Source: Wilmington (OH) News-Journal January 8, 1948 (page unknown)
Airman Killed Chasing Reported Flying Saucer
Original Article Image: http://nicap.org/images/1948_1_8_NewsJournal.jpg
Louisville, Ky., Jan 8 – (AP)
The Kentucky National Guard headquarters revealed here today that Capt. Thomas F. Mantell, Jr., 25, was killed in a plane explosion near Franklin, Ky., yesterday while chasing what was believed to be a “flying saucer.”
Mantell was one of three Kentucky National Guard officers sent yesterday to investigate a reported “flying saucer” in the air near Fort Knox. The object also was reported visible at Hopkinsville, Ky., Nashville, Tenn., and other points in the two states.
Mantell was flying a P-51 National Guard plane which witnesses said apparently exploded in the air and crashed near Franklin.
“SAUCER” ESCAPES
Fort Knox, Ky., Jan 8 – (AP)
A “flying saucer” reportedly was seen here yesterday and Col. Guy F. Hix, commander of Godman Field, sent three airplanes after it, but the “saucer” got away.
Colonel Hix said the saucer became visible here about 2 P.M.
“It was to the south and near the sun, very white and looked like an umbrella,” he elaborated.
Three National Guard planes we circling overheard at the time, so the colonel said he radioed the craft to give chase. But a few minutes later the pilots radioed back the saucer was too high and going too fast for them to catch.
The Army officer said he watched the saucer through binoculars and that from an observation tower it appeared motionless.
“I thought it was a celestial body, but I can’t account for the fact it didn’t move. I just don’t know what it was.”
Dr. Walter L. Moore, of the University of Louisville, said the planet Venus was near the sun at the time the saucer was reported seen.
Control Tower Operators at CCAB Watch Maneuvers
A sky phenomena, described by observers at the Clinton County Air Base as having the appearance of a flaming red cone trailing a gaseous green mist, appeared in the southwest skies of Wilmington Wednesday night between 7:20 and 7:55 P.M.
S/Sgt. Gale F. Walter and Cpl. James Hudson, control tower operators at the air field, saw this phenomena at 7:20 P.M. and observed its maneuvers in the sky until 7:55 P.M. when it reportedly disappeared over the horizon. The sky phenomena hung suspended in the air at the intervals and then gained and lost altitude at what appeared to be terrific bursts of speed. The intense brightness of the sky phenomena pierced through a heavy layer of clouds passing intermittently over the area and obscuring other celestial phenomena.
M/Sgt. Irvin H. Lewis, S/Sgt. John P. Haag, Sgt. Harold E. Olvis and T/Sgt. Leroy Ziegler, four members of the alert crew, joined the control tower operators in observing the sky phenomena for approximately 35 minutes.
