UK UFO files reveal alleged attempt to shoot UFO
By RAPHAEL G. SATTER
LONDON – An American fighter pilot flying from an English air base at the height of the Cold War was ordered to open fire on a massive UFO that lit up his radar, according to an account published by Britain’s National Archives on Monday.
The fighter pilot said he was ordered to fire a full salvo of rockets at the UFO moving erratically over the North Sea — but that at the last minute the object picked up enormous speed and disappeared. The account, first published in Britain’s Daily Star newspaper more than 17 years ago and to this day unverified by military authorities, was one of many carried in the 1,500 pages the archives made available online.
The unnamed pilot said he and another airman were scrambled on the night of May 20, 1957 to intercept an unusual “bogey” on radars at a Royal Air Force Station Manston, an airfield at the southeastern tip of England about 75 miles from central London.
“This was a flying object with very unusual flight patterns,” the pilot said, according to a typed manuscript of his account mailed to Britain’s Ministry of Defense by a UFO enthusiast in 1988. “In the initial briefing it was suggested to us that the bogey actually was motionless for long intervals.”
Ordered to fly at full throttle in cloudy weather, the pilot said he was given the order to fire a volley of 24 rockets at the mysterious object.
“To be quite candid I almost (expletive) my pants!” the pilot said, saying he asked for confirmation — which he received.
Retired U.S. airman Milton Torres told Britain’s Sky News on Monday that he was the pilot and has spent 50 frustrating years attempting to uncover the truth of his mid-air encounter.
Speaking from his home in Miami, Florida, Torres said he never saw the UFO with his naked eye, but watched in awe as it appeared on his jet’s radar and sped off before he had chance to fire.
“All of a sudden as it was coming in, it decided to take off and leave me behind … The next thing I know it was gone,” Torres told Sky News. “It was some kind of space alien craft. It was so fast, it was so incredible … it was absolutely death defying.”
In the newly published government file, the U.S. airman said the UFO appeared impossible to miss.
“The blip was burning a hole in the radar with its incredible intensity,” the pilot said. “It was similar to a blip I had received from B-52’s and seemed to be a magnet of light. … I had a lock on that had the proportions of a flying aircraft carrier.”
As he closed in on the object to prepare for combat, however, the object began to move wildly before fading off his radar. The target gone, the mission was called off, and he returned to base to an odd reception.
“I had not the foggiest idea what had actually occurred, nor would anyone explain anything to me,” the pilot said. He said he was led to a man in civilian clothes, who “advised me that this would be considered highly classified and that I should not discuss it with anybody not even my commander.”
“He disappeared without so much as a goodbye and that was that, as far as I was concerned,” the pilot said, according to the account.
Britain’s military said it had no record of the incident, according to the files. Neither did the U.S. military. The second pilot’s account, also included in the files, paints a somewhat different picture of events, saying there were not one but several “unknowns” and that he did not remember being contacted by anyone about staying quiet. He did not mention the targets’ size.
“I know this is not a very exciting narrative but it is all I can recall,” the second pilot said.
His name, like his colleague’s, was redacted from the files.
David Clarke, a UFO expert who has worked with the National Archives on the document release, said it was one of the most intriguing stories he had culled from the batch of files released Monday.
He said that the CIA once had a program intended to create phantom signals on radar — and that this may have been an exercise in electronic warfare. Whatever the case, Clarke argued that “there’s no doubt something very unusual happened.”
Clarke said the batch of files released Monday — which include witness accounts, investigations, and sketches — was part of a three to four year program intended to make a total of 160 UFO-related files available to the public.
Animal at the wheel…
The Muppets’ Animal Caught Speeding, Driving Police Crazy
Yes, the photo above is real: It is Animal—from The Muppets—driving a British Audi while speeding through a German road. The famous pink drummer is driving the police there absolutely crazy, because he keeps doing it again and again. Or better said, the real driver is, using a low-tech approach to take advantage of a weak point of the radar cameras. I don’t know about you, but this image makes me laugh out loud. The German police, however, wasn’t amused when they explained to the press how the whole joke worked and how they couldn’t fine the driver because of it:
The number plate is not enough [to catch and fine the driver]. We need clear evidence of who is driving the vehicle too. But because this is a British vehicle we can never get a decent picture [because he radar cameras are designed to take photos of the passengers in the left seat, not the right]. The driver has obviously worked this out because he has placed a large puppet in the passenger seat.
This may be an example of the famous British sense of humour but it is still dangerous driving. The driver has been caught on camera on several occasions and the puppet is on the passenger seat every time. We suspect he positions the toy deliberately before accelerating past the camera.
DS9 Surprise!
I don’t normally think stuff like this is funny, but this one is pretty well done and not as obnoxious.
Beverly Hills Chihuahua
Yo no quiero.
From the director of Scooby-Doo and Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed
WTF???
Crap. Pure crap.
Nerd Rage at its finest! Digg goes crazy
Digg, the social site where you”digg” user-submitted stories, banned an article mentioning a certain hexadecimal key:
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
This key supposedly unlocks HDDVDs for use on Linux or something. The original artical is still here.
This guy posted the original article to digg, which got over 15,000 diggs before it vanished and he was banned.
The people on Digg went nutso, and suddenly were posting the number all over comments, and every story on the front page was just the numbers again:
People posting the comments were getting IP banned left and right, and comments deleted. However, the people far outnumber the few admins on digg, and they are still being overrun 7 hours later.
What is weird was I thought the code had something to do with Lost at first…
But it is fun to see Internet Rage in action! What will happen tomorrow, when no one cares anymore because of a new YouTube video? Only time will tell.
(also, the digg story about being banned wasn’t banned by digg, for some odd reason…)
Special bonus: Digg took money from HDDVD!
The founders of Digg.com – which has been rocked by an unprecedented user revolt over the release of an HD-DVD decryption code – accepted sponsorship from the organization behind HD-DVD last year.
Episodes of the DiggNation video show were sponsored by the HD DVD Promotion Group. DiggNation is produced by Revision3, a company run by Digg founders, Jay Adelson and Kevin Rose. Rose is also a co-host of the DiggNation show. The image below shows the HD DVD logo displayed at the beginning of one such episode.
During the past 24 hours, Digg administrators have apparently deleted dozens of stories which included references to the HD DVD decryption code. These included one story which appeared poised to become the most popular ever seen on Digg, with almost 16000 votes within 20 hours. Administrators have also apparently begun deleting stories criticizing their actions, and also banned numerous members – according to angry statements posted by Digg users on the site and elsewhere.