News clippings

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B2 Anchorage Dally News Sunday, January 4, 1987
By ROBERT ENGELMAN
Scrtpps Howard News Service
A Federal Aviation Admin
istration probe of a UFO that
showed up on an air control
ler's screen in November was
set back when a radar record
ing failed to show the craft's
signal, FAA spokesman
said Friday.
Agency officials Friday al
so interviewed for a second
•time a Japanese pilot who
signting stiira rhystery
was helped by an FAA air
controller to evade what he
said was an unidentified fly
ing object over Alaska in
mid-November.
But the UFO sighting re
mained a mystery, with FAA
and Air Force sources saying
it was unlikely that the origin
of the craft described by Ken-
Ju Terauchi would ever be
determined.
Terauchi, a veteran pilot
ferrying JAL Flight 1628 from
Iceland to Japan, told United
Press International last Tues
day that on the evening of
Nov. 17 he had been shad
owed for more than 30 min
utes and for nearly 400 miles
over Alaska by a mysterious
aircraft much larger than his
own plane.
The object, which Terauchi
said was twice the size of an
aircraft carrier, was accompa-
See Page 8-3, UPO
UFO; Does not show up on a recording of radar screen
Comtnued from Page B-1
nied by two smaller aircraft,
the pilot said. The night was
clear, and FAA investigators
who questioned the crew con
cluded in a report that they
were rational and profession
al and showed no evidence of
drug or alcohol use.
Anchorage FAA spokesman
Paul Steucke said the agency
was investigating the matter
further only to find out if
unknown aircraft had violat
ed the Japan Air Lines
plane's airspace, not to ascer
tain if the unknown craft had
extraterrestrial origins. He
said he did not exp^ "Terau
chi to add to the information
in press accounts.
But Steucke confirmed that
an FAA air traffic controller
had spotted the unknown
craft as a "weak, intermittent
signal" on his own radar. The
signal appeared within eight
miles of the JAL aircraft and
at the same speed and alti
tude.
When the recorded radar
transmission was replayed
later, however, there was no
image of any aircraft except
for the commercial airliner,
Steucke said. He said it was
possible the signal from the
UFO was strong enough to be
picked up while the incident
was occurring but not strong
enough to register on the ra
dar recording system.
Officials with the Air
Force's Alaskan Air Com
mand initially told the FAA
air controller they, too, could
see the object's radar signal.
But Friday. Capt. Larry Jen
kins, a command spokesman,
said the signal didn't last
long enough to be confirmed
and that the command now
attributed the signal to elec
tronic clutter.
"We're not doing any fur
ther Investigation," Jenkins
said.
The FAA has no systematic
procedure for evaluating re
ports of unidentified flying
objects. The Air Force once
did, but abandoned such in
vestigations more than 15
years ago, Jenkins said.
A spokesman for the North
American Aerospace Defense
Command in Colorado said
officials there had no radar
signal that could correlate
with what Terauchi described
and were not investigating
the incident.
Terauchi and his crew of
two told the FAA at 6:19 p.m.
on Nov. 17 that they were fast
approaching the lights of a
large flying object and re
r
quested help in avoiding it.
An FAA controller, spot
ting the signal of the ms^teri-
ous craft on radar, directed
the JAL pilot to take evasive
action, at one point approving
a 360-degree turn to shake the
object.
Steucke said both objects
appeared to be traveling
about 550 mph at 35,000 feet
in altitude and traveled to
gether for more than 350 mi
les.
"I haven't seen anything
like this (situation) before,"
said Steucke, who has lived
in Anchorage for 12 years and
worked in the FAA for four.
He said theories on the origin
of the mysterious object var
ied from "a UFO to some
body else's (foreign) military
aircraft." .