Mission
The UFO 8 MY COW Research Collective exists to document the bovine abduction crisis, support experiencers, decode the formations, catalogue the implants, identify the species, expose the Bureau and bring Beryl home. In that order, except for Beryl, who is always first.
We are community-led, government-ignored and headquartered in the second bedroom at Boolaroo Downs, via Wandoona, Central West Queensland, population 312 and falling. Draw your own conclusions.
History
The site went live in March 1996 as GeoCities page Area51/Vault/8142, built by Shane Doolan, then aged nine, on a computer the school was throwing out. It had one photograph, one paragraph, a visitor counter and a MIDI file that has since been lost to history and is not missed. It moved to its own domain after "the hosting provider was compromised", which Shane says means GeoCities closed and Warren says means GeoCities closed, with emphasis.
Today the Collective publishes news, testimony, opinion and investigative dossiers; maintains the photographic archive; runs the Tuesday Night Experiencer Support Group; adjudicates the Most Suspicious Cow competition at the Wandoona Show; and answers correspondence from around the world, usually with a pamphlet of our own.
The people
Founder & webmaster
Warren Doolan
Grazier, Boolaroo Downs. Fifty-something since 1994. Owner of the tape, the camcorder and the position. Warren has been told it was a cloud, a balloon, a flare, Venus, swamp gas and a flock of birds flying in formation with their headlights on. He has not been told where his cow is. He writes most of the news, all of the capital letters and the Paddock Alert Level, which he reviews nightly from the verandah. Signs off: Keep watching the paddock.
Management
Noreen Doolan
Runs the station, the books and the hosting account. The Collective's in-house sceptic and the only person on this site who has ever been to Roma saleyards with a receipt book. Writes A Word From Management whenever the record needs correcting, which is often. Her position on Beryl is settled. Her position on Warren is "he's happy, and it keeps him off the roof".
Chief Scientific Officer
"Dr" Lyle Faraday
Doctorate in Ufology, Open University of the Internet (Cayman Islands campus), awarded by post in 1998. Former television repairman, Toowoomba. Dr Faraday performs all photographic analysis, which consists of saying "enhance" at the monitor until a shape appears, and all measurement, which is in Faraday Units. He believes every light is a craft and that every craft is, on some level, interested in him personally. He is not wrong about the second part as often as you would think.
Abductee Liaison Officer
Cheryl Mangan
Taken forty-seven times since 1991, forty-eight if you count Bunnings, which the Collective does not, officially, to keep the peace. Mother of Jaxon (24, Brisbane, IT, declines to comment). Facilitates the Tuesday Night Experiencer Support Group at the CWA hall, 7 pm, bring a plate. Cheryl is the Collective's heart, its institutional memory and its only member to have been returned to the wrong house. She is still waiting for Gary to call.
Head of Digital
Shane Doolan
Warren's nephew. Built the site at nine, maintains it at nineteen, has been nineteen for a while now and would prefer we didn't check. Runs the guestbook, the counter, The Weekly Probe and the site's position on the New Jersey drones. Thinks the visitors are "probably just vibing". Has been asked by Warren to stop saying that in official correspondence.
Source
Pine Gap Pete
Anonymous. "Senior facilities contractor at a facility near Alice Springs." All intelligence arrives on the back of a Keno slip at the Royal Hotel on Friday Disclosure Night. Has never been wrong, according to Warren. Has never been right, according to Noreen. May be Warren's cousin Peter, who mows lawns in Alice Springs, a claim the Collective neither confirms nor denies nor, Noreen notes, denies very convincingly.
Our opponents
The Bureau. Nobody knows which one. Its field officers are the Men in Beige. Dossier 01 has the full picture, such as it is.
The Bureau of Meteorology. The swamp gas people. Responsible for the Venus letter.
Keith Rowbotham. The sole member of the Wandoona Rationalist Society. Writes letters. Banned from the Tuesday group in 2003 for asking questions. The Collective publishes his letters in the interests of balance and annotates them in the interests of accuracy.
Senior Constable Brett Taggart. Not an opponent exactly. Tired. Has filed everything under Livestock: Miscellaneous since 1994. Declines to comment, which tells you everything.
Funding
The Collective is funded by management, the raffle at Friday Disclosure Night, and the gift shop. It receives no money from any government, corporation, foundation or alien civilisation, and Gary has never paid a cent.
Editorial standards
Every story on this site is checked by Warren for truth, by Dr Faraday for science, and by Noreen for whether it happened. Items passing two of the three tests are published as CONFIRMED. Items passing one are published as UNVERIFIED BUT TRUE. Items passing none are published as DEVELOPING. Items the Bureau has asked us to remove are published larger.
Note from the actual humans who made this website: everything above is satire. Every person named is invented. Nobody at the real Bureau of Meteorology has ever written to anyone about a cow, as far as we know, and if they have, we would love to see the letter.