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Chapter 1: What mysterious package did Bob Oeschler receive in 1992?
It's February 1992, and Bob Exler is sifting through his mail. He's used to getting a lot of letters, letters that most people might find a bit strange. See, Bob is a well-known and highly respected UFO researcher, so people write to him from all over the place about their alleged sightings. Some of the reports are convincing, others, not so much.
This evening, one envelope in particular catches his eye, and there's something different about it. It's missing a return address. Bob's interest is piqued, so he pulls it from the stack, rips the manila envelope open, and dumps out the contents. outspills a bunch of folded documents. At first glance, they appear to be official Canadian government memos.
There's also a hand-drawn map and photographs of aliens that, well, honestly look like a guy in a cheap costume. And then there's a VHS tape. Bob pops it in his VCR and a shaky homemade video flickers to life on his television. Whoever holds the camera seems to be running through the dark toward a bunch of lights.
Chapter 2: What evidence did the Guardian tape present to UFO researchers?
The images are blurry and the objects far away, so it's not immediately obvious what Bob's looking at. But it appears as though some kind of aircraft is landing near a line of red flares. Bob studies the video. Then he sends it to a colleague with expertise in photo analysis. They both agree, there's something here worth investigating.
To Bob, this could be the most credible piece of UFO evidence ever captured on camera. And it landed right in his lap. Only he doesn't know who sent it to him. The tape is labeled with just one word, Guardian. Right next to the name, there's an inky fingerprint. Whoever Guardian is, They've just sent Bob down a years-long rabbit hole.
One that will ultimately cause him to step away from the field of UFO research entirely. One that still, to this day, has people asking, who is Guardian? Welcome to Conspiracy Theories, a Spotify podcast. I'm Carter Roy. New episodes come out every Wednesday. We'd love to hear from you.
So if you're listening on the Spotify app, swipe up and give us your thoughts or check us out on Instagram at The Conspiracy Pod. Stay with us. Former NASA employee and UFO researcher Bob Exler pours over the Guardian tape. It's February 1992, so that means lots of pausing and rewinding on his VCR. The video is blurry.
The camera work is shaky, but there seems to be some horizontal light in the distance with another bluish light blinking above it.
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Chapter 3: Who is Guardian and why is their identity significant?
At one point, whatever object they're attached to looks as though it flies away. When you watch this video, it seems like there is something there, but also it really is hard to make out exactly what it could be. I can imagine going over this video back and forth a thousand times, as I did.
The more Bob looks, the more he feels certain he can see a large, curved object briefly illuminated with each strobe. It looks larger than a truck, smaller than a bus, maybe 20 to 30 feet from one end to the other. And, of course, it can fly, but it doesn't look like any man-made spacecraft he knows of. Which, for Bob, immediately rules out a hoax.
His reasoning, faking a scene with an object that size and that shape would take a lot of effort and time. And this appears to be a real video shot outdoors in a field somewhere in Canada. There are no film sets or tiny models involved here. Staging a hoax of this scale would simply draw too much attention. just as odd as what Bob sees is what he hears or doesn't hear.
The video does have sound, a dog barks off in the distance, but the potential spacecraft is completely silent. From that moment on, Bob works under the assumption that Guardian's video is credible, although there's still a lot he doesn't know. One, what the object in the video really is, two, when the event supposedly happened, and three, who was operating the camera.
For him, that last question is the biggest hurdle to overcome. He doesn't know Guardian's identity. They seem to be passing themselves off as some kind of government whistleblower, the deep throat of Canadian UFO conspiracies. which would explain why they were able to be in the right place at the right time to capture the video. They had insider information.
But because Guardian has remained anonymous, Bob can't get in touch. However, he's a seasoned researcher. He'll just have to go out there and find Guardian, along with the truth behind the video. If Bob can do all that... he might be looking at a career-defining case. And in a way, he ends up being right. Probably just not in the way he hoped.
Like any great 90s adventure, this one starts with a map. Guardian hasn't spelled out for Bob exactly where to go, but he did send along a hand-drawn map of a Canadian region known as West Carleton, about 35 miles outside of Ottawa, Ontario. The search area defined on the map covers a little over one square mile. It's not huge, but we're talking about a place with big open fields, farmland.
Some areas are covered in dense vegetation. There are even swamps. It's not the easiest terrain, especially if you're trying to pinpoint the precise location where a 20 to 30 foot object might have landed. Now, Bob lives in Maryland, and he doesn't know much about Wes Carlton, but he does have a head start thanks to his connections.
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Chapter 4: What challenges did Bob face while investigating the Guardian tape?
He's a member of the Mutual UFO Network, or MUFON, and his first order of business is calling his fellow researchers in Canada. The guy he talks to tells Bob he's not the only person who received a VHS tape from Guardian. On the one hand, it's got to sting a little bit, right? Like Bob's not as special as he might have thought he was. Oh, oh, you got a tape too?
No, I figured, I mean, of course you got a tape. I didn't think I was the only one who got the super special tape. On the other hand, it's kind of exciting news. Bob's no longer alone in this mystery. Plus, he learns not all of the tapes are identical. His copy includes a closer shot of the mysterious craft.
By the end of that long distance call, which probably cost an arm and a leg, that was very much still a thing in the early 90s, he has a plan to visit West Carleton the following week. On May 10th, Bob and his son meet up with a crew of eight Canadian UFO researchers. including a man named Graham Lightfoot, who knows a little more about the history of Guardian.
And yes, I said history because apparently Guardian has been sending out packages since 1989. He'd mailed various organizations and lecturers and experts at least four times before. The difference is those earlier communications only included documents and some blurry photos, never a VHS. Even so, Guardian's first letters caused a bit of a stir.
Back in 89, Guardian wrote about an alleged UFO crash near Ottawa, in roughly the same area where the tape is later filmed. Graham Lightfoot was sent to investigate that first claim. he managed to track down at least three possible witnesses to the 1989 crash Guardian described.
There's a couple who recalled an intense light flooding into their house, and a woman named Diane Labanek saw something similar. A bright light that she says flew over her house and toward the adjacent swamp, followed by several helicopters that appeared to be using their lights to search for something. That may sound like a solid lead, but Graham is a thorough and discerning researcher.
He ends up speaking to far more residents who don't recall seeing anything out of the ordinary. He searches the land surrounding Diane's house on foot and comes up empty-handed. Ultimately, Graham has no choice but to report back, "...I could find nothing conclusive to support or disprove any of the witness's claims." So the first investigation prompted by Guardian was a bust, but now it's 1992.
Three years later, there's a bigger crew, new leads, a map, and not to mention a friggin' video. The search begins near the Cedar Ridge Estates, an upscale neighborhood. Stately two-story homes dot the countryside, each one surrounded by a couple acres. The open fields bring to mind the scene from Guardian's video.
What's more, one investigator notices he can hear a single dog barking in the distance. when the team thinks they've pinpointed the square mile highlighted on Guardian's map.
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Chapter 5: What leads did Bob uncover during his search in West Carleton?
There's a problem. They're standing in the middle of a mosquito-infested swamp. The land is wet and mucky, and they have to trudge through knee-high plants. After a while, most of the team decides to throw in the towel and get some dinner. Only Bob and his son stay behind. When they all rendezvous that evening, Bob announces he's found the spot from Guardian's video.
Graham Lightfoot realizes it's not far from the home of Diane Labanek, the woman he believes is a credible witness to the 1989 sighting. The following day, Graham introduces Diane to Bob. They ask if she's seen anything else strange near her home in the past few months, and once again, she has. Diane remembers a night in mid-August 1991, around 10 p.m.,
A bright light caught her attention and drew her to a nearby window. She recalls thinking there was a fire out in the field beyond her house, but it may have been flares. And then, as she watched, it looked like some kind of aircraft landed out there.
Graham is gobsmacked, not only by her clear memories of the event, but because Diane is describing exactly what unfolds on Guardian's video, only she hasn't seen the video yet. She doesn't even know it exists. Then Graham asks her to draw the aircraft, and Diane sketches a basic silver object with a zigzag design, which reportedly looks a lot like a sketch included in Guardian's documents.
When Graham and Bob show her the tape, Diane agrees. That's it. That's what she saw back in August. She feels like, finally, here's some proof that she's not imagining things, which is apparently something she's been wrestling with. She's been nervous about telling anybody her story because she knows how all this sounds. However, that night wasn't the end of her troubles.
If you ask Diane Labanek, unmarked helicopters have been buzzing over her house, flying too low all the time. A few choppers every now and then wouldn't be so strange in West Carleton that there's a military base not far away. Except the Canadian government claims the helicopters aren't theirs. Now that Bob has found a possible witness to back up the Guardian tape,
it's time to inspect the site where he thinks it all happened. He guides Graham through the swamp to a patch of land that looks like it's been disturbed. And Bob excitedly points out, a lot of the nearby plants seem to have been blasted by intense heat. They look like they could fall apart to the touch. Maybe they've even been irradiated. Graham isn't so sure.
He happens to work for the Ontario Federation of Agriculture. So when Graham sees the dug up soil, he thinks it's simply the work of a regular old skunk. As for the irradiated plants, Graham knows it's common for juniper bushes to look dried out after surviving the harsh winter. Bob isn't a turd. He just thinks he needs to locate the real Guardian, the person who started this whole investigation.
But so far, none of the UFO researchers working the case have any clue who Guardian could be. So Bob decides, why not get this story out to the largest audience possible? Surely someone out there knows more. If only Bob could get enough eyes on this Guardian tape. And in the early 90s, there is one person who could make that happen. The man, the icon, Robert Stack, host of Unsolved Mysteries.
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Chapter 6: How did the Unsolved Mysteries episode impact the Guardian case?
They agree to travel with him to West Carleton in the fall of 1992 to film a segment. It airs in season five and features Bob, Graham, and Diane playing themselves in one of the show's hallmark recreations. Producers on the show also track down a couple of experts. First, there's Dr. Robert Nathan of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
He watches the Guardian tape and concludes that he can't say whether or not the events captured are real or a hoax. Then there's Major N.J. Patterson of the Canadian Forces Base in Ottawa. He confirms that if any helicopters are flying over Diane Labanek's house, they are not military. He also says something else. Major Patterson gets a good look at the documents sent by Guardian.
Remember the envelope with the VHS tape? It also included the cheap-looking alien photos I mentioned earlier, along with a bunch of papers. They're emblazoned with an official-looking letterhead that purportedly comes from the Department of National Defense. But if the letterhead adds any authenticity at all, the contents of those documents quickly reveal that these aren't real government memos.
They outline a supposed conspiracy between China working with quote, gray aliens to take over the world. Anyway, Major Patterson looks through these pages and without hesitation concludes they're forged. He cites several errors throughout and adds, quote, someone with very little effort could have come a lot closer than this.
Both a pretty solid burn and a really nice way to call out the documents as pure BS. If you're wondering why Bob has put so much faith and effort into this case, considering how unbelievable the documents and alien photos are, well, he says he was just that confident in the video evidence. Regardless, going to unsolved mysteries does have its intended effect.
Not long after the episode airs, showing the raw footage to the world for the first time, more information comes to light. Another witness steps forward who works for the government. And she believes on that night in August 1991, she may have seen extraterrestrials. Then Bob meets a man who tells him he knows the true identity of Guardians.
Bob Exler's plan to get the Guardian story out to the public works. After Unsolved Mysteries airs the segment in February 1993, the case gets picked up by papers and local news. That's when a woman reaches out to Bob. She claims she also witnessed the event captured on Guardian's video, because she lives right across a small road from where it supposedly happened.
The story this woman tells Bob is apparently so compelling that he persuades her to appear on another national TV show with him called Encounters. She agrees, but will only go on camera in silhouette and with voice modulation. She also uses a pseudonym, Sarah, although we now know that her real name is Susan Gills.
Susan insists on staying anonymous because she says she fears repercussions at work. She apparently has some kind of quote unquote sensitive government job, but neither she nor Bob can be more specific. And this is the story she tells on Encounters. On that August night in 1991, Susan was watching television on her couch when her dog, Sheba, started barking like mad.
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Chapter 7: What theories emerged about the authenticity of the Guardian evidence?
Encounters conducts a lie detector test on Susan, and she apparently does pass, though polygraphs are known to be unreliable. But whether or not her story sounds believable, she at least seems to believe it really happened. To her, this is a scary story she seems almost reluctant to tell. To Bob, Susan provided an exciting new lead. He thinks the car she saw that night belonged to Guardian.
Now, I don't know how much the following events played out exactly as they were described and how much was movie magic, but encounters claim Susan is able to describe the mysterious car and remember the license plate. That brings them to the doorstep of a man they allege is the real Guardian.
They perform a full stakeout outside this man's apartment and even give chase when he runs away from their cameras. Why am I a tad skeptical? Well, Graham Lightfoot had already been given this guy's name as a possible Guardian suspect over a year ago. He's Bobby Charlebois, a UFO enthusiast who has reportedly used the name Guardian before.
Little side note, their similar names might sound confusing, but Bob is the UFO researcher, while Bobby is the potential guardian suspect, and Bob's been chasing down Bobby for a while now. Okay, got it? Good. It turns out lots of people know Bobby, even for a small town. Remember Diane Labanek, who claims she saw both the 1989 and 1991 incidents Guardian reported?
She admits to being close friends with Bobby. He visits her family at her home all the time. He would be familiar with the area depicted on Guardian's map. But wait, it seems like this should be an open and shut case for Bob Exler, right? And remember, he has Guardian's fingerprint to work with. It's stamped on each and every VHS tape.
Assuming that finger belongs to Guardian, it's simply a matter of finding a match.
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Chapter 8: What lasting questions remain about the Guardian case and its implications?
First, Bob tries to recruit a local reporter to help him get Bobby's prints. She knows the case and personally knows Bobby Charlebois. She agrees to pass along a packet of information to him. I don't know what's in that packet. It's described only as some kind of UFO material. A dangling carrot for a guy like Bobby, I guess.
The hope is that he'll handle the materials, leave his fingerprints all over everything, and return the package. The UFO materials come back an hour later. Bob brings them to the police to have them dusted for prints. They find... nothing. Well, maybe Bobby just didn't take the bait, but Bob thinks it's far more likely that he's outsmarted everyone again.
Like maybe he handled everything with gloves or wiped every page clean somehow. Next, Bob goes to the RCMP, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. He asks them to charge Bobby with a minor offense for forging government documents. He thinks even if the charges don't stick, maybe they can scare Bobby into admitting he's Guardian. But the RCMP says, um... No, we're not going to do that.
For one thing, Bob isn't even a Canadian citizen. He lives in Maryland. Secondly, they have no hard evidence that Bobby is behind any of this. Foiled again. And Bob never gains access to these fingerprints. He's never able to confirm or deny whether Bobby Charlebois is Guardian.
But if you ask Bobby's friends around town, he's just a regular Joe who happens to be interested in UFOs, not some mastermind or prankster.
these days the prevailing theory is that the guardian tape was all a big hoax a saucer swindle if you will i mean the documents purporting to be from the canadian department of national defense don't really fool anybody and even bob exler can admit the photographs of the aliens don't look realistic he tells unsolved mysteries clearly this could have been someone dressed up in a costume
The one element Bob seemed convinced by is the videotape, along with the fact that witnesses claim they saw something around the time that tape could have been made. Now, interestingly enough, Bob is able to help open an official investigation. He brings attention to Diane Labanek's complaints of helicopters buzzing her house. As a result, the RCMP agrees to look into the matter.
As part of the case, they have to review the Guardian tape to determine what kind of aircraft appears in the footage. Their expert concludes it was a Sikorsky S-76 helicopter. Bob never accepts those findings. But to most, the real mystery here was never, is this footage of a real UFO? Rather, the enduring question remains, who is Guardian? Because nobody ever stepped forward.
But over the years, a few more suspects are named, like Susan Gills, AKA Sarah, the anonymous witness working for the government. Her grandson will later tell a CBC documentary that she was seemingly a true believer, she was conducting her own investigation, and she wasn't particularly impressed with Bob's work on the case.
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