from Point M
Popocatépetl Volcano
The mission’s second destination was Popocatépetl, an active volcano in Mexico that had erupted thirteen times in twenty-four hours at the end of February 2024.
Flying from Puerto Rico, Chi 2-56 arrived in the afternoon. As Terra and Manny watched the radar screen, they saw something spinning toward them. Terra increased their speed, but the unidentified craft followed closely. When they reached the volcano, they hovered and studied the plasma orbs darting around the summit crater. The UFO hovered as well. Unsure if it was hostile, Terra decided to request landing in a private area of the Mexico International Airport. She then asked the craft to identify itself, but it didn’t reply.
It was now 1700. Terra spoke into the intercom, telling the crew they’d start circling the volcano in an hour. Maia made a quick, simple dinner. Manny was the first to join her, then came Coni, Nate, and Isaac. After eating in silence, Manny left to join Terra in the cockpit, and Coni and Nate did a quick check first of the ship’s exterior and then its instruments.
The mission packet had contained a printout of an article published in the Journal of Modern Physics: “Extraterrestrial Life in the Thermosphere: Plasmas, UAP, Pre-Life, Fourth State of Matter” by R. Joseph et al. The abstract read:
“Plasmas” up to a kilometer in size and behaving similarly to multicellular organisms have been filmed on 10 separate NASA space shuttle missions, over 200 miles above Earth within the thermosphere. These self-illuminated “plasmas” are attracted to and may “feed on” electromagnetic radiation. They have different morphologies: 1) cone, 2) cloud, 3) donut, 4) spherical-cylindrical; and have been filmed flying towards and descending from the thermosphere into thunderstorms; congregating by the hundreds and interacting with satellites generating electromagnetic activity; approaching the Space Shuttles.
Isaac flipped to the section of the article with images taken of the plasmas from the space shuttles and noted that much of it was devoted to STS-75. The primary objective of the 1996 NASA mission was to deploy a twelve-mile-long tether so that the electromagnetic force fields it generated could be studied. After five hours of deployment, the tether broke, and during that time and after, the crew documented hundreds of plasmas circling and interacting with it. Some of their observations were also in the abstract:
Computerized analysis of flight path trajectories documents these plasmas travel at different velocities from different directions and change their angle of trajectory making 45°, 90°, and 180° shifts and follow each other. They’ve been filmed accelerating, slowing down, stopping, congregating, engaging in “hunter-predatory” behavior and intersecting plasmas leaving a plasma dust trail in their wake. Similar life-like behaviors have been demonstrated by plasmas created experimentally.
After scientists recorded and analyzed the plasmas’ behavior, they formulated a number of conclusions and hypotheses, including the possibility that plasmas might be the source of many UFO and UAP sightings. The abstract ended with this hypothesis:
“Plasmas” may have been photographed in the 1940s by WWII pilots (identified as “Foo fighters”); repeatedly observed and filmed by astronauts and military pilots and classified as Unidentified Aerial—Anomalous Phenomenon. Plasmas are not biological but may represent a form of pre-life that via the incorporation of elements common in space, could result in the synthesis of RNA. Plasmas constitute a fourth state of matter, are attracted to electromagnetic activity, and when observed in the lower atmosphere likely account for many of the UFO-UAP sightings over the centuries.
The attraction of plasmas to electromagnetic activity sometimes made them seem sentient. The article described the experience of crew members who witnessed plasmas moving from window to window as if to peer inside. It was tempting to think that curiosity motivated them.
Isaac’s videos and photographs would provide additional information on the phenomenon of plasma orbs congregating near volcanoes, so he had to capture both typical and atypical behavior. The night before, he had put a video camera on a rotating axis, and on a stationary point, he put a camera that would take pictures every ten minutes.
He now strapped a GoPro to his head and held his silver camera in his hands. Then parts of his vision field became fuzzy and jagged lines started to appear. He’d had this problem before—a condition called ocular migraine or migraine of the eyes. In an attempt to calm himself, he closed his eyes, but doing so caused him to have a flashback: a memory of when he discovered Chikako had left and taken their son with her. Frantic, he’d called her parents’ home and learned she was there but wouldn’t speak to him. He called many times after that and wrote to her, pleading with her to return, but her mother intercepted his messages and he got nowhere.
Waiting, he sat rigidly in his seat, his heart beating quickly and perspiration collecting on his forehead. He could hear Terra shouting commands and feel Chi moving. He prayed to Asami to help him, and within minutes, he felt her warm hands on his shoulders and then his forehead. His breathing returned to normal, and he opened his eyes. Thank you, Asami, he mouthed.
Pat Matsueda was the managing editor of MANOA Journal from 1992 to 2022. More about the manuscript from which this excerpt was taken can be found at her website.
Photograph of Popocatépetl Volcano by Luisalvaz