Documents / Hearing transcript
This is the printed record of a July 29, 1968 symposium on unidentified flying objects held by the Committee on Science and Astronautics of the U.S. House of Representatives, chaired by Rep. J. Edward Roush. The committee heard statements from six scientists: J. Allen Hynek, James E. McDonald, Carl Sagan, Robert L. Hall, James A. Harder and Robert M. L. Baker. It also printed papers from Donald Menzel, Stanton Friedman, Frank Salisbury and others. Hynek argued that puzzling UFO reports from competent witnesses deserve serious scientific study.
“The Advance”52 pages
78 than hazard from the car -stopping phenomenon. Indeed, the number of instances of what we might term "car -buzzing" instances that have involved road -accident hazards is large enough to be mildly disturbing, yet I know of no official recogni- tion of this facet of the T_TFO problem either. An incident I learned of in Australiainvolved such fright on the part of the passengers of the "buzzed" vehicle thatthey jumped out of the car before it had come to a stop, and it went into a ditch. A similar instance occurred not long ago in the U.S. For reasons of space -limita- tions, I shall not cite other such eases, though it would not be difficult to assemble a list that would run to perhaps a few dozen. 2. Mild radiation exposure By "radiation" here, I do not mean exposure to redioactivity or to other nuclear radiations, but skin irritations comparable to sunburn, etc. I have interviewed a number of persons who have experienced skin-reddening from exposure to (visible) radiations near UFOs. Rene Gilham, of Merom, Indiana, watched a UFO hovering over his home -area on the evening of Nov. 6, 1957, and received mild skin -burns, for example. I found in speaking with him that the symptoms were gone in a matter of days, with no after-effects. The witnesses in a car.stopping incident at Loch Raven Dam, Md., on the night of Oct. 26, 1958, who were close to a brightly luminous, blimp -sized object after getting out of their stopped car, experienced skin -reddening for which they obtained medical atten- tion. Without citing other such instances, I would say that these cases are not suggestive of any serious hazard, but they warrant scientific attention. 3. More serious physical injuries James Flynn, of Ft. Myers, Fla., in a case that has been rather well checked by both APRO and NICAP investigators, reportedly suffered unusual injuries and physical effects when he sought to check what he had taken to be a mal- functioning test vehicle from Cape Canaveral that had come down in the Ever- glades, March 15, 1965. I have spoken with Flynn and others who know him and believe that his case deserved much more than the superficial official attention it received when he reported it to proper authorities. He was hospitalized for about a week, treated for a deep hemorrhage of one eye (without medical evidence of any blow), and suffered loss of all of the principal deep -tendon reflexes for a number of days, according to his physician's statement, published by APRO (Ref. 45). An instance of more than mere skin-reddening, associated with direct contact with a landed unidentified object, reportedly occurred in Hamilton, Ontario, March 29, 1966. Charles Cozens, then age 13, stated to police and to reporters (and recounted to me in a telephone interview with him and his father) that he had seen two rather small whitish, luminous objects come down in an open field in Hamilton that evening. He moved towards them out of curiosity, and states that he finally moved right up beside them, and touched the surface of one of them to see what it felt like. It was not hot, and seemed unusually smooth. One of the two small (8 ft by 4 ft plan form, 3-4 feet high) bun -shaped objects had a projection on one end that the boy thought might have been some kind of antenna, so he touched it, only to have his hand flung back as a spark shot out from the end of the projection into the air. He ran, thinking first to go to anearby police substation. But, on looking over his shoulder after getting to the edge of the field and seeing no objects there, he decided the police might not believe him and ran to his home. His parents, after discussing the incident at some length with the frightened boy, notified police, which is how the incident became public knowledge. Two others in Hamilton saw that night seeminglysimilar objects, but airborne rather than on the ground. Cozens was treated for a burn or sear on the hand that had been in contact with the projection at the moment the spark was emitted. On questioning both the boy and his father, I was left with the impression that, despite the unusual nature of the report, it was described with both straightforwardness and concern and that it must be givenserious consideration. Clearly one would prefer a number of adult witnesses to an individual boy; yet I believe the case will stand close scrutiny. There are a few other such reports of moderate injury reportedly sustained in direct physical contact with landed aerial objects for which I do not yet feel satisfied with the available degree of authentication. It would be very desirable to conduct far more thorough investigations of some foreign cases of this type, to check the weight of the evidence involved. That only a very small number of such cases is on record should be emphasized.
Hearing transcript, from the govinfo collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. 256 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.