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[soft mysterious music]
- [Narrator] For 22 years, starting officially in 1948,
the United States Air Force was responsible
for investigating reports of unidentified flying objects.
That investigation began with a serious high-priority status
to search for answers.
About a year later, those involved created
an estimate of the situation.
That was an intelligence analysis
of the events that had taken place.
The conclusion was that the flying saucers
were interplanetary craft.
The Air Force Chief of Staff, General Hoyt S. Vandenberg,
rejected the analysis and nearly everyone involved
in its creation found themselves reassigned.
The UFO project, then known as Sign, fell into disarray.
After a series of officers had been put in charge
and the name changed first to Grudge, then Blue Book,
investigations became a priority.
They didn't last very long
and eventually Blue Book became little more
than a public relations operation
designed to convince the public
that the Air Force was doing its job,
that there was no threat to national security,
and that there was nothing to the tales of flying saucers.
[electronic music]
[text beeping]
[tense mysterious music]
During the Second World War, they were called foo fighters,
and in 1946 as they flew over Scandinavia,
they were known as ghost rockets.
It wasn't until Boise, Idaho businessman Kenneth Arnold
saw them near Mount Rainier, Washington,
that they became flying saucers.
Although the official investigation
wouldn't be launched for another six months,
the Arnold sighting was the first one
to receive major coverage in the United States.
Army Air Forces investigations working
out of the Fourth Air Force Headquarters
became deeply involved in the Arnold sighting.
Arnold made his sighting of these strange objects
flying one behind the other at about 9,500 feet
at a speed he estimated to be more than 1,500 miles an hour.
This was something that clearly wasn't made
in secret projects hidden in the mountains of New Mexico
and it wasn't something that was made by the Soviet Union
as they began to press for world domination.
This was something strange that had no ready explanation
other than it was strange and almost impossible to believe.
When Arnold landed later in the afternoon
on June 24th in Yakima, Washington,
he told the assembled reporters what he had seen.
In the course of describing the objects,
he said they moved with a motion
like that of saucers skipping across the water.
The shape, however, according to drawings
that Arnold completed for the Army,
showed objects that were keel-shaped with a blunt nose.
In later drawings, Arnold had elaborated,
showing objects that were crescent-shaped
with a scalloped trailing edge
and even a clear canopy over the cockpit.
Later, Arnold would provide the military
with a written description of the events
in a document that was originally classified
but that has long since been released.
Arnold wrote--
- [Man] On June 24th, I'd finished my work.
At about two o'clock,
I took off for Chehalis Washington Airport
with the intention of going to Yakima, Washington.
I flew directly toward Mount Rainier
after reaching an altitude of about 9,500 feet
which is the approximate elevation
of the high plateau from which Mount Rainier rises.
There was a DC-4 to the left and to the rear of me
approximately 15 miles' distance,
and I should judge a 14,000 foot elevation.
I hadn't flown more than two or three minutes
on my course when a brightflash reflected on my airplane.
It startled me as I thought I was too close
to some other aircraft.
I looked every place in the sky
and couldn't find where the reflection had come from
until I looked to the left and the north of Mount Rainier
where I observed a chain of nine peculiar-looking aircraft
flying from north to the south
at approximately 9,500 foot elevation
and going seemingly in a definite direction
of about 170 degrees.
They, the objects,
were approaching Mount Rainier very rapidly
and I merely assumed they were jet planes.
Anyhow, I discovered that this
was where the reflection had come from
as two or three of them every few seconds would dip
or change their course slightly just enough
for the sun to strike them at an angle
that reflected brightly on my plane.
I thought it was very peculiar that I couldn't their tails
but assumed they were some type of jet plane.
I was determined to clock their speed
as I had two definite points I could clock them by.
I watched these objects with great interest
as I had never before observed airplanes
flying so close to the mountaintops.
I would estimate their elevationcould've varied 1,000 feet
one way or another, up or down.
They flew like many times I have observed geese to fly
in a rather diagonal chain-like line
as if they were linked together.
Their speed at the time did not impress me particularly
because I knew that our Army and Air Forces had planes
that went very fast.
A number of newsmen and experts suggested
that I might've been seeing reflections
or even a mirage.
This I know to be absolutely false
as I observed these objects not only through the glass
of my airplane, but turned my airplane sideways
where I could open my window and observe them
with a completely unobstructed view.
When these objects were flying approximately straight
and level, they were just a black thin line,
and when they flipped was the only time
I could get a judgment as to their size.
- [Narrator] Arnold's sightings didn't gain
front-page status immediately.
Stories about it appeared in newspapers a day or two later,
usually on page eight or nine, and then with a comment
about strange objects in fast flight.
It was, at that time, the story of an oddity.
Arnold claimed later that he thought he had seen
some sort of new jet aircraft and he was a little concerned
about breaking the security around it.
[dramatic music]
In the Project Blue Book files is a note
about the Arnold case
which labeled it as incident number 37.
The Air Force officers who reviewed the case wrote,
"The report cannot bear even superficial examination,
"therefore, must be disregarded.
"There are strong indications that this report
"and its attendant publicity is largely responsible
"for subsequent reports."
Note content with a negative note in the file.
The unidentified officer also wrote,
"It is to be noted that the observer has profited
"from his story by selling it to 'FATE Magazine'."
Here for the first time were two accusations
that would be made about many UFO cases,
that is, the witnesses were in it for the money
and a suggestion that UFO reports were the result
of the snowball effect.
It seems to suggest that Arnold invented his tale
with an eye to writing a story about it for "FATE".
There is no evidence to support this
and Arnold had not written any articles
for any magazines prior to this sighting.
The editors of "FATE", and Ray Palmer specifically,
who would become one of the first
and most vocal proponents of the flying saucers,
induced Arnold into writing about what he had seen.
The point then becomes irrelevant.
The article doesn't seem to have been a motive for Arnold
but more of a serendipitous reward
for seeing and reporting the objects in the first place.
It seems that thoseinvestigating the flying saucers
didn't see a link between his sighting and photographs taken
on July 7th, 1947, in Phoenix, Arizona.
William A. Rhodes, a self-employed scientist
living in Phoenix, claimed he had taken
what might be considered the first good photographs
of one of the flying saucers.
Initially puzzled by the case,
the military did take the report seriously.
The investigation that included the FBI,
whose agent asked not to be identified as an FBI agent,
accompanied the Army Air Force's officer
to interview Rhodes.
Rhodes would first tell reporters
and then various government investigators,
including those from the FBI
and the Army's Counter Intelligence Corps
that he had been on his way to his workshop
at the rear of his house when he heard a distinctive whoosh
that he believed to be from a P-80 Shooting Star fighter jet
which was the fastest airplane at that particular moment.
Overhead he saw something that didn't have the shape
of a conventional aircraft.
He hurried to his lab, grabbed his camera from his workbench
and hurried outside to a small mound in his backyard.
Rhodes sighted along the side of his camera
and it took the first photograph.
He estimated that the object was circling in the east.
He advanced the film and then hesitated,
thinking that he would wait for the object to get closer.
Worried that it would disappearwithout coming closer,
he snapped the second picture, finished the film roll,
and his ability to record the event further.
Rhodes' story, along with the pictures, appeared
in the Phoenix newspaper "The Arizona Republic" on July 9th.
In that article, men long experienced
in aircraft recognition studied both the print
and the negative from which they were made
and declined to make a guess
on what the flying object might be.
Rhodes said that the object appeared to be elliptical
in shape and to have a diameter of 20 to 30 feet.
It appeared to be at 5,000 feet when first seen
and was traveling according to Rhodes
at 400 to 600 miles per hour.
It was gray, which tended to blend
with the gray overcast background of the sky.
The object had, according to Rhodes
and a confidential report from the Project Blue Book files,
what appeared to be a cockpit canopy in the center
which extended toward the back and beneath the object.
The cockpit did not protrude from the surface
but was clearly visible with the naked eye.
Then on August 29th, according to a memorandum
from the office in charge, George Fugate, Jr,
a special agent of the CIC and stationed
at Fourth Air Force Headquarters,
interviewed Rhodes in person.
Fugate was accompanied by Special Agent Brower
of the Phoenix FBI Office.
This interview is importantbecause of some of the confusion
about location of the negatives and prints
of the photograph that would develop later.
During the interview, Rhodes again told the story,
suggesting that he thought at first
it might have been the Navy's Flying Flapjack
which had been featured on the May 1947 cover
of "Mechanix Illustrated".
He rejected the idea because he saw no propellors
or landing gear, though the overall shape
of the craft matched that of the Flapjack.
Later, research by various investigators,
both military and civilian, showed that the Navy built
two Flapjacks but neither had flown
outside the Bridgeport, Connecticut area.
The project was canceled in 1947
as the Navy moved to jet-powered aircraft.
While Rhodes was being interviewed in his home in Phoenix,
Arnold, because he lived in the Northwest,
Lieutenant Frank Brown with Captain William Davidson
took a B-25 and flew up to Tacoma, Washington,
where Arnold was investigating Maury Island.
They all got together in Arnold's hotel room
late in the evening where Arnold showed them the debris
that had been recovered on Maury Island
that Dahl and Crisman had given him.
Both Army officers, Brown and Davidson, believed
that the material was nothing more than smelter slag.
They were unimpressed but both man respected Arnold.
They didn't tell him they believed
the Maury Island tale to be a hoax.
All of this takes us back to Rhodes.
According to Early, Arnold asked the two officers
what Army intelligence had learned
about UFOs in the days after his sighting.
Davidson sat down and then drew a picture of an object.
He told Arnold, "This is a drawing of one
"of several photographs we consider to be authentic."
Brown then added the information
that tied it to the Rhodes photograph.
He said, "It came from Phoenix,Arizona, the other day.
"We have prints of it at Hamilton Field
"but the original negativeswere flown to Washington, D.C."
It is clear that those pictures were the ones
that Rhodes had taken
since there were no other UFO photographs taken
in July, 1947, in Phoenix, Arizona.
It's interesting that Brown mentioned Hamilton Field
because Rhodes does the same thing,
and Hamilton Field was part of the Fourth Air Force
in 1947, and Rhodes had communications with officers
at Fourth Air Force about his photograph as well.
In the end, the Air Force decided
that Arnold had been fooled by mirages created
as the wind whipped up the snow
at the highest levels of the mountain.
Rhodes had created a hoax, no real evidence of that,
but when they had no other explanation,
they claimed the sighting was a hoax.
What they couldn't explain, and didn't try,
was how Rhodes could photograph an object
that looked like that reported by Arnold
without having seen the Arnold illustrations.
The belief at the beginning of the official investigation
was that trained military personnel
and law enforcement officers made the best,
most credible witnesses.
Using this criteria, they selected a number of reports
that seemed inexplicable to them
and that seemed to suggest that the observed craft
were beyond the technical capability
of any nation on Earth.
[mysterious percussive music]
[somber music]
On July 4th, 1947, there were a series of sightings
over several Northwest states
that Air Force officers labeledas either insufficient data
for a scientific analysis or as unidentified.
These involved police officers and airline flight crews
as well as local civilians.
Many of the reports were independent of one another
but can be linked by location,
time of day, and other factors.
Combined rather than separated,
they make a powerful statement
about the nature of the flying saucers.
Although the first reports were made by civilians,
it was just a few minutes after one p.m.
that police officer Kenneth A. McDowell,
who was near the Portland Police Station,
noticed that the pigeons began fluttering as if frightened.
Overhead he saw five large disks east of the city.
According to the report he gave to military officers,
three disks were flying east
and two were headed to the south.
All were flying at high speed
and all appeared to be oscillating.
McDowell alerted other police officers in an all-car alert
and they immediately broadcast the information
over the police radio.
Two other police officers, Walter A. Lissy
and Robert Ellis, after hearing the broadcast,
stopped near a park.
Overhead they saw three disks moving at high speed.
Neither heard any sound,
but both did see flashes of brightness
that could've been sunlight reflecting
from a metallic surface.
According to them, the objects moved erratically
and changed their direction of flight.
They were in sight for about 30 seconds.
Both men were veterans of the Second World War
and both were civilian pilots,
which suggested they had some experience
around aviation and aviation assets.
Patrolman Earl Patterson, after hearing the broadcast,
stopped to search for any of the disks.
The broadcast had suggested that the saucers
were coming out of the sun
which meant they were coming from the direction of the sun.
At first, Patterson noticed nothing,
but a few seconds later,
he saw one object coming out the west
and heading towards the southwest.
He said that the craft seemed to be either aluminum
or eggshell white and didn't flash or reflect the sun.
He also said that he didn't think they were airplanes
like so many of the others.
Their flight path was erratic, wobbling and weaving.
Patterson thought they were radio-controlled
rather than having a living pilot onboard.
On the far side of the Columbia River
in nearby Vancouver, Washington,
sheriff's deputies Sergeant John Sullivan, Clarence McKay,
and Fred Krives also heard the alert broadcast
and ran outside to look for themselves.
Over Portland three to five miles away,
they saw 20 to 30 disks that looked to them
like a flight of geese.
They heard a low humming sound
which might or might not have been related to the objects.
Not long after that, three Harvard patrolmen
who had also been monitoring the police radio band
stepped outside, Captain K.A. Prehn, A.T. Austad,
and Patrolman K.C. Hoff,
saw three to six disks traveling at high speed.
They couldn't get a good count on the number
because of the bright flashes surrounding them.
According to witnesses,
the objects looked like huge chrome hubcaps
and oscillated as they flew.
Sometimes the witnesses could see a full disk,
then a half-moon, and then nothing at all.
They did see a plane overhead as well,
but all the witnesses said
that what they were watching was not aircraft.
This would cause Air Force investigations to wonder
if aircraft might be a plausible explanation
for the sightings, despite the suggestion by the witness.
They thought that something the plane's pilot did,
such as tossing shiny disks from the cockpit,
might have caused the confusion.
And later in the day, there was another report
with a similar claim.
The Air Force files contained a report
that a former Air Corps veteran said the object he saw
was unlike any plane he had ever seen.
He thought it appeared radio-controlled
because the disk could change direction
at a 90-degree angle without difficulty.
Another witness suggested that he had seen three objects
fly east across the Willamette River.
The objects did not appear to be very high
but they were traveling very fast.
He said that they looked like a metallic disk
glinting in the sun.
He also said that he and a neighbor
saw a single disk later that afternoon.
About four p.m., more civilians reported more disks.
A woman called the police telling them
she had watched a single object
as shiny as a new dime flipping around.
An unidentified man called to say
that he had seen three disks,
one flying to the east and the two heading north.
They were shining, shaped like flattened saucers,
and were traveling at high speed.
About an hour later, a man said
that he spotted two white or silver objects
flying southeast over Portland.
Half an hour later, he sighted a single disk
headed to the northeast.
In Milwaukee, Oregon, not far from Portland,
Sergeant Claude Cross reported three objects
flying to the north.
All were disk-shaped, all were moving at high speed.
But disks overhead weren't the only things being reported.
There were objects falling from the sky as well.
Near Eugene, Oregon, a railroad cashier said
he saw silver disks being dropped
out of a white plane flying over the city.
A man in Portland recovered a large piece of paper
he had seen fall from a great height.
According to reports, the time that the paper fell coincided
with some of the flying saucer sightings
which might explain some of them.
The best of the sightings, and the one that was labeled
as unidentified, occurred about dusk
as a United Airlines flight crew saw a single disk.
Minutes later, they spotted several others.
Captain E.J. Smith, the captain of the flight,
explained it this way.
- [Man] As our flight number 105 took off
from Boise, Idaho at four p.m. Pacific time,
the tower joshingly warned us
to be on the lookout for flying saucers.
My co-pilot, Ralph Stevens, was in control
shortly after we got into the air.
Suddenly, he switched on the landing lights.
He said he thought he saw an aircraft
approaching us head-on.
I noticed the objects then for the first time.
We saw four or five somethings.
One was larger than the rest, and for the most part,
kept off the right of the other three or four similar
but smaller objects.
Since we were flying northwest,roughly into the sunset,
we saw whatever they were in at least partial light.
We saw them clearly.
We followed them in a northwesterly direction
for about 45 miles.
Then I called the attendant
at the Ontario, Oregon radio tower,
giving an approximate location and course for the objects.
The attendant acknowledged our call, went outside to look,
but was unable to see anything like what we'd described.
Finally the object disappeared in a burst of speed.
We were unable to tell
whether they outsped us or disintegrated.
We were never able to catch them in our DC-3.
Our airspeed at the time was 185 miles per hour.
Through the Boise air tower,we radioed another United plane
to see if it had seen anything.
That plane flying eastbound into the night
had not sighted them.
Because we were following the objects
at roughly the same altitude,
we can't say anything about their shape
except they were thin and were smooth on the bottom
and rough-appearing on the top.
[eerie music]
- [Narrator] Smith called the flight attendant,
Marty Morrow, to the cockpit to, in Smith's words,
verify they were actually seeing the disks.
He saw four or more disks, three clustered together
and a fourth flying off in the distance by itself.
The objects were in sight for 10 to 15 minutes
which means that she was able to get a good look at them.
Not everyone was convinced
that the sightings were of unconventional aircraft.
Colonel G.R. Dodson,
a commander in the Oregon National Guard,
told reporters that he had made an inspection of the area
from the air but that he had found nothing suspicious.
Solutions were offered by some of the local residents.
One thought that the sightings were the result
of cottonwood blossoms drifting on the wind.
Another complained about the news coverage,
believing it all to be a hoax.
He said that he had seen an airplane fly over
and about a minute later he saw what he believed
to be bits of aluminum foil
that might have been cigarette wrappers.
Air Force officers mentioned that radar chaff had been seen
in the area but offered no evidence to back up the claim.
The idea that a private plane pilot
was dropping small silver diskstook on greater importance.
In the only news story that might have been of importance,
the Oregon Journal noted that the only known airplanes
in the area at the time of the reports
were 23 B-29 bombers near Astoria.
A formation of that size would've been difficult
to misidentify, not to mention that the roar
that the engines would've caused.
Dr. James McDonald, an atmospheric scientist,
interviewed Smith, the United Airlines captain,
about his sighting.
In a prepared statement to United States
House of Representatives Committee
on Science and Astronomics' Symposium
of the Unidentified Flying Objects
in July, 1968, McDonald reported--
- [Man] Smith emphasized to me
that there were no cloud phenomena to confuse them here
and that they observed these objects long enough
to be quite certain that they were no conventional aircraft.
They appeared flat on the bottom, rounded on the top,
he told me, and he added that there seems to be
a perceptible roughness of some sort on top,
though he could not refine the description.
Almost immediately after they lost sight of the first five,
a second formation of four,
three in a line and a fourth off to the side,
moved in ahead of their position,
again traveling westward but at a somewhat higher altitude
than the DC-3's 8,000 feet.
These passed quickly out of sight to the west at speeds
which they felt were far beyond then known speeds.
Smith emphasized that they were never certain of sizes
and distances but that they had the general impression
that these disk-like craft were appreciably larger
than ordinary aircraft.
Smith emphasized that he had not taken seriously
the previous week's news accounts
that coined the since persistent term flying saucer
but after seeing this total
of nine unconventional high-speed wingless craft
on the evening of July 4th, 1947,
he became much more interested in the matter.
Nevertheless, in talking with me,
he stressed that he would not speculate
on their real nature or origin.
- [Narrator] These reports were investigated
by Army officers at the time,
though the reports seemed to be fairly superficial.
That is, there were objects seen high in the sky
for seconds or a minute or two.
As part of the Project Grudge final report
written in 1949, one of the officers wrote,
"This investigation can offer no definitive hypothesis
"but in passing, would like to note the incidents occurred
"on the 4th of July and that if relatively small pieces
"of aluminum foil had been dropped
"from a plane over the area,
"then any one object would be visible
"at a relatively short distance.
"Even moderate wind velocities would give the illusion
"that fluttering gyrating disks had gone by
"at great velocities.
"Various observers would not, of course,
"in this case, have seen the same objects."
The officer also noted thatthe above is not to be regarded
as a very likely explanation, but only as a possibility.
The occurrence on these incidents on July 4th
may have been more than coincidence.
Some prankster might have tossed such objects
out of an airplane as part
of an Independence Day celebration.
The thing that the Air Force did here
was link the case by date and location
but didn't think of them as a continuation of one sighting.
Once a police officer had alerted his fellow officers
to the object, they, in different locations
and at different times, went outside or looked up
and were able to spot them.
The descriptions are of a similar type,
dish-shaped object flying alone or in formations.
That they were seeing the same thing
from different locations suggested something
that was very high or that there was more
than one formation.
The thing to be remembered thateven if the police officers
in the one location were fooled by something,
those officers observing it from a different perspective
might have been able to identify it
if there was a terrestrial explanation.
Since that didn't happen, it would seem
that there was something very strange going on here.
Add to this the sighting by Smith and his airline crew
which we can do because they observed the craft
on the same day and in the same general location.
We have a new dimension to the case.
Smith's report was labeled unidentified,
meaning that he and his crew were able
to give a detailed description of what they had seen.
We have to wonder if that was because they were met
by reporters when he landed.
Had his report not received the attention it did
and had he not provided the detail he did,
might it have ended up with only a little information
and a label of insufficient data for scientific analysis?
Army Air Force's investigation
which took the reportseriously in the summer of 1947
failed to find a satisfactory explanation
for these sightings.
It should be remembered that in this case,
there was nothing other than witness testimony,
witnesses who were separated by distance
but who, in some cases, had been warned
about the flying saucers by the police radio
and who had claimed to have seen basically the same thing.
These sightings are interesting
and we have to wonder what more might have been learned
had a little more effort been made
in the investigation of them.
Although it has been said there is a single case
in the Blue Book files in which alien creatures
were reported that wasn't labeled
as some sort of psychological program,
there are several good cases hidden in there.
Skeptics, disbelievers, and debunkers like to say
that there is no evidence
that alien creatures have visited the planet.
They ignore, reject, or are unaware
that the Blue Book files do contain examples
of physical evidence that has been recovered.
The best of those cases came from Socorro, New Mexico,
on April 24th, 1964.
Lonnie Zamora, then a police officer in Socorro,
saw a landed object
and two small humanoids standing near it.
According to Project Blue Book,Zamora was chasing a speeder
when he heard a loud roar and saw a flash of light
in the southwestern sky.
Fearing that a dynamite shed on the edge of town
might have exploded, Zamora broke off the chase
and headed in that direction.
Captain Hector Quintanilla added more detail to the story
as it was told by Zamora duringthe official investigation.
Quintanilla later wrote--
- [Man] It was off the road to the left in the arroyo,
and at first glance it looked like a car turned over,
but when he drove closer it appeared to be aluminum clay,
not chrome, and oval-shaped like a football.
Zamora drove about 50 feet along the hill crest,
radioing back to the sheriff's office,
"10-44," meaning accident, "I'll be 10-6,"
meaning busy, out of the car,
"Checking a wreck down in the arroyo," Zamora said.
From this point, seated in the car,
he could not see the object over the edge of the hill.
As he stopped the car, he was still talking on the radio,
and while he was getting out he dropped his mic.
He picked it up and put it back
and started down towards the object.
Zamora then said, "As soon as I saw flames and heard roar,
"ran away from object but did turn, head towards object.
"Object was in shape.
"It was smooth, no windows or doors.
"As roar started, it was still on the ground.
[dramatic music] [choir singing menacingly]
- Quintanilla said, "I was determined
"to solve the case, and come hell or high water,
"I was going to find the vehicle or the stimulus.
"I decided that it was imperative for me to talk
"to the base commander at Holloman Air Force Base.
"I wanted to interview the base commander at length
"about special activities from his base.
"I needed help to pull this off
"so I called Lieutenant Colonel Maston Jacks at SAFOI.
"I told him what I wanted to do and he asks,
"'Do you think it will do any good?'
"I replied, 'Goddammit Maston, if there is an answer
"'to this case, it has to be in some hanger at Holloman.'"
He went to work with his position at the Pentagon
and the approval for his visit came through.
Colonel Garman was the base commander during his visit.
"He was most cooperative and told me
"that I could go anywhere and visit any activity
"which interested me.
"I went from one end of the base to the other.
"I spent four days talking to everybody I could
"and spent almost a whole day
"with the down-range controllers
"at the White Sands Missile Range.
"I left Holloman dejected and convinced that the answer
"to Zamora's experience did not originate
"and terminate at this base.
"On my way back to Wright-Patterson, I hit upon an idea.
"Why not a lunar landing vehicle?
"I knew that some research had been done at Wright-Patterson
"so as soon as I got back I asked for some briefings.
"The briefings were extremely informative,
"but the Lunar Landers were not operational
"in April of 1964.
"I got the names of the companies that were doing research
"in this field and I started writing letters.
"The companies were most cooperative,
"but their answers were all negative.
"I labeled the case unidentified and the UFO buffs
"and hobby clubs had themselves a field day.
"According to them, there was proof
"that our beloved planet had been visited
"by an extraterrestrial vehicle.
"Although I labeled the case unidentified,
"I've never been satisfied with that classification."
[smooth electronic music]
It has been claimed that the only case
involving occupants, creatures associated
with a landed UFO that was labeled as unidentified,
was that from Socorro, New Mexico.
Although somewhat hidden in the Project Blue Book files,
there is another that took place almost two years later.
Hynek mentioned it in his book, "The Hynek UFO Report",
but he doesn't give a location
and he dates it with a newspaper clipping
from the "Dallas Times Herald".
Although Hynek suggests the case
is from the Wichita Falls, Texas, area
and the witness, W.E. Laxson, was a civilian employee
at Sheppard Air Force Base in Wichita Falls,
the government files list the case as Temple, Oklahoma.
The newspaper clipping cited by Hynek
is dated March 27th, 1966,
but the sighting occurred on March 23rd, 1966.
With the misdirection from Hynek probably as a result
of the classified nature of thecase when he wrote his book,
it took a while to deduce the facts.
Hynek, using the newspaper account,
said there was nothing in it that varied
from what was in the government file.
That file said, "Observer W.E. Eddie Laxson
"was driving his car along the highway
"at approximately 5:05 a.m. on the 23rd of March, 1966,
"when he noticed an object parked
"on the road in front of him.
"He stopped the car and got out
"so to get a better view of the object.
"The object was so parked that it blocked out a portion
"of the road curb sign.
"There were no sharp edges noticed by the observer.
"The object had the appearance of a conventional aircraft,
"a C-124, without wings or motors.
"There was a Plexiglas bubble on top
"similar to a B-26 canopy.
"As the observer approached,
"he noticed a man wearing a baseball cap enter the object
"by steps from the bottom.
"After the man entered the object,
"it began to rise from the pavement
"and headed on a southeasterly direction
"at approximately 720 miles per hour.
"The object had forward and aft lights
"that were very bright.
"As the object rose from the ground,
"a high-speed drill type of sound was heard
"plus a sound like that of a welding rod
"when an arc is struck.
"The object was 75 feet long,
"about eight feet from the top to the bottom,
"and about 12 feet wide.
"There was some type of supports
"on the bottom of the object.
"After the object disappeared,
"the witness got back into his car
"and drove approximately 15 miles down the highway.
"At this time, the original witness stopped
"and talked with another individual
"who had also stopped along the roadway
"to watch some lights over Red River
"which is approximately five or six miles to the southeast.
"Various organizations were contacted
"around the Temple, Oklahoma area
"for a possible experimental or conventional aircraft.
"The observer stated that he thought the object
"was some type of Army or Air Force research aircraft.
"All attempts at such an explanation proved fruitless
"since there were no aircraft in the area
"at the time of the sightings.
"Although there are numerous helicopter
"and other experimentals in the area,
"none could be put in the area of Temple
"at approximately five o'clock on the 23rd of March, 1966.
"Because of this factor, the case is listed
"as unidentified by the Air Force."
The second witness who was not interviewed by the Air Force
and who, according to the government file, did not fill out
their long and involved form, was C.W. Anderson.
Anderson confirmed for the newspaper
that he had seen the craft as well.
He told the reporter, "I know that people will say
"that Laxson is durned crazy, but that's what I say."
Anderson said that he thought
the object had been following him down the road.
He had watched it in his rear view mirror for several miles.
The problem for the Air Force
was that Anderson did not complete their form.
He didn't see the pilot or crewmen either.
The drawing of the object made by Laxson resembled that
which Lonnie Zamora had made of the craft he had saw,
which means it was sort of egg-shaped.
It was certainly longer and was lying on its side.
Like Zamora, Laxson said that he saw symbols on the object,
but unlike Zamora, he recognized them.
He told the reporter that, "On the side,
"I made out T-L-A, with the last two figures 38."
In what might be described as a fit of honesty,
the Air Force admitted they had no solution for the case.
The description of the alien was more human than humanoid
and he seemed to be dressed in conventional clothing,
right to the mechanic's hat.
Investigations revealed a second witness
and that might have influenced the Air Force,
especially since the men had never met
prior to the sighting.
In the end, they labeled the case as unidentified.
[tense electronic music]
In a review of government records,
another case, also labeled as unidentified, was found.
This one took place in Pittsburg, Kansas.
The case is a single witness and has gone nearly unreported
for more than 60 years.
William Squires was on his way to work
along Highway 160 about eight miles from Pittsburg
when he sighted an unknown object hovering over a field.
It was about 27 feet in length at about 12 feet high.
Squires thought it had the appearance of an airfoil.
He said that he saw smallpropellors around the perimeter.
They were about a foot in diameter.
There were also a number of windows in the craft
and through one of them, Squires could see a man
who seemed to be controlling the object.
He was facing forward to the edge of the object.
The windows were described as blue,
becoming darker as time passed.
This seems to be the type of sighting
the Air Force would dismiss as psychological,
which would be a nice way of saying that it was a hoax
and there was something wrong with the witness.
However, there was some physical evidence left behind
according to the government file.
The object reported as hovering over an open field
used for cattle grazing,
general area under the exact location was pressed down
and formed a round 60-foot-diameter impression
with the grass in arecognizable concentric pattern.
Loose grass lay on top of the impression
as if drawn in by suction
when the object ascended vertically at a high speed.
Vegetation and grass approximately three
to four inches high.
Area was extremely dry at present.
Grass showed where Squires had walked in
to a fence and stopped.
L.V. Baxter and D. Whitener, local employees of KOMA,
went to the place of the sighting, 11:35 CST,
with Squires and confirmed his path to the fence
and the 60-foot-diameter impression in the tall grass.
Robert E. Greens visited the site at 1600
on the 25th of August of 1952,
with source and reports that the vegetation was laid down
in concentric circles but with the impression less distinct
than reported by Whitener and Baxter.
Green obtained grass and soil samples
at the immediate area where the impression was made
and also gathered control samples
200 yards removed from the site.
He is sending some to the Air Technical Intelligence Center,
airmail, special delivery.
What is strange about this case is the fact
that there seemed to be little interest
in the pilot of the craft.
Although there is another point where he was discussed,
there's no real addition to the information.
Clearly, based on these descriptions, that alien was human,
or human enough to beindistinguishable from a human.
Squires did suggest that the occupant seemed to be frenzied
in his activities inside the craft.
Although this case is essentially single-witness,
there was the physical evidence left by the craft.
Others, Baxter, Whitener, and Green, did see the impressions
in the ground left by the craft.
Eventually this sort of evidence would become known
as a saucer nest, meaning simply
that the crushed vegetation left by a UFO on the ground
had somewhat similar features to other parts of the country
and other parts of the world.
The ultimate description would be of a crop circle.
Here, rather than an elaborate design,
it was a simple circle of crushed or flattened grass.
The soil samples taken by Green
were analyzed by the Air Force.
In a short report of a single paragraph,
the technician said they had found no radiation,
burning, or stress of any kind.
In other words, there was nothing to the sample
to distinguish those taken from the landing area
or from those taken 200 yards away.
There's one final aspect to the case
that is mildly interesting.
In a couple of the letters from the government files,
there is a notation that reminds all of paragraph seven
which is a paragraph in the regulations
that requires unidentified cases be classified.
Those who have information about the case
are not allowed to discuss it with those
who do not have the proper clearances.
J. Allen Hynek, writing in "The Hynek UFO Report",
provides a glimpse into the thinking
at Blue Book at the time of this sighting.
He wrote, "My skepticism was so great at that time
"that I was quite willing todismiss it as a hallucination."
Even with that admitted bias against the case
which never received wide exposure,
there's another which the witness said
that he had seen the pilot of an unidentified craft
and that was left as unidentified by the Air Force.
In their zeal to label cases,
this seems to be another that they missed.
They could've easily labeled it as psychological,
if not for the darned landing traces.
Keeping with their tradition of labeling cases
but not solving them, the Air Force officers decided
that witnesses had psychological problems
if they claimed to have seen the beings
outside of their craft.
There's no need to investigate if the witness is unreliable
or under the influence of some kind of mental problem.
In the Pittsburg, Kansas case, there is the same problem.
Here was a case in which the object interacted
with the environment.
True, it was a single witness,
but it left marks on the ground.
Rather than send in someone to review it carefully,
the Air Force allowed samples to be gathered by a civilian.
They may have provided some guidance,
but it would seem that anexpert with the proper training
should have been sent if the Air Force was serious
about investigating UFOs.
There is another aspect to this case
and that is that a military officer
did gather some of the data.
Green was apparently a second lieutenant
in the Army Reserve.
He is the man who collected the samples.
But this is not to suggest
that his military training had covered that,
but his membership in the Reserve caused one problem.
The report he filed with his chain of command
made its way eventually to the Air Force,
but they delayed it.
Zamora seemed to be a single witness
but there was physical evidence left behind.
Here, the Air Force responded quickly,
gathering evidence, and analyzed the situation.
They found no answer that satisfied them.
There is the possibility that there were two witnesses.
They appeared after the fact
but are not from the Socorro area,
and their stories seem to have been embellished
with facts from news reports.
In fact, in all the cases,
there was some physical evidence to be examined.
The cases did not rest solely
on the testimony of the witnesses.
If there wasn't some kind of physical evidence,
there was another witness to corroborate the sightings.
The Cisco Grove occupantreport is just one more example
of an opportunity that was missed,
or rather, one that seems to have been missed.
There was some corroborative testimony
from the other hunters.
There was the damage to the arrows
and then there was the report
that the area had been cleaned.
What we don't know is who had been out
in the forest cleaning the areas
in which the witness claimed to have seen the alien beings.
Just who could have done that?
There is evidence that not all sightings
made it to Project Blue Book
even though the regulations seemed to require that.
Dr. J. Allen Hynek, who was a scientific consultant
to Project Blue Book for many years,
often said that the really good cases didn't make it
into the Blue Book files.
He suspected another reporting system
but he couldn't prove that there was one.
Hints about this other investigation
came from Brigadier General Arthur Exon
who was the base commander
at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in the mid 1960s.
Exon said that while he was base commander,
he would periodically receive telephone calls
which ordered him to prepare an aircraft
for a mission outside the local Wright-Patterson area.
Exon himself described this in May 19 of 1991
in a recorded interview.
He said, "I know that while I was there,
"I had charge of all the administrative airplanes
"and had to sign priority airplanes to the members
"who would go out andinvestigate reported sightings.
"I remember several out in Wyoming and Montana
"and that area in the '60s, '64 and '65.
"I knew there were certain teams of people,
"they're representing headquarters United States Air Force
"as well as the organizations there
"at Wright-pat, and so on.
"When a crew came back, it was their own business.
"Nobody asked any questions."
He expanded on this, saying,
"The way this happened to me is that I would get a call
"and say that the crew or team was leaving.
"There was such and such a timeand they wanted an airplane
"and pilots to take X number of people to wherever.
"They might be gone two or three days
"or might be gone a week.
"They would come back and that would be the end of it."
Asked about the overall controlof the teams, Exon said,
"I always thought they were part of that unholy crew
"in Washington that startedkeeping the lid on this thing."
Everything said to this point suggests
that the operation was run from FTD,
the parent organization to Blue Book at Wright-Patterson,
but in an interview conducted about a month later
on June the 18th of 1991, Exon clarified what he had meant.
Asked if these teams of eight to 15 people were stationed
at Wright-Patterson, he said, "They were."
"They would come from Washington, D.C.
"They'd ask for an airplane tomorrow morning
"and that would give the guys a chance to get there,
"Wright-Patterson, by commercial airline.
"Sometimes they'd be gone for three days
"and sometimes they'd be gone for a week.
"I know they went to Montana and Wyoming
"and the northwest states a number of times
"in a year and a half.
"They went to Arizona once or twice."
He also said, "Our contact was a man, a telephone number.
"He'd call, he'd set the airplane up.
"I just knew there was an investigative team."
What all this boils down to is an attempt
to cover the activity.
The team, whoever they were, would fly into Dayton, Ohio,
on commercial air and then drive out to the base.
If a reporter attempted to trace the movements
of the team after it had been deployed,
the trail led back to Wright-Patterson.
After that, it just disappeared.
This team, or those teams, was made up
of eight to 15 individuals at a time
when Project Blue Book was composed
of two Air Force officers, an NCO, and a secretary.
They were stationed at Wright-Patterson
but these other teams were assigned somewhere else
and there is no reason to assume
that all members of a teamwere assigned at the same base.
They would come together as needed.
On October 20th, 1969,
Brigadier General C.H. Bolenderprovided the documentation
to prove that there was another investigation.
In paragraph four of his memo, Bolender wrote,
"As early as 1953, the Robertson Panel concluded
"that the evidence presented on unidentified flying objects
"shows no indication that these phenomena
"constitute a direct physical threat to national security.
"In spite of this finding, the Air Force continued
"to maintain a special reporting system.
"There is still, however, no evidence
"that Project Blue Book reports
"have served any intelligence function.
"Moreover, reports of unidentified flying objects
"which could affect national security are made
"in accordance with JANAP 146,
"the Joint Army, Navy, Air Force Publication,
"or Air Force Manual 55-11,
"and are not part of the Blue Book system."
In other words, the suspicions of Hynek and Exon
were confirmed by this documentfrom the government files.
This organization dealt with matters of national security
and the sightings at Malmstrom
because of the missile shutdown
and it was a matter of national security.
Those sightings and theinformation collected about them
would not be part of the Blue Book system
and therefore would not be in the files.
That they are missing is the significant point.
In the beginning, in the summer of 1947,
the military was concerned about the sightings
of flying saucers.
They didn't know what they were.
But the reports from military pilots,
civilian pilots, and police officers concerned them.
They believed the reports to be accurate
and thought they represented an advancement
in technology by our competitors in the world.
Alien visitation, though discussed,
was not the top explanation.
When the official investigation,
known officially as Project Sign,
the officers assigned were motivated to find an explanation.
In July, 1948, they produced a document
known as the estimate of the situation.
According to Ed Ruppelt,
one-time chief of Project Blue Book,
that situation was flying saucers
and the conclusion was that they were from another world.
The Air Force chief of staff, General Hoyt S. Vandenberg,
rejected the estimate and those who had been responsible
found themselves with new jobs.
The fire went out of the investigation.
No longer did they worry about the explanation.
They just worried about providing solutions for the cases.
Sign eventually evolved into Grudge
and then Project Blue Book.
For a brief period, Blue Book was more interested
in the truth than in explaining cases
regardless of the facts.
An explanation of the Blue Book files,
a reinvestigation of many of the cases,
reveals the flaws in them.
There are radar cases, physical evidence cases,
photographic cases, landing cases,
and reports of humanoid creatures
that have no solid terrestrial explanations.
The truth is that for most of its existence,
Blue Book was a public relations operation
designed to convince people
that there were no flying saucers, no alien visitation,
and finally, no reason for continued research.
Blue Book ended in 1969
after the University of Colorado accepted more
than a half million dollars to investigate UFOs.
There were three caveats: they must say something positive
about the Air Force investigation,
they must conclude their investigation
the way the Air Force wanted, and then must show
that there was no national security threat.
With these three goalsaccomplished, the Air Force said
they were through investigating flying saucers.
Like so much else, that statement was also untrue.
[mysterious electronic music]
[eyelids thudding]
[dramatic music]
- [Announcer] 10, nine, ignition sequence start,
six, five, four, three,
two, one, zero.