Skinwalker Ranch: Angels & Demons (Pt 3) Brandon Fugal, UFOs, Ghosts & Mormons | The Basement Office

So here’s Homestead Two. I’m gonna walk around. Uh, there are lots and lots of stories about this particular place, so let’s go ahead and go in.

Foreign.

I heard a thump over here, so this is creepy. Did you hear that? Right here.

So over there I heard a thump, and I just heard it again. I swear to God I keep hearing it.

What—

[Music]

Skinwalker Ranch is a 500 acre property in eastern Utah. It’s also supposedly one of the most haunted places on Earth.

For 20 years, the ranch was owned by Robert Bigelow, a real estate millionaire obsessed with the paranormal. Bigelow claimed the ranch was a hot spot for UFOs, poltergeists, and all kinds of monsters. But no evidence to support any of this has ever been presented.

In 2016, Bigelow sold the ranch to another real estate millionaire with a passion for the paranormal, Brandon Fugal. And Fugal claims to finally have the goods—proof, evidence.

He produces a reality TV show on the History Channel called The Secret of Skinwalker Ranch. It claims to show real paranormal phenomena, proving that the spooky legends of the ranch are actually true.

I reached out to Brandon Fugal and asked if I could come to the ranch and see this evidence for myself. I was surprised when he enthusiastically accepted. He said I could come to the ranch, that he would show me everything, and that he would answer all my questions.

So I got on a plane, and my journey began.

I fly to Salt Lake City, Utah, a city I used to live in. Brandon Fugal tells me that before I can go to Skinwalker Ranch, he needs to show me some things first. He says there’s a whole backstory that I need to hear before I can fully understand the ranch.

So I drive 45 minutes down the I-15 to the city of Provo, another city I used to live in.

[Music]

Hey, how’s it going?

It really has. Yeah, it’s like the Batmobile.

Yeah, this is my driver.

[Music]

You know, it makes sense that someone who owns Skinwalker Ranch would drive this crazy.

I’m just—

[Music]

Brandon says being the owner of Skinwalker Ranch only takes up five percent of his day, and he wants to show me his real job.

[Applause]

The landscape of the valley surrounding Salt Lake City is changing. Brand new buildings are popping up everywhere, and a lot of these buildings all have something in common: Brandon Fugal.

His name is posted on signs up and down the Salt Lake Valley.

I noticed your name all over the sign.

Yeah. I mean there’s your name right over there.

Yeah.

Brandon takes me up to an overlook. Every new building in the valley below us is part of his real estate empire.

So you did this one, this one, this one, that one?

This is why I work 18 to 20 hours a day.

[Music]

Over the next three hours, we drive from building to building to building, all new construction, Brandon’s name in the front.

Fugal is the chairman of Colliers International, the number one commercial real estate company in the state of Utah.

Colliers has a global—one of the top three global players—manages 2 billion square feet of commercial space globally.

Hey Pete, how’s it going? Congratulations on our closing.

Crow, I have never worked with more talented, harder working, more charismatic real estate genius in the world.

Is that— is that true?

No, no, he’s preaching false doctrine.

It’s hard not to be impressed. He is without a doubt an extremely successful real estate magnet.

And while it may not seem like it, he and I actually have a few things in common.

We both were born and raised in the Mormon religion. We were both Mormon missionaries. And we both attended Utah Valley University.

Except his name is now on a building, and mine’s not.

This is the newly completed Brandon Fugal Gateway administration building. I recently donated five million dollars in support of really the expansion of this incredible institution where I went to school.

We stop in Brandon’s hometown of Pleasant Grove where his uncle Guy Fugal is currently the mayor. And there’s a Mormon church on nearly every corner.

[Music]

Brandon comes here every day to refill on gas and caffeine.

How’s it going?

Doing good. Just grabbing a Diet Mountain Dew as usual.

I’m a bit of a germaphobe so I try not to touch the knobs. But it’s a mixture of Diet Mountain Dew with just a splash of Goji Citrus strawberry.

I start every day with the 52 ounce of Diet Mountain Dew. I drink about two to three hundred ounces a day of this stuff.

And Friends is my hometown gas station. I’ve been going here since I was a little boy.

Hey Nyri, how’s it going?

Let’s put these— let’s put this on my tab.

And you can attest: am I here every day or not?

Every single day.

So like everyone knows your name in there?

Yeah.

This is— it’s the center of gravity for Pleasant Grove Town here where I’ve lived my whole life and grown up.

Why is a place like this important to you?

You know, roots are important to me. Heritage is important to me and my family.

You know, they were converts to the LDS church and came from primarily Scandinavia, settled here in the 1860s, and uh, and this is home.

[Music]

In 1820, a young boy in upstate New York named Joseph Smith claimed God and Jesus Christ physically appeared before him and told him that none of the world’s religions were true, and that they were choosing him as their prophet to establish God’s true religion.

Over the next few years, Smith claimed angels visited him via interdimensional portals and provided him with a new religious text, the Book of Mormon.

Smith called his new religion the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and he eventually attracted over 2,000 followers.

But in 1844, Joseph Smith was murdered by an angry anti-Mormon mob. The sentiment grew. More Mormons were attacked and even killed.

So Smith’s successor Brigham Young led the Mormon pioneers out west. They traveled over 1,000 miles through harsh conditions to find refuge from violence and persecution.

Their wagons and hand carts finally arrived at the Salt Lake Valley in Utah. And there in the desert they built a temple to their God in a city for their people.

They proclaim these are the latter days—the final days of conflict between God and the devil, angels and demons.

Brandon Fugal’s ancestors were part of this group of early Utah Mormons.

This is the old historic Fugal blacksmith shop. This was constructed in the 1890s by my great grandfather.

Next door you have one of the older structures standing in town. My great great grandfather lived in a little underground dugout those first harsh winters here and then they built this structure right on top of it in the 1860s.

So uh, Brandon, I have to admit like I had no idea your roots were everywhere here. Like it’s— you’re far-reaching.

You know, we passed the cemetery just now and one of the— the great big heads all Fugal. My great great grandfather, my great-grandfather, my even my father who recently passed.

Up the hill from where his Mormon ancestors lived, Brandon shows me where he plans to build his fourth home.

So right here you’re gonna build your future home?

Yeah.

In the next few months.

He shows me architectural mock-ups of what the house will look like.

Oh that’s the— right, that’s what it’s going to look like. This is going to be the front. We’re going to be—

It’s like a castle.

Yeah.

That’s awesome.

It’s right out of a fairy tale.

Road a fairy tale.

It’s pretty extraordinary.

Brandon tells me he has a master plan for the patch of woods below.

I’m gonna have the most terrifying haunted forest in the state every Halloween. In fact I’m gonna— I will have fog machines and strobe lights. I plan on making it so terrifying it’ll make children cry, but they’ll get full-size candy bars out of it.

Oh and I’m gonna totally have the Scooby-Doo factor with secret passageways, hidden staircases that I’ve already planned to build into it here because you can’t build a castle without having the Scooby-Doo factor, without having you know trap doors and secret rooms, right?

Right.

We end up in Salt Lake City at Brandon’s high-rise condo.

It’s kind of— it’s a nice convenience to have this as a splash pad to operate.

How many splash pads do you have, Brandon?

Couple.

You have a couple?

Yeah.

[Music]

Splash pads.

[Music]

So I— I like I just wing it, you know.

But I love— I grew up writing music and that was my passion. I was the only elementary school kid who knew the Close Encounters— the Close Encounters theme and all that stuff.

Do that again.

[Music]

I’m a songwriter. I had band— rock bands all through high school. And then I have a dark secret techno project called Supplicant.

I saw it. Yes.

That was very— yes, the music video.

Yeah I’ve seen it. It’s funky.

Yes.

[Music]

You’ve got you know the alien head. This is actually a faithful license recreation uh from H.R. Giger.

Yeah.

That’s from Stargate. So this is one of the rings used on screen in the classic with James Spader, Kurt Russell. So it’s a movie prop. It’s a screen used movie prop.

So it’s— it’s safe to say that like you’re a sci-fi fan?

Yeah. Love science fiction.

[Music]

Brandon Fugal is a collector. His multiple offices are packed with movie and television memorabilia.

Can you guess what this wardrobe—

Yes, I do.

That is from Unbreakable.

Yep.

And most of these are not replicas but screen used originals.

This is The Terminator jacket, screen worn by Arnold Schwarzenegger with the fake blood and the bullet holes.

These are the glasses worn by Tom Cruise in the original Mission Impossible.

He has Walter White’s gas mask from Breaking Bad, the monkey head from Indiana Jones, part of baby Superman’s spaceship, Fox Mulder’s FBI badge from the X-Files, puzzle box from Hellraiser.

He has so many items that I could produce an entire documentary on his collection alone.

In these drawers— let’s see.

Oh let’s see.

Um— whoa.

Will you came to show me an alien fetus and then close the door?

Yeah.

You have a couple of interesting things in here.

He has two drawers full of authentic movie screenplays.

This is the final script for Close Encounters of the Third Kind.

Poltergeist, Steven Spielberg, written by Steven Spielberg, first draft, 1981.

You get the drift.

He also owns an incredible number of rare antique books.

A King James Bible from the year 1611.

An original printing of the works of Shakespeare from the year 1685.

In here is the first printing of The Christmas Carol, 1843.

The Complete System of Magic, 1729.

This is the History of Stonehenge that belonged to King Charles II.

Flying saucers have arrived.

Yeah.

The Book of the Damned.

You got Ghost Stories of an Antiquary.

Yep.

He also has an entire shelf of historical books and documents from the Mormon church. Most of them are over 200 years old.

[Music]

I have the Masonic guide belonging to the first Mormon bishop.

He not only signed it, but he signed it in his Masonic cipher.

Behold I am Jesus Christ the son of God.

I came unto my own and my own receiveth me not.

I am the light with shyness and darkness and darkness comprehendeth not.

I have what I believe to be the Holy Grail of Mormon history.

So Oliver Cowdery, who is the principal scribe of the Book of Mormon, and this is— this is his copy. This is his personal 1837 Kirtland.

He was the principal witness, claimed to his death that he’d been visited by Peter, James and John— John the Baptist.

He’s the only witness to the events at the pulpit of the Kirtland Temple dedicatory service where he claimed that Moses, Elijah, and Elias appeared.

I think one of the most valuable pieces of church history. I can’t think of anything I would trade this for.

And it has 25 pages that bear his handwriting and his notations.

There is one more item in Brandon’s collection, and it eventually leads us directly to Skinwalker Ranch.

You notice these strange objects. These are not movie props.

These are what we call forced processed gyroscopic mechanisms. These were constructed in conjunction with a private confidential technology endeavor testing gravitational physics theories.

Anti-gravity.

Correct.

So you had these constructed to test and experiment with anti-gravity?

Correct.

And what many believe to be the technology that would potentially drive or propel flying saucers.

Did you achieve anti-gravity?

We’ll get to that.

Okay.

Brandon sits me down and tells me that his path to buying Skinwalker Ranch started with a phone call in 1995 from one of his former Mormon missionary friends.

And he said, Brandon, you’re— you’re in the business of selling office bills, correct? You’re in the commercial real estate business. You work with companies.

And I said yeah, of course.

Fugal’s friend told him he knew a successful business executive who was looking for office space and asked if Brandon could help.

And I of course jumped out of my chair. I remember I was so excited.

And I said absolutely I can help.

So he passed on the number to me. He says well his name is Joe Firmage.

Joe Firmage was a senior vice president at Novell, a software company in the 90s. He’s also a direct descendant of Mormon prophet Brigham Young.

In 1995 during the dot-com bubble, he left Novell to become the founder of US Web, an interactive website design and consultancy company.

Firmage needed office space for his new company. Brandon Fugal, a young real estate broker, provided that office space.

US Web quickly became very successful and Joe Firmage was the toast of Silicon Valley.

In 1998, Firmage appeared on the cover of Forbes Magazine, deemed one of the Masters of the new internet universe.

Also on the cover was Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon.

Joe Firmage and his company US Web were rising stars destined for greatness.

And then at the height of their success, when they’re in the midst of merging with a big global PR firm agency, he does a story.

Joe Firmage came out and said that number one, in my spare time with my resources I have learned that the UFO phenomena is real.

Then he proceeds to say in this expose that he’d been visited by what he believed to be an alien being, and that uh, that he was going to bring the truth forward.

And that the physics— that the physics to enable breakthrough propulsion travel to the stars, and also free energy, was within our grasp.

Firmage’s statements on aliens and UFOs caused a lot of embarrassment and controversy for US Web.

He was removed as CEO and eventually left the company completely to hunt UFOs and experiment with the technology he believed an alien had given him.

Over 10 years later, in 2009, Brandon Fugal was standing in his private airport hangar. He was wondering why there had been no breakthrough aerospace technologies since the invention of the jet engine in 1937.

In the most fundamental ways that we propel and even power our world, we’re still dealing with technology that is very old and antiquated.

It bothered me, and I became obsessed.

And then he remembered Joe Firmage.

I remember Joe Firmage and the fact that he’d done this interview and had claimed that he was going to be investing in physics programs.

And I thought, well you know maybe he has some insights.

Fugal says he contacted Firmage and had a meeting with him.

And I’m whisked into a garage where there are the equivalent of giant Tinker Toys that looks like spinning objects, mechanical, very rudimentary crude mechanical devices that are that are being operated.

And I see an older bearded Joe Firmage.

Fugal says Firmage claimed to be on the cusp of inventing humanity-changing anti-gravity technology that would allow humans to travel to the stars.

He said, I believe that you’ve been led here for a reason.

Right here in my garage before you, you are looking at the early proof of concept embodiment. So the— the experiments showing the physics underpinning these new advancements.

Fugal says he was skeptical, but Firmage introduced Fugal to various people who would back up his claims.

He puts me on the phone with uh General Wesley Clark, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs.

He introduces me to General Clark. Says, General Clark I’d like you to meet Brandon Fugal. You know he needs to know that there’s that there’s reality to this.

You know it would you mind telling him your views?

And General Clark said yes, I— I don’t have any problem.

Great to meet you, you know Mr. Fugal. I— I support Mr. Firmage. I’ve been following his work closely and there’s truth to it.

A representative for General Clark told me that while the general does not specifically remember this phone conversation with Fugal, he did indeed know Joe Firmage and was in fact interested in Firmage’s claims of exotic technology.

So I’m— I’m blown away here.

I have former chairman of the Joint Chiefs, head of NATO command, who’s confirming that Joe has been involved with credible activities confirming that there’s some reality.

Next, Firmage put Fugal on the phone with Hal Puthoff and Kit Green, two scientists who had previously worked with the CIA and had a long history of researching otherworldly topics like UFOs and psychic powers.

They also vouched for Joe Firmage.

This all happens back to back on the same day.

So yeah, Wesley Clark, Hal Puthoff, Kit Green.

So you had a series of—

Yeah, series of phone calls.

Puthoff and Green had long been involved with millionaire Robert Bigelow’s hunt for the paranormal.

And at the time of this phone call with Fugal in 2009, they were both involved in a now infamous 22 million dollar Pentagon program headed by Bigelow.

The program, among other things, allegedly investigated strange phenomena at Skinwalker Ranch, which at the time was owned by Robert Bigelow.

Fugal’s back-to-back phone conversations with General Clark, Hal Puthoff, and Kit Green, in which they all vouched for Joe Firmage and his endeavors, was enough to convince Fugal.

It completely changed my view of reality. It blew my mind.

Fugal converted his family’s private airport hangar into a laboratory, a dedicated space where Firmage could experiment and build his world-changing technology.

They created a company called Motion Sciences, and Fugal claims he spent millions of dollars on Firmage’s work.

[Music]

These 2010 videos on Joe Firmage’s YouTube page show various tests of his invention. Fugal appears in a few of them.

Working with is advanced propulsion technology that truly has not been really related yet, and this patented technology and physics breakthrough is going to change the world as we know it.

Foreign.

This video appears to show a celebratory demonstration of Firmage’s device.

A happy looking Fugal stands next to Hal Puthoff.

But the smiles and celebrations soon went away.

Fugal says it soon became apparent that there was no truth to Firmage’s claims.

Within months it became apparent that Mr. Firmage had some serious issues.

The unfortunate truth was that there wasn’t any validity to it.

Fugal and Firmage had a falling out. Motion Sciences eventually ceased operations and closed down.

In a statement to me, Firmage says that while his invention was showing great progress, its potential was not realized.

He claims to have since continued to work on his device, which he now calls the accelerometer, and will reveal it to the world in 2023.

Firmage’s devices from 10 years prior now sit on the bottom shelf of a Fugal sci-fi and fantasy movie collection.

It was disappointing and heartbreaking.

And trust me, to lose that money, to lose years, to have the disappointment of family.

I— at that point in time I had lost a lot of faith and trust in people.

Fugal says this was a dark time for him, that he struggled to trust anyone, and even his faith in the Mormon church was shaken.

But this all changed with a phone call in 2015.

Late 2015, I received a call from Dr. Hal Puthoff and Dr. Christopher C. Green— Kit Green.

The same two guys.

Just a few years after the Joe Firmage Motion Sciences debacle, Fugal says Hal Puthoff and Kit Green had a brand new proposition for him.

And in the middle of that call, both Dr. Puthoff and Dr. Green said: are you familiar with a certain piece of property in Utah known as Skinwalker Ranch?

What do you know about Skinwalker Ranch?

Fugal says Puthoff and Green told him that the ranch was for sale.

We’d like to suggest that you take a meeting with Mr. Bigelow if you’re interested. Would you be open to it?

And I said absolutely.

Fugal flew to Las Vegas to meet with Robert Bigelow and discuss purchasing Skinwalker Ranch.

Fugal says Bigelow would only sell the ranch as is, and that Bigelow would not be sharing with Fugal any of the research he had done at the ranch over the last 20 years.

I agreed. I said okay fine. I’ll buy it as is.

On April Fool’s Day 2016, Brandon Fugal became the official owner of Skinwalker Ranch.

The next morning I met Brandon at his private airport hangar in Provo, Utah.

In the hangar were some of his luxury cars, his private jet, and his six million dollar helicopter which he uses to fly to Skinwalker Ranch.

His brother Cameron is the helicopter’s pilot.

Sierra believer.

I’m a believer that there’s something happening out there that we don’t understand and we may never totally understand it.

It’s finally time to go.

We took off towards Skinwalker Ranch.

We flew over Brigham Young University, a school both Brandon and I once tried to get into but failed.

We flew over the Missionary Training Center where both Brandon and I had once prepared for our Mormon missions.

Flew into Rock Canyon where I used to hike many years ago, but I’d never seen it from this angle before.

[Music]

Brandon told me before I could go to Skinwalker Ranch there was a whole backstory that he needed to tell me before I could fully understand the ranch.

And now that he had, I think he was right.

I thought of something that I hadn’t considered before.

These stories about the ranch, the visitors from another place, the evil spirits, voices of the dead—all of these stories had a new context.

Maybe all this was part of a bigger story. Universal story. A tale, as they say, as old as time.

Was Skinwalker Ranch just another story? Was it just another item in Brandon’s science fiction collection?

Or was it something else?

Could some of this, despite my skepticism, actually be real?

And if so, what was I in for?

I was caught up in these thoughts as Skinwalker Ranch appeared on the horizon and Brandon announced that we needed to say a prayer.

I’ll be asking my brother—

Do you pray every time you come out here?

Before you come out here every time.

Every night.

Every time we’re dealing with forces that uh, not only— and but also malevolent.

The prayer that they offered was very similar to ones I heard growing up in the church.

[Music]

Okay God, Heavenly Father, we’re grateful for the opportunity that we have to come out to Skinwalker Ranch today.

We ask for thy protection and help to avoid any of the negative aspects of the ranch while we explore the sciences associated with it.

We’re grateful for the opportunity to explore this and to try to learn more about our planet, this universe, and all that that was created.

Please bless us this day and to protect the helicopter from any harbor danger and also ourselves.

And we say these things in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

Amen.

[Applause]

Welcome to Skinwalker Ranch, the most scientifically studied paranormal hotspot on the planet.

[Music]