The Milton Torres Intercept Order: RAF Manston, 1957

Spring 1957. At RAF Manston, on the Isle of Thanet in Kent, American pilots of the 514th Fighter Interceptor Squadron stood quick-reaction alert. They flew F-86D Sabres armed with Mighty Mouse rockets. One of them was a young lieutenant named Milton J. Torres.

20 May 1957. Late one cloudy night. Torres and his wingman, Dave Roberson, were scrambled from the alert shack and climbed to about Flight Level 310. Ground control said the target showed "very unusual flight patterns." It had been "motionless for long intervals," reportedly holding stationary positions over Ipswich. Cloud ruled out any chance of seeing it.

Then came the order. Fire a full salvo of 24 rockets. Torres asked for authentication. He got it. "To be quite candid I almost [expletive] my pants!"

He locked on at exactly 15 miles. "I had a lock on that had the proportions of a flying aircraft carrier." The blip "was burning a hole in the radar with its incredible intensity."

About 10 seconds from firing, the overtake indicator swung. "It moved rapidly to the 6 o'clock, then 3 o'clock, then 12 o'clock and finally rested about the 11 o'clock position." The target had reversed. "The UFO had broke lock, and I saw him leaving my 30 mile range." Torres was flying flat out at mach .92 with afterburner on. Whatever it was, he said, it "must have been traveling in 2 digit mach numbers."

Neither pilot ever saw the object. It existed only on radar. The next day a man in civilian clothes debriefed Torres. He looked like a "well dressed IBM salesman," Torres said, and carried NSA credentials. He "threatened me with a national security breach if I breathed a word about it to anyone. He disappeared without so much as a good bye." Torres said nothing for 31 years.

In 1988 Torres and Roberson met again at a USAF reunion at Manston. There, Torres spoke about it for the first time. That year a UFO enthusiast mailed his typed account to the Ministry of Defence. It surfaced in files DEFE 24/1931/1 and DEFE 24/1942/1, released by The National Archives on 20 October 2008. The RAF and USAF both say they have no record of the incident.

Roberson's account in the same file differs. He remembers himself as flight leader, a training flight, "not one but several 'unknowns'," and no lock. "I do not recall being contacted one on one by anyone about keeping the details quiet."

David Clarke, consultant to The National Archives, called it "one of the most intriguing stories" in the release. "There's no doubt something very unusual happened." He pointed to CIA radar jamming work that could create phantom targets. One candidate was Project Palladium, which put "ghost aircraft" on Soviet radar. But CIA history puts its start under Bud Wheelon, who took charge of science and technology in 1962. Martin Shough also doubts several F-86D radars could be fooled at once. Others point to ambiguous returns, or memories reshaped over 31 years. No one has alleged a hoax.

Torres later reached the rank of Major, earned a PhD in mechanical engineering and taught at Florida International University. In April 2009 Nick Pope introduced him at the X-Conference in Washington. At 77 he told AP: "It was not made of this Earth." He died in Miami on 25 October 2015.