Encounter at Sandstone Peak
Copyright 2000 Joseph Burkes, MD
Sandstone Peak is the highest point in the Santa Monica Mountains. At just under 3000 feet in elevation, one might say its not much of a Mountain. What gives it some power is its majestic location right on the coast. There are few homes on the slopes. Sandstone PeakÕs relative isolation, while at the same time proximity to Los Angeles and its spectacular view, all made it a prime site for UFO fieldwork.
There were a number of drawbacks however. The previous Fall catastrophic fires had ripped through the area. Trees ,shrubs, all vegetation were burnt on the mountainÕs slopes. Torrential downpours in the canyons leading to the peak stripped away the most direct paths leading to the summit. During a daylight reconnaissance hike and without the benefit a well maintained trail, I failed to make it up the steep ocean side face of Sandstone Peak. Before the storms, a vigorous hiker in daylight could scale the rock face in 30 minutes. This was now impossible.
There was another way up however, through the back door. A four mile
trail lead up the behind Sandstone Peak. The path followed a gentle slope and a series of switch backs. It was such an easy hike that I decided to take an advanced team up at night. Unfortunately the night we chose was raining. My two intrepid co-workers for that night were not discouraged by the bad weather. We went up anyway
My team had a couple of new members. The one investigator with the most promise was Nataliya. She liked to go by the name Natasha. Tall , dark and athletic, she looked more like a fashion model than the cosmetologist that she was. Natasha played a key role in field work operations during the entire following year. She revealed herself to be, in my opinion, the most determined CE-5 Investigator that I was ever privileged to work with on the West Coast. As of the year 2000 she is still leading teams of contact workers out into the hinterlands around the megalopolis known as LA.
My medical partner Daniel also accompanied us. He carried his video camera packed in plastic under a poncho. As our documentation specialist, he was well prepared if anything spectacular were to take place. The landscape on the climb up was hardly photogenic. The fires had certainly done their dirty work. Shrubs and small trees were stripped bare of leaves. In the dark the burnt out trunks looked like eerie skeletons. I recalled news clips on TV during the Vietnam War.
Images of napalm exploding on hillsides flashed through my mind. I
wondered if the aftermath of napalm looked like the devastation surrounding us on the trail to Sandstone Peak
The stormÕs center was offshore. The rain was constant but at first not too heavy. As we got closer to the summit, we lost the shelter from the breeze provided by the ridge line. As wet gusts of wind flapped our rain gear, I was beginning to wonder if it was such a good idea to do mountain field work on a night like this. At the Peak itself, we finally got some protection from the storm. A few shrubs had been spared by the fires and we huddled some 20 feet below the top of the mountain. I decided to try a round of meditation. In the rain and wind, with my back to the mountain, I conducted Coherent Thought Sequencing.
Daniel volunteered to be the spotter. He climbed to a rock ledge above us. He peered into the cold wind looking for a sign of contact.
He carried a 500, 000 candle power lantern with him that he used to
make signals with. Facing thirty plus miles per hour gusts, after a
few minutes he couldnÕt take it anymore. He climbed down to Natasha
and me. We all huddled together trying to stay warm. I then
volunteered to climb to the top. The cold wind was more intense than I
had imagined it would be. Tears streamed down my eyes from the wind, I
scanned the sea and land. Even in a storm, with limited visibility,
the view was absolutely spectacular! To the north the lights of Oxnard
glowed yellow through dark gray clouds. Los Angeles lit up the horizon
to the southeast. Clinging to the rock ledge I felt like I was flying
into the storm. My exhilaration was quickly washed away by wind and
rain. After just a few minutes I climbed down to the others
We took turns, climbing up to the peak, scanning the horizon and signaling. Although thrilling at first, each of my co-workers soon became exhausted. After being up at the top for less than an hour, we called it quits and headed down the trail. Below the peak, shielded from the wind by canyon walls, I contemplated with some amazement our determination. What a strange passion guided us on this night like so many others.
I recalled a quote attributed to President Eisenhower that we had paraphrased during my work in the nuclear disarmament movement. It went something like, Ò someday the passion for peace of the worldÕs peoples will be so strong that their leaders will just have to step aside and let them have it. Ò Cold and wet on hike down from Sandstone Peak I wondered if our contact movement was driven by a passion of similar ferocity. ÒSomeday the desire for contact with extraterrestrial intelligence will be so strong, the worldÕs elites will just have to step aside and let the people have it.Ó I suspected that such a day was far far off in the distant future. Nevertheless my contact team was still able to carry out operations even under adverse weather conditions. I was proud of our willingness to keep on trying.
The following month on April... 1995 Natasha convened the next attempt at Sandstone Peak. This time we numbered four. Nataliya had brought in two new researchers. Neither had any formal CSETI training and both were single in their 20s I was concerned about their lack of preparation for field work. David was a professional singer who often traveled abroad on cruise ships to entertain the tourists. Justin was a maintenance man who was fascinated by UFOs but had no consciousness training. Unlike David who meditated regularly and was open to the possibility of telepathic communication, Justin seemed only interested in having a sighting. His wish came true during his first and only night out with us.
The night of field work a dense fog blanked the coast. It was nearly 10 PM when we set out climbing up the back door trail to Sandstone . We hiked into the mist hoping that the Peak would be clear of fog. Moisture attenuated all sound except our footsteps producing a strange silence. We were on an open trail, however with no wind or noise I felt like I was walking on a movie studio sound stage. Justin chattered incessantly about how excited he was. Natasha was clearly starting to get annoyed with him. David quietly shared with me his interest in astrology, a subject I had practically no knowledge of what-so-ever. My scientific education and former materialist world view, in the past had compelled me to take a dim view of astrology. I tried to keep an open mind and just listened.
Half way up the mountain we were above the fog. The trail behind us disappeared into the mist as did the lower canyons and ridges. Hiking above the clouds always conveys a sense of great altitude. In this case it was merely an illusion. No more than 2500 feet in elevation, I fancied however that I was on a mighty mountain trek. Above us the stars were visible in great expanses of sky that were now free of clouds. It felt good to be out in the fresh spring air. The city with all its fuss and bother seemed a million miles away.
At Sandstone Peak we set up a camp just below the summit. Justin fidgeted while the rest of us mediated and listened to the crop circle tones played on the tape recorder. The words came easily to my lips.
ÒTake several deep breaths with you diaphragm and let all of your air out.
Let go of all things
Let go of all thoughts.
Let go of all feelings.
Be still, quietly let your mind follow your breathing.
I lead the team through the required visualizations. For those few members of the working group who were advanced psi capable, presumably they were able to remote view deep space. I simply described mental pictures of the earth, the solar system, the milky way and then distant galaxies, all the while sending out a message of welcome.
We spent about an hour and a half carrying out the contact protocols, doing light work, meditating and taking brief breaks in between to chat. Around 1:30 PM we headed down the mountain. Natasha wanted to stay longer. On the trail she kept urging us to go back. Apparently she had received Òat the level of awarenessÓ a message that contact was likely to occur. She kept looking behind to the north as if she expected ÒthemÓ to appear from that direction.
I had responsibility for keeping the team together and the consensus was that it was time to depart. While still hiking above the cloud line, a small plane descended towards us from the north. It was a single engine job that slowly flew by at no more than sixty miles per hour. Less than 200 yards away I was surprised how silent its engines were. It was following the course of the ravine that we were in. After passing by it dropped down below us into the canyon It then made an abrupt right turn and disappeared into the soup. I was amazed. What kind of wild pilot was willing to fly into a canyon shrouded in fog. I listened holding my breath, half expected to hear the sound of a crash. I heard nothing. It was gone. I presumed that it had found a clear path out to sea.
Nataliya had settled down for a while after the appearance of the small plane. But after reaching the wilderness parking lot at the base of Sandstone Peak, she again asked that we do another round of CTS. Although it was close to 3AM, and I was fairly tired, I consented. Such passion to do contact work should not be ignored by a working group coordinator.
We formed a small circle a few yards from our vehicles. This time Natasha lead the meditation. David was serving as spotter. He suddenly interrupted us and urged us to look to the southwest. He spotted a small bright rapidly moving star like object moving overhead to the south over the Pacific. It was at least two and a half-hours till sunrise, and a bit early for satellite spotting.
We stopped our meditation and scanned the heavens. Suddenly another object appeared. Through binoculars it was visible as a tiny white
glowing disc. We all burst out in a cheer. Justin was shouting the
loudest. Natasha tried to get us to focus and send a united and
coherent message for the unidentified object to come closer. Instead
of following her lead in a disciplined way, Justin repeatedly
interrupted Natasha with exclamations like, ÒOh boy, Oh my God.Ó This
is great. I canÕt believe it, a CE-5, a CE-5Ó
Following these initial sightings, the rapidly moving lights appeared one after another flying over the ocean. It was hard to track so many at once. I asked each observer to follow one object at a time. No less than fifteen, perhaps twenty of these disc like objects were seen in succession. All followed more or less the same flight path in a northwesterly direction . Without the aid of magnification they were mere points of light. Through binoculars each had the a circular or slightly oval appearance. Their altitude was unknown, but we guessed it to be many tens of thousands of feet up.
After the encounter was over we compared notes. The most remarkable display was described by David, the aspiring astrologer. He saw one disc do a series of loop de loops as it continued to fly to the northwest. My most remarkable sighting was that of an object which flew as it if were riding a wave. Every few seconds it dropped down in altitude in a step wise fashion, all the while heading to the north. The one troublesome aspect of the individual reports were that the strange flight patterns, Òriding a waveÓ, or Òloop de loopsÓ were never described by more than one observer. All of us confirmed the disc like appearance of the objects, the white color, the rapid succession of visual displays, but the most interesting unique characteristics were seen only by one observer without confirmation from the others.
All and all it was an exciting nights work. I was happy to be working with Natasha. She told me that she did not want to invite Justin back for more field work. I agreed not to do so. Our research sessions were few and far between averaging once every two to three months. Justin called me several time but became discouraged when we had no further field work planned. He stopped calling me after a few weeks. Rumor had it that he returned to the Sandstone Peak by himself. Working alone he reportedly had poor results, no more sightings.
Natasha continued to work Sandstone for some time. I never returned, preferring the site picked out by Tony Craddock near the Reagan Ranch near Santa Barbara. After nearly 3 years I was still able to bring a diverse team of field workers together and find experiencers like Natasha to help Òbring in the craft.Ó It was far short of the landings and boardings we all hoped for. But still there was enough action to keep us going.
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