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Texas Company Aims to 3D-Print Buildings on the Moon

October 14, 2020
ExoNews Editor

Article by Mike Wall October 2, 2020 (space.com)

• The Austin-based company ICON, known for 3D-printing houses here on Earth, just launched Project Olympus to develop a space-based construction system to help get a foothold on the Moon and Mars. “From the very founding of ICON, we’ve been thinking about off-world construction,” said ICON CEO Jason Ballard. “I am confident that learning to build on other worlds will also provide the necessary breakthroughs to solve housing challenges we face on this world.”

• Project Olympus recently signed a four-year, $14.55M Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) deal with the U.S. Air Force to expand the capabilities of its 3D-printing tech. NASA is contributing 15% of the SBIR funding.

• NASA’s interest in ICON’s 3D-printing construction tech is tied to the Artemis program for manned lunar exploration and permanent base on the Moon by 2030. Making this happen will require extensive use of lunar resources, including water ice (for life support and rocket fuel) and moon dirt (for building materials). A similar devotion to “living off the land” will likely be necessary for sustained human exploration of Mars.

• ICON will partner with NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Alabama to test a variety of processing and printing technologies using simulated lunar soil. “We want to increase the technology readiness level and test systems to prove it would be feasible to develop a large-scale 3D printer that could build infrastructure on the Moon or Mars,” said Corky Clinton, associate director of Marshall’s Science and Technology Office. “The team will use what we learn from the tests with the lunar simulant to design, develop and demonstrate prototype elements for a full-scale additive construction system.”

• ICON is also teaming with two architecture firms on the program – SEArch+ (Space Exploration Architecture) and Denmark-based BIG-Bjarke Ingels Group. “To explain the power of architecture, ‘formgiving’ is the Danish word for design, which literally means to give form to that which has not yet been given form,” said Bjarke Ingels, creative director at the BIG-Bjarke Ingels Group. “This becomes fundamentally clear when we venture beyond Earth and begin to imagine how we are going to build and live on entirely new worlds.”

• “With ICON, we are pioneering new frontiers – both materially, technologically and environmentally,” Ingels said. “The answers to our challenges on Earth very well might be found on the Moon.”

A Texas company aims to take its innovative homebuilding approach into the final frontier.

Austin-based startup ICON, known for 3D-printing houses here on Earth, just launched Project Olympus,

an ambitious effort to develop a space-based construction system. The program will eventually help humanity get a foothold on the moon and Mars, if all goes according to plan.

“From the very founding of ICON, we’ve been thinking about off-world construction. It’s a surprisingly natural progression if you are asking about the ways additive construction and 3D printing can create a better future for humanity,” ICON co-founder and CEO Jason Ballard said in a company statement.

“I am confident that learning to build on other worlds will also provide the necessary breakthroughs to solve housing challenges we face on this world,” Ballard said. “These are mutually reinforcing endeavors.”

Project Olympus will get a boost from a Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) contract that ICON recently signed with the U.S. Air Force to expand the capabilities of its 3D-printing tech.

The four-year deal is worth $14.55 million, according to the Austin Business Journal. (You can find the outlet’s story

here, but it’s behind a paywall.) NASA is contributing 15% of the SBIR sum, ICON representatives told Space.com.

NASA’s interest in ICON’s tech makes sense. The space agency is working, via its Artemis program of crewed lunar exploration, to establish a long-term human presence on and around the moon by the end of the 2020s. Making this happen will require extensive use of lunar resources, including water ice (for life support and rocket fuel) and moon dirt (for building materials), NASA officials have stressed.

A similar devotion to “living off the land” will likely be necessary for sustained human exploration of Mars, an ambitious goal that Artemis will inform and advance, NASA officials have said.

As part of the newly announced SBIR deal, ICON will partner with NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Alabama to test a variety of processing and printing technologies using simulated lunar soil. The research will build upon tech that ICON demonstrated in 2018 during NASA’s 3D Printed Habitat Challenge, company representatives said.

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NASA, FEMA Prepare for Sept 20 Asteroid Impact on California Coast

August 29, 2020
ExoNews Editor

Article by Shepard Ambellas August 21, 2020 (intellihub.com)

• In 2017, NASA and FEMA initiated a supposed fictitious response scenario for an asteroid hitting southern California on September 20, 2020. But is it just a drill? Or is it actual preparation for a real event while avoiding public panic?

• We have seen past situations when such a “drill” actually went “live”. In July 2017, a bombing drill became the actual London bombing. On September 11, 2001, a ‘military exercise’ became the 9-11 attacks on the World Trade Center buildings in NYC. Last March, in a White House press conference, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo blurted out that the coronavirus pandemic was a “live exercise” playing out. (see video here) In the background, a disgusted President Trump is heard to mutter, “You should have let us know.”

• The ‘exercise’ goes like this: A fictitious asteroid is discovered in the fall of 2016 heading in the direction of the Earth. The asteroid is estimated to be between 300 and 800 feet in size. NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory gives it a 2 percent chance of impacting the Earth on September 20, 2020. NASA tracks the asteroid over the following three months using ground-based telescope observations, and the probability of impact climbs to 65 percent. The observations are put on hold for another four months due to the asteroid’s position relative to the Sun. When the observations resume in May 2017, the impact probability jumps to 100 percent. By November 2017, the asteroid’s impact is calculated to hit somewhere in Southern California or just off the coast in the Pacific Ocean.

• However, NASA recently listed a real asteroid, dubbed 2017 SL16 discovered in 2017 (see here), as making a close approach to Earth on September 20, 2020. This raises a major red flag.

• NASA, FEMA, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the Department of Energy’s National Laboratories, the U.S. Air Force, and the California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services have all been participating in this four year ‘exercise’. “By working through our emergency response plans now, we will be better prepared if and when we need to respond to such an event,” said FEMA Administrator Craig Fugate.

• Previous tabletop simulations included a scenario where the asteroid is somehow deflected away from the Earth. But in this scenario, NASA JPL said that “the time to impact was too short for a deflection mission to be feasible”. Instead, they role play the forced mass evacuation of Los Angeles.

• “Scientists from JPL, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Sandia National Laboratories, and The Aerospace Corporation predicted impact footprint models, population displacement estimates, information on infrastructure that would be affected…” according to the NASA simulation report, “… as well as other data that could realistically be known at various points throughout the exercise scenario.”

• “[U]nlike any other time in our history, we now have the ability to respond to an impact threat through continued observations, predictions, response planning and mitigation,” said Thomas Zurbuchen, Associate Administrator for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate. “It’s not a matter of if – but when – we will deal with such a situation.”

The National Aeronautics Space Administration and FEMA in 2017 devised and initiated a supposed fictitious scenario in which the two agencies would drill down on an asteroid that’s set to impact the Earth in or just off the coast of California on September 20, 2020, but is this so-called “exercise” really just a drill?

NASA claims “the simulation was designed to strengthen the collaboration between the two agencies, which have Administration direction to lead the U.S. response” but could the drill actually go live like so many other drills have in the past? (i.e. the July 7, 2007, London bombing, the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon, and others)

“It’s not a matter of if–but when–we will deal with such a situation,” Associate Administrator for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate Thomas Zurbuchen said. “But unlike any other time in our history, we now have the ability to respond to an impact threat through continued observations, predictions, response planning and mitigation.”

The exercise was designed to create “a forum for the planetary science community to show how it would collect, analyze and share data about a hypothetical asteroid predicted to impact Earth. Emergency managers discussed how that data would be used to consider some of the unique challenges an asteroid impact would present-for preparedness, response and public warning,” according to NASA.

Representatives from NASA, FEMA, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the Department of Energy’s National Laboratories, the U.S. Air Force, and the California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services attended the initial meeting and will be participating throughout the 4 year long exercises which is set to come to a head on Sept 20, 2020.

“It is critical to exercise these kinds of low-probability but high-consequence disaster scenarios,” FEMA Administrator Craig Fugate said. “By working through our emergency response plans now, we will be better prepared if and when we need to respond to such an event.”

The exercise simulates a possible impact four years from now in which, according to NASA, “a fictitious asteroid imagined to have been discovered this fall with a 2 percent probability of impact with Earth on Sept. 20, 2020. The simulated asteroid was initially estimated to be between 300 and 800 feet (100 and 250 meters) in size, with a possibility of making impact anywhere along a long swath of Earth, including a narrow band of area that crossed the entire United States.”

12:11 minute video on the 11/20/20 asteroid simulation (‘End Times Productions’ YouTube)

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Over 8,500 Airmen Volunteer to Join U.S. Space Force

June 14, 2020
ExoNews Editor

Article by Sandra Erwin June 9, 2020 (spacenews.com)

• On June 9th, The U.S. Space Force announced that more than 8,500 active-duty airmen applied to join the new military branch. Applicants include a mix of officers and enlisted personnel from 13 career fields. It was anticipated that only about 7,000 would give up their commission in the Air Force and transfer to the U.S. Space Force. The Space Force is reviewing transfer applications and expects that approximately 6,000 of the 8,500 will be selected for transfer.

• The response reflects the enthusiasm in the ranks about the opportunity to serve in the newest branch of the military. These men and women “made the bold decision to volunteer to join the U.S. Space Force and defend the ultimate high ground,” said chief of space operations General John “Jay” Raymond. Approximately 16,000 military and civilians from the former U.S. Air Force Space Command are now assigned to Space Force.

• Transfers to the Space Force will begin September 1st. For volunteers from other career fields, evaluation panels known as “transfer boards” will be scheduled between July and November, with transfers expected by February 2021.

WASHINGTON — More than 8,500 active-duty airmen applied to join the U.S. Space Force during the month of May, the service announced on June 9.
Applicants include a mix of officers and enlisted personnel from 13 career fields.

The number of applicants is larger than what the Space Force had projected. Officials said they were anticipating about 7,000 would volunteer to give up their commission in the Air Force and transfer to the U.S. Space Force.

The response reflects the enthusiasm in the ranks about the opportunity to serve in the newest branch of the military, said Gen. John “Jay” Raymond, chief of space operations of the U.S. Space Force. These men and women “made the bold decision to volunteer to join the U.S. Space Force and defend the ultimate high ground,” he said in a statement.

Approximately 16,000 military and civilians from the former U.S. Air Force Space Command are now assigned to the Space Force. The transfer process will officially commission or enlist military members into the Space Force.

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Alien Investigation Series ‘Project Blue Book’ Promises More Weird Encounters in Season 2

February 10, 2020
ExoNews Editor

Article by Elizabeth Howell January 28, 2020 (space.com)

• The History Channel’s hit television series, “Project Blue Book”, is back for Season 2. The show, which airs on Tuesdays at 10 p.m. EST and PST, follows the U.S. Air Force “investigation” into UFOs during the 1950s and 60s. Under Blue Book, Air Force officer Edward J. Ruppelt and astronomer J. Allen Hynek and their successors examined over 12,000 UFO sightings. The HISTORY show delves into some of the 700 still-unexplained encounters.

• Series creator and executive producer David O’Leary said that he became convinced that UFOs really existed through his research on Project Blue Book. He is quick to note that this doesn’t necessarily mean that they are extraterrestrial. O’Leary says that in the end, both Ruppelt and Hynek themselves became convinced that UFOs were real and represented a true mystery worthy of scientific study. “Something clicked for me,” said O’Leary, “This is unbelievable (to me). So this ….series … examines this (UFO) program through the eyes of these two men.”

• O’Leary has spent many hours reading the first-hand research from both Blue Book, via the declassified documents found in Hynek’s book The UFO Experience, and from independent UFO historians. O’Leary interviewed the last living director of Blue Book — Robert J. Friend, who died in June 2019 at age 99. Friend provided not only details of the investigations, but advised them on what the Blue Book offices looked like and details of the show’s set.

• The ten episodes of Season 1 of Project Blue Book ran between January and March 2019. Last year’s show topics included a “dogfight” with a UFO over Fargo, N.D. in 1948; “foo fighters” during World War II (Friend was a WWII fighter pilot himself); and UFOs buzzing Washington DC in the summer of 1952. O’Leary says he likes to mix it up and explore scenarios beyond traditional UFO sightings in the sky, such as chasing aliens through the forest, making telepathic connections with aliens, and a Kentucky family that reported an alien home invasion.

• Anything beyond Season 2 has not been confirmed. But O’Leary and his team say they “have a lot of new ideas and areas to explore” and would be interested in producing more episodes.

“Project Blue Book,” the hit television docudrama about the U.S. military’s investigations into aliens more than 50 years ago, is back for Season 2.
The History Channel series runs on Tuesdays at 10 p.m. EST and PST — check your local listings to confirm the time in your viewing area. The next episode is tonight (Jan. 28).

The series shares the same name as the real-life U.S. Air Force investigation into unidentified flying objects (UFOs), which was called Project Blue Book. That investigation launched in 1952 and continued until 1969. Experts examined more than 12,000 UFO sightings (of which more than 700 are still unexplained), according to series creator and executive producer David O’Leary.

“For me, UFOs have been a lifelong obsession,” he told Space.com. “I have always been fascinated by the question [of] ‘Are we alone in the universe? And I never felt you could honestly answer that question without examining the UFO issue.”

O’Leary said through his research on Project Blue Book, he became convinced that there “really is a phenomenon” of UFOs, even though experts often debunk the purported sightings, or say that the existence of UFOs doesn’t necessarily mean that aliens are in our airspace.

“Once I learned the chief of scientific consultants for the U.S. Air Force [J. Allen Hynek] and the first director of that program [Edward J. Ruppelt] both became convinced through this program that UFOs are real and represent a true scientific mystery and worthy of true scientific study, something clicked for me. This is unbelievable. So this is a drama series that examines this program through the eyes of these two men.”

O’Leary has spent many hours reading the first-hand research from both Blue Book, via the declassified documents in Hynek’s book “The UFO Experience” (Regnery, 1972), and from independent UFO historians. The producer also interviewed the last living director of Blue Book — Robert J. Friend, who died in June 2019 at age 99. Friend not only provided details of the investigations, but also discussed matters such as what the project’s offices looked like. His testimony helped with the sets on the show, O’Leary said.

2:14 minute trailer for Season Two of ‘Project Blue Book’ (HISTORY YouTube)

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‘I Was Scared to Death’: New Account Given of Rendlesham Forest UFOs

August 7, 2019
ExoNews Editor

Listen to “E56 8-7-19 ‘I Was Scared to Death’: Rendlesham Forest UFOs” on Spreaker.

Article by Katy Sandalls July 26, 2019 (eadt.co.uk)

• During the 1980 Christmas party at the twin Royal Air Force bases, RAF Bentwaters and RAF Woodbridge, in Suffolk, England, US Air Force servicemen stationed at the base were sent out to investigate strange goings on in the nearby Rendlesham Forest. The American witnesses have since maintained stories of encountering a strange craft in the woods.

• Nick Pope, the UFO desk officer for Britain’s Ministry of Defence between 1991 and 1994, said, “The Rendlesham Forest incident is the most compelling of the approximately 12,000 UFO cases investigated during the lifetime of the MoD’s UFO project, and it remains unexplained to this day.” It has since been nicknamed the ‘UK’s Roswell’.

• Retired US Air Force Sergeant Michael Stacy Smith served in the 81st Airborne Police Squadron at the twin RAF bases in 1980. Smith was 19 years old at the time, and has never spoken publicly about his alien encounter until now.  Speaking to website The Analysis, Sgt. Smith spoke of a number of incidents which took place in Suffolk only weeks before the well-known incident in late December of 1980.

• “In November of 1980 I had my first incident. Our base went on alert, I was called out to the barracks,” said Smith. “They assigned me to a post behind the east gate on Woodbridge. So they dropped me off and I got into the bunker.” Then he had to take a pee. “I was standing on the edge of the bunker, peeing, and I looked off in the forest and you could see an orange, glowing light down in the woods.”

• “It was an orange – reddish glowing ball. Bigger than a beach ball, and it had a cats eye in it,” says Smith. “I thought what the hell is that? At first I thought it was someone with a lantern walking through the woods, looking at our planes. It stopped right in front of me. It just stayed there and hovered two feet off the ground.” Smith called for reinforcements who couldn’t believe what they saw. Then the object disappeared. “I was scared to death,” said Smith.

• In a separate incident Sgt. Smith recalled seeing strange shapes in the vicinity of RAF Bentwaters. “You could see coming from the south of Bentwaters… was a triangular shaped craft. It was blueish in the middle and had white around the edges of it. It was just above the tree line of Rendlesham Forest.” “I don’t care what anyone says, it was real.”

• Nick Pope agrees that “These new revelations are fascinating, though difficult to evaluate, especially given that nearly 40 years have passed since these events.” “As this new interview shows, whatever these military witnesses experienced was truly bizarre and had deep and lasting effects – both physical and emotional – on some of the individuals concerned.”

A new account of alien encounters in Rendlesham has been made public for the first time.

Retired Sergeant Michael Stacy Smith served in the 81st Airborne Police Squadron at the twin bases of RAF Bentwater and RAF Woodbridge at the time of the famous UFO incident in 1980.

It was during the base’s Christmas party that US airmen were sent out to investigate strange goings on at the base which have since been nicknamed the UK’s Roswell.

Sergeant Smith was only 19 when the events took place and has never spoken publicly about his alien encounter until now.  Speaking to website The Analysis, Sgt. Smith spoke of a number of incidents which took place in Suffolk only weeks before the well-known incident.

“In November of 1980 I had my first incident. Our base went on alert, I was called out to the barracks,” said Sgt Smith.
“They assigned me to a post behind the east gate on Woodbridge. So they dropped me off and I got into the bunker.”

Sgt Smith said that while in the bunker he needed to go to the toilet.

“I was standing on the edge of the bunker, peeing, and I looked off in the forest and you could see an orange, glowing light down in the woods.

“It was an orange – reddish glowing ball.

“Bigger than a beach ball and it had a cats eye in it.

“I thought what the hell is that. At first I thought it was someone with a lantern walking through the woods, looking at our planes.

“It stopped right in front of me. It just stayed there and hovered two feet off the ground.”

Sgt. Smith called for reinforcements who couldn’t believe what they had seen.

Not long after the encounter, the object disappeared.

“I was scared, I was just a 19-year-old kid,” said Sgt Smith.

“I was scared to death.”

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In 1952, ‘Flying Saucers’ Over Washington Sent the Press Into a Frenzy

March 24, 2019
ExoNews Editor

by Missy Sullivan March 10, 2019 (history.com)

• In July of 1952, as UFO fever spread across Cold War America, the “grandfather of all ‘saucer’ sightings” took place in the skies above the nation’s capital. Over several weeks, up to a dozen unexplained objects repeatedly streaked across the skies over Washington, D.C. – spotted by radar operators, professional pilots and other highly credible witnesses. The ‘saucers’ outran Air Force fighter jets.

• When President Harry Truman called for answers, the Air Force’s Project Blue Book hastily convened a press conference, blaming the whole thing on the weather.

• Nationwide, newspaper headlines blared the fantastic news. Local publications ran stories, many drawn from national wire services, often edited with different details to fit their space. Some added sidebars with local ‘saucer’ news or tidbits like what Albert Einstein thought when asked about UFOs. One reporter got the bright idea to ask the Soviets if they were somehow behind it all.

• Below are some original clippings from around the nation during that extraordinary historical moment. Click on the newspaper title to link to the original article.

• Monroe News-Star (Monroe, Louisiana), page 1, July 21, 1952 – ‘The Air Force today investigated reports that several “flying saucers” had been spotted by radar virtually in its own backyard on the outskirts of the nation’s capital. Not only were unidentified objects seen on radar—indicating actual substance instead of mere light—but two airline pilots and a newsman saw eerie lights fitting the general description of flying saucers the same night… Capt. S.C. Pierman piloting Capital Airlines Flight 807 said, “They couldn’t have been aircraft. They were moving too fast for that.”

• The Cedar Rapids Gazette (Cedar Rapids, Iowa), page 1, July 29, 1952 – ‘Radar showed that the air over the nation’s capital was full of flying objects early Tuesday…’

• The Daily Inter Lake (Kalispell, Montana), page 11, July 31, 1952 – “It looked like a sphere, so deeply orange colored that it appeared almost the shade of rust. It was silent as death. It was moving too fast and evenly to be a balloon… Most persistent rumor is that Boeing Airplane Co. in Seattle, Wash., is either making flying saucers or has been in charge of the engineering of the project. In the weirder category of rumors is the one that the saucers are either Russian-built or from another planet and that several of them have crashed and have been picked up by the Air Force. ‘

• Daily Independent-Journal (San Rafael, California), page 5, July 29, 1952 – ‘Reports of “saucers” have kept police, air force and weather bureau telephones jangling for several days recently in widely scattered localities… At Key West, Fla., the Navy said it was investigating accounts by several sailors who said they saw a “saucer” while attending an outdoor movie.’

• Akron Beacon Journal (Akron, Ohio), page 2, July 30, 1952 – ‘Mrs. Floyd Wetzel of 901 Sayder st., said, “I think the government knows what’s back of it all and isn’t revealing it.” “I think they may be coming from another planet…,” asserted Al Rose of 74 Eastgay Dr.’

• The Salt Lake Tribune (Salt Lake City, Utah), page 3, July 23, 1952 – ‘The Soviet embassy Tuesday denied any connection with flying saucers seen in this area…’

• Standard-Sentinel (Hazleton, Pennsylvania), page 1, July 30, 1952 – ‘It was the third time in 10 days that radar… picked up signs of something unknown packing through pre-dawn black skies… And the Air Force threw lots of cold water on any chilling speculation about men or missiles from Mars—or enemy nations.’

• The Paris News (Paris, Texas), page 1, July 30, 1952 – ‘The Air Force says… it’s certain of one thing: The saucers—whatever they are—don’t seem to be a menace to the United States.’

• The Rhinelander Daily News (Rhinelander, Wisconsin), page 1, July 30, 1952 – ‘The bulk of these, after cross-checking, have been reasonably well identified as the product of friendly aircraft, out-and-out hoaxes, or electrical or meteorological phenomena… Two generals added that… a temperature inversion—a layer of warm air over cool air—sometimes may be sufficient to deflect radar waves and cause a false response on a radar set.’

• [Editor’s Note] Why would highly advanced “extraterrestrial” spacecraft target Washington D.C. several times during the summer of 1952? It would seem to be politically motivated, but what extraterrestrial would know that D.C. is the capitol of the United States? The explanation given by Corey Goode and William Tompkins makes a lot of sense. At the end of WWII, the Nazi high command relocated to a base set up in a thermal pocket under the ice of Antarctica through the Nazi German’s alliance with the Draco Reptilians. The Nazi/Draco coveted American industrial might which had “won” the war. By the 1950’s, the American military industrial complex was being pressured to enter into a treaty to provide industrial support to the Nazi/Draco. With the Draco’s assistance, the Nazi’s had built a fleet of spacecraft with electro-magnetic/anti-gravity propulsion technology. This technology creates a “temporal bubble” around the craft itself basically creating its own self-contained environment, allowing it to accelerate and make sharp turns without being affected by gravitational g-forces. To the observer on the ground, this temporal bubble appears as a bright light surrounding the craft. In 1952, the Nazi’s flew their craft over Washington D.C. to demonstrate their tactical superiority over American military technology. So in order to avoid widespread panic and the public’s revelation that the Nazi’s had actually escaped defeat in WWII, the American military (US Air Force) and its private industrial complex capitulated and entered into a secret treaty with the Nazi/Draco faction, which continues to this day. And as depicted in the History Channel’s “Project Blue Book” episode 10, the Air Force generals were keen to cover up their alliance with the Nazi/Draco by blaming everything on the Russians, which also continues to this day. (See 5:04 minute recap of History Channel’s “Project Blue Book” S1-E10 below.)

If 1952 marked the year that UFO fever spread across Cold War America, events in late July of that year spiked that mania to critical levels. That’s when the grandfather of all “saucer” sightings took place in the skies above the nation’s capital, causing a coast-to-coast collective jaw drop.

Over several weeks, up to a dozen unexplained objects repeatedly streaked across the skies over Washington, D.C.—spotted not just by crackpots, but by radar operators, professional pilots and other highly credible witnesses. The Air Force scrambled fighter jets, but the ‘saucers’ outran them. Around the U.S., sci-fi-like headlines blared, rumors flew and sightings soared.

When President Harry Truman quietly called for answers, a representative from the Air Force’s secret UFO-investigation team, Project Blue Book, was summoned to D.C. But before anyone could fully probe the incidents, the Air Force hastily convened a press conference to quell the panic, blaming the whole thing on the weather.

The incident didn’t just get covered in big-city papers. In every corner of the country, local publications ran stories, many drawn from national wire services, often edited with different details to fit their space. Some added sidebars with local ‘saucer’ news or tidbits like what Albert Einstein thought when asked about UFOs. One reporter got the bright idea to ask the Soviets if they were somehow behind it all.

5:04 minute recap of History Channel’s “Project Blue Book” S1-E10

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Meet J. Allen Hynek, the Astronomer Who First Classified UFO ‘Close Encounters’

December 1, 2018
ExoNews Editor

by Greg Daugherty November 19, 2018 (history.com)

• In 1947, a rash of reports of UFOs had the public on edge. The Air Force created Project Sign to investigate these UFO sightings. But they needed outside expertise to sift through the reports and come up with explanations for all of these sightings. Enter J. Allen Hynek.

• In 1948, Hynek was the 37-year-old director at Ohio State University’s McMillin Observatory. He had worked for the government during WWII developing new defense technologies for the war effort with a high security clearance. The Air Force approached him to be a consultant on ‘flying saucers’ for the government. “I had scarcely heard of UFOs in 1948 and, like every other scientist I knew, assumed that they were nonsense,” Hynek recalled.

• Hynek’s UFO investigations under Project Sign resulted in twenty percent of the 237 cases that couldn’t be explained. In February 1949, Project Sign was succeeded by Project Grudge, which said Hynek, “took as its premise that UFOs simply could not be.” The 1949 Grudge report concluded that the phenomena posed no danger to the United States, and warranted no further study.

• But UFO incidents continued, even from the Air Force’s own radar operators. The national media began treating the phenomenon more seriously. The Air Force had little choice but to revive Project Grudge under a new name: Project Blue Book. Hynek joined Project Blue Book in 1952 and would remain with it until its demise in 1969. But he had changed his mind about the existence of UFOs. “The witnesses I interviewed could have been lying, could have been insane or could have been hallucinating collectively—but I do not think so,” he recalled in 1977. Hynek deplored the ridicule that people who reported a UFO sighting often had to endure, causing untold numbers of others to never come forward, not to mention the loss of useful research data.

• “Given the controversial nature of the subject, it’s understandable that both scientists and witnesses are reluctant to come forward,” said Jacques Vallee, co-author with Dr. Hynek of The Edge of Reality: A Progress Report on Unidentified Flying Objects.

• On October 4, 1957, the Soviet Union surprised the world by launching Sputnik, a serious blow to Americans’ sense of technological superiority. Hynek was on TV assuring Americans that their scientists were closely monitoring the situation. UFO sightings continued unabated.

• In the 1960s, Hynek was the top expert on UFOs as scientific consultant to Project Blue Book. But he chafed at what he perceived as the project’s mandate to debunk UFO sightings, and the inadequate resources at his disposal. Air Force Major Hector Quintanilla, who headed the project from 1963 to 1969, writes that he considered Hynek a “liability.”

• Hynek frustrated UFO debunkers such as the U.S. Air Force. But in 1966, after suggesting that a UFO sighting in Michigan may have been an optical illusion created by swamp gas, he became a punchline for UFO believers as well.

• In his testimony for a Congressional hearing in 1966, Hynek stated, “[I]t is my opinion that the body of data accumulated since 1948…deserves close scrutiny by a civilian panel of physical and social scientists…”. The Air Force established a civilian committee of scientists to investigate UFOs, chaired by physicist, Dr. Edward U. Condon. In 1968, Hynek assailed the Condon Report’s conclusion that “further extensive study of UFOs probably cannot be justified.” In 1969, Project Blue Book shut down for good.

• UFO sightings continued around the world. Hynek later quipped, “apparently [they] did not read the Condon Report”. Hynek went on with his research, free from the compromises and bullying of the U.S. Air Force.

• In 1972, Hynek published his first book, The UFO Experience. It introduced Hynek’s classifications of UFO incidents, which he called Close Encounters. Close Encounters of the First Kind meant UFOs seen at a close enough range to make out some details. In a Close Encounter of the Second Kind, the UFO had a physical effect, such as scorching trees, frightening animals or causing car motors to suddenly conk out. In Close Encounters of the Third Kind, witnesses reported seeing occupants in or near a UFO.

• In 1977, Steven Spielberg released the movie, Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Hynek was paid $1,000 for the use of the title, another $1,000 for the rights to use stories from the book and $1,500 for three days of technical consulting. He also had a brief cameo in the film, playing an awestruck scientist when the alien spacecraft comes into view.

• In 1978, Hynek retired from teaching. In 1973 he had founded the Center for UFO Studies which continues to this day. Hynek died in 1986, at age 75, from a brain tumor.

It’s September 1947, and the U.S. Air Force has a problem. A rash of reports about mysterious objects in the skies has the public on edge and the military baffled. The Air Force needs to figure out what’s going on—and fast. It launches an investigation it calls Project Sign.

By early 1948 the team realizes it needs some outside expertise to sift through the reports it’s receiving—specifically an astronomer who can determine which cases are easily explained by astronomical phenomena, such as planets, stars or meteors.

For J. Allen Hynek, then the 37-year-old director at Ohio State University’s McMillin Observatory, it would be a classic case of being in the right place at the right time—or, as he may have occasionally lamented, the wrong place at the wrong one.

The adventure begins

Hynek had worked for the government during the war, developing new defense technologies like the first radio-controlled fuse, so he already had a high security clearance and was a natural go-to.

“One day I had a visit from several men from the technical center at Wright-Patterson Air Force base, which was only 60 miles away in Dayton,” Hynek later wrote. “With some obvious embarrassment, the men eventually brought up the subject of ‘flying saucers’ and asked me if I would care to serve as consultant to the Air Force on the matter… The job didn’t seem as though it would take too much time, so I agreed.”

Little did Hynek realize that he was about to begin a lifelong odyssey that would make him one of the most famous and, at times, controversial scientists of the 20 century. Nor could he have guessed how much his own thinking about UFOs would change over that period as he persisted in bringing rigorous scientific inquiry to the subject.

“I had scarcely heard of UFOs in 1948 and, like every other scientist I knew, assumed that they were nonsense,” he recalled.

Project Sign ran for a year, during which the team reviewed 237 cases. In Hynek’s final report, he noted that about 32 percent of incidents could be attributed to astronomical phenomena, while another 35 percent had other explanations, such as balloons, rockets, flares or birds. Of the remaining 33 percent, 13 percent didn’t offer enough evidence to yield an explanation. That left 20 percent that provided investigators with some evidence but still couldn’t be explained.

The Air Force was loath to use the term “unidentified flying object,” so the mysterious 20 percent were simply classified as “unidentified.”

In February 1949, Project Sign was succeeded by Project Grudge. While Sign offered at least a pretense of scientific objectivity, Grudge seems to have been dismissive from the start, just as its angry-sounding name suggests. Hynek, who played no role in Project Grudge, said it “took as its premise that UFOs simply could not be.” Perhaps not surprisingly, its report, issued at the end of 1949, concluded that the phenomena posed no danger to the United States, having resulted from mass hysteria, deliberate hoaxes, mental illness or conventional objects that the witnesses had misinterpreted as otherworldly. It also suggested the subject wasn’t worth further study.

Project Blue Book is born

That might’ve been the end of it. But UFO incidents continued, including some puzzling reports from the Air Force’s own radar operators. The national media began treating the phenomenon more seriously; LIFE magazine did a 1952 cover story, and even the widely respected TV journalist Edward R. Murrow devoted a program to the topic, including an interview with Kenneth Arnold, a pilot whose 1947 sighting of mysterious objects over Mount Rainier in Washington state popularized the term “flying saucer.” The Air Force had little choice but to revive Project Grudge, which soon morphed into the more benignly named Project Blue Book.

Hynek joined Project Blue Book in 1952 and would remain with it until its demise in 1969. For him, it was a side gig as he continued to teach and to pursue other, non-UFO research, at Ohio State. In 1960 he moved to Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, to chair its astronomy department.

As before, Hynek’s role was to review the reports of UFO sightings and determine whether there was a logical astronomical explanation. Typically that involved a lot of unglamorous paperwork; but now and then, for an especially puzzling case, he had a chance to get out into the field.

There he discovered something he might never have learned from simply reading the files: how normal the people who reported seeing UFOs tended to be. “The witnesses I interviewed could have been lying, could have been insane or could have been hallucinating collectively—but I do not think so,” he recalled in his 1977 book, The Hynek UFO Report.

“Their standing in the community, their lack of motive for perpetration of a hoax, their own puzzlement at the turn of events they believe they witnessed, and often their great reluctance to speak of the experience—all lend a subjective reality to their UFO experience.”

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Former Pentagon Official Calls for Big UFO Reveal After Secret Investigation

August 11, 2018
ExoNews Editor

by Michelle Basch July 26, 2018 (wtop.com)

• Retired Air Force Col. David Shea, 80, was the U.S. Air Force press spokesman from 1967 to 1971. In 1969 he announced the end of Project Blue Book by concluding that there was no threat to national security, no sign of advanced technology and no evidence that UFOs are extraterrestrial. Retiring from the Air Force after 29 years, Shea then spent 20-plus years working for Hughes Aircraft and Raytheon.

• Shea is a staunch skeptic of the existence of UFO’s from other worlds. “I would believe if I saw some evidence that showed we were visited by alien spacecraft, but there hasn’t been evidence to my mind of such,” says Shea. (see 2:24 minute video of Col. Shea below)

• In 1947, when a veteran pilot reported seeing nine ‘flying saucers’ near Mt. Rainier in Washington, the Army Air Corps began to investigate. By the end of 1949, the Air Force had determined that “… there was no threat, and there was no visitation, there was no advanced technology.” But the Air Force continued to investigate UFOs under projects such as Project Blue Book.

• As a public relations man, Shea thinks that the Air Force inadvertently created a PR nightmare. “What was initially an intelligence matter quickly evolved into a PR problem of the greatest magnitude,” says Shea. “The Air Force, ignoring public opinion on the subject, failed to communicate its conviction that UFOs were no cause for alarm and consequently was unable to convince the American public that what it was saying about UFOs was true.” “During its more-than-20-year history of investigating flying saucers, the Air Force has been accused of almost every conceivable sin, and had been guilty of most,” says Shea.

• Shea is not swayed at all by the NY Times’ revelation of a recent Pentagon program that studied UFOs and the release of several military videos of UFOs. “They saw something, but we don’t know what it is, and we don’t have the evidence to suggest what it may be. So again, it comes back to the word ‘evidence.’” Shea thinks that with the closing of Project Blue Book, the government ‘washed its hands of UFOs’. So he wonders, “Why would the government want to do that again? …We’ve been there, done that.”

• Shea says that the Air Force was placed in the impossible position of trying to prove that aliens are not whizzing around above Earth. According to Shea, despite “exhaustive” investigations and studies of UFOs, the government has come up with nothing. “No eureka moment. No threat. No advanced technology. No alien spacecraft.” “You can’t prove that something doesn’t exist. Why doesn’t the other guy prove that (UFOs do) exist?” he said. Asked if, to his knowledge, the government has covered up evidence of alien visitation in the past, Shea says, “Absolutely not. It would be impossible to do so in our environment of leakers and whistleblowers.”

• Shea thinks the Air Force is misunderstood. “The Air Force has never said that UFOs aren’t spacecraft from another civilization. What the Air Force has said is that there’s no convincing evidence that they present a threat, or they advance scientific knowledge, or that they are alien spacecraft. Convincing evidence is the key, and that’s what we don’t have,” said Shea. Just because a military pilot spots or chases a UFO doesn’t mean the unidentified object should be considered a threat to national security, said Shea. “I would say we would be concerned if they were fired upon. We would be concerned if they started bombing our bases. None of that has happened, so whatever they’re seeing doesn’t seem to be hostile in nature. Not to worry, is what I would say.”

• [Editor’s Note] Where is the evidence of UFOs? Take a look at this website. At 80 years old, Shea is clinging to his Air Force pension with both hands. The government hides all evidence of extraterrestrials, and then uses the lack of evidence to prove that extraterrestrials do not exist. Shea’s reasoning is: ‘so long as the government says that UFOs do not pose a threat, then who cares what they are?’ Shea is completely brain washed. He thinks that the whole issue of UFOs and extraterrestrials should remain hidden from the public in black projects and secret space programs. This is the attitude of the ‘old guard’ military and government authority, and this is exactly why our society has been prevented from making any real technological advancement in the past 70 years. So keep spouting your disinformation, Col. Shea, and keep collecting those retirement checks.

NORTHERN VIRGINIA — If evidence proving that extraterrestrials visited Earth has been squirreled away behind locked doors in Nevada, a former Pentagon official is calling for a big reveal.

“Show it to the National Academy of Sciences. Don’t hide it. Show it! We’ve been waiting for it! We’ve been waiting for it forever,” retired Air Force Col. David Shea said, raising his voice. “But so far, that hasn’t happened, and I don’t know why.”

Shea, 80, was the Air Force’s press spokesman on UFOs at the Pentagon from 1967 to 1971. He considers himself an “agnostic” when it comes to whether some unidentified flying objects are ships piloted by intelligent beings from faraway worlds.

“I would believe if I saw some evidence that showed we were visited by alien spacecraft, but there hasn’t been evidence to my mind of such,” he said in an interview at his Northern Virginia home.

In 1969, Shea wrote the news release that announced the end of Project Blue Book, an Air Force investigation of more than 12,000 UFO reports.

It concluded that there was no threat to national security, no sign of advanced technology and no evidence that UFOs are extraterrestrial.

And with that, it appeared to the public that the government had washed its hands of UFOs.

But in December, almost 50 years after Project Blue Book ended, came explosive news.

The New York Times reported that Bigelow Aerospace had been storing material recovered from “unidentified aerial phenomena” in its buildings in Las Vegas as part of a secret Pentagon UFO investigation project called the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program (AATIP).

Shea was not surprised by news of the project’s existence, but he thinks if more people were aware of the government’s history with UFOs, they would better understand why, in his opinion, the government should not get involved again.

“The UFOs never seem to go away,” he said.

2:24 minute video of Ret Col. David Shea discussing the lack of evidence of UFOs

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When a U.S. Fighter Pilot Got Into a Dogfight With a UFO

August 5, 2018
ExoNews Editor

by Colin Bertram July 19, 2018 (history.com)

• On October 1, 1948, a 25-year old former World War II fighter pilot named George F. Gorman (standing at left in above photo) had a 27-minute encounter with a white orb UFO at high altitude above Fargo, North Dakota. “I’ve never seen anything like it,” Gorman told a local newspaper following the event. “If anyone else had reported such a thing I would have thought they were crazy.” The incident was recorded both on the ground and in the sky by numerous reputable sources, and investigated by the U.S. Air Force under Project Sign, a precursor to Project Blue Book.

• Gorman was serving as a second lieutenant in the North Dakota Air National Guard, and was taking part in a cross-country flight in a P-51 Mustang alongside other National Guard airmen. When the other pilots landed at Fargo’s Hector Airport, Gorman stayed in the air in order to get in some night-flying time in the cloudless conditions. Having circled over a lighted football stadium, he was preparing to land at about 9 pm when he saw the taillight of another craft passing on the right, though the tower had no other object on the radar.

• Gorman closed to within 1,000 yards to see a white orb “…about six to eight inches in diameter, clear white and completely without fuzz at the edges.” “It was blinking on and off. As I approached, however, the light suddenly became steady and pulled into a sharp left bank. I thought it was making a pass at the tower.”

• Gorman tried in vain to catch up with the object, and got behind it at around 7,000 feet when it made a sharp turn and headed straight for his P-51. Almost at the point of collision Gorman dived and said the light passed over his canopy at about 500 feet before cutting sharply once more and heading back in his direction. Then the object shot straight up in the air in climb so steep that his plane stalled. The object was not seen again. Gorman had been engaged in aerial maneuvers with the UFO for 27 minutes by the time he brought his plane in to land.

• Gorman reported that he noticed no sound, exhaust trail or odor from the object. And while he had reached speeds of up to 400 m.p.h. while in pursuit—he couldn’t keep up with whatever it was.

• “I’m convinced that there was definite thought behind its maneuvers,” Gorman said in a sworn statement to his commander. “I am further convinced that the object was governed by the laws of inertia because its acceleration was rapid but not immediate… [and] followed a natural curve.” “The object was not only able to out-turn and out-speed my aircraft… but was able to attain a far steeper climb and was able to maintain a constant rate of climb far in excess of my aircraft,” said Gorman.

• The small white orb UFO was also witnessed by air-traffic controllers Lloyd D. Jensen and H.E. Johnson, who were manning the Hector Airport tower. According to Johnson, the object was “travelling at a high rate of speed” and was “fast enough to increase the spacing between itself and [Gorman’s] fighter.” Johnson described the object as appearing to be “only a round light, perfectly formed, with no fuzzy edges or rays leaving its body.”

• Dr. A. E. Cannon, the pilot of the Piper Cub also flying in the vicinity, and his passenger also viewed the object both in the sky and upon their return to the airport where they immediately joined the traffic controllers in the tower. Two Civil Aeronautics Authority employees on the ground also reported seeing the object.

• Back in Fargo, after the Air Weather Service revealed it had released a lighted weather balloon 10 minutes before Gorman first saw the object, Air Force investigators pounced, proclaiming the balloon the likeliest explanation for the object seen. They determined that Gorman’s own maneuvers and high speed gave the balloon the appearance of moving in opposite directions as he passed by. Investigators also noted the bright appearance of Jupiter on that date, and that Gorman had been attempting to chase the bright dot of the planet at the same time the weather balloon was in range. This became the official government explanation.

• Gorman returned to the Air Force full-time, retiring at the rank of lieutenant colonel in 1969. He never spoke publicly about the encounter again, though he did tell friends “he was never convinced that he had been dueling with a lighted balloon for 27 minutes.” Gorman died in 1982.

In the words of Captain Edward J. Ruppelt, the man who investigated unidentified-flying-object reports for the U.S. Air Force in the early 1950s, the Gorman Dogfight remains one of the “classics” among UFO sightings.

The incident, which still lacks an airtight explanation, involved a 27-minute air encounter between a veteran World War II fighter pilot named George F. Gorman and a mysterious white orb at high altitude above Fargo, North Dakota. “I’ve never seen anything like it,” Gorman told a local newspaper following the October 1, 1948 event. “If anyone else had reported such a thing I would have thought they were crazy.”

Captain Ruppelt operated Project Blue Book, which continued the work of Project Sign and Project Grudge, a series of hush-hush studies conducted by the U.S. Air Force between 1947 and 1969. His mission: to determine if UFOs were a threat to national security and to scientifically analyze UFO-related data.

What makes the Gorman Dogfight unique in the now-declassified pages of Project Blue Book is not only the length of the encounter, but that it was recorded both on the ground and in the sky by numerous reputable sources.

Chasing—and being chased by—a light

At the time of the incident, Gorman, a 25-year-old former fighter pilot, served as a second lieutenant in the North Dakota Air National Guard. It was this role that placed him behind the flight controls of a P-51 Mustang on Oct. 1, 1948, taking part in a cross-country flight alongside other National Guard airmen.

While the other pilots landed at Fargo’s Hector Airport, on that fateful evening Gorman stayed in the air in order to get in some night-flying time in the cloudless conditions. Having circled his P-51 over a lighted football stadium, he was preparing to land at about 9 P.M. Advised by the control tower that the only other plane in the vicinity was a Piper Cub (which Gorman could see about 500 feet below him), he witnessed what he believed to be the taillight of another craft passing on the right, though the tower had no other object on the radar.

Deciding to take a closer look at the unidentified object, Gorman pulled his plane up and closed to within about 1,000 yards. “It was about six to eight inches in diameter, clear white and completely without fuzz at the edges,” he said of the object in his report. “It was blinking on and off. As I approached, however, the light suddenly became steady and pulled into a sharp left bank. I thought it was making a pass at the tower.”

Deciding to follow, Gorman tried in vain to catch up with the object, reporting that he finally got behind it at around 7,000 feet, where it made a sharp turn and headed straight for the P-51. Almost at the point of collision Gorman dived and said the light passed over his canopy at about 500 feet before cutting sharply once more and heading back in his direction. Just as collision seemed imminent once again, Gorman said the object shot straight up in the air in a steep climb—so steep that when he tried to intercept, his plane stalled at about 14,000 feet. The object was not seen again, but according to Gorman he had been engaged in aerial maneuvers with it for 27 minutes by the time he brought his plane in to land.

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Trump Directs DOD to Establish a Space Force in a Surprise Announcement

June 20, 2018
ExoNews Editor

by Rachel Becker Jun 18, 2018 (theverge.com)

• On June 18th, President Trump hijacked the scheduled signing of a Space Policy Directive on the subject of space traffic management and space debris at a meeting of the National Space Council to again call for a Space Force as a sixth branch of the US military. “We are going to have the Air Force and we’re going to have the Space Force, separate but equal. It is going to be something so important,” President Trump announced.

• Trump first proposed the idea of a Space Force in March 2018, in opposition to Defense Secretary Jim Mattis’ who favors a ‘Space Corps’ as an arm of the U.S. Air Force. Mattis argues that it will create more overhead and bureaucracy. The Air Force Space Command currently controls our military interests in space. The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2018 has already directed the DoD to prepare a report on establishing a USAF ‘Space Corps’ that is due in August.

• What Trump didn’t mention was what the Space Force would do and how it would be funded. Point in fact, Congress would have to pass legislation to both to create a new branch of the military and to fund it.

• Then there is the 1967 United Nations’ “Treaty on Principles Governing the Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space, including the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies”, ratified by 104 nations including Russia, China and the U.S., which prohibits nuclear weapons, war exercises, or even military installations in space. (see Article IV)

• [Editor’s Note] This seems to illustrate the current struggle between the Pentagon/Trump Alliance forces and the historically and predominantly ‘Deep State’ controlled Air Force for official control over space, and therefore disclosure of such secret space programs and technology. Recall that in discussing the USAF space program that shot down the Deep State guided missile over Hawaii in January of this year, Dr Michael Salla distinguishes this hero USAF faction as a “USAF run Secret Space Program that has broken away from Deep State control”.

President Donald Trump directed the Department of Defense and the Pentagon to establish a Space Force as the sixth branch of the Armed Forces in a meeting with the National Space Council today.

“We are going to have the Air Force and we’re going to have the Space Force, separate but equal. It is going to be something so important,” President Trump said.

“Separate but equal” is an appalling turn of phrase given that it’s derived from Plessy v. Ferguson, the now-overturned Supreme Court precedent for segregation.

The announcement came as a surprise in a meeting where the newly revived National Space Council was set to unveil the first comprehensive policy on space traffic management. “The whole point of today’s meeting was not about this at all, it was about the space traffic management policy decision,” says Brian Weeden, director of program planning for the Secure World Foundation — an NGO that focuses on space policy.

Still, this isn’t the first time we’ve heard about Trump’s hopes for a Space Force; he first proposed the idea of a Space Force in March 2018 — contradicting Defense Secretary Jim Mattis’ opposition to creating a new military service. In a letter to the Committee on Armed Services, Mattis argued that it would just create more overhead and bureaucracy.

As it stands, the Air Force is largely in charge of controlling national security in space under the umbrella of the Air Force Space Command. Its responsibilities include supervising launches and controlling DoD satellites — including ones involved in missile early warnings, communication, and navigation.

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The U.S. Tried to Detonate an Atom Bomb on the Moon – But There Was an Extraterrestrial Response

June 13, 2018
ExoNews Editor

by Arjun Walia May 31, 2018 (collective-evolution.com)

• In the 1950s, Colonel Ross Dedrickson was responsible for maintaining the inventory of the nuclear weapon stockpile for the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission including monitoring the security of the weapons. He retired from the USAF in 1964 and died in 2007 at the age of 87.

• Dedrickson was one of hundreds of military whistleblowers brought forth by Dr. Steven Greer’s Disclosure Project. His testimony about UFOs — specifically about UFOs and nuclear weapons — can be corroborated by a wealth of information and evidence that’s now available within the public domain.

• In an 11:38 minute video interview by Greer (see below), Dedrickson explains how the American government tried to detonate a nuclear weapon on the moon, but were prevented from doing so. A declassified report by the Air Force Nuclear Weapons Center from June 1959 shows just how seriously they considered the plan, called ‘Project A119’. According to Dedrickson, “I also learned about incidents involving nuclear weapons, and among these incidents were a couple of nuclear weapons sent into space [that] were destroyed by the extraterrestrials. . . . At the very end of the 70’s and the early 80’s, we attempted to put a nuclear weapon on the moon and explode it for scientific measurements and other things, which was not acceptable to the extraterrestrials. They destroyed the weapon before it got to the moon.”

• [Editor’s Note] See also an ExoPolitics.org article from December 2012 that provides more detail on Project A119.

In the 1950s, Colonel Ross Dedrickson was responsible for maintaining the inventory of the nuclear weapon stockpile for the AEC, and for accompanying security teams checking out the security of the weapons, among many other duties. As his obituary states:

He was assigned to the US Atomic Energy Commission. A long service with the Energy Commission between 1950-1958 included, contract administration duties at Nevada test sites, Pacific Nuclear Test Area west of Hawaii, nuclear weapon manufacturing and quality assurance in Albuquerque, and inspection of nuclear and non-nuclear facilities throughout the country. He served with the 5th Air Force in Japan and later as a ranking Colonel, Officer in Charge of the Pacific Unified Command (TM)s alternate “command and control center” in Hawaii. In 1962, he was transferred and served as Deputy for Material for the 832 Air Division at Canon Air Force Base, Clovis, New Mexico. He retired from the USAF in 1964.

He is one of hundreds of military whistleblowers with verified backgrounds to have been brought forth by Dr. Steven Greer’s Disclosure Project. His testimony about UFOs — specifically about UFOs and nuclear weapons — can be corroborated by a wealth of information and evidence that’s now available within the public domain. (To read more about a few of these encounters, click here.) Many of these whistleblowers have made multiple appearances at the National Press Club in an effort to get this information out to the world, with the most recent example being the Citizens Hearing on Disclosure, which took place a few years ago.

Sirius Disclosure Exclusive 11:38 minute video excerpt of Ross Dedrickson

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Real Alien Video Leaked? Is the USAF Conducting Alien Experiments in Area 51?

June 9, 2018
ExoNews Editor

by Nirmal Narayanan May 25, 2018 (ibtimes.co.in)

• Conspiracy theory YouTube channel ‘UFOmania’ has released an eerie video showing an alien-like figure bearing immense pain on a bed. The narrator of the video claims that the footage comes from the S4 Base medical laboratory in Papoose Lake near Area 51, Nevada. (see UFOmania video below) The video image was originally uploaded by Misterio TV YouTube channel. (see Misterio tv video clip below)

• The video was shot by a man using the pseudonym ‘Victor’. According to Victor, aliens recovered from crashed UFOs are being captured and taken to Area 51, and U.S. Air Force officials interrogated them in the nearby S4 military base.

• The alien shown in the video has a wide oval head and completely black eyes, features that are similar to grey aliens, a species of extraterrestrials. It is purported that many experts have examined the authenticity of the video clip, and they failed to find any kind of manipulations.

• The alien in the video was allegedly captured in 1989 after a UFO crash and held in Area 51 where it was questioned to learn more about its race. It was kept secret to prevent citizens from knowing of the existence of extraterrestrial life. According to theorists, national media outlets are puppets of the government and will not disclose the hidden truth.

• [Editor’s Note] Recent testimony by insider Emery Smith who personally conducted autopsies and experiments on thousands of extraterrestrial beings and alien biological material in an underground laboratory at Kirtland AFB near Albuquerque NM support the claim that ET beings are held and interrogated at CIA/military bases like S4 and Area 52 in Nevada and elsewhere.

Conspiracy theory YouTube channel ‘UFOmania’ has released an eerie video showing an alien-like figure bearing immense pain on the bed after being locked up in clutches. The narrator of the video claims that the footage is apparently shot from the S4 Base medical laboratory in Papoose Lake near AREA 51, Nevada.

Are grey aliens real?

The video, which was originally uploaded by Misterio TV, soon went viral and many conspiracy theorists consider this video as a solid proof of extraterrestrial life. These theorists even allege that the United States Air Force is conducting secret alien experiments in the Area 51 base.

According to the conspiracy theory channel, the video was shot by a man known by his pseudonym Victor. According to Victor, aliens are being captured in Area 51, and the US Air Force officials interrogate them in the S4 military base.

Original ‘Misterio tv’ YouTube Channel 32-Second Video Clip of Live ET Being

Descriptive 3:18 Minute ‘UFOmania’ Video of ET Under Interrogation
at an S4 Military Base in Papoose Lake Near Area 51 in Nevada

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Air Force to Create Three-Star ‘Vice Commander’ Post in D.C. Area to Manage Space Activities

January 18, 2018
ExoNews Editor

by Sandra Erwin January 16, 2018 (spacenews.com)

• In an effort to comply with a legislative mandate promulgated in the 2018 National Defense Authorization Act to increase focus on space and make it a higher priority on the U.S. Air Force’s agenda, the Air Force has announced plans to create a new three-star Vice Commander of Air Space Command position, with offices in Washington D.C. That office would “assist the commander of Air Force Space Command with his/her responsibility to organize, train and equip space forces.”

• This comes after Congress scrubbed a previous plan to create an Air Force three-star Deputy Chief of Staff for Space Operations office. Leaders of the House Armed Services Committee’s strategic forces subcommittee determined that the space forces should have more autonomy within the Air Force without setting up a distinctly separate Space Corps.

• Still, there are those in the House Armed Services Committee who want less bureaucracy, and have made it clear that the debate over the Space Corps is far from over.

Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson has notified the congressional armed services committees of a new plan to create a three-star position that would directly support U.S. Space Command.

The post would be “vice commander of Air Force Space Command,” and would be based in Washington — not in Colorado Springs, Colorado, where Air Force Space Command is headquartered.

This is part of a broader effort by the Air Force to comply with a legislative mandate to increase focus on space and make it a higher priority on the Air Force’s agenda.

“Recently, the Secretary of the Air Force notified the defense congressional committees of Air Force actions to implement the provisions of H.R. 2810, Section 1601 of the 2018 National Defense Authorization Act,” Air Force spokesman Maj. William Russell told SpaceNews in a statement.

He said Air Force will establish a three-star vice commander of Air Force Space Command to be located in the national capital region. That office would “assist the commander of Air Force Space Command with his/her responsibility to organize, train and equip space forces.”

This plan comes just weeks after Congress in the 2018 NDAA nixed a previous plan to create an Air Force three-star “deputy chief of staff for space operations,” dubbed A-11. Air Force Space Command chief Gen. John Raymond announced the A-11 decision in April with much fanfare at the National Space Symposium. The intent was to nominate then Vice Commander of Air Force Space Command Maj. Gen. David D. Thompson to the position. Leaders of the House Armed Services Committee’s strategic forces subcommittee derided the idea and led a push to eliminate the A-11, calling for space forces to have more autonomy within the Air Force.

It is not clear whether the Air Force intends to select Thompson to serve in the new D.C.-based vice commander slot. Thompson since July has been special assistant to the commander of Air Force Space Command at Peterson Air Force Base, Colorado. Maj. Gen. Robert J. Skinner is the two-star deputy commander of Air Force Space Command, a job that would remain in Colorado.

Russell pointed out that the Air Force “will not establish the position and office of the deputy chief of staff of the Air Force for space operations.” And the service continues to “review acquisition management and governance to implement this act as well as acquisition reform authorized in previous defense authorization legislation.”

A Capitol Hill source said a move to create a new three-star office may make sense for the Air Force, but it might not go over well with lawmakers who want less bureaucracy. “The rhetoric on the Hill has been about removing boxes from the org chart,” the source said. “Adding a new slot may not resonate on the Hill.”

House Armed Services Committee Chairman Rep. Mac Thornberry did not comment specifically on the Air Force proposal on Tuesday during a breakfast meeting with reporters. In general, he said, his committee will be “watching very carefully” how the Air Force goes about implementing the NDAA provisions concerning the management of space. The House voted for the creation of a stand-alone space corps within the Department of the Air Force but the proposal was rejected by the Senate.

“What we came up with in last year’s NDAA was a compromise that did not set up a separate space corps but did try to improve accountability for space,” Thornberry said. “It’s too early to say how well that’s worked. We’re just in the early days.”

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UFOs and the Pentagon: Mystery Craft ‘Tailed USAF Plane Half Way Across Atlantic’

January 6, 2017
ExoNews Editor

by Jon Austin December 27, 2017 (www.express.co.uk)

• On December 26th, a still unidentified former U.S. Air Force ‘loadmaster’, the person responsible for getting cargo and personnel onto a plane, reported to MUFON a UFO sighting from his Air Force C-141 transport plane which occurred in December 1980.
• The man’s story goes like this (paraphrased): We were flying from Charleston (SC) Air Force Base to Dover (Delaware) Air Force Base when we picked up an object on radar pacing our aircraft. We reported this to the Dover AFB tower who also picked up the object. After arriving at Dover, we left again this time bound for Ireland . Half way across the Atlantic our radar picked up the object again. Again the AFB tower confirmed the object.
• Asked if the crew wished to report the UFO, they discussed it but decided that it would only bring ridicule and ruin their careers, so they chose not to report it. Until now.
• [Editor’s Note] This is a good example of why we don’t have more reports of UFO sightings from the military, as they would only face ridicule, demotion and discharge under an official government policy of secrecy and cover-up of the UFO phenomenon.

A US Air Force man has come forward with details of a bizarre UFO encounter in the wake of the exposure of the secret Pentagon UFO investigations.

The loadmaster, who has yet to be named, has broken a 37-year silence about the encounter that he failed to report at the time in December 1980 for fear of ruining his career.

However, the man reported the unexplained case to the Mutual UFO Network (MUFON) yesterday, just days after there were headlines across the globe revealing details about a top secret US Department of Defense five-year probe into the threat posed by UFOs.

Details of the Department of Defense Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification £16.5million secretive programme were exposed after the US Government claimed for years it had not interest in UFOs, something conspiracy theorists refused to believe.

US-based MUFON is the world’s largest organisation dedicated to UFO and alien research, and keeps a global database of UFO sightings and reports.

Loadmasters are responsible for getting cargo and personnel onto a plane.

In a report to MUFON the man explained he failed to officially report the sighting for fear of affecting his career, due to the perceived ridicule surrounding UFO sightings.

He said: “I was a loadmaster on an C-141 transport aircraft we took off from Charleston Air Force base Going to Dover Air Force base, Delaware, when we pick up an object on radar.

“The object was pacing our aircraft. We reported the incident to the tower they also saw the object, but said we may have a problem with our radar.

“Once we landed at Dover the technicians checked out the radar on the aircraft and found no problems.”
He said the plane then set off again from Dover towards Ireland.

The loadmaster said: “Half way across the Atlantic Ocean the object returned and continue to paced us the rest of the way across the ocean.

“We once again contacted the tower to report the incident and the tower confirmed that they also had the object on radar.

“At this, we were asked if the crew wanted to file a UFO report.

“We discussed it as a crew and decided it would be bad for our careers so no report was filed.”
MUFON is investigating the case, but cautions that most sightings can be explained.

The man joins a growing number of military and airline witnesses to come forward with details of seemingly inexplicable UFO encounters.

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Tag: U.S. Air Force