Documents / Report
The Roswell Report: Case Closed was published by Headquarters United States Air Force and written by Capt. James McAndrew. It follows up the July 1994 report, which traced the 1947 debris to Project MOGUL balloon trains. The report says the reported alien bodies were probably anthropomorphic test dummies dropped from high altitude balloons. It also says the accounts of bodies at the Roswell Army Air Field hospital probably merged two separate events: a 1956 KC-97 crash and a 1959 manned balloon mishap.
High Altitude Polyethylene Research Balloons In 1946, as a result of research conducted for project MOGUL, Charles B. Moore, a New York University graduate student working under contract for the U.S. Army Air Forces, made a significant technological discovery: the use of polyethylene for high altitude balloon construction.71 Polyethylene is a lightweight plastic that can withstand stresses of a high altitude environment that differed drastically from, and greatly exceeded, the capabilities of standard rubber weather balloons used previously. Moore’s discovery was a breakthrough in technology. For the first time, scientists were able to make detailed, sustained studies of the upper atmosphere. Polyethylene balloons, first produced in 1947 for Project MOGUL,are still widely used today for a host of scientific applications. High altitude polyethylene balloons and standard rubber weather balloons differ greatly in size, construction, and utility. The difference between these two types of balloons historically has been the subject of misunderstandings in that the term “weather balloon” is often used to describe both types of balloons. High altitude polyethylene balloons are used to transport scientific payloads of several pounds to several tons to altitudes of nearly 200,000 feet. Polyethylene balloons do not increase in size and burst with increases in volume as they rise, as do standard rubber weather balloons. They are launched with excess capacity to accommodate the increase in volume. This characteristic of polyethylene balloons makes them substantially more stable than rubber weather balloons and capable of sustained constant level flight, a requirement for most scientific applications. The initial polyethylene balloons had diameters of only seven feet and carried payloads of five pounds or less.‘* As balloon technology advanced, payload capacities and sizes of balloons increased. Modern polyethylene balloons, some as long as several football fields when on Raven Industries 40 million cubic foot balloon. 450 ft in diameter at 130,000 feet Fig. 48. Relative sizes of a modern high altitude poyethelyne research balloon, an airliner, and a hot-air balloon. Inaccurate characterizations of the giant high altitude research balloons as “weather balloons” (which are typically 15 feet in diameter) has historically been the source of confusion. (courresy ofMike Smith, Raven Industries) 40
Report, cited by the archive. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. 246 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.