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Hey everyone and welcome back to the Into The Dark Podcast. I am your host, Peyton Morland, and I'm so happy you are here. If you are watching on YouTube, can you please stop right now and give this video a thumbs up, maybe even drop a comment. It just helps with the algorithm. It pushes it to new listeners.
And we could really use it. And then also, if you are just listening on podcasts and can leave a review, that would be great. Again, as always, if not, I'm just happy you're here. I hope you're having a good day. And let's start off this episode by jumping into my 10 seconds. So as you know, if you are watching on YouTube, I am back in my home studio. I was recording in Idaho in my mom's studio, which my mom does Rise and Crime. It's another true crime podcast.
If you haven't checked it out, go check it out. She does like true crime news twice a week. I was recording in her studio, but it feels so good to be back into the Into the Dark set. It just feels right. That being said, because I was in Idaho, I started drinking coffee again. I know that in my previous 10 seconds, we have talked about how I hadn't drank coffee since January. Well, actually, December of 2021.
But yes, I got my Dutch Bros again. I started going every single day. And guys, it was so good. It was so right. It just... I love...
I love, love, love the habit of waking up, going and getting a little drinky and starting the day. Like I love that, it just feels right. But now that I'm back here, I am not near a Dutch Bros. So I did not get one this morning and I won't lie, I've been crashing in the middle of the day, but you know what?
It's okay, I've done this before, I can do it again. But yeah, so a little update on the coffee journey. That's where we're at. I remember I talked about ice cream. I have eaten some ice cream since I promised you guys that I think I was gonna be done with ice cream because it upsets my stomach. But you know what? I haven't had any stomach issues with it. So I think that that is just the universe telling me that I can eat it. So I'm going to keep eating it again until the universe slaps me in the face.
Okay, that's just, that's what we do here. I wanted to give you guys a little mantra that I've been using that I really just is delusional, but also helpful. I have just been saying everything works out for me.
Every day, everything I do, I just say, well, everything works out for me. And then when something actually does work out for me, I go, thank you, because everything works out for me. And I knew it, and I knew it was going to. And I'm not going to lie, things have just kind of been falling in place. Little things like, you know, there just being a Dutch Bros on the side of the road when I'm going somewhere, or just little tiny things like that, that I'm like,
everything works out for me. And guess what? If you're listening to this, everything works out for you too. So let's all start saying it together.
Everything works out for us. All right, let's get into the episode because I'm actually really excited about this one. Okay, so as we know, travel can be stressful, especially if you are getting around by air. When you're passing through an airport, you have to deal with long security lines, delayed flights, gate changes. If you want to relax with a snack, you can expect the shops to charge you twice as much as what you'd pay outside of the airport.
And then once you land, you just have to hope your baggage didn't get sent in the wrong destination, that your baggage claim is going to be timely. So in a word, airports are honestly not happy places. They are pretty stressful and hectic, but at least the stakes are low in theory. I mean, worst case scenario, you might miss a flight or get badly delayed, but it's not like it's the end of the world. Well, at least...
It shouldn't be. But some people believe that the Denver International Airport, otherwise known as the DIA, might have a role to play in the coming apocalypse. And if you didn't know that, this probably just blew your mind. But this is a tinfoil tale that when I learned about it, I had to go to the Denver Airport and I had to see for myself. And let me tell you,
I left feeling eerie. Okay, so you heard me right. There are many people who believe the International Airport in Denver, Colorado might be a key location when the end of the world comes. And those rumors have been going around since before the airport was even built. It was in the late 1980s. So I'm about to give you the history of how we got to this tinfoil tale. So at that
At that point, Denver already had an airport called the Stapleton International. But don't let the name fool you. Although it was an international airport, Stapleton was very small. There were too many people who needed to pass into, out of, and through Denver.
Denver for Stapleton to handle and so then Denver actually needed something bigger to accommodate all that traffic as you know Denver is a big city it's going to eventually become a big hub so in the 80s the city announced its plans to build a brand new facility with plenty of terminals runways and tarmacs this was going to be huge for the state of Colorado and the city of Denver
And when the new airport was first proposed, the city wanted to build it in an empty open field well outside of town. Like you are going to be going to nowhere to get to this airport. And this was a very odd location for such a huge hub. It was actually roughly 25 miles outside of downtown Denver, meaning anyone flying in or
or out of the city would have to travel for at least 30 minutes to an hour to get between the airport and basically anywhere else. So like you would fly into Denver, this huge city, and then you're going to have to drive 30 minutes to an hour to even get to your hotel or wherever it was you were initially going to be into Denver. And so this just didn't seem practical. And it made some people wonder why.
Why build the airport there of all places? It just made more sense to put a major travel hub in or near the city. And I mean, there was room to do this. It's not like Denver didn't have room to build the airport closer. They just chose this random location. And it makes more sense, right? Unless there was something special about the airport that made it so it couldn't be so close to Denver.
So from there, more strange things happened as the facility was being built. It was supposed to open its doors in October of 1993, but thanks to unexpected delays and surprise expenses that sent the project $3 million over budget,
The construction actually took almost a year and a half longer than what was originally anticipated. Now, there are a few theories out there for why the construction ended up being so slow and also so expensive. One is that the executives who designed the airport actually just kept changing their minds about what they wanted. The finished product was very different from the original plan.
And every time they adjusted something, obviously it blew up their time and their money. But the much bigger problem came from a desire to make the Denver International Airport someplace special. So there's a reason for these delays and these needs for more money. Specifically, the creators of this airport wanted DIA to have something that no other airport had.
So the owners installed these underground passages or tunnels that would help workers move baggage from one side of the facility to another.
So the idea was that you checked your bag at the front desk and then those employees needed to get all of that luggage to the right gate before your plane took off, right? And they do that by loading it onto massive luggage carts and then sending them across these underground tunnels, tunnels underneath the airport to get them to arrive at the right place in a timely manner.
And best of all, the whole process was supposed to be completely automated, meaning no people had to be involved and there was no chance for human error either.
Except once everything was built and the engineers started testing the new project, they found that the baggage system, the tunnels they had built, didn't work. Like, at all. The airport's managers never managed to get the automated system to run consistently and reliably, but rather than give up on the project,
Different engineering teams and architects went through a trial and error process, trying different things to see if the luggage system would ever start working, and none of them were ever successful. So eventually, they had no choice but to abandon the automated equipment, only after they'd thrown millions of dollars and months down the drain trying to make this work.
Which might not sound that mysterious or ominous, but when you're walking through the airport and all you can think about is that there's these dark, abandoned tunnels literally right beneath you just swerving and zigging and zagging all the way through this airport as the whole entire upper floor has come to life with thousands of people and traveling and bustling and hustling. It is a little weird.
But there's also been some speculation online about another real cause of those delays and all of that spending. These rumors haven't been verified, but they are interesting. And since this is a tinfoil tale, we are going to go there.
So some of these theories say that the airport repeatedly fired the construction crews and then hired new teams during the building of the airport. It almost seemed like they didn't want to let the same people who started the project be the ones who ended it.
And the allegations were that they were trying to hide something about the airport's layout. They did not want the people building the airport to know everything about the airport.
which could fit with the idea about why they kept changing the designs too. The workers who built the first parts of the airport wouldn't know what was going to come later. And those who wrapped up at the end would have no way of knowing what had been installed before they came in. So this way, nobody got a full picture of what was being built. There was never a full blueprint given to one construction worker or architect that had the entire full airport designed.
especially in those underground tunnels. Tunnels that were officially supposed to be for luggage system, which never worked and were never used. And maybe the reason the automated baggage equipment never functioned was because it wasn't actually supposed to. Those passages might have served as some other secret purpose, or this is at least what people believe.
That maybe this had to be hidden behind cover stories about baggage transport and semi-regular mass firings. Now, whether that's true or not, it was certainly newsworthy that the airport's construction was so delayed.
And it's also worth noting that in March of 1994, while the airport was still being built, a team actually buried a time capsule that was meant to be opened 100 years later, so in 2094. And it was placed under a plaque with an inscription of the Freemasons symbol. And now this is where, if you've never been to the Denver airport or you have no idea what I'm talking about,
The Denver airport is just about to get a little weird. The decor in the Denver airport is eerie and weird. And this is just one example. So they put this time capsule underneath a plaque with an inscription of the Freemasons symbol. You can actually see it today. The Freemason logo is right in the middle of the plaque and it's very prominent.
Above and below it, the dedication lists all of the people who helped pay for the project. There are names you'd expect like Denver's mayor, Colorado's governor, the secretary of transportation and various architectural and aviation organizations. And one of the honorees listed on this plaque is named New World Airport Commission. Now, interestingly, as people have looked into this,
There is no such group as the New World Airport Commission. It literally doesn't exist, but it's listed on this plaque.
So again, this has raised some eyebrows, especially because the phrase New World Airport Commission sounds very similar to New World Order. And for those who aren't familiar, the New World Order is a tinfoil tell that suggests some mysterious group is trying to take over and run the world. Like there's a group of people out there that are trying to do this. And that group is
Could be and has alleged to be the Freemasons, whose logo is on the plaque, or it could be some other secret society like the Illuminati. Now, officially, the New World Airport Commission may not exist today, but it did operate for a brief period of time in the mid-90s.
Basically, the officials in Denver wanted to do something special when the airport first opened, so they formed a group that existed solely for the purpose of planning different projects and art installations around the grand opening. And it was called the New World Airport Commission. So I know you're like, wait, you just said it didn't exist. But I think it's important for me to tell you that as soon as the DIA was operational,
The commission disbanded because there was nothing else to do. They didn't have any other purpose beyond celebrating the grand opening. So in other words, the new World Airport Commission was formed just long enough to put this time capsule together, put the name on the plaque and then shut down instantly. So it is weird and it really didn't exist, but
It's just odd, right, that this group existed for such a brief period of time and that they put their name on this plaque directly underneath the Freemasons logo. Now, given how many other rumors were already going around about the Denver International Airport with all of the delays and the issues with the cruise, this just felt like one more sign that just something was weird about this airport.
And things became even stranger when the DIA finally began operating in February of 1995. Okay, you guys, let me guess. Your medicine cabinet is crammed with stuff that doesn't work. You still aren't sleeping. You still hurt and you're still stressed out.
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still had suitcases to check, and the airport's staff still wanted to use the underground tunnels. So like I mentioned before, they were supposed to be a fully automated transportation system, but it never worked. So almost immediately after the airport began running, they decided to switch to a more traditional system where employees did the physical work of driving baggage carts from one place to another.
They still used those underground passageways to get around during this. And it's hard to say what exactly happened during these trips. But at the beginning of this airport opening, there was definitely something weird going on because it was all too common for travelers' bags to just disappear, never be seen again, which might sound like something that could happen at any airport.
But others would arrive at their destination just completely shredded up. Like they would come out from under the tunnel completely torn apart. Like something had attacked these bags in transit.
And others from incoming flights went flying off the baggage carousel before anyone could even grab them. It's almost came across like some unseen entity just out of sight had picked them up and hurled them across the room. Like whatever was going on with the baggage in Denver was weird. And it's not just like the vibes and the way the baggage is showing up.
Remember how I said the decor in Denver is weird? Well, all of this is particularly concerning because today, if you go to Denver's airport, Denver's baggage claim area actually has two large bronze gargoyles in it.
And together they're called the Notre Denver because they were inspired by the gargoyles at Notre Dame. Mostly. Unlike those famous French gargoyles, the ones in Denver. Okay. And I just want you to picture this. Like you're standing waiting for your baggage and there's these two huge scary gargoyles. And not only are they just like sitting there, they are fully animatronic.
So in other words, they're robots that can move their faces, including their mouths, and they can talk out loud. And these gargoyles are known to strike up conversations with travelers who are waiting to pick up their luggage, luggage that sometimes comes ripped up and sometimes flies off the carousel. So allegedly, they're also supposed to be spirits of protection. They're said to guard travelers' luggage. And unfortunately, they are obviously not doing a very good job of it.
unless they are protecting flyers from something even worse than a lost or damaged bag. Because if you talk to anyone who believes that the Denver airport is a tinfoil tale, they're gonna tell you that there is something dark or dangerous lurking in the tunnels beneath the airport.
That the underground caverns could be a secret meeting space for a hidden but powerful society, maybe the Freemasons, maybe the Illuminati, or maybe they lead somewhere unexpected. Because the Denver International Airport actually sits roughly 100 miles away from a military site called the Cheyenne Mountain Complex and it's
This feels like something out of a Bond movie. So during the Cold War, the U.S. government literally hollowed out a mountain. This is true. This is not a tinfoil towel. They dug out a mountain and
And they wanted a headquarters that was deep underground under all of these layers of stone and granite where they could run military operations in the event of a nuclear war. So all of that stone would reportedly help shield the complex from radiation, EMPs, just any kind of attack.
So in the 1950s and 60s, literally the United States of America dug out this massive complex inside of a mountain in Denver. And to this day, it's the headquarters for a local branch of the North American Aerospace Defense Command, otherwise known as NORAD.
Which is just crazy, right? But some people are like, maybe they didn't stop at hollowing out that mountain. Some people believe that there is a 90 mile long tunnel that runs all the way from the Denver International Airport to the Cheyenne Mountain Complex.
And this is so if a bomb were dropped on Denver, all of the officials in the city wouldn't have to fight traffic or risk getting picked off while they were driving down public roads. Instead, all of the important people could just get to the airport, get underground, and then go to the complex where it's safe from attacks.
essentially. And I mean, I know you're probably like, no, what are the chances? But also like, what are there, what are the chances that there's this huge entire abandoned tunnel system underneath the international airport in Denver? And that also there is a mountain that we have literally hollowed out and dug so far down beneath that
that we house this complex for safety from attacks. Like that is all just weird, right? There are also tinfoil tells suggesting that the DIA's tunnels go much deeper than what you'd see on the airport's official blueprints. Maybe they're as much as six stories deep, which is far enough down to provide some protection in the event of a nuclear blast.
Meaning you wouldn't even have to get all the way from the airport to Cheyenne Mountain to feel safe. You could just stay right there under the airport in its very own nuclear bunkers. These tunnels that they have built so far deep in the ground. And I know this sounds outlandish, but remember what I said earlier about how the Denver airport was so far outside of actual Denver.
If something were to happen to the city and the survivors needed a bunker to escape to, they'd want somewhere far enough away to escape any fallout, but close enough to reach in a few hours or less and somewhere deep underground. Now, some people even think there are massive stockpiles of food and other rations in these tunnels, enough to keep a small community of survivors alive long-term during an apocalypse.
Now, I want to be clear. People who work at the Denver airport have repeatedly denied that there are secret bunkers or 90-mile-long tunnels to a military base. They've even invited journalists to come tour the passages to see for themselves just how normal they are. Going by the pictures and the video footage from those tours, it's clear that these spaces are
are definitely not intended for the general public. The walls are all bare concrete or just white brick, and they're covered in graffiti. So...
The tunnels underneath the Denver airport are covered in graffiti and it's all like smiley faces or aliens. That's what is on the walls in these tunnels. And there are luggage carts that zip up and down the lanes. And it's not the sort of place where anyone would want to live long term or ride out in apocalypse.
At least it's hard to imagine anything human even living down there. Like it's just weird and eerie. But some visitors have filmed strange creatures in these tunnels and they don't look quite human or like any other animal that might've somehow gotten into the tunnels.
Like people say that these creatures look like aliens or some type of like mutant hybrids. And it's hard to say for sure because the footage and pictures from those visits are not always in focus or in high resolution. Like anytime an alien or a weird creature is caught on camera.
All I can say on that front is that if the goal was to make the tunnels look less suspicious when they started letting the public in, that plan backfired spectacularly because there is still a lot of speculation about the DIA's underground tunnels.
And that's all before I get into the airport's art. So I already talked about the gargoyles. I talked about the Freemason symbol. Now let's talk about the art that you as a traveler can see if you go to the Denver airport.
See, the city of Denver set aside a certain percentage of its tax dollars for art installations all over the city. And a lot of them were put on display in the airport. Now, these pieces have sparked plenty of tinfoil tells all on their own. And I will say I have seen a lot of them and it makes sense.
Because many of these art pieces kind of seem to focus on the same theme. And I will say, like, it is so weird to walk through an airport and look up and see art over and over and over again that is so eerie and uncomfortable. And it's because a lot of the art in the Denver airport is weird.
and it focuses on like doomsday the end of the world one of the most infamous pieces is a mural in the airport called children of the world dream of peace and it stretches across three large panels and it the first panel shows a world that has been destroyed by a war now think of this in an airport
There is a mural with a soldier with a gas mask on. He has a gun that skewers a dove with his sword. And just behind and below this soldier is a terrified family that's like cowering. And then the next panel depicts the ravages of climate change.
The mural shows forests burning, like spewing dark smoke into the sky while the foreground is full of mourners gathered around dead animals. In this one, there's also a woman and a girl lying in coffins. Like it's just a lot of death and destruction crammed into two panels as you're just like trying to get to Florida to go on your Disney World vacation.
And then finally, the third segment shows children gathering under a rainbow, destroying all of the world's weapons. And they're waving banners that say the word peace in multiple different languages. So the three panels together, they are showing war, ecological destruction, and then hopeful global unity.
Now, according to the officials at the Denver International Airport, that third panel is key to understanding the mural's overall message. The children, the rainbows and the peace banners are presented as an optimistic alternative to the conflict and climate change that are depicted in the other sections. And like, yeah, that does make sense.
But it doesn't change the fact that the majority of the mural actually focuses on a dismal apocalyptic future and like dead animals and guns and scary things. And the fact that there are also happy images doesn't mean the frightening ones are any less upsetting or striking. And speaking of alarming imagery, the airport actually also briefly was home to a 22 foot tall statue that
of the Egyptian god of death, Anubis. Officially, it was only there to promote a traveling exhibit on ancient Egypt while it was in the Denver Museum. And it was removed from the airport in 2011. But still, like the god of death, a 22-foot statue, which like a 22-foot statue when you're walking through an airport is just already eerie. It's already uncomfortable. But then for it to be the god of death,
After you just walk past the mural of children mourning and coffins and dead animals. And there is also one other controversial bit of art that is still visible today. And it is a simple symbol etched onto the floor. It's basically a cart, like a wheeled cart with symbols on its side. And they say A.
A-U space A-G. Now, let me explain. Those are the chemical symbols for gold and silver. So officially, the sketch is supposed to symbolize a cart full of gold and silver or as a reference to Denver's history as a mining town, right? Like that totally makes sense. But there are also allegations that A-U and A-G stand for Australian antigen.
So hypothetically, this is a bioengineered disease that the Illuminati is going to use as a weapon at the end of times, basically. Rumor is that when they're ready to take over the world, they'll release the Australian antigen to wipe out their enemies. So it's just a little weird because like...
Maybe on its own, you're like, nah, this is just gold and silver in this cart. But then when you like put the history of the airport together and that there's a really strong belief that the Illuminati will use this as a weapon, it's just weird. And while this particular tinfoil tell does feel like a bit of a stretch, there is still morbid artwork scattered all across the DIA that just like doesn't make much sense and is weird.
You have gargoyles, you have the apocalyptic murals, you have the god of death. And these would all make sense in an art museum. And there's nothing wrong with creating pieces that highlight and comment on some of the darker parts of real life. But it's hard to imagine who thought it was a good idea to stress out frazzled travelers with archival
artwork about the end of times unless they're trying to communicate or send a warning about our imminent destruction and how a lot of people believe that you can hide from that destruction by literally just going in the tunnels underneath the airport.
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Now, I can't cover the tinfoil tells about the apocalyptic art at the DIA without touching on one statue in particular. And this one actually sits outside of the airport. So people have to drive past it before they even reach the grounds. And I want to just I've seen this and I want to just set the scene for you if you've never been here. OK.
So you have just driven at least 30 minutes out of the city, but it could have been an hour. And you are in the middle of nowhere.
Like you are in the middle of nowhere and you're about to just come upon the Denver airport. Okay. There's just fields. There's nothing really going on. It's kind of barren. There's not like even really buildings. Like it is just driving out into the middle of nowhere to get to this airport. Okay. And as you're coming upon the airport, it's not some like huge, big building. I mean, they had space. So it's kind of just a vast building out there. There's like
barren and then you have the road going this way one way and the road going the other way out of the airport coming and going right and right in the middle of these roads and like an awkward distance away from the airport so you're gonna have barren
this statue that I'm about to talk about, and then some more barren, and then get to the airport. So it kind of is like eerie and just kind of like sits in the middle of nowhere. And you just like all, you have to pass it and it's uncomfortable. Now, let me tell you what the statue is. It's 32 feet tall. Again, there is something about like,
unnaturally large objects like just in places that they shouldn't be like in the middle of an airport or just like in the middle of a barren field that I don't like okay something about that I don't like it okay and I know there's a word for it and I can't think of it now I should have thought about this when I was doing the freaking research on this but
That is a real thing, okay? So it's a 32 feet tall statue of a horse rearing on its hind legs, but also this horse is bright blue, okay? It's not like a bronze horse or like a horse of a normal color. It is a bright blue, 32 foot tall horse in the middle of nowhere, okay?
And its mane stands straight up like it has just thrown its head back and then forward again. Like the mane is not resting. It is like standing straight up. And the worst part about this statue of this blue horse that looks angry and mad is that its eyes glow. Its eyes glow, okay? And they don't just glow yellow. They glow neon red, okay?
You guys, this horse is bright blue and it has neon red glowing eyes, 32 feet tall. Okay, I can't. The statue is known as the Mustang and it was designed by an artist named Luis Jimenez. Now, Luis said he got the idea for this demonic horse statue. Literally, that's what it is. The bright red eyes, the evil look.
from something that happened to him in real life. So one night, Louie was in bed with his wife when he heard a noise in another room. And his first thought was that someone broke into their house. So he got up to investigate and he was too afraid to turn on the light. So all he could see in his living room were a pair of bright red eyes staring back at him. And Louie was terrified, but rather than run out of the house screaming, he just calmly approached the eyes and
And that's when he realized it was his horse, his pet horse named Blackjack, that had somehow broken into his own living room while he was asleep. And its eyes weren't really glowing in the dark. They were just reflecting the minimal light in a weird way. So they looked red.
But later, Louis said that he learned a lesson from that encounter and that it's sometimes things look scary at first, but once you approach them with a logical mindset, you'll realize they're not as bad as they seem. And so that gave him the idea to sculpt this frightening giant horse, give it neon red lights in honor of his own horse looking like he had red eyes. And then for his father, who used to work in the neon business, he wanted to like make it a whole thing.
But at the end of the day, the Mustang wasn't actually supposed to be a scary statue, which is odd given how aggressive and demonic it looks.
Plus, even with that moral at the end, this story about Louie waking up, finding a horse in his house and then realizing it's not as scary. It just strikes me as odd and weird because I don't know what kind of setup Louie had at his home. And if it was normal for horses to be able to just like let themselves into his house and like roam.
I'm trying to picture a horse getting a door open with its hooves and walking in. And I just still don't see how any of this happens. But the background mythology around the Mustang is very odd. And then it's even odder that they were like, yes, we love your story. Please put that in the Denver airport. And it's about to get even weirder because this story isn't over. The story of the Mustang statue actually took a much darker turn on June 13th, 2006.
So Louie was almost done building the statue. And if you just heard those dates, you heard me right. It's not like all of this was done on opening day of the Denver International Airport. They just keep adding it in, you guys. Like they just keep throwing stuff.
it was the gargoyles and it was the tunnels like they just keep adding more strange things to this airport and maybe at this point they're just like feeding into the theories and the tinfoil tells around the airport but whatever it is in 2006 louis was almost done building the statue and he'd sculpted it as three separate pieces at his home studio because it's huge and
And then the last step was to transport it to the airport and then piece those pieces together. Well, as he was loading it, one of those pieces came loose and actually pinned him down on the ground and it sliced one of his arteries open.
leading him to bleed profusely. So he's trying to load this, one of the huge pieces, and it falls on top of him. It slices his arteries and it pins him down and he is bleeding out profusely. And you guys, Louie doesn't recover from these injuries. He is killed by the demon horse that he created for the airport. If you can't, if you're not watching right now, like what, what? He's killed by the statue he created.
So from that point on, there were countless rumors that the Mustang was cursed because like it's scary, it's demonic looking, it's evil, the red eyes, the blueness, and then it kills its owner before actually being pieced together and put on display at the airport. Some locals even gave it a new nickname called Blucifer. That is what they call this horse. They call it Blucifer. It is obviously a combination of the words blue and blueness.
Lucifer, a name for the devil. So the big Mustang in front of the airport as you pass by, you can just go ahead and say, what up, Lucifer?
Now, there are rumors that Blucifer might be one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse. He's already taken one life, and when the end of times arrive, he is going to lead the charge and kill countless more people. Like, that is also another theory out there. In fact, out of all of the strange and mysterious art installations at the Denver International Airport, Blucifer might be the most famous and the most iconic.
So I've covered a lot already and I want to pause to put everything together. At the Denver International Airport you have mysterious underground tunnels that may or may not be home to otherworldly creatures or nuclear bunkers. There's artwork depicting death, war, destruction, and there is also a demonic horse and you have the gargoyles. And of course there is Freemason symbols and possible references to bioweapons and the New World Order.
Now, what is one thing that all of these have in common? It is all apocalyptic. Each of these details seem to hint at massive global destruction in our future. So some people think the DIA might be a hub for a secret group who's going to bring about the end of times, again, like the Illuminati or the Freemasons. Others think alien invaders are using the airport or more specifically its underground tunnels as a base of operations.
They might make their presence known when they're ready to crush humanity under their heels. These tinfoil tails started spreading in the 1980s before the Denver International Airport was even built.
and they're still spreading around the internet to this day. And a lot of the time when you see a business or an organization become the center of this sort of speculation, like I said, they'll send representatives to try and debunk everything. They let the public down into the tunnels when those became a thing. They'll distance themselves as much as they can from the rumors. But that is not what has happened with the Denver airport. Again, like I said, it feels like they have embraced these theories.
and to explain the reasoning one airport employee has said no matter what you do you lose you show people the tunnels and explain the symbols and you still lose you clam up and you deny it all and you lose so that's why we've decided to have fun with these because people are going to believe what they believe regardless of the evidence so
Basically, the Denver airport's PR team has said, let's run with the fact that people believe the Denver airport is a part of a tinfoil towel. So in practice, this PR strategy meant releasing videos that showed employees wearing rubber alien masks in those underground tunnels and tweeting references to the tinfoil towels. Back in 2016, the airport even hosted a screening of close encounters around Halloween and
And if you ever find yourself passing through the DIA on a trip, you might notice some interesting signs around the airport. So instead of your typical maintenance in progress or caution, wet floor, you'll see postings that say, apologies for the noise. It takes really big drills to get to the underworld. Or forgive the mess, building secret underground tunnels can get quite untidy.
And you'll remember how I mentioned earlier that the gargoyles and the baggage claim are animatronic. They can talk. One of their favorite phrases to say now is welcome to Illuminati headquarters. I mean, Denver International Airport. Welcome to Illuminati headquarters. I mean, Denver International Airport.
So basically, a lot of the airport's branding and marketing now is about making the DIA a destination for tinfoil tell enthusiasts. They've even said that they expect all of this speculation to generate tourism dollars for the city. So they're like, hey, this could even help us out. Now, some people praise the decision as a very savvy marketing move by treating all these tinfoil tells as a tongue in cheek joke.
It made the speculation look a bit ridiculous, right? And interestingly, that means that if there was any truth to the theories, the Denver International Airport actually did an expert job of deflecting attention away from them. In other words, if any of these tinfoil tales are based in reality, it's now that much harder for true believers to be taken seriously. You could even say the Denver Airport's marketing team was diabolically good at what they did.
Of course, if that is the case and these tinfoil tales are true, there's one big question that's hard to answer about them.
Why would the Illuminati or the Freemasons or whoever's behind the nefarious plots put so many clues out in the open? It's a really bad way to keep a secret. If you don't want people to wonder what you're actually up to, maybe you shouldn't operate out of a public space full of apocalyptic artwork. And you have to think, if some group was planning to destroy the world, why put their headquarters in an airport of all places? You might think that a military base or a secret hidden bunker...
or almost anywhere else more private would be more secure. The DIA is the third busiest airport in the United States and the sixth busiest in the entire world. 77.8 million people pass through it every year.
That doesn't strike me as the ideal location for a secret society meeting place or for alien invaders base of operations. And I also just want to touch on one other point before I wrap up the episode. See today, I only scratched the surface when it comes to tinfoil tales about the Denver International Airport. There are
So many other things I didn't touch on. Some of these ideas are easy to debunk. Others are ridiculous. Some are actually harmful. So it might look like I missed some details and that's because I wanted to focus just on the tinfoil tells that I personally find a little interesting.
Now, even with all of those questions the skeptics have asked, I have to say it's not too surprising that the DIA has become so central in so many tinfoil tells. Not only because of the art or the tunnels or the construction delays, but also because airports by nature are liminal spaces. You don't go to one unless you're on your way to or from somewhere else. So by nature, they're hubs for transition and reinvention.
So if some group out there did want to make a massive change, like, I don't know, destroying the world as we know it, there's a certain amount of symbolism in operating out of a transportation hub. Whether you believe the tinfoil tells or not, you have to admit, you can't pass through the Denver International Airport without transforming into something new.
And that is our episode for today. I hope that one day everyone listening or watching this does get to go see the Denver International Airport for themselves because it is quite an eerie experience that fills you with adrenaline. And it's kind of like a scavenger hunt walking through the airport trying to find the next thing to make you go, whoa.
All right, you guys, that's it. Join me next week as we go further into the dark together. Goodbye.