1
00:00:07,440 --> 00:00:10,240
Speaker 1: Hey everyone, I'm Matt Ford, and welcome to the Good

2
00:00:10,320 --> 00:00:13,519
Trouble Show. Drones are all over the news as hundreds

3
00:00:13,519 --> 00:00:16,960
of these airborne vehicles, some reportedly as large as cars,

4
00:00:17,199 --> 00:00:21,440
hover above town's critical infrastructure and military bases in New

5
00:00:21,519 --> 00:00:26,440
Jersey and elsewhere. The Biden administration, sparking concern from residents

6
00:00:26,480 --> 00:00:30,239
and outrage from state and local officials, has explained them

7
00:00:30,280 --> 00:00:34,640
away as misidentified aircraft or drones operated by the public

8
00:00:34,759 --> 00:00:39,079
or law enforcement. The White House has characterized these events

9
00:00:39,200 --> 00:00:42,560
as new something they want to investigate, get to the

10
00:00:42,600 --> 00:00:48,520
bottom of something that has never happened before. Today, Matthew Fhalan,

11
00:00:48,719 --> 00:00:51,520
Chris Sharp, and I released a bombshell story in The

12
00:00:51,600 --> 00:00:54,840
Daily Mail. In it, we interviewed Chris Grooms, a former

13
00:00:54,880 --> 00:00:58,359
deputy of Valley County, Nebraska and former chief of Police

14
00:00:58,359 --> 00:01:01,759
of Ord, Nebraska. Grooms, who was a deputy at the time,

15
00:01:02,079 --> 00:01:06,120
details how hundreds of drones swarmed the county and a

16
00:01:06,159 --> 00:01:10,239
small town of Ord in December twenty nineteen and January

17
00:01:10,400 --> 00:01:14,239
twenty twenty. The descriptions of these drones and their behavior

18
00:01:14,319 --> 00:01:17,760
four years ago are frighteningly similar to what is being

19
00:01:17,799 --> 00:01:21,680
reported on the East coast of the United States. Chief

20
00:01:21,719 --> 00:01:25,280
grooms claims are backed up by written testimony from residents

21
00:01:25,519 --> 00:01:28,359
and over one hundred nine to one one calls and

22
00:01:28,480 --> 00:01:32,680
police reports. Last month, I interviewed Chief Grooms on The

23
00:01:32,680 --> 00:01:35,400
Good Trouble Show. What you are about to hear is

24
00:01:35,519 --> 00:01:39,519
shocking as it makes clear this is nothing new and

25
00:01:39,599 --> 00:01:43,439
that the Biden administration is gaslighting all of us about

26
00:01:43,439 --> 00:01:46,560
what it truly knows is flying in our skies that

27
00:01:46,599 --> 00:01:51,480
they cannot protect today's guests. A US Army Airborne Infantry

28
00:01:51,560 --> 00:01:54,280
veteran who is now serving his country as a law

29
00:01:54,359 --> 00:01:58,599
enforcement professional. As a sheriff's deputy for Valley County, Nebraska,

30
00:01:58,680 --> 00:02:02,319
he was the department's sniper and firearms instructor. He is

31
00:02:02,319 --> 00:02:06,879
currently the chief of police for ord Nebraska. Please welcome

32
00:02:06,920 --> 00:02:10,639
Police Chief Chris Grooms. Chief Grooms, how are you, sir?

33
00:02:11,960 --> 00:02:12,599
Speaker 2: Good yourself?

34
00:02:12,639 --> 00:02:15,240
Speaker 1: I'm very well. Thank you so thank you very much

35
00:02:15,240 --> 00:02:15,840
for joining us.

36
00:02:16,680 --> 00:02:17,840
Speaker 2: You know, we thanks for having me.

37
00:02:17,919 --> 00:02:20,199
Speaker 1: You're you know, you're you're very welcome. Thank you firstly

38
00:02:20,280 --> 00:02:23,520
for your service to this nation and your continued service

39
00:02:23,800 --> 00:02:24,960
to your to your country.

40
00:02:26,199 --> 00:02:26,560
Speaker 2: Thank you.

41
00:02:26,680 --> 00:02:30,319
Speaker 1: We we you're welcome. We have spoken previously. We we

42
00:02:30,439 --> 00:02:34,800
had a fairly long discussion about about what you're about

43
00:02:34,840 --> 00:02:40,560
to go into. And yeah, so firstly, how is it

44
00:02:40,599 --> 00:02:42,919
in Nebraska? Is it Is it getting cold yet?

45
00:02:44,039 --> 00:02:46,960
Speaker 2: Oh? Yeah, it's it's starting to no snow, but it's

46
00:02:47,000 --> 00:02:47,879
it's common.

47
00:02:47,919 --> 00:02:51,520
Speaker 1: Awesome, Yeah, it's it's it's been cooling off finally here

48
00:02:51,520 --> 00:02:54,400
in l A. But but yeah, nothing nothing like Mike

49
00:02:54,680 --> 00:02:58,840
Mike Nebraska. So so tell tell us about the city.

50
00:02:59,680 --> 00:03:03,039
Tell us about Valley County and the city of Ord.

51
00:03:03,120 --> 00:03:05,000
What is it like, how big is it? What's the

52
00:03:05,039 --> 00:03:05,840
population like?

53
00:03:05,919 --> 00:03:11,000
Speaker 2: There? Sure, population wise for the entire counties getting close

54
00:03:11,039 --> 00:03:14,800
to about five thousand people. And then the county seat

55
00:03:14,840 --> 00:03:18,080
for Valley County is Ord, where I currently work. And

56
00:03:18,159 --> 00:03:20,960
it's a town of about twenty to twenty one hundred

57
00:03:20,960 --> 00:03:28,840
people and that includes from farmers, ranchers, business owners, law enforcement, firefighters.

58
00:03:29,479 --> 00:03:32,520
We have a pretty good sized hospital, so we stay

59
00:03:32,560 --> 00:03:36,319
pretty active. The town's is full of nice people. But

60
00:03:36,840 --> 00:03:39,159
what they experienced that we're going to talk about is

61
00:03:39,919 --> 00:03:41,400
to this day still bothers them.

62
00:03:41,520 --> 00:03:45,560
Speaker 1: What is the law enforcement footprint in Ord County? So

63
00:03:45,599 --> 00:03:50,039
the sheriff's department and your police department and any other

64
00:03:50,120 --> 00:03:52,639
city police departments, Like, what would you say like on

65
00:03:52,840 --> 00:03:55,240
average or just a rough estimate of the number of

66
00:03:55,319 --> 00:04:00,599
law enforcement officials that are in Ord County. So for.

67
00:04:02,080 --> 00:04:06,960
Speaker 2: The county, which is Valley, it's about seven total law

68
00:04:07,000 --> 00:04:10,240
enforcement officers for the county, and then for the city.

69
00:04:10,400 --> 00:04:13,159
At the time when all these things were occurring, it

70
00:04:13,199 --> 00:04:16,360
was about three to four officers within the city Award,

71
00:04:17,160 --> 00:04:20,800
and then occasionally we would have state patrolman the Nebraska

72
00:04:20,800 --> 00:04:24,439
State Patrol, which usually was two to three. So in whole,

73
00:04:24,519 --> 00:04:27,480
I would say anywhere between nine and twelve on any

74
00:04:27,480 --> 00:04:28,040
given day.

75
00:04:28,240 --> 00:04:32,319
Speaker 1: And are there any military installations or nuclear facilities in

76
00:04:32,439 --> 00:04:33,720
or around the county?

77
00:04:35,240 --> 00:04:38,120
Speaker 2: No, not near the county. You'd have to go about

78
00:04:38,279 --> 00:04:41,639
an hour south of Valley County just to get to

79
00:04:41,680 --> 00:04:43,000
a National Guard facility.

80
00:04:43,519 --> 00:04:45,959
Speaker 1: And what kind of air traffic is in the facility

81
00:04:46,040 --> 00:04:50,560
in the vicinity? Is there a regional airport or major airport?

82
00:04:50,959 --> 00:04:54,639
Like what on an average night would you see helicopters

83
00:04:54,680 --> 00:04:56,240
flying around or anything like that.

84
00:04:57,319 --> 00:05:00,160
Speaker 2: Yeah, we occasionally have the National Guard flyne up here

85
00:05:00,439 --> 00:05:06,199
Chinooks black Hawks, just your typical flyover county with the

86
00:05:06,199 --> 00:05:11,160
big planes headed towards Omaha or Lincoln, Nebraska orn route

87
00:05:11,160 --> 00:05:14,319
to Denver, somewhere around there, but we do have a

88
00:05:14,360 --> 00:05:18,199
lot of crop dusters and little planes that do a

89
00:05:18,240 --> 00:05:20,600
lot of stuff for the farmers, So we do have

90
00:05:20,639 --> 00:05:22,000
a little bit of plane activity.

91
00:05:22,519 --> 00:05:25,839
Speaker 1: And Chief and Chief grooms like in the evening, is

92
00:05:25,879 --> 00:05:28,639
there much in the way of air traffic or any

93
00:05:28,720 --> 00:05:30,079
low altitude air traffic?

94
00:05:31,680 --> 00:05:33,160
Speaker 2: No? Not not really no.

95
00:05:33,439 --> 00:05:37,240
Speaker 1: Okay, okay. And and in terms of airport, there's not.

96
00:05:37,480 --> 00:05:40,199
You don't have like a big regional carrier or anything

97
00:05:40,399 --> 00:05:44,000
close to the county. And sorry and sorry, what is

98
00:05:44,319 --> 00:05:45,000
the county again?

99
00:05:45,360 --> 00:05:49,439
Speaker 3: Valley County, Valley County yep here here in ord we

100
00:05:49,480 --> 00:05:52,079
have we do have an airport, and we have had

101
00:05:52,160 --> 00:05:58,000
some landings by Chinooks and black hawks, but typically any

102
00:05:58,040 --> 00:06:02,000
planes that come land here are or small prop planes,

103
00:06:02,240 --> 00:06:04,120
your crop dusters, that type of stuff.

104
00:06:04,240 --> 00:06:07,399
Speaker 1: Now, Chief grooms on it. On an average night, how

105
00:06:07,519 --> 00:06:10,519
quiet is it? Is there much in the way of

106
00:06:12,519 --> 00:06:17,480
you know cars or you know airplanes, you know high

107
00:06:17,480 --> 00:06:21,000
altitude airplanes going over? Like, how quiet is it? Are

108
00:06:21,040 --> 00:06:24,800
we just hearing coyotes and wildlife? Or is there a

109
00:06:24,800 --> 00:06:25,600
lot of activity?

110
00:06:27,079 --> 00:06:30,959
Speaker 2: Now your typical night, by nine thirty ten o'clock, everybody's

111
00:06:31,240 --> 00:06:34,040
in home getting ready for school or work the next day.

112
00:06:34,639 --> 00:06:37,600
So you don't typically see a lot of vehicle traffic

113
00:06:38,920 --> 00:06:42,680
past ten ten pm. Air travel, we do have a

114
00:06:42,680 --> 00:06:45,959
lot of flyover planes coming from the big cities, but

115
00:06:46,040 --> 00:06:50,120
that's from you know, sun up to sundown, so that

116
00:06:50,199 --> 00:06:51,120
that's pretty typical.

117
00:06:51,360 --> 00:06:55,720
Speaker 1: It's not like you have a jet, a commercial jet

118
00:06:55,759 --> 00:06:59,079
flying and say like five thousand feet or anything lower.

119
00:06:59,199 --> 00:07:03,439
It's it's just occasional military traffic. But would you say

120
00:07:03,480 --> 00:07:06,720
in the evening it is rare to have any kind

121
00:07:06,759 --> 00:07:07,920
of military air traffic.

122
00:07:08,800 --> 00:07:11,279
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely, it's it's pretty rare out this way.

123
00:07:11,439 --> 00:07:15,240
Speaker 1: Yeah, I just understood, what is the closest military base

124
00:07:15,439 --> 00:07:17,759
to your city?

125
00:07:17,920 --> 00:07:22,000
Speaker 2: So military base for full time active duty guys would

126
00:07:22,000 --> 00:07:25,120
probably be off at Air Force Base, which is about

127
00:07:25,199 --> 00:07:28,040
three and a half hours southeast of where I'm currently

128
00:07:28,079 --> 00:07:29,199
located here in order.

129
00:07:29,199 --> 00:07:31,879
Speaker 1: And why did you decide to reach out to me?

130
00:07:33,879 --> 00:07:38,480
Speaker 2: Well, Ever, since this stuff happened back in twenty nineteen,

131
00:07:38,560 --> 00:07:44,720
late twenty nineteen, early twenty twenty, it became pretty concerning

132
00:07:44,839 --> 00:07:47,759
just some of the activity that we were having from

133
00:07:47,800 --> 00:07:52,839
witnesses calling nine to one one, ranchers mentioning things about

134
00:07:52,879 --> 00:07:56,360
their cattle and horses, kind of being harassed. It was

135
00:07:56,439 --> 00:08:00,800
just real unusual activity that we would see from drones,

136
00:08:02,319 --> 00:08:05,120
and we obviously don't have a lot of drone activity

137
00:08:05,199 --> 00:08:09,519
around here to start with. So all this that went

138
00:08:09,600 --> 00:08:13,000
down at that time when I was with the Sheriff's Office,

139
00:08:13,040 --> 00:08:16,480
we were reaching out to you know, the State Patrol,

140
00:08:16,680 --> 00:08:22,279
National Guard FBI off at Air Force Base, and we

141
00:08:22,279 --> 00:08:26,839
weren't getting any We weren't getting any feedback. They didn't

142
00:08:26,839 --> 00:08:31,240
really seem that they knew what it was. I'm not

143
00:08:31,279 --> 00:08:34,320
saying they didn't, but it just seemed that way. They

144
00:08:34,320 --> 00:08:37,720
were very respectful and whatnot, but as far as getting

145
00:08:37,720 --> 00:08:40,919
back to us and wanting to, you know, let us

146
00:08:40,960 --> 00:08:43,559
know what it was, they were very hesitant on that.

147
00:08:44,200 --> 00:08:46,679
Speaker 1: So Chief Grooms, to the best of your ability, please

148
00:08:46,799 --> 00:08:49,960
walk us through this. You know, these series of events.

149
00:08:50,000 --> 00:08:51,919
And this was in twenty twenty, correct or was it

150
00:08:52,039 --> 00:08:53,519
just before twenty twenty?

151
00:08:54,840 --> 00:08:59,480
Speaker 2: Just before twenty twenty. We started seeing news reports coming

152
00:08:59,480 --> 00:09:04,639
out of callers out of these things late twenty nineteen

153
00:09:05,399 --> 00:09:08,519
and then unannounced to us, they're over the top of us,

154
00:09:08,879 --> 00:09:11,799
and we started getting nine to one one calls from

155
00:09:12,000 --> 00:09:15,200
you know, witnesses coming home from work or going to work,

156
00:09:15,679 --> 00:09:20,240
people just outside minding their own business. Yeah, just tons

157
00:09:20,240 --> 00:09:22,240
of nine to one one calls coming from ranchers even

158
00:09:22,840 --> 00:09:25,200
hey there's these things flying around in my past year.

159
00:09:26,279 --> 00:09:28,679
To a certain point, it got to hey, these things

160
00:09:28,720 --> 00:09:34,159
are harassing my horses. So we started getting pretty serious

161
00:09:34,200 --> 00:09:37,279
with it when we were getting nine to one one

162
00:09:37,279 --> 00:09:40,559
call after nine to one one call for two weeks straight.

163
00:09:41,000 --> 00:09:44,679
Speaker 1: And during these nine to one one calls, what was

164
00:09:45,600 --> 00:09:48,720
what was the did were people fearful of what they

165
00:09:48,759 --> 00:09:50,879
were saying or did they think I was, you know,

166
00:09:50,960 --> 00:09:53,840
some kid with a drone harassing their cattle? What was

167
00:09:53,919 --> 00:09:57,840
the sort of tenor or the the sort of emotion

168
00:09:58,399 --> 00:10:01,000
that you would hear or the dispatcher would hear in

169
00:10:01,039 --> 00:10:01,679
these calls.

170
00:10:03,440 --> 00:10:05,759
Speaker 2: Yeah, I would say At the beginning, it was kind

171
00:10:05,799 --> 00:10:08,279
of a oh, look, you know, these things are in

172
00:10:08,279 --> 00:10:10,919
the sky. He he he ha ha ha. And then

173
00:10:11,000 --> 00:10:15,600
it after the first couple of nights, it started turning into, hey,

174
00:10:16,039 --> 00:10:19,320
what are these things? What is going on? How come

175
00:10:19,360 --> 00:10:24,039
nobody knows anything? You know, why isn't the larger elements

176
00:10:24,039 --> 00:10:27,399
of law enforcement out here? And then it started becoming

177
00:10:27,480 --> 00:10:29,159
concerning for the local populace.

178
00:10:29,759 --> 00:10:32,720
Speaker 1: So so you received, you received nine one one calls

179
00:10:33,080 --> 00:10:37,200
and and you guys are dispatched to locations. How how

180
00:10:37,240 --> 00:10:38,159
did all of that happen?

181
00:10:39,919 --> 00:10:42,919
Speaker 2: Yeah? Well, once, once a call would come into our

182
00:10:43,320 --> 00:10:46,120
regional dispatch center, they would pass it along to whoever

183
00:10:46,320 --> 00:10:48,720
was on duty, which a lot of the nights it

184
00:10:48,799 --> 00:10:52,279
was me and another deputy or or our sheriff or

185
00:10:52,320 --> 00:10:55,960
the local PD officer. And uh, if the call was

186
00:10:56,000 --> 00:10:58,120
in town, it went to the PD, and if they

187
00:10:58,159 --> 00:11:00,840
requested our assistance through the Sheriff's off we would go help.

188
00:11:00,840 --> 00:11:02,879
But if they were out in the county, it would

189
00:11:02,919 --> 00:11:05,679
come back to us at the sheriff's office and we

190
00:11:06,360 --> 00:11:09,200
would essentially get as much information as we could from

191
00:11:09,519 --> 00:11:12,960
the dispatch through the witness, and then we would head

192
00:11:13,000 --> 00:11:17,279
that direction. And typically the calls would come through and

193
00:11:17,320 --> 00:11:19,840
you would say, yeah, okay, you know sure they're seeing

194
00:11:20,639 --> 00:11:23,799
twenty of these things, okay, whatever, and then yep, we'd

195
00:11:23,840 --> 00:11:27,960
get there and there they were just making no sense

196
00:11:28,000 --> 00:11:31,240
to us on patterns and why they were even here.

197
00:11:31,440 --> 00:11:33,600
Speaker 1: So you would go to these nine to one one calls,

198
00:11:33,639 --> 00:11:36,919
you would drive out there in your patrol vehicle and

199
00:11:37,480 --> 00:11:41,360
you would see these things. How describe what on your

200
00:11:41,399 --> 00:11:46,960
first response, your first response making contact with whoever was

201
00:11:47,039 --> 00:11:51,440
reporting these things you drive up, it's at night. What

202
00:11:51,559 --> 00:11:52,039
do you see.

203
00:11:54,279 --> 00:11:57,519
Speaker 2: Well, the first actual recall that I saw these on

204
00:11:57,559 --> 00:12:00,840
a personal level, not only was I on duty, but

205
00:12:00,879 --> 00:12:03,919
it came from my actual sheriff, and he had called

206
00:12:03,960 --> 00:12:06,720
me directly and said, hey, bro, you got to get

207
00:12:06,720 --> 00:12:08,720
out here. And you know, we had a call on

208
00:12:08,759 --> 00:12:11,320
this stuff. I'm here, I'm trying to pursue it, but

209
00:12:11,480 --> 00:12:13,200
if you can come out and help me out, appreciate it.

210
00:12:13,240 --> 00:12:16,919
And you know, I was out the door. So as

211
00:12:16,919 --> 00:12:21,559
I was driving in a southerly direction down Highway eleven,

212
00:12:22,200 --> 00:12:26,559
I could see some flashing lights off in the distance,

213
00:12:27,240 --> 00:12:30,279
and I ended up calling my sheriff back saying, yeah,

214
00:12:30,279 --> 00:12:33,519
I see it. I see it. I'm coming to your location.

215
00:12:33,720 --> 00:12:36,919
And this thing would not let us get close enough

216
00:12:36,960 --> 00:12:40,559
to it. I mean, it just continued to move away

217
00:12:40,600 --> 00:12:42,440
as we would try and approach it. But it wasn't

218
00:12:42,559 --> 00:12:46,200
very high in the air, maybe sixty feet at the

219
00:12:46,240 --> 00:12:49,720
highest level. The one thing that we found to be

220
00:12:49,879 --> 00:12:54,440
very weird about it was it stayed near the roads.

221
00:12:54,480 --> 00:12:59,279
It paralleled the roads as we approached it, So no

222
00:12:59,360 --> 00:13:02,080
matter how much we got close to it, it would

223
00:13:02,120 --> 00:13:04,440
move away, but it would stay near the roads to

224
00:13:04,480 --> 00:13:06,799
where we could continue to pursue it. It was almost like

225
00:13:06,840 --> 00:13:07,879
it was messing with us.

226
00:13:08,080 --> 00:13:10,840
Speaker 1: Were you going to someone's house or residence.

227
00:13:12,960 --> 00:13:16,039
Speaker 2: I don't know exactly what the call came into the

228
00:13:16,039 --> 00:13:19,399
sheriff was other than hey, these things are out here

229
00:13:19,440 --> 00:13:23,360
again tonight. You know what's going on. That's the sheriff

230
00:13:23,440 --> 00:13:26,440
being a good sheriff. He went to go take a

231
00:13:26,480 --> 00:13:27,039
look at it.

232
00:13:27,519 --> 00:13:31,120
Speaker 1: Okay, So the sheriff calls you out to respond to

233
00:13:31,159 --> 00:13:34,519
this call. Were you responding to a place of residence.

234
00:13:36,200 --> 00:13:39,720
Speaker 2: No. I assume from what the sheriff had told me

235
00:13:39,840 --> 00:13:43,360
is that somebody was just coming into town and saw him,

236
00:13:43,559 --> 00:13:47,840
and we had had reports at that time the night's prior,

237
00:13:47,960 --> 00:13:49,679
so it was getting to the point where we were

238
00:13:49,720 --> 00:13:53,080
responding to him no matter what the situation was. So

239
00:13:53,440 --> 00:13:56,960
I assumed the call came to the sheriff, and you know,

240
00:13:57,039 --> 00:13:59,720
he went to go do his due diligence, and you know,

241
00:13:59,759 --> 00:14:01,679
there they were. So he called me out to help him.

242
00:14:01,879 --> 00:14:05,440
Speaker 1: So you drive up and you see what as you're approaching.

243
00:14:06,679 --> 00:14:10,240
Speaker 2: Yeah, as I'm approaching, and I'm probably maybe about four

244
00:14:10,320 --> 00:14:12,559
hundred yards away from it, because I could see my

245
00:14:12,720 --> 00:14:16,240
sheriff's vehicle, you know, to my south and that thing

246
00:14:16,399 --> 00:14:19,559
was to the southwest of his vehicle, so it was

247
00:14:19,600 --> 00:14:23,279
probably about four hundred yards from me, approximately sixty feet

248
00:14:23,279 --> 00:14:28,120
in the air, and I just saw lights. It looked

249
00:14:28,120 --> 00:14:33,080
pretty large, so I continued to go towards him, and

250
00:14:33,240 --> 00:14:37,159
I let him know, yep, I have eyes on. But

251
00:14:37,200 --> 00:14:40,279
the funny thing is is as we approached it, it

252
00:14:40,279 --> 00:14:44,559
would move away from us, and we noticed that it

253
00:14:44,639 --> 00:14:46,440
was as it was a moving away from us, it

254
00:14:46,440 --> 00:14:48,840
would stay parallel to the roads, and it would parallel

255
00:14:48,840 --> 00:14:51,440
the roads. So it was almost like it was toying

256
00:14:51,480 --> 00:14:54,519
with us. It didn't want us to see it fully,

257
00:14:54,840 --> 00:14:57,840
but it still wanted to let us know. Hey, you know,

258
00:14:58,480 --> 00:15:03,240
I'm here, Come get me, you know. And eventually, as

259
00:15:03,279 --> 00:15:07,080
we continued to pursue it down some gravel roads, it

260
00:15:08,759 --> 00:15:11,320
moved off in one direction. We couldn't pursue it no

261
00:15:11,399 --> 00:15:15,080
more because we had come to a dead end, and

262
00:15:15,120 --> 00:15:19,600
it seemed to disappear almost I don't know if it

263
00:15:19,720 --> 00:15:24,759
shut its lights off or what, which is illegal, but

264
00:15:25,120 --> 00:15:28,080
I assume it either shut its lights off or it

265
00:15:28,240 --> 00:15:32,000
just shot straight up in the air. But it disappeared.

266
00:15:32,080 --> 00:15:34,919
We couldn't track it no more with our own eyes.

267
00:15:35,600 --> 00:15:38,879
Speaker 1: So the chief grooms described the lights. What did they

268
00:15:38,919 --> 00:15:42,000
look like? Did they flash? Did they look like a

269
00:15:42,080 --> 00:15:46,000
normal light, sort of aircraft light, an aircraft position light?

270
00:15:46,639 --> 00:15:49,759
Were they brighter than normal? Dimmer than normal? Was there

271
00:15:49,759 --> 00:15:51,720
anything unique about them?

272
00:15:52,559 --> 00:15:54,679
Speaker 2: Well, I can certainly tell you that they were not

273
00:15:55,639 --> 00:15:59,960
FAA approved or regulated by any means. Sometimes when we

274
00:16:00,000 --> 00:16:01,960
would interact with these things, it would just be a

275
00:16:02,000 --> 00:16:09,559
solid light. Sometimes there were multiple blinking lights from call

276
00:16:09,600 --> 00:16:12,799
to call. It varied, and there was there was other

277
00:16:12,919 --> 00:16:16,159
times where, like I had started earlier, it would almost

278
00:16:16,200 --> 00:16:18,320
be like they would disappear or they would turn their

279
00:16:18,440 --> 00:16:19,080
lights off.

280
00:16:19,759 --> 00:16:23,639
Speaker 1: And did when you were approaching these lights? Did you

281
00:16:23,720 --> 00:16:24,960
have your light bar on?

282
00:16:26,600 --> 00:16:29,120
Speaker 2: I did not have my overheads on. No, And we

283
00:16:29,120 --> 00:16:32,799
were we had we had our regular you know, dims

284
00:16:32,799 --> 00:16:35,919
and brights on as we were traversing the gravel road,

285
00:16:36,120 --> 00:16:38,759
but we didn't have a search light on. We didn't

286
00:16:38,799 --> 00:16:41,600
have our overhead emergency lights on or anything like that.

287
00:16:42,080 --> 00:16:45,720
Speaker 1: And when you at any point during this response, did

288
00:16:45,759 --> 00:16:47,320
you stop your patrol vehicle?

289
00:16:49,200 --> 00:16:51,840
Speaker 2: Yeah. When we come to some of the intersections, we

290
00:16:52,240 --> 00:16:54,039
you know kind of made a plan like hey, you

291
00:16:54,080 --> 00:16:55,879
go this route and I'll go this route and see

292
00:16:55,879 --> 00:16:59,879
if we can't intercept this thing, you know, coming from

293
00:17:00,159 --> 00:17:02,919
different angles, and it just didn't matter that it just

294
00:17:03,159 --> 00:17:05,160
it knew where we were at, It knew what we

295
00:17:05,160 --> 00:17:08,119
were doing. We just couldn't get close enough to it

296
00:17:08,160 --> 00:17:11,359
to identify its actual size or what it actually looked like.

297
00:17:11,440 --> 00:17:13,440
Speaker 1: Would you roll down your window to listen to it

298
00:17:13,720 --> 00:17:14,960
to see if there was any noise.

299
00:17:16,039 --> 00:17:20,240
Speaker 2: Yeah, on numerous occasions we would roll down our windows

300
00:17:20,279 --> 00:17:23,319
just to see if we could hear, you know, propellers

301
00:17:23,440 --> 00:17:26,920
or a hum or, you know, a turbine or something

302
00:17:26,960 --> 00:17:27,319
like that.

303
00:17:27,839 --> 00:17:30,200
Speaker 1: Was there any interference that you had with your police

304
00:17:30,319 --> 00:17:31,799
radio or your vehicle.

305
00:17:33,119 --> 00:17:36,400
Speaker 2: No, we, as far as I know it, within my department,

306
00:17:36,519 --> 00:17:40,240
we never had any communication problems, whether through radio or

307
00:17:40,279 --> 00:17:41,960
even talking on our cell phones.

308
00:17:42,359 --> 00:17:45,799
Speaker 1: So you respond to that call with the sheriff. What

309
00:17:46,079 --> 00:17:48,400
was your next encounter with these things?

310
00:17:51,599 --> 00:17:54,839
Speaker 2: Well, it would have probably been within about a week.

311
00:17:55,079 --> 00:17:57,440
I mean, obviously it's been a while, so trying to

312
00:17:58,160 --> 00:18:01,119
remember it as clear as I can, I'd say it

313
00:18:01,119 --> 00:18:04,279
was about a week later. I was actually at home

314
00:18:04,839 --> 00:18:08,720
and again the sheriff had called me and said, hey, man,

315
00:18:08,839 --> 00:18:14,960
I'm currently busy. There's a lot of drone interaction down

316
00:18:15,720 --> 00:18:20,839
south of North Loop, which is in my county, and Scotia,

317
00:18:21,240 --> 00:18:25,279
which is to the southeast of my county. They don't

318
00:18:25,319 --> 00:18:27,519
have a good law enforcement presence over there, so we

319
00:18:27,640 --> 00:18:31,000
help over there as much as we can. And they

320
00:18:31,000 --> 00:18:33,920
were having nine one one calls about hey, there's drones

321
00:18:34,279 --> 00:18:38,799
basically circling circling the town, so it was kind of

322
00:18:39,200 --> 00:18:43,119
scaring people, so they were calling, and my sheriff asked

323
00:18:43,119 --> 00:18:45,480
me if I could fly down there. So I hopped

324
00:18:45,480 --> 00:18:50,079
in my patrol vehicle and headed that way. And it's

325
00:18:50,119 --> 00:18:54,799
about a twelve thirteen mile drive from where I was

326
00:18:54,799 --> 00:18:59,480
at to Scotia, and I happened to come down eastward

327
00:18:59,720 --> 00:19:03,400
down Highway twenty two, and in order to go into Scotia,

328
00:19:03,480 --> 00:19:05,839
you have to turn and head south down Highway eleven.

329
00:19:05,920 --> 00:19:08,440
So I had to come to the junction of Highway

330
00:19:08,480 --> 00:19:12,200
twenty two and Highway eleven. And as I stopped at

331
00:19:12,240 --> 00:19:16,720
the junction to turn to head south, I happened to

332
00:19:16,759 --> 00:19:21,519
look left. And when I looked left, North Loop, which

333
00:19:21,559 --> 00:19:24,480
would be to my left about three quarters of a mile,

334
00:19:24,960 --> 00:19:27,759
there's a giant co op building and that co op

335
00:19:27,799 --> 00:19:30,079
building has a big red light on top of it,

336
00:19:30,119 --> 00:19:33,039
and I would say it's anywhere between one hundred to

337
00:19:33,079 --> 00:19:36,119
one hundred and fifty feet high. And I happened to

338
00:19:36,200 --> 00:19:39,279
just see to the east of the red co Op light,

339
00:19:39,359 --> 00:19:44,480
another large orangish reddish light, and of course I'm going, well,

340
00:19:44,519 --> 00:19:47,319
that's not the co Op building. So I looked right

341
00:19:47,400 --> 00:19:51,119
real quick to check my other direction of travel, and

342
00:19:51,200 --> 00:19:54,640
I looked back left again, and that thing had covered

343
00:19:55,440 --> 00:19:58,480
close to three quarters of a mile in two to

344
00:19:58,559 --> 00:20:02,880
three seconds. And you know, I was kind of stunned

345
00:20:02,880 --> 00:20:07,359
because I'm pretty familiar with aircraft and whatnot from my

346
00:20:07,440 --> 00:20:11,359
military experience, and I just I couldn't believe it that

347
00:20:11,759 --> 00:20:16,359
something that could travel that fast without no noise. And

348
00:20:17,039 --> 00:20:21,400
I didn't have my window up at that time, and

349
00:20:21,519 --> 00:20:25,400
my my vehicle was running, obviously, and at that time

350
00:20:25,480 --> 00:20:29,599
I drove a RAM fifteen hundred pickup truck. But at

351
00:20:29,599 --> 00:20:32,960
that low of altitude and it to be able to

352
00:20:33,000 --> 00:20:35,839
cover that distance, there should have been an ample amount

353
00:20:35,839 --> 00:20:41,079
of noise. And there was nothing, nothing, nothing that you

354
00:20:41,079 --> 00:20:44,119
would think would make a sound from a drone, even

355
00:20:44,720 --> 00:20:50,680
no prop wash, none of that noise. It was completely silent. Yes,

356
00:20:50,720 --> 00:20:55,359
it was dark, but it was just it was stunning.

357
00:20:55,759 --> 00:21:00,799
It blew my mind, and when it flew past me

358
00:21:00,920 --> 00:21:04,519
or flew right in front of my windshield, it was

359
00:21:04,559 --> 00:21:10,440
still that brightish orange red color. I couldn't make out

360
00:21:10,599 --> 00:21:14,000
if it had you know, wings or a tail or

361
00:21:14,039 --> 00:21:16,440
any of that stuff, or if it had windows. I

362
00:21:16,440 --> 00:21:18,000
couldn't see none of that. It was just a bright

363
00:21:18,079 --> 00:21:22,440
orangish color. And the one thing that I thought was

364
00:21:22,519 --> 00:21:26,039
weird as it went by me at that speed, there

365
00:21:26,279 --> 00:21:32,599
was contrails behind it, so I didn't I didn't know

366
00:21:32,640 --> 00:21:36,279
how to regulate that that am I looking at a plane?

367
00:21:36,480 --> 00:21:37,240
Speaker 1: What is this?

368
00:21:37,400 --> 00:21:39,200
Speaker 2: But at the same time, I'm like, hey, I got

369
00:21:39,200 --> 00:21:42,079
to get to Scotia because of all the people that

370
00:21:42,119 --> 00:21:45,160
are freaking out over there. So I turned and headed

371
00:21:45,200 --> 00:21:50,000
south down Highway eleven to can you continue towards Scotia,

372
00:21:50,680 --> 00:21:53,880
And this thing was gone. I mean it, it was gone,

373
00:21:54,759 --> 00:21:59,720
the horizon, the hill, the hilltops. I had no idea

374
00:21:59,759 --> 00:22:03,200
where it went like that, and it was gone. So

375
00:22:03,279 --> 00:22:05,759
as I turned into Scotia, there's a bridge that you

376
00:22:05,799 --> 00:22:09,599
have to cross and it's the North Loop River right there. Well,

377
00:22:09,640 --> 00:22:11,960
I stopped at the river to try and get out

378
00:22:11,960 --> 00:22:13,680
of my truck and get a little bit higher up

379
00:22:13,720 --> 00:22:16,000
on my truck. To see if maybe I could see something,

380
00:22:16,720 --> 00:22:19,960
And by that time, somebody had come pulling up next

381
00:22:19,960 --> 00:22:22,359
to me in their vehicle and it had a couple

382
00:22:22,440 --> 00:22:25,799
people in it that I'm I know them, they're they're

383
00:22:25,839 --> 00:22:30,960
good folks, and they were actually going into Scotia because

384
00:22:31,000 --> 00:22:33,480
they're on the volunteer fire department, and they were actually

385
00:22:33,559 --> 00:22:36,160
going over to look what was going on Scotia because

386
00:22:36,160 --> 00:22:39,519
they were hearing the radio chatter. So they jumped out

387
00:22:39,559 --> 00:22:41,480
and I just looked at him. I said, please tell me,

388
00:22:41,519 --> 00:22:44,519
you guys saw that, and they said, yep, well yeah

389
00:22:44,559 --> 00:22:49,039
we saw it. But you know, that night, I didn't

390
00:22:49,039 --> 00:22:52,559
really think about all of that of what took place

391
00:22:52,559 --> 00:22:54,240
because I was still trying to let it register in

392
00:22:54,279 --> 00:22:57,519
my mind. But within a few days, as I was

393
00:22:57,680 --> 00:23:02,119
recollecting everything, I started thinking how weird it was that

394
00:23:02,319 --> 00:23:07,680
the minute this large, brightish orange looking thing blew by

395
00:23:07,759 --> 00:23:11,440
me at just crazy speeds with no sound, and then

396
00:23:11,519 --> 00:23:15,440
as I'm pulling into Scotia, all of these supposed little

397
00:23:15,759 --> 00:23:19,319
ones that were on the outskirts of Scotia basically essentially

398
00:23:19,319 --> 00:23:24,240
harassing the town and making people freak out, they disappeared.

399
00:23:24,440 --> 00:23:27,240
They were gone. The minute the big looking thing took off.

400
00:23:28,000 --> 00:23:30,799
These things left Scotia and the rest of the night

401
00:23:30,839 --> 00:23:33,599
we had no more nine one one calls or anything

402
00:23:33,640 --> 00:23:35,440
about it. It was weird.

403
00:23:35,799 --> 00:23:39,680
Speaker 1: When you when you know, when your vehicle was stopped

404
00:23:39,920 --> 00:23:43,759
and you saw this big orb of light, how what

405
00:23:44,200 --> 00:23:46,240
would be the size you would estimate it to be.

406
00:23:49,640 --> 00:23:51,680
Speaker 2: I would say it was easily the size of my

407
00:23:51,799 --> 00:23:54,559
Ram fifteen hundred pickup truck. And I'm driving you know,

408
00:23:54,640 --> 00:23:56,920
the crew cabs, so it had the four doors. It's

409
00:23:57,039 --> 00:23:58,279
it's a pretty good sized truck.

410
00:23:58,400 --> 00:24:01,960
Speaker 1: And when this thing, sorry, go ahead, I was.

411
00:24:01,880 --> 00:24:03,960
Speaker 2: Just going to say, if people I want an idea

412
00:24:05,599 --> 00:24:09,400
of the size of that there, they're fairly big that

413
00:24:09,519 --> 00:24:11,799
Ram fifteen hundred, So I would say it was easily

414
00:24:11,839 --> 00:24:13,000
the equivalent size of that.

415
00:24:13,480 --> 00:24:16,160
Speaker 1: And this again was around fifty to sixty feet above

416
00:24:16,359 --> 00:24:17,079
above the ground.

417
00:24:18,799 --> 00:24:21,319
Speaker 2: No that that night, I would say it was closer

418
00:24:21,359 --> 00:24:24,400
to that one hundred, one hundred and fifty beat up

419
00:24:24,680 --> 00:24:28,799
just because of it was flying pretty close to the

420
00:24:28,880 --> 00:24:31,680
same level as the co Op tower was.

421
00:24:31,920 --> 00:24:35,079
Speaker 1: And what would you estimate its distance was from you

422
00:24:35,359 --> 00:24:36,160
to the object?

423
00:24:38,559 --> 00:24:41,640
Speaker 2: Well, when it flew out in front of me, I

424
00:24:41,640 --> 00:24:46,079
would say that it was probably within you know, throwing

425
00:24:46,160 --> 00:24:50,680
distance of a football or something like that. But as

426
00:24:50,680 --> 00:24:52,640
far as at a tight level, it was probably one

427
00:24:52,720 --> 00:24:54,160
hundred and fifty hundred feet.

428
00:24:55,279 --> 00:24:59,920
Speaker 1: Did you notice if it illuminated the surrounding terrain, illuminated

429
00:25:00,039 --> 00:25:02,160
you know, the ground near your vehicle. Was there anything

430
00:25:02,200 --> 00:25:05,400
odd about that or did it behave like any large

431
00:25:05,480 --> 00:25:07,599
light source would have at that distance.

432
00:25:08,839 --> 00:25:11,720
Speaker 2: No, there from what I recollect there was no. It

433
00:25:11,839 --> 00:25:14,880
wasn't lighting up anything on the ground. And I mean

434
00:25:14,920 --> 00:25:18,680
I could have missed that because I've just like, holy cow,

435
00:25:18,759 --> 00:25:23,759
what is this thing? But it it just the light

436
00:25:23,920 --> 00:25:27,720
is odd. I don't understand how that light was like that.

437
00:25:28,279 --> 00:25:31,759
And there was no noise and then the contrails which

438
00:25:31,759 --> 00:25:37,039
typically you see from a jet. But it's just odd.

439
00:25:37,319 --> 00:25:39,519
That's that's all I can say about that night. It was.

440
00:25:40,880 --> 00:25:43,759
Speaker 1: And And in terms of like when you say like

441
00:25:43,960 --> 00:25:47,839
there's something odd about the light that it was emanating emanating,

442
00:25:48,000 --> 00:25:51,359
was it the color or or how it looked to

443
00:25:51,400 --> 00:25:54,640
your eye? Like what what feels or what felt odd

444
00:25:54,680 --> 00:25:55,119
about it?

445
00:25:55,160 --> 00:25:59,759
Speaker 2: If you think back, I I mean that that night

446
00:25:59,839 --> 00:26:04,839
it was just bright, but there was nothing else to it.

447
00:26:04,880 --> 00:26:08,559
There wasn't flashes, it wasn't blinking. It was just bright.

448
00:26:09,519 --> 00:26:12,759
But it it wasn't directional, I guess if I wanted,

449
00:26:12,920 --> 00:26:15,720
if that's a correct word to use. It wasn't directional,

450
00:26:15,759 --> 00:26:17,480
as in, it wasn't in front of it, It wasn't

451
00:26:17,480 --> 00:26:19,640
shining off to the sides. It was just there. The

452
00:26:19,720 --> 00:26:21,119
light was just there.

453
00:26:22,359 --> 00:26:25,160
Speaker 1: Did it look like looking at, say, like a welding arc,

454
00:26:25,359 --> 00:26:28,160
like that kind of intensity or easier on your eyes.

455
00:26:28,279 --> 00:26:30,759
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's yeah, that's a pretty good way to put it.

456
00:26:30,759 --> 00:26:33,559
It was. It was bright. I mean, I obviously I

457
00:26:33,599 --> 00:26:36,400
could look at it. It wasn't hurting my eyes, but

458
00:26:36,480 --> 00:26:39,119
it was. It was. It was just a big bright light,

459
00:26:39,680 --> 00:26:42,519
and there was no direction, you know, like my head

460
00:26:42,559 --> 00:26:44,680
lights point forward when I'm going down the road. It

461
00:26:44,720 --> 00:26:45,759
wasn't like that at all.

462
00:26:45,920 --> 00:26:48,839
Speaker 1: So this particular light, so it was incredibly intense, like

463
00:26:48,920 --> 00:26:51,440
a welding light or a welding arc, Like looking at

464
00:26:51,440 --> 00:26:53,880
a welding arc. Did you have to to shield your

465
00:26:53,880 --> 00:26:55,440
eyes or anything when you looked at it?

466
00:26:56,680 --> 00:26:58,279
Speaker 2: No, I didn't have to. I didn't have to shield

467
00:26:58,279 --> 00:27:00,599
my eyes or nothing. It wasn't. It wasn't that bright.

468
00:27:00,960 --> 00:27:02,960
And perhaps it just could have been because I was

469
00:27:03,000 --> 00:27:07,839
at a distance from it, so as far as it

470
00:27:07,880 --> 00:27:09,480
was blightening me or anything like that.

471
00:27:09,599 --> 00:27:13,680
Speaker 1: Now, the following day, when you're thinking about this, did

472
00:27:13,720 --> 00:27:15,519
you were you trying to think, you know, was this

473
00:27:15,599 --> 00:27:19,039
an airplane? Or were you beginning to recognize that this

474
00:27:19,240 --> 00:27:22,319
was likely something that that may not have had a

475
00:27:22,400 --> 00:27:23,119
human origin.

476
00:27:25,400 --> 00:27:29,039
Speaker 2: I I obviously was thinking a lot of things. Sure,

477
00:27:29,079 --> 00:27:31,440
you know, because I wanted to know what it was,

478
00:27:32,079 --> 00:27:37,440
and having my military background and knowing how, you know,

479
00:27:38,200 --> 00:27:42,480
an operation works and mission planning and stuff like that.

480
00:27:43,839 --> 00:27:47,240
It it just didn't make sense if it was US,

481
00:27:47,440 --> 00:27:52,079
if it was our military or even a private company

482
00:27:52,119 --> 00:27:57,240
doing stuff, Why are they near small town, Nebraska? Why

483
00:27:57,240 --> 00:28:02,200
are they flying around small town? It just didn't make sense.

484
00:28:02,599 --> 00:28:06,480
So at that point, that's when we started making our

485
00:28:06,480 --> 00:28:09,960
phone calls trying to figure out, Hey, is this air force?

486
00:28:10,079 --> 00:28:16,400
Is this a private company? And yeah, I started thinking,

487
00:28:17,039 --> 00:28:20,640
you know, maybe this isn't from planet Earth, or you know,

488
00:28:20,960 --> 00:28:25,119
isn't China or Russia or even US. I, yeah, I

489
00:28:25,160 --> 00:28:26,680
started to think about a lot of things.

490
00:28:26,880 --> 00:28:29,759
Speaker 1: What was the reaction from the sheriff. Did you go

491
00:28:29,839 --> 00:28:32,359
into the sheriff's department the following day and he's on

492
00:28:32,440 --> 00:28:35,160
his office on his phone, How was the sheriff handling

493
00:28:35,160 --> 00:28:35,559
all of this.

494
00:28:37,119 --> 00:28:40,559
Speaker 2: Yeah, well I'll just back up a little bit, if

495
00:28:40,559 --> 00:28:45,839
that's all right please. So that that night, when myself

496
00:28:45,880 --> 00:28:48,319
and a few other people on the bridge had witnessed

497
00:28:48,319 --> 00:28:53,680
that thing, I did call the sheriff pretty quickly after

498
00:28:53,720 --> 00:28:58,400
that interaction happened and started to kind of make the

499
00:28:58,440 --> 00:29:01,160
comment that you know, you're not going to believe this,

500
00:29:01,480 --> 00:29:04,119
but and as soon as I got out the word

501
00:29:04,200 --> 00:29:06,559
but pardon my French, but he said, no, shit, you

502
00:29:06,640 --> 00:29:10,319
saw it too. And it made sense because where he

503
00:29:10,400 --> 00:29:13,599
lived at the time, that thing probably would have flew

504
00:29:13,759 --> 00:29:19,400
directly over him, if not near his residence, So he

505
00:29:19,960 --> 00:29:24,200
saw it too, And at that point it started to

506
00:29:24,240 --> 00:29:28,920
really concern him. Because he's an intelligent guy. He's been

507
00:29:28,920 --> 00:29:32,279
in law enforcement a while. He knows that that's not

508
00:29:32,359 --> 00:29:35,759
normal activity. By even if it was drones, just for

509
00:29:35,880 --> 00:29:39,519
what was going on, it served no purpose. So yeah,

510
00:29:39,559 --> 00:29:44,359
the next morning, when I come into work to basically

511
00:29:44,440 --> 00:29:48,480
start making phone calls, he was already in the office

512
00:29:48,559 --> 00:29:52,480
and he had two three phones just near his face,

513
00:29:52,720 --> 00:29:55,680
calling people trying to figure out who this could be

514
00:29:55,839 --> 00:29:56,599
or what it could be.

515
00:29:57,240 --> 00:30:02,039
Speaker 1: Who again, was the shrif specifically calling or guarding these events.

516
00:30:02,920 --> 00:30:05,319
Speaker 2: We well, that morning, I know he had related to

517
00:30:05,319 --> 00:30:07,880
me that he was in contact with off at Air

518
00:30:07,920 --> 00:30:12,640
Force Base. I don't know the exact name of the

519
00:30:12,960 --> 00:30:15,720
HR person that he was on the phone with, but

520
00:30:16,640 --> 00:30:19,680
they basically gave him the yeah, it's not us, it's

521
00:30:19,720 --> 00:30:22,319
not the Air Force, we're not doing that type of activity.

522
00:30:25,359 --> 00:30:30,640
We contacted the Nebraska State Patrol. They you know, they

523
00:30:30,640 --> 00:30:33,960
don't have that technology. They weren't up here doing things

524
00:30:34,000 --> 00:30:38,039
like that. I did call down to the National Guard

525
00:30:38,079 --> 00:30:42,880
out of Grand Island and they didn't They weren't doing

526
00:30:42,880 --> 00:30:46,200
anything like that up here. So pretty much everybody that

527
00:30:46,240 --> 00:30:48,680
we talked to gave us the no, that's not us,

528
00:30:48,720 --> 00:30:52,440
and essentially, yeah, we don't we don't know what this time,

529
00:30:52,519 --> 00:30:52,880
what it is.

530
00:30:52,920 --> 00:30:57,720
Speaker 1: Either following these calls, was there any follow up from

531
00:30:58,079 --> 00:31:02,200
you know, FBI or FAA or any of these other agencies,

532
00:31:02,240 --> 00:31:04,119
Like did they call a week later and say, hey,

533
00:31:04,119 --> 00:31:06,640
are these are these things still flying around? Or was

534
00:31:06,680 --> 00:31:09,079
it radio silence from those federal agencies.

535
00:31:10,599 --> 00:31:15,720
Speaker 2: Yeah, we never really got a callback or a follow

536
00:31:15,799 --> 00:31:23,960
up or anything from anybody. Go ahead, I was just

537
00:31:24,000 --> 00:31:25,799
going to say that the people that I did have

538
00:31:25,960 --> 00:31:31,599
follow ups from where people like Christopher Mellen. He he

539
00:31:31,640 --> 00:31:34,680
seemed pretty concerned. I had a long conversation with him.

540
00:31:34,680 --> 00:31:37,559
We were on the phone for probably about an hour.

541
00:31:40,039 --> 00:31:44,119
He was very concerned. He clearly was finding this to

542
00:31:44,160 --> 00:31:50,240
be very concerning. I was in contact with a reporter

543
00:31:50,400 --> 00:31:54,039
from the New York Times. I guess, maybe you don't

544
00:31:54,039 --> 00:31:58,119
want me to say her name, but she actually followed

545
00:31:58,160 --> 00:32:01,960
up with me numerous times, and she seemed pretty concerned

546
00:32:02,599 --> 00:32:04,079
and would like to get to the bottom of it.

547
00:32:06,839 --> 00:32:10,000
I spoke to a journalist out of Colorado who was

548
00:32:10,039 --> 00:32:13,319
a journalist for the DoD and him and I had

549
00:32:13,359 --> 00:32:18,079
conversations over the phone and emails and whatnot, and yeah,

550
00:32:18,119 --> 00:32:22,480
he pretty much was given me the same gist of everything,

551
00:32:22,519 --> 00:32:24,759
as yet, it's not us, we don't know what it is.

552
00:32:25,680 --> 00:32:29,759
And he actually did an actual article on these things,

553
00:32:30,559 --> 00:32:33,519
and the article basically read just as if as he

554
00:32:33,640 --> 00:32:36,400
was telling me that we don't know what it is.

555
00:32:37,039 --> 00:32:40,240
Speaker 1: I want to go back again to one of the nights,

556
00:32:40,519 --> 00:32:42,559
or any of the nights, we'll say, perhaps one of

557
00:32:42,599 --> 00:32:45,640
the Knights that had the most volume of radio calls.

558
00:32:45,920 --> 00:32:49,480
I'm sorry, ninety one one calls. What was the radio

559
00:32:49,559 --> 00:32:54,839
traffic like between officers? Was it I guess what I'm asking.

560
00:32:54,960 --> 00:32:58,119
Was it like more than one officer responding to a call.

561
00:32:58,839 --> 00:33:04,079
Was there much sort of tactical communication between officers during

562
00:33:04,920 --> 00:33:07,079
one of the busiest events.

563
00:33:08,400 --> 00:33:12,480
Speaker 2: Yeah, there was. There was communication between us as you know, hey,

564
00:33:13,319 --> 00:33:15,720
you try and go down this road and we'll try

565
00:33:15,759 --> 00:33:19,680
and you know, intercept it from different angles to you know, hey,

566
00:33:19,759 --> 00:33:22,960
go over here and set up on this high point

567
00:33:22,960 --> 00:33:25,519
with your binoculars while we while we try and maneuver

568
00:33:25,680 --> 00:33:30,079
on these things with our vehicles. So there was coordination

569
00:33:31,640 --> 00:33:34,480
to the best that we could do with what we had.

570
00:33:35,440 --> 00:33:38,279
Speaker 1: The communications from the other officers, Like you know, when

571
00:33:38,319 --> 00:33:41,079
I listened to you, Chief Grooms, you're you know, very calm,

572
00:33:41,599 --> 00:33:45,960
very matter of fact. Did you sense any fear in

573
00:33:46,000 --> 00:33:49,920
any of the other officers or like panic or anything

574
00:33:50,000 --> 00:33:52,279
like that that that or was it just you know,

575
00:33:52,440 --> 00:33:54,599
very sort of matter of fact. Don't know what these

576
00:33:54,640 --> 00:33:55,039
things are.

577
00:33:57,400 --> 00:34:01,240
Speaker 2: I think it was a mixture of every thing. I mean,

578
00:34:01,359 --> 00:34:07,200
towards towards the end, not only was becoming an annoyance

579
00:34:07,359 --> 00:34:10,079
because we just couldn't catch them, we couldn't figure out

580
00:34:10,119 --> 00:34:13,719
what they were. Nobody was telling us anything. But also

581
00:34:14,239 --> 00:34:17,440
you know, we we don't want our community to be

582
00:34:18,079 --> 00:34:21,920
worrying about this stuff as much as they were at

583
00:34:21,920 --> 00:34:25,519
the beginning. But we also didn't want accidents out on

584
00:34:25,559 --> 00:34:27,960
the highways when people were trying to find these things

585
00:34:28,000 --> 00:34:32,400
themselves and you know, running across the highways and running

586
00:34:32,400 --> 00:34:34,440
stop signs. And I'm not saying they were doing that,

587
00:34:34,559 --> 00:34:36,599
but that is one thing that we were concerned about,

588
00:34:36,800 --> 00:34:39,480
was are our accident's going to go up because there's

589
00:34:39,480 --> 00:34:43,239
so many people out. So there was concern at a

590
00:34:43,280 --> 00:34:47,199
lot of different levels, not only these things being in

591
00:34:47,239 --> 00:34:53,159
our in our county, messing around with ranchers, cattle and whatnot,

592
00:34:53,800 --> 00:34:58,239
but just also other people's safety from staying out of

593
00:34:58,639 --> 00:35:00,320
accidents and things like that.

594
00:35:00,480 --> 00:35:02,800
Speaker 1: I want to talk a little bit about the interaction

595
00:35:03,039 --> 00:35:08,199
of these drones with cattle. Describe in if you can,

596
00:35:08,360 --> 00:35:12,920
in detail, what those interactions were, like, how many of

597
00:35:12,920 --> 00:35:16,920
them were there, what was the reaction from the ranchers

598
00:35:16,960 --> 00:35:17,960
of these things.

599
00:35:18,559 --> 00:35:22,719
Speaker 2: Towards the end of it, when we couldn't figure out

600
00:35:22,760 --> 00:35:24,800
what they were and what they were doing here, we were,

601
00:35:25,280 --> 00:35:27,239
you know, this is Nebraska, so we were starting to

602
00:35:27,239 --> 00:35:30,840
get those answers from the ranchers about if these things

603
00:35:30,920 --> 00:35:33,440
keep messing, you know, with my horses, and I got

604
00:35:33,440 --> 00:35:36,440
to go round up my cattle every morning. It was

605
00:35:36,480 --> 00:35:38,599
pretty much coming down to you, well, if the government's

606
00:35:38,639 --> 00:35:40,960
not going to look into it and do anything, we're

607
00:35:41,000 --> 00:35:43,320
just going to try and shoot them down. And you

608
00:35:43,360 --> 00:35:45,639
know we're sitting there saying, hold on, let's not go

609
00:35:45,760 --> 00:35:50,199
to that yet, Let's you know, continue. But I understood

610
00:35:50,199 --> 00:35:52,400
where they were coming from. You know, that's their livelihood,

611
00:35:52,440 --> 00:35:56,199
that's their property. So I understood that side of it.

612
00:35:56,960 --> 00:36:00,280
But as far as when these things would show up up,

613
00:36:01,119 --> 00:36:05,440
I received a phone call one night from a rancher

614
00:36:06,000 --> 00:36:08,559
and he had stated to me, you know, these things

615
00:36:08,599 --> 00:36:13,639
are essentially lighting up his pastures with lights, almost like

616
00:36:13,679 --> 00:36:18,000
a searchlight or something like that, and it was starting

617
00:36:18,000 --> 00:36:21,519
to really bug him because it was making his it

618
00:36:21,599 --> 00:36:24,760
was making his animals move away from where he had

619
00:36:24,840 --> 00:36:27,079
left them, and you know, he'd have to go out

620
00:36:27,079 --> 00:36:28,760
at four or five in the morning and round them

621
00:36:28,760 --> 00:36:30,719
all up and get accountability of everything, and it just

622
00:36:30,719 --> 00:36:33,559
became a nuisance. But yeah, he had he had made

623
00:36:33,559 --> 00:36:36,639
the comment that whatever these things were, they had lit

624
00:36:36,719 --> 00:36:39,519
up his cattle and he could see it doing it

625
00:36:39,559 --> 00:36:42,119
and it made him irritated. So he went out to

626
00:36:42,159 --> 00:36:46,000
go try and you know, chase it off or whatever

627
00:36:46,039 --> 00:36:50,320
he thought he was going to do. But it just Yeah, again,

628
00:36:50,360 --> 00:36:51,039
it just took off.

629
00:36:51,039 --> 00:36:52,119
Speaker 1: It just left.

630
00:36:52,320 --> 00:36:53,800
Speaker 2: It's almost like it knew it was coming.

631
00:36:54,119 --> 00:36:57,440
Speaker 1: The description from the from the Ranchers of these things,

632
00:36:57,480 --> 00:37:02,079
did any of the description of these vehicles match or

633
00:37:02,079 --> 00:37:04,840
these airborne vehicles, did any of them match what you

634
00:37:04,960 --> 00:37:07,599
had seen or any of the other officers had seen,

635
00:37:07,679 --> 00:37:11,719
like and did the rancher report any like sounds like

636
00:37:11,719 --> 00:37:13,679
a helicopter or anything like that.

637
00:37:14,960 --> 00:37:17,159
Speaker 2: Yeah, it was. It was typically the same thing that

638
00:37:17,360 --> 00:37:21,559
we experienced it, you know, at our level with the

639
00:37:21,639 --> 00:37:26,840
no noise. Sometimes it was blinking lights, sometimes it was

640
00:37:26,880 --> 00:37:32,800
a solid looking light, and like, like I said, it

641
00:37:32,920 --> 00:37:36,320
just it just was starting to really irritate people that

642
00:37:36,559 --> 00:37:38,960
there was nothing we could do about it. And it

643
00:37:39,000 --> 00:37:43,880
seemed like the government either knew what it was or

644
00:37:44,519 --> 00:37:46,119
they just didn't know what it was, so they were

645
00:37:46,159 --> 00:37:48,719
shunning it off, hoping it would just go away. I

646
00:37:49,079 --> 00:37:51,800
don't know what they were thinking, but that's what it

647
00:37:51,800 --> 00:37:52,280
seemed like.

648
00:37:52,519 --> 00:37:56,760
Speaker 1: Did the Ranchers describe any kind of rotor wash or

649
00:37:58,079 --> 00:37:59,559
you know, if these things were low to the ground

650
00:37:59,559 --> 00:38:02,519
and shining a spotlight on these things. Did the ranchers

651
00:38:02,920 --> 00:38:06,599
see any blowing dust or anything like that, because and

652
00:38:06,639 --> 00:38:09,239
again I'm I'm you know, I live here in Los Angeles,

653
00:38:09,280 --> 00:38:11,679
so I don't have any experience with cattle, but it

654
00:38:12,039 --> 00:38:15,639
would seem to me that just a spotlight wouldn't be

655
00:38:15,760 --> 00:38:19,800
enough to make cattle run or or would it you know,

656
00:38:19,840 --> 00:38:23,679
would a spotlight make him run? Or was there any

657
00:38:23,719 --> 00:38:27,880
sort of wind disturbance that you that was reported during

658
00:38:27,920 --> 00:38:29,400
these interactions with the cattle.

659
00:38:30,639 --> 00:38:33,679
Speaker 2: As far as the noise in the in the dust,

660
00:38:33,840 --> 00:38:38,199
I never got to asking a whole lot about that.

661
00:38:40,360 --> 00:38:42,840
I know that at one point he made the comment

662
00:38:42,880 --> 00:38:45,639
there was no noise, but it could have been due

663
00:38:45,679 --> 00:38:47,559
to the fact that he couldn't get close enough to it.

664
00:38:48,679 --> 00:38:51,440
But as far as dust kicking up or anything like that,

665
00:38:51,559 --> 00:38:53,960
I never I never asked him about that. And then

666
00:38:54,039 --> 00:39:00,360
with the spotlights, Uh, sometimes cattle they might think it's

667
00:39:00,400 --> 00:39:05,280
their actual handlers and they'll move towards those lights thinking

668
00:39:05,320 --> 00:39:07,639
that they're going to get fed or something like that.

669
00:39:08,159 --> 00:39:10,199
So that could have been the reason that they moved off.

670
00:39:10,239 --> 00:39:13,360
I don't know, but I just know that the rancher

671
00:39:14,039 --> 00:39:17,760
was getting getting pretty irritated with it, so.

672
00:39:18,079 --> 00:39:22,639
Speaker 1: And was there any any sort of verbal alarm from

673
00:39:22,679 --> 00:39:25,920
the animals, like a lot of mooing or or whatever.

674
00:39:26,000 --> 00:39:30,480
Any anything unusual about how they reacted to these that

675
00:39:30,480 --> 00:39:33,920
that I don't know that I'm not for sure how

676
00:39:33,920 --> 00:39:39,320
many vehicles were described above the ranch. Was it usually

677
00:39:39,480 --> 00:39:43,079
just one shining a spotlight or were there a series

678
00:39:43,119 --> 00:39:49,599
of them? Any any reports on on that.

679
00:39:47,480 --> 00:39:53,000
Speaker 2: That that night alone, it was one, but on a

680
00:39:53,039 --> 00:39:57,199
lot of the other calls, not specifically ranchers, but even

681
00:39:57,239 --> 00:39:59,480
some of the folks that live right outside of town

682
00:39:59,679 --> 00:40:05,039
right side Ard that don't have animals and whatnot. They

683
00:40:05,079 --> 00:40:07,360
just live outside of town to get away from the lights,

684
00:40:07,400 --> 00:40:11,800
the city lights. They reported upwards of fifty sometimes of

685
00:40:11,840 --> 00:40:13,159
these things.

686
00:40:13,000 --> 00:40:13,719
Speaker 1: At one time.

687
00:40:14,679 --> 00:40:20,039
Speaker 2: Correct, yep, there was. I was not working this night,

688
00:40:21,519 --> 00:40:26,239
but one of the other deputies, the sheriff, my office manager,

689
00:40:26,639 --> 00:40:30,760
and I believe a state patrol trooper who was off duty,

690
00:40:31,480 --> 00:40:34,519
was in the town of Arcadia, which would be to

691
00:40:34,559 --> 00:40:39,239
the southwest of Board and it's in Valley County. They

692
00:40:39,280 --> 00:40:44,719
were hab and I believe a baby shower and upwards

693
00:40:44,800 --> 00:40:49,079
of fifty of these things were hovering around Arcadia just

694
00:40:49,840 --> 00:40:53,199
doing weird stuff. It made no sense for why they

695
00:40:53,199 --> 00:40:55,079
were there and what they were doing. They just showed

696
00:40:55,159 --> 00:41:01,239
up and left. And the one deputy he actually tracked

697
00:41:01,280 --> 00:41:06,079
them out of town headed northbound and he was he

698
00:41:06,199 --> 00:41:09,280
was again counting upwards of forty five to fifty.

699
00:41:09,239 --> 00:41:12,880
Speaker 1: What was the fastest recorded speed of these things? Like,

700
00:41:12,920 --> 00:41:15,039
were you able to pace them with your vehicle?

701
00:41:16,880 --> 00:41:22,119
Speaker 2: Well, if you, if you could pursue them. Obviously, like

702
00:41:22,199 --> 00:41:24,320
I had mentioned, they would never let you get close

703
00:41:24,440 --> 00:41:27,719
enough to him. But there were there were times where

704
00:41:28,360 --> 00:41:32,559
a deputy, well a sheriff had mentioned that he had

705
00:41:32,559 --> 00:41:37,199
his cruiser maxed out at about one twenty and this

706
00:41:37,199 --> 00:41:40,880
thing was still moving away. He couldn't catch up to it.

707
00:41:41,400 --> 00:41:44,480
Speaker 1: During during this two week period of these of these

708
00:41:44,719 --> 00:41:47,519
supposed you know, drones or whatever we want to however

709
00:41:47,599 --> 00:41:51,440
we want to classify them. The interactions are the harassment

710
00:41:51,480 --> 00:41:56,119
of the cattle. Did was that happening every night there

711
00:41:56,320 --> 00:41:59,679
was a report of these drones? Or was it only

712
00:42:00,159 --> 00:42:02,280
you know, once a week? You know, I'm just trying

713
00:42:02,320 --> 00:42:06,199
to understand what the frequency was of the cattle harassment.

714
00:42:07,920 --> 00:42:11,480
Speaker 2: No, at least in my county, it wasn't. There was

715
00:42:11,519 --> 00:42:15,719
not harassment every night. Now the other counties they interacted

716
00:42:15,760 --> 00:42:17,800
with these things. I can't speak for them, so I

717
00:42:17,840 --> 00:42:21,400
don't know, but it was just it was random in

718
00:42:21,440 --> 00:42:26,280
our county when a rancher would call in, whether directly

719
00:42:26,360 --> 00:42:29,559
to us or by you know, nine one one, that hey,

720
00:42:29,639 --> 00:42:32,639
these things are messing with my animals. What's being done

721
00:42:32,679 --> 00:42:36,280
about this? It wasn't every night with that.

722
00:42:36,719 --> 00:42:40,039
Speaker 1: Following the interactions or during this two week period, did

723
00:42:40,360 --> 00:42:44,480
the sheriff's department or the local police departments make an effort, say,

724
00:42:44,519 --> 00:42:46,639
like during the day, like if they saw like a

725
00:42:46,800 --> 00:42:48,960
U haul van pulled over to the side of the road,

726
00:42:49,119 --> 00:42:51,480
or or any kind of vehicle that could have been

727
00:42:51,519 --> 00:42:55,280
a command and control vehicle. Were there any traffic stops

728
00:42:55,320 --> 00:42:59,519
made in order to determine if they were possibly involved

729
00:42:59,559 --> 00:43:00,400
with these drones.

730
00:43:02,280 --> 00:43:05,960
Speaker 2: Yep, so we we made quite a few stops on

731
00:43:06,239 --> 00:43:11,039
anything from semi trailers that looked kind of different to

732
00:43:11,559 --> 00:43:16,000
FedEx FedEx trucks. Yeah, we made we made stops to

733
00:43:16,039 --> 00:43:18,079
try and get to the bottom of you know, where

734
00:43:18,119 --> 00:43:21,360
these things being controlled by a vehicle on the ground,

735
00:43:22,239 --> 00:43:25,880
or or where they were hiding at. We we were

736
00:43:25,920 --> 00:43:28,519
doing everything we could to get to the bottom of it.

737
00:43:28,679 --> 00:43:32,599
Speaker 1: Was there any discovery of anything that was suspicious.

738
00:43:33,960 --> 00:43:37,440
Speaker 2: Not not from the not from stopping vehicles or or

739
00:43:37,519 --> 00:43:40,400
semis or trailers or vans or anything like that. Nope,

740
00:43:40,400 --> 00:43:43,880
we never got anything out of it that would, you know,

741
00:43:44,000 --> 00:43:46,039
show that they were the ones that were controlling them.

742
00:43:46,239 --> 00:43:48,159
Speaker 1: I want to go back to the nine to one

743
00:43:48,239 --> 00:43:51,119
one calls. What would you say during that two week

744
00:43:51,159 --> 00:43:53,760
period were the number of nine to one one calls?

745
00:43:54,000 --> 00:43:57,800
And is that number unique for that time of day?

746
00:43:57,840 --> 00:44:00,280
I think again, you said this happened all between ten

747
00:44:00,360 --> 00:44:07,760
at midnight. Was was the volume unusual? Were the calls unusual? Well?

748
00:44:07,800 --> 00:44:10,480
Speaker 2: We we we vary in our nine to one one

749
00:44:10,519 --> 00:44:13,280
calls on a you know, regular nine to one one calls,

750
00:44:13,920 --> 00:44:19,320
but this two weeks it was every night. I mean

751
00:44:19,360 --> 00:44:24,159
some nights it was three to six. Uh, some nights

752
00:44:24,239 --> 00:44:28,880
it was upwards of twelve. And I would say over

753
00:44:29,000 --> 00:44:34,400
that fourteen to seventeen day window where it was every

754
00:44:34,440 --> 00:44:38,079
single night, I think it equated to about forty four

755
00:44:38,239 --> 00:44:44,119
forty eight nine one one calls specifically for these drones.

756
00:44:46,239 --> 00:44:46,880
Speaker 1: That's a lot.

757
00:44:47,960 --> 00:44:51,320
Speaker 2: Yeah, considering that was just our county and there were

758
00:44:51,360 --> 00:44:54,920
surrounding counties that were also receiving nine to one one

759
00:44:54,920 --> 00:44:56,239
calls two.

760
00:44:56,920 --> 00:44:59,679
Speaker 1: And from these from the surrounding counties. Do you know

761
00:44:59,719 --> 00:45:02,880
if if the various sheriffs from the surrounding counties were

762
00:45:02,880 --> 00:45:06,000
in communication regarding what was going on?

763
00:45:08,440 --> 00:45:12,119
Speaker 2: Specifically, one of the other sheriffs from a county near

764
00:45:12,199 --> 00:45:17,519
ours I had some pretty good contact with, and he's

765
00:45:17,840 --> 00:45:22,559
got quite a few nine one one calls and stories

766
00:45:22,800 --> 00:45:24,519
that he can tell, as well as a few of

767
00:45:24,559 --> 00:45:25,280
his debuties.

768
00:45:25,480 --> 00:45:30,000
Speaker 1: Were these encounters from this from this adjacent sheriff's department?

769
00:45:30,199 --> 00:45:32,760
Did they sound like they were pretty much identical to

770
00:45:32,800 --> 00:45:35,960
the same sort of thing that your department was running into.

771
00:45:37,320 --> 00:45:41,039
Speaker 2: Correct, especially the big ones, the big ones that we

772
00:45:41,039 --> 00:45:46,360
would run into. They had a pretty astonishing interaction with

773
00:45:46,400 --> 00:45:50,639
a large one that to me is still mind boggling.

774
00:45:50,679 --> 00:45:53,320
And I know it. I know it freaked him out.

775
00:45:54,639 --> 00:45:56,039
Speaker 1: Go into that if you wouldn't mind.

776
00:45:57,960 --> 00:46:03,000
Speaker 2: Yeah, So they were out on patrol and he had

777
00:46:03,079 --> 00:46:06,880
two deputies with him, and they got a nine to

778
00:46:06,920 --> 00:46:09,800
one one call and they went to go see what

779
00:46:09,920 --> 00:46:14,159
this thing was, and there it was, they flying near

780
00:46:14,199 --> 00:46:17,119
a house. So they went to pursue it. And as

781
00:46:17,159 --> 00:46:19,719
they were pursuing it down this gravel road again at

782
00:46:19,719 --> 00:46:23,159
paralleled it paralleled the roads as if haha, I see

783
00:46:23,199 --> 00:46:25,840
you you know, but still I'm going to play cat

784
00:46:25,880 --> 00:46:30,199
and mouse with you. And they ended up following it

785
00:46:30,280 --> 00:46:33,360
back to the highway and getting on the highway and

786
00:46:33,440 --> 00:46:35,960
started to pursue it from the highway and it paralleled

787
00:46:35,960 --> 00:46:39,480
the highway and that was the time where he had

788
00:46:39,519 --> 00:46:41,880
mentioned to me that he was basically going top speed

789
00:46:41,880 --> 00:46:46,320
of his suburban which was his patrol vehicle, and I

790
00:46:46,320 --> 00:46:48,480
think he mentioned he had topped it out almost near

791
00:46:48,519 --> 00:46:52,800
one twenty and they could catch it, but it was there.

792
00:46:53,920 --> 00:46:57,519
And as they finally come to a stop because it stopped,

793
00:46:57,559 --> 00:47:00,519
it had kind of veered off back towards the north

794
00:47:01,559 --> 00:47:04,239
off the highway and kind of hugged over a creek bed.

795
00:47:05,199 --> 00:47:08,800
And as they got out and went to go turn

796
00:47:08,880 --> 00:47:12,199
their spotlights on it to get a good look at it,

797
00:47:12,199 --> 00:47:15,599
it actually put a huge spotlight, if you want to

798
00:47:15,599 --> 00:47:20,119
call it, on them. And the sheriff had the two

799
00:47:20,159 --> 00:47:24,679
deputies with him, and they said it was just absolutely blinding.

800
00:47:24,719 --> 00:47:27,440
They had to look away, and the sheriff made the

801
00:47:27,480 --> 00:47:31,199
comment to me that when he looked to his left

802
00:47:31,239 --> 00:47:33,239
it and his right, it looked like it was daylight

803
00:47:33,239 --> 00:47:36,400
out for about two to three hundred yards in all directions,

804
00:47:37,599 --> 00:47:41,400
and it really freaked him out. And he did comment

805
00:47:41,440 --> 00:47:43,960
to me that this thing was huge and it probably

806
00:47:44,079 --> 00:47:48,960
was the size of his suburban, but it made no noise,

807
00:47:49,119 --> 00:47:55,039
it was quiet, and that spotlight, even if that's what

808
00:47:55,079 --> 00:47:59,000
it was, he said, it was blinding. It just what

809
00:47:59,079 --> 00:48:01,639
they went to do to to spotlight it to get

810
00:48:01,639 --> 00:48:03,559
a good view of what it was. It must have

811
00:48:03,639 --> 00:48:06,559
knew what was about to happen, because it spotlighted them

812
00:48:06,639 --> 00:48:08,880
right back. And it was overwhelming, he said.

813
00:48:09,119 --> 00:48:12,639
Speaker 1: And it wasn't say like from a Did you get

814
00:48:12,639 --> 00:48:14,639
the impression that it was brighter than say, like a

815
00:48:14,760 --> 00:48:17,400
night sun that you would see on a police helicopter.

816
00:48:19,960 --> 00:48:22,559
Speaker 2: Yeah, according to him, it lit the whole area up

817
00:48:22,599 --> 00:48:26,159
as if it was daylight. He could see all around him,

818
00:48:26,480 --> 00:48:30,599
and it was super super bright. I would even say

819
00:48:30,599 --> 00:48:33,360
that it was probably way more brighter than anything on

820
00:48:33,360 --> 00:48:34,000
a helicopter.

821
00:48:34,199 --> 00:48:37,639
Speaker 1: Did anyone report any sort of negative health effects or

822
00:48:38,039 --> 00:48:41,159
were there any reports of cattle becoming ill, say, like

823
00:48:41,199 --> 00:48:42,840
a week after any of this happened.

824
00:48:45,000 --> 00:48:49,000
Speaker 2: Not within my county. We didn't have any people showing

825
00:48:49,039 --> 00:48:53,960
signs of you know, some type of exhaust burn or

826
00:48:54,119 --> 00:48:56,639
radiation or anything like that. No, we didn't have none

827
00:48:56,679 --> 00:48:59,559
of that. And I don't think anything from cattle either.

828
00:49:00,039 --> 00:49:02,960
Speaker 1: Did any anyone from any of the federal agencies come

829
00:49:03,000 --> 00:49:07,079
to the county in person to investigate or to interact

830
00:49:07,360 --> 00:49:11,360
directly one on one with with the county sheriff.

831
00:49:12,920 --> 00:49:15,599
Speaker 2: To my knowledge, Note he never mentioned anything like that,

832
00:49:17,880 --> 00:49:20,679
neither neither was the other sheriff that I had just

833
00:49:20,760 --> 00:49:23,760
mentioned with his interaction. I don't think anybody ever showed

834
00:49:23,840 --> 00:49:26,960
up to his to his office. And I also I

835
00:49:26,960 --> 00:49:29,679
also want to make a comment with the that night

836
00:49:29,719 --> 00:49:32,840
when that thing blinded them the way it did, he

837
00:49:32,880 --> 00:49:36,159
did call down to the larger airport, which would be

838
00:49:36,159 --> 00:49:38,679
out of Grand Island, and they do have some fairly

839
00:49:38,760 --> 00:49:42,320
large flights come in and out of there from Las

840
00:49:42,480 --> 00:49:47,639
Vegas or Arizona down in right around Phoenix. And he

841
00:49:47,679 --> 00:49:50,639
called down there, you know, going, hey, are you guys

842
00:49:50,760 --> 00:49:54,440
picking anything up on your radar? And they told him no,

843
00:49:55,480 --> 00:50:00,840
But they, I believe their radar doesn't pick anything up

844
00:50:00,840 --> 00:50:05,280
below three thousand feet, So could it have been just

845
00:50:05,719 --> 00:50:09,960
below their radar, probably, but it still wasn't shown up

846
00:50:10,000 --> 00:50:12,079
on their radar, and it was according to him, it

847
00:50:12,119 --> 00:50:13,159
was big and it could move.

848
00:50:13,360 --> 00:50:16,400
Speaker 1: During this two week period, what would you estimate to

849
00:50:16,480 --> 00:50:19,199
be the total number of drones viewed in the county.

850
00:50:23,360 --> 00:50:26,519
Speaker 2: Well, if you count for the few times that we

851
00:50:26,519 --> 00:50:29,760
were seeing upwards of forty five to fifty at one

852
00:50:29,880 --> 00:50:34,559
night in that fourteen to seventeen days, I'd say it

853
00:50:34,599 --> 00:50:36,000
was pretty close to two hundred.

854
00:50:36,320 --> 00:50:39,440
Speaker 1: The drones, the smaller drones, How did those look like?

855
00:50:39,559 --> 00:50:42,360
Did you see any propellers or anything of that nature.

856
00:50:43,920 --> 00:50:46,880
Speaker 2: Yeah, So the one night that I had mentioned where

857
00:50:46,960 --> 00:50:51,440
the one deputy had seen forty five to fifty, my

858
00:50:51,559 --> 00:50:56,280
office manager she actually got in her vehicle when these

859
00:50:56,320 --> 00:50:59,039
things were near Arcadia to go kind of, you know,

860
00:50:59,440 --> 00:51:01,400
look at them, try and get a better look at them.

861
00:51:01,880 --> 00:51:04,000
And she had one of her kids with her in

862
00:51:04,000 --> 00:51:08,199
the backseat, and as they were leaving to go try

863
00:51:08,239 --> 00:51:11,480
and find these things, one actually just dropped down out

864
00:51:11,480 --> 00:51:15,599
of nowhere right in front of their windshield and stuck

865
00:51:15,679 --> 00:51:17,599
right with them as they were driving down the road,

866
00:51:17,639 --> 00:51:19,679
you know, at twenty five thirty miles an hour, and

867
00:51:19,719 --> 00:51:23,360
it just sat in front of their windshield. Freaked her out,

868
00:51:23,559 --> 00:51:25,559
and then it just shot back up into the air.

869
00:51:25,719 --> 00:51:28,000
And she did make the comment that it did have

870
00:51:28,199 --> 00:51:31,000
some propellers on it, but it was a small one.

871
00:51:31,119 --> 00:51:35,159
It was not very big at all. And the way

872
00:51:35,159 --> 00:51:37,599
that it just sat right in front of her windshield.

873
00:51:37,920 --> 00:51:41,119
You know, again, if this was a military operation, that's

874
00:51:41,840 --> 00:51:44,639
super super unheard of for the military to be doing

875
00:51:44,679 --> 00:51:48,480
that to you know, risk a civilian's life or to

876
00:51:48,599 --> 00:51:51,960
just be harassing a civilian in their vehicle like that,

877
00:51:52,000 --> 00:51:53,159
it just doesn't make any sense.

878
00:51:53,239 --> 00:51:56,360
Speaker 1: It doesn't make any sense. But also what doesn't make

879
00:51:56,360 --> 00:52:00,719
any sense about this to me is like you'll hear

880
00:52:01,079 --> 00:52:03,840
you've been hearing some former military folks that I think

881
00:52:03,880 --> 00:52:06,280
are doing it on behalf of the Pentagon, but for instance,

882
00:52:06,360 --> 00:52:10,599
the Langley drone incursions. You'll you'll hear them say, oh, well,

883
00:52:10,880 --> 00:52:13,679
maybe it was a Chinese ship sitting off the coast

884
00:52:13,679 --> 00:52:18,079
and that's where these things were coming from, or a

885
00:52:18,159 --> 00:52:21,519
base or something like that. You don't have any of

886
00:52:21,559 --> 00:52:26,599
that near your county, correct, I mean, there's no, no.

887
00:52:27,280 --> 00:52:31,599
Speaker 2: The only thing we have around here obviously we're it's Nebraska.

888
00:52:31,679 --> 00:52:35,079
We're right in the middle of the United States. We

889
00:52:35,159 --> 00:52:37,440
do have some pretty decent sized lakes, but there ain't

890
00:52:37,519 --> 00:52:41,159
no there ain't no huge cargo ships or aircraft carrier

891
00:52:41,199 --> 00:52:44,239
sitting out in Calumus Reservoir letting these things come off

892
00:52:44,280 --> 00:52:46,719
of them. They I don't know where they came from.

893
00:52:46,760 --> 00:52:49,400
They would show up unannounced, and they would leave unannounced.

894
00:52:49,920 --> 00:52:52,840
Any nights that we coordinated with other law enforcement to

895
00:52:52,880 --> 00:52:56,239
try and track which directions they would go, they'd just disappear.

896
00:52:57,320 --> 00:53:01,440
Speaker 1: The movement, the movement of these things did other than

897
00:53:01,480 --> 00:53:03,760
the one in the one story where you were talking about,

898
00:53:03,760 --> 00:53:06,880
where it clearly moved an incredible distance in a very

899
00:53:07,000 --> 00:53:11,280
short amount of time. Did their movement seem fairly normal

900
00:53:11,360 --> 00:53:14,800
or close to what a drone would how a drone

901
00:53:14,840 --> 00:53:19,719
would perform. Were there any other observed instances of instantaneous

902
00:53:19,760 --> 00:53:22,480
acceleration or hypersonic speeds?

903
00:53:24,440 --> 00:53:26,159
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, if you go back to that large

904
00:53:26,159 --> 00:53:31,719
one I saw fly past the Koop tower, for a

905
00:53:31,840 --> 00:53:37,360
drone to cover that distance, you know, again probably close

906
00:53:37,400 --> 00:53:39,239
to three quarters of a mile in two to three

907
00:53:39,280 --> 00:53:44,199
seconds with even no noise at all. I've never been

908
00:53:44,639 --> 00:53:47,239
around a drone that's capable of that, especially if it

909
00:53:47,320 --> 00:53:49,960
was as large as I was assuming it was, because

910
00:53:49,960 --> 00:53:53,639
it was a large light And did I see an

911
00:53:53,719 --> 00:53:59,639
actual size, No, but for it to have that size

912
00:53:59,639 --> 00:54:02,239
of light on it, it would have to be bigger

913
00:54:02,280 --> 00:54:06,639
than you know, a little tiny drone. The weight alone

914
00:54:06,679 --> 00:54:09,280
of a light like that would have to be pretty big.

915
00:54:09,559 --> 00:54:12,639
Speaker 1: Were there any reports of, say like a mother ship

916
00:54:12,760 --> 00:54:15,320
or anything that the smaller drones were going in and

917
00:54:15,360 --> 00:54:15,760
out of.

918
00:54:17,440 --> 00:54:20,159
Speaker 2: Well, if you go back to that night that I

919
00:54:20,199 --> 00:54:23,599
had just mentioned about the large one flying over the

920
00:54:23,599 --> 00:54:27,559
co op, you know, there was a report coming out

921
00:54:27,559 --> 00:54:31,719
of Scotia, I believe eleven to fifteen drones and these

922
00:54:31,760 --> 00:54:34,239
were considered smaller from a few of the people that

923
00:54:34,280 --> 00:54:37,599
were calling it in. But the minute this large looking

924
00:54:37,960 --> 00:54:43,920
light flew past me at crazy speeds, these things disappeared

925
00:54:43,920 --> 00:54:46,920
from Scotia. Now did they disappear in the direction of

926
00:54:47,000 --> 00:54:50,599
the larger one, I don't know, but they did disappear

927
00:54:51,159 --> 00:54:55,159
and there was nothing the rest of the night. I

928
00:54:55,159 --> 00:54:58,039
don't know if they flew to a different county or

929
00:54:58,119 --> 00:55:01,159
where they went, but yeah, they disappeared, so it could

930
00:55:01,159 --> 00:55:04,719
have Could it have been a mothership? Sure? But as

931
00:55:04,760 --> 00:55:06,840
far as if I know that directly known.

932
00:55:06,760 --> 00:55:11,440
Speaker 1: As a law enforcement professional, does how does this concern you?

933
00:55:14,480 --> 00:55:20,360
Speaker 2: Well, when you can't figure something out, whether it's coming

934
00:55:20,400 --> 00:55:24,880
from a case like this or you know, a murder investigation,

935
00:55:25,920 --> 00:55:28,519
you you want to get to the bottom of it

936
00:55:28,559 --> 00:55:33,519
because you want to bring, you know, justice to your

937
00:55:33,719 --> 00:55:37,239
your community. You want to give people a sense of relief.

938
00:55:38,280 --> 00:55:40,679
You never want to leave your community up in the

939
00:55:40,679 --> 00:55:45,760
air if you if you can, you know you you

940
00:55:45,840 --> 00:55:48,000
want them to know that you're there to do your

941
00:55:48,079 --> 00:55:51,320
job and that if it takes you ten years to

942
00:55:51,440 --> 00:55:57,320
solve the case, you're going to continue to work on it.

943
00:55:57,079 --> 00:56:01,599
It just it just irritates me from a military standpoint

944
00:56:01,599 --> 00:56:03,360
because I couldn't figure out what it was and I

945
00:56:03,400 --> 00:56:06,840
had to keep telling my community, hey, sorry, I don't

946
00:56:06,840 --> 00:56:08,559
know at this time, and I don't want them to

947
00:56:08,599 --> 00:56:10,719
think that I'm lying or that I'm trying to be

948
00:56:11,159 --> 00:56:13,599
I'm trying to put them off, because that's absolutely not

949
00:56:14,119 --> 00:56:17,360
what we were doing. We were very concerned about this

950
00:56:17,480 --> 00:56:23,159
stuff from the standpoint of if these things are a

951
00:56:23,199 --> 00:56:29,800
foreign nation, we're in trouble. From a tactical ground standpoint.

952
00:56:30,119 --> 00:56:32,679
If you look at what's going on in Ukraine and Russia,

953
00:56:33,719 --> 00:56:36,280
you know, what's to say that if this is a

954
00:56:36,360 --> 00:56:40,440
drone and it is from China or Iran or Russia,

955
00:56:41,239 --> 00:56:44,480
and they just put fifteen pounds a C four on

956
00:56:44,480 --> 00:56:46,360
one of these drones and fly it into one of

957
00:56:46,360 --> 00:56:50,159
our local ethanol plants, that has hundreds of pounds of chemicals.

958
00:56:50,840 --> 00:56:53,119
You're looking at a problem. You're looking at a real problem.

959
00:56:53,239 --> 00:56:56,519
Yes it's not a nuclear plant, but those chemicals can

960
00:56:56,639 --> 00:56:59,800
ruin soil. They can you know, obviously kill a lot

961
00:56:59,800 --> 00:57:04,199
of people from explosions. It just you could stop you

962
00:57:04,199 --> 00:57:07,760
could stop transportation from from trains that come in and

963
00:57:07,800 --> 00:57:10,840
out of here. With thousands and thousands of pounds of

964
00:57:10,840 --> 00:57:14,119
feed that's going out throughout the country to feed other animals,

965
00:57:14,599 --> 00:57:15,719
you've got a real problem.

966
00:57:16,519 --> 00:57:18,000
Speaker 1: And for.

967
00:57:19,559 --> 00:57:22,679
Speaker 2: The government, if you want to call it that, the military,

968
00:57:22,840 --> 00:57:26,440
the Depentagon, to just say, oh, we're looking into this,

969
00:57:26,559 --> 00:57:29,760
you know, don't worry about it. That's not a good answer.

970
00:57:30,239 --> 00:57:33,800
It's not And you know, if I take backlash from that,

971
00:57:34,000 --> 00:57:36,519
so be it. But I'm here for the community, I'm

972
00:57:36,519 --> 00:57:38,840
here for my country. So if I have to be

973
00:57:38,880 --> 00:57:42,519
the one that puts it out there more than some

974
00:57:42,599 --> 00:57:45,400
of the other folks are doing, you know, such such

975
00:57:45,400 --> 00:57:48,320
as yourself. You're you're doing what you're doing, which is awesome.

976
00:57:48,360 --> 00:57:50,599
That's why I reached out to you after I saw

977
00:57:50,639 --> 00:57:55,239
an interview with mister Mellen. So, yeah, it's it's concerning

978
00:57:55,320 --> 00:57:57,519
because we could have a real problem if you just

979
00:57:57,559 --> 00:58:00,000
look at what's going on in Ukraine and Russia.

980
00:58:00,400 --> 00:58:04,480
Speaker 1: If you were given information by the Pentagon that said

981
00:58:05,599 --> 00:58:08,639
these things are not from here, and by what I

982
00:58:08,679 --> 00:58:11,280
mean by that is the Pentagon were to say, we

983
00:58:11,320 --> 00:58:14,360
don't know where they're from, we don't think they're from

984
00:58:14,760 --> 00:58:21,119
any human origin, and we're concerned about them. As a

985
00:58:21,239 --> 00:58:25,880
public law enforcement official, in your mind, would that be

986
00:58:26,000 --> 00:58:30,320
something that would be justifiable in not telling the public

987
00:58:30,360 --> 00:58:33,519
about it, or do you think it's better to be

988
00:58:33,599 --> 00:58:39,519
truthful with the public even if it's not good news.

989
00:58:40,880 --> 00:58:42,719
Speaker 2: Well, I think the public has a right to know.

990
00:58:43,320 --> 00:58:47,199
They do pay our salaries. That's why we're here. Whether

991
00:58:47,239 --> 00:58:49,639
you're a cop or you're a soldier or an airman

992
00:58:49,800 --> 00:58:52,760
or a Pentagon official, you know, the citizens of the

993
00:58:52,880 --> 00:58:55,880
United States are paying you. So whether it's a hey,

994
00:58:56,039 --> 00:58:57,880
we don't know what it is, but it's not from

995
00:58:57,960 --> 00:59:01,039
here that we do know. But as of right now

996
00:59:01,079 --> 00:59:03,400
we can't tell you other things because it's a matter

997
00:59:03,440 --> 00:59:07,920
of national security, then that's fine, but at least at

998
00:59:08,000 --> 00:59:10,960
least let us know something of what this is, so

999
00:59:12,000 --> 00:59:14,920
you know we're not doing what we're doing right now

1000
00:59:15,440 --> 00:59:17,920
where it's oh, we'll get back to you on that

1001
00:59:18,239 --> 00:59:21,079
or that's not a big deal, don't worry about it.

1002
00:59:21,880 --> 00:59:25,000
That's that's not how you know, a democracy in a

1003
00:59:25,039 --> 00:59:26,559
constitutional or public works.

1004
00:59:26,599 --> 00:59:29,079
Speaker 1: Would it be fair to say in your view that

1005
00:59:29,400 --> 00:59:32,760
the way that the government of the United States, in

1006
00:59:32,800 --> 00:59:36,519
particular the Pentagon, the way that they are treating this

1007
00:59:37,079 --> 00:59:40,039
and the information that they are given or that they

1008
00:59:40,079 --> 00:59:44,880
are giving local law enforcement, that the way that they

1009
00:59:44,920 --> 00:59:49,119
are handling this is a is a direct threat to

1010
00:59:49,159 --> 00:59:49,960
public safety.

1011
00:59:51,960 --> 00:59:54,920
Speaker 2: Absolutely, yeah, it is. I mean, just going back to

1012
00:59:54,639 --> 00:59:57,679
the side of it where I had mentioned, you know,

1013
00:59:57,760 --> 01:00:00,519
we we at our level were not only worried about

1014
01:00:00,559 --> 01:00:03,719
what these things we're doing interacting with our community, but

1015
01:00:03,800 --> 01:00:07,360
we also were looking at, hey, what happens if six

1016
01:00:07,440 --> 01:00:10,000
hundred people of our local populists go out tonight at

1017
01:00:10,039 --> 01:00:12,559
ten o'clock at night and start driving around in their

1018
01:00:12,599 --> 01:00:15,119
vehicles and are running stop signs trying to find these things,

1019
01:00:15,119 --> 01:00:18,400
and now we have twelve additional car accidents that could

1020
01:00:18,440 --> 01:00:21,280
be life threatening accidents. You know, that's the stuff that

1021
01:00:21,320 --> 01:00:24,199
we also think about, not only just what are these

1022
01:00:24,199 --> 01:00:27,920
things in the sky, but hey, the populace could also

1023
01:00:28,039 --> 01:00:31,039
be harmed in this way from this action, you know,

1024
01:00:31,840 --> 01:00:37,440
So it just it shouldn't be where we're at with

1025
01:00:37,480 --> 01:00:40,599
this right now. There's just too much going on in

1026
01:00:40,639 --> 01:00:43,840
the world to just be this lacks of daisical with it.

1027
01:00:43,880 --> 01:00:50,559
Whether it's coming from a different world dimension, you know, China,

1028
01:00:51,400 --> 01:00:54,199
it doesn't matter to me where it's from. Let's figure

1029
01:00:54,239 --> 01:00:56,719
out what it is, and the people of the United

1030
01:00:56,719 --> 01:00:57,679
States have a right to know.

1031
01:00:58,039 --> 01:01:01,400
Speaker 1: I could. I couldn't agree more more that since this

1032
01:01:01,440 --> 01:01:04,280
has happened, does this topic ever come back up in

1033
01:01:04,320 --> 01:01:08,920
conversation with locals, either be the civilians or your fellow

1034
01:01:09,280 --> 01:01:12,639
law enforcement colleagues. Is it a topic of conversation?

1035
01:01:13,760 --> 01:01:17,559
Speaker 2: I would say every week. You're mentioning it every week.

1036
01:01:18,760 --> 01:01:21,239
Even some of my local family members that live around

1037
01:01:21,280 --> 01:01:24,119
here that are, you know, up at the hospital or

1038
01:01:24,239 --> 01:01:28,599
they work for the fire and ems. Sometimes I'll have people,

1039
01:01:28,760 --> 01:01:31,039
one of them come up to me, you know, hey, dude,

1040
01:01:31,039 --> 01:01:34,239
what whatever come about this? You know from four years ago?

1041
01:01:34,519 --> 01:01:38,639
Did anything ever happen with this? And it's I'm still

1042
01:01:38,679 --> 01:01:41,440
looking into it, and that side of it I am

1043
01:01:41,480 --> 01:01:44,920
not lying about. I'm actually being truthful. I'm still pursuing this.

1044
01:01:46,079 --> 01:01:50,599
I'm doing it from the work standpoint of it as

1045
01:01:50,599 --> 01:01:53,760
we sit here today. But I also take time out

1046
01:01:53,760 --> 01:01:56,360
of my day, you know, on a personal level to

1047
01:01:57,239 --> 01:02:02,679
reach out to people or to interview new witnesses. So

1048
01:02:03,639 --> 01:02:06,960
our local are one of our local reporters here with

1049
01:02:06,960 --> 01:02:08,599
the ord Quiz. I just talked to her a couple

1050
01:02:08,639 --> 01:02:12,519
of days ago, and she was absolutely excited that I

1051
01:02:12,559 --> 01:02:15,199
had reached out to you, and you know that we

1052
01:02:15,199 --> 01:02:18,599
were in contact because she's still wanting to know more,

1053
01:02:18,639 --> 01:02:25,199
she's still looking into it. So yeah, it's it still

1054
01:02:25,199 --> 01:02:27,519
brought up quite a bit around here, There's no doubt

1055
01:02:27,519 --> 01:02:27,960
about that.

1056
01:02:28,719 --> 01:02:32,920
Speaker 1: Was there any video or photos? Were there any videos

1057
01:02:33,000 --> 01:02:36,679
or photos recovered of these vehicles during any of your investigation?

1058
01:02:38,239 --> 01:02:42,800
Speaker 2: Yeah, there was a photo. Well, there was a video

1059
01:02:42,840 --> 01:02:46,639
and a couple photos sent to me one night by

1060
01:02:46,679 --> 01:02:51,079
a local who they're good people, you know, they mind

1061
01:02:51,119 --> 01:02:54,960
their own business, and they had they had called me

1062
01:02:55,000 --> 01:02:56,719
and said, hey, man, where are you at. We got

1063
01:02:56,719 --> 01:03:00,360
this thing out here. We're trying to have, if you

1064
01:03:00,400 --> 01:03:02,960
want to call it, a party. They had a bonfire

1065
01:03:03,039 --> 01:03:06,760
going and stuff near their house. And yeah, this thing

1066
01:03:06,880 --> 01:03:10,039
was flying above them, not more than maybe thirty feet.

1067
01:03:10,159 --> 01:03:15,960
It was by itself, and the way he described it,

1068
01:03:15,960 --> 01:03:18,199
it wasn't even a light. It was just like a

1069
01:03:18,360 --> 01:03:22,719
solid blue object. But it was dark out, so that

1070
01:03:22,880 --> 01:03:26,599
made it weird. Plus they had their fire going, but

1071
01:03:26,679 --> 01:03:30,159
yet this thing was still showing like a blue color.

1072
01:03:31,360 --> 01:03:35,039
And he sent me the video of that through text message,

1073
01:03:35,119 --> 01:03:37,440
and when I started looking at it, I'm just going,

1074
01:03:38,360 --> 01:03:44,920
that is weird. I mean, first off, the FAA, where's there?

1075
01:03:46,079 --> 01:03:49,159
You know, what's the regulations on that? And why is

1076
01:03:49,199 --> 01:03:52,320
this thing at thirty feet flying over a guy's house

1077
01:03:52,360 --> 01:03:54,760
when it's kids, wife and kids are outside playing And

1078
01:03:54,840 --> 01:03:58,280
you can even hear in the video is his kid going, wow,

1079
01:03:58,360 --> 01:04:01,519
look at that? What is that? And it kind of

1080
01:04:01,559 --> 01:04:06,159
just slowly moves off and disappeared. It just was gone.

1081
01:04:07,079 --> 01:04:08,800
But the way he described it, and even in the

1082
01:04:08,840 --> 01:04:11,400
way the video was, it wasn't a light. It was

1083
01:04:11,440 --> 01:04:14,760
just a solid blue object in the sky. It was

1084
01:04:14,800 --> 01:04:20,599
so weird. And I actually did send that to the

1085
01:04:20,639 --> 01:04:24,920
New York Times journalist and she thought it was pretty

1086
01:04:24,920 --> 01:04:29,320
weird too, So I think one of her exact texts

1087
01:04:29,320 --> 01:04:34,360
to me was, drones don't move and operate like that.

1088
01:04:34,360 --> 01:04:35,880
That's you know, that's weird.

1089
01:04:36,039 --> 01:04:38,559
Speaker 1: Do you still have those videos in your possession?

1090
01:04:40,159 --> 01:04:43,840
Speaker 2: Not not now? Because of I changed over to the

1091
01:04:43,880 --> 01:04:46,400
police department instead of the Sheriff's office, and any of

1092
01:04:46,400 --> 01:04:51,079
that stuff was on the U the cell phone with

1093
01:04:51,159 --> 01:04:54,760
the Sheriff's office. I did. I did reach out to

1094
01:04:54,800 --> 01:04:56,840
a deputy over there to see if it was still

1095
01:04:56,840 --> 01:05:00,400
on the phone. And I assume when I had left

1096
01:05:00,679 --> 01:05:04,400
the department, you know, they either move everything to their

1097
01:05:04,519 --> 01:05:06,920
database or put it somewhere else, But it was no

1098
01:05:06,960 --> 01:05:09,079
longer on that phone because I no longer was in

1099
01:05:09,159 --> 01:05:10,239
possession of that phone.

1100
01:05:10,360 --> 01:05:13,320
Speaker 1: I understand that you went to the nine one one

1101
01:05:13,320 --> 01:05:16,519
call center to look for some of the records regarding

1102
01:05:16,559 --> 01:05:20,159
this and they weren't there. Is that correct?

1103
01:05:21,559 --> 01:05:25,559
Speaker 2: A little bit of it is, But the amount of

1104
01:05:25,679 --> 01:05:28,280
nine to one one calls that we had, I think

1105
01:05:28,280 --> 01:05:32,920
I have it right here. Actually, yeah, so I have

1106
01:05:33,000 --> 01:05:37,199
the I have the call logs right here, and they

1107
01:05:38,280 --> 01:05:40,639
obviously there was a lot more nine one one calls.

1108
01:05:41,440 --> 01:05:44,840
So I do have my regional dispatch still looking up

1109
01:05:45,000 --> 01:05:48,679
more of that stuff, and I should have actual uh

1110
01:05:49,039 --> 01:05:52,159
nine one one recordings next week.

1111
01:05:52,960 --> 01:05:56,159
Speaker 1: Fantastic, But I understand that some of some of the

1112
01:05:56,199 --> 01:05:59,519
information looks like it was physically removed from the nine

1113
01:05:59,599 --> 01:06:01,159
one one call center? Is that correct?

1114
01:06:02,960 --> 01:06:05,800
Speaker 2: Not at not at the regional level, But at my

1115
01:06:06,079 --> 01:06:11,159
level out of the dispatch at the Sheriff's office, I

1116
01:06:11,440 --> 01:06:14,360
couldn't find them. I don't know where they were at

1117
01:06:14,800 --> 01:06:16,960
as far as where they got moved to. They could

1118
01:06:16,960 --> 01:06:20,840
have been moved to a different location because things get

1119
01:06:20,880 --> 01:06:24,639
moved around, so they could still be there, but when

1120
01:06:24,639 --> 01:06:27,719
I searched for them, I couldn't. I couldn't find them.

1121
01:06:28,039 --> 01:06:31,679
Speaker 1: Well, Chief Grooms, I really appreciate, we really appreciate you

1122
01:06:31,760 --> 01:06:35,920
coming on our show sharing your story. This is clearly

1123
01:06:35,920 --> 01:06:39,039
a threat to public safety. The way that the Pentagon

1124
01:06:39,599 --> 01:06:42,960
and the federal government is handling this is a clear

1125
01:06:43,280 --> 01:06:48,159
threat to public safety. But you know, I must applaud

1126
01:06:48,639 --> 01:06:54,559
your your bravery and clearly putting country before self, service

1127
01:06:54,639 --> 01:06:58,559
before self and coming out and talking about this without

1128
01:06:58,960 --> 01:07:02,800
without fear of you Ushians or the stigma. We need

1129
01:07:02,840 --> 01:07:07,599
more law enforcement officials, people from the government like yourself

1130
01:07:07,679 --> 01:07:11,360
that you know, frankly, just have the guts to come

1131
01:07:11,360 --> 01:07:13,639
out and say this is wrong. The way that this

1132
01:07:13,800 --> 01:07:17,960
is being handled. This is a threat to public safety

1133
01:07:18,320 --> 01:07:20,760
in the way that it's being handled. And I just

1134
01:07:21,000 --> 01:07:23,880
I can't thank you enough for going public with this.

1135
01:07:24,440 --> 01:07:28,400
It from how you're describing it, these clearly are not

1136
01:07:29,920 --> 01:07:34,440
something that we understand. And as you mentioned, there are

1137
01:07:34,440 --> 01:07:37,239
no military assets in the area, there are no nuclear

1138
01:07:37,280 --> 01:07:40,599
assets in the area. From a tactical point of view,

1139
01:07:40,679 --> 01:07:46,440
it makes absolutely no sense why two hundred things appearing

1140
01:07:46,480 --> 01:07:50,760
as drones or not really appearing as drones would be

1141
01:07:50,840 --> 01:07:54,519
operating in that environment. It just I can't think of

1142
01:07:54,559 --> 01:07:56,320
a reason why that would be happening.

1143
01:07:57,639 --> 01:08:01,159
Speaker 2: Yes, especially you know, from if you want to talk

1144
01:08:01,159 --> 01:08:06,719
about top secret technology, what are they doing flying over

1145
01:08:06,760 --> 01:08:11,199
a small town Nebraska and interacting with the populace if

1146
01:08:11,239 --> 01:08:14,719
you're wanting to keep it a secret. It just yeah,

1147
01:08:14,760 --> 01:08:18,319
like you said, it makes no sense. It just doesn't.

1148
01:08:18,359 --> 01:08:22,800
And then from that national security standpoint, if it is

1149
01:08:22,880 --> 01:08:27,960
one of our enemies or it's from somewhere else, what

1150
01:08:28,039 --> 01:08:34,600
are they doing here? Are they recounting our infrastructure to

1151
01:08:34,640 --> 01:08:38,239
cause harm later down the road, or are they just

1152
01:08:39,319 --> 01:08:42,880
here trying to figure out what we are? I don't know,

1153
01:08:43,000 --> 01:08:47,319
but somebody needs to get it figured out. And it

1154
01:08:47,319 --> 01:08:49,840
seems like nobody wants to do anything about it other

1155
01:08:49,920 --> 01:08:53,279
than people like yourself and you know, Grush and Melon

1156
01:08:53,359 --> 01:08:57,560
and all those guys. So in lou he seems to

1157
01:08:57,560 --> 01:09:01,319
be really having a train wreck of people wanted to

1158
01:09:01,359 --> 01:09:05,640
bother him and cause him issues, and it just that

1159
01:09:06,000 --> 01:09:09,560
right there tells you that there's something to it and

1160
01:09:09,600 --> 01:09:12,439
that we're not all seeing mass hysteria. I read an

1161
01:09:12,520 --> 01:09:17,800
article that just irritated me with Oh, it's just mass hysteria,

1162
01:09:18,039 --> 01:09:20,159
and I'm like, no, no, it's not, Bud. Why don't

1163
01:09:20,159 --> 01:09:21,920
you do your job and come out here and interview

1164
01:09:21,960 --> 01:09:22,760
some of us.

1165
01:09:23,079 --> 01:09:26,840
Speaker 1: We we are not living in a democracy when the

1166
01:09:26,880 --> 01:09:31,199
federal government and elements of the federal government and security

1167
01:09:31,239 --> 01:09:37,439
contractors working for our defense outfits are threatening the lives

1168
01:09:37,439 --> 01:09:41,520
of people. That that's that's that's not what our founding

1169
01:09:41,560 --> 01:09:45,680
fathers intended for this nation. And frankly, it's it's an

1170
01:09:45,720 --> 01:09:50,760
abomination of democracy that this is going on and has

1171
01:09:50,840 --> 01:09:54,840
been going on for quite some time. It's it's it's

1172
01:09:55,119 --> 01:09:58,319
really really maddening. Well, a Chief Grooms again, thank you

1173
01:09:58,399 --> 01:10:00,600
very much for joining us, and we look for to

1174
01:10:01,560 --> 01:10:05,279
hearing any further information, and I don't know, hopefully we'll

1175
01:10:05,399 --> 01:10:08,359
hear more of you, perhaps testifying in front of Congress

1176
01:10:08,920 --> 01:10:13,800
or something of that nature, because I think our elected

1177
01:10:13,880 --> 01:10:18,560
officials need to be fully aware of your experience and

1178
01:10:18,640 --> 01:10:22,880
the experience of your your law enforcement colleagues, because this

1179
01:10:23,279 --> 01:10:28,520
clearly is is, this isn't good, It really is not awesome,

1180
01:10:28,560 --> 01:10:29,000
and here.

1181
01:10:28,840 --> 01:10:32,000
Speaker 2: We are four years later and it's still they're giving

1182
01:10:32,079 --> 01:10:32,840
us the run around.

1183
01:10:33,079 --> 01:10:35,880
Speaker 1: Absolutely Okay, well, Chief Grooms, thank you very much for

1184
01:10:35,960 --> 01:10:38,239
joining us. We really appreciate your time, your bravery, and

1185
01:10:38,279 --> 01:10:39,520
your service to country.

1186
01:11:00,279 --> 01:11:02,520
Speaker 2: Lest Tuesday, stay expla