Page 36 - 201012 - The 'X' Chronicles Newspaper - Decemmber 2010

Real-Life UFOs Real-Life UFOs, From Flying Flapjacks to Mystery Missiles www.wired.com If you listen to the Air Force tell it, there are simply no such things as UFOs. A two- decade investigation called Project Blue Book determined in 1969 that no extraterrestial life has made contact with Earth. And no unexplained aerial phenomena have exceeded humanity's scientific grasp, let alone threatened national security. That has not been enough for dedicated UFOlogists. In September, a group of Air Force missile officers contended that aliens had temporarily taken control of their nukes. The "do they or don't they exist" debate won't be settled until someone from far away asks to be taken to our leaders. And the controversy makes it easy to forget that a UFO Spy Blimps the Size of Football FieldsAnything larger and you'd have the S.H.I.E.L.D. isn't actually a ship full of little green men. It's a Helicarrier. In June, Northrop Grumman got a $517 million contract from the Army to build placeholder for a puzzle the mind can't solve. three enormous airships as floating intelligence centers. The Long Endurance Multi-Intelligence So, it's also easy to forget that, much like the Vehicle is supposed to carry 2,500 pounds worth of "sensors, antennas, data links and signals Insane Clown Posse observed about miracles, intelligence equipment" to Hoover up information beneath its corpulent husk. UFOs are all around us. With a payload like that, it's a good thing the blimp will be the size of a football field and From weird drones to cheeky satellites seven stories tall. Not quite Hindenberg-sized, but that blimp didn't exactly end well. to things that manifest themselves to the naked Why does the Army need something like that? It would be the first air asset in its arsenal that eye as little more than plumes of smoke, the can remain at 20,000 feet for up to 21 days. One Army official judges it would take 12 Reaper skies can be a mysterious, congested place. drones to do an equivalent amount of spying. Here, we take a look at the most striking Its first destination: Afghanistan, next summer, where eagle-eyed locals might be forgiven curiosities of aviation, both foreign and for thinking they're seeing an alien mothership. domestic, including actual flying saucers. Image: Northrop Grumman flaw its engineers couldn't overcome. After T-Hawk is small enough to fit in a backpack, about 10 years and as many million dollars, the and its ducted fan launches it straight into the military pulled the plug in 1960. But visitors to sky. the Army's transportation museum at Fort Alas, it's not as autonomous as the Eustis, Virginia, check out the prototype and Probot, since soldiers below need to tell the T- imagine what might have been. Hawk where to go with a joystick-based remote-control system. But it's been used in Iraq, where thirsty soldiers dubbed it the Flying Beer Can, and seems not to have suffered for its inadequacies relative to the Galactic Empire model. Indeed, Honeywell says it's building a "much larger" T-Hawk for the Army that'll be ready for tests in 2012, as well as a version for That's the trouble with aliens: the police anti-drug missions. Even if you're hiding misdirection. You spend too much time tracking on an ice planet, it'll find you. down intergalactic visitors and you'll miss the Photo: U.S. Navy oddities that humans invented for getting around our home planet. The best engineering minds in two countries couldn't quite figure out how to make the Canuck Flying Saucer work. A joint venture in the 1950s between the U.S. Army, The (Tiny) Probe Droid You've Been Looking U.S. Air Force and the Canadian aviation For company Avro, the VZ-9 Avrocar was supposed With its squat body and tendril-like to be a "revolutionary" supersonic ship that stands drooping down, this mini-drone might brought extraterrestrial style to the military- have been inspired by the Probot spy droid used industrial complex. to find the Rebel Alliance on Hoth in The The 18-to-25-foot pancake was to lift off Empire Strikes Back. It has a similar function: vertically, thanks to a five-foot fan in its belly. Honeywell's T-Hawk, made for the Army is a The Spy Plane That Started Area 51 The "focusing ring" around its exterior would hovering clunker used for reconnaissance In 1997, a study in the CIA's Studies in push air outward in the opposite direction its missions. Intelligence journal concluded that "manned pilot wanted to fly. Manufacturers called it Snapping imagery from more than 7,000 reconnaissance" flights account for "over half of "Ground Effect Takeoff and Landing," or feet in the air, the T-Hawk is designed to give all UFO reports from the late 1950s through the GETOL. soldiers a view of the dangers ahead of them if 1960s." That figure is disputed in the UFO- And it did pretty well if you only wanted they don't have the runway space to launch a studying community. to go five or six feet off the ground. Higher full-sized drone. Weighing just 17 pounds, the Continued on Page 37 altitudes would cause the craft to pitch wildly, a