About
a year ago, David Grusch showed up on the UFO scene talking about UFO crashes.
In the course of his revelations, he mentioned a dozen UFO crashes over the
years. Now, I sometimes think that I’m the leading expert on UFO crashes,
having inherited the title from the late Len Stringfield, so I believe can
speculate with some expertise on the subject of UFO crashes. Without Len, we
might not even be having this conversation but Len brought the whole subset of
UFO crashes into the public arena.
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| David Grusch |
For those who are unfamiliar with this, Len began investigating tales of UFO crashes, years before the rest of us climbed on that bandwagon. He collected the stories with little in the way of critical comment. His theory was to publish the information, knowing that someone would attempt to verify it. Without that beginning, we wouldn’t be having this discussion today.
That
brings us to David Grusch, who “leaked” some information about crashes but not
very much. He mentioned two crashes. One at Roswell that is so well known now
that it was an answer on Jeopardy! The other was something alleged to
have happened in Italy in 1933. Americans captured the craft from the Italians at
the end of the Second World War.
Italian
UFO researchers, who investigated the claims about the case some twenty to
thirty years ago, concluded that it was a hoax. It would seem that anyone on
the inside, that is the people feeding information to Grush, would have known
that. You can see the evidence here:
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2023/06/david-grush-and-1933-italian-ufo-crash.html
Connected
to Roswell, is the reported case of a crash of a craft on the Plains of San
Agustin in western New Mexico. This tale was linked to the Roswell UFO crash
when Stan Friedman suggested that two alien craft had collided, one falling to
earth near Roswell and the other much farther to the west. The best evidence is
that this aspect of the Roswell case is a hoax. You can learn more about it
here:
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/search?q=Plains+of+San+Agustin
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2021/04/did-herbert-dick-lie-about-being-on.html
http://www.cufos.org/books/Plains_of_San_AgustinR.pdf
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2015/02/the-plains-of-san-agustin-crash.html
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2022/09/lue-elizondo-and-two-crashes-on-same-day.html
https://www.ufoexplorations.com/other-roswell-crash-secret-of-plain
From
that point, Grusch has said that he has more information about the other ten,
that he had talked to people who had seen some of these craft, but that he
hasn’t seen anything himself. Don Schmitt, Tom Carey, and I can make the same
claim. The difference is that we have named names. Lots of names. Some turned
out to be charlatans, others just felt they wanted to tell an interesting
story, and a few thought of it was a way to financial gain. But there is a
solid core of individuals who were there and who were first-hand witnesses. You
can learn about some of them here:
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2007/07/edwin-easley-and-roswell.html
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2009/09/paul-kimball-lance-moody-ufos-and-me.html
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2023/11/new-documentation-for-roswell-easley.html
My
point is that some of us have been around long enough that we can figure out
what crashes Grusch has been told about. In no particular order, here is what I
know about this. The Aztec, New Mexico crash on March 25, 1948, is probably the
first UFO crash that gained any sort of national attention. Frank Scully
published a book, Behind the Flying Saucers, that told the tale of the
crash. Though he mentioned a couple of other alleged crashes, he focused on the
Aztec event because he had talked to the men who knew all about.
The
story was that craft was found near tiny Aztec, was recovered by the military
and had contained bodies of the Venusian flight crew. The story was exposed as
a hoax and for those interested in following this down the rabbit hole, I
suggest reading Scully’s book, then William Steinman’s compilation of nonsense,
UFO Crash at Aztec and finally Scott Ramsey’s The Aztec Incident
on the pro side but with supporting evidence that is weak to nonexistent.
Ramsey did a good job of running down alleged witnesses, but he didn’t have the
opportunity to interview anyone with first-hand knowledge. In other words,
Ramey and his team interviewed people who knew people who said they knew
something about the case. And some of those witnesses said that there had been
no crash.
There
is good evidence on the other side of the argument, you can read Monte Shriver’s
investigation on this blog here:
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2013/02/aztec-in-perspective-by-monte-shriver.html
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2013/02/aztec-in-perspective-by-monte-shriver_8.html
I
suspect one of the better tales is that from Kecksburg, Pennsylvania on
December 9, 1965. This case is the bailiwick of Stan Gordon who was on the
scene within hours to investigate and has carried out that investigation over
the decades. Working with Leslie Kean, Gordon even sued NASA in an attempt to
gather additional information. However, like so much in this aspect of UFO
crashes, there is a plausible alternative. You can read more about this case
here:
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2021/11/x-zone-broadcast-network-stan-gordon.html
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2017/01/x-zone-boardcast-network-stan-gordon.html
The
Del Rio, Texas, UFO crash has been the subject of an ongoing investigation for decades.
It was accepted by UFO researchers in the beginning because a high ranking,
retired Air Force officer, provided an affidavit proving the authenticity of
his information. This crash, misidentified as the El Indio – Guerrero crash was
included in the MJ-12 documents, providing even more credibility. The problem
was the high-ranking officer, Robert Willingham was not a high-ranking officer,
was not a fighter pilot as claimed and the documentation from both the military
records center in St. Louis and the Air Reserve Personnel Center in Denver did
not verify his officer status. He was, according to the available information,
a low-ranking enlisted man who served only thirteen months on active duty. You
can read more about that here:
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2011/08/absense-of-evidence.html
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2014/03/ihave-argued-for-years-that-eisenhower.html
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2018/06/mj-12-and-cognitive-dissonance.html
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2010/07/del-rio-ufo-crash-and-mj-12.html
One
of the reports that has received traction in the last couple of years was the
story from little San Antonio, New Mexico, about a crash there in 1945. Dr.
Jacques Vallee, along with Paola Harris published a book, Trinity: The Best
Kept Secret, that provided two eyewitness accounts of the crash and
retrieval. Those witnesses, who were youngsters at the time of crash offered
shifting accounts as to the date, the names of other witnesses, and the
military recovery operation. Douglas Dean Johnson has made an in-depth study of
that case and has provided amazing evidence that it never happened. You can
read all about it here:
https://douglasjohnson.ghost.io/crash-story-file-the-reme-baca-smoking-gun-interview/
https://douglasjohnson.ghost.io/crash-story-the-trinity-ufo-crash-hoax/
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2021/06/trinity-best-kept-secret-critique.html
I
learned of the Las Vegas UFO crash as I was conducting research into the
Roswell case. I interviewed witnesses in Utah who had seen a low flying UFO
about fifteen minutes before the craft was seen to explode in the sky east of
Las Vegas, Nevada. Hundreds of witnesses in Las Vegas saw that explosion. The
Air Force wrote the case off as a bolide, that is a bright meteor, but I
originally had reason to suspect that was not a good answer. However,
additional investigation has led me to conclude the Air Force explanation was probably
accurate, but there are many who still do not accept that answer. You can read
more about it here:
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/search?q=Las+Vegas+UFO+Crash
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2008/08/las-vegas-ufo-crash.html
One
of what is considered among the first UFO crashes took place in tiny Aurora,
Texas in April 1897. The craft allegedly hit a windmill and exploded. The local
residents found the mangled body of the lone occupant and buried it in the
Aurora cemetery. UFO researchers began to visit Aurora to validate this early
case, which was a hoax started by a stringer for a Dallas newspaper. You can
read more about this here:
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2005/03/aurora-texas-story-that-wont-die.html
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2018/04/aurora-texas-again.html
The
case of a crash near Kingman, Arizona in 1953 might be included because the
original story was told by a man who seemed credible. He said, and the evidence
proved, that he had worked in the Frenchman Flats area of southern Nevada on a
project that dealt with atomic energy. He also said that he was assigned in
some capacity to Project Blue Book. There is no evidence that this claim is
true.
Although
originally called Fritz Werner by Raymond Fowler in an article published in
1976, his real name was Arthur Stansel. He said that he had received a call in
May 1953 about some sort of important and classified event. As evidence of
this, Stansel provided two pages from his work calendar that mentioned a
special assignment, but no details were given.
He
boarded a bus with many others and taken to a site where they were given
specific jobs to do, they were not to speak to the others on the bus, and once
their task was completed, they were loaded back on the bus, with warnings that
they were never to mention this. In a rather stupid move, an Air Force NCO had
a list of names that he called out to ensure that people got to the places they
were to work.
Stansel
did see a disk that had crashed, and by accident, saw the deceased members of
the crew that were not human. He returned to Frenchman Flats and his regular
assignment.
Years
later, a woman, Judie Woolcott, said that her late husband had been part of the
recovery team, which added credibility to the tale. She claimed to have a
letter he had written to her while he served in Vietnam, providing some detail.
However, she was unable to produce the letter. She said he had been killed in
the Vietnam War. Her daughter later contacted me, explaining that her mother
made up tales and that her father had not died in Vietnam. You can read more
about that here:
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2011/05/kingman-ufo-crash-really.html
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2015/10/the-decline-and-fall-of-ufology.html
For
those interested in tales that have some physical evidence, is the case from
Ubatuba, Brazil. According to the most popular version, witnesses saw a craft
explode in the air, raining debris down on a local beach in September 1957.
Some of it was picked up by an unknown witness who sent it to a radio station
reporter. The material eventually made it to APRO here in the US. It has been
analyzed by several organizations including the Air Force that inadvertently
destroyed its sample. You can read more about this here:
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2010/05/ubatuba-ufo-sample.html
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2021/12/jacques-vallee-and-ten-unexplained-ufo.html
Recently,
Jacques Vallee reported that the date was wrong. The explosion took place much
earlier, prior to World War Two. Vallee’s information contradicts the
originally reported tale and Vallee offered nothing in the way of evidence.
According
to Len Stringfield, he was contacted by a woman who claimed that her grandfather
had been to the scene of a UFO crash near Cape Girardeau, Missouri, in 1941.
She claimed there had been a picture taken of the off-world creatures, but the
picture had been lost over the years. She only saw the picture and heard her
father taking about the crash. She saw nothing else.
A
man, who saw nothing himself but whose father had been involved also told his
story of the alleged crash. Other than these two people, who apparently saw
nothing themselves, no one else has come forward to validate the claim. There
are those who accept the story as real. You can read more about it here:
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2019/12/cape-girardeau-ufo-crash-1941.html
The
one case that has some credibility to it, other than Roswell, was the crash
that took place near Shag Harbour, Canada in 1968. It has been investigated
in-depth by Chris Styles and Don Ledger. They have uncovered official Canadian
documents, some of which were originally classified, proving that something
fell into the harbour and that both the Canadian and the US governments and
military responded, searching the downed craft. Like Roswell, everyone agrees
that some fell, it is the identity of that something that is in dispute. You
can learn more about it here:
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2021/05/just-last-friday-may14-another-video.html
http://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2017/02/x-zone-broadcast-network-don-ledger.html
So,
this is my speculation about the most likely UFO crashes that David Grusch
might have been talking about. It is basically a collection of highly suspect
tales, but these are ones that many of the alleged insiders have talked about
in the past. Some of what Grusch has said suggests that he has meet these
people.
Much
of what he has said is negated by his claim of inside information about the
Italian crash. If it is a hoax, as it most certainly is, then the insiders
feeding him information had no more inside knowledge that I do, or other UFO
researchers do. Our access is through interviews with known participants,
research into documents held by various federal and local government agencies,
travels to archives and newspaper morgues.
I
came to these speculations through reports that I have received from many
others in the UFO community. For example, I was told that Grusch spent time at
Skinwalker Ranch. I’m not going to comment on that particular investigation
here. I will note, however, that it did suggest that Grusch brushed elbows with
several once important members of various administrations in Washington, D.C.
And, I know what some of them have advocated in the past, which suggests where
some of Grusch’s inside information originated.
The
question really boils down to how many of the cases mentioned above are those
that Grusch believes were true, and how much of that information did he feed in
the various investigations conducted, in secret, to Congress?
The
point here is that without more specific information from Grusch and some of
those others, we are left with very little evidence. And if the majority of
Grusch’s information is from fraudulent crash reports, why should we waste time
chasing down the others.
True,
I believe Roswell represents something that might have been constructed
off-world, and there is good documentation for the Shag Harbour case, the best
conclusion to be drawn is that those other reports are either mistakes or
misidentifications. Unless Grusch can come up with something that is more
concrete than he has heard stories of credible people, he is not advancing the
case. In the long run, it will hurt it and no one will remember that I
cautioned against acceptance until we had more evidence. They will only
remember how Grusch’s inside information was little more than rumor,
speculation, and science fiction. So,
while Grusch might be an honest man whose is beyond reproach, that doesn’t mean
that the information he was given is any good. Just remember you heard it here
first.
As
a postscript, I will note that by typing the names of these cases in the search
engine on my blog, you’ll find additional information. By typing the names of
these cases into Google or other search engines, you’ll find additional information.
Many sites will provide counterpoints to what I have listed here, but I
reviewed many of those sites in the creation of my postings and often found
them wanting for good sources and the like.
37 comments:
As you write, those who've been around this block (some more than others) are left much less gah-gah by Grusch than those who've taken an inteest post-2017. Thanks for the solid post!
Outstanding piece Kevin. Thank you for your thorough work and research into the spotty history of historical UFO crashes. Agreed concerning Roswell and Shag Harbour. Hope you're feeling better, all the best!
I personally don't believe the San Agustin crash is a hoax. By stating that, you are assuming that Barney Barnett was lying. By all accounts, even though they second-hand witnesses, Barnett was a very credible and well respected soil conservationists. Also, Timothy Taylor took Dianna Pasulka and Gary Nolan there a few years ago. I believe Stan Friedman was on the right track. Your research was flawed by throwing the baby out with the bathwater regarding this case.
Kevin: Thank you for this wonderful summary of important UFO crashes and alleged UFO crashes. Of course, to get the full account one should consult your two excellent tomes on the subject: A History of UFO Crashes and CRASH: When UFOs Fall From the Sky.
As you perhaps recall, I generally agree with Stan Gordon's assessment of the Kecksburg crash, which is more positive than your current stance. However, I am still patiently waiting for Stan (or anyone) to write a book on the subject of the Kecksburg crash.
As for the Las Vegas crash events (plural!) of 1962, again I'm patiently waiting for Scott Holloway (or anyone) to write a book on the subject -- principally because if the Air Force is right about Las Vegas, it's because they got lucky! and not from having conducted a proper investigation.
Roger Stankovic -
First, let me say that I want to make one of my presentations in the upcoming Roswell Festival, more of a discussion rather than a straight presentation. Or maybe I should say a directed discussion where I engage with people who have a different take on a specific case than I do.
The problem I have with Barney Barnett is that he is the lone witness to the case. We have a diary kept by his wife in which there is no mention of anything strange on the Plains. According to Vern Maltais, he and his wife Jean were at the Barnetts for Thanksgiving that year and Barney told them abut the crash. My thinking is that if he was telling friends and other family members about it, then there is no real good reason why it was not mentioned in Ruth Barnett's diary.
According to that diary, the only day that Barney was not in the office in Socorro was July 5, which limits the time frame. Dr. Herbert Dick, who told me he was doing anthropological work on the Plains in July, saw nothing to suggest a crash. His position on the western slope of the mountains on the east side of the Plains gave him a panoramic view of the Plains, all the way to Horse Springs.
I have a letter from Dick saying that he saw nothing and another letter, recovered from the Harvard archives shows that he arrived there on July 1. Had there been a crash there, he should have seen it in some form.
Fleck Danley, Barnett's boss in 1947, said that he remembered Barnett telling him of the crash in July 1947, but when I spoke with Danley, he didn't have a clear idea when he heard the tale. There is nothing to date it to July 1947. I believe that Danley's comments, based on my interview with him, were not specific and the Bill Moore, in writing his book needed a witness to bodies.
So, we're lacking any corroborating witness, we don't have a firm fix on the date, and the only document we have about the time frame (Ruth's diary) provides no hint of this.
Until someone or something comes up to provide additional evidence, I find the tale to be less than credible.
John -
I find myself in the unfortunate position of having to disagree with both you and Stan. I reluctantly point to a bolide that fell about the time of the Kecksburg craft which suggests an extraterrestrial visitor but of a natural nature. There is a photograph of the smoke trail from the meteor. Some of the alleged witnesses are not overly credible. At least with this case, we do have some other witnesses who saw the thing.
I also need to point out that I have talked to people who arrived in Kecksburg about three or four in the morning, who went by the fire station and said that nothing was going on. There is no question that something was seen, but I fear a bolide is the answer.
There are problems with the Las Vegas case, and like all research, I continue to look for answers. What I have learn in the last several years suggests that the Air Force was right about this case and it really doesn't matter if they got lucky or actually learned the truth.
The Utah end of the case suggests something off-world (the term Kirkpatrick used in his report and I liked because of Blade Runner) seems to have caused lights to fail and cars to stall... but it doesn't seem to have crashed. I'm a little disappointed with this, but I have to go where the evidence takes me.
Kevin: Regarding Kecksburg, you have written as follows: Bob Blystone, Jr. "saw the round object glide [!] toward the treetops in what he thought of as a controlled landing [!] into the trees." A History of UFO Crashes, 96; CRASH: When UFOs Fall From the Sky, 208.
Bill Bulebush witnessed "an object in the sky making a series of S turns, or maybe a figure 8 before disappearing into the trees." History, 100; CRASH, 212. Also Bulebush witnessed in the woods "an acorn-shaped device with a gold band around the bottom." History, 100; CRASH, 213.
Numerous witnesses saw a military flatbed truck driving off at a rapid rate of speed and carrying a tarp-covered object approx. the size of a small car [Volkswagen].
None of this comports with the bolide meteor explanation, which is the military's cover story and readily adopted by the skeptical community. Don't fall for it.
P.S. Watch Kecksburg: The Untold Story, a 1998 documentary featuring Stan Gordon for additional findings about this notable UFO crash event.
Though I still can not claim that it proves a saucer landed on that day, here are 6 of the events that occurred on 25 March 1948:
1. Colonel Riley F. Ennis, Chief of the "Intelligence Group" of the General Staff's Office of the Assistant Chief of Staff/Intelligence, signed off on official Army Letter of Instruction; 452.1 with Control A-1917, Reporting of Information on Unconventional Aircraft, which included Flying Discs.
2. ADC "re-issued" (that is, a new date given for the instructions) their Air Defense official Directive/Letters of Instruction: Reporting of Information on Flying Discs, ADC 45-5 and ADCL 200-1
3. Secretary of Defense, James Forrestal, due in part from pressure exerted by Secretary of the Air Force, Stuart Symington, testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee, in order to raise the military budget, especially for the new Air Force, and to alter the official order that created and gave authorization to the Central Intelligence Agency...formerly the Central Intelligence Group...in regards to their use of a secret, undeclared purse.This was House of Representatives Bill : HR 5871
Because of this meeting, on 25 March 1948, it was known as the CIA Act of 1948 until it was updated in 1949
4. Chief of Staff for the new Air Force, General Carl Spaatz, declared "...an immediate air emergency..." on 25 March 1948, which was to be around-the-clock surveillance. It was rescinded in April by the new Chief of Staff, Vandenburg. Though one researcher I respect thinks that Spaatz's order was "a clever ploy", to jump start the stagnating RADAR Fence Plan, I con not agree with that assessment. ADC did NOT get the attention it needed until late 1951. It was followed with the Air Defense Command's Blue Book Plan on Air Defense, of 1952. This is how "Project Blue Book" got its name.
Kevin,
Thank you for putting together this very helpful compendium, including all those links!
Thank you also for your kind words regarding my investigative articles on the Trinity UFO-crash hoax. My latest article, which distills and updates the most important information from the earlier articles, is "'Witness' Credibility Implodes for Jacques Vallee's Trinity UFO-crash Tale," published January 25, 2024. This article included new documentation, some which researcher Frank Warren played a key role in obtaining, further demonstrating that it is very unlikely that Jose Padilla ever served in the U.S. military, as he repeatedly claimed. I further updated the article on February 28, 2024, with new documentation showing that Padilla's story of being wounded in Korea after the Armistice (offered by Vallee in a public memo dated May 15, 2023) is surely a fabrication.
https://douglasjohnson.ghost.io/witness-credibility-shredded-for-vallee-trinity-tale/
Best,
Douglas Dean Johnson
Kevin, List,
The dates we should be considering are the 31st of May and the 1st.June. Barnett lived Just a few miles from the crash and probably visited it. Whatever? He came home and needed medicine. His medicine isn't mentioned on other pages. I can imagine he might need a little medicine.
Ed
Edward -
Doesn't really matter what dates you propose. The diary covers everyday for the year and there is no hint of anything extraordinary.
Re: Kecksburg (part 1 of 2)
First, to provide context to those unfamiliar, a bright fireball trailing smoke was seen by hundreds or thousands in a multistate area, primarily Michigan and Ohio, but also southern Ontario, Canada and western NY. There was an explosion near Detroit, MI/Windsor, Ontario, western Lake Erie. Two sets of photos from the Detroit area emerged showing the smoke trail and the puff of smoke from the explosion.
Initial newspaper reports, at least one astronomy journal, (also a Project Blue Book statement by one of the photographers) placed the trajectory to the SE or ESE in the direction of western Pennsylvania. Newspaper reports also stated a sonic boom, presumed to be from the fireball was heard in western Pennsylvania. (Primary investigator Stan Gordon, of Greensburg, PA, would later determine from witness interviews the sonic booms were centered around Greensburg, only about 7 mi NE of Kecksburg. One Project Blue Book document written about 2 hours after the incident also indicates an unspecified “sound” in Greenburg associated with the incident.)
Flaming debris was also reported raining down on Elyria and Lorain west of Cleveland on the southern shore of Lake Erie, starting a number of grass fires. In Elyria, the local paper published photos of 3 boys holding metal fragments that they saw raining down. (In 1996, I spoke to one of the "boys" who also told me 2 or 3 white NASA cars came the next day and took the metal pieces--there is a NASA facility at Cleveland airport only about a dozen miles away).
Newspaper stories at the time also reported a weather observer in Columbus, OH, seeing a fireball to the EAST of position, or in the direction of Kecksburg. A news story from Uniontown, PA (about 25 mi. SW of Kecksburg), said some witnesses saw a fireball to the north headed in the direction of two suburbs EAST of town.
In a handwritten letter to Project Blue Book, a Canadian witness (former RCAF pilot) on an airliner headed south and in the vicinity of Kecksburg, said he was looking EAST out his window and saw a pencil-shaped object in level flight suddenly change direction and dive toward the ground at tremendous speed. He also wrote that the stewardess told him the pilot had seen it also and radioed it in.
And finally, in a radio report on the incident a week later by Greensburg reporter John Murphy (titled "Object in the Woods"), it was stated that a Pittsburgh airport tower controller confirmed that there was an unknown object in their airspace 3 to 4 minutes after the explosion of the whatever near Detroit. (According to two radio station employees and Murphy's wife, his story had been heavily censored and he had been intimidated by a visit from the military to the radio station. Murphy had personally covered the story on the ground in Kecksburg and also reported in his broadcast an Army and Air Force presence there. Another Greensburg reporter, Bob Gatty, was also on the scene, and in the Greensburg newspaper the next day ("Unidentified Flying Object Falls near Kecksburg — Army Ropes off Area") stated: "The area where the object landed was immediately sealed off on the order of U.S. Army and State Police officials, reportedly in anticipation of a 'close inspection' of whatever may have fallen... State Police officials there ordered the area roped off to await the expected arrival of both U.S. Army engineers and possibly, civilian scientists." (Getty, in one interview I saw, also stated he was an Army brat, knew what an Army uniform looked like, and the Army was definitely there.)
(Part 2 of 2)
A year later, two astronomers (Journal of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada) used the photos taken near Detroit to triangulate a trajectory, claiming the object was a meteor bolide instead traveling on a trajectory at right angles to one towards Kecksburg, furthermore diving at a steep angle with any fragments probably ending up in western Lake Erie. From a nearby seismic station, they also pinpointed the time of the explosion to around 4:43 pm (therefore 3 to 4 min. before the Pittsburgh tower said there was something unknown in their airspace).
The JRASC article is now cited by Kecksburg debunkers as "proof" that nothing whatsoever could have happened at Kecksburg. It was just a meteor bolide that ended near Detroit, nearly 200 mi. away.
Now a bolide would make sense if the event ended near Detroit. The problem is, you then have to ignore all the other reports cited above (not to mention the witnesses on the ground in the Kecksburg area), which all indicate something else continuing on in a general western Pennsylvania direction. And the Army was interested, and was bringing in their engineers. You got to ask, why would the Army be out chasing meteors?
If the astronomers were right (and there are an enormous amount of problems with the methodology of their paper), all these other contemporaneous reports about directions and time and sound and physical evidence would have to be completely wrong. E.g., the Columbus weather observer should have seen the fireball to his north, not east. The Uniontown witnesses should have seen a fireball to their NW diving directly into the ground, not to their N traveling E. (If they could have seen anything at all at that distance and with the reported light haze). Similarly, the RCAF pilot near Kecksburg could not have seen his object to the East. He would have had to be seated on the other side of the plane looking backward to the NW. There would have been no sonic boom heard in western Penns. Pittsburgh tower would not have recorded an unknown object in their airspace 3 to 4 min. after the supposed bolide exploded. Multiple grass fires could not have started from flaming debris in Elyria and Lorain, nor metal fragments found.
The only way a meteor bolide could have been involved with these other reports, if by an amazing coincidence, there were two "fireballs" in the air at about the same time, one a bolide and the other unknown.
So this, plus other evidence not discussed here, suggests to me that Kecksburg is still a very viable crash-retrieval case.
David -
As usual, your arguments are solid, based on facts and logic. I confess that I am ambivalent about the case. You know that some of the witnesses are less than credible but on the other hand, I am bothered by John Murphy's "Object in the Woods" radio report.
Or, in other words, this is the type of discussion that I hope to inspire during one of my presentations in Roswell.
I'm not locked into the bolide theory, but it seems to be a top contender. I simply can't completely ignore it, but there are some credible witnesses to the case, though I don't count Cliff Stone's tale among the credible.
However, even if I concede that Kecksburg is a true off-world craft (again I think Sean Kirkpatrick for bringing in that term from Blade Runner) that actually doesn't negate my argument here... Kecksburg is well publicized so that if Grusch and others do cite it, I would argument contamination.
Again, I just don't know about this case, though I lean the wrong way on it. Maybe I'll get Stan on the show again so we can talk about it.
My two little contributions to "research" ...
1. I was the Kingman City Attorney circa 1990. I spoke to a number of real oldtimers, including some of the most prominent ranchers. None had heard anything at all about anything resembling a UFO crash.
2. Circa 1992, I and a friend visited Aztec for four days. Again, I spoke with as many oldtimers as I could locate. I heard a couple of weird tales, but nothing resembling a UFO crash and nothing at all in the relevant timeframe.
In all these supposed-crash discussions, I'm surprised how many people are not struck by the sheer implausibility of craft with the supposedly near-miraculous capabilities of these nevertheless crashing all over the globe like Piper Cubs. If they actually were crashing with this frequency, surely it would tell us something meaningful about the phenomenon (staged events?). As it is, I tend to think the enthusiasm for supposed crashes tells us pretty much nothing about the phenomnenon but lots about human credulousness.
The one element that is against those so-called UFO crashes is time. If there is even a bit of evidence, it's long gone and cold - useless in other words. Just look at the Roswell incident that is and was well documented, and yet in the end, the major so-called witnesses turn out to be liars. Just to name a few: former Lt. Walter Haut gave us Genn Dennis and Frank Kaufmann, and all died laughing to their graves, knowing all the B.S. they gave us. As for David Grusch, he's just another Lue Elizondo, wagging tongues and all, yet, never giving the public any evidence, but a bunch of 2nd & 3rd hand accounts from so-call witnesses. Oh, people I can't reveal them or their names, they are all classified for the sake of national security!
LBP -- So let me get this straight: Four consecutive days of investigation in Aztec 44 YEARS AFTER THE FACT (!) constitutes your idea of an investigation substantive enough to dismiss an alleged UFO crash entirely?
I hope you researched your legal cases more thoroughly than your claimed investigation of Aztec.
In addition, the last paragraph of your comment above is mischaracterization by exaggeration. This second "little contribution to 'research'" of yours is mighty miniscule indeed.
SKY70 -- Yes admittedly there were a number of false witnesses re: Roswell, however, these were not ALL of "the major ... witnesses" as you erroneously (if not outright deceitfully) imply. If you bothered to review the UFO scholarship re: Roswell, you would be exposed to the numerous credible witnesses, whose testimony greatly outweighs that of the liars you so one-sidedly cite.
@LBP:
Just because some crash reports are phony doesn't mean they all are. Our own experience shows no correlation between advancing technology and invulnerability (although real crashes do appear to be rare). On the other hand, at least one work (THE ALIEN GRAND DESIGN) considers the aliens invulnerable and crashes deliberate.
I personally found Jerome (Jerry) Clark's 2012 review of the book [i]The Aztec Incident: Recovery at Hart Canyon[i] by Scott and Suzanne Ramsey, in the [i]Journal of Scientific Exploration[i]to be very helpful with respect to the Aztec story.
https://www.scientificexploration.org/docs/26/jse_26_3_ReviewClark.pdf
@ John Steiger: If the so-called eyewitnesses gave out false information intentionally, like those that I had mentioned in my post, and they are exposed for what they are by many others in the field, the ones who exposed those liars are not being deceitful at all. They got to this conclusion with good honest research. Every Roswell witness has given bad testimony in their affidavits, etc. You think Majot Marcel was truthful? His own military record stated that he has, "an inclination to magnify problems he is confronted with." See his Efficiency Report for 1 July 1947 to 30 April 1948, dated 6th May 1948. Hence not a good witness neither. What we need are truthful eyewitnesses and hard cold evidence that is new, not 70 years old.
@John Steiger
Goodness, True Believers are a touchy bunch. I put "research" in quotes precisely because I was using the term humorously. I make no great claims. That being said, how many of you folks spent four days in Aztec interviewing oldtimers? The review by Jerome Clark makes precisely the same point: All oldtimers disavow anything like the Aztec crash. That was my experience as well, FWIW.
@starman
Right, I didn't suggest they were all phony. I mostly believe they are, but the possibility remains. My point, based on nearly six decades of deep involvement with weirdness communities of all types, is that True Believers almost always leap right over the threshold issue of the almost fantastic improbability of their beliefs. They want to dive straight into the details, the dubious "evidence," as though the fantastic improbability were irrelevant and as though Bayes' Theorem didn't exist.
@LBP
If I understand correctly, you consider intelligent ETs, or interstellar travel, fantastically improbable. We can't assume the former is. As for the latter, when Sagan said a single intelligent race could colonize the galaxy in a billion years I doubt he assumed faster than light travel.
Ghosts and fairies should be dismissed as fantastically improbable, but ET is different. It's a rational concept, which is why SETI arose. The ETH assumes evolutionary and technological progress essentially like our own, only more advanced i.e. what happened here also happened elsewhere but got underway sooner. And that's possible given the greater ages of many stars in the universe, compared to our solar system.
@Sky70
Major Marcel's "inclination to magnify problems," as an argument against his testimony, would be more convincing if it appeared in a report written BEFORE July '47, not after. By '48 they HAD to say something like that, given his well-known "misidentification of balloon wreckage." Supposedly, he "magnified" mere mogul junk into something exotic and unexplainable. In fact none of the other officers "correctly identified" it either, which is why Blanchard ordered the press release.
Sky70: Do you understand the difference between ALL and SOME? SOME Roswell UFO "witnesses" have rightfully been exposed as liars and frauds. But not ALL Roswell UFO witnesses are liars and frauds as you stubbornly continue to allege.
Major Marcel (ultimately Col. Marcel) was truthful albeit with some inaccuracies. But also Marcel is not as key of a Roswell crash witness as both sides have made him out to be. If you bothered to read my play THE ROSWELL TRIAL: A Courtroom Drama you might discern this, and withdraw from your erroneous conclusion that Marcel was "not a good witness...."
Query: Why do you unquestioningly believe "military records"? Are they without error? And for that matter, do you believe the U.S. military's explanation re: UFOs? Because the U.S. military's explanation re: UFOs is a poorly-crafted fiction at best.
LBP: "Touchy", yes, but also much-maligned (and often wrongfully so) ... whether you care to admit it or not.
As for Aztec, Scott Ramsey and his associates have put in countless hours, dollars, and effort in an attempt to reveal the truth about this ALLEGED UFO crash. Scott & Co. have written two fine books (which you can look up if you're of a mind to learn) about the case, books which far surpass two earlier books (not worth mentioning here).
HOWEVER, as Kevin is quick to point out -- and rightfully so -- Monte Shriver has researched the ALLEGED Aztec UFO Crash rather extensively as well and has determined it was a non-event. Shriver refutes Ramsey's witnesses and Kevin accepts Shriver's conclusion that Aztec was a hoax.
I am firmly on the fence about Aztec. Yes, I would like to believe it, but I don't. On the other hand, I don't believe that Aztec has been proven to be a hoax either.
But I do believe that your four (4) days of research effort, no matter how well-intentioned (and I do not doubt your best intentions here -- in fact, I congratulate you on putting forth your efforts and hope you learned something about the amount of serious effort that sincere UFO investigation and research require), PALE IN COMPARISON to what both Scott Ramsey and Monte Shriver have put forth re: this important case, factual or not.
Sky70 wrote:
You think Majot [sic] Marcel was truthful? His own military record stated that he has, "an inclination to magnify problems he is confronted with." See his Efficiency Report for 1 July 1947 to 30 April 1948, dated 6th May 1948. Hence not a good witness neither. What we need are truthful eyewitnesses
We could also use some good truthful skeptics who don't take quotes completely out of context in order to do a character assassination number on a key eyewitness.
By all means look at Marcel's efficiency reports and commendations. I have all of his post-war ratings on my website:
www.roswellproof.com/marcel_evaluations.html
The "magnify" quote was pulled out of Col. Blanchard's personal comments from the efficiency report of May 1948, which state IN FULL: "A quiet, mature field grade officer. Exceptionally well qualified in his duty assignments. His only known weakness is a tendency to magnify problems he is confronted with. Superior moral qualities."
In the same review, Blanchard also checked off qualities that MOST characterized Marcel: "No one ever doubts his ability", "Knows his job and performs it well", "Cool under all circumstances", "The men know they can rely on his judgment", "Has admiration of officers & men alike", "Respected by all fellow officers", "Commands respect by his actions".
On a numerical ranking, Marcel received 9/10 (Superior) on the quality "The degree to which he is able to discriminate & evaluate facts to arrive at a logical conclusion."
Sounds like just the sort of screw-up who would "magnify" common balloon debris into a flying saucer.
What you will see looking at all the efficiency reports are reviewers generally giving Marcel excellent and superior marks across the board. His marks went UP, not down, after the Roswell incident. These ratings were by the command officers deeply involved in what happened--Blanchard, Dubose, Ramey--and who would know whether Marcel "magnified" a weather balloon into a flying saucer crash, which is what our "truthful" Sky70 is insinuating.
Also particularly telling IMHO are Dubose recommending Marcel for promotion (to Lt. Colonel in the AF Reserve) and command officer training. Ramey called Marcel "outstanding" and command officer material, also saying he had nobody to replace him, as Marcel was being transferred to higher intelligence work. I guess there just weren't any reliable, truthful, intelligence officers to be had in the Air Force who weren't over-magnifying balloons into flying saucers.
Ramey's operations officer, Col. John Ryan (later became AF Chief of Staff), called Marcel's career "most outstanding" and "most exemplary". (Funny how Sky70 doesn't provide quotes like that.) Marcel received his promotion and was also recommissioned the following Spring instead of let go. According to other paperwork, two commands were competing for his services for higher intelligence work. He was finally transferred to Washington to the very top-secret Special Weapons Project to evaluate all intelligence (including Project Mogul ironically) on whether the Russians had the A-bomb. He was made officer in charge of the war room, and prepared the briefing material for the brass on all intelligence that came in.
Curious career arc for such an unreliable officer. So what was the "magnified" comment about? If you look at ALL the reviews, what you usually see are comments that Marcel worked long, grueling hours. He was a workaholic and a perfectionist. Blanchard thought he did more than was necessary. That's all that was meant. Not that he was incompetent or unreliable. Quite the contrary, if you look at this and other reviews in their entirety.
I previously wrote this on Kevin's blog detailing more about Marcel post-Roswell. Worth repeating:
https://kevinrandle.blogspot.com/2016/01/jesse-marcel-conundrum.html
FACT: For such a supposed liar and bungler it is curious that his surviving military record PROVES:
1) He stayed on as head intelligence officer at Roswell for another year, then booted upstairs to higher intelligence work, with both the SAC and Pentagon competing for him. (Eventually ending up with the very top secret Special Weapons Project in Washington trying to find out if the Soviets had tested an A-bomb, being officer-in-charge of the war room and primary briefing officer.)
2) Upon his transfer, Gen. Ramey registered a mild protest, stating he had NOBODY in his command to replace him. (So either Ramey liked bungling intelligence officers and couldn't find a replacement equal to Marcel in the incompetence department, or Ramey liked very good intelligence officers and didn't have anyone his equal at the time...) Ramey also called Marcel's services to his command "outstanding." (Outstanding as in incompetence and lying, or outstanding as in competence and accomplishment?...) Ramey also wrote he thought Marcel command officer material. (Did Ramey also want incompetent command officers?)
See: www.roswellproof.com/Eval_Ramey0848.html
3) At the same time Col. John Ryan (during Roswell Ramey's operations officer, he and Blanchard switched jobs a year later, and Ryan eventually became AF Chief of Staff and Chair of the Joint Chiefs) stated that Marcel's work and service were "most exemplary" and "most outstanding."
See: www.roswellproof.com/Eval_Ryan0848.html)
4) Following Roswell, both Blanchard and Dubose (perhaps representing Ramey's wishes) recommended Marcel for promotion to Lt.-Col. in the AF Reserve, which he received.
5) Following Roswell, Blanchard boosted Marcel's performance rating with Dubose co-signing. (In fact, all post-Roswell Marcel evaluations were generally with very good to excellent marks in all categories.) Although stating he didn't know Marcel personally and was just following Blanchard's lead, Dubose (who DID know what Marcel had done during Roswell and in Fort Worth) independently recommended Marcel for Air Staff and Training School, which would be preparation for possible future command positions, thus echoing Ramey's later statement that he thought Marcel command officer material.
6) Marcel was recommissioned the following Spring, when officer commissions were hard to get following WWII while the military was trying to sharply downsize and dump as many unneeded, lingering WWII officers as possible. (Was the military only retaining the incompetent ones who also couldn’t tell the truth?...)
My point is, even if we suppose Marcel later told a few war stories (and it remains unproven that he lied about anything in his war record, which is incomplete BTW and reconstructed after the original was said burned during the St. Louis veteran's record fire), his post-Roswell record shows ZERO evidence that he in any way mishandled the Roswell event, and he retained the full confidence of higher officers involved like Ramey, Blanchard, and Dubose (“outstanding”, command officer material, promoted, recommissioned, transferred to higher intelligence work). Further, all major parts of his Roswell story had corroboration by others, including two USAF generals.
@ David Rudiak: I see your point of view and it seems correct only on the surface. However, it has been proven beyond all doubt by ufologists that Major Jesse Marcel lied about his military duties (no, he was not a rated pilot and did not earn five (5) Air Combat Medals), did not know every aircraft that ever flew, and was not rated a legal pilot. He stated that he earned a college degree and took classes at different colleges, and a simple check proved this to be false (this means that he lied about his education too.). Lie one time in a courtroom and a person's creditability is gone. However, before he and his son died, they did come across as decent people. Now as for the Aztec UFO crash...!
@ John Steiger, the witnesses that appeared to tell the truth were not first-hand witnesses. But sons and daughters of some of the original witnesses, and they just related the stories heard from their relatives. And there's even a text out titled, "The Grandchildren of Roswell", now what in the world are they going to tell us about the alleged Roswell UFO crash? As for military records, by all means they can be incorrect and a dozen other things wrong with them. I know because I had to get my own Army records corrected by the U.S. Army Board of Corrections, and they needed proof, which I had. Let's see the Roswell evidence that will convince the world a UFO crashed there in 1947. As for the military's belief on UAPs, I don't agree with them at all, there must be something out THERE alive and kicking!
Sky70 -
We're moving into territory i which that are subtle changes. Marcel never said that he was a rated pilot. That is an assumption on your part. What he said was that he had flown as a pilot. As I have said, while in Vietnam, I flew as a door gunner. No, that was not my position. I was a rated pilot and served as an aircraft commander. However, there were times when we were sometimes called on to perform other duties.
I don't know what five Air Combat Medals are, but I do know that Marcel said he had five Air Medals, which can be awarded for meritorious serve or for valor. I have 41 such medals, that include awards for valor or for meritorious service (we received one Air Medal for 25 hours of combat assault flight or 50 of combat support. Marcel, according to the records had 2 Air Medals for meritorious service. He also had a Bronze Star Medal for his service in the Pacific Theater during WW II. He did claim shooting down five enemy aircraft, and although the Air Force (in this case the Army Air Forces) kept records of crewmen who shot down enemy aircraft (as opposed to pilots), there is no record that Marcel downed any enemy aircraft.
He didn't say that he knew everything in the aviation inventory but told Bob Pratt, "I was pretty acquainted with most of the things that were in the air at the time, not only from my own military but also in a lot of foreign countries." So, it's close but not the same thing.
He did tell Bob Pratt that he "... degree in nuclear physics (bachelors) at completed word at GW Univ in Wash. attended (LSU, Houston, U of Wis, NY Univ, and Ohio State (which I'm sure was THE Ohio State). I asked Pratt about this and if he had retained the tape, but he had not. His records show he did attend LSU, but I was unable to find any indication that he attended this other schools. I did communicate with them, asking if they provided extension classes to military personnel during the war, which they did, and some military classes were taught at these universities... I would say that the way the transcript was written, there is some room for interpretation. I would also that it seems that Marcel exaggerated these claims. I don't know if Pratt, in transcribing the tape might had made errors but I can say that some of these claims by Marcel are untrue.
I will also note here that your claim "...the witnesses that appeared to tell the truth were not first-hand witnesses," is inaccurate. We have Major Edwin Easley, Colonel Joe Briley, MSG Bill Rickett, BG Arthur Exon (yes, his first-hand experience is limited), BG Thomas DuBose, to name a few. True, Glenn Dennis lied, Frank Kaufmann lied, Jim Ragsdale lied and it was those of us investigating Roswell who exposed the lies. And, no, I'm not going to mention Gerald Anderson because his tale has little to do with Roswell.
And finally, my military were inaccurate and I had a hell of a time getting them corrected, but I had the documentation to prove it. Beware of those who make claims about military service but who cannot provide the documentation.
(part 1 of 2)
RE: Glenn Dennis
Yes, he lied about the name of the nurse, but it is not at all clear to me he lied about anything else. A key part of his testimony was about first receiving a call from the base about whether Ballard Funeral Home could provide small caskets. There are multiple witnesses to Dennis talking about the small casket call back at the time this happened or shortly thereafter, therefore NOT something he recently made up. The witnesses include:
1. L.M. Hall, motorcycle policeman, later Roswell police chief. Wrote an affidavit saying this:
http://www.roswellproof.com/Dennis.html#anchor_3375
"I had a funny call from the base. They wanted to know if we had several baby caskets." Then he started laughing and said, "I asked what for, and they said they wanted to bury [or ship] those aliens"..." Hall said he thought Dennis was joking.
2. Rex Alcorn, Clifford Butts, and William Burkstaller, all friends of Dennis, recalled him telling the story "back when it happened." Alcorn remembered Dennis "telling me at the time of the incident about receiving calls from the base inquiring about 'child-size caskets.'" (Witness to Roswell, p. 147)
3. Roswell attorney Richard L. Bean said he heard about the crashed saucer "within days of the crash," but it was another year or two before he heard Dennis talking about receiving calls for children's caskets from the base. (WTR p. 147)
4. S/Sgt Milton Sprouse, B29 crew chief:
http://www.roswellproof.com/Sprouse.html
Sprouse said he knew Dennis from a funeral that Dennis arranged for a friend several years later. Dennis told him at that time of receiving calls from the base for child-size coffins (Sprouse recalled Dennis said five) Sprouse also told a very similar story as Dennis of an autopsy at the base hospital and a disappearing nurse:
He heard "of the alien bodies and an autopsy quickly conducted at the base hospital from a medic friend, a fellow staff sergeant who shared the barracks. The medic worked in the emergency room and had been called out to the hospital. He had seen the "humanoid" bodies and said two doctors and two nurses were involved with the autopsy. Immediately afterwards, the medic disappeared and Sprouse said they couldn't discover what had become of him. Similarly he heard that the doctors and nurses involved also were immediately transferred out and nothing could be discovered of their fate either."
(part 2/2)
5. Other stories about the base inquiring about small, child-size caskets:
a. Barbara Beck, current publisher of the Roswell Daily Record, stated that her father, Robert Beck, the publisher since 1955 (but who began with the RDR in Dec. 1947 after marrying the daughter of the previous publisher), told her he knew the Ballard family, who owned Ballard Funeral Home. At some point, Ballard related to him that they received a call from the base at night for four small, child-sized caskets. They were to leave them at the base, but not go inside. Beck's father told her he found the base request really odd, but no explanation was given and he didn't ask questions. (Related on the CW Network, 2020, "Mysteries Decoded: Roswell Revisited" S1E9, 5:00' in)
b. Garner Mason, whose father, grandfather, and uncles ran the family mortuary business in Hagerman at the time [Hagerman is about 30 miles south of Roswell], said it was their mortuary that actually made the delivery of child caskets to the Roswell base hospital. "We received the call from Ballard's, because they didn't have enough of them to fill the order. So we made the delivery to the base. They were actually made out of cardboard." (WTR, p. 147)
c. Adam Dutchover, then a young boy living in Hagerman, said he used to help out at the local small grocery store serving coffee to patrons. He recalled the talk of the flying saucer crash and the "little bodies." Regular customers were members of the Roswell Police Department and one or two employees of Ballard Funeral Home. Though he couldn't recall most of the names, he did remember the Ballard people talking about the need for ordering "small caskets" for the Air Force. (WTR pp. 146-147)
d. Beverly Otto, said she worked at the National Institute of Health in Washington soon after the "Roswell business". She briefly met an Army nurse during a dinner with women friends. The nurse was recently assigned to Walter Reed hospital in Washington and said she was previously stationed at the base near Roswell. When jokingly asked about the "little people" at Roswell, she responded, "I was the nurse who ordered the children's coffins, because they were just big enough for the little guys who were in the spaceship." (WTR p. 148)
Yes, I know a some of this is pretty thin, 2nd & 3rd hand, but I find it hard to dismiss all of this testimony about there being calls for small caskets from the base back when it happened. Dennis didn't just make this up 40 years later.
@KRandle: I do indeed agree with your post esp. about the correction of military records. In my case, I was lucky because my infantry commander wrote a letter for me for the Veterans Administration (I was in the A Shau Valley, 1968-69, 101st Airborne division, Artillery RTO). As for Major Marcel, he is the perfect reason/example why I keep on saying that we need recent evidence, photos (who don't have an iPhone?), plus radar images, etc., etc. and the more the merrier on RECENT sightings not the old famous ones. As I've stated earlier, there has to be someone out THERE alive and kicking!
Sky70 wrote:
@ David Rudiak: I see your point of view and it seems correct only on the surface.
"Only on the surface"--really? You were the one with the superficial commentary about Marcel without providing in-depth context, which I provided. You pulled one slightly negative quote out of a post-Roswell review about Marcel by Col. Blanchard to obviously try make him look like an incompetent, emotional buffoon who couldn't distinguish a balloon from a flying saucer. What you left out was the entirety of the performance review that was highly laudatory about his high competency and trustworthiness, as were all of his post-Roswell reviews. Marcel remained in high-esteem by superior officers post-Roswell, as I detailed.
However, it has been proven beyond all doubt by ufologists that Major Jesse Marcel lied about his military duties
Proven beyond all doubt? Really? It's a lot more complicated than that.
(no, he was not a rated pilot
Never said he was a rated pilot. In one interview with Bob Pratt, said while stationed in the South Pacific he WAS the squadron intelligence officer (absolutely true), but also at times acted AS a pilot and navigator, not that he WAS a pilot and navigator. It is not at all uncommon, especially in combat, for soldiers to sometimes assume other positions when needed, even with no ratings. Kevin has provided his own war-time example of that.
Marcel had 468 hours combat air hours recorded in his record (exactly the number he recalled), representing a helluva lot of combat bombing missions, probably at least 40. He could easily have acted in relief of one of the regular pilots during long stretches of flying over the Pacific. I read one biography of Eisenhower, which said he frequently flew as a co-pilot over the Pacific while stationed in the Philippines as one of MacArthur's aides. He wasn't a rated pilot either. When he got back to the States, he did eventually get a pilot rating.
Before the war, Marcel spent many years and hours as an aerial cartographer for the Army Corp of Engineers and Shell Oil, flying in the right seat (copilot). Probably got in a lot of unofficial air hours that way. His aerial cartography expertise is why Marcel got drafted in the first place and immediately made a photointerpretation and combat intelligence officer, even without a college degree.
It also explains why he might act AS a navigator at times. Yes, he also wasn't a rated navigator, but he was an expert at reading things from the air. He received a Bronze Star, didn't claim any heroics for it, said in his Bob Pratt interview it was for teaching green flight crews out of the States how to fly combat in the South Pacific. It wasn't unusual at all back then before modern navigation for planes to get lost over the ocean in the absence of landmarks. (Incidentally, when Marcel was ordered to Fort Worth on a B-29 with Roswell debris, some testimony indicates he flew in the cockpit instead of in back and acted as the navigator on this flight. Deputy base commander Payne Jennings was the pilot and didn't seem to object to a non-rated navigator.)
and did not earn five (5) Air Combat Medals), did not know every aircraft that ever flew, and was not rated a legal pilot. He stated that he earned a college degree and took classes at different colleges, and a simple check proved this to be false (this means that he lied about his education too.). Lie one time in a courtroom and a person's creditability is gone.
More exaggerations here. Marcel never said he knew every aircraft that ever flew, never said he was a rated legal pilot (discussed above). I will try to discuss all these issues in another post when I have the time. There may be some truth to some of this, or not, but as I said, it's more complicated.
(Part 1 of 2)
Kevin wrote:
I don't know what five Air Combat Medals are, but I do know that Marcel said he had five Air Medals, which can be awarded for meritorious serve or for valor. I have 41 such medals, that include awards for valor or for meritorious service (we received one Air Medal for 25 hours of combat assault flight or 50 of combat support. Marcel, according to the records had 2 Air Medals for meritorious service. He also had a Bronze Star Medal for his service in the Pacific Theater during WW II. He did claim shooting down five enemy aircraft, and although the Air Force (in this case the Army Air Forces) kept records of crewmen who shot down enemy aircraft (as opposed to pilots), there is no record that Marcel downed any enemy aircraft.
I'm not trying to be argumentative here, but just add some commentary, also as partial reply to Sky70. While there is no record Marcel downed any enemy aircraft, there is also no record that he didn't. It's hard to prove a negative. But he was clearly in aerial combat situations where it is conceivable he might have. He did have 2 Air Medals in his record, the specific (boilerplate) wording being:
"For meritorious achievement while participating in sustained operational flight missions from [4 Dec 1943 to 28 Apr 1944; 22 May 1944 to 7 Oct 1944] during which hostile contact was probable and expected. These operations consisted of bombing missions against enemy airdromes and installation and attacks on enemy naval vessels and shipping. The courage and devotion to duty displayed during these flights are worthy of commendation."
So clearly they were being shot at, including, presumably, by Japanese Zeroes, what Marcel claimed he shot down five of when he replaced the dead waist gunner. I don't find it all unbelievable that Marcel might assume the gunner position to help defend themselves while they were under fire. He wasn't a rated gunner either. I know, shooting down 5 planes sounds like a lot, but it's not unheard of. E.g., a well-known, documented story similar to this was about "Dorie" Miller during Pearl Harbor. From Wikipedia:
Doris "Dorie" Miller... was an American Naval cook who was the first Black recipient of the Navy Cross and a nominee for the Medal of Honor. As a mess attendant second class in the United States Navy, Miller helped carry wounded sailors to safety during the attack on Pearl Harbor. He then manned an anti-aircraft gun and, despite no prior training in gunnery, officially shot down one plane (according to Navy Department Records) but Doris and other eye witnesses claimed the ranges of four to six.
So no training and no rating or experience as a gunner, but nobody complained when a lowly cook during mortal combat took over the regular gunner's position. Also officially credited with only one kill, when eyewitnesses instead apparently said 4 to 6.
It is conceivable Marcel also didn't receive full credit if he had shot down five planes. Only 2 air medals instead of 5. Or maybe the air medals were instead awarded for flight time or number of missions. (Though based on his total flight hours and missions he should have gotten more if that were true--see below) I keep saying it's complicated.
Another complication was the varying and controversial rules during WWII for who got awarded air medals. From what I've read, fighter pilots acting alone were much more likely to get them than gunners on a bomber. It was harder to confirm kills by bombers (multiple bombers might be shooting at the same planes), there were multiple gunners per bomber (which gunner actually shot down the plane?), and commanders tended to consider bomber enemy shootdowns a team effort (seemed unfair to just award one guy). Therefore, it seems it was actually relatively rare for a bomber gunner to get an air medal for a kill, but there were of course exceptions, and it apparently varied a lot by command.
(part 2 of 2)
Marcel's air medal claims continued:
Another complication were other variations in rules in how air medals were handed out. Early on, crews in Europe complained that they might fly just as many combat missions as Pacific crews, but because of generally much shorter distances, flew fewer hours, therefore awarded fewer medals. So rules changed. Because of high casualty rates (75%) in bombing raids against Germany, it might take as few as 5 missions to qualify for an air medal, but 15 in the Mediterranean. I don't know what it was in the South Pacific.
Some more points... It is possible there was a mention about Marcel's shoot-down claims in his record. According to an efficiency report, dated 31 Dec 1944 (shortly after the second recorded air medal), in a box where the evaluator is supposed to note whether the officer had been favorably mentioned in official communications, it was typed "Yes*". The asterisk probably indicated that the circumstances of the favorable communications would be detailed elsewhere. But this is missing from his record, along with a lot of other things. (There is only about 1 page of records for every month he served in the South Pacific.) So are the original communications. For all we know, the favorable communications could have been about Marcel shooting down enemy planes in combat--or not. There is no way of knowing.
Marcel's record listed 468 combat flying hours. That's a LOT of hours and missions. By standard regulations, each 100 hours should have qualified for an air medal, so he should have received at least four. 25 combat missions qualified you for a Distinguished Flying Cross, so Marcel theoretically should have gotten that too. But it's complicated, because the rules were inconsistent and varied a lot by command and region. What I wrote was true for bomber crews flying against Germany, but might have been very different in the Pacific.
@David Rudiak: First of all, I'm a believer that there are others out "THERE" alive and kicking. For if "IT" happened here on earth, then "IT" can happen somewhere else in our universe. The only thing lacking about all those old sightings and even recent ones is hard core proof/evidence that can pass the scientific method. Yes, any ET material(s) must abide by scientific principles, and the public must be involved too. As for Jesse Marcel and others like him (note, that the firsthand eyewitnesses never reported any dead alien bodies), when truth and error is mixed together, that's a sure sign of a scammer - no court of law would stand for that. But in the end, sir, we must agree to disagree for now. Heck, I wonder what Ms. Kean is doing now?
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