This intelligence summary concerns the events of the summer of 1974, in particular MADAR 5, but includes MADAR 6 &7 .  The MADAR effort consists of looking for correlations between UFO activity and detections of anomalistic E-M phenomena.

Sometimes we have a report of a radar target where there is no visual report of an unidentified object in the area. On our computer database we list this as a "UT" or "uncorrelated target".  More scientific interest is paid to cases where there IS a visual sighting along with the radar paint and this is what we call an "RV" or "radar/visual". Air Route Traffic Controllers have realtime knowledge of something in the air. What makes this possible is the Flight Plan (filed by the pilot) and the transponder on the aircraft. ARTC units use the term "squawk" when they are assigning an aircraft a transponder code, e.g., "Squawk 7421". Squawk thus can be said to mean "select transponder code" (or IDENT code). If you've listened to aircraft frequencies and have seen a busy radar display you can appreciate this. On the display you'll notice for each aircraft there is what they call a Full Data Block: The symbology displayed adjacent to a tracked aircraft target on a MDM (scope) containing an aircraft position symbol, a leader line, velocity vector line, and the alphanumeric data associated with the aircraft.

MADAR has a different but very efficient set-up but the recorded data is reviewed AFTER the event. The MADAR Center has a local grapevine consisting of local spotters, police, sheriff and state police in local counties, as well as personnel at the ARTC (control tower) at Evansville (20 miles to the east of Mt. Vernon). And during a MADAR event our black box recorders log all transmissions from law enforcement and aircraft for 45 minutes. Also recorded is the background radiation, before, during, and after the event. Our database then is produced as raw data comes in from local calls, MUFON, and the National UFO Reporting Center in Seattle. There is a delay of 1-2 months in most cases. The exception would be in terms of what is filed locally (call-ins) at the UFO Filter Center here in Mt. Vernon. In the case of MADAR 5 there were no calls. But MADAR 5 occurred at 2:42 AM!  The good news (if there was any) is that anomalistic E-M phenomena associated with UFOs many times occurs in the wee hours. The sensor had deviated from North just enough to trigger the system, indicating a disturbance probably close to the limits of the estimated 5-mile range of the variometer. I refer to this as the "phantom pulse" since you cannot hear it on the recordings due to the fact that it was this initial pulse that activated the system and turned on the recorders. The background radiation reading was a normal 14 counts per minute. The radar at Dress-Regional Airport at Evansville was NIS (not in service) at this hour of the day. and while on alert I observed no unusual objects in the heavens. The alert was terminated at 3:42 AM.



What we DO know is that MADAR events are extremely rare with two dozen events in about as many years. When MADAR 5 occurred there was no visual UAP correlation. But close encounters are also rare, very rare in Posey County in fact. In the summer of 1974 one of the best close encounters that ever occurred in the MADAR area happened a little more than three miles away, and MADAR didn't pick it up. The significance here, however, is in the location on the graph of three rare anomalistic events during a UFO report dry season.



July 30, 1974; Solitude, Indiana
8:50 PM. Our involvement began when the Sheriff contacted me right after the incident had occurred and was reported. Our Rapid Deployment Team of three men were on the road to the area within minutes. Near Solitude, Indiana, just a little over three miles north of us, a Mt. Vernon couple and their little boy were on their way home from a play in New Harmony, heading south on Hwy 69. They observed an object silhouetted against the moonlit haze in the southwest. Although a couple of miles away, the object had a clear cigar shape with three white lights. They continued driving down the highway and, as they got over the top of some hills, the object started to descend, getting larger and larger all the time. Right at the bottom of the hill they slowed down and the object appeared to be hovering. It was approximately a hundred yards from them then, and it was moving, but very slow. The adult male witness reported: "It acted like it was on water or floating'-like." It now had four lights on it, two on each end, the shadowy object was was long and slender, "kinda cigar-shaped." At one time "it was just right above us, maybe 50-60'. Well, you couldn't believe the size of it. It was real large. We went down the highway just a little further. We were going to park the car, so we pulled in there and were getting out of the car and we couldn't find it. It had just vanished." The object was "thin on the ends" and, "as it got to the middle, it was thicker. But like I say, we could just see the shadow". Duration: 7-18 minutes.