wafflesatnoon.com » Hoaxes & Rumors » Did Mysterious Blobs Rain Down Over Washington in 1994?
Did Mysterious Blobs Rain Down Over Washington in 1994?
When Oakville, Washington was showered with mysterious blobs in 1994, is modern mystery was born. The incident has been circulated and discussed heavily on the internet since then. How accurate is the story and the photo that often accompanies it?
The story is true, but the photo is completely unrelated.
Let’s take a look at a recent version of the story as circulated on the internet in 2012:
The townspeople of Oakville, Washington, were in for a surprise on August 7, 1994. Instead of their usual downpour of rain, the inhabitants of the small town witnessed countless gelatinous blobs falling from the sky. Once the globs fell, almost everyone in Oakville started to develop severe, flu-like symptoms that lasted anywhere from 7 weeks to 3 months. Finally, after exposure to the goo caused his mother to fall ill, one resident sent a sample of the blobs for testing. What the technicians discovered was shocking – the globs contained human white blood cells. The substance was then brought to the State Department of Health of Washington for further analysis. With another startling reveal, they discovered that the gelatinous blobs had two types of bacteria, one of which is found in the human digestive system. However, no one could successfully identify the blob, and how they were connected to the mysterious sickness that plagued the town.
These are salamander eggs, NOT the Oakville mystery blobs.
The Original Story
This story as told above is a somewhat accurate account of the events that took place in August 1994, but the story has been expanded from the initial report.
Variations from the original story:
- The person who sent the samples for testing as not a man, but a woman named Sunny Barclift. She sent the samples after her mother, friend, and herself experienced “bouts of nausea” along with the death of a kitten around that time.
- There is no mention of “two types of bacteria” in the original accounts – only discussion of cells found within the blobs.
- Aside from those “bouts of nausea” reported by Barclift, suggestions that an illness “plagued” nearly “everyone” in the the town appears to be untrue.
- There is no mention that the illnesses reported by Ms. Barclift had a duration of “7 weeks to 3 months.”
Unsolved Mysteries
The story was picked up several years after the event by the television show “Unsolved Mysteries” in which many new details arose. We are told that the substance “blanketed 20 square miles” on six occasions. This is also where resident Beverly Roberts first mentioned illnesses lasting “7 weeks to 2 or 3 months.” Residents interviewed were Dotty Hearn, the mother of Sunny Barclift, who had been interviewed in the original newspaper article. Dotty described it as a “gelatinous-like material” that resembled hail. She reported dizziness and nausea soon after examining the blobs. Officer David Lacey was also interviewed, and he reported becoming ill within hours of touching the material which pelted his police car during a storm.
Lab technician Mike McDowell was interviews and stated that the blob samples had two types of bacteria, one of which is found in the human digestive tract.
The show states that the blobs appeared 6 times in a three-week period, dozens of people fell ill, and several pets died. A year later, private lab results showed the material to be eucharyotic cells, according to microbiologist Tim Davis. This indicates the material had come from a living organism.
Here's another photo of the same type of salamander eggs.
One additional mysterious piece of information is that the hospital lab which examined the blobs identified them as human white blood cells, but a lab which later examined them could find no nuclei in the cells, which are present in human white blood cells.
Local residents believe the blobs were related to increased military activity and “testing” done in the area in August, 1994, to the point of expressing belief that they were experiments of biological warfare.
The show indicated that there are no more samples of the blobs in existence.
Jellyfish Theory
One possible explanation is the “Jellyfish Theory.” Local residents learned that the Air Force had been exploding live bombs in the ocean around 20 miles from the town. It is suggested that jellyfish remains may have been ejected into the air and remained suspended in the clouds until they fell with rain. Residents did not report an odor one would expect if material from sea creatures had been out of the water that long, nor is it likely that the volume reported of this substance could be created from one school of jellyfish.
Airline Theory
Modern forums discussing the incident often suggest that the cause of the blobs may have been waste leaked from an airline. While this would tie into the finding of human white blood cells, it is unlikely because airline waste is commonly known as blue ice due to its color from the disinfectant in which it resides. The blobs were not reported to have any specific color.
Oakville Collusion Theory
It has been suggested by some skeptics that the residents of Oakville have enhanced the original story for notoriety. The original news report in fact stated that local residents were discussing an annual jellyfish festival, and mentioned a drink called “The Jellyfish” at a local tavern.
The photo
The image of a hand holding a giant blob is often circulated with this story, however it is not related to this incident. It is actually a photo of eggs from the Northwestern Salamander (Ambystoma gracile) as published on this website.
The 1994 newspaper accounts of the incident describe the blobs as “half the size of rice grains” which is far different than the image associated with the story.
What do you think these blobs were?
Source
- “Mystery Blobs Were Once Alive.” Observer-Reporter 20 Aug. 1994, D1
Filed under: Hoaxes & Rumors
It seems strange that no-one in the town took pictures of these blobs at the time.I certainly would have.
That’s actually an excellent point.
Aliens… :O
Perhaps it’s an alien version of “blue ice”. Or as the article indicated, some kind of government experiment. Perhaps even an alien experiment.
I just read the above and some but not all information is correct. Unfortunately when strange things like this happen and the news hits the internet it seems to take on a life of it’s own. Yes there were photos taken of the substance. A photo appears in the Seattle PI newpaper August 1994 that shows me holding part of one of my samples. I did not take photos of the substance directly because we did not have a working camera at the time. I will be happy to fill in any info or answer any questions regarding the strange rainfall here if you so desire. Thanks, Sunny Barclift
hello, I would like as much info as you have please, I’m extremely curious
thank you,
What specifically do you want to know? Most of the information in the Unsolved Mysteries segment is correct. Post your question here and I will answer it. Sunny
im mad because im doin a report and everything i saw as facts u r denying (i dont care about grammar right now)
What facts were denied? Several explanations were offered.
I sent a sample of the goo to the Washington State Health Department where is was analyzed by Mike McDowell an epidemiologist at their facility. Mike isolated two types of bacteria. Pseudomonas Florescan and Enterobacter. (I may have misspelled the names of the bacteria I do not have my notes in front of me.) It is true that several people became ill but not the entire town. Some people who became ill reported that the illness did indeed last 6 to 8 wks. I found my kitten dead on the doorstep two days after the fallout. Both dogs became ill within two weeks and survived. A human white blood cell was found in the goo when tested by a lab tech at the hospital where my mother was seen. She was hospitalized for 4 days. The goo fell 6 times over a 3 week period of time. We did experience a great deal of flyovers of various military aircraft. They were black in color. We did draw a possible conclusion that the military aircraft might be associated with the fallouts. We have no proof of that however. Unsolved Mysteries filmed the story about two years after the event. This website did a very good job of identifying the true statements regarding the events as well as the untrue comments and photo. Thank you website. Sunny
Thanks for your input. Do you know if anyone there has photographs of the material that fell?
Unfortunately no. We have some photos of a later incident of goo being found by members of the community some 3 or 4 years later but the goo is clear and cannot be discerned in the photos.
One other thing. Most of the residents of Oakville did not want any attention drawn on the community regarding the event. The comments made in the Seattle PI regarding the Jellyfish drink or festival were my comments. A lame attempt to try to bring some levity to the situation. Thank you.
If you have any additional information on this, we’d be very interested to hear your story.
If I told you the story from the beginning to the end it would constitute a book. Suffice to say what you have been able to glean from the material online and the Unsolved Mysteries video basically covers most of the facts, although, as I mentioned before, some info online has been distorted. I make every attempt to clarify when I find bad info online but it is hard to keep up with it. And even though I have contacted some owners of various websites to give them the correct information most just ignore me and continue to publish things that are misleading or just plain not true.
I am doing a report on the blobs in history could I have all your info please
Your best bet for researching this historically would be to view The National Geographic Channels program Paranatural “Blood Rain and Star Jelly”. You can google it and should be able to view it online. Pay no attention to the two women who were interviewed because their interview is nothing more than a mirror of the interview my mother and I did in the Unsolved Mysteries piece. I refused to do the interview and so the producer found someone locally who agreed but I can tell you that I personally know for a fact that those individuals knew nothing about the original event until I told them. The one piece of information that shook me up was the interview with Mike McDowell the epidymiologist who I sent the sample to originally. His interview was startling. I believe what he said. He discovered through his investigation that the material was a “matrix”. Like an envelope something would be inserted into. (Such as a bacteria or virus.) He reported this to his supervisor. When he returned to work the following day the sample was missing. Again, he reported this to his supervisor and was advised to “not ask any questions”.