Part 2 - 4: Project SIGN
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There is a large amount of ground to cover with the Mantell incident,
but for a moment let's discuss the UFO project which had just
"officially"
began in January of 1948, a few weeks after the tragic incident.
Project SIGN, the forerunner of Projects Grudge and Blue Book, was
actually started a month before, if not years before and was referred
to as "Project Saucer". Project Sign was instigated following a recommendation from Lt. General Nathan F. Twining, then the head of Air Materiel Command. Just before this, Brig. Gen. George Schulgen, of the Army Air Forces air intelligence division, had completed a preliminary review of the many UFO reports, then called "flying discs" by military authorities, which had received considerable publicity following the Kenneth Arnold sighting of June 24, 1947. Schulgen's study, completed in late July 1947, concluded that the flying discs were real craft. Schulgen then asked Twining and his command, which included the intelligence and engineering divisions located at Wright Patterson Air Force Base, (then referred to as Wright Field), to carry out a more exhaustive review of the data. In his formal SECRET letter to Gen. Schulgen (*) on September 23, 1947, in part, General Nathan Twining wrote: "2. It is the opinion that:
"(a) The phenomenon reported is
something real and not visionary or fictitious. "(b) There are objects probably
approximately the shape of a disc, of such appreciable size as to
appear to be as large as a man-made aircraft. "(c) There is the possibility
that
some of the incidents may be caused by natural phenomena, such as
meteors. "(d) The reported operating
characteristics such as extreme rates of climb, maneuverability
(particularly in roll), and action which must be considered evasive
when sighted or contacted by friendly aircraft and radar, lend belief
to the possibility that some of the objects are controlled either
manually, automatically or remotely."
Twining's suggestion was approved on December 30 by Major General Laurence C. Craigie, Director of Research and Development under the Deputy Chief of Staff for Materiel at Headquarters U.S. Air Force. According to Craigie's directive, it would be the role of Sign to: "...collect, collate, evaluate and distribute to interested government agencies and contractors all information concerning sightings and phenomena in the atmosphere which can be construed to be of concern to the national security." On January 22, 1948, Project Sign formally began its work as a branch of Air Technical Intelligence Center (ATIC) at Wright Patterson Air Force Base, under the direction of Captain Robert R. Sneider. Sign was seen as a very important undertaking: Ruppelt wrote that Sign "was given a 2A priority, 1A being the highest priority an Air Force project could have." Though it was classified "restricted", the study's existence was eventually known to the general public, and was often called "Project Saucer". However, UFO historian Wendy Connors established, through an interview with a surviving Sign secretary, that "Project Saucer" was the project's original informal name and had actually begun in late 1946. If this was the case, then the Army Air Force had already begun investigation of UFOs well before the Kenneth Arnold sighting that launched the first flood of UFO reports of June-July 1947 in the United States. May 28, 2006, continued: Michael D. Swords is a Professor of Natural Science at Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo, Michigan. His major professional and involvements are teaching and writing in the areas of general sciences and anomalous phenomena. His teaching centers about human biology, the history and philosophy of science, scientific methodology, and the "parasciences" of which UFOlogy is a member. His writings have concentrated mainly on topics in UFOlogy, parapsychology, and cryptozoology, and several have been published in the "MUFON UFO Journal". A very relevant paper is: Project SIGN & the Estimate of the Situation (2000). Dr. Michael D. Swords writes: "The core personnel for the
project were probably the most talented group to work on UFOs until the
Air Force ended its investigation in 1969. Aiding chief officer, Capt.
Robert R Sneider, were two outstanding aeronautical engineers, Alfred
Loedding and Alfred B. Deyarmond. Completing the group was nuclear and
missile expert Lawrence Truettner. The quality of these people
indicates the seriousness (and the comparative difference in later
years) with which the Air Force considered the flying disk problem."
Wendy Connors: In 1947, Wright-Field's
T-2's job (Dayton, Ohio) was to acquire,
collect, analyze and produce foreign aerospace technical intelligence
for the Army Air Forces. Loedding was an expert in such
areas as Vertical Takeoff aircraft, the hydro bomb, rockets/fuel and
low aspect ratio aircraft. Documents show Colonel Howard McCoy sent
Loedding to the Pentagon as the first liaison between T-2 Intelligence
and the AF Office of Intelligence (AFOIN). This was done in July 1947
because General McDonald wanted someone to work with Dr. Charles
Carroll in setting up the preliminary outline for a formal and parallel
project to investigate the "flying disc" phenomenon that was rapidly
developing. Loedding's expertise was necessary because at the time the
"boys at the Pentagon" were of the opinion that the discs were advanced
technology from Russia and invading US airspace. Dan Wilson's reports to the A-Team:
http://www.nicap.org/docs/mantell/mantell480107docs9.htm MAXW-PBB3 713-722 The cover-up of the Mantell case begins with the timely discovery of a document (MAXW-PBB3-714) signed by base commanding officer, Colonel Guy F. Hix. In the document below it clearly states that the civilian investigator (Alfred Loedding) from Wright Field, arrived at Godman Field on January 9, 1948 and made a thorough investigation. After obtaining statements and full information on the matter, he (Loedding) issued instructions that no report on the subject would be made until further instructions were given. Fran Ridge: USAF-SIGN1-377 is a better version of MAXW-PBB3-714, transcript below (Frame 377, see Part 2-2) . THIS PAGE IS UNCLASSIFIED
HQ
315th AF BASE
UNIT (RES TNG), Godman Field, Ft. Knox,
Ky. 9 Jam 48
TO: Commanding General Eleventh Air Force, 1612 South Cameron Street Harrisburg, Pennsylvania ATTENTION: Lt. Col. Chandler, PIO Section 1. Forwarded in accordance with telephone instructions, your office this date. 2. A Mr. Loedding, civilian investigator for the intelligence Division, Department of the Air Force, assigned to Wright Field, Ohio, arrived at this headquarters, this date, and made a through investigation of the matters listed in basic letter. 3. After obtaining statements and full information on the matter, he issued instructions that no reports on the subject would be made until further notice was given. 4. This report, however, is forwarded in compliance with your instructions.
6 Incls GUY F. HIX N/C Colonel, USAF Commanding The next day, May 29, Brad Sparks sent the group an email: He had gotten the records on the balloon flight. I read over the posted June 1994
CAUS
article on Mantell expecting
to find a RECORD of a Skyhook launch on Jan 6, 1948. I was hoping
to find a THEODOLITE tracking on a MAP, since "theodolite" tracking was
made much of in the article. I was bitterly disappointed to find
neither. In fact there is an eerie deja vu here with the infamous
C B Moore again involved in peddling questionable stories about balloon
antics that are not documented and are flagrantly contradicted by the
facts -- just like with his wholesale falsification of the Roswell
MOGUL balloon fiction which Dave Rudiak and I thoroughly exploded as a
tissue of lies, deceit and fabrication from start to finish.
(more on
Moore's lies below).
If it was a UFO it was very
poorly documented. If it was a
Skyhook balloon it was very poorly documented.
How do we _know_ the alleged
Skyhook balloon was lost after
passing the Georgia/South Carolina coastline? That kind of
assertion
in the article makes it seem like there was a TRACKING of the balloon
over a distance of 1,000+ miles out to the Georgia/South Carolina
coast, a
seemingly solid documentary record.
Or is this just a bald assertion
based simply on drawing a
straight line from Camp Ripley, Minn., to Mantell's crash site near
Franklin, Ky., and then continuing the line out to the Georgia/South
Carolina? That is not a RECORD, that is a hypothetical
extrapolation
dressed up to LOOK like a documentary record made at the time, in 1948,
which is not quite kosher, it's misleading. That would be pretty
amazing given all the cross-winds at altitude that are hypothesized
just to get a Camp Ripley -- Believe it or Not! -- balloon over central
Kentucky at the time of the Mantell and other sightings, and to stop
and start at the right time, etc.
Interestingly the AF claimed to
have had actual "wind plots"
(Ruppelt book) to show that a Clinton County AFB Skyhook launch
would have traveled SW to the sighting area in Kentucky -- about 90
degrees off of C B Moore's alleged SE heading claimed for the purported
Camp Ripley balloon. How is that possible? Where are the
WEATHER RECORDS to prove the Camp Ripley theory??? Moore is a
meteorologist for crying out loud so where are the meteorological
records to support his baseless theory??? At least the Clinton
County Skyhook theory has WEATHER RECORDS, but these would seem to
contradict any Camp Ripley balloon path.
The article claims that "Complete
weather and tracking data for
the Camp Ripley launch are not available for the entire path."
Well that implies there ARE such "weather and tracking data" available
for SOME of the balloon flight path so WHERE IS IT????
Speaking of amazing coincidences,
isn't it a pretty extraordinary
"coincidence" that just a few hours after an alleged Skyhook balloon
supposedly passes over the general region that at 7:20-8:00 PM (EST) on
Jan 7, 1948, or almost 2 HOURS AFTER SUNSET AT BALLOON ALTITUDE AND
WHEN THE BALLOON COULD NOT POSSIBLY BE SEEN there were
Skyhook-balloon-like sightings from Lockbourne AFB and Clinton County
AFB in southern Ohio??? How is that possible??? Pretty
amazing when one considers a Skyhook could not possibly have been seen
as a classic "ice cream cone" shape in PITCH DARKNESS of night.
Even if the instrument package underneath the balloon carried a tiny
light the light could not possibly have illuminated the 100-foot
cone-shaped gas bag above it. These are just physical
impossibilities you can take to the bank.
Here is what I found in the AF
file on the Mantell case about
these impossible NIGHTTIME Skyhook-like sightings of a "flaming red
cone" with "intense brightness" seen by the Clinton County Air Field
Control Tower operators and flight crew members, an object so bright
that when a cloud drifted in front of it the object's light could still
be seen even though stars were completely blotted out (Maxwell Roll 3,
p. 737; see also Sign Roll 1, p. 513-4, 518, 526-7, 531, etc.):
"Description of object seen at
Clinton AFB.
"A. 6 observers at
Wilmington,
site of Clinton AFB, stated that a cone shaped object ... similar
to what a partially inflated Skyhook balloon would look like. It
was in sight
for approx. 30 [mins]. All stated it disappeared in general SW direction.
"B. 2 observers
described
it as an inverted triangle or a cone -- it climbed and descended.
Wind was from NE to SW, which is in the exact direction of GODMAN.
"CONE INVERTED TRIANGLE
[drawings]
partially inflated
balloon"
I noticed in the article that
famed astronomer Carl Seyfert's
sighting of a balloon from Vanderbilt Observatory near Nashville,
Tenn., is seriously MISQUOTED leaving out the crucial observation that
the balloon seen in the SSE was "moving first SE" (which would fit the
Camp Ripley Skyhook theory) but then it WENT WEST "then W" which would
contradict the Ripley "Believe It or Not" Skyhook balloon theory.
The part saying "then W" was left out and no ellipses indicated any
deletion, and so was the word "first" left out of "moving first SE,
then W" so as to further cover up the direction change. There
were several other distortions in the mangled quotation or
misquotation. (Maxwell Roll 3, p. 711)
If the Camp Ripley Skyhook was
held stationary for 1-1/2 hours
from 1:45 to 3:15 PM (CST) as the article and Moore apparently both
claim, because of ascending into a "turnaround altitude" from 60,000 to
75,000 ft then how is it that astronomer Seyfert just over an hour
later at 4:30 PM CST estimated the balloon was at just 25,000 ft moving
at 10 mph, a speed which Moore seemed to agree with. But you can't
have both because if Seyfert was able to accurately estimate a 10 mph
speed then he must have had a reasonable estimate of distance and
height in order to calculate the speed. If the Skyhook was
rapidly descending 35,000+ ft in perhaps another 1 hour then it should
have impacted the ground in south-central Tennessee at about 5:30 PM
CST. It could not possibly then have traveled to the Atlantic
Ocean over the Georgia/South Carolina border as Moore claims.
The article claims, based on what
Moore was alleging, that the
Navy did the Skyhook launch from Camp Ripley but did not disclose this
at the time to the AF investigation of the Mantell crash because the
Navy did not want to get blamed for Mantell's death. We also get
the usual bullshit about how Skyhook was "highly classified" at the
time, too, which it WAS NOT. It was HIGHLY PUBLICIZED at the
time. Certain projects using Skyhooks were classified but not the
Skyhook launches or the Skyhook balloons. This is a cute new
"reasonable cover-up" theory similar to the Roswell MOGUL fraud but it's
missing any proof that the NAVY launched the Skyhook from Camp Ripley
on Jan 6, 1948. Moore's finding photos of the alleged Camp Ripley
launch in his files implies that he personally was there and that he
launched the Skyhook (why not say so? why conceal his personal
involvement?). But Moore was under AIR FORCE CONTRACT at the time
and he is able to cite chapter and verse by AF Contract Number "AF
19(122)-633" to prove that Clinton County, Ohio, was not launching
Skyhooks until 1951, but doesn't do the same for Camp Ripley in
1948. Where is the NAVY CONTRACT NUMBER and PROJECT
IDENTIFICATION for the Camp Ripley Skyhooks in 1948????
Where is the actual RECORD of the
alleged Skyhook balloon launch
from Camp Ripley, Minn., on Jan 6, 1948???? It was launched at
"about" 8 AM? Why is there no exact recorded time? Is that
because this "record" is actually all dependent on the confabulated
convenient memory of one person, C B Moore, one of the most notorious
liars in the history of UFOlogy who has been caught red-handed in
numerous outright proven lies and falsifications of data and
preposterous math? Moore makes George Adamski look like an honest
Boy Scout in comparison.
<snip> The Mantell crash itself seems to
suffer from outright
doubletalk. In the same Accident Report it first says Mantell's
fighter crashed because "as nose depressed, [Mantell] finally began a
spiraling dive which resulted in excessive speeds causing gradual
disintegration." So Mantell's aircraft was in a crash dive nose
down going so fast it broke apart, yet then the report admits the plane
did not hit ground nose first but came down pancaking flat on its
belly, while still trying to maintain the fiction of coming "straight
down," but IN A "HORIZONTAL POSITION"!!! Huh???? Note the
slick weasel-wording:
"The aircraft came straight
down in a horizontal position and landed on the left side." (Maxwell
Roll 3 p. 750) Fran Ridge: I then discovered two restricted documents, one which tells more about what Mantell had said than any previous document found. MAXW-PBB3-681 reads in part: "About
1445 flight leader (NG 869) reported sighting object 'ahead and above
still climbing'. At 15,000 ft he reported: 'Object directly ahead and
above and moving about half my speed ' Again 'it appears metallic and
of tremendous size.' Still later 'I'm still climbing - object is above
and ahead moving about my speed or faster - I'm trying to close in for
better look'. This was about 3:15 PM. Five minutes later the
other two ships turned back. Both documents appear on the web page I
created, http://www.nicap.org/docs/mantell/mantell480107docs11.htm,
but the actual documents are located at the end of this chapter. Interest in the case re-investigation was mounting, but some were questioning why re-investigate in the first place? Mary Castner of CUFOS wrote: "Please tell me what makes you
think
this Skyhook couldn't be what
Mantell saw and why a Skyhook had to be launched on 1/7 to qualify for
what Mantell saw?" Fran Ridge: As I told the list members, first of all, I was approached in March by Drew Speier of WFIE to help on a story they wanted to do on the Mantell incident. To set the record straight, I told him that there were MUCH better reports and that the Mantell incident was not even an "unknown". He insisted that it was a "local" story and told me that it would possibly lead to other stories if it went well. May was ratings month and that was the release period. There are a LOT of problems with the Mantell incident. It
was NOT
an open and shut case of a balloon. I didn't go into them at this time
because when Drew asked me to do the story I re-opened the
investigation. I told her (and the list) that, when Dan and I get all
the documents posted, the case
will be presented for comment. The case was not listed
as an unknown at this point. I have worked with people, one which served on on Project
SAUCER (Code-named SIGN),
and
there is reasonable doubt about many factors in this case. There WERE
UFO reports that day. One report of an object 250' in diameter moving
at a good clip does not square with a Skyhook balloon, reported BEFORE
Mantell and the tower saw anything. And some pilot friends of mine
cannot accept the idea of a pilot who, during the stress of aerial
combat in WWII,
while chasing a balloon OR flying saucer would forget his oxygen.
Whether we like it or not, we still have a mystery. We may not end up
with an unknown, but mystery we do have. Later that day I found this document, showing the Project SIGN first quarter sightings, early on lists the case as solved, yet doesn't do an across the board balloon explanation to explain the rash of sightings in the region. Venus is the explanation for ALL of them, except the Mantell incident. The Jan-Feb-March sighting listings lists the sighting at Godman as a "balloon"!!! NARA-PBB1-15 (*) The Air Force publicly blamed the planet Venus as the cause for all of the series of sightings, including the daylight incident in Kentucky (not Mantell). In actuality, however, many of the intelligence officers in TID's Sign project were slowly becoming convinced UFOs were extraterrestrial in origin during the course of the long accident investigation that continued through April. Loedding and Sneider got the Venus idea from Dr. Hynek who had only offhandedly suggested the planet as one possible explanation. They, however, used it as a cover or a quick fix to explain away what, at the time, became a very widely publicized incident in the midst of what was obviously going to be a long investigation. Sign team members thought they might have to suggest a far more shocking conclusion, but not before they had the time to develop the theory.
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