The Roswell Report: Case Closed

# STATEMENT OF WITNESS

## Place :

Date: 20 June 95

I. Raymond A. Madson, Lt Col, USAF (Ret), hereby state that James McAndrew was identified as a Lieutenant. USAFR on this date at my place of employment and do hereby voluntarily and of my own free will, make the following statement. This was done without having been subjected to any coercion, unlawful influence or unlawful inducement.

I was born, raised, and presently reside in New Mexico. I graduated from New Mexico A&M College in 1954. I entered the Air Force in 1955 and was assigned a short time later to the Aero Medical Laboratory at Wright Patterson AFB, OH. At the Aero Medical Laboratory I was assigned to the Escape Section as a project officer and test parachutist. During this time I also had extensive participation in various aspects of the space program and worked on the highly classified U-2 project. I served a tour of duty in Alaska and at the School of Aerospace Medicine at Brooks AFB, TX. before being reassigned to the Aero Medical Laboratory at Wright Patterson. I retired in from the Air Force in 1979 and I am currently and Environmental Specialist for the State of New Mexico.

The first project that I was assigned at Wright Patterson was Project 7218, later changed to Project 7222. This project was first known by the name High Dive and then was known as Excelsior. The object of this project was to study the free fall characteristics of anthropomorphic dummies from balloons at altitudes of 50,000 to 100,000 feet. Following satisfactory dummy drops, Capt Joe Kittinger made a series of high altitude parachute jumps that culminated with a jump from 102,800 feet.

I assumed the duties of Project Officer for the dummy drops in the spring of 1956. I made numerous trips to Holloman AFB, NM, the site of the drops, from 1956 until the end of the project in 1959 (dummies were also dropped for this project at Wright Patterson AFB by personnel from the Parachute Branch). I wrote two technical reports that described the project in considerable detail. The type of anthropomorphic dummy used primarily was manufactured by Alderson Laboratories but we also used Sierra Manufacturing type dummies. Both of these dummies are shown in the technical reports. The Alderson dummy had facial features that were not life-like and ears that were not well defined. The dummies were outfitted with flight suits of various colors, fuchsia, olive drab, and sage green (a shade of gray). We chose the Alderson dummy because it was relatively inexpensive as compared to the Sierra dummy.

We encountered considerable difficulty dropping the dummies from the balloons. I designed the rack that suspended the dummies, two at a time, from the balloon. On numerous occasions the dummies were fouled during the release sequence and the dummy rode a "streamer" all the way to the ground. Other times malfunctions occurred that caused the two dummies and the entire rack assembly to descend to the ground as one package. Both of these instances are described in the technical reports.