Post by auntym on Dec 18, 2014 12:04:20 GMT -6
www.history.com/news/u-s-air-force-closes-the-book-on-ufos-45-years-ago
December 17, 2014
U.S. Air Force Closes the Book on UFOs, 45 Years Ago
By Evan Andrews
Credit: Lorenz and Avelar/Getty Images
In 1948, inspired by Cold War paranoia and dozens of public sightings, the U.S. government launched the first of several inquiries into so-called “Unidentified Flying Objects.” In what later became known as “Project Blue Book,” a team of U.S. Air Force analysts investigated 12,618 UFO close encounters, eventually debunking the lion’s share as misidentified aircraft or natural phenomena. The Air Force finally terminated the program 45 years ago after concluding that there was no evidence that UFOs were “extraterrestrial vehicles,” but to this day, 701 of Blue Book’s cases remained unexplained.
On the afternoon of June 24, 1947, amateur aviator Kenneth Arnold was flying near Mt. Rainier, Washington, when he suddenly spotted nine unusual objects on the horizon. Arnold claimed the craft flitted from side to side and flipped in unison like “the tail of a Chinese kite,” and he estimated they were moving at around 1,700 miles per hour—far faster than any known aircraft. He initially assumed the physics-defying objects must be secret military vehicles, but he later admitted the incident was “as much a mystery to me as it is to everybody else.” Arnold’s extraordinary story soon found its way into newspapers across the country, and reporters pounced on his description of the objects as moving “like a saucer if you skip it across water.” Within days, the term “flying saucer” was born.
Coupled with the famed July 1947 incident at Roswell, New Mexico, when the Air Force claimed a military weather balloon was mistaken for an alien spacecraft, Arnold’s encounter helped spark a wave of “flying saucer” sightings across the United States. The military brushed aside most of these “close encounters” as misidentifications or mere hokum, but a few reports came from air traffic controllers and commercial pilots—people trained to search the skies with a discerning eye. The hysteria also dovetailed with the beginning of the Cold War, leading many to speculate that the mysterious sightings might be hostile Soviet aircraft.
CONTINUE READING: www.history.com/news/u-s-air-force-closes-the-book-on-ufos-45-years-ago
December 17, 2014
U.S. Air Force Closes the Book on UFOs, 45 Years Ago
By Evan Andrews
Credit: Lorenz and Avelar/Getty Images
In 1948, inspired by Cold War paranoia and dozens of public sightings, the U.S. government launched the first of several inquiries into so-called “Unidentified Flying Objects.” In what later became known as “Project Blue Book,” a team of U.S. Air Force analysts investigated 12,618 UFO close encounters, eventually debunking the lion’s share as misidentified aircraft or natural phenomena. The Air Force finally terminated the program 45 years ago after concluding that there was no evidence that UFOs were “extraterrestrial vehicles,” but to this day, 701 of Blue Book’s cases remained unexplained.
On the afternoon of June 24, 1947, amateur aviator Kenneth Arnold was flying near Mt. Rainier, Washington, when he suddenly spotted nine unusual objects on the horizon. Arnold claimed the craft flitted from side to side and flipped in unison like “the tail of a Chinese kite,” and he estimated they were moving at around 1,700 miles per hour—far faster than any known aircraft. He initially assumed the physics-defying objects must be secret military vehicles, but he later admitted the incident was “as much a mystery to me as it is to everybody else.” Arnold’s extraordinary story soon found its way into newspapers across the country, and reporters pounced on his description of the objects as moving “like a saucer if you skip it across water.” Within days, the term “flying saucer” was born.
Coupled with the famed July 1947 incident at Roswell, New Mexico, when the Air Force claimed a military weather balloon was mistaken for an alien spacecraft, Arnold’s encounter helped spark a wave of “flying saucer” sightings across the United States. The military brushed aside most of these “close encounters” as misidentifications or mere hokum, but a few reports came from air traffic controllers and commercial pilots—people trained to search the skies with a discerning eye. The hysteria also dovetailed with the beginning of the Cold War, leading many to speculate that the mysterious sightings might be hostile Soviet aircraft.
CONTINUE READING: www.history.com/news/u-s-air-force-closes-the-book-on-ufos-45-years-ago