On the evening of January 6, 1976 Mona Stafford and her friends, Louise Smith and Elaine Thomas of Liberty, Kentucky had traveled to a restaurant outside Lancaster, Kentucky to celebrate Mona's 36th birthday. The women were all quite normal and respectable citizens. Mrs. Stafford herself worked as an assistant at the Casey County Extension Office. None of the three women were drinkers and the possibility of alcohol influencing their subsequent tale is non-existent.

After dinner the friends began the thirty-five mile journey back to their hometown. Leaving the restaurant just after 11 p.m. in Louise Smith's new 1967 Chevrolet Nova, the weather was a cold 38 degrees with a fifteen mile an hour wind and a fifteen mile visibility. Just short of the town of Hustonville on Highway 78, the women saw a bright red object in the clear night sky. They at first thought they were witnessing a burning aircraft falling from the sky. The object however, drew close to their vehicle, which accelerated to a speed in excess of 80 mph without Mrs. Smith even pressing the accelerator. The object took up station beside the driver's side door during this high-speed run.

The women then described the pain as a bright white, "foggy" light illuminated the inside of the car and their exposed skin began to sting as though being burned. Their last conscious memory at the time was of the car being backed into a pasture entrance. An hour and a half later the women were again on the road home with burning skin and a frightened feeling. After arriving at Mrs. Smith's home they realized the forty-five minute drive had taken them over two hours.

After the event the women began experiencing many problems both physical and psychological. Mrs. Smith began having trouble focusing on her work and had developed a greyish-pink circular mark on her neck. Her pet parakeets became frightened of her and ultimately died. Mrs. Stafford developed badly inflamed eyes and all three were scarred from the burning of the light and were suffering from rapid weight loss. While their case eventually came to the attention of MUFON (Mutual UFO Network) it was over two months before they could arrange a hypnotic regression session.

Under the care of Dr. Leo Sprinkle the story eventually emerged from the women that they had been taken aboard the craft and had separately been subjected to harsh examinations. While the faces of their captors were never clear to the women, they described four short beings with very large eyes and sharply pointed chins. None of the women recalled seeing a mouth on any of the beings although they swore they had been communicated with. The women passed a lie-detector test that had been performed by a skeptical member of the Lexington, Kentucky police department.

There were a number of reports from various people around the area that evening as to the sighting of a saucer-shaped craft flying low and even the owner of the property where the abduction happened had reported seeing a strange craft shoot a white light into the field.