UFO DATA Magazine News Round-Up November/December, 2007

Presidential hopeful Rudy Giuliani on Sunday said preparedness will be key for all crises, even an attack from outer space.

During a town hall meeting in Exeter, a young questioner asked the former New York mayor about his plan to protect Earth.

"If (there's) something living on another planet and it's bad and it comes over here, what would you do?" the boy asked.

Giuliani, grin on his face, said it was the first time he's been asked about an intergalactic attack. "Of all the things that can happen in this world, we'll be prepared for that, yes we will. We'll be prepared for anything that happens," said Giuliani, who spent the day campaigning in key early voting state.

Being prepared is a theme that runs through the

campaign of Giuliani, the mayor during the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in New York.

The boy's question let Giuliani take a lighthearted turn as he wrapped up his answer on emergency preparedness.

"This could be the new Steven Spielberg," he said. "You want to be a science fiction writer or a scientist?"

The boy replied he wants to be a sculptor.

Then Giuliani asked the audience for another question: "Shall we take one question about this planet?"

Source: Associated Press 14^th October, 2007

When you are a minor candidate in a presidential debate with the likes of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama it can be hard to get noticed. But the Ohio congressman Dennis Kucinich inadvertently did just that when live on national television he admitted he had seen a UFO.

At the end of the two-hour debate for Democrat candidates, with the presenters switching to light-hearted mode, the Ohio congressman was reminded of a passage in a book published recently by his friend Shirley MacLaine.

The actress, who is godmother to Mr Kucinich's daughter, writes that he saw the object near her home in Washington state and "found the encounter extremely moving", seeing "a triangular craft silent and hovering, that you felt a connection to your heart and heard direction in your mind".

"Now," Mr Kucininch was asked, "did you see a UFO?"'

"I did," he replied, before stressing that it was unidentified and reminding the audience - correctly

- that former president Jimmy Carter also saw a UFO.

Mr Kucinich, a Left-winger who is light years behind the frontrunners in the race for the Democratic Party's nomination for the 2008 presidential election, said afterwards:

"It was more than 25 years ago, I don't want to go into details right now because that is not why I am running for president, but I can affirm that I did see something and it was a UFO. But so have a lot of other Americans.

"It's interesting to see how a lot of people start hyperventilating about this because it really says something more about them than about me.

"Shirley is a dear friend of mine, but if I was writing a book I might give a slightly different account."

Indeed pundits on MSNBC, the cable network that hosted the debate at Drexel University in Philadelphia, feasted on the unfortunate Mr Kucinich, whose major point during the debate was that the current president and vice-president should be impeached for an illegal war in Iraq that abused their executive power.

After Mr Kucinich's positive response Barack Obama was asked during the debate if he believed in extra terrestrial life forms.

'I don't know, and I wouldn't presume to know, but what I do know is there is life on earth and if elected I would deal with that first," he said.

Source: The Telegraph 2^nd November, 2007

China's first lunar module has begun orbiting the Moon, 12 days after blasting off, officials have confirmed.

The satellite, named Chang'e I, slowed down as it reached lunar gravitational pull, 200km (120 miles) from the Moon.

Scientists intend to keep the probe in orbit for one year while it studies the surface and beams back images.

China's lunar mission comes just weeks after Japan launched a similar module, but officials in Beijing denied an Asian space race was under way.

Long Jiang, deputy commander of spacecraft systems of China's lunar exploration programme, said China wanted to use its space mission to work with other countries.

"We are willing to co-operate with the rest of the world to the benefit of humankind, but as to what kind of co-operation, it depends on specific circumstances," Mr Long said.

Japan's lunar probe entered orbit in early October, and India is planning a mission for April next year.

Pace of exploration

Analysts believe China's launch, from the Xichang Centre in south-west Sichuan province, is a key step towards its aim of putting a man on the Moon by 2020.

State TV broadcast the launch of the unmanned Chang'e I, named after a Chinese goddess who flew to the Moon.

Efforts by Asian nations to advance their space programmes have gathered pace in recent years.

In 2003, China became the first Asian nation to use its own rocket to put an astronaut in space.

Four years later, Beijing triggered international concern by destroying a weather satellite as part of a weapons test.

Source: BBC News 5^th November, 2007

Aliens were responsible for a series of unexplained fires in fridges, TV’s and mobile phones in an Italian village, according to an Italian government report.

Canneto di Caronia, in northern Sicily, drew attention three years ago after residents reported everyday household objects bursting into flames.

TV news footage at the time showed electrical appliances as well as cookers, a pile of wedding presents and furniture smouldering.

Dozens of experts including scientists, electrical engineers and military boffins, arrived in the village 60 miles east of Palermo to investigate the phenomenon. Arson was quickly ruled out and at one stage an amazed scientist was interviewed after he described how he saw an unplugged electrical cable burst into flames.

Locals were quick to blame supernatural forces and at the time the Vatican’s chief exorcist Father Gabriele Amorth backed up their fears and said: "I’ve seen things like this before. Demons occupy a house and appear in electrical goods. Let’s not forget that Satan and his followers have immense powers."

Now in an interim leaked report published by several Italian newspapers it has emerged that the Civil Protection Department has concluded the most likely cause was "aliens".

The report was ordered by the Italian government and brought together dozens of experts including a NASA scientist. Their two year investigation has cost an estimated £1 million.

According to the report the fires were "caused by a high power electro magnetic emissions which were not man made and reached a power of between 12 and 15 gigawatts."

The report also detailed a possible UFO landing close to the village, citing "burnt imprints which have not been explained were found in a field."

Francesco Mantegna Venerando, Sicily’s Civil Protection chief who coordinated the report, said: "This is not the final report. We are still working on our conclusions and this has been leaked.

"We are not saying that little green men from Mars started the fires but that unnatural forces capable of creating a large amount of electromagnetic energy were responsible.

"This is just one possibility we are also looking at another one which involves the testing of top secret weapons by an unknown power which are also capable of producing an enormous amount of energy."

Source: The Telegraph 26^th October, 2007

It didn’t come from an airplane.

The mystery about the origin of a 16-inch, unidentified falling object that fell from the sky Monday and sliced “like butter” through the hood of a parked vehicle deepened Tuesday, after an official with the Federal Aviation Administration announced that whatever it is, it’s not a piece of aircraft.

At about 4 p.m. Monday, the brownish, hook-

shaped piece of metal crashed through the roof of an unoccupied 2007 Mitsubishi Outlander parked at the Happy Harry’s drugstore at 536 Main St. in Stanton. Its arrival came with a boom that one witness told Mill Creek Fire Company Chief James Howell sounded like an explosion.

The SUV’s owner, Susan Wilson, said she was inside the drugstore at the time. When she returned to her car, she found ash and debris on the driver’s seat and gaping hole in the vehicle’s roof. Nestled on the rear passenger side floor she found the hot object still smoldering from its descent.

“The metal was still too hot to handle,” Delaware State Police spokesman Cpl. Jeff Whitmarsh said.

Once the mysterious object had cooled down, it was turned over to the FAA personnel from the Philadelphia office. The federal agency was doing some last procedural work on the object Tuesday, but FAA spokesman Jim Peters said he’s confident it didn’t come from any plane.

Wilson, of Wilmington and her fiance Michael Roberto have struggled with how to deal with the aftermath of the object falling from the sky. Their SUV has been towed to a repair shop and the couple is waiting on the bill. Lacking answers to what launched the hunk of metal, Wilson’s insurance has asked her to pay the deductible for the damage.

Source: Daily Times (Maryland) 16^th October, 2007

Something happened in Roswell, New Mexico, 60 years ago this summer.

In June or early July 1947, a farmer found strange debris while working on a ranch about 70 miles north of Roswell. He put some of it in a box and drove to the local sheriff. Neither man knew what to make of it, so the sheriff called Roswell Army Air Field, which sent two men to investigate.

On July 9, 1947, the Roswell Daily Record, a

newspaper, printed a story with the alarming headline: "RAAF Captures Flying Saucer On Ranch in Roswell Region."

Other than those facts, there appear to be few things people agree on regarding what has become known as "the Roswell incident."

Six decades later, competing UFO enthusiasts promote their own theories, skeptics dismiss the spaceship claims as outrageous, and the military, which originally claimed all the fuss was over a weather balloon, now sticks to its story that it was an experimental spy craft.

Escondido resident Milton Sprouse, 85, said he knows what happened in Roswell ---- not because he favors one theory over another, but because he was there.

As for the outrageous stories of mysterious metal, alien corpses and a military coverup?

It's all true, he said.

From atom bombs to flying saucers

Before arriving at Roswell Army Air Field in 1945 as a corporal and engine mechanic, Sprouse already had participated in an undisputable historic event.

As a member of the 393rd Bomb Squadron assigned to the 509th Composite Group, Sprouse worked on the ground crew of Big Stink, one of the B-29 bombers stationed on the Pacific island of Tinian, where the two atomic bomb missions on Japan were launched to end World War II.

After the war, the 509th Composite Group was reassigned to Roswell, where they were renamed the 509th Bomb Wing. Sprouse continued to lead the ground crew of Big Stink, which had been renamed Dave's Dream after the pilot.

"There was nothing there but tumbleweeds blowing for miles," he said about arriving at Roswell in November 1945.

Sprouse first learned that something odd was going on at Roswell after returning from a three-day trip to Florida aboard Dave's Dream.

"I was there the day they announced a UFO had crashed," he said. "The next day, it was published in the Roswell Daily Record, and that night, all the generals said the story was untrue."

Farmer William "Mac" Brazel had found debris on the J.B. Foster Ranch, where he was a foreman, sometime in June or early July. Brazel took some of the material, which reportedly included sticks, rubber strips, metallic foil and sturdy paper, to Sheriff George Wilcox, who called the air base.

Intelligence Officer Jesse Marcel was sent to the sheriff's station. Marcel reported what he saw to Air Force commanding officer Col. William Blanchard, who told him to go with Brazel to the ranch and examine the crash site.

After spending the night at the ranch, Marcel and another officer loaded their vehicles with debris, some of which reportedly was marked with mysterious symbols, and drove back to the base. Blanchard then ordered a press release stating that the base had captured a flying saucer.

The original story ran in the local paper July 8. That same day, the debris was loaded onto a B-29 and sent with Marcel to an Air Force base in Texas. Marcel was photographed with what was said to be the debris, and the military issued a statement saying that it was in fact a weather balloon.

Search for the truth

Meanwhile, Sprouse said, all copies of the Roswell newspaper were collected by officers, and hundreds of men from the 509th were taken to the crash site and told to walk shoulder-to-shoulder through the field, looking for debris pieces.

Sprouse himself did not go because he was told he was needed for Dave's Dream, but five men from his ground crew went to the ranch. "They said it was out of this world," Sprouse said about what the crew reported finding. Among the objects it reported seeing was a metallic foil that, when crumpled, unfolded without a crease.

But what was the debris? Was it really something from another world, or just the product of overactive imaginations fueled by the monotony of a desolate 1950s desert town?

One thing that is agreed upon now: It was not from a weather balloon.

In 1995, after years of questions about the incident, the U.S. Air Force admitted the weather-balloon story was fabricated to cover up a top-secret project called Project Mogul designed to detect atomic activity over the Soviet Union with high-altitude balloons.

Some of the launches in the project contained more than two dozen neoprene balloons strung across more than 600 feet.

Charles Moore, a Project Mogul scientist interviewed in the Air Force report, has spoken in public about the project and described striking similarities to what was found at the ranch outside of Roswell and the Project Mogul material, which used sticks, metallic paper and strangely marked tape.

The strange markings that had seemed like cosmic hieroglyphics may have had a much more mundane explanation: Moore said the project used tape made at a toy factory.

The balloons were launched in June and July 1947 from Alamogordo Army Air Field in New Mexico. One flight was launched June 4 and tracked to Arabela, N.M., about 17 miles from the Foster ranch, before its batteries ran down and contact was lost.

More questions

But if the debris did come from a Project Mogul craft, how could a string of balloons create the types of gouges on the ground some witnesses have reported?

Then again, maybe there were no gouges; skeptics of the UFO theory have noted that some witnesses changed their stories about what they saw on the crash site.

The Project Mogul explanation also does not address why some people reported seeing alien bodies at the site. Those were explained in another report in 1997 that concluded the bodies actually were anthropomorphic dummies used to test high-altitude parachutes.

UFO believers found the explanation a little too convenient. There also was a timing problem, as the parachute tests were not conducted until the 1950s. The timing discrepancy has been explained as the result of people who over the years confused the two incidents and compressed memories of them into one event.

Sprouse, however, said he recalls people speaking about "alien bodies" immediately after the debris discovery.

"They took the bodies to a hangar, and there were two guards at each door with machine guns," he said.

Sprouse said one witness, a barracksmate, was an emergency-room medic who reported seeing what he called "humanoid" bodies in the hospital.

"They went to the ER room and two doctors and two nurses were called in, and they dissected two of those humanoid bodies," he said. "Then the doctors and nurses were transferred.

"My friend said he saw the bodies, and I believed him," Sprouse said. "He said, 'We don't think the humanoid ate food.' I don't know why he said that. The digestive system wasn't designed for food or something."

Like the other doctors and nurses, Sprouse said, his friend suddenly was transferred, and he never heard from him again. Others on the base, however, kept the story alive.

"I heard it so many times, it had to be true," he said.

Sprouse said he knew Marcel, but he never spoke to him after the incident.

"From that day on, I could never get close to him," he said.

The story lives on

After the story about the UFO crash was retracted, the rest of the world largely forgot about Roswell and accepted that what had been discovered was just a misidentified weather balloon.

The men stationed at the base, however, did not easily forget.

"They were still talking about it when I left, and I left in '56," Sprouse said.

In 1978, Marcel was interviewed by a researcher and appeared in a documentary, "UFOs Are Real," the following year. The National Enquirer interviewed Marcel in 1980 for an article in which he said the woodlike debris could not be burned and the thin metal could not be bent. "The Roswell Incident" was released in 1980 as the first of a string of books on the subject.

As interest grew in the Roswell UFO incident, so did the number of detractors. Some have questioned Marcel's credibility, saying he got caught up in UFO hysteria and was known to exaggerate his own military past.

Jesse Marcel, Jr. published his own book this year, "The Roswell Legacy," defending his father, who died in 1986.

Sprouse has not kept up with all the books and documentaries on Roswell and did not go to Roswell in July for the 60th anniversary of the discovery.

He does, however, attend annual reunions with the 509th, which attracts 25 to 30 veterans.

"The Roswell incident comes up every year, but there's nothing really new," he said.

Sprouse also speaks about his experience at Tinian to about five high schools a year, and he often is invited to speak to other groups. He usually ends his talk with his memories of Roswell, often to the surprise of his audience.

At a talk in Tucson, Ariz., earlier this year, Sprouse said a man came up to him afterwards and said, "I don't believe a damn thing you said."

"I told him, 'You can believe what you want, but I know it's true,'" Sprouse said.

Source: North County Times (California) 29^th September, 2007

UFO DATA Magazine values its subscribers, you are the life's blood of this publication and without you we simply can’t exist.

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