Recent UFO reports spur excitement at annual Kecksburg UFO Festival

The Kecksburg UFO Festival hasn’t taken place in the years since the covid-19 pandemic began. During that same time, U.S. military officials declassified information that includes hundreds of reports of unidentified flying objects.

And while nothing at the festival focused on that specifically, it wasn’t far from the minds of those in attendance.

“I think they released it during covid so no one would pay attention to it,” said Lindsey Zambo of Latrobe, who has attended the past few festivals in Kecksburg.

It includes everything from craft vendors and carnival games, a parade and a bed race to local UFO-bigfoot investigator Stan Gordon.

Zambo has never seen the bed race before. She came to the festival with her friend Missy Piper of Latrobe.

“It’s something to see,” Piper said. “I had lots of questions after I watched it the first time, and it’s a lot of fun.”

Joe Fogle of Johnstown was at the festival for the first time as a vendor after setting up his t-shirt and print company, Cryptoteeology.

“I used to do it as a hobby, and it’s my full-time job now,” said Fogle, surrounded by T-shirts featuring all manner of cryptid creatures and prints including a parody of the “Exorcist” poster featuring the Mothman creature, as well as a mock vintage boxing poster matching up “Mothman vs. Bigfoot.”

“Those are probably the two most popular cryptids,” he said, adding he also is interested in the recently-released military reports of UFOs.

“For the extraterrestrial/paranormal community, it gives a lot more credibility to what people have said, and it builds up the folklore some more,” he said.

The festival runs from noon to 11 p.m. Saturday, with fireworks at 10 p.m., and from noon to 5 p.m. Sunday, with a UFO hot dog eating competition at 12:30 p.m., and a paranormal conference at from 1-4:30 p.m., featuring Gordon and others.