Two guys are claiming they did it:
FOX Television News Report(with video):
http://www.myfoxphilly.com/dpp/news/dpg ... 2092384885Hoaxers home video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IqcRpQ-WaQwUpdated: Friday, 03 Apr 2009, 7:01 AM EDT
Published : Thursday, 02 Apr 2009, 11:25 PM EDT
(MYFOX NATIONAL) - For four days in January, residents in Morris County, N.J., were mystified by glowing lights in the sky. Were they UFOs?
"We didn't really know what they were. They were bright, red lights," local resident Paul Hurley, a pilot who works at nearby Morristown Airport, told MyFoxNY . "They were just kind of floating along."
For months the mystery remained unsolved, although some people had a sneaking suspicion that the whole thing was a manufactured hoax. In April 2008, mysterious lights showed up in Phoenix and it was revealed that they were simply red flares tied to balloons. UFO buffs quashed theories that the New Jersey lights were also a hoax.
One story was shared by user healthyskeptic on LiveScience.com -- "I do not believe (in my opinion) that these could have been flares. They flew over our car at a very high rate of speed. They were large red orbs. We watched them. I was already very familiar with the phoenix lights of April 2008 which turned out to be some guy putting flares on balloons."
The History Channel even aired a special called "UFO Hunters," which declared that flares were "tested and proven implausible."
Then on April Fool's Day, the truth came out. Joe Rudy and Chris Russo admitted to tying flares on balloons. They even created their own eyewitness video to perpetuate the hoax .
Rudy and Russo explain that they wanted to conduct a social experiment. "We brainstormed the idea of producing a spaceship hoax to fool people, bring the charlatans out of the woodwork to drum up controversy, and then expose it as nothing more than a prank to show everyone how unreliable eyewitness accounts are, along with investigators of UFOs," the men wrote on Skeptic.com .
The duo wonder what credibility do UFO theorists have in light of this. "Are UFO investigators simply charlatans looking to make a quick buck off human gullibility, or are they alarmists using bad science to back up their biased opinions that extraterrestrial life is routinely visiting our planet?" the men ask. "Do the networks buy into this nonsense, or are they in it for the ratings? How can a television network that has pretensions of providing honest and factual programming be taken seriously when the topic of one of their top rated shows deals with chasing flares and fishing line? In fact, we delivered what every perfect UFO case has: great video and pictures, "credible" eyewitnesses (doctors and pilots), and professional investigators convinced that something amazing was witnessed. Does this bring into question the validity of every other UFO case? We believe it does."
Many appreciate what Rudy and Russo did, despite the fact the men are now facing disorderly conduct charges . Wickius on LiveScience.com wrote , "This was a GREAT social experiment into the way humans are willing to believe anything they see, even if it has a rational explanation, simply because they think they are special and would be the ones to witness something "extraordinary" if it were to happen." Yoweigh had a more simple message : "In your FACE, silly UFO people."
But there are still plenty of people out there who believe that we are not alone. Solrey on UniverseToday.com says , "All this proves is that there is an explanation for this one event, and this event alone. Many things that were unidentified are explained, but a small amount remain unexplained."
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