Flying Saucers UFO Reports

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from front to back. In a letter to Richard Hall, of NICAP, Dr. Tombaugh said these illuminated rectangles maintained a fixed position in respect to each other, which supported his impression of solidity. "I was really petrified with astonishment," he wrote. And, in an article for Life magazine he stated that "in all his long years of sky watching he had never seen the equal of this remarkable craft."

Greenville, S.C., May 13, 1952: Four astronomers watched four oval shaped glowing saucers flying in diamond-shaped formation. They were silent. They wobbled several times, then went out of sight.

Source: Flying Saucers from Outer Space, Major Donald Keyhoe

Cigar-shaped object is frequent sighting. This, over Anaheim, Cal., in 1957 "flickered with reddish light."

The A.P.R.O. Bulletin, official publication of the Aerial Phenomena Research Organization, with headquarters in Tucson, Ariz., recently reported on a sighting made in 1964 by two technicians attached to the Cosmic Radiation Center at Chile University near Santiago, Chile. They had been awakened by the intense heat in their room despite the piercing cold on that November night at that altitude. One of the men went outside, found the heat there even more intense and the mountain lighted up by a bright orange color. Afraid some tanks of liquid gas had caught fire, he called to his companion. The other man arrived just in time to see an object ascend from the bottom of the canyon and disappear from sight in the sky at a tremendous speed. Dr. Gabriel Alvial, Director of the center, and Professor Claudio Anguita, Director of the Astronomical Observatory of Chile University, in reporting the incident to the press,

stated their belief in unidentified aerial objects and said that "something beyond our ken is prowling the earth," and that "we are not alone in the universe."

Understandably, one of the first recorded sightings of a UFO, dating back to 1896 when a "cigar-shaped" object moving, unexplainably, into the wind was witnessed by hundreds of people on the West Coast in the San Francisco area, triggered the same "real" and "hoax" response that such reports unleash today. Those who had seen it credited it as an authentic mystery ship and those who had not were quick to attribute it to pranksters in balloons. Astronomers could be found in both camps, those who attributed the sighting to Venus, or other planets, and those who, despite the threat of ridicule, held firmly to their convictions that the "ship" could not be so readily explained and that they had witnessed sound evidence of unidentifiable craft.

The UFO Evidence quotes the late Dr. H. Percy Wilkins, British lunar astronomer from his book "Mysteries of Space and Time," in relation to that astronomer's recognition that most UFOs can be attributed to conventional objects: "... a residium remains which cannot be thus explained." Part of this residium would logically have to include the report submitted to NICAP by Dr. Charles H. Otis, professor emeritus of biology, Bowling Green State University. In his report, Dr. Otis told of sighting a number of silent, wingless, high flying objects over Ann Arbor, Mich., in July, 1952. He counted 15 of what he referred to as "ships," and described them as moving in the form of "organized flotilla." They were identical in size and shape (elongated and split at the rear with no discernible cabin, windows or persons) and they maintained perfect position in the flotilla. Each "ship" gave off what the doctor described as a "caterpillar track" from their two pronged tails in the rear. Dr. Otis explored several possibilities that might account for these unwavering and glowing trails, but found none of them satisfactory.

On the surface it may appear that astronomers who do not believe in interplanetary craft exceed those who do. The theory has been offered, however, that these astronomers are inclined to be more vocal than their more credulous colleagues. The scorn and ridicule of a nation are not easy to accept and it has been well demonstrtaed that unless a person has seen a UFO for himself he is inclined to be not just skeptical but downright insulting in his attitude toward believers. A man of science would be understandably reluctant to expose himself to the jibes of his colleagues, employers and audience.

An impressive listing of UFO sightings by scientists is provided in The UFO Evidence, supplemented by detailed reports and sketches on some of the more noteworthy experiences. The introduction to this section carries the