship was found abandoned in 1921. Just a couple days before, a lightship crewman spotted the vessel, and a “thin man with reddish hair and European accident” called out to him saying the ship had lost its anchors and wanted the company that owned the ship to be notified. He was not the captain. The crew were also “milling about” on the quarterdeck, which is usually off limits to the crew. To this day it is still not known what happened to them.

Another is that of the MV Joyita. It was found partially listing and flooded in 1955, with no crew onboard. The ships logs were gone and the radio was tuned the distress signal frequency. Bloody bandages were found onboard, and the life rafts were missing. This is especially mysterious because the boat’s design was extremely buoyant and made it difficult to sink, and therefore it is bizarre that the crew and passengers would abandon it for dinky life rafts. No one knows what happened to them.

I’m also interested in the Dyatlov Pass incident.

Stuff like this sends shivers down my spine but it sure is interesting!

[AstroWolfie]

Im pretty sure once I saw a meteor, but I was on a UFO kick and was like 10 at the time and thought it was a UFO crashing or soemthing

On 12/7/2023 at 2:20 PM, SunlitZelkova said:

UFOs, ghosts and the like. But I think these are religious phenomena rather than something worthy of science so I won’t discuss it here.

I know aliens exist, but I don't thing us humans are that important in the grand scheme of things. Ghosts, those are a kinda yes kinda no for me, cause my great grandpa passed away earlier this year, and I have been seeing hummingbirds and once this outline of a person that was just relaxing on a bench, in the same way my great grandpa would.

[BA-Forums]

Malaysia Airlines Flight 370.

What do you think happened to that? (Besides the fact that it crashed)

I honestly have no idea.

Now, im not discussing extremely dumb theories (i.e. "Mh370 wAs sHoT dOwN bY a bLAcK hOLe!!!1!!!" or "It WaS fAkEd!!!!1!") but legitimate theories (i.e... uhhhh i dont know if theres enough evidence for this)

rip to everyone on it though.

[Ryaja]

The young sun paradox is interesting, basically the sun was not bright enough to support life up until relatively recently despite life existing on earth.

[kerbiloid]

Troy.

The legendary ancient city of Homer's Iliad.
The city of heroes, the city of gods.

Poseidon and Apollo together had built its walls, making them impregnable.

Ten years, ten endless years was lasting its siege...
Ten years of the desperate Achaean attempts to break in...

And finally only a sneaky trick helped them to get inside, but the fortress itself, the stone stronghold, stayed invincible.
Stayed covered with dust, with sand, with ground, with time...

... until  Schliemann hired a brigade of Turkish workers with shovels and razed the whole [bleeping!]  hill to ground in two years with two pauses.
Together with the impregnable cyclopic stone walls built by gods, and ten more layers of the Trojan city.

Edited December 18, 2023 by kerbiloid

[Kerbart]

On 12/15/2023 at 4:03 PM, BA-Forums said:

Malaysia Airlines Flight 370.

What do you think happened to that? (Besides the fact that it crashed)

Even if they find the wreckage (unlikely) I doubt that will shed any light on the mystery either.

[Minmus Taster]

On 12/15/2023 at 4:03 PM, BA-Forums said:

Malaysia Airlines Flight 370.

What do you think happened to that? (Besides the fact that it crashed)

I honestly have no idea.

Now, im not discussing extremely dumb theories (i.e. "Mh370 wAs sHoT dOwN bY a bLAcK hOLe!!!1!!!" or "It WaS fAkEd!!!!1!") but legitimate theories (i.e... uhhhh i dont know if theres enough evidence for this)

rip to everyone on it though.

Seems fairly clear the pilot or maybe co-pilot did it, though motive is hard to pin down. My personal hunch is that it was politically motivated (won't be going into details on that obviously) but the plane is reported to have circled over land for some time, the pilot could have tried to negotiate with the authorities and the malasian government chose not to divulge this in fear or possible sociopolitcal repercussions. Some or all of this could be total bogus but the mass murder-suicide theory doesn't seem to be something the pilot would do. He had a wife and family and apparently loved his job, while not everyone has an outward reason for ending their own lives it just doesn't make sense why he would choose to take so many with him. Regardless of motive its clear the plane was manually steered to the most remote area possible to avoid it ever being found. The little wreckage found indicates that it nosedived into the ocean and probably totally disintegrated, weather this was intentional or not I cannot speculate on but it makes detecting the wreck even harder on the bottom. If it is somehow found the blackbox is likely useless at this point. A very sad story and certainly mysterious but not impossible to decipher with what we already have.

[kerbiloid]

There were two fallen Malaysian Boeings in different parts of world, so we'll definitely never know the truth.

[AstroWolfie]

I think that if we found it, it would be at the bottom of the ocean, but not in the area they think it is, due to the currents. Hopefully, it wasn't someone onboard and I think it was probably a mechanical failure, which made the communications crap out multiple times. What doesn't make sense is 9M-MRO turning, which could only be caused by people in the cockpit. There were also supposed eyewitness reports of a burning object in the sky, which indicates a possible engine failure. Like what @kerbiloid said, we probably won't learn the truth. F in the chat for everyone onboard.

[magnemoe]

I have an 30 year old personal one: The ghost in the machine. 
Early 1990's the old style motherboard with the fat keyboard plug as only fixed connector was standard.
At this point scsi was common interface for scanners and similar stuff. Customer bought an scanner and brought his pc so I added an random scsi card, connected the scanner, installed drivers, tested it and put it in the out rack.  Quite a bit of testing scanning various images. 
Day after or something customer came back, scanner did not work. 

I put it up, scsi card was not found so I took off the cover moved it to another ISA slot and restarted. Scsi card now worked so it was probably a bit loose or bad connection. 
Put case on, then I thought I should verify that scanner worked and scan some more stuff. Scsi card not found again. 
Unscrewing the cover for for these type of pc was an U chraped cam-shell covering left right ant top of an tower. 
6 screws the bottom one opposite of the motherboard was the fail one. 
Why?

No it did not short any wires this is the opposite side of the motherboard or top bottom on an modern case lied down, no wires closer than 10 cm. 
Nor was the case wrapped then putting on the cover, who could happen with badly and weakly build cases. The last screw could be screwed in by hand and still the scsi card stopped working. 

My only sort of theory is radio noise, pc's back then often made listing to radio in the room impossible. Yes in part the frequency on motherboards tend to be 20-33 MHz. 
The scsi card was an very cheap version and the last screw changed the noise inside the case?

Anyway. I sent out the PC with only 5 screws, customer never complained. 

On 12/18/2023 at 5:18 PM, kerbiloid said:

There were two fallen Malaysian Boeings in different parts of world, so we'll definitely never know the truth.

Its the one who got missing and the second who was shot down by Russian separatists over Ukraine. Later folded Malaysian airlines. 

[SunlitZelkova]

2 hours ago, magnemoe said:

My only sort of theory is radio noise, pc's back then often made listing to radio in the room impossible. Yes in part the frequency on motherboards tend to be 20-33 MHz. 
The scsi card was a very cheap version and the last screw changed the noise inside the case?

 Do you know if there happened to be any military radar stations nearby? Maybe a SAM unit close by was testing the fire control radar on that day?

[kerbiloid]

5 hours ago, magnemoe said:

On 12/18/2023 at 7:18 PM, kerbiloid said:

There were two fallen Malaysian Boeings in different parts of world, so we'll definitely never know the truth.

Its the one who got missing and the second who was shot down <...>. Later folded Malaysian airlines. 

What's the probability of Malaysian Airlines (not PanAm ^(rip), not Lufthansa, not other giants) to tragically lose two planes one-by-one at rather strange and unusual circumstances?

We'll unlikely know the truth about both incidents, and if we do, we'll unlikely recognize it.

Did you personally know anyone onboard of any?

[BA-Forums]

42 minutes ago, kerbiloid said:

What's the probability of Malaysian Airlines (not PanAm ^(rip), not Lufthansa, not other giants) to tragically lose two planes one-by-one at rather strange and unusual circumstances?

We'll unlikely know the truth about both incidents, and if we do, we'll unlikely recognize it.

Did you personally know anyone onboard of any?

no, i did not. I was watching a docuseries episode about it on disney plus.  I remember hearing about it when i was in kindy. It was surreal. 

3 hours ago, SunlitZelkova said:

 Do you know if there happened to be any military radar stations nearby? Maybe a SAM unit close by was testing the fire control radar on that day?

i doubt it was military. There were radar stations that they tracked it with, but i'm not sure about SAM/air defense. but that could be the case. I personally think it could be this. I will admit, it does sound far-fetched and even i am having trouble to believe this theory.

1. A crewmember took control of the airplane, turned back, then someone intervened (it could be crew or passenger) and tried bringing it back, but something failed and the autopilot switched on, locking heading, and sealing the plane's fate.

I'm not sure we will ever know for a while. I might be very, very old if we find it.

[BA-Forums]

On 12/7/2023 at 10:34 AM, Kerbalsaurus said:

I live out in Nowhereville, Delaware Valley, and once I remember hearing a shrill scream from the woods. I immediately ran inside, and to this day I still rarely go outside at night. However, I recently figured out what the shriek was. A fox. I have been petrified by this moment for 6 years only to realize that it's some animal I see all the time. Maybe it's not an exciting mystery, as the solution was simple, but still. A mystery nontheless.

now that's interesting. If I were you I wouldn't go outside at night at all without some a flashlight and a powerful weapon of some sort! Heck, I don't think i would be outside at all!  

[magnemoe]

7 hours ago, SunlitZelkova said:

 Do you know if there happened to be any military radar stations nearby? Maybe a SAM unit close by was testing the fire control radar on that day?

No this was downtown Oslo, by radio noise I was referring to noise the motherboard itself generated, pc back then was known to jam radios in the room they was in. 
The metal case would reduce this externally but might increase inside the body. 

[DDE]

Didn't find a thread for it, so here goes.

Does anyone still remember those alien corpses in the Peruvian parliament?

Papier-mâché over animal bones. To no-one's surprise.

https://apnews.com/article/peru-aliens-mexico-congress-extraterrestrials-2ab059d55d3d0352e41ad2a4c312d1ed

[magnemoe]

23 hours ago, DDE said:

Didn't find a thread for it, so here goes.

Does anyone still remember those alien corpses in the Peruvian parliament?

Papier-mâché over animal bones. To no-one's surprise.

https://apnews.com/article/peru-aliens-mexico-congress-extraterrestrials-2ab059d55d3d0352e41ad2a4c312d1ed

I say correct tread and it was kind of yes obviously, still Papier-mâché, how did it ever become an thing. Using boiled and dried frog meat or something who would be to weird to test against 

[AstroWolfie]

The alien hoax had me for like, 20 seconds

[DDE]

1 hour ago, AstroWolfie said:

The alien hoax had me for like, 20 seconds

Not to toot my horn, but I was suspicious of the whole UFO drive of the last few years, so I had not a second of doubt.

(and I also wanted to use this image)

Come on, I've grown up on Alyosha of Kyshtym (a prematurely-born fetus likely affected by radiation and then incompetently mummified), that was far more convincing. The final story is rather wild (KP prevents use of translator links, though).

TL:DR is that a schizophrenic hoarder found it, neighbors called the doctors on her for walking around with an imaginary baby, an alcoholic acquaintance stole it and tried to make it stop stinking (through use of copious alcohol), then bribed a cop with it, cop called the news but a UFO cult showed up first and took the body off of him, before - surprise- handing it over to an actual pathologist, who disposed of it, only for individual cuktists to spread stories about burying it at Yevpatoria's deep-space array or on the grave of Baba Vanga (crossover - check!)

Edited January 16 by DDE

[DDE]

P.S. Oh, lord, those Peruvian "mummies" were so crap... and yes, they were found and confiscated dressed up. The skull of each is likely an alpaca's.

"Maybe they're a cardboard-based lifeform?"

"Convergent evolution: those hands are shaped like shovels to shovel suckers' money"

- VK

Edited January 16 by DDE