585: Operation Prato | Alien Vampires of the Amazon
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This is the sound of my husband loving me enough to get a CPAP for his sleep apnea. Good sleep is a turn-on with a ResMed CPAP. Simply Air. Learn more at loveisintheair.com. In the late 1970s, all across South America, farmers were finding their animals mutilated.

The wounds were precise: surgical cuts, puncture holes, and burns. Major organs were missing. The bodies were drained of blood. Something was terrorizing the continent. But on a remote Brazilian island called Calares, the pattern changed. Three things made the Calares animal attacks unique. One, there were witnesses. Two, there were pictures. And three, the animals were people.

Dr. Williade Carvalho stared at the burns on her patient's chest. Perfect circles, burned tissue. Inside each circle, puncture marks grouped together like needle holes.

After six months as Kalade's only doctor, Carvalho knew what to expect on an island of 2,000 people. Farming accidents, fishing injuries, colds. Animal bites were the most exotic cases she'd treated. She wasn't prepared for any of this. More UFOs in Brazil? Oh yeah, Brazil has a lot of UFO activity. Maybe even more than the U.S. I guess there's more to Brazil than just barbecue and bikini waxes. There is. And booties. Okay.

The fishermen saw them first, bright objects shooting in and out of Marajo Bay without disturbing the water. They raced across the sky and disappeared into the jungle. Local pilots saw them too. Their instruments failed whenever the objects appeared. Some described cylinders, others saw cones or discs. All were bright. Within weeks, more UFOs appeared. At first, just sightings. Then the phenomenon became more interactive. The UFOs waged an all-out assault on the island.

Dr. Carvalho's 40th patient lay before her. All victims had similar injuries: burns, incisions, punctures. Most were women. Most attacks happened at night. Their stories sounded crazy but were identical. It always started with the ceiling glowing orange.

One victim described it like a cigar held to paper. The light intensified. Then a hole opened in the ceiling. Victims could see stars through it. The alien ray guns burned through the roof? No, people said the ceiling started to shimmer, and then they could see through the opening, but it was wavy like looking through water. Ah, phase-shifting technology. Probably. Next, colored lights would hit parts of their body, usually the left side of their chest. Then, paralysis. Complete immobility. They couldn't even scream.

They felt blood being drained from their bodies. They gave the lights a name, Chupa Chupa, bloodsuckers. When people told Dr. Carvalho they felt blood being sucked from their bodies by beams of light, she dismissed it as trauma. But blood tests confirmed it. Every victim had low blood counts, even without traces of bleeding.

Whatever was doing this wasn't using any medical tool Dr. Carvalho recognized. She took patients to Belen, a city two hours away. Doctors there were equally baffled. The burns appeared in seconds, but took weeks to heal. Brain scans showed unusual activity patterns no one could explain.

Half the residents fled the island. Those who stayed lit bonfires. They set off fireworks. Bonfires and fireworks? Oh, they were celebrating the arrival of the new alien overlords? No, they were trying to scare them off. If you can shoot laser beams through invisible roof holes, you're probably not going to flinch at a few bottle rockets roaming candles. The lights weren't afraid. They even shot at them with hunting rifles. Nothing worked.

After treating strange injuries all night, Dr. Carvalho got a call from Belen. Two of her patients had died. Official cause? Unknown. She begged local authorities for help, but they were overwhelmed. Police increased patrols. The lights kept coming. The island transformed into a prison of fear. Fishermen refused to go out. Farmers abandoned their fields. The economy collapsed.

It is hard in the economy when people can't go to work. It is. Well, at least on this island they chose to stay home. Imagine if the government forced you to close your business. Devastating. Okay, I see what you... Imagine what would happen to the economy if they shut it down for two years. Ooh, mama, that would be devastating and unconstitutional. Now is not the time... Two weeks to flatten the curve of my dorsal fin! You got that out of your system? Sorry, sorry, sorry. I got triggered. Uh, go ahead. What happened next?

The mayor finally called the Air Force. His island was under attack. People were hurt. Two were dead. He was put on hold, and a different voice picked up. He asked if victims had experienced blood loss or tissue damage like burns or punctures. When the mayor confirmed, they promised to send investigators. The mayor exploded. He didn't want investigators. He wanted fighter jets, missiles. He wanted these things destroyed.

The Air Force officer was not surprised at the mayor's description. He'd heard it all before. A special unit arrived the next day, except they didn't bring weapons. They brought cameras. Captain Olanda's Air Force team arrived with sophisticated equipment: telescopes, infrared sensors, high-speed cameras. They set up observation posts along the beach, working rotating shifts to document every incident.

The military told local media this was a routine investigation. The talk of UFOs were rumors. There were no flying saucers. The lights were probably birds or planes. Satellites, weather balloons, swamp gas. Right. The Air Force said they weren't looking for UFOs. They were just there to secure the island. But if they weren't looking for UFOs, why did they call this Operation Prato?

Pronto is the Portuguese word for plate, or dish, or saucer. Olanda's orders were to debunk the story. Simple mass hysteria, he thought. Poor farmers and fishermen were seeing satellites or birds. Oh yeah, you gotta watch out for the laser beam-shooting vampire birds of Brazil. They're very crafty. Olanda didn't know. The people on Calares were poor and unsophisticated. This was probably a local legend being blown out of proportion. But then Olanda's team saw the lights.

Night after night, objects performed impossible maneuvers. Olanda was an experienced pilot. He knew what planes could do. These weren't planes. The lights hovered silently, then accelerated faster than any aircraft he'd ever seen. They tracked objects diving into Marajo Bay at high speed, making no splash, leaving no wake. Minutes later, the same object would appear over the jungle behind them.

The team began to recognize patterns. The objects went from the water to the jungle, then to the villages. These lights were operated by something intelligent. The attacks continued. Olanda saw it with his own eyes. Women would try to hide, but the light followed them. Once hit, they were paralyzed.

While the village was under attack, other lights hovered over Olanda's team. He felt like they were being watched or guarded. He tested his theory and moved their camp. The lights followed. As weeks passed, the evidence mounted. The team documented electromagnetic interference whenever the objects appeared. Their compasses spun wildly. Radio equipment failed. Even the military's sophisticated tracking devices malfunctioned. This was not mass hysteria. This was real.

After four months, Operation Saucer had assembled over 2,000 pages of documents and scientific data. Captain Olanda believed they were close to understanding the phenomenon. The team mapped the lights' patterns, documented their capabilities, and even predicted their appearances with increasing accuracy.

But these were still just lights. Not a single member of the team ever saw a solid craft. They took hundreds of photos and shot 16 hours of film, but the results were frustrating. Distant red and yellow spheres, most frames were overexposed and useless. When Olanda sent his reports to regional air command, he told the truth. Something strange was happening in Colades, he just couldn't prove it. The Air Force was not going to respond to lights in the sky, not in 1977.

This was the height of Operation Condor. Brazilian military had to be careful. The CIA was everywhere. Hold on, hold on, hold on. You just took a hard left turn and this ball doesn't have an old shit handle. What do American spokes have to do with this? Operation Condor was a secret alliance of military dictatorships in South America designed to crush political opposition. Brazil's government was deep in it. They were sharing intelligence with Argentina, Chile, and Paraguay.

They work together on covert operations like coups and assassinations, all paid for by... The CIA. Right. The lights might be a classified American operation. Oh, you mean like flying drones around military bases and pretending you don't know what they are? Kind of like that, yeah. Uh-huh. If the Brazilian Air Force took out an American asset and disrupted a CIA op, the consequences would be severe.

Olanda needed hard evidence. He had nothing, just hundreds of images of pure white. One night he was sitting in his office going through the photos, frustrated. He knew there had to be something there, but whatever it was, the camera couldn't see it. Then Olanda looked at the flashlight on his desk, then back at the white photo, then back at the flashlight. Captain Olanda had an idea.

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Thank you.

Oh, yeah.

This is the sound of my husband loving me enough to get a CPAP for his sleep apnea so we can sleep together.

Good sleep is a turn-on with a ResMed CPAP. Simply air. It works overnight for that desirable, well-rested feeling. Learn more at loveisintheair.com. Results may vary. See website for details and important information. This is the sound of my husband loving me enough to get a CPAP for his sleep apnea. Good sleep is a turn-on with a ResMed CPAP. Simply air. Learn more at loveisintheair.com.

Oh, yeah. This is the sound of my husband loving me enough to get a CPAP for his sleep apnea so we can sleep together. Good sleep is a turn-on with a ResMed CPAP. Simply Air. It works overnight for that desirable, well-rested feeling. Learn more at loveisintheair.com. Results may vary. See website for details and important information.

Captain Olanda's team had sophisticated cameras, night vision devices, and state-of-the-art telescopes. Over four months, they documented every strange light and unexplained object. The capturing proof was harder than they expected. The team shot over 500 photographs and 16 hours of film. Some showed only lights, distant blurry spheres of red and yellow. Most frames were completely blown out, pure white. As Captain Olanda examined one of these pictures, he saw the flashlight on his desk and had an idea.

What if instead of examining the finished photograph, he examined the negative? He thought about how doctors hold x-rays up to a lighted board. He tried the same technique. He enlarged the negatives, which looked pure black, but they weren't. When Olanda held them up to a light, he saw the faint outline of an object. Captain Olanda asked Milton Mendonca to join the team. Mendonca was a filmmaker and photographer, but he was also a sergeant and a trusted friend.

Mendonca brought special ultraviolet film and showed the team a new technique. Instead of trying to photograph the lights directly, they focused on capturing the solid shapes hidden within them. It worked. The new photos revealed cylindrical objects with black bands along their hulls. Some were over 300 feet long, bigger than a 747. The objects moved in formation, even when diving into Marajo Bay, always without making a sound. The cameras also caught smaller probes being released from what

team called "Mother Shifts". These probes would return to the larger craft after conducting what seemed to be surveillance missions. By December 1977, the team had documented enough evidence to prove these objects were real. Captain Olanda sent the evidence to Regional Air Command. He immediately received a call from a Brigadier General with new orders: "Surrender all photos, footage and documents. All findings and reports where to be classified. Shut everything down."

The team was surprised. They were finally making progress, but Captain Olanda followed orders. They packed up camp and returned to base. Operation Saucer was over. Olanda believed the Brazilian government shut them down because they didn't want them to find out who or what was controlling the UFOs. But it was too late. Captain Olanda already knew.

Soon after the military left Calares, the UFO encounters ended. The Air Force's official statement? Nothing extraordinary was found. Back in Calares, the story faded into local legend. But in 1996, Brazil made headlines with another UFO incident in Virginia. Virginia. What?

The public wanted answers. For 20 years, Captain Olanda kept silent about colades. Then in 1997, now a retired lieutenant colonel, he decided the truth had to come out. For two days, Olanda spoke with AJ Giverde of Brazilian UFO magazine. His memory was sharp, but something had changed in the captain. The confident military commander was gone, replaced by a man haunted by what he'd seen.

He described three encounters with the objects. The first happened during a routine night watch. A light appeared over Moral Bay, performing impossible maneuvers. The object was cylindrical, about 100 meters long, and made a strange hum. This thing was making a noise, a very strong sound of air. It sounded like a tube. It wasn't a jet noise. It sounded like something spinning, something...

The second encounter occurred on the beach. A craft appeared directly above his team. She was following the side of the river, the opposite side of the lake. She was following, following, and we saw, look there. Look there, and she came, came, came, came, when she reached the direction of the island, she entered the direction of Belém. But it was very low. At the height of the trees, passing the top of the trees. But a very large light, a huge beam.

The object was close enough that Olanda could see it wasn't made of any material he recognized. The surface seemed to shift and flow like liquid metal. At this point, Olanda realized the objects were aware of them and were being operated by an intelligence. They seemed to have absolute certainty where we were. They were looking for us. They were on top of us. After some time that we were there, let's say after May, things were on top of the team.

They were already on top of us. They knew what we were doing. If we could move, we would go somewhere else. That's where I visited. As if they had knowledge of our movement, they knew how to secure us. Operation Saucer lasted four months. During this time, Olanda sometimes went home to see his family. During one of these visits, in his own home, he had a life-changing incident. Late one night, he was in bed when he heard a crack, like an electrical power surge.

After the flash of light, Olanda found himself standing up, paralyzed with fear. He felt a presence behind him.

I was very scared. And that thing came and hugged me.

Oh, no, this isn't going to turn into alien erotica like from a Gino Storio, is it? Will you let the man speak? No, I'm not judging. I'm just asking. Another crack, another flash of light, and it was over. His wife slept through the whole thing. Olanda thought it was a dream.

But the next day, driving back to the operation, his forearm felt itchy. He noticed it was red. Game play. Yep. During his interview, Olanda rolled up his sleeve and pressed his forearm. Something moved under the skin. A small, flexible object. X-rays couldn't detect it, but a compass could. Givert asked what happened to all the photos and the documentation of Operation Saucer.

I never told anyone that I was authorized to publish. I'm telling you now, I'm 70, I'll be 70 soon, and before I get there, I'll disappear.

Olanda's concern about disappearing seems strange. But just weeks after giving this interview, before the article was even published, he was found dead in his apartment. He apparently hung himself using the belt of his bathroom. Upgrading your wardrobe doesn't have to mean emptying your bank account. With Quince, you get high-end, versatile pieces at prices that actually make sense.

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The Brazilian government kept Operation Prato classified for over 20 years. Then in 1997, the officer in charge came forward. Less than two months later, he was dead. Holanda's death seemed too convenient. Brazilian UFO researchers launched a campaign called "Freedom of UFO Information Now." They demanded the release of all Operation Saucer files. The Air Force resisted.

But by 2005, under public pressure, three generals invited researchers to military headquarters in Brasilia. For the first time, civilian UFO investigators examined Operation Prato's classified files.

They accessed 110 photographs and 160 documents, a fraction of the total archive, but enough to confirm the extraordinary nature of the investigation. The Brazilian Air Force went further in 2010. They passed Resolution 551-GC3, a law requiring all UFO reports to be sent directly to the National Archives. Any Brazilian citizen could now access decades of military UFO investigations.

Finally, a government was actively preserving its UFO records instead of destroying or classifying them. Mostly. Resolution 551-GC3 has a carve-out. The government can still classify documents if their release is considered a threat to national security. Right. The complete story remains hidden. The original operation files contained over 500 photographs and 2,000 pages of documents. Only a fraction have been released.

The hours of film footage Olanda's team shot was never made public. We still don't know the details of the two women who died. Some of Brazil's top military commanders want full disclosure. Brigadier General José Carlos Pereira, head of Brazilian Aerospace Defense Command for over 10 years, publicly stated that UFOs were solid objects under intelligent control, but factions within the military were fighting to keep specific files classified.

There may be valid reasons governments don't fully disclose contact with extraterrestrials. Acknowledgement is announcement. It broadcasts to whoever's out there that we understand we're not alone in the universe. Some prominent scientists think revealing ourselves is a very, very bad idea.

This is usually the part of the story where I debunk what I can. But with colades, there's nothing to debunk. Now, maybe the attacks weren't from UFOs, but the fact is it happened. And then it happened again. In 2014, another string of UFO attacks hit Brazil. This time, indigenous tribes deep in the Amazon. The same light beams, the same injuries. The methodical nature of these attacks suggests something calculated, not random encounters.

These beings are on mission, we just don't know what mission. Some scientists worry they're testing our defenses and technology. Now, if that's true, we might want to keep it quiet. Stephen Hawking warned that an advanced civilization might view us like Europeans viewed Native Americans, primitives to be conquered or eliminated. This is David Brin suggested any civilization capable of interstellar travel would see emerging technological species as future rivals, better to eliminate them early.

This became known as the Dark Forest Hypothesis, named after Leo Sishun's Three-Body Problem books. The universe is a dark forest. Every civilization is an armed hunter stalking through the trees like a ghost, gently pushing aside branches that block the path and trying to tread without sound. Even breathing is done with care. The hunter has to be careful because everywhere in the forest are stealthy hunters like him.

Every civilization hides in the shadows facing the same problem. They don't know who else is out there, but they know two things: resources are limited and technology grows exponentially. Any civilization discovered today could become a threat tomorrow. If he finds other life, another hunter, an angel or a demon, a delicate infant or a tottering old man, a fairy or a demigod, there's only one thing he can do.

open fire and eliminate them. In this forest, hell is other people, an eternal threat that any life that exposes its own existence will be swiftly wiped out. This is the picture of cosmic civilization. It's the explanation of the Fermi Paradox. The Fermi Paradox asks, if billions of advanced civilizations should exist, where is everybody? The answer, they're hiding.

The moment you reveal yourself, you become a target. Not because advanced civilizations are evil, but because they can't risk letting potential competitors emerge. We don't know what these UFOs want, and given their technology, they could destroy us easily, but haven't. Does that mean they're friendly?

Not necessarily. Maybe they just don't care. We're not a threat. Like the aliens in the three-body problem. They may think of us as bugs. And like bugs, we can be annoying, but we're not really dangerous. But what happens when wasps build a nest in your attic and start stinging your children?

You call an exterminator. Our radio waves, space programs, and attempts at alien contact are like lighting a flare in a dark forest. They might lead to a new alien race making first contact, a race that will do more than experiment on a small number of people. Our government may have technology that aliens would view as threatening. And if it exists, it might be better to keep it a secret.

But the decision shouldn't be up to the military alone. The military's job is to destroy things and kill people. And that's what they do. The military is necessary. But we need to show humanity is capable of more than destruction. We need civilians involved, scientists, philosophers, theologians. We need our brightest minds and our most empathetic souls, people who represent the best of us. Because when first contact is finally made, it'll either be the greatest achievement of the human race

or the end of it. We need to make this decision now, and let's not get it wrong.

Thank you so much for hanging out today. I'm AJ. Here's Hecklefish. Remember what they say, Ewings. A tinfoil hat on your head keeps the blood in your veins. This has been the Y-Files. If you have fun or learned anything, do him a favor. Comment, subscribe, like, share. I know I'm a broken record, but it only takes a second and it really helps us out. And like most topics we cover on the channel, today's was recommended by you. So if there's something you want to see or learn more about, go to the Y-Files.com slash tips.

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No, it never ends.

And his name was Cole.

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Mysterious number stations, planets are both too pricky And what the dark watchers found In a simulation, don't you worry though The black knight said a lot, he told me so I can't believe I'm dancing Head to fish on Thursday night, Swiss Day, JT When the white bouts of meat are through the night

Good enough to dance. Good enough to dance. Good enough to dance.

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