THINK ABOUTIT ENTITY ENCOUNTER REPORT

1973: The Alabama Tinfoil Alien

On the night of October 17, 1973 — six days after the Pascagoula abduction made national headlines and in the middle of the most intense UFO/humanoid wave in American history — the 26-year-old police chief of Falkville, Alabama drove out to investigate an anonymous woman’s report of a spacecraft landing in a field. He found no spacecraft. What he found instead, standing in the road, was a figure approximately five and a half feet tall in a smooth, brilliantly reflective suit with no visible seam between head and neck and a small antenna on its head. Jeff Greenhaw said “Howdy, stranger,” got no response, and snapped four Polaroid photographs before the figure turned and ran — with an odd side-to-side, spring-loaded gait that outpaced his truck at 35 mph. Within a month, Greenhaw had lost his job, his house had burned, and his wife had left him. He never retracted his account and never profited from it.

Date: October 17, 1973

Sighting Time: Approximately 10:00 PM

Day/Night: Night

Location: Falkville, Morgan County, Alabama (rural area near a field owned by Bobby Summerford; entity encountered on a road near the reported landing site)

Urban or Rural: Rural

No. of Entity(‘s): 1

Entity Type: Humanoid figure in a reflective full-body suit — nature undetermined (interpretations range from extraterrestrial entity to person in a costume)

Entity Description: Approximately 5½ feet tall. Entire body covered in a smooth, brilliantly reflective material — Greenhaw compared the surface to mercury rubbed on nickel, as smooth as glass, with different lighting at different angles. He stated he did not believe it was aluminum foil. No visible separation between the head and neck — the two appeared to be made together as a continuous form. A small antenna was attached to the head. Movements were described as mechanical and robotic during the initial approach, transitioning to an extremely fast, side-to-side running gait with arms held down at the sides and an apparent spring-like propulsion, covering approximately 10 feet per leap.

Hynek Classification: CE-III (Close Encounter of the Third Kind) — provisional. The entity was encountered in the context of a reported spacecraft landing, but the reporting witness (Greenhaw) did not himself observe a craft. The anonymous caller who reported the landing was never identified. The entity was on the roadside near the alleged landing field, not adjacent to a visible craft. Standard ufological catalogs (Webb, HumCat) classify this as CE-III based on the association with the reported landing.

Duration: Several minutes (initial encounter through vehicle pursuit and loss of contact)

No. of Object(s): 0 observed by Greenhaw (the anonymous caller reported a spacecraft in the field, but Greenhaw found no craft at the scene)

Description of the Object(s): No craft observed by the reporting witness. The anonymous female caller described a “spaceship” landing in an open field owned by Bobby Summerford. When Greenhaw arrived and searched the field, he found no trace of any craft.

Shape of Object(s): Not applicable — no craft observed by reporting witness

Size of Object(s): Not applicable

Color of Object(s): Not applicable

Distance to Object(s): Not applicable (Greenhaw approached the entity to within approximately 10 feet before it fled)

Height & Speed: Entity was approximately 5½ feet tall. During the pursuit phase, the entity outran Greenhaw’s truck at 35 mph on rough terrain. Greenhaw described the running as faster than any human he had ever seen, with an apparent spring-loaded propulsion covering approximately 10 feet per leap.

Number of Witnesses: 1 (Jeff Greenhaw — the anonymous caller who reported the landing is an unidentified, uncontacted witness)

Special Features/Characteristics: Four Polaroid photographs taken by Greenhaw — the first shows only darkness with a flash of silver; the remaining three clearly show a humanoid figure in a reflective full-body suit. The photographs were published by Associated Press wire services and appeared in newspapers worldwide. The entity initially approached Greenhaw slowly with a mechanical gait before fleeing at high speed when headlights or the vehicle’s emergency flashers were activated. The entity appeared to be heading toward Lacon, approximately 3 miles from Falkville. Severe personal consequences followed for Greenhaw: mockery, threatening phone calls, house fire, divorce, and termination as police chief approximately one month after the incident.

Case Status: Insufficient Data

Source: David Webb, “1973 — Year of the Humanoids” (primary ufological catalog entry); B.J. Booth article (2002) via NICAP/UFOCasebook; Associated Press contemporaneous reporting (October 1973); Chester County Independent retrospective (2025)

Summary/Description: Police Chief Jeff Greenhaw of Falkville, Alabama responded to an anonymous call reporting a spacecraft landing and found no craft but encountered a 5½-foot humanoid figure in a brilliantly reflective full-body suit with no head-neck separation and a head-mounted antenna. He photographed the entity four times with a Polaroid camera before it fled at a speed exceeding 35 mph with an unusual spring-loaded running gait. The four photographs — published internationally — show a figure in a reflective suit but are ambiguous as to the figure’s nature. The anonymous caller was never identified. The case occurred six days after the Pascagoula abduction during the peak of the 1973 Southern US humanoid wave. Greenhaw suffered severe personal and professional consequences and never retracted his account.

Detailed Report

On the evening of October 17, 1973, Jeff Greenhaw, the 26-year-old police chief of Falkville, Alabama — a small town in Morgan County approximately 60 miles north of Birmingham — was at home off duty with his wife when he received an emergency phone call at approximately 10:00 PM. An unidentified, nearly hysterical woman reported that a spacecraft had landed in an open field owned by Bobby Summerford on the outskirts of town. The caller was never subsequently identified, and no one has ever come forward to claim the call.

Greenhaw responded to the call in his personal truck, bringing his keys, handcuffs, revolver, and — as an afterthought — his Polaroid instant camera. He radioed the call and drove to the reported landing site. Upon arrival, he searched the field but found no trace of any spacecraft or landing evidence.

As he continued searching the area near the road, Greenhaw encountered a figure standing just off the roadside. The being was approximately five and a half feet tall, covered head to foot in a brilliantly reflective material that Greenhaw later described as resembling mercury rubbed on nickel — smooth as glass, with the reflectivity changing at different viewing angles. He explicitly stated that he did not believe the material was aluminum foil, despite the nickname the case would later acquire. There was no visible separation between the head and neck — the two appeared to be a continuous form. A small antenna protruded from the head.

According to an Associated Press interview, Greenhaw’s first reaction was to say “Howdy, stranger” to the figure. It did not respond. The entity began walking toward Greenhaw with a slow, mechanical gait. Pushing past his shock, Greenhaw raised the Polaroid camera and snapped four photographs. The first captured only darkness with a flash of reflected silver. The remaining three clearly show a humanoid figure in a wrinkled, highly reflective suit.

When Greenhaw activated his vehicle’s headlights or emergency flashers — accounts vary on which — the entity appeared startled and turned to flee. Its movements shifted instantly from the slow mechanical walk to an extremely fast running gait unlike any human locomotion Greenhaw had seen: the figure ran side to side, arms held rigidly at its sides, with what appeared to be a spring-loaded propulsion covering approximately ten feet per leap. It headed in the general direction of Lacon, approximately three miles from Falkville.

Greenhaw jumped in his truck and pursued, but the rough terrain limited him to approximately 35 mph. The entity easily outpaced him. The chase ended when Greenhaw’s vehicle spun off the road, and the figure disappeared into the darkness.

The photographs were distributed by the Associated Press and published in newspapers worldwide, making Greenhaw briefly and unwillingly famous. The consequences were devastating. He was mocked and ridiculed by townspeople. He received threatening phone calls. His house burned down — whether by arson or accident was never established. His wife left him. Approximately one month after the incident, the Falkville town council fired him as police chief. Greenhaw eventually rebuilt some semblance of a normal life but always regretted the encounter. He never retracted his account and, according to journalists who followed the case over the decades, never profited financially from the photographs or the story.

Researcher’s Notes

The Falkville Metal Man — Alabama 1973 and the Hoax Question in a Humanoid Wave

The 1973 Humanoid Wave Context: This case cannot be evaluated outside its temporal context. October 1973 was the peak of the most intense UFO/humanoid flap in American history, with cases concentrated heavily in the Southern and Midwestern United States. The Pascagoula abduction of Charles Hickson and Calvin Parker occurred on October 11, 1973 — just six days before the Falkville encounter — and had generated massive national media coverage. Alabama and Mississippi are adjacent states. The entire region was saturated with UFO reports, media attention, and heightened public suggestibility. This does not invalidate the Falkville case, but it establishes the environment in which the anonymous caller, the encounter, and the community reaction all occurred.
The Hoax Theory: The most prominent alternative explanation — circulated by anonymous internet sources but never formally proven — is that the entity was a local teenager wearing a reflective suit, and that the hoax was orchestrated by community members who wanted Greenhaw removed as police chief. The circumstantial evidence for this theory is not trivial: the anonymous caller was never identified (a staged call would explain this); no spacecraft was found at the reported landing site; the Polaroid photographs clearly show what could be a person in a full-body costume; and Greenhaw was indeed fired approximately one month later. Against this theory: Greenhaw was a law enforcement officer with no history of fabrication; the speed of the fleeing entity (exceeding 35 mph on foot) is extremely difficult to fake; Greenhaw suffered catastrophic personal consequences and never retracted or monetized the story; and no participant in any alleged hoax has ever come forward in over fifty years.
The Photographs: The four Polaroid images are the case’s most distinctive physical evidence. They are authentic Polaroid prints — no one has contested that Greenhaw took them. They clearly show a humanoid figure in a reflective, wrinkled suit. They are consistent with either an entity in an unknown covering or a person in a manufactured reflective costume. The images do not resolve the question of the figure’s nature. Polaroid instant film of the early 1970s had limited resolution, no ability to be post-processed, and was shot at night with a flash — conditions that inherently produce ambiguous images. The photographs prove that Greenhaw encountered something in the road; they do not prove what it was.
Classification and Assessment: The CE-III classification is provisional. Greenhaw himself did not observe a craft — only the entity. The craft was reported by an anonymous, unidentified caller who never came forward. Per locked editorial standards, entity encounters without an associated craft observed by the reporting witness are classified as unassociated humanoid encounters. The standard ufological catalogs (Webb’s “1973 — Year of the Humanoids,” HumCat) classify it as CE-III based on the association with the reported landing, and we retain that classification here as provisional with the caveat clearly noted. Case Status is Insufficient Data: the photographs exist but are ambiguous, the hoax theory is plausible but unproven, the witness was credentialed and paid an enormous personal price, and the anonymous caller remains the single largest evidentiary gap in the case.

Jeff Greenhaw said “Howdy, stranger” to something standing in a road outside Falkville on an October night in 1973, and it cost him nearly everything — his job, his home, his marriage, and his standing in the community. Whether the thing in the reflective suit was a visitor, a teenager, or something else entirely, Greenhaw took four photographs, told the truth as he understood it, and never backed down. The photographs went around the world. The anonymous woman who called in the landing was never found. The entity — whatever it was — ran into the darkness toward Lacon and has never been identified. After fifty years, the Falkville case remains exactly what it has always been: four Polaroids, one ruined life, and no resolution.