The Cash - Landrum UFO Encounter, Piney Woods, Texas

The Cash-Landrum Incident was a highly reported unidentified flying object sighting from the United States in 1980, which witnesses insist was responsible for damage to their health. It is one of very few UFO cases to result in civil court proceedings. It can be classified as a Close Encounter of the Second Kind, due to its reported physical effects on the witnesses and their automobile.

On the evening of December 29, 1980, Betty Cash and Vickie and Colby Landrum (Vickie's seven-year-old grandson) were driving home to Dayton, Texas in Cash's Oldsmobile Cutlass after dining out. At about 9:00 p.m., while driving on an isolated two-lane road in dense woods, the witnesses said they observed a light above some trees. They initially thought it was an airplane approaching Houston Intercontinental Airport (about 35 miles away) and gave it little notice. A few minutes later on the winding roads, the witnesses saw what they believed to be the same light as before, but it was now much closer and very bright. They claimed that the light came from a huge diamond-shaped object, which hovered at about treetop level. Its base was expelling flame and emitting significant heat.

Landrum told Cash to stop the car, fearing they would be burned if they approached any closer. However, her opinion of the object quickly changed: a born again Christian, she now interpreted the object as a sign of the second coming of Jesus Christ, telling Colby: "That's Jesus. He will not hurt us." Anxious, Cash considered turning the car around, but abandoned this idea because the road was too narrow and she presumed the car would get stuck on the dirt shoulders, which were soft from that evening's rains. Cash and Landrum got out of the car to examine the object. Colby was terrified, however, and Landrum quickly returned to the car to comfort him. Cash remained outside.

The object, intensely bright and a dull metallic silver, was shaped like a huge upright diamond, about the size of the Dayton water tower, with its top and bottom cut off so that they were flat rather than pointed. Small blue lights ringed the center, and periodically over the next few minutes flames shot out of the bottom, flaring outward, creating the effect of a large cone. Every time the fire dissipated, the UFO floated a few feet downwards toward the road. But when the flames blasted out again, the object rose about the same distance.

The witnesses said the heat was strong enough to make the car's metal body painful to the touch—Cash said she had to use her coat to protect her hand from being burned when she finally got back in the car. When she touched the dashboard, Landrum's hand pressed into the softened vinyl, leaving an imprint that was evident weeks later. Investigators cited it as proof of the witnesses' account; however, no photograph of it exists.

The object then moved to a point higher in the sky. As it ascended over the treetops, the witnesses claimed that a group of helicopters approached it and surrounded it in tight formation. Cash and Landrum counted 23 helicopters, and later identified some of them as tandem-rotor CH-47 Chinooks used by military forces worldwide. With the road now clear, Cash drove on, claiming to see glimpses of the object and the helicopters receding into the distance.

From first sighting the object to its departure, the witnesses said the encounter lasted about 20 minutes. Based on descriptions given in John F. Schuessler's book[2] about the incident, it appears that the observers were southbound on Texas state highway FM 1485/2100 when they claimed to have seen the object. The initial location of the reported object, based on the same descriptions, was just south of Inland Road, approximately at 30.0926°N 95.1109°W.

Investigators later located a Dayton police officer, Detective Lamar Walker, and his wife who claimed to have seen 12 Chinook-type helicopters near the same area in which the Cash-Landrum event allegedly occurred and at roughly the same time. These other witnesses did not report seeing a large diamond-shaped object.

One day in April 1981, a CH-47 flew into Dayton. As Colby watched he became very upset. Landrum decided to take him to the spot where the helicopter had landed with the hope that it would seem less frightening on the ground. When they reached the landing zone, they found a lot of people there already and had to wait some time before they were allowed to go inside the helicopter and talk to the pilot. Landrum and another visitor both claim that the pilot said he had been in the area before for the purpose of checking on a UFO in trouble near Huffman. When Landrum told the pilot how glad she was to see him, because she had been one of the people burned by the UFO, he refused to talk to them further and hustled them out of the aircraft.

After the UFO and helicopters left, Cash took the Landrums home, then retired for the evening. That night, they all experienced similar symptoms, though Cash to a greater degree. All suffered from nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, generalized weakness, a burning sensation in their eyes, and feeling as though they were suffering from sunburn.

Over the next few days, Cash's symptoms worsened, with many large, painful blisters forming on her skin. When taken to a hospital emergency room on January 3, 1981, Cash "could not walk, and had lost large patches of skin and clumps of hair. She was released after 12 days, though her condition was not much better, and she later returned to the hospital for another 15 days. The Landrums' health was somewhat better, though both suffered from lingering weakness, skin sores and hair loss.

In 1982, Lt. Col. George Sarran of the Department of the Army Inspector General began the only thorough formal governmental investigation into the supposed UFO encounter. He could not find any evidence that the helicopters the witnesses claimed to have seen belonged to the U.S. Armed Forces. Sarran stated that "Ms. Landrum and Ms. Cash were credible … the policeman and his wife [who claimed to have seen 12 helicopters near the UFO encounter site] were also credible witnesses. There was no perception that anyone was trying to exaggerate the truth."

Eventually, Cash and Landrum contacted their U.S. Senators, Lloyd Bentsen and John Tower, who suggested that the witnesses file a complaint with the Judge Advocate Claims office at Bergstrom Air Force Base. In August 1981, Cash, Landrum, and Colby were interviewed at length by personnel at Bergstrom Air Force Base, and were told that they should hire a lawyer, and seek financial compensation for their injuries. With attorney Peter Gersten taking on the case pro bono, the case wound its way through the U.S. Courts for several years. Cash and Landrum sued the U.S government for $20 million. On August 21, 1986, a U.S. District Court judge dismissed their case, noting that the plaintiffs had not proved that the helicopters were associated with the U.S. Government, and that military officials had testified that the United States Armed Forces did not have a large, diamond-shaped aircraft in their possession.

The incident received coverage in both the tabloid press and mainstream media. In 1981, Landrum appeared on That's Incredible, a popular ABC television program. She was hypnotized in front of a studio audience; under hypnosis she recounted the UFO incident. She and Cash both appeared on the 1989 U.S television special, UFO Cover Up? Live!, hosted by Mike Farrell. They related their account of the UFO encounter and their subsequent medical problems and legal battles. The Cash-Landrum event was also depicted on the television programs Unsolved Mysteries and Sightings. In 2009, Colby appeared on UFO Hunters: Alien Fallout. Cash died at the age of 71 on December 29, 1998, 18 years after her claimed close encounter. Landrum died September 12, 2007, seven days before her 84th birthday.


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