An event from 1973

As a sophomore in college, I worked from 9PM until midnight at the university library. From my apartment, I drove down a two-lane road with few houses (mostly scrub pines), then through the university golf course to the campus. One Sunday night in the fall or winter, as I got to an area just inside the golf course road, I felt an unnatural chill for about 15 seconds. This was in Central-south Florida, so ambient temperature wasn't really the problem. Traveling in the opposite direction about 12:15AM, nothing unusual happened. The next night, the same thing happened at the same place, within ten minutes of the same time, but on the return trip, nothing. The next night that I worked was either two or three nights later. Remembering what happened previously, I found a yellow construction flag and when I got to that spot again, about 50-60 yards into the golf course area from the scrub pines, I received the same cold feeling. I stopped the car just past the spot, got out and found a tree as close to the exact spot as possible, and tacked the flag to it. The next night off, I took a friend to that spot at the same time of night (8:50 - 8:55PM) and we both felt it. This time we stayed in the area about three or four minutes outside the car, trying to find the limits of the "field". It became very uncomfortable however, so we left. Keep in mind that we were 19 years old at the time.
The "cold" feeling was not a skin reaction, but it seemed to start in the chest/abdomen at radiate out from there. Only outside the car were we in the "field" long enough for more than a momentary sensation. There were no structures on either side of the road that we could see that would be an origin point for some directed energy or other technological reason for the event. At that time, the university had only a small electrical engineering department and no DOD/DARPA contracts that anyone knew of. Soon after the event I found a better job and never drove that road at that time of night again. I returned to this area in 2003 and the entire area outside the golf course had turned into housing.

Aren't there normal variations in temperature? Why think it was anything other than that? What's the noteworthy part?

The fact that it was the same spot each night could be explained by the spot being slightly lower than the surroundings and collecting cooler, heavier air. It could be explained by any number of things, for that matter. A consistantly cool place is not a sign of anything paranormal.

I'm not trying to be dismissive in a discourteous way. Perhaps you're leaving out something important? It can't just be a cold patch of air that is still bothering you 37 years later, can it?

Originally posted by OnceReturned
Aren't there normal variations in temperature? Why think it was anything other than that? What's the noteworthy part?

The fact that it was the same spot each night could be explained by the spot being slightly lower than the surroundings and collecting cooler, heavier air. It could be explained by any number of things, for that matter. A consistantly cool place is not a sign of anything paranormal.

I'm not trying to be dismissive in a discourteous way. Perhaps you're leaving out something important? It can't just be a cold patch of air that is still bothering you 37 years later, can it?

I wouldn't dismiss anything of course, but it was a tight, focused area, about 1 meter wide. This part of Florida makes Kansas look like the Rocky mountains, so terrain variation is measured in inches. We never actually considered supernatural causes, but then we became an electrical engineer and an astrophysicist, so it wasn't really in our makeup to go there.

reply to post by Office 4256


1973 was a huge year in reportings of UFO and other types of phenomena. The Pascagoula Mississippi abduction case comes to mind here.

Thank you for sharing your experience.

Had you guys been pounding down a few beers, or maybe tipping a likker bottle just a little bit?

reply to post by MMPI2


Afraid not. We weren't "normal" college students. My astrophysicist friend is a conservative Quaker whose only vice was studying too much. As the son of an alcoholic, I did not participate in the campus booze-a-thon activities.