As of late afternoon Feb. 8, Bill Hanshumaker, a public marine specialist and (Ph.D) doctor of marine science at the Hatfield Marine Science Center in nearby Newport, told Huliq in an interview that, “I don’t know what they are.” In turn, Doctor Hanshumaker said he’s advised “surf monitoring” about these strange metal boxes that suddenly appeared along local beaches Feb. 6, and now seem to be multiplying like Star Trek “Tribbles.” The photograph that accompanies this report – taken during the afternoon of Feb. 8 near Bray’s Point -- of yet another strange metal box stuck in the surf up is one of a possible group of a dozen or more that have been sited up and down West Coast beaches. Meanwhile, the British government also photographed similar huge metal boxes on beaches in Sri Lanka in the late 1990’s and in early 2004 and 2005. The discovery of the boxes is detailed in updated previously classified reports from the British government that document sightings of unidentified flying objects by both the military and the general public dating back to the 1950s.

UFO history filled with “mystery boxes”

Thus, within these British government UFO files, available via the Internet, are the Sri Lanka beach boxes that are similar in both size, coloring and shape; with locals all along Sri Lanka’s beaches – located in the blue waters of the Indian Ocean and the Bay of Bengal – stating in the recently released British UFO documents that “the strange metal boxes appeared suddenly, and after numerous reported UFO sightings.”

In turn, the metal boxes along Oregon, Washington State and Northern California beaches are now being photographed, documented and examined by local experts.

Also, due to recent storms out in the Pacific Ocean, the “boxes” are being more or less ignored; with passing comments in local coastal newspaper,” state Errol, a Bray’s Point local and a member of the Oregon UFO “watchers” group that gathers both here and at nearby Stonefield Beach to scan the sky for flying objects in much the same way bird lovers use binoculars for birth watching.

Science is slow in reacting to UFO related objects

Errol notes that it’s always a sort of “communication breakdown” that always seems to go the same way; be it a UFO sighting or even something like “these humming metal boxes.”

However, Errol said it’s a good thing “when something like this becomes interesting to the Oregon State University Research Agenda.” For instance, Doctor Hanshumaker works for this OSU research enterprise at the nearby Hatfield Marine Science Center in Newport, Oregon. Whenever there’s some dead sea life – such as a beach whale or other something along the lines of massive dead sea birds – the experts at the Hatfield are called in to investigate.

When asked if he’s ever heard of anything like these huge metal boxes, with no opening or seam, Doctor Hanshumaker would not comment or speculate on the record. Instead, this marine science expert has for photos of the boxes and size and coloring details.

In turn, Doctor Hanshumaker would not speculate about various rumors regarding the boxes; but said that an alert has gone out and the boxes are being investigated. Of course, Huliq will continue to monitor this breaking story that has local coastal residents and visitors scratching their heads about the boxes.

Bray’s Point monitored by the Hatfield

An hour's drive from Corvallis, the Hatfield Marine Science Center in Newport is OSU's coastal campus for research and investigation of marine biological and geochemical aspects of tidal, estuarine, and near shore ocean environments. According to it's fact sheet, "research programs at HMSC advance scientific understanding of marine and coastal ecosystems, with an emphasis on collaboration across disciplinary and institutional affiliations of the more than 300 personnel onsite."

In turn, marine science experts are tasked by both the state and federal government to monitor the Oregon coastal beaches even more so today after the Japan earthquake last March that sent Tsunami waves racing across the Pacific Ocean that slammed into the West Coast causing destruction and creating a massive amount of debris that seems to be growing daily as beach trekkers find “all sorts of things” along the coast.

While these strange metal boxes have been examined for any lettering or symbols that they may be from last year’s earthquake in Japan, Errol and other Bray’s Point locals say “all we know is there’s been a lot of action in the sky as of late with UFO sightings that seem to be increasing. The boxes were found the day after several sightings and bright lights over Bray’s Point. The boxes have no identification at all.”

Monitoring the coast comes under OSU

Earning $261.7 million in external research funding in FY 2011, Oregon State’s fact online fact sheet that describes its operations notes “it is one of only two land, sea, space and sun grant institutions in the U.S., and holds a top tier research designation from the Carnegie Foundation. Also, Nine of OSU’s academic programs have ranked among the top 10 nationally in the past three years. Faculty include 29 NSF Early Career Award recipients since 2000, two MacArthur Foundation Fellows and scientists who lead federal programs at NSF, NASA and NOAA. More than 35 present and past faculty have been elected as Fellows of AAAS, and five as members of NAS.”

In turn, the Hatfield Marine Science Center is home base for the Coastal Oregon Marine Experiment Station (COMES), the Cooperative Institute for Marine Resources Studies (CIMRS), and the Marine Mammal Institute, along with various other OSU and state/federal agency units:

-- Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife

-- Oregon Coast Community College

-- OSU College of Agricultural Sciences

-- OSU College of Engineering

-- OSU College of Forestry

-- OSU College of Oceanic and Atmospheric Sciences

-- OSU College of Science

-- OSU College of Veterinary Medicine

-- OSU Extension Service and Oregon Sea Grant

-- NOAA Fisheries

-- NOAA Ocean Environment Research Division

-- USDA Agricultural Research Service

-- US Environmental Protection Agency

-- US Fish & Wildlife Service

What is and what should never be with UFOs

According to now de-classified once top secret UFO reports – that were under lock and key by the British government since the end of World War II – there’s good reason to keep the public in the dark when it comes to such things as UFO sightings, strange occurrences, first contact with aliens and more in detailed reports that point to senior British Ministry of Defense officials stating to the prime minister in now declassified memos that “if we said to you, Sir, that we have reason to believe the UFOs are real, than what would the British people think of us?”

As for this link between the Sri Lanka beach boxes and the ones now showing up in the surf up and down the West Coast – based on local media reports of “strange metal boxes” – the British Ministry of Defense photos of the Sri Lanka “boxes” are still marked “classified.”

However, there are detailed statements – that cover the period from 1997 to 2005 and include photographs, drawings and “descriptions of flying saucer sightings, as well as letters that the Ministry of Defense sent eyewitnesses in response to their accounts of the metal boxes.”

Of course, both local police here along the coast and back in the day when the Sri Lanka boxes were discovered, state that “they are probably from a container ship,” that theory doesn’t hold water since both the central Oregon coast and the coast of Sri Lanka are not accessible to container ships.

Boxes on the beach called “projectiles”

In one account – featured in the now released British government UFO documents -- a man said he believed he had been "abducted" by aliens in October 1998 after seeing an unidentified craft hover over his coastal home and finding that he had gained an hour of time in the process. The man went on to describe seeing “projectiles” all along the beach “that were here on day, and gone the next.”

However, the metal boxes that suddenly appeared along West Coast beaches – beginning Feb. 6 at nearby Stonefield Beach after local UFO “watchers” reported a weekend filled with what locals call intense UFO sightings.

“These metal looking boxes, that are about 20 inches in height and are a complete square of five foot by five foot are sunk deep in the surf” both here at Stonefield Beach – a popular Oregon coastal beach lookout for UFOs – and down the coast as far as we know “with yet more of these square metal containers that have no opening and are sealed all around,” explains Oregon UFO “watcher” Errol who lives nearby at Bray’s Point.

In turn, these boxes are “not moveable,” and they are solid and metallic and seem to have this keening wail coming from both the boxes and the atmosphere around them,” adds Errol who’s been called in to “see what’s up” by locals thinking it “has something to do with UFOs” quipped a local senior named Doris who said she heard “a miaowing wail come from the boxes Sunday evening.”

Strange beach boxes cause a stir

It’s as if an alarm went off, when a “high, shrill, piercing, frightening ring caught our attention Sunday evening,” explained Doris, a local senior whose retired and lives nearby Stonefield Beach. “I know crazy things happen over at Stonefield, but when you walk down and see that metal box sort of glowing in the surf it gets your attention real quick.”

At the same time, Doris said this area around Stonefield Beach is a very “quiet place,” where “nothing but seagulls and the Pacific Ocean waves to break the quiet.”

Brain plays tricks even when metal boxes appear

While these “metal boxes” buried up and down the Oregon coast are real to the touch and sight, a local professor of psychology – whose attempted to explain away the “strange goings on at both Bray’s Point and here at Stonefield Beach,” thinks the many “of these remote living residents who claim to see UFOs at night are simply not using the tool between their ears to figure this stuff out.”

In turn, this retired professor said in a Feb. 6 Huliq interview at Stonefield Beach that most locals and visitors here “looking for those UFOs” are more or less carrying their own “baggage or self-as-content,” with views and experiences that now seem to define them.

Doris added: “The doc is saying we’re all a bunch of nuts to believe in UFOs.”

What’s real about UFOs?

Yet, the professor – who specialized in repressed memories when he taught at university and had his own private practice – noted that Doris and others are in a sort of “constant frame of reference when they converse with each other that UFOs have appeared.”

“I’ve seen this Stonefield Beach crowd carry on at meetings about UFOs being spotted in the sky, and I’m confident they believe these things to be true.”

However, the professor says there’s “good hard science that can probably explain away each and every claim they’ve made about UFOs and aliens about at Stonefield Beach and Bray’s Point. But, this perspective comes at a cost,” he asserted; while stating that “such beliefs in UFOs can lead them to label themselves, either positively or negatively, in very limiting ways.”

For example, the professor said “I don’t know if these metal boxes are something to worry about or not.”

And, he added, “I don’t know if Errol is an expert on UFOs. Just because people come to him with their stories of UFOs doesn’t make it real.”

"It does raise some questions about what really would happen if at any time in the future there was some kind of incident — would we be prepared?" said David Clarke, author of "The UFO Files" and consultant to the National Archives' UFO project.

Boxes appeared after auras

When pressed for more details a few days later, on Feb. 8, UFO “watcher” Errol noted that “what may have been different with the recent sightings was a sort of bright golden and reddish aura with that keening wail sound that I talked about.”

However, the late afternoon before sunset at Bray’s Point Feb. 8 found only the roar of absolute silence. In turn, there was no same intense level of noise coming from two boxes on the Bray’s Point beach and others at the nearby Stonefield Beach.

Still, it’s interesting to point out that the British government UFO documents do point out that the “Sri Lanka metal boxes” – in a report dated January 2003 and sent to the Ministry of Defense with supporting “classified” photographs reveal even more mysterious happenings on that Sri Lanka beach after “repeated UFO sightings.”

"I noticed a partial aura in the sky, a minute or so later there was a clap of thunder, then a short while later a ring like a doughnut appeared," one Sri Lanka police official told the ministry, adding that he thought it was an "air burst."

In its reply, the ministry suggested that the officer contact the Sri Lankan government.

The world’s oceans hold secrets

While there’s a lot of focus on the heavens these days – with regular reports of “flying saucers” reported up and down the West Coast from as far north as Alaska – there’s also “alien activity” believed to be happening in the world’s oceans.

For instance, a recent ocean exploration team led by Swedish researcher Peter Lindberg has found what some are suggesting is a crashed flying saucer, according to a recent European Union media reports.

Lindberg and his underwater team of scientists are credited with finding and then recovering “sunken ships and cargo” using high-tech sonar; while “never expecting” to find what Lindberg claims “is a mysterious round object that might (or might not) be extraterrestrial.”

Image source of yet another strange metal box that appeared in the surf Sunday evening after locals recorded yet another UFO sighting here at Stonefield Beach. Many other “metal boxes” with the same size and color have appeared up and down the Oregon coast and are also reportedly being found up and down the entire West Coast as of Feb. 8, 2012. This “box” was photographed late afternoon Feb. 8 near Bray’s Point, Oregon. Photo by Dave Masko