Former pilots and officials call for new U.S. UFO probe

[Jolie Rouge]

Former pilots and officials call for new U.S. UFO probe
Mon Nov 12, 5:58 PM ET

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democratic U.S. presidential hopeful Dennis Kucinich may have been ridiculed for saying he had seen a UFO, but for some former military pilots and other observers, unidentified flying objects are no laughing matter.

An international panel of two dozen former pilots and government officials called on the U.S. government on Monday to reopen its generation-old UFO investigation as a matter of safety and security given continuing reports about flying discs, glowing spheres and other strange sightings. "Especially after the attacks of 9/11, it is no longer satisfactory to ignore radar returns ... which cannot be associated with performances of existing aircraft and helicopters," they said in a statement released at a news conference.

The panellists from seven countries, including former senior military officers, said they had each seen a UFO or conducted an official investigation into UFO phenomena.

The subject of UFOs grabbed the spotlight in the U.S. presidential race last month when Kucinich, a member of Congress from Ohio, said during a televised debate with other Democratic candidates that he had seen one.

Former presidents Ronald Reagan and Jimmy Carter are both reported to have claimed UFO sightings.

Most turn out to be misidentified aircraft, satellites or meteors. A panellist who once worked for Britain's Ministry of Defense said 5 percent of incidents cannot be explained.

But the sightings are often dismissed by authorities without proper investigations, UFO activists say. "It's a question of who you going to believe: your lying eyes or the government?" remarked John Callahan, a former Federal Aviation Administration investigator, who said the CIA in 1987 tried to hush up the sighting of a huge lighted ball four times the size of a jumbo jet in Alaska.

The panel, organized by a group dedicated to winning credibility for the study of UFOs, urged Washington to resume UFO investigations through the U.S. Air Force or NASA. "It would certainly, I think, take a lot of angst out of this issue," said former Arizona Gov. Fife Symington, who said he was among hundreds who saw a delta-shaped craft with enormous lights silently traverse the sky near Phoenix in 1997.

The Air Force investigated 12,618 UFO reports from 1947 to 1969 in what was known as Project Blue Book. Investigators concluded that the incidents posed no threat and there was no evidence of space aliens or a super technology in operation. "Since the termination of Project Blue Book, nothing has occurred that would support a resumption of UFO investigations," the Air Force said on its Web site.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20071112/od_uk_nm/oukoe_uk_usa_ufos;_ylt=AhweU9p2xE7Ta5GvXkbXAJIuQE4 F

[Jolie Rouge]

UFO's: Lights Surround Air Force Jet

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Mexican Air Force pilots film unidentified objects
Wednesday, May 12, 2004 Posted: 8:10 AM EDT (1210 GMT)

http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/americ....ap/index.html

MEXICO CITY, Mexico (AP) -- Mexican Air Force pilots filmed 11 unidentified objects in the skies over southern Campeche state, a Defense Department spokesman confirmed Tuesday.

A videotape made widely available to the news media on Tuesday shows the bright objects, some sharp points of light and others like large headlights, moving rapidly in what appears to be a late-evening sky.

The lights were filmed on March 5 by pilots using infrared equipment. They appeared to be flying at an altitude of about 3,500 meters (11,480 feet), and allegedly surrounded the Air Force jet as it conducted routine anti-drug trafficking vigilance in Campeche. Only three of the objects showed up on the plane's radar.

"Was I afraid? Yes. A little afraid because we were facing something that had never happened before," said radar operator Lt. German Marin in a taped interview made public Tuesday.

"I couldn't say what it was ... but I think they're completely real," added Lt. Mario Adrian Vazquez, the infrared equipment operator. Vazquez insisted that there was no way to alter the recorded images.

The plane's captain, Maj. Magdaleno Castanon, said the military jets chased the lights "and I believe they could feel we were pursuing them."

When the jets stopped following the objects, they disappeared, he said.

A Mexican Defense Department spokesman confirmed Tuesday that the videotape was filmed by members of the Mexican Air Force. The spokesman declined to comment further and spoke on customary condition of anonymity.

The video was first aired on national television Monday night then again at a news conference Tuesday by Jaime Maussan, a Mexican investigator who has dedicated the past 10 years to studying UFOs.

"This is historic news," Maussan told reporters. "Hundreds of videos (of UFOs) exist, but none had the backing of the armed forces of any country. ... The armed forces don't perpetuate frauds."

Maussan said Secretary of Defense Gen. Ricardo Vega Garcia gave him the video on April 22.

Jolie Rouge 05-17-2004 06:37 PM

Re: UFO's: Lights Surround Air Force Jet

Weather may explain Mexico UFO stir
Monday, May 17, 2004 Posted: 10:15 AM EDT

http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/space/0...eut/index.html

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) -- A cluster of mysterious objects that surrounded a Mexican Air Force plane, alarming the pilots and sparking a UFO scare, could be a weather phenomenon known as ball lightning, a scientist said on Friday.

The pilots grew nervous during a routine drugs surveillance flight in March when their radar detected strange objects flying nearby and an infrared camera showed 11 blobs of light, invisible to the eye, hovering or darting about their plane.

Mexico's Air Force this week released footage from the infrared camera that was shown widely on television. As Mexican and international media published photographs of the objects, UFO Web sites saw the case as possible evidence of a new sighting of some form of extraterrestrial life.

But nuclear science researcher Julio Herrera said the blobs of light may have been nothing more than ball lightning -- glowing spheres that are little understood but often sighted near the ground during thunderstorms. "Just as you have lightning between clouds and ground, you can also have it within the clouds and sometimes ball lightning can develop. I feel this is one of these rare events," said Herrera, based at Mexico's National Autonomous University. "It's a very rare atmospheric phenomenon and it would be very interesting to be able to analyze all the information these pilots obtained," he told Reuters.

UFO follower Jaime Maussan said on Tuesday the objects seemed "intelligent" after they turned around to surround the plane chasing them -- but Herrera said electrical discharges in ball lightning could have been attracted to the plane as a conductor.



Only three of the objects showed up on the plane's radar.


If it was "ball lightning" would it show up on radar at all ?? Why only three out of eleven ?? Why would the pilots only bee able to see it with infared ?


http://www.bigbigforums.com/off-topic-chat/401879-ufos-lights-surround-air-force-jet.html?highlight=unidentified+flying+objects

[Jolie Rouge]

Yes UFOs do exist, government spokesman says
Tue Dec 18, 9:58 AM ET

TOKYO (Reuters) - Yes, UFOs do exist, Japan's top government spokesman said Tuesday. The comment by chief cabinet secretary Nobutaka Machimura drew laughter from reporters at his regular briefing on government policy.

Earlier the cabinet, responding to an opposition lawmaker's question, issued a statement saying it could not confirm any cases of unidentified flying objects.

"This is an issue that the nation is interested in -- it is a defense issue and a confirmation operation needs to take place," Ryuji Yamane, a lawmaker from the main opposition Democratic Party who submitted the question to the cabinet, told Reuters.

"But the government does not even try to collect information necessary for the confirmation."

Machimura, asked about the government's view on UFOs at a regular press conference, told reporters that the government can only offer a stereotyped response.

"Personally, I definitely believe they exist," he said, apparently tongue in cheek.

But the prime minister stuck to the official view.

"I have yet to confirm (that UFOs exist)," Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda told reporters later in the day.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20071218/od_nm/ufo_odd_dc;_ylt=AnnlwP_2eL7vOVbTy.2JczMuQE4F

[jasmine]

Former Air Force Officers: UFOs Tampered With Nuclear Missiles

(Sept. 25) -- Former U.S. Air Force officers and a former enlisted man are about to break many years of silence about an alarming series of UFO encounters (http://www.aolnews.com/weird-news/article/ufos-visited-nuclear-weapons-sites-former-air-force-officers-say/19642199) at nuclear weapons sites -- incidents officially kept secret for decades.

When the group appears at a press conference at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., on Monday, it will offer testimony about events so chilling, it will seem like a day at a science fiction movie festival.

To put you in the mood for the stories that will soon unfold, we're presenting one here, involving former Air Force Capt. Robert Salas, one of the hosts of the Washington event.

http://o.aolcdn.com/photo-hub/news_gallery/6/8/687480/1285362423727.JPEG Courtesy of Robert Salas
Former Air Force Capt. Robert Salas says he was involved in a 1967 incident at Malmstrom Air Force Base in Montana in which a UFO reportedly tampered with nuclear missiles.




Salas, co-author of "Faded Giant (http://www.amazon.com/Faded-Giant-Robert-Salas/dp/1419603418)" (BookSurge Publishing), was a first lieutenant in 1967, serving as a missile-launch officer while stationed at Malmstrom Air Force Base in Montana.

On March 16, 1967, Salas was 60 feet below ground working a 24-hour shift monitoring a launch-control center outfitted with 10 nuclear Minuteman missiles.

"I got a call from the topside guard, telling me they were watching some strange lights flying around in the sky, making odd maneuvers. They didn't think they were airplanes because they were going very fast, turning on a dime and not making a bit of noise," Salas told AOL News.

"A few minutes later, he called back, this time screaming into the phone, scared to death, and he said, 'Sir, I'm looking out my front window and there is a glowing red oval-shaped object hovering right above the front gate, and I've got all the guards out here with their weapons drawn.' "

The guard told Salas the UFO was approximately 30 to 40 feet in diameter with a very bright, pulsating light.

When the guard asked what they should do next, Salas' immediate response was that they had to do whatever was necessary to protect the nuclear missile area, "so basically, I was giving them permission to use whatever force they needed to use to keep anything out."

As Salas started to inform his duty partner and commander about what was going on 60 feet above them, something chilling happened.

"All of a sudden, we started getting bells and whistles going off. As we looked at the display board in front of us, sure enough, the missiles began going into an unlaunchable, or no-go, mode. They couldn't be launched -- it went from green to red.

"We also had a couple of security violations, meaning there were lights indicating some kind of intrusion at the missile sites, where the missiles were actually located, about a mile or two away from the launch control facility."

Salas said they immediately performed a system checklist to see what was wrong and to determine how it was possible that 10 nuclear missiles could suddenly be deactivated.

"We were getting mostly guidance and control systems failure, and when I called the guard again, he told me the UFO just left and took off at high speed. So I ordered the guards to go out to the missile sites, and while they were out there, they saw the object again at one of the launch facilities.

"It scared them to death again, and they actually lost radio contact while they were near the object and then they returned to the base. I later learned they never returned to security guard duty."

Salas said it was extraordinary that they lost so many missiles at the same time. Isolated mishaps had made a single missile go "unlaunchable," but never 10 at once. And never 10 at once during a UFO sighting.

As a result of the incident, the missiles had to be fixed to get them all back into launch mode.
UFOs and Alien Encounters? (javascript:oKExp.pgPopUp('news-news_media_ufo_and_alien_encounters'))
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An unidentified flying object was photographed by a government employee over the Holloman Air Development Center in New Mexico in 1964. Photos like this one offer some of the most compelling evidence for those who believe that extraterrestrials have visited our planet.

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UFOs and Alien Encounters?
An unidentified flying object was photographed by a government employee over the Holloman Air Development Center in New Mexico in 1964. Photos like this one offer some of the most compelling evidence for those who believe that extraterrestrials have visited our planet.
Bettmann / Corbis
Bettmann / Corbis






Interesting aftermath to the story: Salas returned to the base and was ordered to report to his squadron commander where he also met with a member of the Air Force Office of Special Investigations, or AFOSI. Salas first asked if what they had just been through was some sort of Air Force exercise, and says he was told "absolutely not."

"After we told them our recollection of the incident, the AFOSI captain wanted us to sign papers, saying we'd never talk about this and swear we wouldn't even talk to our wives or any of the other airmen on the base -- nobody.

"I felt a little weird about this because all of us who were launch officers had above top-secret clearance, and I asked, 'If this is classified, what's it classified as?' And he said, 'Secret,' and I said, 'Well, we've got above top secret -- why do we have to sign anymore papers?' "

But further information was denied Salas and his men.

And what does he think would've happened to him had he gone to the press with the story?

"If I went public with this while still in the service, I would've been in Leavenworth [maximum security federal prison], breaking stones into little pebbles."

In 1969, the Air Force ended Project Blue Book, its official program that investigated UFOs. And in 1985, the following information was included in a fact sheet distributed by Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, and this remains the official attitude about UFOs:

(1) No UFO reported, investigated and evaluated by the Air Force has ever given any indication of threat to our national security; (2) There has been no evidence submitted to or discovered by the Air Force that sightings categorized as "unidentified" represent technological developments or principles beyond the range of present-day scientific knowledge; and (3) There has been no evidence indicating that sightings categorized as "unidentified" are extraterrestrial vehicles.
That being said, Salas and his colleagues maintain that if enough military eyewitnesses come forward, it can be proved that there's more to UFOs than officials have led the public to believe.

After the extraordinary events at Malmstrom Air Force base where it appears a UFO may have been responsible for shutting down 10 nuclear missiles, Salas wonders if the military has any legal authority to command its subordinates not to talk about something this significant -- something that he maintains represents a technology not known today.The UFO "had to somehow send a signal to penetrate 60 feet of earth and concrete and also to penetrate the cable system, which is triply shielded cables, and inject some kind of a signal into the system. That's fantastic."

So, why, after so many years of keeping quiet, are former military personnel coming forward to talk about their experiences, as Salas and his Air Force colleagues are doing on Monday? He says the people who will talk in Washington are "just the tip of the iceberg."

"I believe in the extraterrestrial hypothesis, and I think, in this instance, these objects were not constructed on planet Earth."

http://www.aolnews.com/weird-news/article/former-air-force-officers-ufos-tampered-with-nuclear-missiles/19647296

[Jolie Rouge]

UFOs in FBI’s Vault
By Mike Krumboltz – Mon Apr 11, 3:26 pm ET

The truth is out there. And by "truth," we mean a controversial (and official) 1950s FBI memo that alleges aliens did in fact land in New Mexico which has just been republished on the agency's website.

Not surprisingly, the news sparked a furious amount of activity on the web. Online lookups for "ufo fbi files" soared, as did related searches on "ufo pictures" and "ufo fbi coverup." But don't get too excited--this isn't the first time this controversial memo has circulated, and its claims are far from verified.

http://l.yimg.com/a/i/ww/news/2011/04/11/fbi_memo3.jpg

The memo was published on "The Vault," a newly launched FBI blog that showcases documents from the Bureau's past for history buffs to peruse. http://vault.fbi.gov/hottel_guy/Guy%20Hottel%20Part%201%20of%201/view It was written by Guy Hottel, the special agent in charge of the Washington field office in 1950, and was addressed to the director of the FBI, J. Edgar Hoover. The letter's content is amazing, as is the rather casual tone in which it's delivered.


An investigator for the Air Forces stated that three so-called flying saucers had been recovered in New Mexico. They were described as being circular in shape with raised centers, approximately 50 feet in diameter. Each one was occupied by three bodies of human shape but only 3 feet tall, dressed in metallic cloth a very fine texture.

Michael Luckman, director of the New York Center for Extraterrestrial Research, calls these documents a step toward full disclosure. But the story isn't nearly as good upon closer examination. The memo is a Bureau account of an informant, whose name has been blacked out, telling the agency about a UFO sighting. And Guy Hottel--who penned the memo--was the head of the Washington, D.C., not the New Mexico, field office. Whether or not that informant was telling the truth is something we'll probably never know. According to the Bureau, the tip was never followed up on.

CBS News points out that the memo is not exactly news. "The so-called 'Hottel memo'--which the agency never corroborated--has been publicly available for years." The Vault's re-posting of the famous document has put its claims back on the public's radar.

The International Business Times says the memo is but one piece of a larger alien hoax. It could be argued that, if their account is correct, that the real conspiracy may be in trying to convince people that there actually is a conspiracy.

Confirmed alien sightings isn't the only wild FBI conspiracy theory to be resurrected via the FBI's new blog. Files regarding Hitler's possible escape from Germany at the end of World War II were also posted on The Vault. According to the reports, various informants reported seeing the infamous Nazi all over the world in the years following his suicide.

Of course, those turned out to be not true.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_upshot/20110411/od_yblog_upshot/ufos-in-fbis-vault