◆ SpookStack

aero e * athe cl es . * e © of the 11,000 sichtings since M7, did have some ez- planations. The mysterious flaming object in the East was “probably a meteor,” As for'Michigan's muc h- publiedzed and plentiful unidentified firing objects, they turned out to be monkeyshines Instead of mocuships: “Unidentified college bore” plaving pranks with flares to frishten the Girls in the dormitcries, came the august report from a distinguished astronomer ertled in by the Air Force to investigale Ure Hillsdale af-_ fair. Every ceport of a “fiying saucer” had ostensibly been ehecked out by the Air Force's special squad known as “Project Blue Book,”’ al- though the staff was woefully small, Of the 10,147 sightings gince 3187, the Air Force insisted that only 6&6 remain uuexplained — and mest of these because of insufficient information. The others have been attributed te planes, balloons, astronomical causes. missiles. swamp gas. FAESEOT S, UFOWGAS anu, af some cases, to hallucinations and psychological reasons. Ball Lightning? Philip Klass,. avionics edi- tor of Aviation Week & Space Technology magazine, recently proposed some other explanations. Klass, an electronics engineer, said & forma of “bail lightning,”’ gen- eraied by high tension power lines, could explain the phe- pomena. . . Many of the sightings, said “Klass, occurred along or very neat high-tension lines where Juminous balls of ionized air could be generated under * ecrtain conditions. 2 § * No Three?’ The main conclusions reached by the Air Force were: * “No unidentified Giving objects reported, Investigat- ed end evaluated by the Air - Force have ever given any in- dicalion of a threat to our national séecurity.”” * “There has been no ev- “Wence submitied to or discov- ered by the Air Force that sightings represent tec ba o- ‘lorical developments or prin- ciples beyond the range of present day sclentific knowl . edge.” * ® “There has been no evi- dence dhet sightings catego- Yized as unidentificd are ex- » traterrestrial vehicles.” Major Donald Keyhoe, - however, was unconvinced. Major Key hoe, USMC (re tired), director of the Nation- #1 Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena (Ni- CAP), a privale space watch- ing ergonization, accused the Air Force of conducting e long-term whitewash on the ” UFO question. It was Reyhoe's theory that the Air Force was. with- holding information. for fear ef causing public panic. UFOs, insisted the Major, who bad never seen one, were of extraterrestrial origin an= the Air Force feared that the Ae —_ )j =a . aed public could not accept this knowledge. “They won't give * elaim a powerful ally in you details,” he complained. “If they did, many of their explanations would fall flat.” And Keyhoe could also rod Nichigan's Gerald Ford. the House Republican leader, who sugzesied it would be “a very wholesome thing” for Congress to look into uniden- tified flying objects. Such an investigation. Ford suggest- ed. would make the Ameri exun people ‘feel better.” ~ Stndy in Depth Whether or not that was #0, the Air Force last week tock definite steps to make itself. fee) better. Fed up with in vestigating reports of glow- ug, {iy img. zooming, wink- ing, awesome, blinking, streaking, hovering things, _ the Air Force last week de cided to bail itself out of all responsibility for future con clusions concerning UFOs. The Air Force announced that it had commissioned the University of Coloradae ts weanclieh eee O02 ek OP ne SVEMUL. Sh EUtpuL BLY ’ of flying saucers for the next 1G months. The director of the study fexpected to cost $300,000) would be Dr, Ed- ward U. Condon, former di- rector of the National Burean of Standards, and now a physics professor at Colora- To satisfy the skeptics, and insure the study's sbiectivi. tr, Colorado would select several other universities te take part in the independent investigation, with about 100 scientists participating, And in case that wasn't enough, the National Acade- my of Sciences also agreed fo appoint a pane] to review the Colorado report, = ~ — an cm + te he ee eh ee HESS ve Prd ae Se ad le, OP aetarmimste Pen e Sete Prel erg BR TG NTE Be mp i en he er oo . = — = se 27s ~~. =e Ree vite ” TAA et