The World of Flying Saucers: A Scientific Examination of a Major Myth of the Space AgeMenzel, Donald H. (Donald Howard)
Science
The World of Flying Saucers: A Scientific Examination of a Major Myth of the Space Age
Menzel, Donald H. (Donald Howard)
Unidentified flying objects
The literature of flying saucers contains dozens of similar incidents
that fit perfectly into the meteor pattern. Pointing to this list of
“unidentified” flying objects, saucer addicts still abuse the Air Force
for concealing the “fact” that these UFOs are actually spaceships!
_Great Meteor Processions_
Even more dramatic than the ordinary exploding meteor whose fragments
naturally fall into a pattern around it, a cluster of fireballs or
a great procession of meteors occasionally startles the world. On
December 21, 1876, about 8:45 P.M. such a swarm of fireballs appeared
over Kansas and disappeared some three minutes later over Pennsylvania,
having traveled the thousand-mile distance at a velocity of 20,000
to 25,000 miles an hour. Hundreds of persons in Kansas, Missouri,
Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, and Pennsylvania saw the display, which
included nearly 100 separate fireballs; the leader was more brilliant
than the full moon and many of the followers were brighter than Venus
or Jupiter. Perhaps fortunately for the nerves of the public, the most
recent such display occurred before the saucers began to fly (March 24,
1933). This cluster of fireballs was visible chiefly in the skies over
New Mexico and left a great cloud that was visible for at least three
hours.
The most spectacular of such formations was the great meteor procession
of February 9, 1913. At about 9:05 in the evening the leader or leaders
appeared in the sky over western Canada, their fiery red bodies
followed by long streaming tails. These immense fireballs showed no
tendency to fall toward the earth but, like the green fireballs of New
Mexico, “moved forward on a perfectly horizontal path with peculiar,
majestic, dignified deliberation,” and disappeared in the distance
to the southwest. No description can surpass that given by Professor
Chant[V-21] who spent two weeks in locating and interviewing many of
the witnesses.
“Before the astonishment aroused by this first meteor had subsided,
other bodies were seen coming from the northwest, emerging from
precisely the same place as the first one. Onward they moved, at the
same deliberate pace, in twos or threes or fours, with tails streaming
behind, though not so long nor so bright as in the first case. They
all traversed the same path and were headed for the same point in the
southeastern sky.
“Gradually the bodies became smaller, until the last ones were but
red sparks, some of which were snuffed out before they reached
their destination. Several report that near the middle of the great
procession was a fine large star without a tail, and that a similar
body brought up the rear.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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