alt=Travis Walton at The 2019 International UFO Congress in Phoenix, Arizona.|thumb|Travis Walton at The 2019 International UFO Congress in Phoenix, Arizona
The Travis Walton incident was an alleged alien abduction of American forestry worker Travis Walton on November 5, 1975, in the Apache–Sitgreaves National Forests near Heber, Arizona. Walton reportedly had said that he was taken aboard a flying saucer. Walton sold his abduction story to a tabloid, National Enquirer, which published the account and awarded the crew a $5,000 prize for Best Case of the Year.
In 1978, he published his account as The Walton Experience. While he claimed sole authorship, it was rumored to have been ghostwritten by John G. Fuller.
Science writers Philip J. Klass and Michael Shermer later alleged that Walton perpetrated a hoax. They suggested a potential motive: an abduction could be considered an "Act of God", thus enabling the logging crew to avoid a steep financial penalty from the Forestry Service for failing to complete their contract by the deadline, as they were behind schedule.
Travis Walton and the Turkey Springs forestry job
Travis Walton was born around 1953 to Mary Walton (later Mary Walton Kellott). On May 5, 1971, Travis Walton and associate Carl Rogers pleaded guilty to breaking into the offices of the Western Molding Company, stealing company checks, forging and then cashing them. The pair were placed on probation for two years, after which they were allowed to plead not guilty and "cleanse their records".
In 1975, Travis, aged 22, was a member of a seven-person forestry crew led by Carl's older brother Michael H. Rogers, aged 28. The year prior, Rogers had won a bid for a federal contract to thin out small trees from an area known as Turkey Springs in the Apache-Sitgreaves National Forest when he underbid two other contractors. The Turkey Springs job called for the thinning of 1,277 acres by August 1975.
The film aired two weeks before the Travis Walton UFO incident. Later researchers suggested that Rogers and Walton could have been inspired by the film to concoct their own alleged abduction story. At 7:45 PM, a member of the logging crew called officer L. C. Ellison. Ellison, Sheriff Marlin Gillespie, and Deputy Kenneth Coplan drove to Heber to meet with the loggers. According to a 1983 account, Rogers and two crew members agreed to return to Turkey Springs with the three officers, while the three other crew members refused to return and instead drove home in Rogers's vehicle. Walton, his older brother Duane, and his mother were described by the sheriff at the time as "longtime students of UFOs". recorded a 65-minute interview with crew chief Mike Rogers and Travis's older brother Duane Walton. At no point during the interview did either express any fear or concern for Travis; rather, they expressed confidence that Travis would be returned.
By November 10, stories of Walton's disappearance were being published throughout the US, UK, and Canada. On November 11, the press reported that Travis's mother felt any further searching for Travis would be useless. Walton had placed a collect call to his sister's home from a payphone in Heber, Arizona Walton reached his sister's husband, Grant Neff, who drove to pick up Duane and proceeded to Heber to pick up Travis; Neff later reported he initially thought the caller was intoxicated.
In the days following Walton's UFO claim, The National Enquirer awarded Walton and his co-workers a $5,000 prize for "best UFO case of the year" after they were said to have passed polygraph tests administered by the Enquirer and the Aerial Phenomena Research Organization (APRO).
Skeptics include the story as an example of a UFO hoax promoted by a credulous media circus with the resulting publicity exploited by Walton to make money. UFO researcher Philip J. Klass, who agreed that Walton's story was a hoax perpetrated for financial gain, identified many discrepancies in the accounts of Walton and his co-workers. After investigating the case, Klass reported that the polygraph tests were "poorly administered", that Walton used "polygraph countermeasures," such as holding his breath, and that Klass uncovered an earlier failed test administered by an examiner who concluded the case involved "gross deception".
In 1978, Walton wrote the book The Walton Experience detailing his claims. In 1993, the book served as the inspiration for the 1993 film Fire in the Sky, starring Robert Patrick as Mike Rogers, D. B. Sweeney as Travis Walton, Craig Sheffer as Allan Dallis, Peter Berg as David Whitlock, and Georgia Emelin as Dana Rogers. Travis Walton made a cameo in the film. Paramount Pictures decided that Walton's account was "too fuzzy and too similar to other televised close encounters", so they ordered screenwriter Tracy Tormé to write a "flashier, more provocative" abduction story. On the opening day of Fire in the Sky – March 12, 1993 – Walton and Mike Rogers appeared on the CNN program Larry King Live, which also featured Philip J. Klass.
Walton has occasionally appeared at UFO conventions or on television. He sponsors his own UFO conference in Arizona called the "Skyfire Summit". On January 19, 2021, Walton appeared on episode #1597 of the Joe Rogan Experience podcast. On August 25, 2023, he appeared in the fifth episode of the third season of How To with John Wilson, titled "How to Watch Birds".
Rogers-Walton dispute of 2021
On March 19, 2021, Mike Rogers posted a statement to his Facebook page announcing "I, Michael H. Rogers, being of sound and rational mind, do hereby give notice that I am no longer to be considered a witness to Travis C. Walton's supposed abduction of November 5, 1975." He later clarified: "Travis tried to keep a new remake of the movie a secret from me. He has always had his big secrets that he has kept from me. It angered me. I tried over the last two weeks to reason with [him], but of no avail. I don’t believe Travis is an honest person, and therefore I want nothing to do with him." Rogers and Walton later reconciled and Rogers issued a statement retracting his confession.
Within four months of the incident, UFO author Raymond E. Fowler, himself a believer in UFOs and abductions, proposed that some members of the crew had been the victim of a hoax perpetrated by others in the crew. Authors including Klass and Pflock argue that Travis Walton and Mike Rogers planned the incident.
Contrast with alien abduction syndrome
In the 1980s, reports of alien abductions became more widespread, due to authors such as Budd Hopkins, John E. Mack, and Whitley Strieber. Folklorist Thomas E. Bullard notes that stories of alien abductions exhibit a fairly consistent sequence and description of events. Scholars suggest that alien abduction syndrome is the result of sleep paralysis or false memory syndrome.
Walton didn't report paralysis, recovered memories or other common elements of an "alien abduction" narrative, leading Fire in the Sky screenwriter Tracy Tormé to opine "I don't think the Travis case is an abduction case... it doesn't fit any of the other patterns as in the cases that were explored in [Budd Hopkin's book] Intruders... So many witnesses, gone for five days... So I think all those things break the mold and make this case unique." Philip J. Klass noted that "a 'UFO-Abduction Mold' did not yet exist in 1975". Starting in 2021, Sheaffer promoted the hypothesis that Rogers and the Waltons made use of a nearby fire lookout tower to achieve their hoax. Sheaffer suggests Travis walked towards the tower, which was brightly lit above the tree tops, until an accomplice in the tower illuminated him with the spotlight.