The Kecksburg, Pennsylvania, UFO Crash: A Mystery Purloined By Cover-Ups, Over-Thinking and Bad Science
The Kecksburg, Pennsylvania, UFO Crash: A Mystery Purloined By Cover-Ups, Over-Thinking and Bad Science
On December 9, 1965, at around 4:45 p.m., a huge and unusual looking fireball was observed in the sky and reported by citizens of six U.S. states and Windsor, Ontario, Canada. A report by Kim Opatka (Pennsylvanian author, journalist and caver) was published in The Latrobe Bulletin on May 6, 1989 stating, “The object was first seen streaking across the sky, with thousands from Michigan to New York witnessing a brilliant ball of fire which left a smoke trail, visible for about 20 minutes after it passed. Many who observed it, thought it was an aircraft which was on fire. Reports of debris from the object were made in many states, and an Ohio fire department was called to extinguish ten small fires in an area where witnesses said they saw flaming fragments falling from the sky.”
Astronomers almost immediately said it was likely to have been “a meteor bolide burning up in the atmosphere and descending at a steep angle”, even though it had none of the usual characteristics of one. NASA later joined the conversation in 2005 (during the Kecksburg crash 40th anniversary observance) by reporting that “experts” (names withheld) had examined fragments from the area and determined they were from a Soviet space probe known as Kosmos 96. However, official research records that led to their statement were (conveniently) lost in 1987.
In an article by Investigator Stan Gordon, of the Pennsylvania Association for the Study of the Unexplained (PASU), he stated that he has been investigating the Kecksburg crash "since the night it happened." The military decided the object was a meteor. Their assessment was backed up by an Associated Press release published the day after the crash. However, Gordon says that civilian evidence, including the discovery of a man who actually saw the object, supports the idea that the object was an actual UFO.
A volunteer fireman from the Latrobe area stated that he was called to the scene of the crash. He says, "It was in the early part of December and there was a little snow and a little rain, and mud… I had seen a fiery object in the sky. I can't say exactly which direction, but it was coming from the north. It was not too much longer and the fire whistle went off. I answered the call and was told they needed a search team because at the time they believed it was a downed aircraft. And I thought, 'My God, this is what I have just seen'. It was getting semi-dusk and we had flashlights. We were taken in the back of a truck and dropped off and told to go 'this way' which we did. I was not on the initial contact team. Another team found the object. It was definitely, unequivocally, positively, absolutely no aircraft, plane, helicopter or rocket, at least not to my knowledge. It was in an area that was part field and part woods and we went down to investigate," he said.
"We found the object had crashed at a 30 to 40 degree angle, and had broken off numerous tree branches in its impact path. My initial reaction was 'This is no airplane.' I observed no shrapnel, no breaking up of the fuselage. It was one solid piece, no doors, no windows… Preliminary searches found no bodies or casualties. It was shaped like an acorn, laying on its side, like the acorn nut is in its shell when it's on a tree… I've been a machinist for
24 years and I've worked with a tremendous amount of different metals, and I have never seen any type of metal that looked even close to that." The fireman also said the object was not broken, "not even cracked, just dented a bit. It did not give off smoke, steam or vapors, at least none that we could see." Neighbors who saw the crash said it had given off a faint trail of blue smoke, which disappeared quickly afterwards.
The fireman described the portion visible as between eight and ten feet long, six and seven feet across, and said a man of average height would probably have had little trouble standing up inside it. The crater it plowed into the ground was "rectangular in shape.” When the Pennsylvania State Police arrived, the area was quarantined. The fireman went on to say, "They drove us out. It was late at night when we finally got back to the fire hall and it had been completely taken over by the
military. They were carrying in large pieces of equipment, radios and such, and they had armed guards posted outside so nobody could get in or out.” The firemen were thrown out. “We weren't even allowed back in to use the bathroom.”
"The military had control of the whole operation," the fireman recalled. "After a while we saw a flat bed truck come by with some other military equipment, a crane or something. It was not too much longer, an hour, an hour and a half, when the trucks came back and there was a large object on the back of the flat bed, covered by a tarp, with military escorts front and back. I got the feeling that if you had stepped on the road you were dead meat. They weren't stopping for anything."
The meteor explanation of the crash didn't wash with the fireman. He said, “It had writing on it, not like your average writing, but more like ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics. It had sort of a bumper on it, like a ribbon about six to ten inches wide, and it stood out. It was
elliptical the whole way around and the writing was on this bumper. It's nothing like I've ever seen, and I'm an avid reader. I read a
lot of books on Egypt, the Incas, Peruvians, Russians and I've never to this day come across anything that looked like that."
The fireman noted that the news media later denied that the object was a meteorite, and the military "denied they were even in the area. But I know there were Air Force and Army personnel involved. It was like they just came out of the woodwork."
Stan Gordon says that one of the military groups involved was most likely the 662nd Radar Squadron, based at the Oakdale Armory, located near Greater Pittsburgh International Airport. The squadron was found to be under the control of the Aerospace Defense Command, and attempts to get information on the Kecksburg crash, through the Freedom of Information Act, have not provided much to go on. One response said there had been no record of the squadron being activated on that date, Gordon said, wondering how so much equipment and personnel could be activated while the monthly report showed no entry on Dec. 9, 1967.
The Air Force was still officially investigating UFO cases at that time and did not shut down Project Bluebook until 1969. Gordon believes that it may have been the Project Blue Book staff which contacted the 662nd squadron. Subsequent reports have led him to theorize that even the Project Blue Book staff was not made aware of objects which could "affect national security" and that some intelligence teams investigated crashes of "foreign space vehicles."
Gordon stated that another strange occurrence that night were reports by some civilians that radiation was released. He explained that some children playing in the area had reportedly been told by military personnel that that was a possibility, and men in decontamination suits were allegedly seen at the site later the next day. Although he has considered the possibility that the object could have been space debris or a test device, Gordon says documents and evidence obtained in the last few years lead more in the direction of it being a "true UFO." The fireman agrees. "It was definitely not of this planet. At the time I was a
skeptical teen, but when you see something like that you don't forget it. When you get called out like that from the fire department you think you're going out looking for an aircraft of some sort, not a UFO… I'll never forget it. I still want to know what the hell it was."
On September 19, 1990, NBC's Unsolved Mysteries aired a re-enactment of the Kecksburg crash. It was an objective treatment which featured comments from eyewitnesses and Stan Gordon. Soon after the broadcast, Gordon was overwhelmed with calls from viewers who thought they might add some information to the case. One of the callers was an Ohio man who claimed to have seen the acorn shaped object a few days after the Kecksburg event while delivering bricks to property adjacent to Wright-Patterson AFB (the home of Project Blue Book). The source preferred to go by his first name.
‘Myron’ and his cousin, "JS", delivered a large inventory of specially glazed bricks to Wright-Patterson just a few days after the Kecksburg event. Curiously, the order came through the Navy. Many people in the know have said that the U.S. Navy, not the Air Force, has ultimate responsibility for all things UFOs and Aliens within the U.S. Government. The bricks were to be used to construct a double-thick, lead lined structure 50 x 80 feet in size, inside an already existing red brick building. After following a jeep bearing an officer (possibly a general) and a driver to the site, they were left to unload the bricks.
Myron saw men dressed in decontamination suits. He recognized the Navy officer who had selected and ordered the special bricks. During a break Myron's curiosity got the best of him, so he decided to have a look at what was so important. The security officers got used to Myron's presence and ignored his approach. He got a brief glimpse before being hustled back to the brick delivery by a guard. Myron saw a ten foot high, bell-shaped object inside the building, supported by metal scaffolding. After the Unsolved Mysteries episode, he agreed that the object could be described as acorn-shaped as well. Myron's story is supported by his cousin, JS. The day before he worked with Myron, JS made a solo run to Wright-Patterson AFB with the first load of bricks. He saw a flatbed trailer near the red brick building with something covered by a tarp. It was "liberty bell" shaped and stood eight to ten feet tall. It's obvious that Myron and JS witnessed the Kecksburg object at Wright-Patterson.
The Federal Aviation Administration received 23 reports from aircraft pilots stating they had seen the object still in the air at 4:44 p.m. on December 9, 1965. A seismograph 25 miles southwest of Detroit recorded shock waves created by the fireball as it passed through the atmosphere. Sonic booms were heard as well. Even more amazing, an early story in the Greensburg Tribune-Review (a daily newspaper for Westmoreland County, PA) stated that the area where the object landed was immediately sealed off by orders of the U.S. Army and Pennsylvania State Police officials. The article went on to say that State Police officers roped off the crash site “to await the expected arrival of both U.S. Army engineers and possibly, civilian scientists.”
The few government statements on the subject pointed to a meteorite or other “natural” explanation, completely ignoring what actually crashed, how it was recovered and everything else related to the matter. Meanwhile, back at the funny farm, in 2011, the History Channel's Ancient Aliens (almost always on the wrong side of right and in desperate need of a good hair stylist for their hosts) suggested the alleged Nazi secret weapon Die Glocke was recovered at Kecksburg, prompting a government conspiracy and cover-up. Why were there no Swastikas on the object? A national UFO investigative group joined the party by saying what was found was part of a General Electric reentry motor. Once again, doing what they do best, ignoring the actual evidence in favor of some normal explanation.
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