UFOs: The Research, the Evidence

[Almo]

I don't find this argument compelling from a beliver's perspective:

"95% of all sightings have been explained, often by lack of witness reliability. This means the other 5% are probably the same thing."

Suppose there is one alien ship that shows up across 1,000 years, because life is pretty rare in the universe. One sighting might be real in the 5%, and you'd never be able to tell from the other data due to the tiny sample size of real sightings.

The argument could work against the idea that aliens are here often, but a believer in that type of theory won't listen to this type of reasoning.

 

[Access Denied]

I don't find this argument compelling from a beliver's perspective:

"95% of all sightings have been explained, often by lack of witness reliability. This means the other 5% are probably the same thing."

Suppose there is one alien ship that shows up across 1,000 years, because life is pretty rare in the universe. One sighting might be real in the 5%, and you'd never be able to tell from the other data due to the tiny sample size of real sightings.

The argument could work against the idea that aliens are here often, but a believer in that type of theory won't listen to this type of reasoning.

Good point Almo, that argument used to really bother me as well. But then I started looking at a number of the 701 officially “unidentified” cases in detail, particularly those considered to be the “best evidence” by UFOlogists. After all, they should know, right? Unfortunately, without exception, they all fell apart under closer scrutiny. In fact, one might start to wonder why they were classified as “unidentified” to begin with. Why couldn’t the Air Force have investigated a given case as in-depth as myself and others have since?

Of course the answer is the reality is Project Blue Book was little more than an office and a couple of desks and those assigned to it were ill-equipped to deal with the sheer volume of reports they received, some 12,618 over the course of some 30 years. Given the lack of resources and expertise (Astronomer Dr. J. Allen Hynek was their sole scientific consultant) and the intense pressure from the public and various government officials to solve the UFO “enigma”, it’s no surprise they were unable to follow many high-profile cases to their logical conclusion, especially if it became clear (but impossible to “prove”) a given witness was most likely mistaken or perhaps overreacted to a stimulus of a particularly “sensitive” nature. They were simply caught between a rock and a hard place and in no real position to, in effect, pass judgment on the “credibility” of any given witness. That would have resulted in a public relations nightmare…and often did despite their best efforts.

If the available evidence is too ambiguous (or *cough* unavailable *cough*) to make a conclusive identification then the only scientifically (and politically) correct conclusion is of course “unidentified”… in effect saying “we don’t know”. Ironically, this was entirely unacceptable to a relatively small but highly vocal segment of the public who wanted the government to validate their near fanatically religious belief in extraterrestrial visitation which led to the unintended consequences of charges of a “massive” cover-up and all manner of conspiracy “theory”.

Anyway, if the so-called “best evidence” isn’t compelling after cross-examination and there’s no other evidence to suggest we’ve been visited when arguably there should be from a myriad of sources (official or otherwise to include academia to keep this on topic) then I’m comfortable with the notion that for all practical purposes, we probably haven’t been visited… yet.

[or if we have and missed it then so what? I say better luck next time]

 

[ufology]

So in the words of the head of Project Blue Book the cases were cherry picked, and don't represent the full number of reports. That's strange, because someone else on another thread has been trying to argue that Blus Book shows that 20% of all UFO reports are unidentified.

No it doesn't, it represents poor skepticism. Removing two thirds of all cases before you even start is very poor skepticism, and very poor science, unless you're going to at least include them in some statistical way later in the study. Was that done?

All of Blue Book's numbers are irrelevant and misleading if two thirds of all cases were rejected before they even started.

We know, from Ruppelt's quote, that Blue Book's cases don't represent all reports, and that from the numbers he gives the percentage of objects left in the "unidentified" category for Blue Book should be about 7% (1/3rd of 20%) assuming that all of the pre-rejected cases were either obvious to identify or fall into the "insufficient data" category.

The USAF data gives about 5.5%, so the difference between the two is pretty small.

It's perfectly legitimate to discard useless data from a study the same way spoiled ballots are discarded from elections or useless tips are discarded from a missing person searches. For example. If a 12 year old girl is reported missing at 2pm in New York, you are going to restrict your tips to young girls that came in after 2pm. Furthermore a radius will be setup based on possible travel time ... tips from Los Angeles an hour later will be discarded, tips for male adults will be discarded, as will be many others. It is perfectly legitimate investigative procedure. What isn't legitimate is to include all those tips in your report saying that you investigated every one of them when you didn't ( which is what you have with the so called USAF fact-sheet ).

j.r.

 

[wollery]

It's perfectly legitimate to discard useless data from a study the same way spoiled ballots are discarded from elections or useless tips are discarded from a missing person searches. For example. If a 12 year old girl is reported missing at 2pm in New York, you are going to restrict your tips to young girls that came in after 2pm. Furthermore a radius will be setup based on possible travel time ... tips from Los Angeles an hour later will be discarded, tips for male adults will be discarded, as will be many others. It is perfectly legitimate investigative procedure. What isn't legitimate is to include all those tips in your report saying that you investigated every one of them when you didn't ( which is what you have with the so called USAF fact-sheet ).

j.r.

On what basis were those 2/3rds of reports discarded?

 

[TjW]

It's perfectly legitimate to discard useless data from a study the same way spoiled ballots are discarded from elections or useless tips are discarded from a missing person searches. For example. If a 12 year old girl is reported missing at 2pm in New York, you are going to restrict your tips to young girls that came in after 2pm. Furthermore a radius will be setup based on possible travel time ... tips from Los Angeles an hour later will be discarded, tips for male adults will be discarded, as will be many others. It is perfectly legitimate investigative procedure. What isn't legitimate is to include all those tips in your report saying that you investigated every one of them when you didn't ( which is what you have with the so called USAF fact-sheet ).

j.r.

What would you call that methodology? You've committed to the position that such a methodology is neither scientific nor pseudoscientific. What, then, is it?

 

[Access Denied]

We know, from Ruppelt's quote, that Blue Book's cases don't represent all reports, and that from the numbers he gives the percentage of objects left in the "unidentified" category for Blue Book should be about 7% (1/3rd of 20%) assuming that all of the pre-rejected cases were either obvious to identify or fall into the "insufficient data" category.

The USAF data gives about 5.5%, so the difference between the two is pretty small.

Here's what the actual report that Ruppelt is referring to says regarding the cases selected for statistical analysis....

"Originally, the problem involved the preparation and analysis of about 1,300 reports accumulated by the Air Force between 1947 and the end of March, 1952. During the course of the work, the number of reports submitted for analysis and evaluation more than tripled, the result of the unprecedented increase in observations during 1952. Accordingly, this study is based on a number of reports considered to be large enough for a preliminary statistical analysis, approximately 4,000 reports.

[…]

Altogether, the data for this study consisted of approximately 4,000 reports of sightings of unidentified aerial objects. The majority were received through military channels or in the form of observer-completed questionnaires; a few were accepted in the form of direct letters from unquestionably reliable sources. Sightings made between June, 1947, and December, 1952, were considered for this study. Sightings alleged to have occurred prior to 1947 were not considered, since they were not reported to official sources until after public interest in "flying saucers" had been stimulated by the popular press.

[…]

The first step in evaluation, the deduction of discrete facts from subjective data, required certain calculations based on the information available in the sighting report. An example was the finding of the approximate angular velocity and acceleration of the object or objects sighted. Care was taken during this phase of the work to insure against the deduction of discrete facts not warranted by the original data. Thus, even though there was a complete lack of any valid evidence consisting of physical matter in any case of a reported unidentified aerial object, this was not assumed to be prima facie evidence that "flying saucers" did not exist.

In those cases in which an attempt to reduce the information to a factual level failed completely, the report was eliminated from further consideration, and thus not included in the statistical analysis. About 800 reports of sightings were eliminated or rejected in this manner. Most of these reports were rejected because they were extremely nebulous; the rest were rejected because they contained highly conflicting statements."​

I’m a little confused as to what ufology is claiming here, that the Air Force did not receive (or received more than) 12,618 reports over the course of some 30 years, or that the number of cases (701) listed as “unidentified” should have been higher?

[presumably because they failed to thoroughly investigate every single one?]

Or is it only the (hand selected) sightings reported during the first 5 years (nearly 60 years ago!) that should be considered as a representative sample for the purpose of conducting a valid statistical analysis?

[and making claims about how “reliable” UFO reports are?]

You know what they say about statistics right?

 

[ufology]

On what basis were those 2/3rds of reports discarded?

Here is a quote that gives an example of how the selection process went. Reasons for each incident are not availabale, but searching the Bluebook microfilm archives ( which I have done ), gives more clues. The quote below is from Ruppelt ( One of the heads of the project ).

"Reports are often seen in the newspapers that say: "Mrs. Henry
Jones, of 5464 South Elm, said that 10:00A.M. she was shaking her
dust mop out of the bedroom window when she saw a flying saucer"; or
"Henry Armstrong was driving between Grundy Center and Rienbeck last
night when he saw a light. Henry thinks it was a flying saucer." This
is not a good UFO report.

This type of UFO report, if it was received by Project Blue Book,
was stamped "Insufficient Data for Evaluation" and dropped into the
dead file, where it became a mere statistic.

Next to the "Insufficient Data" file was a file marked "C.P." This
meant crackpot. Into this file went all reports from people who had
talked with flying saucer crews, who had inspected flying saucers
that had landed in the United States, who had ridden in flying
saucers, or who were members of flying saucer crews. By Project Blue
Book standards, these were not "good" UFO reports either."

j.r.

 

[wollery]

Here is a quote that gives an example of how the selection process went. Reasons for each incident are not availabale, but searching the Bluebook microfilm archives ( which I have done ), gives more clues. The quote below is from Ruppelt ( One of the heads of the project ).

"Reports are often seen in the newspapers that say: "Mrs. Henry
Jones, of 5464 South Elm, said that 10:00A.M. she was shaking her
dust mop out of the bedroom window when she saw a flying saucer"; or
"Henry Armstrong was driving between Grundy Center and Rienbeck last
night when he saw a light. Henry thinks it was a flying saucer." This
is not a good UFO report.

This type of UFO report, if it was received by Project Blue Book,
was stamped "Insufficient Data for Evaluation" and dropped into the
dead file, where it became a mere statistic.

Except that they are excluded from the "insufficient data" category of the final statistics, so they don't become a mere statistic at all, but are instead excluded from the statistics. So by virtue of being a bad report they are given a status as a non-report. Hardly a valid statistical approach. If you're going to include statistics on cases that eventually end up in a category of "insufficient information" then you can't arbitrarily draw a line on how much information is sufficient to make it into the lower end of that category. Insufficient information is insufficient. You have to include them all or you are artificially skewing the statistics. That isn't to say they have to be investigated, but they should be part of the final statistics.

Next to the "Insufficient Data" file was a file marked "C.P." This
meant crackpot. Into this file went all reports from people who had
talked with flying saucer crews, who had inspected flying saucers
that had landed in the United States, who had ridden in flying
saucers, or who were members of flying saucer crews. By Project Blue
Book standards, these were not "good" UFO reports either."

Sounds like a bias in the selection criteria to me. How could they know whether or not someone had talked to a flying saucer crew without investigating the case?

The assumption that any such case is "crackpot" without investigation is simply unwarranted.

 

[ufology]

Except that they are excluded from the "insufficient data" category of the final statistics, so they don't become a mere statistic at all, but are instead excluded from the statistics. So by virtue of being a bad report they are given a status as a non-report. Hardly a valid statistical approach. If you're going to include statistics on cases that eventually end up in a category of "insufficient information" then you can't arbitrarily draw a line on how much information is sufficient to make it into the lower end of that category. Insufficient information is insufficient. You have to include them all or you are artificially skewing the statistics. That isn't to say they have to be investigated, but they should be part of the final statistics.

Sounds like a bias in the selection criteria to me. How could they know whether or not someone had talked to a flying saucer crew without investigating the case?

The assumption that any such case is "crackpot" without investigation is simply unwarranted.

I tend to agree that the so-called "crackpot" cases maybe should have been taken more seriously, especially if there was some corroborating evidence to go along with them. But we're getting off track, this is clearly a "skeptical bias" ( not real skepticism ) against the ETH. It could have been interpreted the other way, thereby increasing the "unknown" percentage even further, but it wasn't. It shows that if anything, there was a real effort not to show any bias in favor of the ETH and to use only reports from what were deemed "reliable witnessess". This further supports my initial statement regarding the so-called USAF Fact Sheet, which is a deliberate whitewash. Your words also support my statement that there was bias shown in the statistics against the ETH ( what else would men from Mars and contacts from Venus be if not extraterrestrial )?

What I would really like to see with respect for the skeptics here is less us vs them and more of an effort to look at past and present cases to help establish their level of reliability given the evidence at hand ( evidence being observational, recorded and/or physical data ). Ufology needs skeptics, but we need constructive ones who can focus on cases and hypotheses with a critical yet open mind.

j.r.

 

[wollery]

I tend to agree that the so-called "crackpot" cases maybe should have been taken more seriously, especially if there was some corroborating evidence to go along with them. But we're getting off track, this is clearly a "skeptical bias" ( not real skepticism ) against the ETH. It could have been interpreted the other way, thereby increasing the "unknown" percentage even further, but it wasn't. It shows that if anything, there was a real effort not to show any bias in favor of the ETH and to use only reports from what were deemed "reliable witnessess". This further supports my initial statement regarding the so-called USAF Fact Sheet, which is a deliberate whitewash.

What I would really like to see with respect for the skeptics here is less us vs them and more of an effort to look at past and present cases to help establish their level of reliability given the evidence at hand ( evidence being observational, recorded and/or physical data ). Ufology needs skeptics, but we need constructive ones who can focus on cases and hypotheses with a critical yet open mind.

j.r.

And what about the other group that were excluded from the statistics?

Why are they not included with the other "insufficient information" cases? Or if you want to exclude cases with insufficient information then why not discard those other case from the statistics?

 

[Rramjet]

Except that they are excluded from the "insufficient data" category of the final statistics, so they don't become a mere statistic at all, but are instead excluded from the statistics. So by virtue of being a bad report they are given a status as a non-report. Hardly a valid statistical approach. If you're going to include statistics on cases that eventually end up in a category of "insufficient information" then you can't arbitrarily draw a line on how much information is sufficient to make it into the lower end of that category. Insufficient information is insufficient. You have to include them all or you are artificially skewing the statistics. That isn't to say they have to be investigated, but they should be part of the final statistics.

According to Dr J. A. Hynek, scientific consultant to Blue Book for 20 years, there were 13,134 UFO cases in the Blue Book files. These were broadly categorised by the Air Force as being either “Identified” (n=12,547) or “Unidentified” (n=587). The “Insufficient Information” category of reports was listed by Blue Book as “Identified” (18.3%) and was contained within the same list as the categories Astronomical(26.0%), Aircraft(17.0%), Balloons(9.3%), Radar Phenomena(1.2%), Psychological(0.5%), Hoax(0.9%), Meteorological(0.3%), Birds(0.6%) and Other(21.4%)). As Hynek notes:

“Clearly, the “Insufficient Information” cases should have been excluded from statistical computations altogether. Instead, those cases were treated statistically as if they had been solved!” (The Hynek UFO Report, p.259)​

 

[GeeMack]

I tend to agree that the so-called "crackpot" cases maybe should have been taken more seriously, especially if there was some corroborating evidence to go along with them. But we're getting off track, this is clearly a "skeptical bias" ( not real skepticism ) against the ETH. It could have been interpreted the other way, thereby increasing the "unknown" percentage even further, but it wasn't. It shows that if anything, there was a real effort not to show any bias in favor of the ETH and to use only reports from what were deemed "reliable witnessess". This further supports my initial statement regarding the so-called USAF Fact Sheet, which is a deliberate whitewash. Your words also support my statement that there was bias shown in the statistics against the ETH ( what else would men from Mars and contacts from Venus be if not extraterrestrial )?

Yes, there is a conspiracy to prevent proper investigation. Everyone knows if the resources were allocated and the personnel were dedicated to the cause, we'd all know the aliens you believe in are visiting us. Rather like those 911 Truthers and that conspiracy to prevent their truth from coming out.

What I would really like to see with respect for the skeptics here is less us vs them and more of an effort to look at past and present cases to help establish their level of reliability given the evidence at hand ( evidence being observational, recorded and/or physical data ). Ufology needs skeptics, but we need constructive ones who can focus on cases and hypotheses with a critical yet open mind.

Here is a thread with nearly 9,000 posts where one of the most avid alien believers has tried to make your pitch for you. Vigorously. Desperately. Every bit of it has been thoroughly considered by some extremely intelligent, analytical skeptics. And in that 9,000 post thread, the UFO alien believers have failed completely, miserably, and thoroughly to make a case that any such alien visitation has or is occurring.

But it does bring up the question, since you seem to believe you have a different take on the alien belief than others who have come before you, what exactly is missing from previous examinations of the evidence? Who are these skeptics, "constructive ones who can focus on cases and hypotheses with a critical yet open mind?" Because the 911 Truthers, for example, want an investigation that shows their conspiracy theory is correct, and anything less they will not accept as focused on the case with a critical yet open mind. Is that what you think "ufology" should be, where it should go?

Given all the investigations and research that has been done so far, why has it failed to show the aliens exist? What would you change about the research? Would you change the skeptics to make them more willing to believe anecdotal evidence? Would you make them more willing to accept arguments from incredulity and ignorance? What has gone wrong with all the previous investigations that has caused them to fail to support your belief?

 

[Rramjet]

So in the words of the head of Project Blue Book the cases were cherry picked, and don't represent the full number of reports. That's strange, because someone else on another thread has been trying to argue that Blus Book shows that 20% of all UFO reports are unidentified.

The Battelle Study (Blue Book Special Report No. 14 - http://www.ufocasebook.com/pdf/specialreport14.pdf) determined that 21.5% of the 2199 cases it analysed could be categorised as “Unknown” and not only that, the more reliable the report, the greater the percentage of unknowns there were (for example, 33.3% of the “Excellent” reliability reports were categorised as “Unknown”).

Given your obvious lack of knowledge about Blue Book - as evidenced in your previous post I just commented on above - and your blatant misrepresentation of my statements in the above quoted statement from you, perhaps you might actually like to familiarise yourself with the facts and stick to reporting the truth before speaking again?

 

[Rramjet]

Here is a thread with nearly 9,000 posts where one of the most avid alien believers has tried to make your pitch for you.

This is a major problem for the UFO debunkers. If the only way forward that they can see is to lie about my contentions in that thread, then their credibility falls away completely. I have repeatedly stated in that thread that I am not proposing the ET hypothesis as an explanation for UFOs. That thread is based on the premise that there are UFO cases which simply defy plausible mundane explanation (and that that therefore such cases are “alien” – as in foreign – to our concept of the natural or technological world). While the ET hypothesis might be a plausible alternative explanation (there is nothing in science that would preclude it and the observations have included ostensible “nuts and bolts” craft, intelligent control and associated beings), that does not mean it is the explanation – looks can be deceiving after all. So when you state:

And in that 9,000 post thread, the UFO alien believers have failed completely, miserably, and thoroughly to make a case that any such alien visitation has or is occurring.

It is of course a direct lie - for not only have you have participated in that thread and know perfectly well my often stated position on the matter – nowhere in that thread has anyone attempted to make a case for “alien visitation”.

 

[RoboTimbo]

<sigh> It is perfectly appropriate to ask a wife beater if he has stopped beating his wife.

So, was it deliberate dishonesty on your part in selectively providing links which didn't show Ron Johnson's other hoaxing attempts or was it genuinely just a lack of basic research ability as also evidenced by your lack of research ability in the cases at Venezuela and Kecksburg?

Rramjet, there is some serious concern about your not posting information that would be germaine to the Delphos case for which you need to answer. The information that you neglected to post (the Johnson boy's other attempted hoaxes: claiming to be psychic and claiming to see a wolf girl) would lead a competent researcher to conclude that his alleged UFO sighting was another one of his hoax attempts.

This serious concern will remain until you answer it. Was it incompetent research that caused you to overlook it or was it deliberate dishonesty on your part? The answer to that question will have a bearing on all of the other links you've "researched" and presented here.

 

[Access Denied]

Given your obvious lack of knowledge about Blue Book - as evidenced in your previous post I just commented on above - and your blatant misrepresentation of my statements in the above quoted statement from you, perhaps you might actually like to familiarise yourself with the facts and stick to reporting the truth before speaking again?

LOL... wollery points out some flaws in a study YOU used to support your position and suddenly he's the one who hasn't done his homework?

Too rich...

 

[Rramjet]

Nah..I accuse you of ignoring their requests.

Throughout this thread I have always replied to other’s posts and reasonable requests as fully as I can, indeed I have made a point of it, often going into a level of detail that clearly annoys those same posters. So, you may “accuse” all you want, but the mere fact that you do so – does not make it so!

I stated:
“ Some of that other evidence is in the geographical locations where the object was sighted (southern Canada, Lapeer County (Mi), south-east Michigan, Indiana, Ohio and Pennsylvania). If C&K were correct, we should have expected reports instead from Kansas, Missouri, Iowa, Illinois and Indiana…”

No. You are wrong again on this. The meteor appeared and descended over a small area. That area being South and SE of Detroit. If you draw a radius of about 250-300 miles around points A and B, you will see that it would include Michigan, eastern Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Northern Kentucky, West Virginia, possibly Virginia and Maryland, Pennsylvania, western NY, and Ontario. I am not sure how you can get Kansas, Missouri, and Iowa. Anyway, according to the Meteorites of Michigan article previously described (and a link you found) and other media sources previously mentioned, reports were received as far west as Chicago (eastern Illinois) from Indiana, Ohio, Michigan, Ontario, Pennsylvania, western NY and Virginia. That pretty much covers the range of states I described. Of course, weather would play a role in determining which states could see what.

No matter how you spin it, the preponderance of sightings were from Canada, through Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania- rather than Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Canada – suggesting a northwest to southeast trajectory rather than a southwest to northeast trajectory.

Better to be 7 miles off rather than 200 miles. If you look closely however, you will see that point B is on dry land only 7 miles from the lake (essentially on the shores of Ontario as I described)…

Ummm …no …you stated (and I quote) “It is over the north-western end of Lake Erie on the shores of Ontario.”

… but the meteor debris trail was before Point A and therefore was over the northwestern end of the lake.

Ummm …no … Point A is above the southern end of Lake Erie…

So, while I did erroneously state that the endpoint was at this location, I was not completely off base. Saying it is “completely erroneous” is something of an exaggeration. However, if you want to argue that the description I made of the meteors endpoint was not precise enough, I will concede it.

I had the wrong lake and I conceded readily when you pointed it out. You had the wrong location - but have only conceded with considerable dissembling…

Really? Are we going to argue over the point of where they defined the city center of Pontiac, Michigan? Their statement of “about two miles” was not really a precise measurement was it? BTW, I measure 2.77 miles using Google earth from the center of Pontiac (as defined by Google earth) so it is not really that much of an error was it. Are you now claiming that Campine took them to an entirely different location and they did not notice they were in the wrong location?

No, just noting that if they can be a whole mile out in indicating a location that they used to triangulate the trajectory of the object, then that casts doubt over the accuracy of that triangulation.

And for the first time, Rramjet finds an actual error in the paper. However, it is not fatal. They mixed up their description of the two points. They describe point B (notice the altitude) but call it point A and describe Point A and call it point B. It appears to be an editorial error and possibly was corrected in the next issue of the journal.

LOL. This indicates sloppy work and casts further doubt over the accuracy of their methodology. Also, have a closer look at the listed coordinates and their alleged locations on the map…

So, are you now stating the difference of a few inches in placing the transit will not cause a significant change in bearing? Imagine that…

I stated that a few inches there, coupled with other potential errors, could substantially throw the whole trajectory calculation into error.

I had stated "the greater Detroit area", which is a large city. I was looking at a circular diameter of about 15 miles surrounding downtown for my measurements.
BTW, the endpoint marked by VDC and Krause is at a bearing of about 155 degrees from downtown Detroit. I am not sure where your Kecksburg endpoint is drawn but if you draw a line from Downtown Detroit on Google Earth, to Kecksburg, you get a bearing of about 128 degrees.

You claimed (and I quote) “From Detroit (depending on what part of the greater Detroit area you are looking at), the bearing to the endpoint can be anywhere between ESE (about 100 deg) to South (about 180 deg).” I merely noted that both C&K’s endpoint and the Kecksburg endpoint, as seen from Detroit, are generally in the same direction (generally southeast or about 135 degrees bearing from Detroit).

Hmmm…are you actually saying that a meteor debris trail is the exact same thing as an airplane contrail? If so, you really have not been paying attention. BTW, last fall there was a case of a misidentified airplane contrail by a television camera crew in LA, California. It made quite the news stir. They thought it was a missile launched in a WNW to NW direction. In reality it was an airplane contrail heading ENE. I guess people can get the direction wrong on these things even when it is something as simple as an airplane.

Sure, but “I am truly sorry officer, I thought the light was green…” does not mean that mistaking a red light for green is common.

Sigh….You were not paying attention the first time I explained this. The direction was based solely on Dr. Wetherhill’s preliminary investigation and not based on the photographic data. He had arrived at an endpoint over the western end of lake Erie but it was only a ball park assessment. Look at what he wrote,”..they intersected in approximately a 300 square-mile area between Toledo Ohio and Pelee island.” A 300 square mile area is a reasonable size margin for error and many of these reports were basically estimates and not done with a transit and using photographs, which would be more precise. He does not describe an endpoint but the area described is only about 20-25 miles south-southwest of the actual endpoint. The key point in all of this is that nobody saw the meteor actually saw that the meteor passed overhead in Ohio and all the Ohio observers reported seeing the fireball descend to the north. If you want to claim that a preliminary finding mentioned by Sky and Telescope refutes VDC and Krause, go right ahead. However, as most people understand such things, it is possible for better and more complete information to become available and refine the trajectory.

Sure, but despite Wetherhill’s comments, the “take home message” from Sky and Telescope was that “The path of the fireball extended roughly from northwest to southeast…” and that refutes C&K’s trajectory. The question then becomes whether C&K accurately calculated the trajectory and as they make no accounting of error margins, it is certainly possible that they did not.

Not really. They all come up with the conclusion that VDC and Krause did. The meteor was over the western end of lake Erie/Ontario and it was seen to the north by observers in Ohio. This contradicts your interpretation of the bluebook files that state all observers from that small data set (a handful of reports is not really “all over the compass” is it?) pointed towards Kecksburg/Acme (even though you gave no precise locations of witnesses and the 105 bearing does not even point towards Kecksburg).

You cannot have it both ways AstroP. On the one hand you are claiming that observers have no way of determining trajectory direction (or that they are likely to be in error when they do) and yet on the other you now claim that an observation “to the north” can provide us with a directional trajectory….

I stated:
I made no such claim. I stated “ Clearly those at Blue Book were operating under the impression that Acme (just four miles south of Kecksburg) was the location of a potential landfall.”

Actually did. You previously stated that:

“Throughout the Blue Book files we see the Air Force convinced that it was a meteor and it came down in Acme (about four miles from Kecksburg as the crow flies – see pages 6-11, 13, 15 and 28 )…”

The military sent a team to Acme to investigate! All those Blue Book memos indicate Acme… besides, there were reports from other locations of something falling to the ground, so why ignore those others to send the team to Acme if they were not “convinced” that Acme was the location?

As I pointed out previously, only one of these clearly indicated they thought something came down at Acme. All the others refer to a sighting or meteor over Acme or sending people to investigate.

Over, at, near and landed… as I stated, you are merely nitpicking AstroP…

The team found nothing…

It was reported that they found nothing…

…and reported back early in the morning of the 10th. We have no idea when these “memos for the record” were actually typed up. Maybe around midnight on the 9/10th or maybe the next day based on reading the duty officer’s log. Who knows but considering it some sort of verification that something actually came down at Acme/Kecksburg is just wishful thinking.

I did not bring that point up before – but it does seem likely that those memos were typed up after the event doesn’t it! The reference to “the” photo” rather than “a” photo was the first clue… (and this has other ramifications, not the least of which concerns the completeness and accuracy of the duty officers “log”) …but yes, the memos are certainly not a verification that something did come down in the area, just that Blue Book and the military seemed convinced that if something came down, then Acme was the area to investigate.

BTW, Bluebook DID conclude it was a meteor no matter how much you want to deny it. Look at document number one.

I have never denied it.

So you and the legend/myth say. I see no proof of this. In fact, the proof is in what the editorial staff concluded for the paper (after actually investigating the case themselves) on December 11th (again you don’t see that published at your UFO websites). They concluded nothing had actually come down!

The papers reported the official line that nothing was found. They also reported Gatty’s comments about the cordon and the search.

She only saw the debris trail hovering in the direction of Kecksburg.

Your point being?

In order to determine direction of travel using the technique you claim (the narrowing/thinning of the ‘vapor trail’) requires a constant size trail. If the trail is not constant in size, then the visual cue you rely upon to determine direction fails.

I would say the opposite, If the vapour trail is of constant dimension over its length, then it would be difficult to determine direction after the event. If however it was not constant, then one would have to make an assessment of whether the “entry point” had dispersed to a greater extent that the terminal end - or whether the entry point was much closer than the terminal point (resulting the in perception of different dimension), or whether the terminal burst of the object resulted in a thicker trail at the terminal end – all these would be a matter of assessment on the ground at the time, but each would supply a direction - where a constant sized trail would not.

You obviously are not following. The terminal point is what created the seismic event. If it was not heard in any of the stations in Ohio or Pennsyvania, then that terminal point did not occur near them.
I guess you are trying to claim that the device slowed down at this point and no longer created a sonic event and then traveled through the air over 200 miles at subsonic speeds without being seen.

Ah, but it was seen… remember the Canadian Airlines passenger?

However, the reported sighting by Kalp (4:45PM) is the same basic time frame reported by others elsewhere. The precise time was computed to be 4:43 PM. How could the object suddenly go over 200 miles in two minutes without creating a sonic boom? Even if we give a generous time frame of 10 minutes between Detroit and Kecksburg, we are describing a ground speed of over 1200 mph! Surely, a sonic boom would have resulted.

When I was about 16, I was walking one night along the ridge of a mountain when I heard an incredibly loud hissing sound. Something large whizzed directly over my head and gave me the impression that it passed over extraordinarily close to me. I ducked instinctively, but of course it was long gone before I even did so. As I stood up I saw a bright flash behind the clouds some miles distant over the peak of another range. Whatever it was had come in from over the sea (obviously slower than the speed of sound or I would have heard a sonic boom?), but still very fast and it must have travelled horizontally (for it to miss my ridge and the preceding ridges, but also not to crash into the mountains before its terminal point) for many tens of miles (before and after I observed it). It was all over in a matter of seconds. Incredibly fast. Horizontal flight. No sonic boom… what gives?

All stories told over a decade after the event at the prompting of UFO investigators. Of course, we have the testimony of others (the real fire chief and the owners of the properties where the UFO and military takeover took place) who we know were there that say nothing happened like that at all. Therefore, we look at what was recorded in 1965 and not 1980 or beyond. The 1965 documentation makes no such mention of these things as far as the military is concerned.

The “real” fire chief? The “real” owners? A “military takeover”? Lets confine ourselves to the reports and testimony of witnesses who were actually there shall we…

Interestingly, apart from Gatty and Murphy, there were other reporters on the scene that night:

”Ernie Hoffman was also a reporter for the Greensburg, PA Tribune-Review in 1965. He replaced Robert Gatty in Kecksburg that night, so that Gatty could return to the newspaper office and work on the story. Hoffman said that he had pulled off on the shoulder of the narrow country road, and about 100 yards away saw a military flatbed tractor-trailer truck near a tree line. He said that there was something on the back of the truck under a tarpaulin which, at that distance, appeared about the size of two suitcases. The possibility remains that Hoffman did not see the object in question and/or the vehicle which was carrying other equipment. There are accounts of more than one flatbed tractor-trailer accompanying the other military equipment which had arrived that day. Hoffman verifies, as so many other people have, that military vehicles were around Kecksburg and down in the woods that evening. Another reporter, Adam Lynch, with WIIC-TV at the time, also confirmed seeing a military truck.” (http://ufoupdateslist.com/2001/jan/m29-002.shtml)​

Your concern is that the eyewitness testimony did not emerge publicly until about 15 years after the event. Based on that you are then inclined to dismiss that testimony. That is of course your opinion and of course you are entitled to it.

I have yet to see any evidence they have had such equipment and manpower available. It ignores everything we know about what the bases you identified actually do and have available. There is no record of such activity and nobody mentions a massive convoy moving over Pittsburgh roads that evening clogging up traffic. As I have stated, in order to fit the bill provided by the myth, you have to wave that magic wand for them to appear and disappear into thin air.

What “massive convoy”? The contention is merely that military personnel and equipment were dispatched to the area and that something was recovered. I have simply noted that there were military bases within range that could have supplied the resources. Nothing more, nothing less.

This is your myth. If you are going to buy into it, you have to accept all the stories:
“He pointed his rifle at me and said get out,” Newhouse said before the meeting. “So, something was definitely there. I don’t have any idea what it was, but the Army doesn’t come out to guard a patch of woods.”
http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pitt.../s_147868.html
“Betters will never forget the tone of voice of a military officer ordering servicemen to get him and his friends out of there. Jerry became quite upset when the soldiers aimed their guns at them.”http://ufoupdateslist.com/2001/jan/m29-002.shtml
When you point a gun, you are threatening somebody's life. BTW, this act is illegal (unless martial law was declared) and charges should have been filed at the time.
I am not the one making this stuff up. However, if you think they are exaggerating about this, then, for once, I agree with you. Of course, if you agree they may be exaggerating, doesn’t that call into question a lot of the other stories?

Obviously if someone points a gun at you and tells you to go away then naturally you will feel threatened. It is just the way you phrase things that lends them an air of hyperbole (as in “…massive military force where guns are drawn and lives threatened”). You make it sound like an invading army, whereas what actually occurred – according to the eyewitnesses – was a cordon was set up and people who approached too closely were warned off. If they felt threatened, they could simply walk away – which of course they did.

 

[Access Denied]

According to Dr J. A. Hynek, scientific consultant to Blue Book for 20 years, there were 13,134 UFO cases in the Blue Book files. These were broadly categorised by the Air Force as being either “Identified” (n=12,547) or “Unidentified” (n=587).

So “officially” 4.7% “unidentified” according to Hynek.

Here’s how Brad Sparks characterizes the apparent discrepancy…

Comprehensive Catalog of 1,600 Project Blue Book UFO Unknowns:
Work in Progress (Version 1.16, Oct. 2, 2009)
http://www.cufos.org/BB_Unknowns.pdf

When Project Blue Book (BB) closed down on Jan. 30, 1970 (it was not on Dec. 17, 1969, which was merely the announcement date by the Secretary of the Air Force) the total number of Unidentified sightings was thought to be 701 and this is the number given on all subsequent press releases and so-called "fact sheets." However, based on the review by Hynek and the CUFOS staff of the released sanitized BB microfilm and Hynek's personal records which included many missing (and unsanitized) BB documents, the final number was determined to have been approximately 587, apparently reflecting an IFO elimination process carried out on old historical cases by the second-to- last BB Chief, Major Hector Quintanilla in the 60's (and of dubious scientific validity based on examples McDonald studied), which must have reduced the number of Unexplained cases by 114. Evidently the AF did not update its annual historical UFO statistics to reflect this gradual winnowing process, not realizing it could improve upon its anti-UFO PR position by reducing the perennially embarrassing number of Unidentifieds.

However, in reverse, Hynek re-evaluated 53 Blue Book IFO cases as Unexplained UFO cases, bringing the total partially back, up to 640, unfortunately a complete list identifying these is not available, though some of the worksheets have been copied by Jan Aldrich from CUFOS-Hynek files. A number of the re-evaluated cases have been included in The Hynek UFO Report book published in 1977.

So (unofficially) revised again to 5.1% “unidentified” by Hynek.

[still less than the official figure of 5.5% given by the “whitewashed” fact sheet]

Embarrassing?

 

[Rramjet]

So “officially” 4.7% “unidentified” according to Hynek.

Here’s how Brad Sparks characterizes the apparent discrepancy…

Comprehensive Catalog of 1,600 Project Blue Book UFO Unknowns:
Work in Progress (Version 1.16, Oct. 2, 2009)
http://www.cufos.org/BB_Unknowns.pdf


So (unofficially) revised again to 5.1% “unidentified” by Hynek.

[still less than the official figure of 5.5% given by the “whitewashed” fact sheet]

Embarrassing?

Embarrassing for whom? A few tenths of a percent here or there depending on who classifies some few contentious cases one way or other... so what? The official AF statistic is around 5% and a few tenths either way is relatively insignificant. However, when we come to an official scientific and targeted study of cases (The Battelle Study - http://www.ufocasebook.com/pdf/specialreport14.pdf), then we DO have a significant difference. It was then discovered that fully 21.5% of cases could not be explained in terms of the entire knowledge base of the "Free World"... and more, it was discovered that the more reliable the report, the greater the percentage of unknowns (with the most reliable reports having 33% unknown)!

Hyneks comments (in reference to the AF and government treatment of the Battelle study and also in reference to Condon) are illuminating, especially as he was one of the principle debunkers in Blue Book (and who did of course change his mind in the face of the evidence):

”Once again, statistics which could have been used to illuminate were used instead to debunk the UFO phenomenon.” (The Hynek UFO Report, p. 278)​

Nothing changes it seems...

 

[Rramjet]

Au contraire. The trained investigators have exhaustively eliminated any human suspects. Therefore, aliens.

Oh, so then you make the direct leap from no plausible mundane explanation to ET? I was unaware that you knew everything there was to know about the universe. My apologies. Perhaps then you can tell what I am thinking right now..?