Tyson was delivering this year’s Robert and Elizabeth Knight Distinguished Visiting Lecture. But this lecture was part of a larger, week-long event on campus hosted by the office of Student Life: Dream Big. And in the evening, he was the honoured guest at the Emerging Leaders Dinner, which celebrates student leadership. The Emerging Leader Award (ELA) is a way the University of Manitoba recognizes the outstanding contributions that students make to the enhancement of the institution and our community.

When he arrived on campus he also partook in a round table discussion in the Faculty of Engineering.

“I know this will sound new-agey, but I like the energy here,” he said.

1. Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977). This was a grand tour of ufology, with pre‑X‑Files government conspirators, UFO fanatics and early abduction themes. Richard Dreyfuss is outstanding as an average guy whose UFO experience turns his life upside down. The railway crossing scene, where he gets burned by a close brush with a UFO, is memorable and taken from witness’ narratives of actual close encounter reports. The movie is also noted for its attention to detail from actual UFO sightings and the people who study them. The French scientist working with the American government is patterned after Jacques Vallee, while noted ufologist Dr. J. Allen Hynek actually makes a cameo appearance during the climactic scene towards the end where the “mother ship” finally lands. The movie’s title refers to the most extreme of the UFO encounter categories defined by Hynek in his research: the first kind is a sighting within 500 feet; the second kind is a case in which physical traces are noted; the third kind is contact with aliens.

2. The Abyss (1989). In James Cameron’s film, unidentified underwater objects (UUOs) turn out to be curious aliens. Given that much of the Earth is covered by water and much of the oceans’ depth is still unexplored in detail, it makes perfect sense that aliens might choose to establish a base on the ocean floor, undisturbed by humans. Again, this is partly based on claims that there are underwater UFO bases off the Eastern Seaboard, at the bottom of Lake Ontario and within the Bermuda Triangle. The stunning effects and cinematography make this film an outstanding first‑contact story.

3. Uforia (1980). This is a sadly underrated story of a checkout clerk played by Cindy Williams, who thinks she’s been chosen by aliens to carry their message of peace to the masses. She attracts quite a following, and there’s lots of resemblance to Elmer Gantry when her boyfriend begins exploiting her as a contactee who is acting as the aliens’ ambassador. But then it seems the government is taking her seriously for some reason…

The real Barney and Betty Hill.

4. The UFO Incident (TV movie, 1975). This teleplay of Fuller’s The Interrupted Journey has wonderful, low‑key and believable performances by Estelle Parsons and James Earl Jones as Betty and Barney Hill. A thoughtful portrayal of the “grandaddy” of all UFO abductions, this movie accurately portrayed the confusion and angst felt by the Hills as they tried to come to terms with memories of their experience.

5. Earth Versus the Flying Saucers (1956). This was one of the best saucer movies of the 50s, with excellent special effects for its time, including the frequently‑seen stock footage of plastic model saucers flying over Washington, D.C. The malevolent aliens were clearly here to take over the planet, with displays of force such as blowing up buildings. The film conveyed the fear and panic that many people expressed regarding the “invasion” of saucers over the USA in the 1950s, and the military response to the alien menace.

6. The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951). A classic even beyond ufology, this film turns the alien invasion theme on its head. When Klaatu’s saucer hovers over Washington, it creates absolute chaos, despite his good intentions. This is a story of hope and peace dashed by our inherent xenophobia, and the inappropriate and unwise use of military force when faced with what we might perceive as a threat to ourselves and our society.

7. Hangar 18 (1980). Probably the true forerunner of the X‑Files, this movie out-Roswelled Roswell, revealing a military base where a crashed saucer is under study. Another example of fiction meeting fact, Hangar 18 was a real location at right-Patterson Air Force Base in which  the debris from a crashed flying saucer from Roswell was allegedly housed. In the movie, when a saucer collides with a NASA vehicle, it’s all quickly hushed up because it’s election time. Can the heroic astronauts find the saucer in time? Aliens = good. Government = bad. Thrash rock group Megadeth recorded two songs about aliens at Hangar 18, neither story ending well for the humans.

8. Communion (1989). This very strange film is less a UFO movie than it is a character study of abduction researcher Whitley Streiber. Christopher Walken goes over the top to portray dissociation and paranoia when aliens seem to be haunting Streiber’s life. The ultimate message seems to be that aliens are in complete control and that they will show us only what they want. The movie does convey many elements of abductees’ experiences well, especially the multi-layered memories and confusion that are part of some stories.

9. Fire in the Sky (1993). Panned when it first came out, largely because of the end sequences in which Travis Walton is encased in goo similar to the Matrix or Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Those scenes were not part of Walton’s actual story, which was fantastic enough without Hollywood embellishment. Leading up to the final scenes, however, the film accurately portrays how UFO case investigations are conducted, and the difficulty in unraveling witnesses’ testimony in complicated cases.

10. The Brother From Another Planet (1984). In this low-key but sympathetic John Sayles movie that stars Joe Morton, the UFO is seen only at the beginning, but the story of an alien dealing with the reality of being stranded on Earth like a fish out of water again underlines our xenophobia. Yes, I liked E.T., which had a similar theme, but this low‑budget film gets my vote as a touching, yet powerful statement about our society.

You can see more on the “vomit comet” in the video below.

This exciting alumnus completed his B.Sc. and M.Sc. degrees in Computer Engineering in 2008 and 2013 respectively, both at the University of Manitoba (UofM). His research interest includes evolutionary algorithms for cognitive machines, and particularly the design of hardware and algorithms with software implementations for space applications, resulting in several conference and journal publications.

Currently, Schor works as a Software Engineer at Magellan Aerospace Winnipeg where he designs, implements, and tests elements of the flight software and ground tools to support small-satellite missions such as CASSIOPE and the Radarsat Constellation Mission (RCM).

Here’s what he had to say about parabolic flight:

Last summer, while attending the Space Studies Program offered by the International Space University, a group of classmates and I submitted a proposal for a parabolic flight experiment that would investigate the effects on gravity on sensorimotor processes.

That is, we wanted to evaluate how our body performs and adapts to different gravity conditions when some of the visual and physical cues around us are taken away.

This kind of research helps to train and develop counter-measures for future human space missions.

In the experiment, subjects perform a series pointing tasks using a touch screen monitor while measuring a subject’s reaction time and accuracy performing the tasks.

To simulate the different environments where some of the visual and physical cues are removed, subjects repeat the tasks using inversion goggles. The hypothesis is that when using inversion goggles, the number of errors should decrease in zero gravity conditions because the physical cues are diminished — so our bodies do not have a reference point to tell they are being inverted.

According to the Canadian Space Agency, “Parabolic flights can simulate microgravity. These parabolic manoeuvres, executed by modified commercial jets, give the opportunity to obtain short periods of free fall. On the upward arc, the thrust of the airplane is adjusted so that there is no lift: the plane is in free fall since nothing reduces the force of gravity. The plane remains in free fall over the top of the parabola and part of the downward arc. Microgravity conditions are achieved for time periods of 15 to 20 seconds, in which it is possible to conduct experiments. By free floating experiments, low g-levels can be achieved for 5 to 8 seconds.”

I attended the Space Studies Program at the International Space University in Strasbourg, France after defending my thesis in Comp. Engineering at the University of Manitoba. There were 100 participants from 22 different nations with varying backgrounds and a common interest in space studies.

The program emphasizes the (i) international, (ii) intercultural, and (iii) interdisciplinary nature of space. During the program, we attended lectures on space applications and engineering, human performance in space, space humanities, space management and business, space policy and law, and space sciences.

Each lecture was carefully crafted and delivered by experts in the field.

For example, NASA astronaut Jeffrey Hoffman delivered the lectures on human performance in space sharing his experience, while Prof. John Logsdon, long time space historian, delivered many history and policy lectures providing insight into both current and upcoming events in the industry.

In addition to the lectures, the participants were divided into three teams to work on large capstone projects that require in depth research and creative thinking.

The capstone projects evaluate the technical, financial, and political feasibility with respect to the end user. These three projects were recently presented at the annual United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs session to promote discussion and ideas on space projects that can benefit mankind

I worked on project AMBIEnT – an affordable microsatellite based internet access and environmental monitoring constellation to aid in the digital divide in the Brazilian Amazon.

In January 2014, the team had a design review with engineers from Magellan Aerospace, Winnipeg. They provided a great deal of feedback based on their experience designing experiments for shuttle missions and the international space station.

Since then, the team has completed implementing the software and building the apparatus. Ground trials are currently underway in Strasbourg, France, and the experiment is scheduled to fly in an European Space Agency parabolic flight campaign in September 2014.

Chris Rutkowski is a Canadian science writer and educator with a background in astronomy who’s been studying reports of UFOs and writing about his investigations and research since the mid-1970s. His presentation, “UFO Phenomena in Canada,” is part of the Dream Big events presented this week by the student life office; his talk takes place on Tuesday, March 11 at noon in 224 University Centre.

UM Today asked him about his UFO research — and to supply our readers with some fun UFO trivia.

Rutkowski has published many books on UFOs and related issues, including A World of UFOs (2008), I Saw It Too! (2009) and The Big Book of UFOs (2010).

He’s also been involved in writing and media projects for more than 30 years, including TV specials, planetarium shows and newspaper columns. He regularly appears on radio programs, podcasts and TV series, such as Unsolved Mysteries, UFO Hunters, Sightings, Eye2thesky and A&E’s The Unexplained.

According to Rutkowski, there are six basic categories of explanations for UFOs:

• Misinterpretations of conventional objects or common phenomena;
• hoaxes;
• unusual natural or poorly-understood phenomena;
• secret government or military projects; hallucinations;
• and something else.

However, the “something else” category is not insignificant, he says.

“Included in the last category is every speculative idea ever proposed concerning the extraterrestrial nature of UFOs and alien spacecraft, he explains.

Chris Rutkowski.

“This quite naturally leaves the category wide open for anyone to propose his or her pet theory and innovation. These range from the relatively passive “man from Mars” to the extragalactic, and on through other dimensions and time travel. The motivations as to what ‘they’ want from us range from benign alien anthropologists watching our daily routines to preparation for insidious oppression, colonization or slavery.”

>>Scroll down for his list of “Top 5 Canadian Space Achievements” and click for his “Top 10 UFO Movies of All Time.”

Chris Rutkowski’s Top 5 Canadian Space Achievements

1. Chris Hadfield’s first music video shot in space, a tribute to David Bowie’s “Major Tom”

2. Alouette 1, the first Canadian communications satellite, still in orbit but now inactive

3. The Canadarm, which was seen in the hit movie Gravity

T he Canadarm grapples the Hubble Space Telescope from the payload bay of Space Shuttle Discovery to place it into orbit. (Photo : NASA)

4. The Churchill Rocket Range, which launched many sounding rockets for the US Army and NASA, right here in Manitoba, and is now a National Heritage Site

5. The LEM Landing Gear Sensing Probe, a sticklike device on the bottom of the “feet” of the Apollo 11 Lunar Excursion Module, was said to be built in Canada, so a Canadian artefact was first on the Moon, ahead of Neil Armstrong’s first steps!