The Gulf Breeze Sightings, Part 1, "Zeehass, Step Forward."


This post is an update from 2011. Several of my online source links no longer function. In the 1980s, these sightings were oft in the news, dividing the UFO community into pro- or anti-Ed Walters story.

The Gulf Breeze Sightings: The Most Astounding Multiple Sightings of UFOs in U.S. History,  Ed and Frances Walters, William Morrow & Co., 1990.

And several emails between myself and Don Ware, the MUFON State Director for Florida at the time. He and two other Field Investigators researched the Gulf Breeze case as soon as Ed Walters decided to take his story to the public.

The first UFO intrusions

Walter Andrus, state director of MUFON studied the case for three years. His conclusions were: “The overwhelming evidence is in. Gulf Breeze is indeed one of the most incredible cases in modern UFO history.”

I couldn’t agree more. As I re-read the book, viewed the photos, and considered the people who were drawn into the investigation, I thought, “This is a slam dunk. Stunningly documented and convincing.” But that was in ’87 and ’88. In 1990, the hew and cry of hoax arose in Gulf Breeze that still divides the community today. I was totally shocked as I perused the events of 1990 on the web. However, as I peeled back the layers of accusation, I discovered some interesting developments and statements that you may never have heard.

Since there are so many summaries of the book on the blogosphere today, I’ll try to point out what I thought was extra interesting as I recap the original story. Ed and Fran Walters had spent time in Costa Rica as a kind of life adventure, so he knew a little Spanish. That is important because Ed’s alien stalkers and some of their abductees seem to speak Spanish with South American slang. He quickly developed a telepathic connection with the ship and its occupants.

They first appeared on his personal radar on Nov. 11, 1989. He was in his home office, working on a construction project, when he saw something strange out the window. He ran out with his old Polaroid camera and snapped a picture of it as it played peek-a-boo behind a pine tree.

It was as big as the houses and three times as high. It had portholes. It hit him with a paralyzing blue light that almost lifted him into the craft. When he mentally resisted, they assured him that they would not hurt him. They told him to calm down and tried to assist in getting him to cooperate by flashing visions of dogs in his head. He thinks that a small plane flying by in the vicinity saved him from being abducted, but when he got back to the house, he smelled like ammonia and cinnamon. Considering that the abduction phenomenon was only a couple of decades old, the vision of dogs and the odd smell are two details that I doubt anyone would invent, yet they are consistent with future abduction lore.

The UFO stalked Ed and his family for about 7 months, at least in the book. They wanted him on their craft for tests. On the second encounter, they showed him naked women and tempted him with a female voice assuring him that they hadn’t been hurt, they were going home now, and that he couldn’t resist them forever. In that one ploy there were 5 clever psychological applications. A) Come on board to see naked women. B) We didn’t hurt them, although we have the power to. They are going home now, and so will you. C) Resistance is futile. We always get our way. D) We can smite you with paralyzing blue beams, but we can also stalk you telepathically. This is classic alien behavior.

What did they want?

What they seemed to want most from Ed was his capitulation. They plagued him with visits to his back yard, commands to step forward, commands to not take pictures while they practically posed in his back yard, etc. They assured him he was in danger and they only wanted to help. They gave him a nickname, Zeehass. Someone suggested that it was the Spanish word for eyebrows, cejas. They just wanted to do a few simple tests. Nothing harmful. No reason to resist.

But Ed did resist over the months. It's important to note that his wife seemed to have some weird and unusual capacity to shield him from total vulnerability to their plans. Ed took over 40 pictures in those months. He alerted the press and the Mutual UFO Network. At first, he pretended the messages were from Mr. X, but eventually everyone in town figured it out.

The Gulf Breeze crafts were also essentially thumbing their noses (if they have any) at the 3 Naval bases in the region. You want mind control, secret experiments, and psychological ops? Hey, look what we can do, and you can’t stop us! Don’t think for a millisecond that the Navy wasn’t interested in the taunting UFO’s.

Friends and supporters

Ed wasn’t the only one seeing UFOs on the Gulf coast during the winter of ’87 to ’88. An anonymous observer named Believer Bill and another named Jane also took photos that were published in the Sentinel. Many reports, photos, and videos began to flow in. So many people saw the UFOs that the town named it Bubba. Duane Cook, editor of the Sentinel, was with Ed when he took one of his photos. Duane actually pulled the photo from the camera. Unsolved Mysteries TV documentary turned up about 170 other witnesses. Some saw alien creatures as Ed did, 6 reported blue beams, 9 reported missing time (p. 347).

MUFON showed up with three investigators, all of whom were supportive of Ed’s case. The State Director Don Ware coordinated the activities of seven local MUFON investigators. They handed the photos to physicist and UFO researcher Bruce Maccabee, who could find no fault with the photos. An outside lab investigated them. Abductee researcher Budd Hopkins helped Ed realize that he may have been an abductee in his youth. A special Nimslo 3-D camera and a stereo camera using 2 Polaroid 600 LMS’s helped produce the 41 images by Ed. Last but not least, Ed passed two lie detectors.

Ed finally caves

On May 1, 1988, Ed Walters gave it up. His daughter was asleep. His wife was out of town. He went out to the park and called to the pesky aliens to take him and get it over with. They did.

There was a white flash in his head. Then he awoke about 2:25 a.m. on the sand several feet away from where he knew he had been. His head pounded and he was dizzy. His hands reeked so badly that it made him sick. Back at home he had to wrap them to block the stench. He spent the rest of the night beside his daughter’s bedroom door to make sure she was OK. Around daybreak he fell into bed and slept until noon.

Ed wrote in his book that as he combed his hair, he noticed a bruise at the back of his neck. Puzzled, he went to the mirror. “A large bruise, with a red dot in the center, was prominent between my eyes right at the bridge of my nose. Two more similar red marks were centered on my temples, surrounded by a bruise. I was shocked. What the hell had they done to me?”

The six-figure book deal brings howls of protest

Wherever MUFON goes, the debunkers and skeptics follow. They are on all the talk shows, they write articles and blogs, and they do esoteric research to prove the falseness of every claim. Gulf Breeze was no exception. When the TV documentaries appeared, it was clear to the debunkers that Ed was just a bright, creative attention-seeker. When the book deal was signed, that was proof that it was all about money. This development surprises no one.

However, when I began to google the web to find a follow-up on the Walters, I was shocked at the howls of foul that arose in 1990. Even MUFON began to have doubts.

To be continued: Amazing accusations, and Don Ware’s unpublished perspective.

You'll also find Part 2 here, "Ed Just Loves Attention."  The Gulf Breeze Sightings, Part 2, Ed Just Loves Attention (janetkatherinesmith.blogspot.com) 

Part 1 can also be seen on Medium: New story – Medium

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