Green balls: atmospheric phenomenon or UFO? Types of UFOs and their appearance There is a luminous ball flying in our forest.

BRUCE MACCABI

From a message to Dr. Mirarni

The efforts of Dr. Kaplan and Major Oder to launch the fireball project bore fruit in the spring of 1950. A six-month contract was signed with the Land Air Corporation, which placed phototheodolites at the White Sands military training ground. In addition, Land Air was to establish 24-hour surveillance at a location in New Mexico designated by the Air Force. The phototheodolites operators at White Sands were instructed to photograph any unusual objects that passed by.

Research began on March 24, 1950. According to a catalog of sightings compiled by Lt. Col. Reese of the 17th AFOSI at Kirtland Air Force Base, many incidents have been reported in the southwestern United States, including around Holloman Air Force Base. For the state of New Mexico, data for 1949 was distributed as follows: Sandia base (Albuquerque) - 17 messages, mainly in the second half of the year; Los Alamosa area – 26 incidents, evenly distributed throughout the entire observation period; Holloman Air Force Base, as well as Alamogordo/White Sands area - 12; other areas in southwestern New Mexico - 20 (75 incidents total). Data for the same areas for the first three months of 1950: Sandia base - 6 (all in February); Los Alamos - 8; Holloman Air Force Base, as well as Alamogordo/White Sands area - 6; other areas

in southwestern New Mexico - 6 (total 26 incidents). With so many observations, scientists were quite confident that they would be able to “catch” a fireball or flying saucer.

On February 21, an observation post was set up at Holloman Air Base: two people with a phototheodolite, a telescope and a movie camera. The watch was only carried out from sunrise to sunset, and during the first month the observers did not notice anything unusual. Then the scientists decided to establish round-the-clock surveillance, which lasted six months: Land Air specialists were on duty at phototheodolites and movie cameras, and airbase employees controlled spectrographic cameras and radio frequency receivers. The Ogonyok project began with high hopes of solving the mystery of flying saucers and fireballs.

A year and a half later, in November 1951, the head of the Ogonyok project, Dr. Louis Elterman, who had previously worked at the Atmospheric Physics Laboratory (one of the divisions of AFCRL), wrote the final report. According to this report, the Ogonyok project was a complete failure: “...no information was received.” He recommended that the project be closed, and his proposal was accepted.

But did the project really fail? Was no information collected? According to the FBI report presented in the last chapter, Land Air employees saw from 8 to 10 unidentified objects. Isn't this “information”? Let's take a closer look at the Ogonyok project.

According to Dr. Elterman, even before Project Ogonyok began, “an abnormally large number of reports” were received from Wann, New Mexico, so it was decided to establish an observation post there. Why this place was chosen remains a mystery to me. It is about 120 miles from Los Alamos, 90 miles from Sandia Air Force Base and nearly 150 miles from Holloman Air Force Base in Alamogordo. Were you going to

were they triangulating along a very long baseline from Holloman Base to Wann or were they actually trying to avoid observation? These questions will forever remain unanswered.

Either way, it was a mistake. After the launch of the Ogonyok project, the frequency of incidents decreased sharply. The Holloman Project Blue Book sighting list includes one sighting in April, one in May, and one in August. The same thing happened in other places. In fact, during the period from April 1 to October 1 (the period of the first contract with Land-Air), there were only 8 sightings in New Mexico, compared to approximately 30 sightings in the previous six months.

This fact is reflected in the final report of the Ogonyok project, which refers to a very small number of observations. However, one circumstance, accidentally or intentionally not reflected in the report, is of much greater importance: the Ogonyok project was successful.

“Some photographic activity was observed on April 27 and May 24, but both cameras did not record anything, so no information was received. On August 30, 1950, during the launch of a rocket from a Bell aircraft, several people observed atmospheric phenomena over Holloman Air Force Base, but neither Land Air nor the project staff were notified of this in time, and, accordingly, no no results received. On August 31, 1950, certain phenomena were observed again after the V-2 was launched. Although a lot of film was wasted, the triangulation was not done properly, so again no meaningful information was obtained.”

During the second contract period, from October 1, 1950 to March 31, 1951, no anomalous phenomena were recorded - as if the phenomenon had responded to the installation of observation posts and moved to another location. Reports of UFOs came from different parts of the country and even from other areas of New Mexico, but not from the Holloman base. Lack of valuable observations was sufficient reason to terminate the contract. After the end of the contract, a discussion broke out about what to do with the data obtained and whether it was worth continuing observations in a “softer” mode, with less effort. In the late spring of 1951, the decision was made to stop all observations. In November 1951, Elterman recommended that “no more time and money be wasted.” And so it was done.

But what about the observations at Holloman Air Force Base in April and May 1950? According to Elterman, no information was received. How justified is this statement?

In my opinion, it is completely unjustified. Some information was certainly obtained when trained observers simultaneously monitored unidentified objects from several different locations. Even more information was obtained if one of these observers was filming with a phototheodolite or movie camera. This is useful information even if “triangulation was not performed properly.” But we do know that triangulation was done at least once, but Elterman didn't mention it.

Further in his report, Dr. Elterman points out a serious flaw in the operational plan for the Ogonyok project. Scientists working on the project knew they might have to analyze film and photographic material, but according to Elterman, the contract did not provide enough funding to analyze the films. After speaking with Mr. Warren Cott, who was in charge of the Land-Air operation, Elterman estimated that it would take at least 30 days to analyze the tape and conduct a comparative study that would “prove that these tapes do not contain significant information” and the same number of persons. According to Elterman, “sufficient funds were not allocated under the contract” for this analysis.

All this is, to put it mildly, surprising. Why organize large-scale searches for unidentified objects using film and photographic equipment if there is no money even to analyze the film? What kind of science project is this? What did they want from the very beginning - to succeed or fail?

Elterman's assertion that a comparative study of the tapes should prove the absence of significant information sounds as if he had already concluded that the tapes would have no practical value. Can such a study be called impartial?

Towards the end of the report, Elterman reinforces his point about the lack of significant information by offering a number of explanations for the unidentified objects: “Many of the observations are consistent with natural phenomena, such as bird flight, planets, meteors, and possibly unusually shaped clouds.”

The average reader of the final report on the Ogonyok project may agree with Dr. Elterman's opinion. Only an astute person will realize that Elterman had not actually proven the truth of his claims, although he presumably had photographic evidence that could serve as evidence... if it did not prove something else.

Dr. Anthony Mirarchi was not an “average reader.” Yes, he was skeptical about the existence of UFOs, but this attitude extended to unconvincing explanations. In 1950 he was head of the Atmospheric Composition Estimation Branch at GRD/AFCRL. The Ogonyok project began under his leadership. However, in

He retired in October 1950 and was not involved in the project when Dr. Elterman wrote his final report. It's possible Dr. Mirarchi never even saw the report.

Dr. Mirarchi visited Holloman AFB in late May 1950 and requested a summary report of the April 27 and May 24 observations mentioned by Elterman (see above). Fortunately for “truth seekers,” a copy of this report was preserved on microfilm in the National Archives, where it was discovered in the late 1970s, long after the project’s inglorious conclusion. As you can see, this document refutes Elterman's point of view.

"1. In response to a request from Dr. E. O. Mirarchi during his current visit to Holloman Base, the following information was provided.

1. On the morning of April 27 and May 24, air phenomena were observed in the vicinity of the base. Observations using Ascania phototheodolites were carried out by employees of the Land-Air Corporation participating in a special research project. It was reported that objects were observed in significant numbers - up to 8 at a time. The employees who conducted the observations are high-class professionals: the reliability of their testimony is beyond doubt. In both cases, phototheodolite photographs were taken.
2. The information processing department at Holloman Base analyzed the images from April 27 and compiled a report, a copy of which I am enclosing along with the film for your information. We initially thought it would be possible to triangulate based on the May 24th imagery since the photography was done at two separate observation points. The films were immediately developed and sent to the information processing department. However, they came to the conclusion that two different objects were recorded on the films, so triangulation was impossible.
3. We have nothing further to tell you on this matter at this time.”

1. According to a conversation with Colonel Baines and Captain Bryant, the following information was received.
2. Decoding the film from observation post P10 made it possible to determine the azimuths and elevation angles for four objects. In addition, the size of the image was recorded on the film.
3. Based on this information and the azimuthal angle taken from station M7, the following conclusions were drawn:

a) The objects were at an altitude of approximately 150,000 feet.

b) The objects were located above the Hollman Ridge, between the air base and Tularosa Peak.

c) The diameter of the objects was approximately 30 feet.

d) The objects were moving at an uncertain, but very high speed.”

Wilbur L. Mitchell, Mathematician Information Processing Division

So, four unidentified objects - in other words, UFOs - flew at an altitude of 150,000 feet above the White Sands training ground. Each one was approximately 30 feet in diameter. This observation was very

similar to Charles Moore's post last year. Could he, like the Land Air operators, have made a mistake? Unlikely. Tracking fast-moving objects and calculating missile trajectories was part of their profession. According to the author of the letter, “the employees who conducted the observations are high-class professionals: the reliability of their testimony is beyond doubt.”

In the spring of 1950, humanity did not have vehicles that could fly at an altitude of 150,000 feet. In that case, what was it? How to explain this?

Compare this report with the statement in the Elterman report, which says that “both cameras recorded nothing, so no information was obtained.”

It is possible that Elterman received the original information about the sightings on April 27 and... May 24 from the same letter that was a response to Dr. Mirarchi's request. However, he did not say a word about the most important result of the Ogonyok project: the triangulation from April 27 contained information about the height and size of objects. Maybe he didn't know about the information processing department's report? Or did he know, but deliberately kept silent about the main result of the observations?

In his book “Reports of Unidentified Flying Objects,” Edward Ruppelt describes in more detail the events of April 27, 1950 at the Holloman base. According to him, that day the operators had just finished tracking the flight of a guided projectile and began to remove the film cassettes when someone noticed strange objects flying high in the sky. The observation posts were equipped with telephone communications, so the rest of the observers received prompt notification.

Unfortunately, all but one of the cameras were discharged, and the UFO was out of sight before the cameramen had time to load new film. According to Ruppelt, “the only photograph showed a dark

an object with blurred outlines. All that could be proven from this image was the presence of some kind of object flying at high altitude.” Apparently Ruppelt was unaware of the triangulation carried out using phototheodolites.

Ruppelt also mentions the May 24 sighting and the impossibility of triangulation due to the fact that the two cameras were pointing at different objects (these words were written in February 1951, a year before he became director of Project Blue Book): “There is no analysis of these tapes in the AMC archives, but there is mention of a data processing facility at White Sands. Later, when I started investigating, I made several calls in an attempt to locate the tapes and tests.”

Unfortunately, Ruppelt was not successful, although with the help of “a major who was very cooperative,” he did contact two people who analyzed the tape of either May 24, August 31, or both ( see Elterman's statement above regarding the August 31 observation). Ruppelt writes:

“[The Major's] message was what I expected - nothing specific except that UFOs are the unknown quantity in the equation. He said that after adjusting the data from the two cameras, they were able to roughly estimate the object's speed, altitude and size. The UFO was flying “above 40,000 feet at over 2,000 miles per hour; its diameter was more than 300 feet.” He warned me that these figures were only preliminary and may have been calculated based on an erroneous adjustment. So they didn't prove anything. The only thing that can be said with certainty is that there really was something in the air.” ‘

Apparently Ruppelt underestimated the importance of this observation. So what if the estimates of speed, size and distance were wrong - after all, there really was something big, unusual and moving at high speed, otherwise the cameramen simply would not have bothered to film it. Since Ruppelt apparently did not know about the April 27 triangulation, one can only wonder whether he would have denied the value of this tape as “proving nothing.”

The message to Dr. Mirarchi ends with a list of notes indicating that two reports (“Data-Red” #1 and 2) and three tapes (P-8 and P-10 May 24 and P-10 April 27) were handed over to him along with a map of Holloman Ridge, which presumably showed the location of surveillance cameras. In the margins there is a handwritten note: “film forwarded to AFCRL for storage” and several other scribbles that are indecipherable. Recent attempts to locate these films have been unsuccessful.

Incidentally, Project Blue Book's large catalog of sightings states that all four of the sightings Elterman listed had "insufficient information" to evaluate.

The frequency of sightings in New Mexico dropped to almost zero in late 1950 and remained low through 1951. Most cases of UFO sightings have been reported in the area of ​​Holloman Air Force Base. The most important of them occurred on January 16 in Artesia (the Ogonyok project was still ongoing, but its employees were not involved in this case). Early in the morning, two Navy engineers working on a special project launched a huge Skyhawk balloon in the vicinity of Artesia. Towards the end of the day it triggered a series of UFO reports in West Texas, but important events occurred in the morning while the balloon was still in the vicinity of Artesia Airport.

At approximately 9:30 a.m., engineers observed the balloon, which by then was at a maximum altitude of 110,000 feet. The ball, approximately 100 feet in diameter, was drifting east at 5 miles per hour. Then the observers saw another round object appear in the clear sky not far from the ball; Apparently, he came down from above. This object had a milky white hue and was significantly larger than the Skyhawk ball. After about half a minute he was out of sight.

Engineers drove several miles west of Artesia to the airport area to continue surveillance. This time they watched the ball together with the airport manager and other people. All witnesses saw two dull gray objects approaching the ball from the northeast at a high altitude, making a 300-degree turn around it, and then moving away in a northerly direction. Compared to the ball, both objects were approximately the same size as the one previously observed. At first they flew at a distance of approximately 7 of their diameters from each other, and when they made a sharp turn around the ball, it seemed to observers that they “stood on edge” and disappeared from sight until they again aligned themselves in the horizontal plane. The objects moved at high speed and, having passed the balloon, disappeared within a few seconds.

In the large catalog of Project Blue Book observations, this case is noted as not being supported by sufficient information - apparently because more than a year passed before Project Grudge staff learned about it (January 1952) and no investigation was undertaken.

Although Dr. Mirarchi retired in October 1950 and did not participate in the final report of the Ogonyok project, his interest in flying saucers and green fireballs remained undiminished.

Four months later he returned “to business” on his own initiative, and three years later his actions almost cost him serious trouble with the authorities.

In mid-January 1951, Time magazine published an article written by renowned scientist Dr. Erner Liddell of the Naval Research Laboratory in Washington. In this article, Dr. Liddell stated that he had studied approximately 2,000 UFO reports, and in his opinion, the only ones that were more or less plausible were the descriptions of Skyhawk balloons, the true nature of which most eyewitnesses had no idea. Apparently, Dr. Liddell was unaware of several incidents involving specialists who themselves launched such balloons.

Apparently Dr. Mirarchi felt it was his civic duty to refute Liddell's claims, as he issued a public response to the article two weeks later.

According to the United Press news agency on February 26, 1951, Mirarchi said that after examining more than 300 reports of flying saucers, he concluded that they were Soviet aircraft photographing objects and testing sites related to atomic weapons .

According to the United Press article, the forty-year-old scientist, who has been “for more than a year engaged in top secret research into unusual phenomena,” unequivocally argued that no probes or balloons could leave contrails behind them. Another point against Dr. Liddell is that balloons cannot be seen at night.

Mirarchi also explained how scientists “collected dust particles with abnormally high levels of

copper, which could not have come from any other source than the propulsion device of the flying saucer”*.

Mirarchi said that “fireballs or flying saucers,” as he called them, were regularly observed in the Los Alamos area while he was installing a system of phototheodolites to measure the speed, size and distance of objects... but mysteriously stopped appearing when the equipment was ready to go. However, he mentioned two cases when it was possible to obtain documentary evidence: a photograph of a round luminous object and a film on which for one and a half minutes one could see “a fast-flying object leaving a contrail behind it.”

Dr. Mirarchi said he was aware that many incidents involved sightings of balloons and probes, but “the existence of flying saucers is supported by so much evidence that it cannot be doubted.” He said that he could not understand how the Navy [that is, Dr. Lidzel] could deny the existence of this phenomenon.

Dr. Mirarchi's speech ended with accusations against the government. He said the government was “committing an act of suicide” by refusing to openly admit that flying saucers were real and most likely of Soviet origin.

Powerful words! So strong that after more than two years, Dr. Mirarchi had to pay for them. According to one Air Force document, declassified * Referring to Dr. LaPaz's efforts to collect air samples from areas where green fireballs were observed to analyze copper or copper compounds. Such compounds burn with a “green flame” or have a characteristic greenish tint when heated. In one case, high levels of copper were actually detected in the sample, but Dr. Lapas was not sure that the green fireball was the source.

In 1991, at the height of the Cold War and the spy hunt (referring to 1953, when the Rosenbergs were executed for passing on secret material about the production of atomic weapons to the Russians), the FBI asked the Air Force whether it should involve Dr. ra Mirarchi to responsibility for violating the secrecy regime.

Frederick Oder, who played an important role in launching the Ogonyok project (see Chapter 12), responded in writing that since Mirarchi had leaked some information to the press classified as “secret” or “for official use,” this “could have caused serious consequences.” damage to the internal security of the country […] both in terms of the prestige of our government and in the sense of revealing our interest in certain classified projects.”

However, Brigadier General W. M. Garland, who commanded the AMC in 1953, decided not to proceed with the matter because, in his opinion, Dr. Mirarchi's information was of no practical value. According to the general, the theory about the Soviet origin of flying saucers “has already been debunked and, at best, represents a personal opinion that cannot be considered classified information.” In other words, General Garland did not consider flying saucers and green fireballs to be Soviet devices, although he did not say what he thought they were.

It is possible that General Garland let Mirarchi off the intelligence agency's hook with a recommendation that the results of Project Ogonyok be declassified and published in December 1951, only a month after the final report was compiled.

However, the AMC archives do not contain any record that the materials were declassified. Moreover, in February 1952, the Directorate of Intelligence received a letter from the Directorate of Research and Development containing the opposite recommendation:

“The Secretariat of the Scientific Advisory Council proposed not to declassify the project for a number of reasons, the main one being the lack of a scientifically based explanation of the “fireballs” and other phenomena in the report on the results of the [Ogonyok] project. Some renowned scientists still believe that the observed phenomena are of man-made origin.”

Another letter, sent from the Directorate of Intelligence to the Research Division of the Directorate of Research and Development and dated March 11, 1952, contains another argument in favor of maintaining secrecy:

“We believe that publicizing this information in its current form will cause unnecessary speculation and create unfounded fears among the public, as happened after the publication of previous press releases about unidentified flying objects. There is absolutely no need for this, especially if no real solution to the problem has been found.”

In other words, Air Force intelligence understood that many people saw through the smokescreen of previous explanations and wanted real answers; If such answers are not found, then it is better to remain silent.

More than a year after Mirarchi responded to Liddell, Life magazine published an article on flying saucers (discussed in Chapter 19). The authors of the article describe some UFO sightings that forced the Air Force command to establish the Ogonyok research project. Of the hundreds of letters the editors received in connection with this article, one was sent by Captain Daniel McGovern, who wrote: “I was very closely associated with the work on the Grudge and Ogonyok projects at Alamogordo, New Mexico, as I was head of the photographic department. service at Holloman Air Force Base. I have personally seen several unidentified flying objects; as for their shape, speed and size, everything is indicated correctly in your article”*.

In contact with

First: Very small objects, which are balls or disks with a diameter of 20-100 cm, which fly at low altitudes, sometimes fly out of larger objects and return to them. There is a known case that took place in October 1948 in the area of ​​the Fargo airbase (North Dakota), when the pilot Gormon unsuccessfully pursued a round luminous object with a diameter of 30 cm, which very skillfully maneuvered, evading pursuit, and sometimes itself quickly moved towards the plane, forcing Hormon to avoid the collision.

Second: Small UFOs, which are egg-shaped and disk-shaped and have a diameter of 2-3 m. They usually fly at low altitude and most often land. Small UFOs have also been repeatedly seen detaching from and returning to the main objects.

Third: Main UFOs, most often disks with a diameter of 9-40 m, the height of which in the central part is 1/5-1/10 of their diameter. The main UFOs fly independently in any layer of the atmosphere and sometimes land. Smaller objects can be separated from them.

Fourth: Large UFOs, usually shaped like cigars or cylinders, 100-800 meters or more in length. They appear mainly in the upper layers of the atmosphere, do not perform complex maneuvers, and sometimes hover at high altitudes. There have been no recorded cases of them landing on the ground, but small objects have been observed repeatedly being separated from them. There is speculation that large UFOs can fly in space. There are also isolated cases of observation of giant disks with a diameter of 100-200 m.

Such an object was observed during a test flight of the French Concorde aircraft at an altitude of 17,000 m above the Republic of Chad during a solar eclipse on June 30, 1973. The crew and a group of scientists on the plane filmed a movie and took a series of color photographs of a luminous object in the shape of a mushroom cap with a diameter of 200 m and a height of 80 m, which followed an intersecting course. At the same time, the contours of the object were unclear, since it was apparently surrounded by an ionized plasma cloud. On February 2, 1974, the film was shown on French television. The results of the study of this object were not published.

Commonly encountered forms of UFOs have variations. For example, disks with one or two convex sides, spheres with or without rings surrounding them, as well as oblate and elongated spheres were observed. Objects of rectangular and triangular shape are much less common. According to the French group for the study of aerospace phenomena, approximately 80% of all observed UFOs were round in the shape of disks, balls or spheres, and only 20% were elongated in the shape of cigars or cylinders. UFOs in the form of discs, spheres and cigars have been observed in most countries on all continents. Examples of rarely seen UFOs are given below. For example, UFOs with rings surrounding them, similar to the planet Saturn, were recorded in 1954 over Essex County (England) and over the city of Cincinnati (Ohio), in 1955 in Venezuela and in 1976 over the Canary Islands .

A UFO in the shape of a parallelepiped was observed in July 1977 in the Tatar Strait by members of the crew of the motor ship Nikolai Ostrovsky. This object flew next to the ship for 30 minutes at an altitude of 300-400 m, and then disappeared.

Since the end of 1989, triangular-shaped UFOs began to systematically appear over Belgium. According to the description of many eyewitnesses, their dimensions were approximately 30 by 40 m, with three or four luminous circles located on their lower part. The objects moved completely silently, hovered and took off at enormous speeds. On March 31, 1990, southeast of Brussels, three credible eyewitnesses observed how such a triangular-shaped object, six times larger than the visible disk of the moon, silently flew over their heads at an altitude of 300-400 m. Four luminous circles were clearly visible on the underside of the object.

On the same day, engineer Alferlan filmed such an object flying over Brussels with a video camera for two minutes. Before Alferlan's eyes, the object made a turn and three luminous circles and a red light between them became visible on its lower part. At the top of the object, Alferlan noticed a glowing lattice dome. This video was shown on central television on April 15, 1990.

Along with the main forms of UFOs, there are many more different varieties. The table, shown at a meeting of the US Congress Committee on Science and Astronautics in 1968, depicted 52 UFOs of different shapes.

According to the international ufological organization "Contact international", the following forms of UFOs have been observed:

1) round: disc-shaped (with and without domes); in the form of an inverted plate, bowl, saucer or rugby ball (with or without a dome); in the form of two plates folded together (with and without two bulges); hat-shaped (with and without domes); bell-like; in the shape of a sphere or ball (with or without a dome); similar to the planet Saturn; ovoid or pear-shaped; barrel-shaped; similar to an onion or a top;

2) oblong: rocket-like (with and without stabilizers); torpedo-shaped; cigar-shaped (without domes, with one or two domes); cylindrical; rod-shaped; fusiform;

3) pointed: pyramidal; in the shape of a regular or truncated cone; funnel-like; arrow-shaped; in the form of a flat triangle (with and without a dome); diamond-shaped;

4) rectangular: bar-like; in the shape of a cube or parallelepiped; in the shape of a flat square and rectangle;

5) unusual: mushroom-shaped, toroidal with a hole in the center, wheel-shaped (with and without spokes), cross-shaped, deltoid, V-shaped.

Generalized NIKAP data on observations of UFOs of various shapes in the USA for 1942-1963. are given in the following table:

Shape of objects, Number of cases / Percentage of total case

1. Disc-shaped 149 / 26
2. Spheres, ovals, ellipses 173 / 30
3. Type of rockets or cigars 46/8
4. Triangular 11/2
5. Luminous points 140 / 25
6. Others 33 / 6
7. Radar (non-visual) observations 19 / 3

Total 571 / 100

Notes:

1. Objects, by their nature classified in this list as spheres, ovals and ellipses, may in fact be disks inclined at an angle to the horizon.

2. The luminous points in this list include small brightly luminous objects, the shape of which could not be determined due to the great distance.

It should be borne in mind that in many cases, observers' readings may not reflect the true shape of objects, since a disk-shaped object may look like a ball from below, like an ellipse from below, and like a spindle or mushroom cap from the side; an object shaped like a cigar or an elongated sphere may appear like a ball from the front and back; a cylindrical object may look like a parallelepiped from below and from the side, and like a ball from the front and back. In turn, an object in the shape of a parallelepiped from the front and back may look like a cube.

Data on the linear dimensions of a UFO reported by eyewitnesses are in some cases very relative, since with visual observation only the angular dimensions of the object can be determined with sufficient accuracy.

Linear dimensions can only be determined if the distance from the observer to the object is known. But determining the distance in itself presents great difficulties, because human eyes, due to stereoscopic vision, can correctly determine the distance only within a range of up to 100 m. Therefore, the linear dimensions of a UFO can only be determined very approximately.

The surface of the UFO is usually shiny, as if polished, and no seams or rivets are visible on it. The top side of an object is usually light, and the bottom is dark. Some UFOs have domes that are sometimes transparent.

UFOs with domes were observed, in particular, in 1957 over New York, in 1963 in the state of Victoria (Australia), and in our country in 1975 near Borisoglebsk and in 1978 in Beskudnikovo.

In some cases, one or two rows of rectangular “windows” or round “portholes” were visible in the middle of the objects. An oblong object with such “portholes” was observed in 1965 by members of the crew of the Norwegian ship Yavesta over the Atlantic.

In our country, UFOs with “portholes” were observed in 1976 in the village of Sosenki near Moscow, in 1981 near Michurinsk, in 1985 near Geok-Tepe in the Ashgabat region. On some UFOs, rods similar to antennas or periscopes were clearly visible.

In February 1963, in the state of Victoria (Australia), a disk 8 m in diameter with a rod similar to an antenna hovered at an altitude of 300 m above a tree.

In July 1978, members of the crew of the motor ship Yargora, sailing along the Mediterranean Sea, observed a spherical object flying over North Africa, in the lower part of which three antenna-like structures were visible.

There have also been cases when these rods moved or rotated. Below are two such examples. In August 1976, Muscovite A.M. Troitsky and six other witnesses saw a silvery metal object over the Pirogovsky reservoir, 8 times the size of the lunar disk, slowly moving at an altitude of several tens of meters. Two rotating stripes were visible on its side surface. When the object was above the witnesses, a black hatch opened in its lower part, from which a thin cylinder extended. The lower part of this cylinder began to describe circles, while the upper part remained attached to the object. In July 1978, passengers on the Sevastopol-Leningrad train near Kharkov watched for several minutes as a rod with three brightly luminous points emerged from the top of a motionlessly hanging elliptical UFO. This rod was deflected to the right three times and returned to its previous position. Then a rod with one luminous point extended from the bottom of the UFO.

UFO Info. Types of UFOs and their appearance

Inside the lower part of the UFO there are sometimes three or four landing legs, which extend during landing and retract inward during takeoff. Here are three examples of such observations.

In November 1957, Senior Lieutenant N., returning from Stead Air Force Base (Las Vegas), saw four disk-shaped UFOs with a diameter of 15 m on the field, each of which stood on three landing supports. As they took off, these supports retracted inward before his eyes.

In July 1970, a young Frenchman, Erien J., near the village of Jabrelles-les-Bords, clearly saw four metal supports ending in rectangles gradually retracting into the air of a round UFO with a diameter of 6 m that had taken off.

In the USSR, in June 1979, in the city of Zolochev, Kharkov region, witness Starchenko observed how a UFO in the shape of an overturned saucer with a row of portholes and a dome landed 50 m from him. When the object dropped to a height of 5-6 m, three landing supports about 1 m long, ending in the likeness of blades, telescopically extended from its bottom. After standing on the ground for about 20 minutes, the object took off, and it was visible how the supports were retracted into its body. At night, UFOs usually glow, sometimes their color and intensity of the glow change with changes in speed. When flying rapidly, they have a color similar to that produced by arc welding; at a slower rate - a bluish color.

When falling or braking, they turn red or orange. But it happens that objects hovering motionless glow with bright light, although it is possible that it is not the objects themselves that glow, but the air around them under the influence of some radiation emanating from these objects. Sometimes some lights are visible on a UFO: on elongated objects - on the bow and stern, and on disks - on the periphery and on the bottom. There are also reports of rotating objects with red, white or green lights.

In October 1989, in Cheboksary, six UFOs in the form of two saucers folded together hovered over the territory of the Industrial Tractor Plant production association. Then a seventh object joined them. On each of them yellow, green and red lights were visible. Objects rotated and moved up and down. Half an hour later, six objects soared up at great speed and disappeared, but one remained for some time. Sometimes these lights come on and off in a specific sequence.

In September 1965, two police officers in Exeter (New York) observed the flight of a UFO with a diameter of about 27 m, on which there were five red lights that flashed on and off in the sequence: 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 4th, 3rd, 2nd, 1st. The duration of each cycle was 2 seconds.

A similar incident occurred in July 1967 in Newton, New Hampshire, where two former radar operators observed through a telescope a luminous object with a series of lights flashing on and off in the same sequence as at the Exeter site.

The most important characteristic feature of UFOs is the manifestation of unusual properties that are not found either in natural phenomena known to us or in technical means created by man. Moreover, it seems that certain properties of these objects clearly contradict the laws of physics known to us.

Almost five months have passed in 2019, and the American organization MUFON Mutual Network, specializing in the study of UFO encounters, has published several reports related to the sighting of unidentified objects over the past and the first months of this year. From these cases we have selected only a few that seem to us the most interesting and exciting. In recent months, the report says, UFOs have been observed in the US, UK, the Philippines and other countries. At the same time, along with the already familiar objects, flying triangles and floating balls were observed.

Illustration: Depositphotos.com/boscorelli

Black triangular UFO over London and the Philippines

On May 1, 2018, a UFO in the shape of a black triangle flew over the British capital of London and, according to one of the eyewitnesses of this incident, it was two to three times the size of an Airbus A380. The witness and his wife observed the object from near the rear of their home around 11:30 p.m., where they had gone out to smoke. As the wife-witnesses describe, a black triangular UFO appeared in the west. Round lights glowed at its corners, and a red-orange glow was observed in the center of the object.

The object flew over them smoothly and without jerking, and its trajectory followed a small arc. As the UFO moved in the sky, it suddenly performed a rotational motion and flew from the western to the northern horizon of London in just 8-10 seconds. There was no noise during the flight, and the sky was starry. When the UFO flew away, the couple could not come to their senses for a long time, trying to understand what they saw.

The witnesses, they say, work in the film industry, so they have no reason not to trust their eyes. The flying object showed its clear solid structure, and also a flicker on the underside that looked like a pulse glitch or interference. It can be assumed, based on the descriptions of witnesses, that the UFO apparently had its cloaking device turned on and off - probably for the purpose of rebooting.

This UFO sighting was classified as an "unknown aircraft".

Low flying triangular UFO over the Philippines

On March 2, 2019, an eyewitness from the Philippine city of Dasmarinas saw a low-flying UFO in the shape of a triangle. She was just driving down the expressway at 5:25 when she saw faint lights shining on a V-shaped object. At first she thought it might be a plane or even a bird. For the birds, however, the time was too early and too dark. The UFO flew over the woman almost silently, and its size turned out to be enormous.

When the object flew over the trees and disappeared behind them, the witness was literally speechless from what she saw. She drove in the direction in which the UFO had flown away, continuing to peer into the sky, but did not see anything else. After the encounter with the UFO, she was shocked and felt strange, and then told her friend about this strange incident.

MUFON field researcher Eric Smith classified this UFO incident as an "unknown flying object."

A soaring UFO flew over a power plant in Florida

Last spring, on April 17, 2018 to be exact, a spherical floating object was observed above the C.D. power plant. McIntosh Jr. Power Plant in Lakeland, in the US state of Florida.

According to the witness and her fiance, they were walking their dogs near Parer Lake on April 17, 2018 at 9:00 p.m. And then she noticed an orange ball standing in the sky. From where she was, it was clear that the UFO was hovering directly above the power plant. The woman stood and watched the object for several minutes. Her fiancé fully confirmed what his future wife told her.

When they looked at the UFO for several minutes, the ball suddenly illuminated for 10-15 seconds with a bright white light. After that, it switched back to the orange glow. The couple returned with the dogs back to the house and continued to watch the object from the window. But as soon as they approached the window, the UFO flew to the west, and immediately developed a high speed comparable to an airliner. But she claims it was neither a plane nor a helicopter.

This case was studied by MUFON field researcher Mark D. Barbieri, who classified it as Unknown.

Bernard Gildenberg, a retired US Air Force colonel, participated in secret CIA programs for thirty-five years and was involved in them as a consultant for another quarter of a century, already in retirement. In an article recently published in the US magazine Skeptical Inquirer, Gildenberg explains how CIA balloons contributed to the record of sensational UFO sightings. We bring to your attention the abstract of the article.

The launch of one of the Skyhook program cylinders from aboard a military transport ship.

Preparing for flight a four-ton container with equipment for the Skyhook program. The walls of the container were covered with solar panels, which provided power to the equipment.

For several decades, as part of the secret Projects Mogul and Skyhook, which began in 1947, the CIA launched huge balloons with automatic reconnaissance equipment. The volume of such a ball made of polymer film was twice as large as that of the largest German airships of the 30s of the last century. A helium-inflated balloon with a diameter of 90 meters and a height of 130 meters from the gondola to the top was capable of carrying several tons of equipment for a long time at a given altitude (usually in the stratosphere). Illuminated high in the sky by the rays of the sun, when it was already dark at sea level, such a ball could well arouse the interest of outside observers and give rise to many sensations. It is no coincidence that the first wave of reports of UFO sightings arose precisely in 1947, with the beginning of the Mogul project. The goal of the project was to identify radioactive isotopes in the upper atmosphere that arise during nuclear weapons testing. In addition, within the framework of the Skyhook and Moby Dick projects, similar balloons with equipment for studying wind currents in the stratosphere were launched. The military intended to use these winds with constant direction and speed to deliver the balls to the territory of the intended enemy. It would be possible to change the direction of flight by changing the height of the ball, causing it to alternately fall into multidirectional flows.

The soft landing of such a balloon with suspended equipment, which took place at night accompanied by three helicopters, is accurately described in one of the books about UFOs: “At night, floating red lights appeared in the sky over the highway. They moved towards the field and sank to the ground. It was possible to see an object the height of a three-story building, above which other lights moved, sometimes descending towards the main object." There were indeed red lights on the balloon's gondola; the rest of the lights belonged to helicopters.

There was also a top-secret project WS-119L, which at various times was assigned verbal designations that were more convenient to pronounce and remember, for example, “Gopher” (a rodent living in North America). These balloons were intended to fly with huge aerial photographic installations over the territory of the Soviet Union. The project remained secret until the mid-80s, although back in the 50s several of these balloons were shot down by Soviet air defense, and the remains of the shell and equipment were demonstrated to the press.

The balloons of this program were first tested over the United States, they were launched from air bases in Alamogordo (New Mexico) and in the states of Montana, Missouri and Georgia. For example, in 1952, 640 flights were carried out. It is not surprising that in these and surrounding areas newspapers, radio and television channels began to report on mysterious flying objects. And when the gondola of one of these balloons crashed over New Mexico and the remains of the secret equipment were hastily hidden at the Roswell airbase, rumors spread that a downed alien apparatus with the embalmed bodies of these creatures was stored in the hangar at the base. Discussions about this are still ongoing.

To fly over the USSR, balloons of the WS-119L program were launched from Turkey, from Western Europe and from the Pacific coast of the United States (and previously, sounding balloons were launched from there to study the direction of air flows). Many flights were successful, and since they were kept secret even from the closest allies, in 1958 the European headquarters of NATO worriedly reported in a secret report about the flight of several UFOs from the Soviet Union at an altitude of 30 km over Western Europe. These were balloons launched from the southern tip of Alaska.

The military also considered the possibility of hanging a nuclear bomb from a balloon and delivering it more or less accurately to the designated target, using the known trajectories of constant air flows at different levels of the stratosphere. But with the advent of reliable and accurate intercontinental missiles, the idea disappeared.

In 1952, at the Alamogordo base, an F-86 fighter intercepted a high-altitude balloon to test whether Soviet aircraft could shoot down American balloons. The press received a message: a fighter tried to intercept a UFO, but failed. The date, time of the experiment and the type of aircraft were reported accurately in the newspapers, but the reporters added on their own that the UFO either hovered motionless, or in a matter of seconds accelerated to 1200 kilometers per hour.

The experimental balloon, launched from Alamogordo on October 27, 1953, refused to descend into the United States 24 hours after launch due to a malfunction of the timing relay and continued its flight. Six days later, the British Air Force discovered a UFO in the sky over the Atlantic, flying in the direction of London! A sensational sensation arose in the English press. British intelligence soon found out what was going on, but chose to remain silent for reasons of secrecy, especially since one of the launch points for the WS-119L program in the direction of the USSR was in Scotland. Nevertheless, this case still appears in the UFO literature as an example of undoubted “contact with aliens.”

In the 50-60s, Gildenberg participated in a program for launching balloons, which, having risen 32 km, were supposed to turn on bright light flashes (an altimeter for cruise missiles was being tested). It is clear that this mysterious phenomenon did not pass the attention of the public and caused a stir in the newspapers.

In 1967 and 1969, the author took part in testing new and improved aerial cameras. Such an installation was placed in a cylinder 3 meters high and weighed 3-4 tons. The flight of the high-altitude balloon was monitored by military helicopters with armed detachments, which immediately surrounded the landing site of the equipment to protect it from prying eyes. The descended installation was loaded into a helicopter and delivered to the nearest air base. Of course, newspaper reports again appeared that the military had shot down a UFO and was hiding it from the public.

From 1956 to the early 70s, the secret program "Grab Bag" ("bag of gifts") was in operation, aimed at searching in the stratosphere for radioactive traces of atomic testing and plutonium production in the Soviet Union. The military was testing new equipment. At a certain moment, by a radio signal or by a signal from a time relay, the valve in the cylinder opened, part of the gas was released, the balloon descended from 20-30 km to one or two kilometers and dropped the equipment by parachute, and in flight, not allowing it to reach the Earth, it was intercepted by an airplane. The balloon, freed from its load, soared upward and burst somewhere in the stratosphere. Newspapers and television reported: a UFO attacked a military aircraft, separated from a huge mother ship, which immediately soared upward with incredible speed and disappeared.

In the equipment lowered by parachute, a powerful pump was turned on, pumping the collected samples of stratospheric air into a metal container. This noise added mystery to the whole process. Sometimes some of the collected radioactive material fell on the ground, and UFO enthusiasts then noted a slight increase in radioactivity at the scene. The Grab Bag program was so secret that the military could not even tell the concerned local authorities, without revealing the essence of what had happened, that they were conducting some kind of testing here and there was nothing to worry about. The project generated the largest number of reports of UFOs over America.

In fact, the American authorities not only did not try to curb the mass hysteria about “flying saucers”, but also quietly encouraged it. The calculation was this: when American reconnaissance balloons fly over the territory of the Soviet Union, the Russians will write off reports about them as mysterious UFOs, about which there is so much noise in American newspapers. Since these mysterious phenomena, which have now appeared over Russia, did not cause any harm to America and the Americans did not manage to intercept them, they probably should not attach too much importance to them.

Gildenberg believes that all these programs did not bring any significant intelligence data, and their only practical solution was to develop a technique for delivering capsules with photographic film and other data from satellites, and subsequently for a soft landing of astronauts.