MIflyer
Captain
The History Channel has a new TV show, "Project Blue Book," based on some of the actual events that were investigated under the auspices of the USAF's UFO investigation project. But there is one incident that was formally reported through USAF channels that you won't see on that show. I heard about it personally about 20 years ago over dinner one night with the pilot of the aircraft that was involved.
It was 1955 and a USAF TB-25 was heading back to its home base, Greenville AFB in Mississippi, from Andrews AFB, MD, near Washington DC. Pilot of the TB-25 was Maj Bill Coleman, deputy commander of the base.
The weather was good and the flight proceeded normally until one of the passengers seated in the nose compartment called the pilot's attention of a bright shiny spot just above them and slightly off to one side. Coleman replied that was due to the sun reflecting off the canopy and he would maneuver the airplane around and climb a bit, so they could see how the position of the reflection changed as he did so.
He maneuvered the airplane, and rather than the reflection going away they found themselves flying formation with a disk shaped object about four feet in diameter and two feet thick in the middle. Its surface resembled polished aluminum. There were no holes in the disk that they could see and no sign of any kind of exhaust. They flew in formation for a time; then it started to pull away from them. Maj Coleman added power, going finally to full power, which he could only stay at for about 15 min. Then the disk dove away. They lost sight of it but then saw it crossing a large plowed field, heading due West. They chased it but it was a bit too fast for the TB-25. Finally they broke off to head South to their destination and they could see a bright object disappearing to the West.
On the ground at Greenville AFB Maj Coleman instructed everyone aboard the TB-25 to go sit down separately and write down what they had seen without discussing it among with each other. He compared the descriptions and found they agreed. He then filed a formal Blue Book report on the incident.
Five years later Maj Coleman was serving at the Pentagon as a Public Information Officer. One day his boss told him he was going to be the contact point for inquiries on Project Blue Book. Coleman responded that there was something he needed to tell his boss relative to that subject and described the 1955 encounter. His boss said, "Well let's go see the Secretary and see what he thinks." Coleman described his experience to the Secretary of the Air Force, who replied "Sounds like you are the best qualified person that we could hope for, so you have the job."
After Coleman became PIO for Project Blue Book he looked through the records and was very surprised at what he found.
The report he had filed on the 1955 incident was not there.
So you won't see that encounter on Project Blue Book.
It was 1955 and a USAF TB-25 was heading back to its home base, Greenville AFB in Mississippi, from Andrews AFB, MD, near Washington DC. Pilot of the TB-25 was Maj Bill Coleman, deputy commander of the base.
The weather was good and the flight proceeded normally until one of the passengers seated in the nose compartment called the pilot's attention of a bright shiny spot just above them and slightly off to one side. Coleman replied that was due to the sun reflecting off the canopy and he would maneuver the airplane around and climb a bit, so they could see how the position of the reflection changed as he did so.
He maneuvered the airplane, and rather than the reflection going away they found themselves flying formation with a disk shaped object about four feet in diameter and two feet thick in the middle. Its surface resembled polished aluminum. There were no holes in the disk that they could see and no sign of any kind of exhaust. They flew in formation for a time; then it started to pull away from them. Maj Coleman added power, going finally to full power, which he could only stay at for about 15 min. Then the disk dove away. They lost sight of it but then saw it crossing a large plowed field, heading due West. They chased it but it was a bit too fast for the TB-25. Finally they broke off to head South to their destination and they could see a bright object disappearing to the West.
On the ground at Greenville AFB Maj Coleman instructed everyone aboard the TB-25 to go sit down separately and write down what they had seen without discussing it among with each other. He compared the descriptions and found they agreed. He then filed a formal Blue Book report on the incident.
Five years later Maj Coleman was serving at the Pentagon as a Public Information Officer. One day his boss told him he was going to be the contact point for inquiries on Project Blue Book. Coleman responded that there was something he needed to tell his boss relative to that subject and described the 1955 encounter. His boss said, "Well let's go see the Secretary and see what he thinks." Coleman described his experience to the Secretary of the Air Force, who replied "Sounds like you are the best qualified person that we could hope for, so you have the job."
After Coleman became PIO for Project Blue Book he looked through the records and was very surprised at what he found.
The report he had filed on the 1955 incident was not there.
So you won't see that encounter on Project Blue Book.
