Observers think UFOs hovered above the Eagle Ford Shale

ARTESIA WELLS — Strange things are afoot in the South Texas oil patch and in the sky above. In a region that's seen its tax rolls and traffic problems swell from the scores of new residents, could extraterrestrials be the next wave?

Roughnecks working at a fracturing well in the Eagle Ford Shale drilling region say they saw unidentified lights in the night sky on consecutive days in October and captured blurry video of at least one of them.

Three months earlier, a security camera captured a blurry, black-and-white image of what appears to be a flying saucer hovering ominously at another well site.

So far, no little green men have applied for a truck-driving job, but in a region desperate for more workers, they may not get turned down if they did.

Space alien visitation, or at least claims of it, adds a new dimension to the social upheaval that's engulfed La Salle County.

Here and throughout South Texas, drilling for energy in the lucrative Eagle Ford Shale has created an economic tsunami in traditionally cash-dry towns.

In years past, pitch-black nights swaddled the unforgiving mesquite forests that cover the region. Now, large tracts are lit up by floodlights that allow around-the-clock work at drilling rigs.

In other places, the fire of flare pits burning off unwanted byproducts casts an orange glow in the sky.

Armies of oil field workers have descended on the area, but if you believe the eyewitnesses, this is a different type of invasion.

The cellphone video, taken by worker Xavier Garza, shows a reddish-orange orb in the northern sky. Roughnecks can be heard off-camera cursing — as they are wont to do — in amazement.

Witnesses say the camera didn't pick up a dozen more lights that appeared and reappeared several times, typically hovering in formation. It happened two nights in a row.

And last week, a photo surfaced on the website of the Mutual UFO (Unidentified Flying Object) Network, a volunteer group that investigates UFO claims, purportedly taken at a well site in the same stretch of the Eagle Ford.

Allegedly taken from a security camera, it appears to show a large saucer-like object, with an array of four lights, hovering over the caliche pad of a La Salle County well site. Other odd orbs can be seen in the background.

That photo, with a July 5 time stamp, already has passed two authenticity tests, says Charles Stansburge, a veteran MUFON investigator.

“If it's a prank,” Stansburge said, “someone spent a lot of money to stage it. It's not a doctored photo. It's a 60-foot-diameter saucer that's hovering.”

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