10 UFO Investigators Who Died Mysteriously Under Suspicious Circumstances, Killed To Hide The Truth? and 1952 Washington, D.C. UFO incident

 

10 UFO Investigators Who Died Mysteriously Under Suspicious Circumstances, Killed To Hide The Truth?

Ansh Srivastava

February 11, 2022

There are many UFO-related conspiracies, but some of the most intriguing ones involve the UFO investigators who died mysteriously.

Table of Contents

• 10. Ron Rummel
• 9. Ron Johnson
• 8. John Murphy
• 7. Tony Dodd
• 6. John Mac
• 5. Ann Livingston
• 4. Jim Keith
• 3. James Forrestal
• 2. Morris K. Jessup
• 1. Phil Schneider

10. Ron Rummel

Ron Rummel worked as an Air Force intelligence agent. In the years leading up to his death, he was the publisher of the UFO journal Alien Digest. Some of the topics discussed in this magazine revolved around the idea that aliens have indeed been present on Earth for a long time. 

Rummel had received information from somewhere that these aliens had long-term plans to use humans as a source of food. 

Many in the UFO community dismissed such ideas as too fantastical, but shortly thereafter, in August 1993, Rummel died. His death looked like a clear suicide in which he shot himself in the mouth. 

However, doubts soon arose. Evidence included the absence of blood on the barrel of the gun and Rummel’s fingerprints on the handle. It was also revealed that the suicide note was written by a left-hander, while Rummel was right-handed. 

It looked like Rummel was silenced because he “got too close to the truth.”

9. Ron Johnson

Ron Johnson was one of the ufologists who worked for the MUFON organization, the main UFO community in the United States. In June 1994, he was at a MUFON meeting in Texas when he suddenly collapsed to the floor, dead. 

Officially, he was diagnosed with a stroke, but Johnson was only 43 years old, and shortly before that he underwent a complete medical examination, which did not reveal any problems with his vessels. 

For eyewitnesses, his death looked especially terrible, because before falling, Johnson screamed in pain, and then his face turned red and blood gushed from his nose. And some of these people later claimed that it didn’t look like a stroke at all, but rather was the result of poisoning. 

Moreover, there were eyewitnesses who saw that just before screaming and falling, Johnson took a sip from a can of soda, which was never found. These people wondered if something was smeared on the can or added to the drink itself that could have caused such a reaction.

8. John Murphy

John Murphy was not a direct UFO researcher, but a radio journalist who just happened to be in Kecksburg at the right time in December 1965, when the famous incident occurred with a likely UFO crash in these places.

Murphy was lucky enough to interview many locals in hot pursuit and take photographs of the alleged UFO crash site. Alas, this evidence was eventually confiscated from him by high-ranking government officials.

A few years later in California, in February 1969, Murphy died in a tragic car accident and rumors soon began to circulate that the car accident was deliberate.

7. Tony Dodd

In the 1990s and early 2000s, Tony Dodd was one of the leading British ufologists. The fact that he had a long career as a police detective under his belt only made him much more reliable regarding the incidents he investigated.

He has been a regular speaker at various UFO events and has investigated some of the UK’s most intriguing UFO sightings and apparent alien abductions from the late 1980s to the early 2000s.

Dodd died in 2009 from a brain tumor. Considering that he, according to his own records, received repeated warnings to avoid certain countries due to possible attempts on his life, as well as direct warnings from a mysterious agent in the United States, many wondered if the tumor was somehow “provoked “. dark agency agents with advanced technology. 

By the way, Dodd himself also repeatedly expressed such assumptions until his death.

6. John Mac

John Mack was killed by a drunk driver in London in 2004 and his death is still considered highly suspicious.

Mack was a Harvard University professor who once became fascinated with UFOs and began to study cases of alien abductions. In the UK, many consider him one of the first “academicians”. serious about ufology.

According to friends of Mack and his associates, the very idea that such an outstanding person suddenly became a victim of a completely random and sudden collision with drunk drivers, who not only knocked him down, but took his life, looks unlikely, and they are sure that all this was not only a tragic accident.

5. Ann Livingston

UFO researcher and MUFON member Ann Livingston died in 1994 from a fast-acting and very aggressive form of ovarian cancer. However, many of her MUFON colleagues and close friends began to wonder if her multiple UFO sightings and subsequent encounters with the Men in Black could have been related to her tragic death.

In December 1992, her apartment near O’Hare Airport in Chicago was suddenly lit up by a silver-white flash. Then, just a few hours later, several faceless entities, much like the Men in Black, arrived at her apartment. 

Moments after seeing them, Ann passed out and she doesn’t know what happened next. When she woke up, there were no Men in Black around and she looked unharmed. However, she soon developed health problems and was diagnosed with cancer.

4. Jim Keith

The death of explorer and writer Jim Keith could very well be the result of a series of coincidences, but they seemed rather strange. 

Keith’s first activity was to study the work of Danny Casolaro (an investigative journalist whose death was also suspicious). In his book, The Octopus claimed that Casolaro’s claims about the existence of the Octopus group were real. This shadow group allegedly controls many world events. 

Keith, based on Casolaro’s notes, said that some government forces are testing Americans, dragging them to the Dulce underground base in New Mexico under the guise of being abducted by aliens and pumping them with new drugs. 

In 2004, Keith arrived at the festival and fell off the stage, breaking his tibia and requiring emergency surgery. He safely survived the operation but died soon after without regaining consciousness. His official cause of death is a blood clot in his lung. 

3. James Forrestal

Next, on our list of UFO investigators who died mysteriously is James Forrestal.

On the night of May 22, 1949, James Forrestal, the very first United States Secretary of Defense to retire a few months before that date, jumped off the 13th floor of the Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland. 

At the time of his death, he was being treated for depression at this facility, but for some, including members of his own family, his death was far from an outright suicide. 

According to the official version of events, Forrestal was last seen being checked by a security guard at 1:45 a.m. He read in his room. Forrestal is then said to have immediately left the room and made his way to the kitchen, where he tied a robe rope to a nearby radiator and the other end around his neck. Then he jumped out of the window. The rope broke and he fell to his death.

However, something caught the eye of those who read this official version. First, the rope around his neck was not long enough for him to reach the battery window. Moreover, there was no evidence that the rope had ever come into contact with the radiator battery.

Even more suspicious was the guard on duty that evening. It was not at the facility before and was delivered as a last-minute replacement. He testified – as the last person who saw Forrestal alive, and then disappeared somewhere, no one knows where.

The most disturbing evidence, however, was scratches found on the windowsill from which Forrestal is said to have voluntarily jumped. This suggested that Forrestal had been forcibly thrown out of a window and then frantically tried to hook onto the ledge with his fingers before finally falling.

As for the UFO connection, some have argued that, as US Secretary of Defense, Forrestal knew a lot about UFO incidents and may have been unhappy with the fact that they were covered up, or perhaps even wanted to make them public.

By the way, in the USSR, it was believed that Forrestal had gone crazy, unable to withstand the political hysteria due to the alleged threat of the “Soviet” invasion of the United States, and therefore jumped out of the window. 

2. Morris K. Jessup

Next, on our list of UFO investigators who died mysteriously is Morris K. Jessup.

One of the first American UFO researchers was Morris K. Jessup, author of the 1955 book The Case for UFOs. Little did Jessup know that the release of this book would set off a series of events that would lead to his tragic death. 

Jessup first began receiving letters from a mysterious gentleman named Carl Allen, who also claimed to be involved in the legendary Philadelphia Experiment. 

This correspondence came to the attention of the US Navy, who questioned Jessup at length about this and his UFO research in general. After this meeting, Jessup began to receive strange phone calls. This caused him to be much more careful in his research. 

Then, on April 19, he arranged to meet with one Dr. J. Manson Valentine the next day about his “breakthrough in the investigation.” But Jessup never showed up for that meeting. The next day, he was found dead in his car, with a hose leading to the exhaust pipe coming out of the window. 

Some believe that the suicide was actually a murder. Perhaps one reason for suspicion was the soaked towels wrapped around the hose. Not only did they not belong to Jessup, but there was no source of water nearby in which to soak them.

1. Phil Schneider

The final and most controversial person on our list of UFO investigators who died mysteriously is Phil Schneider.

In the early 1990s, Phil Schneider began a series of public lectures in which he claimed to have worked for the US government at various underground facilities. And it was during this work that he witnessed a real battle between underground aliens and employees of a military underground base near Dulce in New Mexico. 

He also claimed to have been injured during this battle by an alien weapon, scars which he publicly showed on several occasions.

As you can imagine, many have ridiculed Schneider’s claims, including even some in the UFO community. Others, however, completely believed what he was saying. Videos of his performances still attract a lot of attention on the Internet. 

Schneider officially committed suicide on January 17, 1996. His body was found with a piece of flexible wire wrapped several times around his neck in a clear indication of suicide. But many people, including some members of his family, dismissed the suicide claims. 

1952 Washington, D.C. UFO incident

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Washington National Airport terminal in 1944

UFOs and ufology
Notable sightings
Kenneth Arnold sighting 1947 wave Roswell Mantell crash Chiles-Whitted Gorman dogfight McMinnville photos Mariana film 1952 flap Sightings in outer space Flatwoods monster Barney and Betty Hill Travis Walton Rendlesham Forest Belgian wave Ariel School Landing Phoenix Lights Pentagon UFO videos
Government investigations
Operação Prato - Brazil Project Magnet - Canada GEIPAN - France Institute 22 - Soviet Union Flying Saucer Working Party - UK Project Condign - UK History of government investigations - US All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office - US NASA's UAP independent study team - US Condon Committee - US Project Blue Book - US Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena Disclosure Act - US
Other Relevant Topics
Area 51 Bob Lazar Majestic 12 Men in black Evidence Suppression
Religions that have UFOs in their Literature
Aetherius Society Church of the SubGenius Heaven's Gate Nation of Islam Raëlism Scientology Unarius Academy of Science
Lists of organizations, sightings, studies, etc.
UFO organizations Reported UFO sightings Sightings by country Investigations of UFOs by governments Identification studies of UFOs Ufologists Alleged extraterrestrial beings
v t e

From July 12 to 29, 1952, a series of unidentified flying object (UFO) sightings were reported in Washington, D.C., and later became known as the Washington flap, the Washington National Airport Sightings, or the Invasion of Washington.^[1] The most publicized sightings took place on consecutive weekends, July 19–20 and July 26–27. UFO historian Curtis Peebles called the incident "the climax of the 1952 (UFO) flap"—"Never before or after did Project Blue Book and the Air Force undergo such a tidal wave of (UFO) reports."^[2]

1952 UFO flap

[edit]

Reports peaked in late July.

The 1952 UFO flap was an unprecedented rash of media attention to unidentified flying object reports during the summer of 1952 that culminated with reports of sightings over Washington, D.C.^[3][4][5] In the four years prior, the US Air Force had chronicled a total of 615 UFO reports; during the 1952 flap, they received over 717 new reports.^[6] Project Blue Book director Edward J. Ruppelt later recalled: "During a six-month period in 1952... 148 of the nation's leading newspapers carried a total of over 16,000 items about flying saucers."^[7]

On May 12, an explosion in Seattle led to public speculation of a 'flying saucer'.^[8]

On April 3, the Associated Press reported on an upcoming story in Life magazine that would reveal the Air Force was taking a serious interest in flying saucers.^[9] The June edition of Look magazine featured a story where astrophysicist Donald Howard Menzel proposed flying saucers were optical mirages created by temperature inversions.^[10][11] American papers covered similar statements from French astronomer Ernest Esclangon who debunked the "flying saucer reports" by explaining they could not be supersonic craft because no sonic booms were reported.^[12]

On April 7, Life magazine, featuring Marilyn Monroe on its cover,^[13] published the Flying Saucer article under the title "Have We Visitors From Space?", becoming the most reputable outlet to seriously consider the possibility that flying saucer reports might be caused by extra-terrestrial spaceships.^[14][15] Publicity surrounding the piece is believed to have contributed to the subsequent wave of reports that summer.^[16][17]

In his book, Ruppelt argued "If you can pin down a date that the Big Flap started, it would probably be about June 1." That day, a UFO report was filed by Hughes Aircraft Company in Los Angeles.^[6] On July 1, two F-94s scrambled to intercept a UFO over Boston.^[18] On July 14, the Nash-Fortenberry UFO sighting was reported over Chesapeake Bay, when two commercial pilots (William B. Nash and William H. Fortenberry) claimed to have seen eight UFOs flying in a tight echelon formation.

Sightings over Washington, D.C.

[edit]

At the height of the UFO flap, there were UFOs reported at the nation's capital on two consecutive Saturday nights.

Night of July 19

[edit]

At 11:40 p.m. on Saturday, July 19, 1952, Edward Nugent, an air traffic controller at Washington National Airport, spotted seven objects on his radar.^[19] The objects were located 15 miles (24 km) south-southwest of the city; no known aircraft were in the area, and the objects were not following any established flight paths. Nugent's superior, Harry Barnes, a senior air-traffic controller at the airport, watched the objects on Nugent's radarscope. He later wrote: "We knew immediately that a very strange situation existed ... their movements were completely radical compared to those of ordinary aircraft."^[20]

Barnes had two controllers check Nugent's radar; they found that it was working normally. Barnes then called National Airport's radar-equipped control tower; the controllers there, Howard Cocklin and Joe Zacko, said that they also had unidentified blips on their radar screen, and saw a hovering "bright light" in the sky, which departed with incredible speed.^[19] Cocklin asked Zacko, "Did you see that? What the hell was that?"^[19]

At this point, other objects appeared in all sectors of the radarscope; when they moved over the White House and the United States Capitol, Barnes called Andrews Air Force Base, located 10 miles from National Airport. Although Andrews reported that they had no unusual objects on their radar, an airman soon called the base's control tower to report the sighting of a strange object. Airman William Brady, who was in the tower, then saw an "object which appeared to be like an orange ball of fire, trailing a tail ... [it was] unlike anything I had ever seen before."^[19][21] As Brady tried to alert the other personnel in the tower, the strange object "took off at an unbelievable speed.^[21]

On one of National Airport's runways, S.C. Pierman, a Capital Airlines pilot, was waiting in the cockpit of his DC-4 for permission to take off. After spotting what he believed to be a meteor, he was told that the control tower's radar had detected unknown objects closing in on his position. Pierman observed six objects—"white, tailless, fast-moving lights"—over a 14-minute period.^[22][19] Pierman was in radio contact with Barnes during his sighting, and Barnes later related that "each sighting coincided with a pip we could see near his plane. When he reported that the light streaked off at a high speed, it disappeared on our scope."^[23]

Meanwhile, at Andrews Air Force Base, the control tower personnel were tracking on radar what some thought to be unknown objects, but others suspected, and in one instance were able to prove, were simply stars and meteors.^[24] However, Staff Sgt. Charles Davenport observed an orange-red light to the south; the light "would appear to stand still, then make an abrupt change in direction and altitude ... this happened several times."^[23] At one point both radar centers at National Airport and the radar at Andrews Air Force Base were tracking an object hovering over a radio beacon. The object vanished in all three radar centers at the same time.^[25]

At 3 a.m., shortly before two United States Air Force F-94 Starfire jet fighters from New Castle Air Force Base in Delaware arrived over Washington, all of the objects vanished from the radar at National Airport. However, when the jets ran low on fuel and left, the objects returned, which convinced Barnes that "the UFOs were monitoring radio traffic and behaving accordingly".^[23] The objects were last detected by radar at 5:30 a.m.

Publicity and Air Force reaction

[edit]

The sightings of July 19–20, 1952, made front-page headlines in newspapers around the nation. A typical example was the headline from the Cedar Rapids Gazette in Iowa. It read "SAUCERS SWARM OVER CAPITAL" in large black type.^[26] By coincidence, USAF Captain Edward J. Ruppelt, the supervisor of the Air Force's Project Blue Book investigation into UFO sightings, was in Washington at the time. However, he did not learn about the sightings until Monday, July 21, when he read the headlines in a Washington-area newspaper.^[27] After talking with intelligence officers at the Pentagon about the sightings, Ruppelt spent several hours trying to obtain a staff car so he could travel around Washington to investigate the sightings, but was refused as only generals and senior colonels could use staff cars. He was told that he could rent a taxicab with his own money; by this point Ruppelt was so frustrated that he left Washington and flew back to Blue Book's headquarters at Wright-Patterson AFB in Dayton, Ohio.^[28] Upon returning to Dayton, Ruppelt spoke with an Air Force radar specialist, Captain Roy James, who felt that unusual weather conditions could have caused the unknown radar targets.^[29] On July 24, two Air Force colonels took off from Hamilton Air Force Base bound for Colorado Springs; they reported witnessing unidentified triangular objects. ^[30]

Night of July 26

[edit]

At 8:15 p.m. on Saturday, July 26, 1952, a pilot and stewardess on a National Airlines flight into Washington observed some lights above their plane. Within minutes, both radar centers at National Airport, and the radar at Andrews AFB, were tracking more unknown objects.^[31] USAF master sergeant Charles E. Cummings visually observed the objects at Andrews, he later said that "these lights did not have the characteristics of shooting stars. There was [sic] no trails ... they traveled faster than any shooting star I have ever seen."^[23]

Meanwhile, Albert M. Chop, the press spokesman for Project Blue Book, arrived at National Airport and, due to security concerns, denied several reporters' requests to photograph the radar screens. He then joined the radar center personnel.^[32] By this time (9:30 p.m.) the radar center was detecting unknown objects in every sector. At times the objects traveled slowly; at other times they reversed direction and moved across the radarscope at speeds calculated at up to 7,000 mph (11,250 km/h).^[33] At 11:30 p.m., two U.S. Air Force F-94 Starfire jet fighters from New Castle Air Force Base in Delaware arrived over Washington. Captain John McHugo, the flight leader, was vectored towards the radar blips but saw nothing, despite repeated attempts.^[34] However, his wingman, Lieutenant William Patterson, did see four white "glows" and chased them.^[35][19] He told investigators that "I tried to make contact with the bogies below 1,000 feet," and that "I was at my maximum speed but...I ceased chasing them because I saw no chance of overtaking them."^[19] According to Albert Chop, when ground control asked Patterson "if he saw anything", Patterson replied "'I see them now and they're all around me. What should I do?'...And nobody answered, because we didn't know what to tell him."^[23]

After midnight on July 27, USAF Major Dewey Fournet, Project Blue Book's liaison at the Pentagon, and Lt. John Holcomb, a United States Navy radar specialist, arrived at the radar center at National Airport.^[19] During the night, Lieutenant Holcomb received a call from the Washington National Weather Station. They told him that a slight temperature inversion was present over the city, but Holcomb felt that the inversion was not "nearly strong enough to explain the 'good and solid' returns" on the radar scopes.^[34] Fournet relayed that all those present in the radar room were convinced that the targets were most likely caused by solid metallic objects. There had been weather targets on the scope too, he said, but this was a common occurrence and the controllers "were paying no attention to them".^[36] Two more F-94s from New Castle Air Force Base were scrambled during the night. One pilot saw nothing unusual; the other pilot saw a white light which "vanished" when he moved towards it.^[29] Civilian aircraft also reported glowing objects that corresponded to radar blips seen by Andrews radar operators.^[19] As on July 20, the sightings and unknown radar returns ended at sunrise.^[37]

Aftermath

[edit]

On August 19, West Palm Beach scoutmaster Sonny DesVergers reported being burned by a flying disc.^[38][39]

Air Force explanation

[edit]

Duration: 5 minutes and 1 second.5:01Subtitles available.CC

Maj. Gen. John A. Samford's Statement on Flying Saucers

Air Force Major Generals John Samford, USAF Director of Intelligence, and Roger M. Ramey, USAF Director of Operations, held a well-attended press conference at the Pentagon on July 29, 1952. In his opening comments, he noted that, out of the hundreds of UFO reports in recent years investigated by the Air Force, there was "a certain percentage of this volume of reports that have been made by credible observers of relatively incredible things" but that none of them posed any national security threat.^[40] At the event, Samford stated that the visual sightings over Washington could be explained as misidentified aerial phenomena such as stars or meteors, and unknown radar targets could be explained by temperature inversion, which was present in the air over Washington on both nights the radar returns were reported. In addition, Samford stated that the unknown radar contacts were not caused by solid material objects, and therefore posed no threat to national security. In response to a question as to whether the Air Force had recorded similar UFO radar contacts prior to the Washington incident, Samford said that there had been "hundreds" of such contacts where Air Force fighter interceptions had taken place, but stated that they were all "fruitless".^[41] It was the largest Pentagon press conference since World War II.^[42] Press stories called Samford and Ramey the Air Force's two top UFO experts.^[43]

Among the witnesses who supported Samford's explanation was the crew of a B-25 bomber, which had been flying over Washington during the sightings of July 26–27. The bomber was vectored several times by National Airport over unknown targets on the airport's radarscopes, yet the crew could see nothing unusual. Finally, as a crew member related, "the radar had a target which turned out to be the Wilson Lines steamboat trip to Mount Vernon... the radar was sure as hell picking up the steamboat."^[44] Air Force Captain Harold May was in the radar center at Andrews AFB during the sightings of July 19–20. Upon hearing that National Airport's radar had picked up an unknown object heading in his direction, May stepped outside and saw "a light that was changing from red to orange to green to red again...at times it dipped suddenly and appeared to lose altitude." However, May eventually concluded that he was simply seeing a star that was distorted by the atmosphere, and that its "movement" was an illusion.^[45] At 3 a.m. on July 27, an Eastern Airlines flight over Washington was told that an unknown object was in its vicinity; the crew could see nothing unusual. When they were told that the object had moved directly behind their plane, they began a sharp turn to try to see the object, but were told by National Airport's radar center that the object had "disappeared" when they began their turn.

At the request of the Air Force, the CAA's Technical Development and Evaluation Center did an analysis of the radar sightings. Their conclusion was that "a temperature inversion had been indicated in almost every instance when the unidentified radar targets or visual objects had been reported."^[46] Project Blue Book would eventually label the unknown Washington radar blips as false images caused by temperature inversion, and the visual sightings as misidentified meteors, stars, and city lights.^[47] In later years two prominent UFO skeptics, Donald Menzel, an astronomer at Harvard University, and Philip Klass, a senior editor for Aviation Week magazine, would also argue in favor of the temperature inversion/mirage hypothesis.^[48] In 2002 Klass told a reporter that "radar technology in 1952 wasn't sophisticated enough to filter out many ordinary objects, such as flocks of birds, weather balloons, or temperature inversions."^[23] The reporter added that "UFO proponents argue that even then seasoned controllers could differentiate between spurious targets and solid, metallic objects. Klass disagrees. It may be that 'we had two dumb controllers at National Airport on those nights'...[Klass] added that the introduction of digital filters in the 1970s led to a steep decline in UFO sightings on radar."^[23]

Criticisms

[edit]

In his book, The Report On Unidentified Flying Objects, author Edward J. Ruppelt wrote that radar and control tower personnel he spoke to, as well as some Air Force officers, disagreed with the Air Force's explanation.^[44]

Michael Wertheimer, a researcher for the government-funded Condon Report, investigated the case in 1966, and stated that radar witnesses still disputed the Air Force explanation.^[49]

Former radar controller Howard Cocklin told the Washington Post in 2002 that he was still convinced that he saw an object, stating that "I saw it on the [radar] screen and out the window" over Washington National Airport."^[19]

White House concern and CIA interest

[edit]

The sightings of July 26–27 also made front-page headlines, and led President Harry Truman to have his air force aide call Ruppelt and ask for an explanation of the sightings and unknown radar returns. Truman listened to the conversation between the two men on a separate phone, but did not ask questions himself.^[50] Ruppelt, remembering the conversation he had with Captain James, told the president's assistant that the sightings might have been caused by a temperature inversion, in which a layer of warm, moist air covers a layer of cool, dry air closer to the ground. This condition can cause radar signals to bend and give false returns. However, Ruppelt had not yet interviewed any of the witnesses or conducted a formal investigation.^[26]

CIA historian Gerald Haines, in his 1997 history of the CIA's involvement with UFOs, also mentions Truman's concern. "A massive buildup of sightings over the United States in 1952, especially in July, alarmed the Truman administration. On 19 and 20 July, radar scopes at Washington National Airport and Andrews Air Force Base tracked mysterious blips. On 27 July, the blips reappeared."^[51] The CIA would react to the 1952 wave of UFO reports by "forming a special study group within the Office of Scientific Intelligence (OSI) and Office of Current Intelligence (OCI) to review the situation. Edward Tauss reported for the group that most UFO sightings could be easily explained. Nonetheless, he recommended that the Agency continue monitoring the problem."^[51] The CIA's concern with the issue would lead to the creation, in January 1953, of the Robertson Panel.^[51]

The Robertson Panel

[edit]

The extremely high numbers of UFO reports in 1952 disturbed both the Air Force and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Both groups felt that an enemy nation could deliberately flood the U.S. with false UFO reports, causing mass panic and allowing them to launch a sneak attack. On September 24, 1952, the CIA's Office of Scientific Intelligence (OSI) sent a memorandum to Walter B. Smith, the CIA's Director. The memo stated that "the flying saucer situation ... [has] national security implications ... [in] the public concern with the phenomena ... lies the potential for the touching-off of mass hysteria and panic."^[47] The result of this memorandum was the creation in January 1953 of the Robertson Panel. Howard P. Robertson, a physicist, chaired the panel, which consisted of prominent scientists and which spent four days examining the "best" UFO cases collected by Project Blue Book. The panel dismissed nearly all of the UFO cases it examined as not representing anything unusual or threatening to national security. In the panel's controversial estimate, the Air Force and Project Blue Book needed to spend less time analyzing and studying UFO reports and more time publicly debunking them. The panel recommended that the Air Force and Project Blue Book should take steps to "strip the Unidentified Flying Objects of the special status they have been given and the aura of mystery they have unfortunately acquired."^[52] Following the panel's recommendation, Project Blue Book would rarely publicize any UFO case that it had not labeled as "solved"; unsolved cases were rarely mentioned by the Air Force.

In popular culture

[edit]

• The tenth and final episode of the first season of the 2019 History Channel television series Project Blue Book is titled "The Washington Merry-Go-Round". It's based on the 1952 Washington, DC UFO incident.^[53]

• Several episodes of the 2021 Netflix series Top Secret UFO Projects Declassified refer to the 1952 Washington, DC UFO incident, including the first episode "Project Blue Book Unknown", which reenacts the incident with CGI and plays archival footage with several former witnesses.^[54]

References

[edit]

Notes

[edit]

1. ^ Peebles 1994, p. 73.
2. ^ Peebles 1994, p. 78.
3. ^ Ruppelt ch 11 "The Big Flap"
4. ^ Peebles, Ch5 "The 1952 Flap"
5. ^ Zempter, Glenda S. (1993). "New York Times Coverage of the 1952 UFO Scare".
6. ^ Jump up to:^a b Ruppelt 1955, p. 141
7. ^ Ruppelt, Edward J. (May 28, 2022). "The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects".
8. ^ "Seattle Talks Saucers After Jolting Sky Blast". The Atlanta Journal. May 12, 1952. p. 2. Retrieved November 24, 2024 – via Newspapers.com.
9. ^ ""Flying Saucer" Interest Grows". The Spokesman-Review. Associated Press. April 4, 1952. p. 27. Retrieved November 24, 2024 – via Newspapers.com.
10. ^ "Flying Saucers Called Mirages". Green Bay Press-Gazette. June 2, 1952. p. 6. Retrieved November 24, 2024 – via Newspapers.com.
11. ^ Ruppelt 1955, p. 109
12. ^ "French Scientist Denies Flying Saucer Existence". The Arizona Republic. June 5, 1952. p. 16. Retrieved November 24, 2024 – via Newspapers.com.
13. ^ "50 years ago, UFOs buzzed the nations capitol". The Courier. Waterloo, Iowa. July 26, 2002. p. 8. Retrieved November 24, 2024 – via Newspapers.com.
14. ^ Ruppelt, p. 131-132, "Other very reputable magazines, such as True, had said it before, but coming from Life, it was different"
15. ^ "Dispute On "Lubbock Lights" Revived". Lubbock Evening Journal. June 11, 1952. p. 24. Retrieved November 24, 2024 – via Newspapers.com.
16. ^ Lang, Daniel (March 15, 1954). "The Man in the Thick Lead Suit". Oxford University Press. p. 49 – via Google Books.
17. ^ Mazur, Allan (July 5, 2017). Implausible Beliefs: In the Bible, Astrology, and UFOs. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-351-51322-7 – via Google Books.
18. ^ Ruppelt 1955, p. 150
19. ^ Jump up to:^{a b c d e f g h i j} Carlson, Peter; Carlson, Peter (21 July 2002). "50 Years Ago, Unidentified Flying Objects From Way Beyond the Beltway Seized the Capital's Imagination". The Washington Post.
20. ^ Clark 1998, p. 653.
21. ^ Jump up to:^a b Clark 1998, p. 654.
22. ^ Clark 1998, p. 655.
23. ^ Jump up to:^{a b c d e f g} Gilgoff, Dan (December 14, 2001). "Saucers Full of Secrets". Washington City Paper. Retrieved January 23, 2024.
24. ^ Peebles 1994, p. 74.
25. ^ Ruppelt 1955, p. 160.
26. ^ Jump up to:^a b Michaels 1997, p. 22.
27. ^ Ruppelt 1955, p. 210.
28. ^ Ruppelt 1955, p. 162.
29. ^ Jump up to:^a b Ruppelt 1955, p. 163.
30. ^ Ruppelt 1955, p. 10.
31. ^ Peebles 1994, pp. 75–76.
32. ^ Ruppelt 1955, p. 164.
33. ^ Ruppelt 1955, p. 159.
34. ^ Jump up to:^a b Peebles 1994, p. 76.
35. ^ Clark 1998, p. 659.
36. ^ Ruppelt 1955, p. 166.
37. ^ Ruppelt 1955, p. 165.
38. ^ "Article clipped from The Miami News". Newspapers.com. August 25, 1952. Retrieved November 22, 2024.
39. ^ Ruppelt 1955, p. 176-186.
40. ^ Lewis-Kraus, Gideon (April 30, 2021). "How the Pentagon Started Taking U.F.O.s Seriously". The New Yorker magazine. Archived from the original on June 23, 2023.
41. ^ "Page 2 Project Blue Book - UFO Investigations - Fold3". Minutes of Press Conference Held By Major General John A. Samford Director of Intelligence, U.S. air Force 29 July 1952 - 4:00p.m. - Room 3E-869, The Pentagon.
42. ^ Peebles 1994, p. 80.
43. ^ "Los Angeles Times: Archives - U.S. SAUCER HUNTER DOUBTS THEY EXIST" . pqasb.pqarchiver.com.
44. ^ Jump up to:^a b Ruppelt 1955, p. 170.
45. ^ Peebles 1994, p. 62.
46. ^ Peebles 1994, p. 66.
47. ^ Jump up to:^a b Peebles 1994, p. 79.
48. ^ Peebles 1994, p. 360.
49. ^ "Condon Report, Sec III, Chapter 5: Optical & Radar Analysis". files.ncas.org.
50. ^ Peebles 1994, p. 77.
51. ^ Jump up to:^a b c "CIA's Role in the Study of UFOs, 1947-90 — Central Intelligence Agency". www.cia.gov. Archived from the original on October 1, 2019. Retrieved July 9, 2019.
52. ^ Peebles 1994, p. 102.
53. ^ "Project Blue Book | TV Guide". TVGuide.com. Retrieved July 9, 2019.
54. ^ "Project Blue Book Unknown". Top Secret UFO Projects Declassified. Season 1. Episode 1. 2021. Netflix.

Sources

[edit]

• Clark, Jerome (1998). The UFO Book: Encyclopedia of the Extraterrestrial. Visible Ink. ISBN 1-57859-029-9.
• Michaels, Susan (1997). Sightings: UFOs. Simon and Schuster. ISBN 0-684-83630-0.
• Peebles, Curtis (1994). Watch the Skies!: A Chronicle of the Flying Saucer Myth. Berkley Books. ISBN 0-425-15117-4.
• Randle, Kevin D. (2001). Invasion Washington: UFOs Over the Capitol. HarperTorch. ISBN 0-380-81470-6.
• Ruppelt, Edward J. (1955). The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects.

External links

[edit]

• CIA's Role in the Study of UFOs, 1947-90 — Central Intelligence Agency Archived 2019-10-01 at the Wayback Machine 1997 Gerald Haines article on the CIA's involvement with the UFO phenomenon.
• Minutes of Press Conference Held By Major General John A. Samford Director of Intelligence, U.S. air Force 29 July 1952 - 4:00p.m. - Room 3E-869, The Pentagon.
• General Samford Meets The Press at Saturday Night Uforia
• "The flying saucers are real" - open source 1950 novel by Donald Keyhoe on www.sacred-texts.com
• Flying Saucers Over the Capitol and White House - Ghosts of DC history blog

Charles Wharry(Darkbird18);

Over the past 50 years, UFO events have changed the world forever! The people who report on them have a very special for us who want information about UFOs/UAPs for some reason mysteriously disappearing and the authorities can not find a clue on what's happening to these people?? The government and the power elites want to keep control of all information to keep us under control; why?