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The Roswell Report: Fact vs. Fiction in the New Mexico Desert

USAF / The Black Vault · 1995 · 882 pages · text by OCR

The Roswell Report: Fact versus Fiction in the New Mexico Desert was published by Headquarters United States Air Force in 1995. The Black Vault distributes this copy. It reproduces the report by Col. Richard L. Weaver and the synopsis by 1st Lt. James McAndrew, both written after a General Accounting Office inquiry requested by Representative Steven Schiff. The Air Force search found no evidence of an extraterrestrial craft or crew. It concluded that the Roswell debris most likely came from NYU Flight No. 4, a Project MOGUL balloon train.

  • p. 190 …Well, Boford was Navy, that was the Navy... Q: Like taking a Pi Ball reading now…
  • p. 191 …fabricate balloons for us. During that period we heard of the Navy project that was going…
  • p. 207 …But were any of those used as precursors to Mogul or... A: None whatsoever. That was…
  • p. 270 …Ewing had conducted considerable research for the Navy during World War II, studying, among other things…
  • p. 323 …f) Measurements of actual sound channel transmission using a small stratosphere balloon carrying sound receivers and…
  • p. 657 …At the present time this company cannot supply us with balloons until Navy clearance is obtained…
  • p. 693 …for six hours using a non-extensible envelope with the addition of a ballast valve to…
  • p. 704 …Met Gifford who has 90' sea rescue boat this project is planning to use. Stayed at…
  • p. 705 …Wyckoff, Hungerfield, Vaux and myself regarding Navy participation with us in Crossroads. Captain Kellogg of Weather…
  • p. 718 …Schneider up with O'Day to check use as NYU station. Alamoggrdo crew helped get helium…
A: As I say, I find it hard to think that something... While we may have been flying TNT on balloons and being very carefree about it, I really doubt that a thing of any military significance would have fallen this far away from the proving ground. It could have, but...

Q: Other than your balloons.

A: Oh yeah, those first flights we didn't even coordinate with CAA. Peoples was so eager to go get those measurements, that these were going to be flown from a restricted area and he didn't worry about it. We later, before the Civil Air Board in El Paso, but that was two or three months later.

Q: When you went on the field trips, what was the chain of command at that point when you arrived? Who did you report to?

A: We were somewhat self contained, but we got housing provided by, I guess Crary was our contact, if you will. Some way or another, barracks were made available for us to live in at Alamagordo.

Q: Would anyone at Roswell Army Air Field have known about your activities, what your purpose was?

A: Not at all. In fact, we went over and tried to get into the weather station at Roswell and because of the atomic bomb security of the 509th, as I remember, we couldn't even get on the base. We drove up in a weapons carrier to the Roswell Army Air Field, and tried to get on the base because we wanted to go to the weather station, wanted to see if we could put a radiosonde receiver there. As I remember we got turned away.

Q: But you ultimately did put a radioson receiver there.

A: In a motel. We just worked out of motels in Roswell.

Q: I thought I saw you had a radioson receiver on Roswell Army Air Field.

A: Again, forgive my memory, but I do remember being turned away. But if you can find it, I'd be glad to have my memory refreshed.

Q: I saw that you had a copy of the 509th Bomb Group history. In the 509 the Bomb Group history from September I saw a meeting where Dr. Peoples met with LTC Joe Briley, 830th the Bomb Squadron Commander, 509th, Air Group Roswell. Do you know why Dr. Peoples would meet with the squadron commander of a B-29 outfit?

A: Only if he wanted to get in to put a receiver on the base there. That would be my guess. We had a big operation. We went back to Alamagordo in September. We had our first 20 foot

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Report, cited by the archive. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is under it. The text was read from the page images by an OCR model; expect the odd misread word. 882 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.