Year in Review for Ufology

By Pete Hartinger  The Circleville Herald   Januray 23, 2009

Year in review for Ufology

Published: Friday, January 23, 2009 10:15 AM EST
    Sightings of strange looking objects continued in our skies for the past year. Here are the highlights pertaining to this phenomenon:

   Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary Machimura and Defense Minister Ishiba stated their beliefs in the existence of ufos.

   On Jan. 2, the Wall Street Journal ran a story on page A1 about presidential candidate Dennis Kucinnich’s UFO sighting of 1982 with two other witnesses. He was questioned about this at a debate and affirmed it. 
The Stephenville, Texas UFO sightings in January created heavy news coverage.

   The UFOs were observed by many witnesses over several days.  The Mutual UFO Network (of which I am a member) did an intensive investigation. They submitted around 300 sighting reports. FAA radar showed that an unidentified flying object was headed toward President George Bush’s Crawford ranch.

   After a thorough analysis the news media never printed the results that showed unknown craft had penetrated our airspace. In the August MUFON Journal (an issue is at the Circleville Library) there is a complete article given about this extraordinary event.

   In summary it was a very good radar/visual case with many credible witnesses with radar return confirmation. When this sighting first broke in the news I was interviewed by Fox News out of New York. I gave them the contact information for the Texas Mufon investigators. 

   Albert Einstein made this statement years ago, “condemnation without investigation is the height of ignorance.” This can be referred to skeptics of the ufo phenomenon.

   A spokesman for NASA told the Associated Press that they had examined metallic fragments from the object that crashed at Kecksburg, Pennsylvania over forty years ago and now claim it was from a re-entering Russian satellite.

   Furthermore, the spokesman claims all records were lost. Note, if all records were lost than how do they know it was a Russian satellite? Also, the Russians have supposedly denied this.

   In a book review of “Strange Company” the author Keith Chester made this statement about the “foo fighter” sightings of World War II.

    “It was clear that American and British commanders were very worried about repeated encounters with unidentified and apparently highly advanced aircraft or, indeed, spacecraft over Europe and the Pacific.”

   Ufologist Stanton Friedman wrote that when press coverage is fair, people make ufo reports, like in the Texas sightings.

   For decades it has been felt that the fear of ridicule is the major reason witnesses don’t come forth and report their sightings. 

   He also stated that the subject of UFOs was not brought up at a recent SETI conference. He said that obviously if aliens are visiting, who needs to listen for signals from outer space.

   The city of Socorro, New Mexico, in conjunction with its historical society, is officially recognizing the ufo incident that occurred there on April 24, 1964. 

   It is felt that this is probably the first time a municipal government in the United States has ever officially recognized the historical reality of a ufo event.

   A British television announcer interviewed former astronaut Edgar Mitchell and was surprised at what Mitchell stated about the ufo mystery.  Mitchell has stated for years that several “insiders” told him that UFOs do exist.

   Robert Hastings has written a new book, titled “UFOs and Nukes”.  Hastings contends that a credible link exists between the appearance of nuclear weapons in the mid 1940s and the overall increase in UFO sightings since that time.

   We at the Roundtown UFO Society have felt the same way for the past several years. Unidentified Flying Object related events have occurred at both U.S. and Soviet nuclear missile sites during the Cold War.

   An Ohio truck driver, Tim Comstock, took three camera cell phone images of a UFO hovering over the Ohio River around 3:48a.m. on Oct. 24, 2008. It seemed to be drawing another unknown object up to it. The location was on Route 7, near Empire.

    There have been several television shows about this subject. Most of these have been on the Discovery, History, and Science channels. The “UFO Hunters” on the History Channel had the Trumbull County case. Part of this event is when the ufo hovered over the policeman’s patrol car. His engine completely stopped and didn’t start back up again until the unknown object had left the area.

   A new web site dealing with truck ufo reports has been started by a couple in Arizona. It is
tuforc.com and linked with our own site. I feel that many truck drivers have observed strange UFO sightings over the years, especially at night.

   This is very interesting. Newly elected President Barack Obama has appointed John Podesta to be head of his transition team.  Podesta in 2002 was with the UFO Disclosure Group on trying to gain access to secret government records about the ufo existence. I guess time will tell.

   If you have any comments about this article, please feel free to contact me by phone at 477-6252; e-mail,
[email protected]; or visit our website at roundtownufosociety.com.

Pete Hartinger

Director, Roundtown UFO Society

HOME  ~  BACK