◆ SpookStack

Approved For Release 2001/04/02 : they were able to pick up on radar were at distances ‘‘con- siderably less than a mile.”? Yet allauthors agree that angels are clearly visible at distances of 25 miles or even more. If the ‘bird’? theory is correct, it must be possible to show that ordinary aircraft-control radar can ‘‘see’”’ a bird 25 miles away. No evidence that this is true has ever been presented, and no practicing radar operator will take such a suggestion seriously for a moment. . . Something that appears only sporadically, like angels, can- not - in the name of simple common sense - be identified with something that is around all the time, like birds. That the bird-theorists can ignore difficulties as fundamental as this one only shows us once again how irrational the human mind can be when confronted by facts that point to some conclusion it does not wish to accept. . . The other leading ‘‘orthodox”’ idea about angels is that they are ‘refractive-index inhomogeneities of various types,” in the words of a valuable though turgidly-writtenarticleby Ver- non G. Plank of the Air Force’s Cambridge Research Center (Bedford, Mass.) in Electronics of March 14, 1958. Plank, like Harper, nails his thesis to the mast in his title: ‘“Atmos- pheric Angels Mimic Radar Echoes.” As forbirds, he informs us that they have ‘‘radar cross-sections as large as 20 sq. cm at S-Band. . . Radar cross-sections of the non-wind- carried sources range as large as 700 sq. cm at L-Band. . . birds cannot explain echoes with such large indicated radar cross-sections. There must be other sources.” (In other words: the angels give a radar echo far stronger than that from a bird), This confirms what we have said above about the applicability of the bird theory. But when Plank puts forward ‘convective bubbles, highly refractive portions of atmospheric layers and water-vapor or temperature anomaly regions” as his candidates, he is shutting his eyes to known impossibilities just as the bird-men have done. Not only are such atmospheric phenomena obviously incapable of flying counter to the wind, but they are known to be just as incapable as birds of producing the sharp, relatively intense ‘‘angel’? echoes. To quote Herbert Goldstein in the authoritative Radiation Laboratory treatise Propagation of Short Radio Waves, ed. D, E. Kerr (McGraw-Hill, 1951): “In Section 7.4 it is shown that the refractive index gradients believed to exist in the atmosphere are much too low to ac- count for the observed echoes.” . . . “Then there are radar flying saucers.’’ Plank continues. Here he cites no detail, and has only two remarks to make. “The classic saucer incidents over Washington in July, 1952, for example, occurred when the atmosphere was exceedingly super-refractive and spotty anomalous propagation was de- finitely in order.’’. . . (In reality, there was onlya moderate inversion on those nights, and ‘‘spotty anomalous propaga- tion” is a purely imaginary phenomenon. It has never been known to occur, there is no theoretical basis for believing that it could occur, and it would have had no resemblanace to the Washington sightings if it did occur.) Plank’s other “saucer mechanism’? (as he calls it) is the suggestion that real aircraft may generate ghost images by reflection to and back from some radar mirror on the ground, thus producing a phantom echo that might seem to accompany the plane. The accompanying diagram [in the original article ] shows that Plank is unconscious of the optical grotesquerie of what he is proposing. Quite apart from that, he has not stopped to think that if this could happen at all, it would happen all the time, and would be a perfectly familiar nuisance to the radar men. The idea that reflection from refractive index gradients could account for radar UFO reports is also challenged by Merrill J. Skolnik, a scientist associated with the Research Division of Electronic Communications, Inc. In a 1962 book on the subject of radar, Mr. Skolnik states: “. . . there must be a large change in the index of refraction over a very short distance [to account for the observed radar targets]; Un- fortunately, the refractive-index gradients required by the theory are much greater than have been measured experi- mentally, and it has not been possible on this basis to account for the observed angel radar cross sections theoretically.” {70} CIA-RDP81R00560R000100010001- ‘One of the persons consulted in preparing this report was a veteran Air Force radar operator, a Sgt. First Class, who has operated sets all over the world. He has also tracked unidentified targets, at White Sands, N.M.; in Detroit, Michigan; and during NATO maneuvers overseas. He stated that he had observed some “solid unidentified targets moving at variable speeds, up to 500 mph.” He had observed targets which disappeared and reappeared on his scope. Sometimes the objects simply moved out of range. Ionized air ‘‘islands,” which are commonly invoked to explain radar-UFO reports, he said were easily recognizable. Their blips ‘pile up” and they tend to develop a comet-like tail on the screen. ‘Birds, he said, cause no problem even to novice opera- tors fresh out of radar school. The targets which caused prob- lems were those which exactly resembled a solid object, when there was no known aerial device in the position indicated. Special records are kept of all such sightings. Usually, ina case of this type, jets are Scrambled and other radar stations along the path of the UFO notified. . Another consultant, David L, Morgan, Jr. (physicist), Madison, Connecticut, submitted a paper to NICAP which he preferred to term “‘thoughts on the matter’”” rather than a detailed scientific study. In it, Mr. Morgan approached the question of radar-UFO targets theoretically, based on a general knowledge of physics. Citing hypothetical cases of different types of images which appear on radar screens, he analyzed each in terms of the probability that they could be explained by weather phenomena. Mr. Morgan independently concluded that the cases of an un- explained radar target pacing an aircraft could not be explained by an echo from the aircraft to another surface, and back to the radar set. “If a large, stationary ground object did this,’’ he states, ‘‘it would always do it and this would be familiar to the radar operator. If the [radar-detected] object were a meteoro- logical condition such as an ionized layer of air, it is highly doubtful that the reflection would be regular enough to give a consistent appearance, and sharp enough to prevent the blip from spreading in a radial direction.” In summary, Mr. Morgan stated: ‘‘It may be said that highly specialized UFO patterns on radar scopes can be explained only by highly unlikely or even impossible meteorological conditions. In the case of inversions, it is further unlikely that a specialized condition would exist without the simultaneous presence of less specialized conditions that would immediately be recognized as coming from an inversion.” Having examined various known phenomena which produce blips on radar, and theoretical attempts to account for unknown tar- gets, a closer look at some of the radar-UFO reports is in order. Summer 1948; Goose Bay, Labrador Major Edwin A, Jerome, USAF (Ret.) reported the following information to NICAP in 1961. Major Jerome was a Command Pilot, Air Provost Marshal for about 8 years, and also served as an Intelligence Officer and CID Investigator. “My only real contact with the UFO problem was way back in the summer of 1948 while stationed at Goose Bay, Labrador. There an incident happened which is worthy of note. It seems that a high-ranking inspection team was visiting the radar facilities of this base whose mission at the time was to serve as a prime refueling and servicing air base for all military and civilian aircraft plying the north Atlantic air routes. GCA [Ground Control Approach radar] was a critical part of this picture, thus these high-ranking offi- cers RCAF & USAF up to the rank of General as I recall. “While inspecting the USAF radar shack, the operator noted a high-speed target on his scope going from NE to SW. Upon computation of the speed it was found to be about 9000 mph. This incident caused much consternation in the shack since obviously this was no time for levity or miscalculations in the presence of an inspecting party. The poor airman tech- nician was brought to task for his apparent miscalculation. Again the target appeared and this time the inspectors were actually shown the apparition on the radar screen. The only reaction to this was that obviously the American equip- ment was way off calibration. ‘The party then proceeded to the Canadian side to inspect the RCAF GCA facility. Upon their arrival the OIC related Approved For Release 2001/04/02: CIA-RDP81R00560R000100010001-0