Alien (Molyobka)

The alien monument stands at the entrance to the village of Molyobka (Molebka) in Kishertsky District, Perm Krai, Russia. It is a wooden figure of an extraterrestrial, put up in 2011 as a symbol of the famous Molyobka anomalous zone, also known as the "M-Triangle", the best-known UFO sighting spot in Russia. The village lies on the Sylva River near the border with Sverdlovsk Oblast, 170 km from Perm and 90 km from Kungur.

History of the monument

In spring 2011 the Kishertsky District administration decided to put up a monument to the "pilots" of UFOs. District officials explained that the latest flights of unidentified objects had been recorded here in May and July of the previous year, and that, in their words, there was no other place in the world where they flew regularly.

The competition was won by a local woodcarver, Viktor Sazanov, then 26 years old. The municipality allocated 45,000 roubles for the work, and the sculptor added a few thousand of his own. He carved the figure from pine and set it on a concrete pedestal. Two wooden idols of his work already stood on the bank of the Sylva. The monument was part of a plan to turn Molyobka into a tourist brand: a year earlier, road signs with a UFO image had appeared on the highways nearby.

Legends of the M-Triangle

Geologist Emil Bachurin is considered the discoverer of the zone. In 1984 he found a circle of flattened grass about 62 metres across near Molyobka: the snow inside it was melting, and his watch, he said, had fallen more than two hours behind. Bachurin concluded it was a UFO landing site.

The place became widely known after the Riga journalist Pavel Mukhortov published an article titled "The M-Triangle, or Strangers Don't Walk Here" in the newspaper Sovetskaya Molodyozh in 1989. He referred to some forty eyewitnesses. In the early 1990s hundreds of seekers camped in the woods across the Sylva at a time, a symposium on anomalous phenomena was held in the village in 1996, and since 2008 it has hosted the festival "M-Triangle: Myth and Reality".

Eyewitnesses tell of glowing balls and figures made of lights, strange sounds, headaches, sudden fear and failing phones, batteries and cameras. Ufologists speak of footsteps on snow in the middle of August, a "wood goblin" whistle and pillars of fog over the river. Every glade in the zone has its own name: Central, Lens, Astral, Yuris Glade.

Explanations

Ufologists see the zone as a landing site for alien craft and report raised instrument readings there. Sceptics have their own explanations: the magnetic anomalies are linked to iron ore deposits, the "glowing balls" to marsh lights, fogs and mirages, some UFO sightings coincide with military flights and launches from the Plesetsk cosmodrome, and the mysterious "pyramids" turn out to be slag from old ironworks. Mukhortov's fellow hikers did not confirm the wonders he described.

How to get there

Take the Perm – Yekaterinburg highway, then turn towards Kishert. The last 20 km or so to Molyobka is a gravel road. The nearest railway station is Shumkovo, 39 km away.

Good to know

The anomalous zone itself begins across the Sylva, about 5 km from the village. The road there is poor and mostly passable only by off-road vehicles. The river at Molyobka can be forded, but the current is strong. There are no hotels: visitors stay in tents or at a guest house whose owner drives guests around the area. The village also has another art object, the "Molyobka Nail" (2013), dedicated to the old Molyobka ironworks.