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CIA Responsible for 1950s Norwegian UFO Sightings

posted by azrael on Tuesday July 15 2014, @12:21PM   Printer-friendly
from the truth-sometimes-less-strange-than-fiction dept.
/dev/random

Randolph Carter writes:

The CIA, via their recently new twitter account have admitted to being the cause of unusual activity in the 50s. Norwegian news website The Local reports:

Sensational reports of UFO activity in the skies, that gripped Norway in the 1950s, are explained 60 years later.

The CIA has revealed sightings of mysterious flying crafts travelling at high speeds with flashing lights were actually test flights of US military aircraft.

Related Stories

C.I.A. Admits Penetrating Senate Intelligence Computers 25 comments

mendax and bob_super write:

It's official, the CIA was interfering with a network of computers created for the Intelligence Committee of the US Congress.

The New York Times is reporting that the CIA did indeed hack into Senate computers, as was suspected several months ago. From the article:

An internal investigation by the Central Intelligence Agency has found that its officers improperly penetrated a computer network used by the Senate Intelligence Committee in preparing its report on the C.I.A.'s detention and interrogation program. In a statement issued Thursday morning, a C.I.A. spokesman said that agency's inspector general had concluded that C.I.A. officers had acted inappropriately by gaining access to the computers. The statement said that John O. Brennan, the C.I.A. director, had apologized to the two senior members of the Senate Intelligence Committee and that he would set up an internal accountability board to review the matter. The board will be led by former Senator Evan Bayh, Democrat of Indiana.

An internal investigation? What about a law enforcement investigation for violation of several criminal statutes? Is anyone going to prison for this?

The best part is that the CIA created that "secure" network, called RDInet, to store documents requested by the Committee to keep an eye on... the CIA.

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  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by crAckZ on Tuesday July 15 2014, @12:51PM

    by crAckZ (3501) on Tuesday July 15 2014, @12:51PM (#69269) Journal

    nothing says the government thinks we are dumb like an agency admitting what everyone already knows. after all it was 2013 when they admitted area 51 existed because No one knew anything before they tell us.

    http://www.thewire.com/national/2013/08/government-now-admits-theres-area-51/68389/ [thewire.com]

    • (Score: 5, Interesting) by Sir Garlon on Tuesday July 15 2014, @01:53PM

      by Sir Garlon (1264) on Tuesday July 15 2014, @01:53PM (#69285)

      I don't see admitting what everyone knows as a sign that the government thinks we are dumb. I see it as a reluctant admission that they've failed to keep a secret. In this case, at least, I can see the value of the secret they were protecting (flight paths of the spy planes that were presumably photographing Soviet military installations).

      --
      [Sir Garlon] is the marvellest knight that is now living, for he destroyeth many good knights, for he goeth invisible.

      • (Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 15 2014, @02:19PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 15 2014, @02:19PM (#69294)

        Well, if you want to keep them secret, I think it's a very bad idea to let them use blinking lights while flying over populated areas ...

  • (Score: 2) by present_arms on Tuesday July 15 2014, @01:27PM

    by present_arms (4392) on Tuesday July 15 2014, @01:27PM (#69279) Homepage Journal

    The CIA has revealed sightings of mysterious flying crafts travelling at high speeds with flashing lights were actually test flights of US military aircraft.

    Of course it is.

    --
    http://trinity.mypclinuxos.com/

  • (Score: 5, Funny) by DrMag on Tuesday July 15 2014, @02:35PM

    by DrMag (1860) on Tuesday July 15 2014, @02:35PM (#69298)

    In reality, the NSA has intercepted signals indicating a massive wave of UFO's are headed our way. The CIA is spreading this lie to circumvent the inevitable sightings and surge of believers they can't control. Now when people see one of these UFO's, they'll just say, "Oh, it's that dumb American military again. Why do they have to test such bizarre looking airplanes these days?"

    </YouKnowYouAlmostWantItToBeTrue>

  • (Score: 4, Informative) by Woods on Tuesday July 15 2014, @02:58PM

    by Woods (2726) <woods12@gmail.com> on Tuesday July 15 2014, @02:58PM (#69304) Journal

    Interesting bits from the PDF follow.

    Landing difficulties:

    New pilots all had difficulty in getting the U-2's wheels on the ground because at low speeds it would remain in ground effect and glide effortlessly above the runway for great distances.

    The first test pilot was instructed to land with the main (forward) landing gear and let the plane settle back on the rear wheels, after attempting this five times, and bouncing into the air each time, the test pilot tried the standard method of rear wheels first, which resulted in a near-perfect landing.

    On September 8 1955, the U-2 reached its initial design altitude of 65,600 feet. In preparation for this flight, the 42-year-old test pilot (Tony LeVier) completed the Air Force partial-pressure suit training program, becoming the oldest pilot to do so.

    The UFO bit:

    In the mid 1950s, most commercial airliners flew at altitudes between 10,000 and 20,000 feet ... B-47 and B-57s operated at altitudes below 40,000 feet ... U-2s above 60,000 feet. This was causing air-traffic controllers to receive increased numbers of UFO reports.

    Such reports were most prevalent in the early evening hours from pilots of airliners flying from East to West when the sun dropped below the horizon of an airliner flying at 20,000 feet, the plane was in darkness. But, if a U-2 was airborne in the vicinity of the airliner at the same time, its horizon from an altitude of 60,000 feet was considerably more distant, and, being so high in the sky, its silver wings would catch and reflect the rays of the sun and appear to the airliner pilot, 40,000 feet below, to be fiery objects ... At this time, no one believed manned flight was possible above 60,000 feet, so no one expected to see an object so high in the sky.

    This, in turn, led to the Air Force's Operation BLUE BOOK. The operation collected all reports of UFO sightings, Air Force investigators then attempted to explain such sightings by linking them to natural phenomena ... U-2 and later OXCART flights accounted for more than one half of all UFO reports during the late 1950s and most of the 1960s.

    Gliding capabilities:

    During final tests in the spring of 1956, the U-2 once again demonstrated its unique airworthiness ... A westward-bound U-2 had experience a flameout over the Mississippi River at the western border of Tennessee ... The project office asked the pilot how far he could glide so they could determine which SAC base should be alerted. The pilot, who by this time was over Arkansas, radioed back that, given the prevailing winds and the U-2's 21:1 glide ratio, he thought he could reach Albuquerque, New Mexico. Within minutes, the base commander was explained that an unusual aircraft would make a deadstick landing at Kirtland within the next half hour. After a half hour passed, the base commander called the Pentagon to ask where the crippled aircraft was, as he was speaking, the officer saw the U-2 touch down on the runway and remarked, "It's not a plane, it's a glider!" Even more surprised were the air police who surrounded the craft when it came to a halt. As the pilot climbed from the cockpit in his "Space" suit, one air policeman remarked that the pilot looked like a man from Mars. The pilot, REDACTED later reported to Cunningham that, from the beginning of the flameout until the landing, the U-2 had covered over 900 miles, including more than 300 by gliding.

    [The Air Force needs a better editor]

  • (Score: 5, Interesting) by zocalo on Tuesday July 15 2014, @03:07PM

    by zocalo (302) on Tuesday July 15 2014, @03:07PM (#69310)
    It's buried in TFA, which almost no one will read of course, but they also explain the probable nature of the sightings. Essentially when you have a very high-flying aircraft, while it might be after sunset on the ground, the aircraft is still catching the sunlight because the it is still within the line of sight of the sun. Given the number of agencies and manufacturers playing around with high-flying aircraft for pretty much the entire period when UFO sightings were at their peak, I suspect a considerable proportion of "unexplained" sightings were probably made under similar circumstances with other aircraft.

    Not that the UFO-nuts will buy into it, of course.
    --
    UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 15 2014, @03:45PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 15 2014, @03:45PM (#69336)

      I suspect a considerable proportion of "unexplained" sightings were probably made under similar circumstances with other aircraft.

      If you read just a little farther, you wouldn't need to suspect:

      U-2 and later OXCART flights accounted for more than one-half of all UFO reports during the late 1950s and most of the 1960s.

      (OXCART is, of course, the A-12 [wikipedia.org], predecessor of the SR-71.)

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 16 2014, @07:07AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 16 2014, @07:07AM (#69651)

        U-2 and later OXCART flights accounted for more than one-half of all UFO reports during the late 1950s and most of the 1960s.

        And obviously the little green men accounted for the other half.

    • (Score: 2, Funny) by emg on Tuesday July 15 2014, @04:53PM

      by emg (3464) on Tuesday July 15 2014, @04:53PM (#69357)

      Everyone knows the U-2 was a hoax. All those videos were faked in Microsoft Flight Simulator.

    • (Score: 2) by frojack on Wednesday July 16 2014, @01:11AM

      by frojack (1554) on Wednesday July 16 2014, @01:11AM (#69521) Journal

      Still, you have to wonder why a plane flying higher than any other craft was capable of, was running blinking navigation lights.

      Also, lots UFO sightings were not necessarily of high altitude planes, yet more than half were airforce projects of some sort.

      And that all stopped the minute everyone on the planet had a camera in their pocket. Even bigfoot when on vacation.

      --
      No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.

  • (Score: 2) by r3dakted on Tuesday July 15 2014, @09:17PM

    by r3dakted (409) on Tuesday July 15 2014, @09:17PM (#69441)

    The "CIA says?" They aren't a trustworthy source for anything except for lies, murder, corruption, and more lies.

  • (Score: 2, Funny) by arslan on Wednesday July 16 2014, @02:58AM

    by arslan (3462) on Wednesday July 16 2014, @02:58AM (#69555)

    what about abductions, anal probes and other weird activities? Mulder is not happy..