Roswell UFOs

Reproduced below is the classic order…

Tags: Air Force, Science
Posted in Uncategorized on January 11th, 2008 by RoswellUFOs.com

Reproduced below is the classic order from the Inspector General
of the Air Force to all air base commanders in the continental United
States on December 24, 1959

Unidentified flying objects – sometimes treated lightly by the
press and referred to as “flyiny saucers” – must be rapidly and acc-
urately identified as serious USAF business in the ZI. As AFR 200-2
points out, the Air Force concern with these sightings is threefold:
First of all, is the object a threat to the defense of the US?
Secondly, does it contribute to technical or scientific knowledge?
And then there’s the inherent USAF responsibility to explain to the
American people through public-information media what is going on in
their skies.

The phenomenon or actual objects encompassing UFO’s will tend to
increase, with the public more aware of goings on in space but still
inclined to some apprehenson. Techinical and defense considerations
will continue to exist in this area.

Published about three months ago, AFR 200-2 outlines necessary
orderly qualifed reporting as well as public-information procedures.
This is where the Base should stand today, with practices judged at
least satisfactory by commander and inspector:

-Reasponsibility for handling UFO’s should rest with either intelli-
gence, operations, the Provost Marshal or the Information Offices -
in order of preference, dictated by limits of the base organisation;

-A specific officer should be designated as responsible;

-He should have experience in investigative techniques and also,
if possible, scientific or technical background;

-He should have authority to obtain the assistance of specialists
on the base;

-He should be equipped with binoculars, cameria, Geiger counter,
magnifying glass and have a source for containers in which to
store samples.

What is required is that every UFO sighting be investigated and
reported to the Air Technical Intelligence Center at Wright-Patterson
AFB and that explanation to the public be realistic and knowledgable.
Normally that explanation will be made by the OSAF information Officer.

Popularity: 4%

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Tully “nests”

Tags: Air Force, Science
Posted in Uncategorized on January 11th, 2008 by RoswellUFOs.com

This is a transcript from the original article printed in the
‘FLYING SAUCER REVIEW’, Volume 15, No. 3, May/June 1969 issue.
(5 shillings) {hey…don’t ask me… we converted to
decimal currency in 1966!! These UFO people must have been a
bit resistant to change in the old days! } It is part of the
‘official’ Tully report which includes a report by Stan Seers,
ex-president of QFSRB (now URQ), letters between people
involved in the investigation, newspaper articles of the time,
the below article, etc.. etc…

NORTH QUEENSLAND UFO SAGA – By Stan Seers and William
Lasich.

The sparsely-populated coast of North Queensland opposite
the Great Barrier Reef abounds in vegetative growth. Tall reed
or cane concealing “flying saucer nests” form a notable feature
of the UFO saga which began(1) with the adventure of George
Pedley, a 27-year-old banana farmer of Euramo near Tully, some
95 miles south of Cairns.
At about 9.00 a.m. on the clear sunny morning of Wednesday,
January 19, 1966, Pedley was driving a petrol tractor across
the property of a friend and neighbour, Mr. Albert Pennisi,
cane farmer and resident of some 19 years.
The farm track along which he drove wound its way towards,
and thence alongside, what is locally known as Horseshoe Lagoon.
This contained an area of still water about 5ft. deep and an
acre or so in extent, much of which was covered by a thick
growth of water reeds, the stems of these, about 1/2in. in
diameter protruding above the surface to a height of
approximately 2ft.
As he approached the lagoon, which was to his right, with
the sun by this time well up in the sky to his left, he thought
he detected a misfire in the tractor motor. Almost immediately
over the noise of the tractor he heard a sharp hissing noise,
and then to his amazement he saw rising from the reeds,
approximately 25 yards to his right and slightly ahead of him,
a saucer-shaped object which ascended fairly slowly to an
estimated height of 60ft., tilted a little to one side and then
with a burst of speed quickly vanished in a south-westerly
direction. Except for the original hissing noise, no other
sound was heard. The total time of observation was estimated at
4 to 5 seconds.
Mr. Pedley stated that the object was approximately 25ft. in
diameter, about 9ft thick at the centre, silver-grey in colour
and generally sharp in outline. He jumped from the tractor and
hurried across to the lagoon from whence the object had
ascended and immediately discovered a circular flattened area
within the tall green reeds. The flattened stems were radially
distributed in a noticeably anti-clockwise manner(2). He was
emphatic that the swathed reeds were at that time quite green,
as were all other reeds outside this area. The swathe of
newly-flattened reeds formed a “nest” of 30ft diameter.
He further noted an area of giant water couch grass
immediately outside the perimeter of the “nest”, about a square
yard of which had been apperently clipped short and the
clippings removed. Pedley is positive in recollection that the
water of the “nest” was STILL SWIRLING slightly in a circular
motion at the moment when he first saw it.
After a few minutes he returned to the tractor, started the
motor and went on his way. When questioned later, Mr. Pedley
stated that he could not remember whether or not he switched
the motor off when leaving it, stalled the motor when stopping,
or whether it just cut out after he left it, but is quite
certain that the tractor motor was “dead” when he returned
since he clearly remembers restarting it. The motor electrical
ignition system was the conventional one for the model.
Later in the day he felt that he should tell someone of what
he had seen, so called on Mr. Albert Pennisi, owner of the
lagoon and surrounding property and related to him his
experience. At about 4.00 p.m. they returned together to the
lagoon. Mr. Pennisi stripped, waded out to the “nest” and found
that it was possible to swim through from side to side BELOW
the flattened area, without meeting with any obstruction,
indicating quite clearly that the whole mass of the “nest” was
actually FLOATING on the surface.
Shortly afterwards, at about 5.00 p.m., Mr. Pennisi, using
colour film took a series of photographs. The prints
subsequently obtained, clearly substantiate a remarkable
feature which both witnesses had observed and remarked on. The
flattened reeds in the “nest” had turned noticeably brown, but
ONLY ON THE UPPER SURFACES. The underside of each reed nearest
the water still remained quite green. this “browning” of the
upper surfaces of the reeds had quite obviously taken place
since 9 a.m. that morning.
A resurgence of “nest” phenomena at the same Tully lagoon
has occurred recently (January/February 1968). Sometime
earlier, noting a prediction of sunspot maximum for May 1968 by
the Swiss authority M. Waldmeive, QFSRB [Queensland Flying
Saucer Research Bureau - now; UFO Research Queensland. M.W.]
were primed(3) to the possibility of increased UFO activity in
1968.
With this in mind, it was decided to set up two monitor
stations, No. 1 in the Tully district (North Queensland) and
No. 2 in the South, some 20 miles out of Brisbane. The precise
location of sites must remain undisclosed, since the monitors
operate virtually unattended at some distance from habitation.

The equipment at No. 1 station was set up by Mr. Vince Mele
with the assistance of an electronics friend. The monitor is
built around a photo-cell and sensitive magnetic compass. The
photo-cell light beam is interrupted if magnetic dusturbance is
present, and the fluctuation of photo-cell current then
activates the cine-camera release. The camera (Eumig 8mm auto.)
is energised so long as magnetic field disturbance continues
(five frames exposed per 2-second interval).
During February a spontaneous magnetic field disturbance was
actually recorded during initial trials. On the same day a UFO
sighting was reported by an isolated witness, some eight miles
from the base. Heavy cloud cover in the area impeded further
observation of the UFO flight trajectory. The information was
not enough to provide 100 per cent proof that the detector was
UFO-triggered on this occasion. Nevertheless things looked
quite promising.
At the end of February both monitors were fitted with
cameras, tested and operating. On March 2, Tully lagoon
contained four nests, then about three weeks old. The camera
site was screened from view some 50ft. from the nearest “nest”.
On this date radio 4KZ broadcast an arresting news flash! An
airliner en route Cairns to Iron Range had been paced at
6,000ft. for some minutes by a UFO some 2,000ft above the
aircraft. Both airline pilots witnessed the event. Somewhere
over Cooktown area the UFO broke contact and shot off at
enormous speed (described as something like 1,500 m.p.h.). An
inspection of the No. 1 monitor found the camera still in
motion although all 25ft of colour film(4) had been run through
and the batteries were nearly exhausted. The roll of 16-mm film
was removed and reversed for a second run, and new batteries
installed. (Technically this indicates the field perturbation -
cum UFO – was present for the whole 10 minutes the film was
run.)
On March 4, two days later, quite a number of local
inhabitants reported the passage of another UFO. An inspection
of the monitor again revealed that it had been “triggered”, but
this time, for some unknown reason, only some 15 or 16 frames
had been exposed. An examination of the batteries which had
been carefully tested and were fully charged when fitted,
revealed that they were quite flat.
The remainder of the film was wound through by hand, removed
from the camera, sealed in the usual container and addressed to
Kodak Ltd., Melbourne, for processing, all of this in the
presence of two reliable witnesses. It was then conveyed to
Tully for posting, the packet was weighed, and the charge was
14 cents. Some 10 days later a letter was received from Kodak
stating that the container, which was returned to the sender,
HAD BEEN EMPTY ON ARRIVAL! The empty container still had the 14
cent stamp attached, and a quick check at the Post Office
established that the postage on an empty container was 5 cents
only. Further exchanges with Kodak Ltd. produced no results.
The loss of the film was reported to the civil police who
were very co-operative, but after a careful detective
investigation interstate, were unable to shed light on the
mystery of the vanished film so far as can be quoted from
official statement. Unofficially, however, a hint was thrown
out by a person of reliable character and seemingly well
informed in police matters, that it was likely that
Commonwealth authorities had taken possession of the film and
therefore it would be useless to pursue enquiries further.
To complete the “cloak and dagger ” atmosphere, even more
bizarre was a seemingly casual suggestion conveyed to one of
the UFO investigators by an individual undoubtedly
knowledgeable in government intelligence activities. This
“contact” advised our UFO researching colleague that NEXT time
the UFO camera ought to be loaded with black and white film. Is
this too incredible? No, probably just the verdict of hard-won
experience in the photographic lab. of “salvaging” difficult
aircraft images, under-exposed and diffused by grain and
distortion. Even perhaps of UFOs?
It is not without interest also to record, shortly after
loss of the film, circa March 13, two R.A.A.F. [Royal
Australian Air Force] helicopters were observed for some time
deploying over the site of the very lagoon significant to the
events described, by the owner of the properties concerned.
Several “saucer nests” were still visible at this date.
Mr. Colin Bennett, M.L.A., [Member of the Legislative
Assembly] Barrister, after studying complete documentation of
the incident, expressed keen interest and promptly offered his
every assistance in inquiries. Mr. Bennett then wrote to
Canberra [Federal government] concerning the missing UFO film,
presenting, he stated, “a submission to the Commonwealth
Authorities in rather strong terms.”
In a reply from Canberra dated August 29, Mr. Gordon Freeth,
Minister for Air stated he was unable to offer any suggestion
as to the fate of the film. He denied positively the Department
of Air had ever, at any time, removed from Kodak Ltd., material
relating to UFOs.

So far a disappointing outcome for UFO researchers. Could it
be that sensible lifemanship indicates the affair might as well
be allowed to fade into limbo? Let the UFOs “buzz-off” so we
can get on with our own affairs. A public philosophy endorsed
by our officialdom!
MORE VISITATIONS

However the UFOs must be immune to exorcism, or have ignored
the message, since the Cairns-Tully area continues to sport its
UFO-active events. A further “nest” was discovered soon after
on April 25 in a cane field close to Cairns (25 miles north of
Tully). Flattened stems lay in an oval-shaped area 70ft. by
30ft. These were described by a horse-riding party as
completely screened by standing cane.
A more recent close encounter with a UFO (October 1) was
reported by Louie Maule, 35, a Tully district farmer. Near on
8.00 p.m. he was headed north driving home from South
Johnstone, when he saw descending from the night sky, a large
black object ringed with red lights. “I got a shock”, Maule
said. “It was GIGANTIC and looked to be slowing up.”
The headlights of a passing car momentarily obscured his
vision, and he slowed to a stop. “When I looked again it was
travelling towards South Johnstone at maybe 100 m.p.h.”
Interviewed by Vince Mele, the motorist Louie Maule stated
the UFOs’ altitude was about 500ft. It was circular in shape,
and about 60ft. in diameter, as clearly out-lined by the red
lights around the perimeter. The red-ringed disc was last seen
to bank and proceed towards the clouds at very high speed.
On the same evening, some 3 miles to the north, Vince Mele
had set up his mobile detector on a hill site overlooking the
surrounding area. Promptly at 8.00 p.m. his detector alarm
sounded and it was two minutes before the alarm re-set itself
automatically. After this, it was quiet for the rest of the
evening.
Although it must be noted that Vince Mele did not himself
see any lights, the October 1 incident now seems to provide
the first good evidence for independent visual sighting
correlated with triggering of the detector by the ambient field
of a UFO.(5)

A Continued Mystery

The Tully UFO photographs (presuming something WAS on the
film) are by no means the first UFO shots to disappear from the
Australian scene. A recapitulation made at the CAPIO Convention
(Canberra, July 1968) produced the following list:
1. 11.00 a.m., August 23, 1953, of nine photographs taken at
Port Moresby by T.P. Drury, Deputy Minister of Civil Aviation,
the five best shots were “lost” by CAD, who had loaned them
to the United States Air Force, Washington. **[I will type
up and post the full report on this particular sighting
shortly. It is contained in the complete, original 45 page
report entitled "Flying Saucers Over Papua - A Report on
Papuan Unidentified Flying Objects." dated March 1960, by
the Revd. Norman E.G. Cruttwell, M.A. Oxon, of the Anglican
Mission, Menapi, Papua, New Guinea, and documents a lot of
the 79 Papuan sightings of the time, including the full
report on the 'Father Gill' case. M.W.]**

2. Daytime, Easter 1954, some 200 photographs, cine and
stills, of an object pacing three young men in an Austin
sedan, driving through the interior near the Western and
South Australian border. “Borrowed” by the R.A.A.F. and
never returned.

3. 11.00 a.m., July 7, 1961, 6in. by 3in negative of the
“Thing” observed by scores of North Queenslanders and
photographed by R.T. Sheward of the Cairns Post. This
negative was sent to Kodak Melbourne by Mt. Stromlo
scientists. This time the container did not arrive empty -
according to Kodak, IT JUST DID NOT ARRIVE.

4. 3.25 a.m., May 27, 1965, several photographs taken by an
airline pilot (Ansett-ANA) of a UFO pacing an air liner in
flight for 10 minutes over Bougainville Reef en route to
Port Moresby. Film confiscated by the authorities.

5. Actual time unknown, March 4 of this year, Tully, North
Queensland, Missing cine film. We wonder where they all
are?

NOTES
—–
(1) ‘Queensland Again’ by Judith Magee, FLYING SAUCER REVIEW,
March/April 1966 (Vol. 12, No. 2.)
(2) Clockwise swirl observed contrary to hypothetical ground
effects from a helicopter landing. Rotor blades are driven
with left-hand screw motion.
(3) A study of the graphs (1851 to 1961) contained in the work
‘Anatomy of a Phenomenon’ by Jaques Vallee strongly suggests
the possibility of peak UFO activity being related to maximum
and minimum sunspot activity and/or geo-magnetic activity. The
latter could well be the significant factor, in view of the
UFOs’ well-known electro-magnetic effects.
(4) Film was Kodachrome II, ASA speed 25.
(5) No electric cables, geophysical prospecting, etc., are
present in the area to act as source of magnetic field
disturbances.

Popularity: 58%

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REPORT ON A SURVEY OF THE MEMBERSHIP

Tags: Air Force, NORAD
Posted in UFO Report on January 11th, 2008 by RoswellUFOs.com

REPORT ON A SURVEY OF THE MEMBERSHIP OF THE
AMERICAN ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY CONCERNING THE UFO PHENOMENON

SUMMARY

Refereed journals, to which scientists turn for their reliable
information, carry virtually no information on the UFO problem. Does
this imply that scientists have no views and no thoughts on the
subject, or that all scientists consider it insignificant? Does it
imply that scientists have no reports to submit comparable with UFO
reports published in newspapers and popular books? The purpose of this
survey is to answer these questions.

Of 2,611 questionnaires mailed to members of the American Astronomical
Society, 1,356 were returned, 34 anonymously. Only two members offered
to waive anonymity. These facts and many comments confirm that the UFO
problem is a sensitive issue for most scientists. Nevertheless, only a
few (13) respondents made critical remarks about the subject or the
survey; 50 made encouraging statements, 34 offered to help, and 7
indicated that they are actively studying the problem.

Each respondent was asked to state his opinion on whether the UFO
problem deserves scientific study: 23% replied “certainly”, 30%
“probably”, 27% “possibly”, 17% “probably not”, and 3% “certainly not”,
which represents a positive attitude among 53% of the respondents, as
against a negative attitude among 20%. Analysis of the returns shows
that older scientists are markedly more negative to the problem than
are younger scientists. One also finds that opinions correlate strongly
with time spent reading about the subject. The fraction of respondents
who think that the subject certainly or probably deserves scientific
study rises from 29%, among those who have spent less than one hour, to
68% among those who have spent more than 365 hours in such reading. It
appears that popular books and publications by established scientists
exert a positive influence on scientists’ opinions, whereas newspaper
and magazine articles exert negligible influence.

Respondents were asked to express their views on possible causes of UFO
reports by assigning “prior probabilities” to four “conventional”
causes [(a) a hoax, (b) a familiar phenomenon or device, (c) an
unfamiliar natural phenomenon, and (d) an unfamiliar terrestrial
device] and four “unconventional” causes [(e) an unknown natural
phenomenon, (f) an alien device, (g) some specifiable other cause, and
(h) some unspecifiable other cause]. There was a very wide spread of
opinions on this issue. Averaging all returns gives the values: (a)
.12, (b) .22, (c) .23, (d) .21, (e) .09, (f) .03, (g) .07. This average
response is therefore quite open-minded, although many individual
responses are not. Older people tend to give more credence to the
possibility of a hoax and less to unconventional possibilities. By
contrast, those who have studied the subject extensively attach less
weight to the possibility of a hoax and greater weight to the
unconventional possibilities.

Over 80% of respondents expressed a willingness to contribute to the
resolution of the UFO problem if they could see a way to do so but, of
those expressing this interest, only 13% could see a way. This is a
notable consensus which may encapsulate the dilemma which this problem
presents to scientists. Those who have studied the subject are more
willing to help and more likely to see a way to help.

Most respondents consider that meteorology, psychology,
astronomy/astrophysics and physics have relevance to the UFO problem
and some consider that aeronautical engineering and sociology may also
be relevant. Most respondents (75%) would like to obtain more
information on the subject, but they express a strong preference for
getting it from scientific journals rather than from books or lectures.

The returns identified 62 respondents who had witnessed or obtained an
instrumental record of an event which they could not identify and which
they thought might be related to the UFO phenomenon. The total number
of events reported was larger (65) since some respondents reported more
than one event. In addition, ten _identified_ strange observations were
mentioned, four investigations were described (including one detailed
study of ground traces), and attention was drawn to a few strange
events described in the scientific literature. It was found that these
62 respondents have spent longer than average studying the UFO problem,
that they are more positive in their assessment of the scientific
importance of the problem, and that they tend to be more open-minded
about unconventional explanations. Only 18 (about 30%) of these
respondents indicated that they had previously reported their
observations; seven to the Air Force, Navy or NORAD, one to the police,
two to airport authorities, seven to other scientists, and one to a
newspaper.

Sixty-three percent (63%) of those reporting events were night-sky
observers, as against 50% of respondents who did not report events.
Thirty-six (36) of the events comprised lights seen in the sky at
night. Twelve (12) were of point lights which were more or less
puzzling; four (4) were of formations of lights; and four (4) were of
diffuse lights. Three respondents independently described what appeared
to be a searchlight playing on a cloud when there were no clouds in the
sky. Four described disk-like objects, and five described objects with
different shapes. Three cases concerned objects which appeared to emit
smaller objects or “sparks.” One case described apparent interference
with an automobile electrical system (as did also a daylight case).

There were sixteen accounts of strange objects seen by day. Five were
of small objects, seven were of disk-shaped objects, and four described
other miscellaneous observations.

Seven respondents described photographic records of strange phenomena,
and three were kind enough to provide me with copies of the photographs
or film. (With help, I was able to make plausible interpretations of
two of these.) One respondent recalled a radar observation he had made,
another described two strange radio records, and a third described
puzzling records obtained by a satellite tracking station.

This study leads to the following answers to the questions initially
posed. To judge from this survey of the membership of the American
Astronomical Society, it appears that:

(a) scientists have thoughts and views but no answers concerning the
UFO problem;

(b) Although there is no consensus, more scientists are of the opinion
that the problem certainly or probably deserves scientific study than
are of the opinion that it certainly or probably does not;

and (c) a small fraction (of order 5%) are likely to report varied and
puzzling observations, not unlike so-called “UFO reports” made by the
general public. As is the case with reports from the public, many may
be unusual observations of familiar objects, but some seem to be
definitely strange.

These results are consistent with the findings of an earlier but more
limited survey of members of the American Institute of Aeronautics and
Astronautics (Sturrock, 1974b), except that the opinions of astronomers
(expressed in 1975) concerning the significance of the UFO problem were
more positive than were the views of aeronautical engineers (expressed
in 1973).

Popularity: 4%

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Roswell – Blanchard

Tags: 1947, Air Force, Fort Worth, Roswell
Posted in Uncategorized on January 11th, 2008 by RoswellUFOs.com

When a Leave is not a Leave: Col. Blanchard and the Roswell Timeline
by Kevin D. Randle

(IUR, International UFO Reporter, July/August 1994, Volume 19, Number 4.
Copyright 1994 by the J. Allen Hynek Center for UFO Studies, 2457 West
Peterson Ave., Chicago, IL 60659, published bimonthly with a
subscription rate of $25/yr.)

In the complex story that comprises the Roswell incident, side
issues sometimes attain a momentary importance. For example, Gerald
Anderson, who claimed to have seen a crashed saucer on the Plains of San
Agustin in early July 1947, submitted a phone bill which purported to
document the length of a conversation with me. The length of the call in
and of itself was trivial. It became significant only when it became
apparent that the bill had been doctored. Without that bill and
Anderson’s subsequent admission that he had tampered with it, we might
still be debating the validity of his story. It revealed something
critical to our understanding of Anderson’ s testimony and its place in
the larger scheme of things. A discussion of the matter appears in IUR,
July/August 1992.

A new question, seemingly trivial but in fact important,
concerns the time Col. William Blanchard, commanding officer of the
509th Bomb Group, went on leave in July 1947. In his recent monograph
Roswell in Perspective (published by the Fund for UFO Research, Box 277,
Mount Rainier, Maryland 20712), Karl T. Pflock suggests that Blanchard
began his leave on July 9, 1947, instead of July 8, as Donald R. Schmitt
and I have insisted. Pflock writes, “According to the 509th’s
headquarters morning report and a tiny Associated Press story in the
July 10 Albuquerque Journal, the ninth (not the eighth) was the day he
began ‘a three week leave in Santa Fe and Colorado.’ . . . [H]e was on
his way north on a long planned vacation.”

Pflock continues:

Taken together, these admittedly fragmentary and in some part
questionable bits of testimony and documentation point to a delay
before the 509th was instructed to treat the Brazel discovery as a
sensitive matter. They also suggest Blanchard may have personally
conveyed this guidance to those in the field, perhaps as he was on
his way north on a long-planned vacation – although some have
contended he headed somewhere else entirely.

It appears that Pflock has misunderstood the significance of
Blanchard’s leave and the timing of the events. In fact, when examined
carefully, it becomes clear that the timing actually reinforces the
theory that the 509th was involved in the situation before rancher Mac
Brazel arrived in Roswell with the box of debris on July 6.

The first part of Pflock’s analysis can be resolved without
debate, varied interpretation of eyewitness testimony, or rancor. We can
review the situation and draw a valid conclusion about it based on all
the documentation currently available.

First, we have the testimony of Lt. Col. Joseph Briley.
(According to the unit history, Briley became the Operations Officer in
the middle of July. Prior to that he had been a squadron commander.)
Briley asserts Blanchard had gone to the crash site. Available
information indicates that this visit was made on July 8 and that
Blanchard’s leave began on July 8. The leave was actually a cover for
Blanchard’s activities revolving around the crash.

But Pflock attempts to refute this idea, drawing on Robert
Shirkey’s testimony:

It is entirely possible, even likely, Blanchard went to the debris
field to survey the situation personally. However, reliable
testimony suggests he did not do so on the afternoon of July 8.
First, according to Robert Shirkey, about mid-afternoon that day
he was with Blanchard in the Roswell AAF [Army Air Force]
operations building, where the colonel personally was overseeing
the dispatch of the B-29 which took Jesse Marcel and some of the
debris to Fort Worth. Second, Walter Haut vividly recalls
Blanchard['s] colorfully complaining to him that same afternoon
about not being able to place outside telephone calls because the
base switchboard was tied up with inquiries about the flying
saucer.

While this is interesting, it is not especially significant.
According to other testimony, the debris put on the aircraft arrived in
Fort Worth, Texas, about 4 p.m. local time, or 3 p.m. Roswell time.
Newspaper articles and testimony from J. Bond Johnson suggest the debris
was in Eighth Air Force Commander Brig. Gen. Roger Ramey’s office about
that time. It means, simply, that Blanchard was on the base at Roswell
until the flight’s departure, about 1:30 p.m. Roswell time, and then
left on his leave. There is nothing contradictory about this, and it
allows for both points to be correct.

Second, as Pflock suggests, the morning reports show that
Blanchard was present for duty on July 8 but had signed out on leave
before the morning report was created on July 9. These documents are
available from the Army in St. Louis, and I recovered a complete set of
the headquarters morning reports (which were indirectly supplied to
Pflock) from June 1 to July 31, 1947, through the Freedom of Information
Act.

This, too, does not contradict the proposition that Blanchard
went on leave on July 8. If Blanchard signed out on leave in the
afternoon of July 8, then the morning report would show him present on
the eighth and gone on the ninth – which is exactly what it does show.

The newspaper article Pflock quotes is interesting but probably
irrelevant. It is, after all, a newspaper article, and it shows, again,
that Blanchard was gone on the ninth. It does not tell us when he signed
out from the base.

The critical piece of evidence is Special Order Number 9, issued
by Headquarters, 509th Bomb Group, and dated July 8, 1947. It says,
“Pursuant to the authority contained in Hqs. 8th Air Force TWX number A1
1593 6 July 1947, the undersigned hereby assumes control of the Roswell
Army Air Field, Roswell New Mexico. Effective this date.” It was signed
by Payne Jennings, Lt. Col. A.C. (Air Corps), commanding.

Here is the definitive proof. Jennings assumed command on the
eighth. Therefore Blanchard went on leave on the eighth. If Blanchard
went on leave on the ninth, as Pflock would have us believe, then the
special order would reflect that. Eighth Air Force would not want to
create a situation whereby two commanders were on station at the same
time.

OTHER EVIDENCE

Some other points must be considered. What the Special Order
does is show military interest in the case days before July 8. It shows
that Blanchard’s leave was not long planned because the TWX was sent on
July 6, a Sunday. Had it been a long-planned leave, the TWX would have
been sent earlier. If it was a long-planned leave, there was no reason
to wait until Sunday, July 6, before sending the TWX. That date becomes
important when it is placed in the context of all the activities of that
critical weekend.

In fact. we can see that the military were interested in the
case before Mac Brazel’s arrival. If his arrival had been the reason for
that interest, nothing official would have happened on July 6. Brazel
arrived with debris that was interesting, but if we follow the
conventional wisdom, that is all it was, until Jesse Marcel and the
counter-intelligence agent returned late on July 7. If the headquarters
had waited for their return and for the cursory examination of the
debris on the morning of July 8, then the documentation would have been
dated no earlier than that day. The TWX demonstrates the military were
interested prior to July 8.

The TWX and the Special Order resulted from rumors circulating
in Roswell. Military officials, in both Roswell and Fort Worth, probably
in consultation with Washington, decided that Blanchard had better
monitor the activities. Their problem was, after the story began to
leak, the news media would have noticed Blanchard’s absence. Without
Brazel’s arrival and the rumors spreading through Roswell, there would
have been no reason to cover Blanchard’s absence or to grant him a
leave.

This leads to another point, one not lost on the military
planners. If the story was so important, if it involved a real flying
saucer, would Blanchard leave the base? Surely the commanding officer of
the 509th would not want to be off the base and out of town when the
biggest event of the twentieth century took place, unless his leave
itself was part of the cover-up.

On the other hand, if it was nothing more than a weather
balloon, as the military claimed publicly, then the absence of the
commander wouldn’t matter. Blanchard wouldn’t be expected to cancel his
leave over something so trivial as a crashed weather balloon.

So the TWX on July 6 becomes as important as the Special Order
because it demonstrates what was happening inside the military. They
were responding to the events of the day before. They were preparing for
what was coming. The TWX on July 6 suggests that the military already
knew about the crash on the sixth, and they knew because of what had
been found on the impact site by military officers on July 5.

Let us examine one more aspect of the case. By July 8, when the
press got interested in the Roswell case, the key players had been
removed. Mac Brazel was in military custody, held in the guest house at
the base, according to Maj. Edwin Easley, the 509th Provost Marshal.
Jesse Marcel, the only man mentioned by name in the press release, is no
longer in Roswell but on his way to Fort Worth, or already there and
insulated by Gen. Ramey. And Col. Blanchard? He was on leave, heading to
the north and into Colorado.

Even if we ignore the testimonies of Steve MacKenzie and Jim
Ragsdale, who describe activities on the impact site during the recovery
of the craft and bodies, we can still offer testimony to the 509th’s
involvement prior to the July 8 press announcement. Leo Spear, a
military policeman in Roswell in July 1947, reported hearing other MPs
return to the barracks talking about the crashed flying saucer. Like the
others who had not been used as guards, Spear thought they were making
up the story. But Spear says that when he read about the saucer in the
newspaper (July 8), a day or two after he had heard from his fellow MPs,
he changed his mind.

In other words, he had heard about the crash from the guards
prior to the press release. The release convinced him their stories were
true. This corroborates the reports of those who claim military
involvement on july 5 and supports the idea that the military were
preparing for contingencies on July 6. It suggests they knew a great
deal more much earlier than researchers have believed until recently.

SUPPORT FOR THE NEW TIMELINE

All of this refutes Pflock’s theories about Blanchard’s leave.
Pflock appears to have drawn his conclusions without having reviewed all
the relevant documents or testimonies. It is clear that the military
were active in the Roswell affair on July 5 and that they were planning
for all contingencies on July 6 by, among other things, putting
Blanchard on leave.

What we can do is restructure the timeline based on the
testimony of the participants and underscore the validity of those
changes with existing documentation. The old timeline suggested no
military interest until Mac Brazel arrived. After all, how could the
military begin a recovery before they knew a crash had occurred?

We now know they didn’t. They knew of the crash on July 5 and
commenced recovery operations then. Blanchard’s leave is the key to
understanding this. First we have to ask, why would anyone begin a leave
on a Tuesday afternoon? Or, even if we accept Pflock’s analysis, why
begin on a Wednesday?

Leaves normally start at the close of business on Friday
afternoon, allowing two extra days because of the weekend. With
Blanchard in a high-profile position, he might not have been able to do
that, but surely he would have signed out on Monday morning, not Tuesday
afternoon. The only exception would be an emergency leave, but that
doesn’t seem to have been the case. Nothing in the documentation
indicates that Blanchard was responding to a personal emergency such as
a sick family member. Based on the fragmentary documentation he
produces, Pflock concludes that the leave was routine.

The circumstances and the Special Order No. 9 refute that
notion. They show the military were responding to a critical situation.
Blanchard’s leave was neither routine nor emergency in the normal sense.
Blanchard was being freed to respond to the situation as necessary
without having to worry about awkward questions from reporters. To
summarize: Blanchard began his leave on Tuesday, July 8. It was not long
planned. It was a response to the events of July 5, when the military
recovered a flying saucer just north of Roswell. The situation became
critical when Brazel found the debris field and reported it, not only to
the military officers at the Roswell Army Air Field but also to the
local sheriff and a reporter for a radio station.

——————–

Kevin D. Randle, an IUR contributing editor, is coauthor of The
Truth About the UFO Crash at Roswell (1994).

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