report after roswell

8/9/2019 Report After Roswell

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REPORT OF AIR FORCE RESEARCH REGARDING THE"ROSWELL INCIDENT"July 1994

EXECUTIVE SUMMARYThe "Roswell Incident" refers to an event thatsupposedly happened in July, 1947, wherein the Army AirForces (AAF) allegedly recovered remains of a crashed"flying disc" near Roswell, New Mexico. In February,1994, the General Accounting Office (GAO), acting on therequest of a New Mexico Congressman, in i t ia ted an audi tto attempt to lo cate re co rd s o f such an incident and todetermine i f r ecords regarding it were properly handled.Although the GAO effort was to look a t a number ofgovernment agenc ie s, th e apparent focus was on the AirForce. SAF/AAZ , as the Central Point of Contact for theGAO in th is matter, in i t ia ted a s ys tema tic s ea rch o fcurrent Air Force offices as well as numerous archivesand records centers that might help exp la in this matter.Research revealed that the "Roswell Incident" was noteven considered a UFO event unt i l the 1978-1980 timeframe. P rior to that , the incident was dismissed becausethe AAF or ig inal ly iden t if ied the debris recovered asbeing tha t of a weather balloon. Subsequently, variousauthors wrote a number of books claiming that , not onlywas debris from an al ien spacecraft recovered, but alsothe bodies of the craf t ' s alien occupants. These claimscontinue to evolve today and the Air Force i s nowroutinely accused of engaging in a "cover-up" of thissupposed event.The research located no records a t exist ing Air Forceoff ices that indicated any "cover-up" by the USAF or anyindication of such a recovery. Consequently, effortswere in tensif ied by Air Force researchers a t numerouslocations where records for the period in question werestored. The records reviewed did not reveal any increasein operations, s ec urity , o r any other act ivi ty in July,1947, that indicated any such unusual event may haveoccurred. Records were located and thoroughly exploredconcerning a then-TOP SECRET balloon project, designedto attempt to monitor Sov ie t nuc lear t es t s , known asProject Mogul. Addi tional ly , several surviving projectpersonnel were located and interviewed, as was the onlysurviving person who recovered debris from the originalRoswell s i te in 1947, and the former off icer whoin i t ia l ly identif ied the wreckage as a balloon.Comparison of a l l i n f o r m a t ~ o n developed or obtainedindicated that the material recovered near Roswell wasconsistent with a balloon device and most l ikely fromone of the Mogul balloons that had not been previouslyr ecover ed . A ir Force research efforts did not discloseany rec ord s o f the recovery of any "alien" bodies orext ra ter res t r ia l materials.INTRODUCTIONAir Force involvement in t he a ll eg ed UFO-relatedincident popularly known as the "Roswell Incident" beganas the resul t of a January 14, 1994, Washington Postar t ic le (Atch 1) which announced Congressman Steven


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Schi ff 's i nt en t to in i t ia te a General Accounting Office(GAO) effor t to re so lv e this controvers ia l matt er .Having previously been involved in numerous Freedom ofInformation Act (FOIA) and Congressional requests on"unusual aircraf t , " to include Unident if ied FlyingObjects (UFOs), The Direc to r, Secur it y and SpecialProgram Oversight, Office of t he Sec re ta ry of the AirForce, (SAF/AAZ) beli ev ed th e Air Force would becomeinvolved in any GAO effor t involving this subject .Thus, in late January, 1994, SAF/AAZ directed i t sresearch/declassif icat ion team, SAF/AAZD, to attempt tolocate any off ic ia l records relat ive to this matter.These i n i t i a l research efforts focused on records a t theAir Force Historical Research Agency (AFHRA), MaxwellAFB, AL, the Air Force Safety Agency (AFSA) a t KirtlandAFB, NM, and the National Archives and RecordsAdministration (NARA).On February 15, 1994, the GAO off ic ia l ly notif iedSec re ta ry o f Defense William J . Perry that , it wasin i t ia t ing an audit of the Department of Defense (DoD)policies and procedures for acquiring, classifying,retaining, and disposing of off ic ia l governmentdocuments dea ling w ith weather balloon, aircraf t , andsimilar crash incidents (Atch 2). This notification wassub- sequently passed to the Department of DefenseInspector General who in turn off ic ia l ly notified theSecretaries of the Services and other affected part iesof the audit in a February 23, 1994, memo (Atch 3). Thismemorandum indicated that the "GAO is anxious to respondto Representative Schiff ' s request and to d isp el anyconcerns tha t the DoD is being unresponsive ." These werethe f i r s t off ic ia l US Government documents thatindicated that the purpose of the GAO was to review"crash incidents involving weather balloons and unknownaircraf t , such as UFOs and foreign ai rcraf t , and (2) thefacts involving th e re po rted c ras h of an UFO in 1949(sic, 1947) a t Roswell, New Mexico . . (and an) allegedDoD cover-up."An entrance meeting of potent ia l ly concerned part ies washeld in the offices of the DoD Inspector General onFebruary 28, 1994. Dur ing this meeting it was learnedthat , while the audi t off ic ia l ly would be reviewing therecords of a number of DoD (and possibly other ExecutiveBranch en t i t i e s ) , the bulk of the effort would befocused on Air Force records and systems. The audit wasoff ic ia l ly given the GAO code 701034, and enti t led"Records Management Procedures Deal ing With WeatherBalloon, Unknown Aircraft , and Similar Crash Incidents."Although th is off ic ia l t i t l e appeared rather broad,there was no misunderstanding tha t the real purpose wasto attempt to locate records and/or information on the"Roswell Incident." This incident, explained l a te r inmore detai l , general ly dealt with the claim tha t in Julyof 1947, the US Army Air Forces (USAAF) recovered aflying saucer and lo r i t s al ien occupants whichsupposedly crashed near Roswell, New Mexico. When theUSAAF ultimately became the United States Air Force(USAF) in September, 1947, the USAF inherited equipment,personnel, records, pol icies , and procedures from theAAF. In th is par t icu la r case, the Air Force alsoinheri ted the al legat ion that it had "cove red up" the"Roswell Incident" and has continued to do so for thenext 47 years.


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Within the Air Force, th e O ffic e of the Administ ra t iveAssis tant to t he Sec re ta ry of the Air Force (SAF/AA) i sresponsible both for information manaqement procedures(SAF/AAI) and security policy and oversiqht (SAF/AAZ).Because of this orqanization, SAF/AA was the loqicalent i ty to ass i s t the GAO in i t s audi t and SAF/AAZ wasoff ic ia l ly named as the Central Point of Contact forth is endeavor (Atch 4). Subsequently, the thenAdministrative Assistant , Mr. Robert J . McCormick,issued a taskinq memorandum dated March 1, 1 9 9 ~ (Atch5), to a number of current Air Staff and Secretar ia toffices tha t miqht possibly have records re la ted to suchan incident i f , indeed, somethinq had actually occurred.This search for records was purposely lim ite d to AirForce records and systems since:(a) The Air Force had no authori ty to compel otheraqencies to review the i r records;(b) The Air Force would have no way to monitor thecompleteness of t he ir e ff or ts i f they did; and(c) the overal l ef for t was the task and responsibil i tyof the GAO--not the Air Force.Durinq the in-br ief inq process with GAO, it was learnedthat th is audi t was, indeed, qenerated a t the specificre qu es t o f Conqressman Steven Schiff of New Mexico.Earlier , Conqressman Schiff had writ ten to theDepartment of Defense Leqislat ive Liaison Office forinformation on the "Roswell Incident" and had beenadvised tha t it was par t of the former UFO "ProjectBluebook" that had previously been turned over to NARAby the Air Force. Conqressman Schiff subsequentlylearned from NARA that , a lt houqh they did, indeed, havethe "Bluebook" materials, the "Roswell Incident" was notpar t of tha t report . Conqressman Schiff , apparentlyperceivinq tha t he had been "stonewalled" by the DoD,then qenerated the request for the aforementioned aUdit.I t i s within this context that the followinq researchand assistance effor ts were conducted in support of theGAO. This report i s intended to stand as the f inaloff ic ia l Air Force r esponse reqard inq this matter.THE "ROSWELL INCIDENT"- -WHAT WAS ORIGINALLY REPORTEDIN 1947The modern preoccupation wi th what ult imately came to becalled Unidentif ied F ly inq Objec ts (UFOs) actually.beqanin June, 1947. Althouqh some pro-UFO researchers arquethat siqhtinqs of UFOs qo back to Biblical t imes, mostresearchers w i l ~ not dispute that anythinq in UFOhis tory can compare with the phenomenon that beqan in1947. What was l a te r characterized as "the UFO Wave of1947" beqan with 16 a ll eqed s iqh ti nqs that occurredbetween May 17 and July 12, 1947, (a1thouqh someresearchers claim there were as many as 800 siqhtinqsdurinq tha t period) . Interestinqly, the "RoswellIncident" was not con si de red one of these 1947 eventsun t i l the 1978-1980 time frame. There i s no dispute,however, tha t somethinq happened near Roswell in July,1947, since it was reported in a number of contemporarynewspaper ar t i c l es ; the most famous of which were theJuly 8 and July 9 edi t ions of the Roswell Daily Record.


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The July 8 edi t ion reported "RAAF Captures Flying SaucerOn Ranch In Roswell Region," while the next day'sedi t ion reported, "Ramey Empties Roswell Saucer" and"Harassed Rancher Who Located 'Saucer' Sorry He ToldAbout I t ."The f i r s t story reported that the Intel l igence Officerof the S09th Bomb Group, stat ioned a t Roswell AAF, MajorJesse A. Marcel, had recovered a " flying d is c" from therange lands of an unidentif ied rancher in the vicini tyof Roswel l and that the disc had been "flown to higherheadquarters." That same s to ry a ls o reported that aRoswell couple c la imed to have seen a l a rge unidenti fi edobject f ly by their home on July 2, 1947.The July 9 edition of the paper not ed that BrigadierGeneral Roger Ramey, Commander of the Eighth Air Forcea t Forth Worth, Texas, s tated that upon examination thedebris recovered by Marcel was determined to be aweather balloon. The wreckage was described as a" . bundle of t infoi l , broken wood beams, and rubberremnants of a balloon . . The additional story of the"harassed rancher" identif ied him as W.W. Braze l o fLincoln County, New Mexico. He claimed that he and hisson, Vernon, found t he mat er ia l on June 14 , 1947, whenthey "came upon a large area of bright wreckage made upof rubber s t r ips , t in fo i l , a rather tough paper, ands t icks ." He picked up some of the debris on July 4 and." . . the next day he f i r s t heard about the fl yi ng d is csand wondered i f what he had found might have been theremnants of one of these." Brazel subsequent ly went toRoswell on July 7 and contacted the Sheriff , whoapparently notif ied Major Marcel. Major Marcel and "aman in plain clothes" then accompanied Brazel home topick up the res t of t he p ie ce s. The ar t ic le fur therrelated that Brazel thought that the material :

" . .might have been as large as a table top. Theballoon which held it up, i f that is how it worked,must have been about 12 feet long, he fe l t ,measuring the distance by the size of the room inwhich he sa t . The rubber was smoky gray in color andscat tered over an area about 200 yards in diameter.When th e d eb ris was gathered up the t infoi l , paper,tape, and s t icks made a bundle about three feet longand 7 or 8 inches thick, while the rubber made abundle about 18 or 20 inches long and about 8 inchesth ick. In a l l , he estimated, the entire lo t wouldhave weighed maybe f ive pounds. There was no sign ofany metal in the area which night have been u sed foran engine and no sign of any propellers of any kind.Although a t leas t one paper f in had been glued ontosome of the t in fo i l . The re were no words to be foundanywhere on t ~ inst rument a lthough there werele t ters on some of the par ts . Considerable scotchtape and some tape with flowers printed upon it hadbeen used in t he cons truc tion . No string or wirewere to be found but there were some eyelets in thepaper to indicate that some sor t of attachment mayhave been used. Brazel said that he had previouslyfound two weather balloons on the ranch, but thatwhat he found th is time did not in any way resembleeither of these."

EVOLUTION OF THE EVENT FROM 1947 TO THE PRESENT


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General Ramey's press conference and rancher Brazel 'sstatement effect ively ended th is as a UFO-related matterunt i l 1978, although some UFO researchers argue thatthere were several obtuse references to i t in 1950's eral i t era ture . Roswell, for example, i s not referred to inthe off ic ia l USAF invest igat ion of UFOs reported inProject Bluebook or i t s predecessors, Projec t Sign andProject Grudge, which ran from 1948-1969 (whichCongressman Schiff subsequently learned when he made hisoriginal inqui ry) .In 1978, an ar t i c l e appeared in a tabloid newspaper, theNational Inquirer , which reported the formerin te l l igence off icer , Marcel, claimed that he hadrecovered UFO debris near Roswell in 1947. Also in 1978,a UFO researcher, Stanton Friedman, met with Marcel andbegan invest igat ing the claims that the material Marcelhandled was from a crashed UFO. Similarly, two authors,William L. Moore and Charles Berli tz, also engaged inresearch which led them to publish a book, The RoswellIncident, in 1980. In this book they reported theyinterviewed a number of persons who claimed to have beenpresent a t Roswell in 1947 and professed to be ei therf i r s t or second hand witnesses to strange events thatsupposedly occurred. Since 1978-1980, other UFOresearchers, most notably Donald Schmitt and KevinRandle, claim to have located and interviewed even morepersons with supposed knowledge of unusual happenings a tRoswell. These included both civil ian and fo rmermili tary persons.Addit ionally, the Robert Stack-hosted television show"Unsolved Mysteries" devoted a l ar ge po rt ion of one showto a "re-creat ion" of the supposed Roswell events.Numerous other television shows have done l ikewise,par t icu lar ly during the l a s t several years and amade-for-TV movie on the subject is due to be releasedthis summer. The overal l thrust of these ar t ic les , boOksand shows i s tha t the "Roswell Incident" was actual lythe crash of a craf t from another world, the USGovernment recovered i t , and has been "covering up" thisfact from the American pub li c s in ce 1947, using acombination of disinformation, r id icule , and threats ofbodily harm, to do so. Genera lly , t he US Air Force bearsthe brunt of these accusations.From the ra ther benign descript ion of the "event" andthe recovery of some material a s descr ib ed in theoriginal newspaper accounts, the "Roswell Incident" hassince grown to mythical ( if not mystical) proport ions inthe eyes and minds of some researchers, por t ions of themedia and a t leas t par t of the American publ ic . Thereare also now several major variat ions of the "Roswellstory." For example, it was original ly reported thatthere was only recovery of debris from one s i t e . Thishas since grown from a minimal amount of debrisrecovered from a small area to airplane loads of debrisfrom mUltiple huge "debris f ie lds ." Likewise, there la t ively simple descript ion of st icks , pa per, ta pe andt i n fo i l has s ince grown to exotic metals withhieroglyphics and f iber opt ic - l ike materials. Mostversions now claim that there were two crash s i tes wheredebris was recovered: and a t the second s i t e , allegedbodies of ext ra ter res t r ia l al iens were supposedlyretrieved. The number of these "al ien bodies" recoveredalso varied. These claims a re f ur th er complicated by the


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been any previous documentary evidence produced by thosewho would debunk the in cid en t to show that something didnot happen; although logic dictates that bureaucraciesdo not spend time documenting non-events.SEARCH STRATEGY AND METHODOLOGYTo i ns ur e s en io r Air Force leadership that there were nohidden or overlooked f i les that might re la te to the"Roswell Incident;" and to provide the GAO with the bestand most complete information available, SAF/AAZconstructed a st rategy based on direct tasking from theOffice of t he Sec re ta ry , to e l i c i t information fromthose functional off ices and organizations where suchinformation might logical ly be contained. This includeddirect ing searches a t current off ices where special orunusual projects might be carried out, as well ashis tor ica l organizations, archives, and records centersover which the Air Force exerted some degree of control .Researchers did not, however, go to the US Army toreview his tor ica l records in areas such as missilelaunches f rom Whi te Sands, or to the Department ofEnergy to determine i f i t s forerunner, the Atomic EnergyCommission, had any reco rds o f nuclear-related incidentsthat might have occurred a t or near Roswell in 1947. Todo so would have encroached on GAO's c ha rte r in thismatter. What Air Force r es ea rche rs d id do, however , wasto search for records s t i l l under Air Force controlp er ta in in g to these s ub je ct a re as .In order to determine parameters for the most product ives earc h o f re co rd s, a review was f i r s t conducted of themajor works regarding the "Roswell Incident" availablein the popular l i t era ture . These works included: TheRoswell Incident, (1980) by Wil li am Moore and CharlesBerl i tz ; "Crashed Saucers: Evidence in Search of Proof,"(1985) by Moore; The UFO Crash a t Roswell, (I 99 1) byKevin Rand le and Donald Schmitt; The Truth About the UFOCrash a t Roswell, (1994) also by Randle and Schmitt; TheRoswell Report: A Histor ical Perspective, (1991), GeorgeM. Eberhart, Editor; "The Roswell Events," (1993)compiled by Fred Whi ting - Cra sh a t Corona (1992) byStanton T. Friedman and Don Berliner, as well asnumerous other ar t ic les writ ten by a combination of theabove and o the r r es ea rcher s. Co ll ec ti ve ly , the aboverepresent the "pro" UFO writers who allege tha t thegovernment i s engaged in a conspiracy. There are nospecif ic books writ ten entire ly on the theme thatnothing happened a t Roswell. However, Curtis Peebles inWatch the Skies! (1994) d iscussed the development of theUFO story and growth of subsequent claims as aphenomenon. There has also been s erio us re se arc h as wellas a number of detai led ar t ic les writ ten by so-called"debunkers" of Roswell and o the r inciden ts , most notablyPhil ip J . Klass who writes The Skeptical Inquirernewsletter, and Rober t Todd, a pr ivate researcher. Theconcerns and claim s o f a l l the above authors and otherswere considered in conducting the USAF records search.I t was also decided, part icular ly af ter a review of theabove popular l i t era ture , that no speci f ic attempt wouldbe made to t ry to refute, point by point, the numerousclaims made in th e v ar io us publications. Many of thesec la ims appea r to be hea rs ay , undocumented, taken out ofcontext , s elf -s er vi ng , o r otherwise dubious.Additionally, many of the above authors are not even in


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agreement over various claims. Most notable of theconfusing and now ever-changing claims is thecontroversy over th e d ate (s ) of the alleged incident ,the exact location(s) of the purported debris and theextent of the wreckage. Such discrepancies in claimsmade the se arc h much more di f f icu l t by greatly expandingthe volume of records that had to be searched.An example of try in g to deal w ith questionable claims i si l lus t ra ted by the following example : one of the popularbooks mentioned that was reviewed claimed that thewriters had submitted the names and ser ia l numbers of"over two dozen" personnel stat ioned a t Roswell in July,1947, to the Veterans Administration and the DefenseDepartment to confirm the i r mili tary service. They thenl is ted elev en o f these persons by name and asked thequestion "Why does nei ther the Defense Department northe Veteran's Administration have records of any ofthese men when we can document that each served a tRoswell Army Air Field." That claim sounded serious soSAF/AAZD was tasked to check these eleven names in thePersonnel Records Center in St. Louis. Using only thenames (since t he authors did not l i s t the ser ia lnumbers) t he r esea rche r quickly found records readilyidentif iable with eight of these persons. The otherthree had such common names that there could have beenmultiple poss ib i l i t ies . Interestingly, one of the l is ted"missing" persons had a casual ty r eport in his recordsref lect ing that he died in 195 1, while the writersclaimed to have interviewed him (or a person of theexact same name) in 1990.While the his tor ica l document search was in progress, itwas decided to attempt to locate and interview severalpersons identif ied as s t i l l l iving who could possiblyanswer questions generated by the research. This hadnever been off ic ia l ly done before, although most of thepersons contac ted repor ted that they had also beencontacted in the past by some of the l is ted authors orother private researchers. In order to counter possiblefuture arguments that the persons interviewed were s t i l l"covering up" material because of prior securi ty oaths,th e interviewees were provided with authorization fromeither t he Sec re ta ry of the Air Force or the SeniorSecurity Offic ia l of the Air Force that would off ic ia l lyallow discussion of class if ied information, i fapplicable, or free them from any prior res t r ic t ion indiscussing the matter, i f such existed. Again, the focuswas on interviewing persons that could address specificissues, raised by research and no consideration wasgiven to t ry and locate every alleged witness claimed tohave been contacted by the var ious autho rs . Fo r example,one of the interviewees thought vi ta l to obtain anoff ic ia l signed, sworn statement from was SheridanCavit t , Lt Col, USAF (Retired) who i s the l a s t l ivingmember of the three persons universally acknowledged tohave recovered material from the F oster Ranch. Otherswere also interviewed as informa ti on developed(discussed in deta i l la ter ) . Additionally, in some casessurvivors of deceased persons were also contacted in anattempt to locate var ious r ecords thought to have beenin the custody of the deceased.Even though Air Force research original ly s tar ted inJanuary, 1994, the f i r s t off ic ia l Air Forcewide taskingwas directed by the March 1, 1994, memorandum from


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SAF/AA, (Atch 5) and was addressed to those current AirStaff elements that would be the l ikely repository forany records, part icular ly i f there was anything of anextraord ina ry na ture involved. This meant tha t thesearch was not limite d t o uncl as si fi ed ma te ri al s, butalso would include records of the highest c lass i f ica t ionand compartrnentation.The specif ic Air Staff /Secretar iat off ices queriedincluded the following:(a) SAF/AAI, Directorate of Information Management(b) SAF/AQL, Directorate of Electronics and SpecialPrograms(c) AF/SE, Air Force Safety(d) AF/HO, Air Force Historian(e) AF/IN, Air Force Intel l igence (including Air ForceIntell igence Agency--AFIA, and the National AirIntell igence Center, NAIC)(f) AF/XOW, Directorate of Weather(g) (added la ter) The Air Force Office of SpecialInvest igat ions (AFOSI)In a dd itio n to the above Air Staff and Secretar ia toff ices , SAF/AAZ also reviewed appropriate c lass i f iedrecords for any t i e- in to this matter. With regards tohighly class if ied records, it should be noted that anyprograms tha t employ enhanced securi ty measures orcontrols are known as a Special Access Programs (SAPs).The authority for such programs comes from ExecutiveOrder 12356 and flows from the Department of Defense tot he S er vi ce s via DoD Directive 5205.7. These programsare implemented in the Air Force by Policy Directive16-7, and Air Force Inst ruct ion 16-701. These direct ivescontain deta i led requirements for control l ing andreporting, in a very s t r i c t manner, a l l SAPS. Thisincludes a report from the Secr et ar y o f the Air Force tothe Secretary of Defense (and u lt ima te ly to Congress) ona l l SAPs submitted for approval, and a cer t i f ica t ionthat there are no "SAP-l iken programs being operated.These report ing requirements are s t ipula ted in publiclaw.I t followed then, tha t i f the Air Force had recoveredsome type of extra te r res t r ia l spacecraft and/or bodiesand was exploi t ing this for sc ien t i f ic and technologypurpose s, th en such a program would be ope ra ted a s aSAP. SAF/AAZ, th e C en tra l O ffic e for a l l Air Force SAPs,has knowledge of, and security oversight over, a l l SAPs.SAF/AAZ c at ego ri ca ll y s ta te d t ha t no such Special AccessProgram{s) exis ts t ha t p er ta in to extra te r res t r ia lspacecraf t /a l iens .Likewise, the Secretary of the Air Force and the Chiefof Staff , who head th e Spe ci al Program Oversightcommittee which oversees a l l sensi t ive programs in theAir Force, had no knowledge of t he exi st ence of any suchprogram involving, or relat ing to the events a t Roswellor the alleged technology that supposedly resul tedtherefrom. Besides the obvious i r regular i ty and


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i l legal i ty of keeping such information from the mostsenior Air Force, off ic ia l s , it would also be i l log ica l ,since these off ic ia l s are responsible for obtainingfunding for opera tions , resea rch, development, andsecur i ty . Without funding such a program, operation, ororganization could not exist . Even to keep such a fact"cover-up" in some sor t of pass ive "ca retaker status"would involve money. More importantly, i t would involvepeople and create paperwork.The aforementioned March 1, 1994, SAF/AA taskinggenerated negative responses (Atch 6-12) from a l lrecipients; i .e . a l l offices reported that they had noinformation that would explain the incident .Consequently, these negative responses led to anincrease in the already on-going his tor ical research a trecords centers and archives.The extensive archival and records center search wassystematically carr ied out a t by the SAF/AAZDDeclassif icat ion Review Team. This team is composedentire ly of Air Force Reserve personnel who haveextensive training and experience in large scale reviewof records. (Previous effor ts in clu de th e Southeast AsiaDeclassif icat ion Review, declassification of POW/MIArecords, and the review of the Gulf War Air Power Surveyrecords). The team members a l l had the requisi tesecurity clearances for class if ied information and hadthe authori ty of the Sec re ta ry of the Air Force todeclassify any c lass i f ied record they found that mightbe re la ted to Roswell. SAF/AAZD conducted reviews a t anumber of locations, i nc lu ding: the Nation al Archives inWashington, DC; the National Personnel Records Center,St. Louis, MO; the National Archives, Suitland, MO, theNational Records Center, Suitland, MO: Naval ResearchLaboratory, Washington, DC; Federal Records Center, FtWorth, TX: the INSCOM Archives, Ft. Meade, MO: NationalAir and Space Museum, Washington, DC; Air ForceHistorical Research Agency, Maxwell AFB, AL; Center forAir Force His to ry , Bol li ng AFB, DC: Phil l ips Laboratory,Hanscom AFB, MA, and Kirtland AFB, NM; Rome Laboratory,Griff iss AFB, NY: and the L ib ra ry o f Congress,Washington, DC.A l i s t ing of the specif ic record areas searched i sappended as Atch 13. The areas included a l l thosesubject areas logical ly believed to possibly contain anyreference to act iv i t ies a t Roswell AAF during t he p eri odof time in question. I t i s anticipated that detractorsfrom this effor t wil l complain that "they did not searchrecord group x , box y, or reel z, etc . : tha t ' s wherethe real records are!" Such complaints are unavoidableand there i s no possible way that the mill ions ofrecords under Air Force control could be sea rched pageby page. The team endeavored to make loqica1 searches inthose places where records would l ikely be found. Theywere a ss is te d in this task by a rchiv is ts , h i sto ri ans ,and records management special is ts , includingexperienced persons who have continually worked in Armyand Air Force records systems since '1943. The team alsosearched some r ecord a reas that were recommended byserious private researchers such as Robert Todd, who hadindependently obtained a lmost encyclopedic knowledge ofthe complexities of Air Force records systems,par t icular ly as re la ted to this subject area.


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Not surpris ingly, the research team found the usualnumber of problems in many of the records centers(particUlarly St. Louis) with misfi l ing, los t ormisplaced documents, mismarking of documents, or thebreaking up of record groups over th e y ears and ref i l ingin di f fe ren t systems. This included, for example, asmall amount of missing "decimal f i les" from the 509thBomb Group a t Roswell that covered th e ye ars 1945-1949,tha t were marked on the index as "destroyed." Theresearchers noted that there was no pattern to anyanomalies found and that most discrepancies were minorand consis tent with what they had found in the past onsimi lar projects .WHAT THE ROSWELL INCIDENT WAS NOTBefore discussing spec if ic pos it ive r es ult s th at theseeffor ts revealed, it i s f i r s t appropriate to discussthose things, as indicated by information a va ila ble tothe Air Force, that the "Roswell Incident" was not:An Airplane CrashOf a l l the things that are documented and t racked wi th inthe Air Force, among the most detailed and scrupulousa re a ir pla ne crashes. In fact , records of a i r crashes goback to the f i r s t years of mili tary f l igh t . Safetyrecords and reports are ava il ab le f or a l l crashes thatinvolved serious damage, injury, death, or a combinationof these factors . These records also include incidentsinvolving experimental or class if ied ai rcraf t . USAFrecords showed tha t between June 24 , 1947, and July 28,1947, there were five crashes in New Mexico alone,involving A-26C, P-5 IN, C-82A, P-80A and PQ-14Bai rcraf t ; however , none of these were on the date(s) inquestion nor in t he a re a( s) in quest ion.One of the addit ional areas specif ica l ly se t forth byGAO in i t s ef for ts was to d ea l w ith how the Air Force(and others) specif ical ly documented ." . .weatherballoon . . . and other crash incidents ." In th is area, thesearch ef for ts revealed tha t there are no a i r safetyrecords pertaining to weather bal loon c ra shes (al lweather balloons "crash" sooner or l a ter ) ; however,there are p rovi si on s f or generat ing reports of "crashes"as ground safe ty incidents in the unlikely chance that aballoon in jures someone or causes damage. However, suchrecords are only maintained for five years.A Missile CrashA crashed or erra nt missi le , usually d es cr ib ed a s acaptured German V-2 or one of i t s variants , i s sometimesse t forth as a pbssible explanation for the debrisrecovered near Roswell. Since much of this test ing donea t nearby White Sands was secret a t the time, it wouldbe logical to assume that the government would handleany missi le mishap under t igh t securi ty , part icular ly i fthe mishap occurred on private land. From the recordsreviewed by the Air Force , however ,' there was nothinglocated to suggest that this was the case. Although thebulk of remaining test ing records are under th e c on tr olof the US Army, the subject has also been v ery welldocumented over the years within Air Force records.There would be no reason to keep such informationclass if ied today. The USAF found no indicators or even


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hin ts th at a missile was involved in th is matter.A Nuclear AccidentOne of th e a re as, considered was that whatever happenednear Roswell may have involved nuclear weapons. This wasa logical area of concern since the S09th Bomb Group wasthe only m ili tary un it in the world a t the time that hadaccess to nuclear weapons. Again, reviews of availablerecords gave no indication that this was th e case. Anumber of records s t i l l class if ied TOP SECRET andSECRET-RESTRICTED DATA having to do with nuclear weaponswere located in the Federal Records Center in St. Louis,MO . These records, which pert ain ed t o the S09th, hadnothing to do with any act iv i t ies that could have beenmisinterpreted as the "Roswell Incident ." Also, anyreco rds of a nuclear related incident would have beeninherited by the Department of Energy (DOE), and, hadone occurred, it is l ikely DOE would have publiclyreported it as par t of i t s recent declassif icat ion andpublic release effor t s . There were no ancil lary recordsin Air Force f i les to indicate the potent ia l existenceof such records within DOE channels, however.An Extra te r res t r ia l CraftThe Air Force research found absolutely no indicationthat what happened near Roswell in 1947, involved anytype of ext ra ter res t r ia l spacecraft . This, of course, isthe crux of th is entire matter . "Pro-UFO" persons whoobtain a copy of th is report , a t this point , mostprobably begin the "cover-up is s t i l l on" claims.Nevertheless, t he r es ea rc h indicated absolutely noevidence of any kind tha t a spacesh ip crashed nearRoswell or that any alien occupants , were recoveredtherefrom, in some secret mili tary operation orotherwise. This does not mean, however, that the ear lyAir Force was not concerned about UFOs. However, in theearly days, "UFO" meant Unidentified Flying Object,which l i t e ra l ly translated as some object in the a irthat was not readily identif iable . I t did not mean, asthe term has evolved in today's language, to equate toal ien spaceships. Records from th e p er io d r ev iewed byAir Force researchers as well as those cited by theauthors mentioned before, do indicate that the USAF wasseriously concerned about the inabi l i ty to adequatelyident i fy unknown f ly ing ob je cts reported in Americanairspace. All the records, however, indicated that thefocus of concern was not on al iens , host i le orotherwise, but on the Soviet Union. Many documents fromthat period speak to the poss ib i l i ty of developmentalsecret Soviet aircraf t overflying US airspace. This, ofcourse, was of major conce rn to th e fle dg lin g USAF,whose job it was' to protect these same skies .The research revealed only one off ic ia l AAF documentthat indicated that there was any act ivi ty of any typethat p erta in ed to UFOs and Roswell in July, 1947. Thiswas a small section of the July Historical Report forthe S09th Bomb Group and Roswe ll AAP' that s tated: "TheOffice of Public Information was quite busy during themonth answering inquiries on the ' f ly ing disc , ' whichwas reported to be in possession of the S09th BombGroup. The object t urn ed out to be a r ad ar t ra ck in gbal loon" ( included with Atch I 1). Additionally, thishis tory showed tha t the S09th Commander, Colonel


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Blanchard, went on leave on July 8, 1947, which would bea somewhat unusual maneuver for a person involved in thesupposed f i r s t ever recovery of extra te r res t r ia lmaterials. (Detractors claim Blanchard did th is as aploy to elude the press and go to the scene to di rec tth e re cove ry operat ions). The his tory and the morningreports also showed that the subsequent a ct iv iti es a tRoswell during the month were mostly mundane and notindicat ive of any unusual high level ac t iv i ty ,expenditure of manpower, resources or security.Likewise, the researchers found no indicat ion ofheightened ac t iv i ty anywhere else in the mili taryhierarchy in the Ju ly , 1947, message t raf f ic or orders(to include class if ied t raf f ic) . There were noindicat ions and warnings, notice of aler t s , or a highertempo of operat ional ac t iv i ty reported that would belogically generated i f an al ien craf t , whose intentionswere unknown, entered US te r r i to ry . To believe that suchoperational and high-level security ac t iv i ty could beconducted sole ly by relying on unsecuredtelecommunications or personal contact without creat ingany re co rd s of such ac t iv i ty certainly stretches theimagination of those who have served in the mili tary whoknow that paperwork of some kind i s necessary toaccompl ish even emergency, highly class if ied, ors en s it iv e t as ks .An example of ac t iv i ty sometimes cited by pro-UFOw rite rs to i l lus t r a te the point that something unusualwas going on was the travel of Lt. General NathanTwining, Commander of the Air Ma te ri el Command, to NewMexico in July, 1947. Actual ly , r ecords were locatedindicat ing tha t Twining went to the Bomb Commanders'Course on July 8, along with a number of other generaloff icers , and requested orders to do so a month before,on June 5, 1947 (Atch 14).Similarly, it has also been alleged that General HoytVandenberg, Deputy Chief of Staff a t the time, had beeninvolved direct ing ac t iv i ty r egard ing event s a t Roswell.Activi ty reports CAtch 15), located in GeneralVandenberg's persona l paper s stored in th e L ib ra ry ofCongress, did indicate that on July 7, he was busy witha "flying disc" incident; however t hi s p ar ti cu la rincident involved Ellington Field, Texas and the Spokane(Washington) Depot. After much discussion andinformation gathering on this incident , it was learnedto be a hoax. There i s no simi lar mention of hispersonal in teres t or involvement in Roswell eventsexcept in the newspapers.The above are but two small examples that indicate thati f some event h a ~ p e n e d that was one of the "watershedhappenings" in human history, the US mi li ta ry c e rt ai n lyreacted in an unconcerned and caval ier manner. In anactual case, the mili tary would have had to orderthousands of soldiers and airman, not only a t Roswellbut throughout the US, to ac t noncha lan tly, p re t end toconduct and report business as usual, and generateabsolutely no paperwork of a suspicious nature, whilesimultaneously anticipating tha t twenty years or moreinto the future people would have available acomprehensive Freedom of Information Act that would givethem great leeway to review and explore governmentdocuments. The records indicate tha t none of this


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happened (or i f it did; it was control led by a securitysystem so eff ic ien t and t igh t tha t no one, US orotherwise, has been able to dup li ca te it since. I f sucha system had been in effect a t the time, it would havealso been used to protect our atomic secrets from theSoviets , which history has showed obviously was not thecase) . The records reviewed confirmed that no suchsophisticated and eff ic ien t secur i ty system existed.WHAT THE "ROSWELL INCIDENT" WASAs previously discussed , what was original ly reported tohave been recovered was a balloon of some sor t , usuallydes cr ib ed a s a "weather balloon, II although the majorityof the wreckage that was ult imately displayed by Genera lRamey and Major Marcel in the famous photos (Atch 16) inF t. Worth, was that of a radar target normally suspendedfrom balloons. This radar target , discussed in moredeta i l l a t e r , was certainly consis tent with thedescription of July 9 newspaper ar t ic le which discussed" t in fo i l , paper, tape, and s t icks ." Add it iona ll y, th edescription of the "flying disc" was consis tent with adocument routinely used by most pro-UFO w rite rs toindicate a conspiracy in proqress-- the telegram from theDallas FBI office of July 8, 1947. This document quotedin par t s ta tes : ." . . The disc i s hexagonal in shape andwas suspended from a balloon by a cable, which balloonwas approximately twenty feet in diameter . th e o bje ctfound resembles a high a l t i tude weather balloon with aradar re f lec tor ...disc and balloon beingt ransported . "Similarly, while conducting the popular l i t era turereview, one of the documents reviewed was a paperent i t led "The Roswell Events" edited by Fred Whiting,and sponsored by the Fund for UFO Research (FUFOR).Although it was not the original intention to comment onwhat commercia l authors in terpreted or claimed thatother persons supposedly said , t hi s p ar ti cu la r documentwas different because it contained actual copies ofapparently authentic sworn aff idavits received from anumber of p erson s who claimed to have some knowledge ofthe Roswell event. Although many of the persons whoprovided these aff idavits to the FUFOR researchers alsoexpressed opinions that they thought there was somethingext ra ter res t r ia l about th is incident , a number of themactual ly described materials tha t sounded suspiciouslyl ike wreckage from balloons. These included thefollowing:Jesse A. Marcel, NM (son of the late Major Jesse Marcel:11 years old a t the time of the incident) . Affidavi tdated May 6, 1991. " . . There were t hree ca tegor ie s ofdebris : a thick, fo i l l ike metal l ic gray subs tance : abr i t t l e , brownish-black plas t ic- l ike material , l ikeBakeli te: and there were fraqrnents of what appeared tobe I-beams. On the inner surface of the I-beam, thereappeared to be a type of wri t ing. This writ ing was apurple-viole t hue, and it had an embossed appearance.The f igures were composed of curved, geomet ric shapes .I t had no resemblance to Rus si an , J apanes e or any otherforeign language. I t resembled hieroglyphics, but it hadno animal -l ike characte rs . .Loretta Proctor (former neighbor of rancher W.W.Brazel). Affidavit dated May 5, 199 1. . 1I Brazel came


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to my ranch and showed my husband and me a piece ofmaterial he said came from a large pi le of debris on theproperty he managed. The piece he brought was brown incolor, similar to plas t ic . . 'MaC' said the othermaterial on the property looked l ike aluminum foi l . I twas very f lexible and wouldn't crush or bum. There wasalso something he described as tape which had print ingon i t . The color of the print ing was a kind ofpurple . . . IIBess ie Braze l Schreiber (daughter of W.W. Brazel; 14years old a t the time of the i nci den t ). A f fi dav it datedSeptember 22, 1993 . . " . . The debris looked l ike pieces ofa large balloon which had burst . The pieces were small,the l a rges t I remember measuring about the same as thediameter of a basketbal l . Most of it was a kind ofdouble-sided material , foi l - l ike on one side andrubber-l ike on the other . Both sides were grayish s i lverin co lo r, the fo i l more silvery than the rubber. Sticks,l ike k i te st icks , were a tt ac hed t o some of t he p ie ce swith a whitish tape. The tape was about two or threeinches wide and had flowerlike designs on i t . The' f lowers ' were fa int , a variety of paste l colors, andreminded me of Japanese paintings in which the flowersare not a l l connected. I do not recal l any other typesof mate ria l o r mark ings , nor do I remember seeing gougesin the ground or any other signs that anything may haveh i t the ground hard. The foi l-rubber materiaY could notbe tom l ike ordinary aluminum fo i l can be tern "Sa ll y S tr ick land Tadolini (neighbor of WW Bra ze l; n in eyears old in 1947). Affidavit dated September 27, 1993." . . What Bi l l showed us was a piece of what I s t i l lthink as fabr ic . I t was something l ike aluminum fo i l ,something l ike sa t in , something l ike well tanned leatherin i t s toughness, yet was not precisely l ike anyone ofthose materials .. I t was about the thickness of veryfine kidskin glove lea ther and a du ll me ta ll ic grayishs i lver , one side s l igh t ly darker than the other . I donot remember it having any design or embossing on it . . "Robert R. Porter (B-29 f l igh t Engineer sta t ioned a tRoswell in 1947). Affidavit dated June 7, 1991 .. On thisoccasion, I was a member of the crew which flew par ts ofwhat we were to ld was a f lying saucer to Fort Worth. Thepeople on board included . . . and Maj Jesse Marce l. Cap t.William E. Anderson said i t was from a flying saucer.After we arr ived, t he mat er ia l was t ra n sf er red t o aB-25. I was told they were going to Wright F ield inDayton, Ohio. I was involved in loading the B-29 withthe materia l , which was wrapped in packages withwrapping paper . One of the pieces was tr iangle-shaped,about 2 1/2 feet across the bottom. The r es t were insmall packages, about the size of a shoe box. The brownpaper was held w ith tap e. The material was extremelyl ightweight. When I picked it up, it was jus t l ikepicking up an empty package. We loaded the t r iangleshaped package and three shoe box-sized packages intothe plane. All of the packages could have f i t into thetrunk of a car ...When we came back from lunch, theyto ld us they had transferred th e ma te ri al to a B-25.They told us the material was a weather balloon, but I 'mcertain it wasn' t a weather balloon . . "In addit ion to those persons above s t i l l l iving whoclaim to have seen or examined the original material


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tound on the Brazel Ranch, there is one additionalperson who was universally acknowledged to have beeninvolved in i t s recovery, Sheridan Cavit t , Lt Col, USAF,(Ret) . Cavi t t is credited in a l l claims of havingaccompanied Major Marcel to the ranch to recover thedebris, sometimes along with his Counter Intel l igenceCorps (CIC) subordinate, William Rickett , who, l ikeMarcel, is deceased. Although there does not appear tobe much dispute that Cavit t was involved in the materialrecovery, other claims about him p re va il in the popularl i t e ra ture . He i s sometimes portrayed as a closed-mouth(or sometimes even sinister) conspirator who was one ofthe early individuals who kept the "secret of Roswell"from getting out. Other things about him have beenalleged, including the claim that he w rote a report ofthe incident a t the time that has never surfaced.Since Lt Col Cavit t , who had f irst-hand knowledge, wass t i l l al ive, a decision was made to interview him andget a signed sworn statement from him about his versionof the e ve nts. P ri or to t he i nt er vi ew , the Secr et ar y o fthe Air Force provid ed him with a writ ten authorizationand waiver to discuss c lass i f ied information w ith th einterviewer and release him from any secur i ty oath hemay have taken. Subsequently, Cavit t was interviewed onMay 24 , 1994, a t his home. Cavit t provided a signed,sworn statement (Atch 17 ) of his recollect ions in th ismatter. He also consented to having t he i nt er vi ewtape-recorded. A t ranscr ipt of that recording i s a t Atch18 . In th i s interview, Cavit t r el at ed t ha t he had beencontacted on numerous occasions by UFO researchers andhad will ingly talked with many of them; however, he fe l tthat he had oftentimes been misrepresented or had hiscomments taken out of context so that the i r true meaningwas changed. He s tated unequivocally, however, tha t thematerial he recovered consisted of a reflect ive sor t ofmaterial l ike aluminum foi l , and some thin, bamboo-likest icks. He thought a t the time, and continued to do sotoday, that what he found was a weather balloon and hasto ld o th er private researchers that . He also rememberedfinding a small "black box" type of instrument, which hethought a t the time was probably a radiosonde. Lt ColCavitt also reviewed the famous Ramey/Marcel photographs(Atch 16) of the wreckage taken to Ft. Worth (oftenclaimed by LITO researchers to have been swi tched andthe remnants of a balloon subs ti tu ted f or i t ) and heidentif ied the materials depicted in those photos asconsistent with the materials that he recovered from theranch. Lt Col Cavit t also stated tha t he had never t akenany oath or signed any agreement not to ta lk about th isincident and had never been threatened by anyone in thegovernment because of i t . He did not even know theincident" was claimed to be anything unusual unt i l hewas interviewed ~ the ear ly 1980's.S im il ar ly , I rv in g Newton, Major, USAF, (Ret) was locatedand interviewed. Newton was a weather officer assignedto Fort Worth, who was on duty when the Roswell debriswas sent there in July, 1947. He was told that he was toreport to General Ramey'S office to view the material .In a signed, sworn statement (Atch 30) Newton relatedthat ." . 1 walked into the General's off ice where th issupposed flying saucer was lying a l l ove r the f loor. Assoon as I saw i t , I giggled and asked i f that was theflying saucer . . I told them that th is was a balloonand a RAWIN target . . . " Newton also s tated that ." . while


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I was examining the debris, Major Marcel was picking uppieces of the ta rg e t s tic k s and trying to convince methat some notations on the s t icks were al ien writings.there were f igures on the s t icks , lavender or pink incolor , appeared to be weather faded markings, with norhyme or reason (s ic) . He did not convince me that thesewere al ien writ ings." Newton concluded his statement byrelat ing tha t ." . .During the ensuing years I have beeninterviewed by many authors, I have been quoted andmisquoted. The facts remain as indicated above. I wasnot influenced during the or iginal interview, nor today,to p rovid e anything but what I know to be t rue, that is ,th e material I saw in General Ramey's off ice was theremains of a balloon and a RAWlN target ."Balloon ResearchThe original tasking from GAO noted that th e s earch forinformation included "weather balloons." Comments aboutballoons and safety reports have already been made,however the SAF/AAZ research ef for t s also focused onreviewing his tor ica l records involv ing bal lo on s, s in ce ,among other reasons, that was what was off ic ia l lyclaimed by the AAF to have been found and recovered in1947.As ear ly as February 28 , 1994, the AAZD research teamfound references to balloon tes ts taking place a tAlamogordo AAF (now Holloman AFB) and Whit e Sands duringJune and July 1947, tes t ing "constant level balloons"and a New York Universi ty (NYU)/Watson Labs effor t thatused " . . meteoro log ica l dev ices . . . suspected fordetecting shock waves generated by Soviet nuclearexplosions"--a poss ib le indi ca tion of a cover storyassociated with the NYU balloon project . Subsequently, a1946 HQ AMC memorandum was s urfa ced, d es cr ib ing th econstant a l t i tude balloon project and speci fi ed t h at thesc ien t i f ic data be class if ied TOP SECRET Prior i ty lA .I ts name was Project MOgul (Atch 19).Project Mogul was a then-sensi t ive , class if ied project ,whose purpose was to determine the s ta te of Sovietnuclear weapons research. This was the ear ly Cold Warperiod and there was serious concern within the USgovernment about the Soviets developing a weaponizedatomic device. Because the Soviet Union's borders wereclosed, the US Government sought to develop a long rangenuclear explosion detection capabi l i ty . Long range,bal loon-borne, low frequency acoustic detection wasposed to General Spaatz in 1945 by Dr. Maurice Ewing ofColumbia Universi ty as a potent ial solution (atmosphericducting of low frequency pressure waves h ad been studiedas ear ly as 1900).As par t of th e re se arc h into this matter , AAZD personnellocated and obta in ed th e or iginal study papers andrep orts of the New York Universi ty project . Theireffor ts also revealed that some of the individualsinvolved in Project Mogul were s t i l l l iving. Thesepersons included the NYU constant alt i tude balloonDir ec to r o f Research, Dr. Athelstan F. Spilhaus; theProject Engineer, Professor Charles B. Moore; and themili tary Projec t Of fi ce r, Colonel Albert C. Trakowski All of these persons were subsequent ly interviewed andsigned sworn statements about the i r act iv i t ies . A copy


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of theses statements are appended a t Atch 20-22.Additionally, t ranscripts of t he i nt er vi ew w ith Mooreand Trakowski are also included (equipment malfunctionedduring t he int ervi ew of Spilhaus) (Atch 23-24). Theseinterviews confinmed that Project Mogul was acompartmented, sensi t ive effort . The NYU group wasr espons ib le for developing constant level balloons andtelemetering equipment that would remain a t specifiedal t i tudes (within the acoustic duct) while a group fromColumbia was to develop acoustic sensors. DoctorSpi lhaus, P ro fe ssor Moore, and certain others of thegroup were aware of the actual purpose of the project ,but they did not know of the project nickname a t thetime. They handled casual inquiries and/or scient if ici nqu ir ie s/paper s in terms of "unclassifiedmeteorological or balloon research." Newly hiredemployees were not made aware that there was anythingsp ec ia l o r class if ied about their work: they were toldonly that thei r work dealt with meteorologicalequipment.An advance ground team, led by Albert P, Cra ry , p recededthe NYU group to Alamogordo AAF, New Mexico, set t ing upground sensors and obtaining fac i l i t ies for the NYUgroup. Upon their arr ival , Professor Moore and his teamexperimented with var ious configu ra ti ons of neopreneballoons; development o f b allo on "trains" (seei l lus t ra t ion, Atch 25): automatic bal las t systems- anduse of Naval sonobuoys (a s the Watson Lab acousticalsensors had not yet arr ived). They also launched whatthey cal led "service f l ights ." These "service f l ights"were not logged nor ful ly accounted for in the publishedTechnical Reports generated as a resul t of th e con tr ac tbetween NYU and Watson Labs. According to ProfessorMoore, th e "s erv ic e f l ights" were composed o f bal loon s,radar ref lectors and payloads specif ical ly designed totes t acoust ic sensors (both ear ly sonobuoys and thel a te r Watson Labs devices). The "payload equipment" wasexpendable and some carried no "REWARD" or "RETURNTO . . " tags because there was to be no associationbetween these f l igh ts and the logged constant alt i tudef l igh ts which were ful ly acknowledged. The NYU balloonf l ights were l i s ted s equen ti al ly in their reports ( i .e .A,B, 1,5 ,6 ,7 ,8 ,10 . ) yet gaps existed for Flights 2-4and Flight 9. The interview with Professor Mooreindicated that these gap s were the unlogged "servicef l ights ."Professor Moore, the on-scene Project Engineer, gavedetai led information concerning his team's effor t s . Herecalled tha t radar targets were used for trackingballoons because they did not have a l l the necessa ryequipment when they f i r s t arrived in New Mexico. Some ofthe ear ly , developmental radar targets were manufacturedby a toy or novelty company. These targets were made upof aluminum "foi l" or foil-backed paper, balsa woodbeams tha t were coated in an "Elmer's-type" glue toenhance thei r durabil i ty, acetate and/or clothreinforcing tape, single strand and braided nylon tw ine,b ra ss eye le ts and swivels to form a multi-facedref lector somewhat similar in construct ion to a box ki te(see photographs, Atch 26). Some of these targets werealso assembled with purplish-pink tape with symbols onit (see drawing by Moore with Atch 2 1).According to the lo g summary (Atch 27) of the NYU group,


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Flight A through Flight 7 (November 20 , 1946-July 2,1947) were made with neoprene meteorological balloons(a s opposed to the l a t e r f l ights made with polyethyleneballoons). Professor Moore stated that the neopreneballoons were susceptible to degradation in thesunlight, turning from a milky white to a dark brown. Hedescribed f ind ing remains of balloon t ra ins withref lectors and payloads that had landed in the desert :the ruptured and shredded neoprene would "almost lookl ike dark g ray or black flakes or ashes af ter exposureto the sun for only a few days. The plas t ic izers andantioxidants in the neoprene would emit a peculiar acridodor and the balloon material and radar target materialwould be scat tered af ter returning to earth depending onthe surface winds." Upon review of the local newspaperphotographs from General Ramey's press conference in1947 and descript ions in popular books by individualswho supposedly handled the debris recovered on theranch, Professor Moore opined that the material was mostl ike ly the shredded remains of a multi-neoprene balloont r a in with multiple radar re f lec tors . The material and a"bla ck box ," described by Cavit t , was, in Moore'ssc ient i f ic opinion, most probably from Fl ight 4, a"service f l ight" that included a cyl indr ical metalsonobuoy and portions of a weather instrument housed ina box, which was unlike typical weather radiosondeswhich were made o f c ardboa rd . Additionally, a copy of aprofessional journal maintained a t the time by A.P.Crary, provided to the Air Force by his widow, showedtha t Fl ight 4 was launched on June 4, 1947, but was notrecovered by the NYU group. I t i s very probable thatthis TOP SECRET project balloon t ra in (Flight 4), madeup of unclassif ied components; came to res t some milesnorthwest of Roswell, NM, became shredded in the surfacewinds and was ult imately found by t he ra nche r, Brazel,ten days l a ter . This poss ib i l i ty was supported by theobse rvat ions o f Lt Col Cavit t (Atch 17-18), the onlyl iving eyewitness to th e actual debris f ie ld and themater ia l found. Lt Col Cavitt described a small area ofdebris which appeared, "to resemble bamboo type squarest icks one quarter to one half i nch squar e, that werevery l igh t , as well as some sor t of metal l ic reflectingmaterial that was also very l igh t . . . I rememberrecognizing th is material as being consis tent with aweather balloon." .Concerning the i n i t i a l announcement, "RAAF capturesFlying Disc," research fa i led to locate any documentedevidence as to why that statement was made. However, onJuly 10 , 1947, following the Ramey press conference, theAlamogordo News published an ar t ic le with photographsdemonstra ting mUltiple balloons and targets a t the samelocation as the NYU group operated from a t AlamogordoAAF. Professor Moore expressed surprise a t seeing thissince his , was the only balloon t e s t group in the area.He s ta ted, " I t appears that there was some type ofumbrel la cover story to protect our work with Moqul "Although the Air Force did not find documented evidencethat Gen. Ramey was d ire cte d to espouse a weatherballoon in his press conference, he may have done sobecause he was e i ther aware of Project Mogul and wastrying to deflect in te res t from i t , or he readi lyperc eiv ed t he material to be a weather balloon based onthe identif ication from h is weather off icer , IrvingNewton. In e i ther case, the materials recovered by theAAF in July, 1947, were not readily recognizable as


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anything special (only the purpose was,special) and therecovered debris i t se l f was unclassi f ied. Additionally,the p re ss dropped i t s in te res t i n th e matt er as quicklyas they had jumped on i t . Hence, there would be nopart icular reason to fu rth er document what quicklybecame a "non-event."The interview with Colonel Trakowski (Atch 23-24) alsoproved valuable information. Trakowski provided specif icdetails on Project Mogul and described how the securityfor the program was se t up, as he was formerly the TOPSECRET Control Officer for the program. He furtherre la te d th at many of the original radar targets thatwere produced around the end of World War I I werefabricated by toy or novelty companies using apurplish-pink tape with flower and heart symbols on i t .Trakowski also recounted a conversation that he had withhis fr iend, and superior mili tary officer in his chainof command, Colonel Marcellus Duffy, in July, 1947.Duffy, formerly had Trakowski's posit ion on Mogul, buthad subsequently been transferred to Wright Field. Hes tated: ." .Colonel Duffy called me on the telephonefrom Wright Field and gave me a story about a fellowthat had come in from New Mexico, woke him up in themiddle of the n ight or some such th in g w ith a handful ofdebris, and wanted him, Colonel Duffy, to ident i fy i t .'" He jus t said 'it sure looks l ike some of the s tuffyou've been launching a t Alamogordo and he described i t ,and I said 'yes, I think it i s . ' Certainly Colonel Duffyknew enough about radar targets , radiosondes,balloon-borne weather devices. He was int imatelyfamiliar with a l l that apparatus."Attempts were made to lo ca te Colonel Duffy but it wasascertained that he had died. I-Es widow explained that ,although he had amassed a large amount o f p ers on alpapers re la t ing to h is Air Force act iv i t ies , she hadrecently d isposed o f these items. Likewise, it waslearned that A.P. Crary was also deceased 1 however hissurviving spouse had a number of his papers from hisballoon test ing days, including his professional journalfrom th e p erio d in question. She provided the Air Forcer es ea rche rs with this material . I t is discussed in moredetail within Atch 32 . Overall, it helps f i l l in gaps ofthe Mogul s tory.During the period the Air Force conducted th is research,it was discovered that several others had alsodiscovered the poss ib i l i ty that the "Roswell Incident"may have been generated by the recovery of a ProjectMogul balloon device. These persons inCluded ProfessorCharles B. Moore, Robert Todd, and coincidental ly, KarlPflock, a researcher who i s married to a s taf fer whoworks for Congressman Schiff . Some of these personsprovided suggestions as to where documen ta tion might belocated in var ious a rch ives , his tor ies and l ib rar ies . Areview of Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requestsrevealed that Robert Todd, part icularly , had becomeaware of Project Mogul several years ago and haddoggedly obtained from the Air Force, through the FOIA,a large amount of mater ia l per ta in ing to i t ; long beforethe AAZD researchers independently seized on the sameposs ib i l i ty .Most in terest ingly , as th is report was being writ ten,Pflock published his own report of th is matter under the


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auspices of FUFOR, ent i t led "Roswell in Perspective"(1994). Pflock concluded from his research that theBrazel Ranch debris original ly reported as a "flyingdisc" was probably debris from a Mogul balloon; however,there was a simultaneous incident that occurred not faraway, that caused an al ien craf t to crash and that theAAF subsequently recovered three alien bodies therefrom.Air Force r es ea rc h d id not locate any information tocorroborate tha t th is incredible coincidence occurred,however.In order to provide a more detai led discussion of thespeci f ics of Projec t MogUl and how it appeared to bedirect ly responsible for the "Roswell Incident," aSAF/AAZD researcher prepared a more detai led discussionon t he ball oon project which is appended to this repor tas Atch 32.Other ResearchIn the attempt to develop addi t ional information thatcould help explain this matter, a number of o th er ste pswere taken. Firs t , assistance was requested from variousmuseums and other archives (Atch 28) to obtaininformation and/or examples of the actual balloons andradar targets used in connect ion wi th Project Mogul andto corre la te them with the various descriptions ofwreckage and materials recovered. The blueprints for the"Pilot Balloon Target ML307C/AP Assembly" (generically,the radar target assembly) were located a t the ArmySignal Corps Museum a t Fort Monmouth and obtained. Acopy i s appended as Atch 29 . This blueprint provides thespeci f icat ion for the fo i l material , tape, wood,eyelets , and str ing used and the assembly inst ruct ionsthereto. An actual device was also obtained for studywith the assis tance of professor Moore. (The exampleactual ly procured was a 1953-manufactured model "C" ascompared to the Model B which was in use in 1947.Professor Moore re la ted t he d if fe rence s were minor). Anexamination of this device revealed it to be simply madeof aluminum-colored foi l - l ike material over a strongerpaper- l ike materi a l, a tt ac hed t o balsa wood st icks ,affixed w ith tap e, glue, and twine. When opened, thedevice appears as depicted in Atch 31 (contemporaryphoto) and Atch 25 (1947 photo, in a "balloon t ra in") .When folded, the device is in a ser ies of t r iangles , thelargest being four feet by two feet ten inches. Thesmallest t r iangle sect ion measures two feet by two feette n i nche s. (Compare with descriptions provided by LtCol Cavit t and others, as well as photos of wreckage) Addit ionally, t he r es ea rche rs obtained from the Archivesof the University of Texas Arlington (UTA), a se t oforiginal ( i . e . f l r s t generation) pr in ts of thephotographs taken a t the time by the Fort WorthStar-Telegram, that depicted Ramey and Marcel with thewreckage. A close review of these photos (and a se t off i r s t generation negatives also subsequently obtainedfrom UTA) revealed several infest ing observations.Firs t , although in some of the l i t era ture ci ted above,Marcel allegedly sta te d th at he had his photo ta ken w it hthe "real" UFO wreckage and then i t was subsequentlyremoved and the weather balloon wreckage subst i tuted fori t , a comparison shows tha t the same wreckage appearedin the photos of Marcel and Ramey. The photos alsodepicted th at th is material was lying on what appeared


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7. AF/SE Memo, March 14 , 19948. SAF/AQL Memo, March 22 , 19949. AF/XOWP Memo, -March 9, 199410. SAF/AAI Memo, March 10 , 199411 . AFHRA/CC Memo, March 8, 199412. AFOSI/HO Memo, May 11, 199413 . List of Locations and Records Searched14 . HQ AAF " Is suance o f Orders," June 5, 194715 . Copy of Vandenberg's Appointment Book and Diary,July 7-9, 194716. July 9, 1947 Photos of Balloon Wreckage, Ft WorthStar Telegram17. Signed Sworn Statement of Cavit t , May 24, 199418 . Transcript of Cavit t Interview, May 24, 199419. Letter , July 8, 1946, Project Mogul20. Signed Sworn Statement of Spilhaus, June 3, 199421. Signed Sworn Statement of Moore, June 8, 199422 . Signed Sworn Statement of Trakowski, June 29 , 199423. Transcript of In terv iew w ith Moore, June 8, 199424 . Transcript of In te rview wi th Trakowski, June 29,199425 . I l lus t ra t ion of Project Mogul "Balloon Trains"26. Two Photos of Project Mogul "Balloon Trains27. Log Summary, NYU Constant Level Balloon Flights28 . List of Museums Contacted29. Copy of Blueprint for "pi lot Balloon Target,NM-307C/AP Assembly"30. Signed Sworn Statement of Newton, July 21, 199431 . Photos of NM-307C/AP Device, With Vintage NeopreneBalloon and Debris32. Synopsis of Balloon Research Findings by lLT JamesMcAndrew33. "Mensuration Working Paper," With Drawing and Photo

report after roswell

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