Ever seen a UFO?

John Baker

John Baker

Final Approach
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John Baker
Back in the 1950s & 60s, our planet seemed to have been visited by more than a few alien spacecraft. The people who reported actually seeing our planets visitors, or their flying saucers, were usually less than credible in most rational peoples eyes, however, there were a few exceptions, including airline pilots and military pilots, along with a few backwoods cops.

Alien visitors seemed to have a liking for the American southwest along with other assorted, away from civilization, locals.

Lately, our planet appears to have lost much of it's visitor destination appeal, I don't know why. Perhaps our gift shops need sprucing up a little.

I'm wondering why airline pilots saw UFOs, but never their passengers. I can't recall anyone on a ship at sea reporting a sighting either.

About twenty years ago I had a customer come in with a photograph he had paid good money for, of a flying saucer. He was convinced it was authentic and wanted it archival framed. I took the order, and did the job for him. I didn't bother telling him that my grandmother had that exact same lampshade hanging over her dining room table for many years.

Myself, other than a few politicians, I have never seen an alien from outer space, nor their devices of transportation. I am wondering if any of you have, or have ever run into a pilot who made the claim.

John
 
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Admitting seeing odd things is one thing. I see odd things all the time (try walking in walmart!). However, I don't think too many are going to admit seeing UFOs for fear of getting odd looks and called a "less than credible" person. I could always be wrong though...
 
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John Baker said:
I'm afraid to walk in Walmart, place is downright scary.
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I lived in SF Bay Area from 1997 till 2001 and witnessed the most remarkable transformation of WalMart. It used to be the place where only the socially disadvantaged shopped, and its parking lot was the high-crime area of the town. Then, the middle class started to like buying cheap things and gradually crowded out the socally disadvantaged, then the crime disappeared and even the store became cleaner. The whole process took about 3 years, and I cannot say that the area was gentrified at all. It was not driven by demographic, completely spontaneous, and as much as I can tell, the same thing happened simultaneously in many other places across the country, perhaps in the majority of WalMarts. When I moved to Albuquerque, the WalMart was a completely respected store there already (not by liberals, of course, but nobody cares about those). The selection of goods continues to suck just as it did before the transformation. I almost never can get any dry goods there and the last thing I bought in WalMart was a lawn chair. Essentially, I only go there to buy decent bread. But now I take my Lexus there.
 
Speaking of San Francisco and aliens... There was once upon a time a billboard in the bay area that was an advertisement for a local health club. It showed an image of aliens attacking people with the slogan "When they come, they'll eat the fat ones first. Time to visit the gym" or something close to that. Funniest dang slogan I ever saw.
 
No. Never. Not even in Walmart.
 
UFO does not necessarily mean alien space craft. U is unidentified. If it's known that it's alien (and the only way to know that is to be aware of all top secret projects that every gov't is working on) then it's no longer unidentified.

I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of the UFO sightings were F-117s, SR-71s, B2s, etc...
 
I've seen UFO's but wasn't sure what they were.
 
Anyone remember that scene at the beginning of CE3K, where the airline pilot is talking to the controllers about what he's seeing? Especially the last part, where the go through a "Do you want to make a report?" "Not me, do you?" routine? Personally, I just don't see anything good coming out of reporting an alien spacecraft sighting in flight.

OTOH, I had a long discussion with a controller one night about a very bright light out in front of us, clearly not a star or even a planet. Looked a lot like an airliner with all its headlights on, but he had no traffic out there at all, at any altitude. Turned out to be a floodlit golf driving range about 50 miles in front of us.:redface:

And then there's always the late Frank Kingston Smith's story about his near mid-air collision with the moon...
 
Several governments have officially acknowledged them and directed their militaries on where to report sightings, etc.

I personally have never seen "Ezekial's Wheel", but know a couple of people who say they have and I don't consider them weirdos.
 
Ron Levy said:
And then there's always the late Frank Kingston Smith's story about his near mid-air collision with the moon...
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I once pulled a hard turn to dodge a collision with what turned out to be my own pitot tube....

Ron Wanttaja
 
Sure, I've seen objects in the sky that I could not identify. Not a chance were they aliens from another world though. BTW, does anyone remember a TV move called The Disappearance of Flight 412? It was a mediocre movie, but interesting psychological thriller.
 
Given the distances, energy, & capital involved a round trip at even at near light speeds could take a long time and require high level approval to access resources for future missions. I'd bet that political issues at their home world have delayed their visits.

Think of it this way, vs other planets the moon is just around the corner but we haven't visited in quiet some time.
 
Pi1otguy said:
Given the distances, energy, & capital involved a round trip at even at near light speeds could take a long time and require high level approval to access resources for future missions. I'd bet that political issues at their home world have delayed their visits.
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Yea. Delayed their visit to sometime after forever just like we have.
Anyone that's serious about space travel wouldn't be using politics or money as a basis of being operational. It's just not possible. Canceled programs after a decade won't get them anywhere and dollar wary designs creating Apollo 13 type disasters don't work too well when the free return trajectory takes 6500 years.

And I doubt they'd be making a multi light year trip in a single spacecraft the size of a B727 or CE172 like all the classic UFO's appear to be.
 
I think looking for them is an exercise in futility. Much more cost effective (and more likely to result in success) is to listen for them.
 
I saw a UFO on approach to San Nicholas Island, I suspect it was the Aurora project plane, but it was never identified.

As for discounting long distance alien travel because of the vastness and time involved, that is just according to our technologies. Just because we don't know how to fold space time doesn't mean nobody does.
 
Pi1otguy said:
Given the distances, energy, & capital involved a round trip at even at near light speeds could take a long time and require high level approval to access resources for future missions. I'd bet that political issues at their home world have delayed their visits.

Think of it this way, vs other planets the moon is just around the corner but we haven't visited in quiet some time.
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And why the heck would we? It's a waste of money, there is no return on investment.
 
fgcason said:
Yea. Delayed their visit to sometime after forever just like we have.
Anyone that's serious about space travel wouldn't be using politics or money as a basis of being operational. It's just not possible. Canceled programs after a decade won't get them anywhere and dollar wary designs creating Apollo 13 type disasters don't work too well when the free return trajectory takes 6500 years.

And I doubt they'd be making a multi light year trip in a single spacecraft the size of a B727 or CE172 like all the classic UFO's appear to be.
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I'll agree that their priorities may be quite different, but their technology- and their physical size and structure- may also be quite different. There's no reason why the ships would have to be big, or that they would need to travel in space and time the way our vehicles might (even with the most efficient drive imaginable with today's hardware). They're definitely not rocket-propelled; based on the behavior of most of these things in our atmosphere as reported, and the ridiculous distances between systems, they are probably generating a field that renders the vessel and everything inside it exempt from the consequences of acceleration, friction, radiation, aerodynamics, and time itself.

If any of the known UFOs were alien craft, it's also quite possible they were unmanned probes, possibly autonomous. If we humans had the technology to "travel without traveling", we'd probably send probes first, maybe for a long time, before sending a crew to meet the locals.
 
Speaking of technology, do any of you older guys remember the old Buck Rogers serials?

The flames from their rocket ship went up, and the engine sounded exactly like a vacuum cleaner.

John
 
Reminds me of the guy that asked Center last year what the airport was below him as it didn't show up on his MFD database. Controller said he couldn't say other than to expect a visit in his motel room that night by men in trenchcoats. We were just north of Las Vegas.
Dave
 
Yea when I was taking off on (actave runway) runway 9 and he was landing on 27 not saying a word. Wife did not like that.
 
I did, once - but wasn't flying. It was in 1973 and I was driving through the downtown L.A. area at night - southbound on the Harbor Freeway. Off to my right I saw a bright light in the sky - and thought nothing of it (there are police helicopters buzzing around all the time). Then the light started to move - and accelerated diagonally upwards at a fantastic rate. It crossed the sky and disappeared in only a few seconds. I said WOW! out loud - and then thought to myself "nothing man made can do that"!. What it was I have no idea - but I wasn't the only person to see it. The event was mentioned in the newspaper the next day (but only a small article). In the absence of death and destruction, it didn't make the headlines.

Dave
 
"Y'know, I seen me a mermaid once. I even seen me a shark eat an octopus. But I ain't never seen no phantom UFO."
 
Frank Browne said:
I think looking for them is an exercise in futility. Much more cost effective (and more likely to result in success) is to listen for them.
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What if everyone is listening and no one is talking?
 
Frank Browne said:
We talked once...to M13!
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Once. And in 50,000 years, if the signal makes it that far and if it hits anything, we will get to find out if they respond back and if they can find us which is doubtful. It's at least an attempt though the distances are beyond the time limits of a civilization like ours.
Anyway you look at it, it's rough even if you do happen to be listening at the right moment and know what you're looking at. In the meantime they sky appears to be pretty seriously quiet.
 
fgcason said:
Once. And in 50,000 years, if the signal makes it that far and if it hits anything, we will get to find out if they respond back and if they can find us which is doubtful. It's at least an attempt though the distances are beyond the time limits of a civilization like ours.
Anyway you look at it, it's rough even if you do happen to be listening at the right moment and know what you're looking at. In the meantime they sky appears to be pretty seriously quiet.
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Not exactly. Radio astronomy goes way, way beyond listening for possible extant civilizations. Even the earth has a shell of radio emissions covering a substntial portion of the spectrum that is nearly 150 light years in diameter. IMHO, occasionally listening for other extant civilization is a worthwhile endeavor.
Granted, I never understood the logic of the transmission to M13 as the possibility of a stable solar system within most globular clusters is slim.
 
Frank Browne said:
Granted, I never understood the logic of the transmission to M13 as the possibility of a stable solar system within most globular clusters is slim.
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A very quick search reveals this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arecibo_message

Apparently it was just a demonstration of ability, not aiming anywhere specifically. M13 will be out of the way by the time it gets there. Gotta lead the target a bit at 25,000 LY... or in the infamous words of Maxwell Smart "Missed it by that much."
 
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Ever been called a UFO?
500ft AGL, full AB, 550knts and accelerating.

Crossed I-40 near Holbrook AZ, had the HF tuned to CB ch19.

"Martha, looky at that UFO!!"
 
fgcason said:
A very quick search reveals this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arecibo_message

Apparently it was just a demonstration of ability, not aiming anywhere specifically. M13 will be out of the way by the time it gets there. Gotta lead the target a bit at 25,000 LY... or in the infamous words of Maxwell Smart "Missed it by that much."
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It would be pretty disappointing if the return message was, "be sure and drink your Ovaltine."
 
BillTIZ said:
Ever been called a UFO?
500ft AGL, full AB, 550knts and accelerating.

Crossed I-40 near Holbrook AZ, had the HF tuned to CB ch19.

"Martha, looky at that UFO!!"
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You oughta hear what a friend of mine did in an RF-4C (we could tune Ch 19 on the HF, but we weren't supposed to use it) while RTB to Louisville from a low-level route that ended out somewhere near Owesboro, or maybe Paducah. Tunes up Ch 19, engages some trucker heading east on I-64 in Southern Indiana towards Louisville.

Trucker: "I'm at mile 90, what's your 20?"
JA: "Mile 60, eastbound, also going to Louisville." (40 miles west of the truck).
Trucker: "Holy smoke, you're blowin' my ears off, you must have some radio!" (No bull, Buckwheat -- we had a 2 kilowatt transmitter and the limit on the Citizens Band was 5 watts).
JA: "What's your 20 now?"
Trucker: "Mile 92."
JA: "We'll be with you in two minutes."
Trucker: "Bull%^&, you can't make 15 miles in two minutes!"
JA: "Stand by...Look up...NOW!"

They went over that truck from behind at about 200 feet and 480 knots, and it wasn't the jet wash which almost sent it off the road. That trucker just about lost control of his bodily functions, and was almost incoherent on the radio -- but said enough they knew he really loved the show.
 
And I was once called a UFO, too. The RF-4C had a way of making all the position lights flash, and we often used that at low level at night (flashing lights being more attractive to the eye than steady ones). In addition, we had the fluorescent strip "formation" lights to aid in flying formation at night, and on low levels, we turned on everything. At the time, my wife was the evening news person at WHAS radio ("the 50,000 watt clear channel voice of Louisville"), and that meant answering the phone as well as doing the drive time and late news. I was often out flying with the Guard while she was working.

One night, when I was out on a low level route that ran through the eastern hills and bluegrass country between Louisville and Lexington, she got a call from some farmer out southeast of Louisville about something that went by and wanted to report that the Martians (or whoever) were landing. He claimed it was too low and too fast to be an airplane, had to be some UFO from outer space. Fran got a bit more description and location, and then, knowing that I was out flying there that night, told him, "No, that's not a UFO, that's my husband."
 
Ron Levy said:
You oughta hear what a friend of mine did in an RF-4C (we could tune Ch 19 on the HF, but we weren't supposed to use it) while RTB to Louisville from a low-level route that ended out somewhere near Owesboro, or maybe Paducah. Tunes up Ch 19, engages some trucker heading east on I-64 in Southern Indiana towards Louisville.

Trucker: "I'm at mile 90, what's your 20?"
JA: "Mile 60, eastbound, also going to Louisville." (40 miles west of the truck).
Trucker: "Holy smoke, you're blowin' my ears off, you must have some radio!" (No bull, Buckwheat -- we had a 2 kilowatt transmitter and the limit on the Citizens Band was 5 watts).
JA: "What's your 20 now?"
Trucker: "Mile 92."
JA: "We'll be with you in two minutes."
Trucker: "Bull%^&, you can't make 15 miles in two minutes!"
JA: "Stand by...Look up...NOW!"

They went over that truck from behind at about 200 feet and 480 knots, and it wasn't the jet wash which almost sent it off the road. That trucker just about lost control of his bodily functions, and was almost incoherent on the radio -- but said enough they knew he really loved the show.
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Nice story but it'd be damn hard to identify the right truck.
 
jesse said:
Nice story but it'd be damn hard to identify the right truck.
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IIRC, he got a description of the box and the mile marker, and a more running commentary of exactly where the trucker was -- and with traffic not too heavy, that would be enough if you knew the road well enough.
 
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