Phantom figure said to wander back roads of Madera

There is a story of a wandering phantom that is seen along the country roads outside of Madera. The location isn’t exact but most accounts have seen the spirit somewhere in between Ave 15 and Ave 18 1/2.

The first recorded sighting happened in January of 2010 when a witness and her husband were driving home to Clovis from Madera on Avenue 15. They were driving down the country road when the witness suddenly saw a man walking down the middle of the road and had to quickly swerve to avoid hitting him. The man seemed oblivious to almost being hit despite the fact that the car was going almost 60 miles per hour. The witness described the figure as Caucasian, in his early twenties, wearing a dark sweatshirt with a hood and blue jeans. After they passed him they hit a thick patch of fog and the man was nowhere to be seen. The witness notes that her husband didn’t see the man at all despite looking in the same direction as she and he was surprised by her sudden swerving of the car. Ever since that night the witness has refused to drive down that stretch of road when going home.

An incident occurred late winter of 2013, this time on Avenue 18. This witness was driving home around 3:00 am and it was somewhat foggy. They were driving down the road when out of nowhere a man wearing blue jeans and a hoodie was seen in the middle of the road. The witness swerved to avoid him and noticed that he didn’t even try to get out of the way, which she thought was odd. When this occurred they didn’t think much of it as they never saw anyone on that road before that late at night. It was only upon hearing that other people had seen the same figure in the area that they thought this wasn’t a normal person.

Another account involves two witnesses who were driving down Avenue 18 1/2 around 1:30am. As they were passing a church a young male, Caucasian and wearing blue jeans and a hoodie suddenly appeared about five feet in front of them. He was standing on the dividing line of the road and the driver missed him by inches as they swerved to avoid him. Despite being so close to him they were unable to see his face. As they drove past him, she looked back and he was no longer there.

There are more accounts like this with the same description of the man, late teens to early twenties, Caucasian and wearing blue jeans and a hooded sweatshirt. Some witnesses have also said he was wearing white tennis shoes, but this varies. Another common theme is how the man is oblivious to the oncoming car and is described usually as looking down. Also most of the incidents happened late at night and it seems all the witnesses are females.

So here’s the question. Who is he? Conjecture (which I’m great at) has me wondering if some young man was walking down one of these roads late one night and wasn’t paying attention (like he was looking down) and didn’t see the oncoming car and was hit and killed. Perhaps the person who hit him was a woman and this is why he seems to only appear to them. It’s hard to say without researching more, which I will be doing. But it does seem that some poor soul is doomed to wander the country roads outside of Madera.

Triangle shaped UFO seen north of Fresno along Hwy. 41

It seems this video of a UFO filmed north of Fresno was making the rounds all last week. First a Canadian website was reporting on it and then one in India and multiple UFO websites out there. Watching the video several times had me perplexed. It wasn't a typical blurred out airplane on approach. So what was it? I decided to leave a comment on the person who posted the video to YouTube and see if they would get back to me.

As luck would have it, they did. A husband and wife were driving north on Hwy 41 when the husband saw a strange light near Valley Children's Hospital. They quickly exited 41 at Children's Blvd. and looped around Mesa Blvd. until it turned into Cobb Ranch Rd. It was here they got a good view of the object and proceeded to film it.

From what I was told the object wasn't moving very fast and at first it seemed to move slowly towards them before reversing its course and heading back the way it had come before disappearing out of sight.

I has asked if anyone else besides the couple had seen it and was told no. I had also mentioned the possibility of it being a medvac helicopter coming in for a landing but was told by the wife that they live near Fresno Yosemite and is familiar with what a helicopter looks like as it's nearing touchdown.

So here's the proverbial question: what was this thing? Could the witnesses be wrong and it was a helicopter approaching the hospital? I asked the witness what day and time they had filmed this and was told it was on February 14 at around 10:00 pm (maybe the aliens were going for a romantic drive?) and several phone calls have been made to Valley Children's to see if any medvacs landed around that time. I'm also going to see if I can find a number through either Fresno Yosemite or the FAA and see if I can find anything out this way. Even if I'm told nothing was in the area at that time that rules out the possibility of a helicopter. This leads it to either being some government type aircraft or aliens taking a joy ride through the San Joaquin River. If it was some government secret project, why have lights on the damn thing and fly it near a hospital? Though given the current state of affairs in DC and the lack of any common sense this wouldn't surprise me really. As for aliens, I guess it's possible. I mean Valley Children's has some advanced tech in it, maybe they were curious as to how we treat our young. Nah, I still say they were joy riding. It's what I would do if dad left me the keys to his flying saucer.

Interesting enough the witness also included this map of where they were located when the filmed the object as well as an estimate of where the object was at given some known locations and distances. I wonder if anyone else at the hospital saw this. I think it’s time to do a bit of digging.

Madera's New Hope Cemetery

New Hope Cemetery - Madera County

Photo by Michael Banti

I first heard the stories of New Hope Cemetery, located in southern Madera County, while I was still in high school. I was with my best friend Tom when a friend of his, who knew of our love of all things paranormal, told us about this cemetery that was located out in the country. At one time it had a church on the grounds, but it had burned down to the ground (all that was left was the steps sometime in the mid 1980's. Rumor had it that a group of Satanist were responsible for the fire as well as performing dark rituals in the cemetery grounds itself. Ever since then the cemetery was reported to be haunted.

Needless to say we were interested. The three of us jumped in Tom's car and headed towards the cemetery. Unfortunately as we got there, we were to chicken to get out of the car (oh to be 17 again) and just drove away. But that wasn't the end of it. A week or so later, Tom and I headed to the cemetery this time armed with baseball bats, knives, sharpened screwdrivers, wooden stakes, and at least a gallon of holy water. We didn't know what to expect, but we were ready (or so we thought). We got there and as we parked next to the cemetery's fence we saw a red glow coming from the cemetery. Freaked out someone had left a candle burning as part of some dark ritual or something, Tom put the car into reverse and started to leave. As he did this I noticed the red glow disappear. I told him to stop and the glow came back. Turns out it was the reflection of his tail lights on a polished gravestone. That's how freaked out we were.

That night, nothing of much interest happened. But a few years later we drove there one night bored as we had nothing going on. We were walking around like we always do when we started to hear what sounded like drums in the distance. Listening to them, they reminded me of the Native American drums I heard when I attended a pow wow a few years previous. I knew the area very well as my family has vineyards a few miles away and couldn't think of where they were coming from. But what I heard next still is fresh in my mind well over a decade later. I heard what sounded like two little girls laughing, almost laughing like they knew something we didn't. I looked at Tom and could tell he heard the same thing. Needless to say we got the hell out of there.

We visited the cemetery over the years, something always strange happening. One night I was driving by it on my way home when I saw a pair of headlights driving literally in the almond orchard next to the cemetery. As I got closer it started to flash it's lights at me. First were high beams, then regular, then completely off, only to repeat the pattern again. As curious as I was, I didn't find out what the hell was going on and got out of there quickly.

Near the steps of the church. You can see the cemetery in the

background. Photo by Michael Banti

I hadn't been by the cemetery in several years when a friend of mine needed a creepy place to shoot some video in Madera. I suggested the cemetery and we headed out there. When we got there I saw the strangest thing. Some guy in a trailer had set up camp on the remains of the church's foundation. Obviously we didn't stop, but I did shoot some video. You can find it and more info on that day here.

I wish I knew if the stories on the cemetery were true or just more urban legends told by teenagers that are bored one night. The only thing I know for certain is the church did burn down as there are records of it. But I haven't been able to find out anything on to what or who caused it. As for the little girls, I went back at a later date and checked to see if there were any young girls buried there (the graves were as recent as the 1990's and went back nearly a century), but couldn't find anything. But I know what I heard and so did Tom. So that begs the question. What did we hear that night?

Madera man sees cigar shaped UFO on Fourth of July weekend

A Madera County man witnessed two strange craft flying over the Sierra Nevadas over the Fourth of July weekend. While laying in the back of his truck with his young son, they saw two bright silver cigar shaped craft with what appeared to be an orange or brown colored band around the middle. He estimates them to be about a quarter of a mile away and were only visible for a minute or so before leaving rather quickly, headed in a southern direction.

I wonder if this has to do anything with the other UFO sightings that happened over that same weekend? It's hard to tell if this was a daylight sighting or not, but given the fact that the witness describes it as silver in color and no mention of any lights leads me to believe it was a daylight sighting which in turn means that this was no errant firework shot into the sky as some others might be.

It has me wondering what the hell exactly went on that weekend and why such a rash of sightings? The Central Valley normally isn't a hot spot for UFO activity, but that weekend people saw some strange things in the skies.

MUFON report: Shimmering silver cigar shape with orange/brown band in the middle.

While lying in a pickup bed with my two year old son we both witnessed two u.f.o.s. They were above the mountain in front of my house about 1/4 mile away. The two objects hovered for at least a minute next to each other then they flew off to the right/south extremely fast leaving the skyline in a second or less.

My two year old son and I both witnessed the objects are were both very excited to have seen them. We have only told my parents who were also present but were inside the pickup truck and did not see the objects.

Storm Wrecks Popular Corn Maze Haunt

I had posted last week about several Halloween attractions in the Fresno area, including the haunted corn maze Raisin Hell.  Unfortunately due to a severe storm that hit the valley on Tuesday, the maze won't be open this year as most of if it was destroyed.  KMPH 26 reports on this.



MADERA - These are spine tingling scenes from last October at the "Raisin Hell Ranch" in Madera County.  But the attraction won't host any terrified guests.
In fact the only horror these cornstalks witnessed this year was the look on workers' faces when they arrived in the morning, to find their maze destroyed.

"This was just a devastating thing to have happen," Darren Schmall said.

Darren Schmall runs the "Raisin Hell Ranch" and he's been growing the corn since August.
It was all destroyed Tuesday in a day of very heavy rain.  In addition to a corn maze, the ranch was supposed to feature two separate haunts, the Chupacabra Haunt and the Demonic Scarecrows.

60 people were hired and ready to scare the bejeepers out of thrill seekers, but:
"Because we're not going to open, all those folks are out of a job," Schmall said.
The operators have 10 thousand free passes and 150 thousand coupons floating around to attract people; they're now worthless.

Darren Schmall says he considers 2009 a practice year for his team of ghouls.  "Next year we'll be back and be bigger and better than ever," he said.

The owners are also involved with Cobb ranch corn maze and pumpkin patch.
They're urging people to head out there this year for some Halloween fun.

Original story can be found here.

Graveyard Camping. Only in Madera.

Last Saturday I was with my friend Ashley and her brother as they needed some help filming a project. One of the locations they needed was a cemetery, preferably an older one. Being that they lived in Madera I suggested one out in the country called New Hope Cemetery. I had been out there many a times when I was a kid looking for ghosts and the place had a creepy factor, even during the day. We pack up out gear and head on to the cemetery. As we get near it, we can see a truck with a camper on it parked near the ruins of the church and a man, who appeared to be in his 40's) on the ruins of the church with what looked like a camper stove. Shocked and honestly a bit terrified by this we drove past and didn't stop. As we drove by the man actually walked out onto the road, dragging his leg like he was Keyser Soze or something. We kept driving on for a mile or so and curiosity got the best of us, so we headed back. Since I had recently sold my soul and bought a new iPhone with video, I thought this would be a good chance to test it out. Below is what I filmed. I apologize for the Blair Witch-esque video. Though I find it funny that I'm talking like I haven't yet reached puberty.





Ashley says the guy waved, but I didn't see him. Honestly I was so focused on videoing him that I didn't really pay attention. We decided to go to another place in Fresno and did the filming there. But I was still curious. Why was this guy there? Was he just camping for the weekend or was he squatting? I had to go back. I drove back by on Monday and the same truck was there, but there was also another vehicle there. Looked like a mid 70's Ford Ranchero. I have no idea what the hell they were doing there, but I did take a bit of video. Though it's choppier than the first. Mostly cause the road is full of potholes and I was driving as well as filming.





I'm not sure what's going on. I know the cemetery has been abadoned since the mid 80's, when the church burned down (rumored by Satanist, but that's for another blog post) and there has been a group of people that go out there and clean up the cemetery every once in a while. Perhaps this person is some sort of caretaker/watchman? I know in my high school days this was somewhat of a party spot and kids would go there all the time. Maybe they have someone out there to keep a watch on it. Or maybe the person is homeless and is staying there as they have no other place to stay. I honestly don't know. But It gets weirder.


The shot from Google Maps Street View. Looks to be the same
truck as in the video minus the camper shell.



An enlargement of the truck from a different angle. The front
looks similar to the one in the video.

I have no recent photos of the place, and didn't want to go by a third time and risk the ire of Keyser Soze, so I went to Google Maps, specifically their Google Street option to see what I can find. Well as luck would have it, the same truck (or at least the same model) sans the camper is in the Google Streets shot. I have no idea how old the shot is, but I think they came through my neighborhood about a year ago and I live maybe five miles from the cemetery. And it's not like I drive by the place daily, so I really can't say how long it's been there. But it's just weird that someone is camped out at a cemetery. Someone wants to go interview them? Do it and I'll be your best friend. Forever and ever and ever.

Recent Central Valley UFO Sightings

From as far south as Porterville to north of Madera, strange things are in the skies. All sightings were reported to the National UFO Reporting Center and are linked back to their original entry.


Occurred : 1/21/2009 19:00
Location: Fresno, CA
Shape: Rectangle
Duration:3 minutes

4 unknown flying crafts were following our car and another one hovered over our neighborhood when we got home.

My husband and I for the last 2 1/2 months have been seeing strange hovering objects in the sky beginning Nov. 3rd 2008. The last sighting was last night around 6:45 pm. We were driving west on McKinley ave in Fresno CA on our way to a meeting. We noticed 4 hovering objects at a stand still on each side of our car about 3 miles up in the sky when we were at a red light. Once our car started moving they moved along side us, every time we stopped they stopped. They all looked alike and did not look like helicopters and not planes. Later on in the evening on the way back home we spotted another craft similar to the ones earlier just hovering at a stand still above the houses in our neighborhood. the object even brightened its lights from red to super bright white. it was still for about 3 minutes then slowly started to move to the right, then left then it either vanished or we just did not catch it take off. This is not the first time we have seen these objects in the sky. we seen larger ones the size of two commercial planes before. We just find it strange that the sightings have not stopped. Our children, my parents friends and my mother in law have all witnessed them. For some strange reason these objects have not gone away and seem to be growing by the numbers each day and showing themselves pretty boldly. If anyone has seen them also please post a report, we hope we are not just going crazy over here by ourselves.


Occurred : 1/23/2009 22:35
Location: Fresno, CA
Shape: Triangle
Duration:3 minutes

Red glowing lights form triangle

I work Security at night, and I was just leaving some ones house that was a loud party call. My partner called me, he is about a mile away locking up a pool and dock area, he tells me to look up in the sky, I do, and there is a big triangle,( the point is at the rear, ) with red glowing lights at each point. Now when I say lights, I don't mean like car or plane or copter lights. They looked like a glow from a fire or if a trash can was turned upside down and a huge road flare was put inside of it. I didn't see anything else to describe, no hull, nothing else.

It was very cloudy that night due to an earlier rain, the clouds were low, and it moved right in them. It also moved very slow. As it moved further away from me, the back light trailed back and the front left light trailed to the left. And that is the last I seen of it. It was also big, hard to tell exactly, best guess, about 60 to 75 feet.

It was some what close, about 100 to 150 yards in front of me, and about 3 light poles up, I am not great at guessing feet when it comes to altitude. There was no sound that I could hear.

Juan, my partner said he seen some of the hull, and saw the lights crossing. I will try to get him to fill a report out.


Occurred : 2/2/2009 20:45
Location: Dinuba, CA
Shape: Triangle
Duration:2 to 3 minutes

Four red light in shape of a triangle gliding over the city of Dinuba CA.

February 02, 2009

Between 8 and 9 o’clock, I stepped outside, like I normally do around this time to smoke a cigarette before heading to sleep. I like gazing up at the stars while I’m smoking and that night I heard like a humming sound, I looked around and then proceeded to look up at the sky. From the corner of my eye (towards my right) I noticed something coming in fast.

As I turned to see what I had seen, the object slowed down and glided across Dinuba, CA. I would guess about 1 ½ from where I was standing and about ½ mile up in the sky. I know that this was not a plane because I have seen planes go across the sky and this did not move like an aircraft. It had four red lights and it was in shape of a triangle. Three lights coming down one side and one on the other side.

I ran inside the house and got my mom to go outside. My mom also seen what I had seen and she was just saying, "What the heck is that?" It glided for about five minutes and then it just speeded off. Before speeding off, the lights turned from red to a yellowish orange color and then it speeded off.


Occurred : 2/3/2009 04:30
Location: Madera, CA
Shape: Sphere

I saw 2 unknown objects with bright lights

I was driving on the freeway when my uncle saw something in the sky and kept pointing to it and couldn't see it at first till i got closer then i saw 2 bright lights in broad daylight just slowly moving kind circular motion then as i got closer one disappeared and I passed underneath it and i saw a black object that appeared to be an unknown object just sitting their floating it wasn't round it wasn't a helicopter or a plane it something different more like a triangle. I reported that sighting to the police department.


Occurred : 2/13/2009 18:30
Location: Fresno, CA
Shape: Circle
Duration:2-3 seconds

Glowing bluish- green ball of light flying west to east at rapid rate of speed

I was driving due east on a dark street when a bluish-green ball of light flew directly over my car from behind me (west) at a very high rate of speed. It was a little smaller than the diameter of a traffic light across 4 lanes of road and had no tail or other lights, just a glowing ball of unearthly light. The sky above me was clear but it's direction was toward the Sierra Nevada mountains which were shrouded in clouds. I couldn't tell if it simply disappeared or was obscured by the distant clouds. Nor could a tell if it was small and close or large and at high enough an altitude to fly into the clouds. No sound was heard.


Occurred : 2/16/2009 19:30
Location: Visalia, CA
Shape: Light
Duration:30-45 minutes

It was about 7:30pm we looked into the sky (Southeast) and there was a very large bright off white light with a green tint around it. It stayed in the same spot just moving back and forth for about 30-45 minutes, then just disappeared. Kind of hovering back and forth. We kept looking at it and took some pictures, but the movie pictures just looks like a white speck moving back and forth. The movies look nothing like just looking at it with the naked eye. We thought it was a bright star, but it had green around it and it hovered back and forth. We also thought at first it was a helicopter, but it never moved. We never took our eyes off of the object, then it just disappeared. No movement at all.


Occurred : 2/24/2009 16:10
Location: Dinuba, CA
Shape: Sphere
Duration:10 minutes

Sphere-like aircraft flying in circle eight pattern at a flying height of a commercial airline.

This day I noticed, what I thought was a flock of birds circling, a group of sphere-like flying objects several feet in the air. Approximate height in the atmosphere is around the level a long distance commercial flight would fly. I thought at the beginning it was a flock of birds, but they were hard to make out and appeared to be 1/3 of the size of a commercial plane flying by seconds after they disappeared. 10-12 spheres flew in a circle 8 pattern in two separate locations in the air and flew at a rather high speed considering the height in the air. They flew in two separate locations for approx. 10 minutes. They disappeared as soon as two commercial airlines flew into view from the south and east. It truly an amazing sight to see with our two 2 year olds and 5 year old as we viewed the sky from the front yard of our house.


Occurred : 3/7/2009 22:15
Location: Porterville, CA
Shape: Fireball
Duration:3 hours

Huge craft moving at incredible speed after hovering for about 3 hours

At around 7:30 PM on March 7, 2009, my boyfriend and I observed what we thought was a very bright star in the western sky. It was much closer then any other stars and it was relatively large but it was not moving, just hovering there, so we ruled out and airplane or helicopter. At around 10:15 PM I had to drive my brother and sister to their grandmother’s house for the night. The kids went outside first while I grabbed my things. One of them screamed so I ran out to see what was wrong. They immediately pointed to the object which we earlier thought was a very bright star or planet, but this time it was bright red, still sitting in the very same spot it was just 3 hours before. By this time my boyfriend and my other brother had also emerged from the house. After observing it for about five minutes the big bright red ball shot across the sky at an amazing speed and covered a distance in one second that would take any airplane a good 5-10 seconds to cover. Then it slowly faded out and was gone.


Occurred : 3/13/2009 19:35
Location: Murrieta, CA
Shape: Circle
Duration:1 min.

A small, flaming- looking object that moved strangely.

Circular flaming object. Seemed like 60 ft. in the air, moving slowly then it took off quickly. We continued to see it for about a 1/2 mile and the flame would get bright and then alternate to a dim flame. Another bystander was watching it while standing outside of a storefront.