Lakenheath and Bentwaters RAF/USAF Radar/Visual Case, 1956
Brief summary: Observations of unidentified objects by USAF and RAF personnel, extending over 5 hours, and involving ground-radar, airborne-radar, ground visual and airborne-visual sightings of high-speed unconventionally maneuvering obJects in the vicinity of two RAF stations at night. It is Case 2 in the Condon Report and is there conceded to be unexplained.
First radar sighting, 2130Z. Bentwaters GCA operator, A/2c ______ (I shall use a blank to indicate the names razor-bladed out of my copies of the case-file prior to release of the file items to me), reported picking up a target 25-30 miles ESE, which moved at very high speed on constant 295 degrees heading across his scope until he lost it 15-20 miles to the NW of Bentwaters. In the Bluebook file, A/2c _____ is reported as describing it as a strong radar echo, comparable to that of a typical aircraft, until it weakened near the end of its path across his scope. He is quoted as estimating a speed of the order of
4000 mph, but two other cited quantities suggest even higher speeds. A transit time of 30 seconds is given, and if one combines that with the reported range of distance traversed, 40-50 miles, a speed of about 5000- 6000 mph results. Finally, A/2c _____ stated that it covered about 5-6 miles per sweep of the AN/MPN-llA GCA radar he was using. The sweep-period for that set is given as 2 seconds (30 rpm), so this yields an even higher speed- estimate of about
9000 mph. (Internal discrepancies of this sort are quite typical of Bluebook case-files, I regret to say. My study of many such files during the past three years leaves me no conclusion but that Bluebook work has never represented high-caliber scientific work, but rather has operated as a perfunctory bookkeeping and filing operation during most of its life. Of the three speed figures just mentioned, the latter derives from the type of observation most likely to be reasonably accurate, in my opinion. The displacement of a series of successive radar blips on a surveillance radar such as the MPN-11A, can be estimated to perhaps a mile or so with little difficulty, when the operator has as large a number of successive blips to work with as is here involved. Nevertheless, it is necessary to regard the speed as quite uncertain here, though presumably in the range of several thousand miles per hour and hence not associable with any conventional aircraft, nor with still higher-speed meteors either.)
Second radar sighting, 2130-2155Z. A few minutes after the preceding event, T/Sgt _____ picked up on the same MPN-11A a group of 12-15 objects about 8 miles SW of Brentwaters. In the report to Bluebook, he pointed out that "these objects appeared as normal targets on the GCA scope and that normal checks made to determine possible malfunctions of the GCA radar failed to indicate anything was technically wrong." The dozen or so objects were moving together towards the NE at varying speeds, ranging between 80 and 125 mph, and "the 12 to 15 unidentified objects were preceded by 3 objects which were in a triangular formation with an estimated 1000 feet separating each object in this formation." The dozen objects to the rear "were scattered behind the lead formation of 3 at irregular intervals with the whole group simultaneously covering a 6 to 7 mile area," the official report notes.
Consistent radar returns came from this group during their 25-minute movement from the point at which they were first picked up, 8 mi. SW, to a point about 40 mi. NE of Bentwaters, their echoes decreasing in intensity as they moved off to the NE. When the group reached a point some 40 mi. NE, they all appeared to converge to form a single radar echo whose intensity is described as several times larger than a B-36 return under comparable conditions. Then motion ceased, while this single strong echo remained stationary for 10-15 minutes. Then it resumed motion to the NE for 5-6 miles, stopped again for 3-5 minutes, and finally moved northward and off the scope.
Third radar sighting, 2200Z. Five minutes after the foregoing formation moved off-scope, T/Sgt _____ detected an unidentified target about 30 mi. E of the Bentwaters GCA station, and tracked it in rapid westward motion to a point about 25 mi. W of the station, where the object "suddenly disappeared off the radar screen by rapidly moving out of the GCS radiation pattern," according to his interpretation of the event. Here, again, we get discordant speed information, for T/Sgt _____ gave the speed only as being "in excess of
4000 mph," whereas the time-duration of the tracking, given as 16 sec, implies a speed of
12,000 mph, for the roughly 55 mi. track-length reported. Nothing in the Bluebook files indicates that this discrepancy was investigated further or even noticed, so one can say only that the apparent speed lay far above that of conventional aircraft.
http://www.ufoevidence.org/documents/doc632.htm
