Stephan Michalak, a Polish immigrant to Canada and part-time prospector was collecting samples in a relatively remote area when the incident happened. He saw 2 objects in the sky. Michalak said the two objects were rotating and glowing red. One stayed up and then left. The other came down near him. A door opened. He heard voices and called to them in several languages, including English, German, and Ukrainian. A bright light kept him from seeing inside. The door shut, the object began to turn, and as it lifted, a grid of holes in the side blew hot gas across his chest. His glove burned when he put a hand on the metal. His outer shirt and undershirt caught. He tore them off and walked out of the bush for help.

Solotki’s report, written that afternoon, is cautious. He thought Michalak looked excited and not fully coherent. He did not smell alcohol. The back of the cap was burned. The back of the head was not. Solotki wrote that it looked to him as if a black substance, possibly wood ash, had been rubbed on the chest. He asked why the hands were not burned if Michalak had touched the craft. Michalak did not answer. He kept backing away when Solotki came close to the shirt.

That night Michalak took the bus to Winnipeg. His son brought him to the emergency department at Misericordia Hospital. He told the intern the burns were from an aircraft exhaust, because he thought the other story would not be believed. He was treated and sent home. He was not admitted. The family doctor, R. Douglas Oatway, saw him after that for headache, sleeplessness, and an inability to keep food down.

On the morning of 23 May, RCMP investigators talked with him for about two hours. He said he had been unable to eat since Saturday, had lost about thirteen pounds, and had a taste in his mouth like burned wiring. They looked at the burn. It covered an area about a foot across on the abdomen and chest, blotchy, with unburned skin inside the burned outline, and no blisters yet. The RCMP crime laboratory later examined the burned clothing and could not say what had caused the damage. Color photographs taken for Life that summer show a grid scorched into the undershirt and a matching pattern on the skin.