Unidentified Flying Objects​—What Are They?

Betty Cash and Vickie Landrum, along with her son Colby, alleged that on December 29, 1980, they were exposed to the heat, smoke, and flames of a UFO (unidentified flying object). A report said that they described it as a ‘large diamond-shaped object, floating in the sky in front of their car on a deserted farm road near Huffman, northeast of Houston, Texas.’ As a result of this encounter, they alleged, they suffered various health problems.​—Miami Herald, September 4, 1985.

The women thought that the U.S. government was involved because “the object soon flew off toward the north, accompanied by about 23 military-type helicopters.” In this report, one of the women, Vickie Landrum, said that “all three suffered blisters, hair loss, dizziness and headaches. Landrum believes the device emitted some type of radiation that also made the three sensitive to sunlight.” They sued the government for negligence.

With the above and other news stories, UFO’s have repeatedly claimed public attention. As Philip J. Klass wrote in UFOs​—The Public Deceived: “The prospect of finding intelligent life elsewhere is universally appealing, and the search for it has attracted the attention, and efforts, of many competent scientists.” ‘But why now?’ asked Edward Dolnik in The New Republic of August 1987, under the heading “Close Encounters.” His reply was: “The leading explanation today has to do with deep-seated and apocalyptic fears associated with approaching the millennium,” that is, as we approach the year 2000.

Do People Believe in UFO’s?

Do you believe in UFO’s? Have you ever seen something in the night sky that has baffled you? Whether driven by apocalyptic fears or persuaded by other experiences, many today believe in UFO’s. In his account, Dolnik mentioned that a Gallup Poll indicated that “57 percent of college-educated Americans believe in extraterrestrials.” He adds: “For Americans without a college education, the figure drops to 46 percent.”

In the past, UFO reports generally described strange and unusual sights in the heavens or sometimes at close range. Quite recently, however, they seem to revolve around actual human contact. These contacts are sometimes said to be with “aliens” who allegedly abduct humans. The accounts indicate that the intent of the “aliens” at times involves biological or even genetic experimentation with humans. These assertions have served to direct the attention of the public again to the subject of UFO’s.

These claimed sightings and encounters are international in scope. For example, one involved a man in Switzerland. Over a period of five years, it is claimed, he “produced hundreds of bright, detailed photographs. He also recorded the sounds of ‘beamships,’ collected several metal samples, and made films of the ship in flight.” The description continues: “Dozens of witnesses have seen the beamships and corroborated [the man’s] fantastic story. His evidence, investigated by a professional security team headed by a retired U.S. Air Force colonel, has been examined by scientists at IBM, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Arizona State University, and the McDonnell Douglas aeronautics company.”

These stories are still being heard. One of the most interesting appeared in The Tampa Tribune, January 30, 1989. It featured a color illustration of a “spacecraft” that had been photographed in the vicinity of Gulf Breeze, Florida. The account involved the experiences of a man called Ed. The description of the first contact that occurred is as follows: “When he peered out the glass doors of his bedroom, Ed says, he was face to face with a childlike creature clad in gray.” These apparent contacts took place over a period of time, with Ed taking many photographs. However, no photographs were reproduced in the newspaper.

With sensational reports of encounters appearing in newspapers, periodicals, and books on the best-seller lists, people are asking, What is it all about? Are UFO’s real, or are they just figments of the imagination? Is there any record of such things in history? Is it possible that there may be explanations that transcend present-day science? These and other questions will be considered in the following articles.

UFO’s​—Ancient and Modern

From the most ancient of times, men have reported seeing strange objects in the sky. A Pharaoh was supposed to have seen fiery circles in the heavens, and American Indians have legends of flying canoes. The early Romans reported seeing flying shields. According to some interpretations of Aztec carvings, the god Quetzalcoatl supposedly arrived on earth wearing a beaked space helmet and in a serpentlike airship.

In 1561 and 1566, according to ancient accounts, “multitudes” of inhabitants of Basel, Switzerland, and Nuremberg, Germany, reportedly saw unusual sights in the sky. However, during 1896 and 1897, a most extraordinary thing happened in the United States. People throughout the country reported seeing an airship cruising overhead. It was said: “America had never before experienced anything quite like the excitement generated by the mystery airship.” These sightings occurred at major cities as well as at villages across the United States, beginning in California. The interesting point is, says the book The Great Airship Mystery, that “the known history of flight contains nothing about a wide-ranging dirigible in the United States in the late 1890s.”

One of the most elaborate and widely published stories came from a small town in Kansas, U.S.A., in 1897. The account relates how a citizen of the area, Alexander Hamilton, described an airship that came down in his cow lot. When the ship finally took off, the crew took along one of the heifers. Later on, three or four miles [5 or 6 km] down the road, a neighbor “found the hide, legs and head in his field.” However, many years later, the story was reprinted and was exposed as a hoax.

Accounts such as the above, whether fabricated or supposedly real, have been reprinted in recent books on the subject. Many of the reports from that period prior to the turn of the 20th century might have been forgotten in dusty newspaper files except for some striking parallel events that began happening over 40 years later. Then it was that people began to recall and research these earlier events and began noting marked similarities.

UFO’s in Modern Times

The subject was revived in more modern times during World War II when Allied bomber pilots reported that they saw “strange balls of light and disc-shaped objects [that] followed them as they flew over Germany and Japan.” The American pilots called them foo-fighters, a term that was derived from the French word feu, for “fire.” Although World War II (1939-45) came to an end and along with it the foo-fighters, stories of strange sights continued to be related.

In Western Europe and the Scandinavian countries, wingless craft called ghost rockets were reportedly seen. They were often described as trailing flames across the sky. In response to these reports, even the United States “felt compelled to send two top intelligence experts to Sweden.” The above stories were only the beginning. The account that seemed to startle the world and that initiated the flying saucer era was told by Kenneth Arnold, a private pilot and a businessman. On June 24, 1947, it was reported that he saw “a chain of nine peculiar aircraft approaching Mt. Rainier [Washington State, U.S.A.].” They were described as “saucer-like things” and as being “flat like a pie pan and so shiny they reflected the sun like a mirror.” He was reported to have clocked their speed “at about 1,200 miles an hour [1,900 km/​hr].” This was much faster than jet aircraft flew at that time.

The use of the word “saucer” caught the imagination of the press and resulted in the now common term “flying saucer.” After this account was published worldwide, many who had seen strange objects in the sky began to tell their varied stories. This, along with other sightings, caught the attention of military authorities.

United States Government Investigates

Apparently at the recommendation of a high-ranking military officer, UFO’s eventually received official attention by the U.S. government. The result was the setting up of Project Sign, which began work on January 22, 1948. This investigative group was assigned to carry out work under the direction of the Air Technical Intelligence Command, located near Dayton, Ohio, U.S.A. The project had hardly begun when tragedy struck. Captain Thomas Mantell, a military pilot, lost his life in a plane crash while in pursuit of a then unidentified object. He could have become unconscious while going too high without the benefit of supplementary oxygen. Later, it was learned that he may have been pursuing a Skyhook research balloon.

However, a new sighting by two Eastern Airlines pilots, coupled with the death of that Air Force pilot, further fueled the growing concern with UFO’s. According to the report, an Eastern Airlines plane had left Houston, Texas, and was headed for Atlanta, Georgia, when suddenly the pilot was compelled to take quick evasive action in order to miss a “wingless B-29 fuselage” that passed him on his right. A passenger and several ground-based observers seemed to add credibility to the story.

The Project Sign group finally issued a report that disappointed some. Later, some staff members who were sympathetic to the viewpoint that UFO’s were real were replaced, and a new title, “Project Grudge,” was given to the project. However, during this period, belief in the existence of UFO’s reached a new high when retired major Donald E. Keyhoe wrote an article entitled “The Flying Saucers Are Real.” The account was published in the January 1950 issue of True magazine, and the issue enjoyed wide circulation. Then, to add to the already wide interest, True published a further article by Navy commander R. B. McLaughlin. This article was entitled “How Scientists Tracked the Flying Saucers.” The enthusiasm was short-lived​—other magazines, Cosmopolitan and Time, published articles debunking UFO’s. With these new articles and a lull in sightings, interest subsided. Then came 1952, a remarkable year in UFO history.

1952​—The Year of UFO’s

The greatest number of UFO sightings received by the U.S. Air Technical Intelligence Command was recorded in 1952: 1,501. Early in March 1952, with increased numbers of sightings, the U.S. Air Force decided to create a separate organization called Project Blue Book. During that year of intense UFO activity, the sightings were diverse and many.

One of a series of especially notable sightings began over Washington, D.C., during the midnight hours of July 19 and 20. It was reported that “a group of unidentified flying objects appeared on two radarscopes at the Air Route Traffic Control Center at Washington National Airport. The objects moved slowly at first . . . then shot away at ‘fantastic speeds.’” The visual sightings corresponded with the radar returns. It was further reported that an interception was attempted, but “the objects disappeared as the jets neared.”

In 1966 Gerald R. Ford, then congressman from Michigan, was credited with calling for another federal investigation of UFO’s. This was in response to a number of UFO sightings in his state. The result was that another study was set up at the University of Colorado. Dr. Edward U. Condon, a prominent physicist, assumed oversight of the work. In 1969, at the conclusion of the study, the Condon Report was issued. Among other things, it said that “nothing has come from the study of UFOs in the past 21 years that has added to scientific knowledge . . . that further extensive study of UFOs probably cannot be justified in the expectation that science will be advanced thereby.”

This ended the official involvement of the U.S. government in the study of UFO’s and, in addition, tended to cool public curiosity. It did not, however, end the UFO controversy, nor was it the end of UFO sightings. According to one report, “20 percent of the ninety-five cases discussed in the document remained ‘unexplained.’”

Interest in UFO’s seemed to rise and fall along with waves of sightings. Outstanding were the years 1973 and 1974, when UFO’s were observed. With the arrival of the 1980’s, reports were again in the news. But what have scientists and other experts concluded in more recent years?

[Picture on page 5]

Some have thought the Aztec god Quetzalcoatl arrived in a snakelike spaceship

UFO’s​—Can They Be Identified?

How do scientists explain UFO’s? The late Dr. Donald H. Menzel, a Harvard astronomer, and Philip Klass, former senior editor of Aviation Week, are among those who have studied the subject of UFO sightings. They affirm that UFO’s are actually IFO’s (identified flying objects). When investigated, UFO’s have turned out to be identifiable things or effects, such as weather balloons, nighttime advertising airplanes and helicopters, meteors, or sun dogs.a

Philip Klass explained UFO’s as natural phenomena or as incorrect identifications. As an example, according to him, some UFO’s were suspected of being a kind of ball lightning, or a plasma. His critics were quick, however, to say that plasmas, or highly ionized gases, can have very short lifetimes and do not adequately explain the problem. He says that some UFO’s seen on radar are artifacts of weather phenomena. However, according to some radar operators, this explanation does not account for the seemingly intelligent behavior sometimes observed. Klass’s thought is that people who are suddenly exposed to a brief unexpected event “may be grossly inaccurate in trying to describe precisely what they have seen.”

In his book Pseudoscience and the Paranormal, Terence Hines states that “careful investigation has resulted in straightforward natural explanations for even very impressive-sounding UFO reports. . . . All these cases make clear the nearly total unreliability of eyewitness reports. In almost every case, the witnesses’ reports differed substantially from the actual stimulus, but in only a very few cases were the witnesses willfully lying. Their knowledge about what UFOs ‘ought’ to look like influenced their reports, along with the effects of visual illusions.”

UFO’s​—Guided by Beings From Space?

A popular theory is that UFO’s may be associated with intelligent beings from outer space. Dr. James McCampbell, a leader among those who came to this conclusion, warned: “It would appear that a superintelligent alien species is indeed becoming a more intimate part of our earth’s environment.” Major Donald E. Keyhoe, “a retired Marine Corps officer turned free-lance writer . . . first popularized UFOs and claimed they were extraterrestrial spacecraft,” according to Philip Klass, writer of UFOs​—The Public Deceived. Keyhoe also advanced the “beings from space” theory and warned: “If the aliens’ purpose should be migration to Earth, it would set off a wave of fear and hysteria.”

Another concept that has captured the interest of some investigators is that UFO’s are superior beings that inhabit a “parallel universe.” According to this theory, these beings may be “able to manipulate the electrical circuits of the human mind.” With this ability, they could presumably control human governments. Some say they may be connected with “intelligences [that involve] the world’s leading religious movements, miracles, angels, ghosts, fairies, poltergeists, and the like.”​—UFO and The Limits of Science, by Ronald D. Story.

UFO’s​—Can We Identify Them?

As we have observed, some investigators are quite positive that they can identify all UFO’s as natural things or known phenomena. Others, however, present their own special theories.

It was while the Condon Report and the subject of UFO’s was still a matter of public concern that Awake! provided a review of the subject along with a discussion of some of the more spectacular cases.b Awake! reached the conclusion that “the great majority of all [UFO] reports have their origin in the same kinds of things that Project Blue Book [an earlier government study] named: Planets, airplanes, balloons, meteorites, mirages.”

The article continued: “The more thorough investigation [summarized in the Condon Report] has clarified the part played by physical and psychological distortions. It has explained how ordinary objects, seen in the sky by persons who do not recognize them under the perhaps unusual circumstances, can be misconstrued in perception, magnified in the telling, further exaggerated in the newspapers, and end up as spaceships landing little green men from Mars.”

The official Condon Report and conclusions as above, coupled with diminished UFO reports, seemed to end the matter for many. Nevertheless, two decades later we find UFO’s still getting public attention. As mentioned in our first article, a writer for one prominent journal observed that a new element has been added. We live with a backdrop of “deep-seated and apocalyptic fears” as we approach the year 2000.

Even more uncertainties developed from recent claims that in the past the United States and even other governments may have ignored or covered up some evidence of UFO’s. The author of a 1988 publication took advantage of the Freedom of Information Act, established in 1966 in the United States, together with sources in other countries, to gather information that according to him “proves beyond doubt that there has been a monumental cover-up of the UFO subject.”​—Above Top Secret, by Timothy Good.

Gary Kinder, in his book Light Years, raises questions as to what proof is needed to convince the authorities of the existence of UFO’s. He notes that one observer asks: “What constitutes proof [of UFO’s]? Does a UFO have to land at the River Entrance to the Pentagon, near the Joint Chiefs of Staff Offices? Or is it proof when a ground radar station detects a UFO, sends a jet to intercept it, the jet pilot sees it, and locks on with his radar, only to have the UFO streak away at phenomenal speed?”

On the other hand, Professor Hines argues that the 997 pages of documents released, covering the period from 1949 to 1979, do not reveal an attempt at a government cover-up. He states: “An examination of the secret CIA papers and documents on UFOs reveals an agency mildly interested in the phenomenon but skeptical of the extraterrestrial hypothesis. These documents . . . also contradict the oft-repeated claims of a government cover-up of the ‘truth’ about UFOs.”

One of the foremost reasons for the lack of proof is that no UFO has ever been publicly exhibited, nor have any extraterrestrial beings officially presented themselves for public recognition. Furthermore, alleges Professor Hines, “there is no UFO photo that can be considered genuine showing anything other than vague shapes or blobs of light.” Time and again, experts have identified UFO’s as misinterpreted sightings of Venus or of other celestial bodies. It is evident that no solution to the UFO problem has been satisfactory to all.

At the time that the Condon Report was in the news, an Awake! contributor discussed privately some of the results with one of the associated scientists working at Boulder, Colorado. The scientist seemed to think that in the unexplained cases, the UFO experiences involved “mental perceptions” of some kind. Thus, although many UFO sightings can be explained scientifically as physical things or wrong identifications, some may involve mental or psychological experiences or perceptions.

Is There an Occult Influence?

When reviewing the mental or psychological experiences of some who have reported contacts with UFO’s, it is also possible to recognize similarities with spiritistic or other paranormal phenomena. One example of this is the testimony of John H. Andrews in his book The Extraterrestrials and Their Reality. In his acknowledgments of help in producing the book, he states: “Great appreciation also goes to the four space people [“ET’s in physical human bodies who circulate unnoticed among us”] who told me their stories and who wished to remain unnamed, to the numerous psychics and channels who assisted me with my many experiments, to the extraterrestrials for their many informative messages.” Regarding these “space people,” he states: “They were all quite intelligent; all were channels for invisible entities.”​—Compare 1 Samuel 28:7, 8; Ephesians 6:12.

Andrews also claims to have received messages from extraterrestrials. He lists some of these as: “There is no such thing as death. . . . There is no such thing as good or evil. [Compare Genesis 3:3, 4.] . . . Creation, evolution, and reincarnation are valid processes at work in the Universe. . . . We (the ET’s) are not here to control or rule you, but to guide you. . . . The Earth will soon undergo tremendous, cataclysmic changes. When these changes are completed, less than 1/1,000 of the present population will still be alive!”

The Bible also speaks of extraterrestrials, spirit creatures, such as obedient angels and disobedient, rebellious angels who became demons. Down through Bible history, God on many occasions used faithful angels to communicate with men. (Genesis 22:9-18; Isaiah 6:1-7) Satan still uses his demon followers to mislead mankind with all kinds of philosophies, fads, messages, communications, and cults that distract from the message that God’s Kingdom, his heavenly government, will soon rule over a restored earth.​—Compare Luke 4:33, 34; James 2:19; Revelation 12:9; 21:1-4.

The Christian apostle Paul gave due warning of demon influence in the last days when he wrote: “The inspired utterance says definitely that in later periods of time some will fall away from the faith, paying attention to misleading inspired utterances and teachings of demons.”​—1 Timothy 4:1.

Keeping in mind how deep we are into these apocalyptic days, it would not be advisable for Christians to spend their valuable time investigating in depth matters of this kind. Rather, we should concern ourselves with the more important challenge at hand, that is, obeying the command of the extraterrestrial holy angel who proclaimed: “Fear God and give him glory, because the hour of the judgment by him has arrived, and so worship the One who made the heaven and the earth and sea and fountains of waters.”​—Revelation 14:6, 7.

[Footnotes]

[Box on page 10]

UFO’s​—The Scientific View

“Astronomy and UFOs are related: if people knew more about astronomy, there would be far fewer UFO sightings.”​—Astronomy, December 1988.

“Venus is the brightest of all the planets in the night sky and is responsible for more UFO reports than any other single object. . . .

“Modern airport radars now automatically identify all aircraft in their area . . . As radars have become more sophisticated at correctly identifying aircraft and filtering out sources of error, the number of radar UFO reports has dropped almost to zero. Of course, if UFOs were real, one would expect . . . modern radar to increase the number of UFOs seen on radar. . . .

“In nearly forty years of investigation, not one authentic photo of a UFO has been taken and not one piece of genuine debris or other physical evidence has been found. Impressive-sounding sightings are reported year after year and, year after year, when carefully examined, they disappear into the mists of misperceptions, misidentifications, and hoaxes.”​—Pseudoscience and the Paranormal, by Terence Hines.

“Much of the trouble arises from the fact that the sky presents an almost endless variety of peculiar sights and objects, only a few of which are likely to be encountered by one person in a lifetime. And when this does happen, he may be misled into thinking that he has seen something extraordinary​—instead of merely unfamiliar. . . .

“Seldom has any subject been so invested with fraud, hysteria, credulity, religious mania, incompetence, and most of the other unflattering human characteristics.”​—The Promise of Space, by Arthur C. Clarke.

“I should like to see these profound words inscribed on the threshold of all the temples of science: ‘The greatest derangement of the mind is to believe in something because one wishes it to be so.’”​—Louis Pasteur, 19th-century French scientist.

[Picture on page 8]

Depending on the angle of vision, nighttime advertising balloons, airplanes, and helicopters can be misperceived as UFO’s

[Credit Line]

Nite Sign, Inc.