1953 Sweetwater, NV - 8th Air Rescue Squadron Flight # 3183 and Ten Elliptical Objects

The crew of a C-47 (Flight #3183 DVFR) from the 8th Air Rescue Squadron was returning from Long Beach, California to Stead AFB, Reno, Nevada when they had a curious encounter 12 April 1953.  Observers of the incident were: Major Fred G. Padeford; 2nd Lt. Frank E. White; 2nd Lt. John Gripe. The C-47 was flying 10,500 feet, 300 degree heading at 140 mph. Objects when first observed appeared to be over the Sweetwater Airport, a small facility lacking radio contact.  The time was 1510 Pacific time. The skies were mostly clear with some haze in the distance.

The pilot and crew observed nine to ten objects, flat, round, metal gray (although pilots written statement says they were dark and grew darker as they neared the plane), and elliptical in shape, in changing formation.  They were estimated to be about 15 feet in diameter. They came on a course of 110 degrees (ESE-WNW) at an estimated 7500 feet altitude and a speed of approximately 500 knots (around 576 mph).  They flew under the aircraft and the C-47 made a sharp and tight 300 degree turn to the right to get a better view. The pilot and crew saw the objects for approximately two minutes. Note, at all times these objects were below the C-47. 

See the map by the pilot from the Project Blue Book files. The sighting garnered a lot of attention - basically because of the credibility of the pilot - it was a military sighting after all - and the details of the encounter. 

Despite the fact that a check with air traffic control near Sweetwater and around the area that indicated there was no other craft in the skies - it had to be an aircraft. The conclusion on the form indicates it was a probable aircraft despite the lack of any other craft in the area. 

 

THE 'DEFENSE OF SILENCE": Balloons BEFORE Roswell

In 1994 the Air Force presented the first of a two-part debunking of what they termed the "Roswell Incident." They sought to mark "case closed" on the whole pesky situation. Prior to that point various online sites had highly academic and scientific discussions about the theory of a lost balloon. Once they had a name for a super-secret project (Mogul), it was clear how little of that projects records had been kept.  The Air Force called on an aging project manager (C.B. Moore) to recall details of test flights from 1947. 

Several websites in that time did collect and list the various test flights, providing the time frame of launches and weather, where and when found, etc. It was learned two flights were unaccounted for.  I recall seeing this in chart form on several sites in the 1994 to 2001 time period.  Now, post the "case closed" those charts and that data seem more difficult to locate. The consensus seems to be to accept the Air Force work on a "just because" basis. Instead of the data and research being made available to a wide variety of researchers - a defunct and no longer classified collection of facts - it was gathered by the Air Force, interpreted by the Air Force and disseminated by the Air Force (and the Government Printing Office for a time), 

In fact, the second volume that explains away the "aliens" aspect of the noted Roswell story, "The Roswell Report: Case Closed" (1997) cites itself as an authority (see page 1 , where the work "The Roswell Report: Facts & Fiction in the New Mexico Desert" (1995) is cited three times).

For those who feel the government played the populace they site the 1947 "weather balloon" story, the 1994, "Project Mogul" story, and then the '"Case closed."

Re-reading the July 9, 1947 news articles it is implied that weather balloons were both a common feature used but also one that most people did not know about. Even experienced, trained military types serving at sites where they went up several times a week.

So, I was curious, just how widely known was the whole concept of the "weather balloon" pre-Roswell?  Searching just one state I found newspaper article before Kenneth Arnold's sighting in June 1947 of people seeing weather balloons, finding weather balloons, and being able to read about their parts and pieces sitting in their living rooms at home! In fact, early accounts of weather balloons, many tethered in place, but still weather balloons with "equipment packages" could be found in papers from the 1930's.

In fact, around June 6, 1947,

there was story out of Chicago (NANA; news service) "U.S. Silence Broke Jap Balloon Bomb Dives, General Reveals." Brig. General, Ret. William H. Wilbur shared the story he had heard from the Japanese leader in charge of those bombs, Major General Kasaba. He sited the U.S. Navy finding balloon bombs as early as 1944 off the coast of California, of one landing in Wyoming, 

"We asked...papers and radio stations not to mention it and they agreed to co-operate...Sheriffs, local officials, forest rangers and troops knew about it, but were notified to keep it to themselves." The retired general credited the "defense of silence" to encouraging the Japanese that more bombs would not be productive since they were not hitting their targets or generating mass fear. (Oklahoma City Times, June 6, 1947).

Here we see a mention of a "cone of silence" approach to national security. If not the alleged "Operation Mockingbird" designed to manipulate news stories to cover true and or covert military actions, it is very close. 

Online copies at:

The Roswell Report: Fact vs Fiction in the New Mexico Desert (1995)

The Roswell Report: Case Closed (1997)

Memes of Merit

 

METAPHYSICAL E.T.'S

 This work, alleged to be a personal report and record of a telepathic interview with a fast learning and chatty alien from Roswell reveals a return to a theme found in many of the early "contactee" dialogues. 

The formula is always the same (1) A wiser, kinder, more knowledgeable alien with a yen to "share", add (2) A rambling, contradictory, and highly spiritualized or metaphysical viewpoint, include (3) science spoken of only in vague ways that blend machine with organic and a trans dimensional aspect, insert vast amounts of (4) expressed desires of the aliens to protect, guide or otherwise help their poor space kin.  Shake well and dispense to only a select few - the sacred 'mysterium' of the science and technological world: the secret made available to only the "chosen." Cults, groups, and followers collected around one figure or another.  Some tossed in the old spiritualism elements, any strangeness (ghosts and Bigfoot) became just another facet to an ever widening 'paranormal' umbrella. 

From George Adamski to Matilda O'Donnel MacElroy there is drama and invention to make fictional authors salivate.  The 1950's saw men and women taken aboard craft, touring around the planets and returned to earth with a message of peace, stop war, or save the planet. This continued, with some changes, into the 1960's. As the 1970's - feed by transcendentalism, metaphysics, drug enhanced spiritual explorations of the cosmos - everything tended to become a construct of the sub-conscious, a dip into the archetypal pool that fed a hundred mythic tales across the globe, and the crazy potential of parallel universes and other dimension portals.

Science was knocked aside in favor of these new possibilities. In many ways these new "groupies" did more to drive people away from a good scientific study of the topic than the ridicule of the 1950's did. Seeing a book exploring the "reality" that Bigfoot was an E.T. who kept company with the dead and played with the Loch Ness Monster while visiting the Reptilian congressman in Washington, a lot of people shook their heads, backed away and said, "No thanks!"

It was this Dr. Carl Sagan was talking about when he spoke about people who talked of "believing" about UFO's.  "Believing" is a faith-based

proclamation. Far better for people to say I believe that the evidence presented argues for the reality of this or that. 

See 1947 Roswell ALIEN INTERVIEW : Matilda O'Donnell MacElroy : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive

INTERESTING QUOTES : Government Lies

Frank Edwards in his book, Flying Saucers: Serious Business,  noted a statement made by Arthur Sylvester, then Assistant Secretary of Defense where he told newsmen that fabrication was okay if results were good. Edwards dates this comment as 29 Oct. 1962, just as the "Bay of Pigs" was coming to a close. The DOD had a program - plan B - Operation Mongoose that would utilize propaganda and "lies" to achieve a regime change desired by the CIA. 

At his death the Washington Post noted he believed it was alright for the government to lie and presented that as keeping things from an enemy. Given the time and the issue of UFO's one has to wonder what else was lied about under the guise of a "good result."

DELTA WINGED CRAFT: 1940 FORWARD

In April 1950 newspapers carried a news story stating that the "Navy is building advanced models of flying saucer type craft" and that these were "originally constructed and successfully flown by US engineers in 1942."  The source quoted went on to state, in reference to reports of "flying saucers" and "discs" that the physical descriptions of the Navy craft was "circular", diameter of about 105 1/2 feet, apparent "jet nozzles" along edge, could land at low speed (35 mph). The article was clear that the craft being seen and those on the drawing board were the property of the U.S. Nacy.

Since the first objects seen and named in the press as "flying saucers" were actually flying wedges or deltas that was the place to start. Had an early delta wing craft been mistaken by Arnold in 1947?

The first true delta wing airplane was conceptualized in the late 1930's.  A good working design apparently was the result of work by Northrup in 1940 with what was termed the N-1M. It was also called a "jeep" and featured a laminate over a wooden frame wing. The next incarnation was the X-9M that birthed the XB-25. 

1943 - Northrup brought out the XP-56 or "Black Bullet"

1948 - YB-49 (January) Northrup brought out the Radical flying wing bombers.

1949 - February the YB-47 was ordered by President Truman to fly over Washington D.C. on the way to Andrews AFB and come right down over Pennsylvania Avenue and the Capitol.

Other instances, as seen from these report sketches, were obviously experimental aircraft and rockets that got away (and there were a lot of those!).

The time period for this fights the adoption of bright strobe type lights and the colors could easily be standard and mandatory aircraft lights.

Flat trajectory, shape and actions all conform to this being a "MIS" guided rocket or missile lost during a test of practice. 

Shape confirms to this being a sighting of an early stealth type craft (the flying triangle with three lights, two at the front and one at the back have appeared early).

Again shape, actions and other elements all suggest a mis-guided test rocket or missile.

All actions, shape, event setting, the "friendly" markings noted on the underside of the wing, all suggest a top-secret experimental craft. 

In March of 1949, the UAF announced a highly radical delta-wing craft. 

("Answers still lacking, " El Reno, Oklahoma, April 1950). 

The truth is that some reports in Project Blue Book and elsewhere were experimental craft, weather balloons, and missiles that "got away."  All of which had to remain secret for one reason or another.  Yet, there are other reports of objects acting outside the norms of known flight at the time and remain unexplained, even when there are pages of supporting evidence. Project Blue Book focused on those cases, bragged with them to support the idea that everything was under control and no threats existed.

Despite the continued banging of that drum the topic and the sightings continued...and remain today.

PUSHING FOR PATRIOTIC SILENCE OR MANIPULATING THE NEWS?: THE ALLEGED OPERATION MOCKINGBIRD

One of the facts researchers run into while chasing down the printed facts about sightings and events is that the stories suddenly move from page one and serious consideration to a death amid the classifieds or  ridiculed.  Good stories, with strong witnesses, good evidence, and widespread interest are turned off leaving a gaping darkness.  Usually, preceding this is a Air Force announcement or a statement by some higher up that serves to minimize the reports or witnesses.

"Operation Mockingbird" was an alleged project that was believed to have been born in the 1940's, was whispered about in the 1960's and carried the strong manipulation of what went into print in order to achieve a government objective.

It is known through various documents, files, and experiences of newspapers and the government during World War Two that "patriotic censorship" was in play. Mail was censored, news reports were controlled, and workers were warned by posters about the result of "loose lips."  News reporters and editors were "leaned" on using patriotism to silence news when Japanese balloon bombs successfully made it all the way to North America. As a result, the death of people on a picnic was successfully hidden until post WW2.

When the "flying discs" show up in late 1946, and early 1947 a new era of patriotic censorship emerges. Stories of the "discs" and the "saucers" become a tug of war between freedom of the press and the obsessive secrecy demanded by military and politicians.  The fears of these men in military and political leadership were transferred to the American peoples so often by paternalistic leaders was merely a projection of their own deep seated terrors about who might gain and use the atomic weapons created, how far any fifth columnist communist plans might have inserted themselves into American life, and a host of other dreads.

So, perhaps there was no actual operation mockingbird, but the mindset was there. So, accusations that the CIA utilized a network of some 25 organizations and 400 journalists does not seem totally impossible. The agencies alleged included: ABC, NBC, CBS, Time, Newsweek, AP, UPI, Washington Post, Reuters, Hearts Newspapers, Scripss-Howard and Coply News Service.