The National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena (Nicap)

# Approved For Release 2001/04/02 : CIA-RDP81R00560R000100010001-0

Abruptly, the leader seemed to slow. The second and third objects wavered slightly and almost overran the leader. The pilots estimated that the UFOs were a little more than a mile below them, at about 2,000 feet, and about 100 feet in diameter.

When the line of discs was almost directly underneath the plane and slightly to the right front, the UFOs abruptly flipped up on edge in unison and reversed direction. (See diagram.) Captain Nash described the maneuver: " . . . they flipped on edge, the sides to the left of us going up and the glowing surfaces facing right. Though the bottom surfaces did not become clearly visible, we had the impression that they were unlighted. The exposed edges, also unlighted, appeared to be about 15 feet thick, and the top surface, at least seemed flat. In shape and proportion, they were much like coins.

"While all were in the edgewise position, the last five slid over and past the leader so that the echelon was now tail foremost, so to speak, the top or last craft now being nearest to our position. Then, without any arc or swerve at all, they all flipped back together to the flat attitude and darted off in a direction that formed a sharp angle with their first course, holding their new formation. . .

"Imediately after these six lined away, two more objects just like them darted out from behind and under our airplane at the same altitude as the others."

As the two additional discs joined the formation, the lights of all eight blinked out, then came back on again. Still in line, the eight discs sped westward north of Newport News, climbed in a graceful arc above the altitude of the airliner. Then the lights blinked out one by one, though not in sequence.

Captain Nash also noted that the original six discs had dimmed slightly before their angular turn, and brightened considerably after making the turn. The two discs speeding to join the formation were brightest of all. Captain Nash and Third Officer Fortenberry radioed a report of the sighting to be forwarded to the Air Force.

"At 7:00 a.m. the morning after the sighting," Captain Nash reported, "we were telephoned by the Air Force. . . to come for questioning. There were five men, one in uniform; the others showed us I.D. cards and badges of Special Investigators, USAF. In separate rooms, we were questioned for one hour and 45 minutes--then about a half hour together. We made sketches and drew the track of the objects on charts. . . the tracks matched. . . the accounts matched. . . all conversation [was] recorded on a stenotype machine.

"They had a complete weather report. . . it coincided with our visual observations. . . our flight plan. The investigators also advised us that they already had seven other reports. One was from a Lieutenant Commander and his wife. . . They described a formation of red discs travelling at high speed and making immediate direction changes without turn radius. . .

"Regarding speed: We tried again to be very conservative in our computations. The objects first appeared about 10 miles beyond Newport News. . . They travelled to within about a half mile of our craft. . . changed direction, then crossed the western suburban edge of the town areas. . . out over a dark area at least 10 miles beyond the lights, then angled up at about 45 degrees. . .

"We drew a line through the lighted area, measured the distance from our aircraft (and we knew our exact position both visually and by VAR navigation using an ILS needle) to the line through the lighted area. The distance was 25 miles. We had seen them cross this line twice, so we knew they had travelled at least 50 miles. . . . To get a time, we, seven times, separately, using our own panel stopwatch clocks, pushed the button, mentally went through the time, even to saying to ourselves again, 'What the hell's that!' Each time we came up amazingly close to 12 seconds. To be conservative, we increased it to 15 seconds. . . 50 miles in 15 seconds equals 12,000 miles per hour." [36]

## Hovering Green Sphere

During the Fall of 1952, three airliners 15 minutes apart sighted a UFO simultaneously. Pan American Airways Captains Charles Zammett, Robert Harris, and William Hutchins were flying DC-4 aircraft about 600 miles south of New York, enroute from New York City to San Juan, Puerto Rico. Suddenly they all saw ahead of them a huge greenball, extremely brilliant and much larger than a full moon in apparent size. The object seemed to be absolutely stationary.

The sighting was not reported to anyone until several years later when one of the pilots happened to fly with Capt. William B. Nash, PAA pilot and NICAP Adviser. Captain Nash describes what happened next:

One ship called to one of the others: "Do you see that?" "I'll say I see it! What the devil is it?"

Then the third crew broke in: "We see it too. Who could miss it!"

The three pilots continued to watch the amazing sight for about 45 seconds, as the UFO stood perfectly still. Then one pilot started to ask: "Do you think we'll pass it-----wow! Look at it go!"

Just then the bright green orb suddenly sped off to the west at fantastic speed. They watched it move straight away from them on a horizontal path gradually diminishing in size, seemingly due to perspective diminishment.

## DISC SIGHTINGS

John B. Bean, a flyer with 17 years experience, made the following report in a letter dated February 7, 1953. [37]

"On the afternoon of January 27, 1953, after stopping at the Purchasing Office of the Atomic Energy Commission Research Facilities near Livermore, California, I was driving north on the road which runs parallel to the eastern fence bounding the Commission properties. Immediately opposite the northeast corner of the fence, I pulled over to the side of the road in order to stop and check some papers which I had in my briefcase behind the front seat of my car. In order to do this, I opened the door and stepped out of the car, thus facing southward. Having finished removing the papers from the briefcase, I was about to climb into the car again when I heard the sound of airplane engines overhead coming in from an easterly direction. . . . It was a DC-6 letting down in the direction of Oakland Municipal Airport, which is to the west of Livermore. Estimated altitude of this aircraft was 2,500 to 3,000 feet.

"As the DC-6 proceeded westward, I was about to take my hand down from my eyes when I noticed a small, whitish object proceeding southward on a course which had just brought it across the Commission property. My initial reaction was that it was some sort of plant fiber floating in the air. Since this was the first clear, sunny day in several weeks and the atmosphere was very springlike, it was a perfectly natural reaction.

"It suddenly occurred to me that we are still in the middle of winter and, insofar as I knew, there were no plants which were giving off any white fibrous substance into the air at this time. As this realization came to me, I also noticed that this object was moving directly away from me at a very rapid rate of departure.