Missile/Rocket Reports

Then felt I like some watcher of the skies when a new planet swims into his ken;
Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyes he stared at the Pacific -
and all his men looked at each other with a wild surmise - silent, upon a peak in Darien.

John Keats - On First Looking into Chapman's Homer

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June 25, 1987     28 SHawwal 1407 A.H.     28 Sivan 5747   (NY Times on June 27, 1987)
The National Weather Service doubts it was theirs and the Defense Department insists it wasn't theirs. About the only thing the Federal Aviation Administration can say about the object that encountered a Delta Air Lines jet at 29,500 feet Thursday is that no one is likely to find it. The pilot of Delta Flight 1083, flying 60 people from Pittsburgh to Atlanta, told investigators that an object, which appeared to be a missile, seemed headed straight for his Boeing 737 before passing to the side and slightly below. "The pilot described it as a rocket or missile about 4 feet long, with fins," a Delta spokesman, Bill Berry, said. "It went so fast that's all he saw." The aviation agency said it would probably never know what had the encounter with the jet 31 miles northeast of Charleston. Kathkeen Bergen, an agency spokesman, said it was left with two explanations: The official one is that it was a promotional balloon that escaped. "Balloons can travel pretty far" she said. "We don't acknowledge the existence of U.F.O.'s."

Mid-year, 1992  Reported in alt.disasters.aviation on Wed, 21 Jan 1998 18:08:48-0800
Christopher Coon wrote:   The TWA Missile Conspiracy notwithstanding, here is a "rogue missile" event straight from the participant (me, as a controller at L.A. Center). In mid '92 I was working a UAL 747 climbing out of about 23,000 near Victorville, California (about 50nm NE of LAX). 23,000, by the way, is in what is called "Class A" airspace (back then, "Positive Control" airspace), meaning nothing--absolutely nothing, military or otherwise--may fly above 18,000 feet without the controller knowing about it and approving it. About 30nm to the north is a huge military restricted area, R-2508, in which the military can play their games as they wish, without notifying FAA controllers. All of their activity, though, must remain within the lateral confines of the restricted area, unless they coordinate a "whisky alert," and identify the accidental spillout. There was no such notification on that day. The 747 pilot suddenly came on and told me a "rocket of some type" just missed their aircraft, passing about 500 feet below. He said it went by at "3 or 4 times the normal closure rate." 3 or 4 times normal closure rate of a head-on jet aircraft comes out to about mach 2. I saw absolutely nothing on radar, and told him so. I pulled up the primary (raw radar) targets, but there was absolutely nothing in his area. He elaborated that the "rocket" was about the size of an F-16, and was heading in the opposite direction (i.e. southwest). I alerted the sectors in its possible path, and alerted my supervisor, who just scratched his chin and said "Hmmmmm." There was no collision, and no loss of life, so it was left at that. The pilot was alarmed enough to report it, though, and I subsequently saw a short article about it in Aviation Week & Space Technology (early August, '92), with a "mysterious black aircraft" slant instead of a "rocket" like the pilot initially reported to me. The voice and radar tapes were pulled, but they revealed no further info, and the cursory investigation was dropped.. Christopher Coon formerly @ ZLA

October 11, 1994 Associated Press report datelined 09/28 23:55 EDT V0009 (1994)
A State bomb squad destroyed a French-made surface to air rocket launcher armed with a live missile and explosives ....along a rural roadside in Westminster, Maryland. This location to commercial aviators is the equivalent of Times Square in Manhattan. If one wants to increase the chances of hitting an airliner this is a key point from which to try.  (6/3/99 - Note from the website author - it is now believed that this was an anti-tank weapon and not a missile)

January 6, 1995   4 SHa`baan 1415 A.H.      5 Shevat 5755    Reported on January 26th, 1995. 'The Sun' newspaper.
Two pilots thought their last moment had come as their British Airways jet headed for mid-air collision - with a high speed UFO. Terrified fliers Roger Willis and Mark Stuart ducked down in the cockpit when the brightly lit mystery craft appeared only yards in front of them at 13,000ft over the Pennines. But as they waited for the deadly impact, they saw the triangular UFO flash down the right hand side of their Boeing 737 and disappear. Captain Willis and First Officer Stuart immediately checked with air traffic control. But they were told theirs was the only plane on the radar. Their flight from Milan, Italy to Manchester Ringway was 17 minutes from touchdown when the "alien" invader zoomed past. The Boeing landed safely, with the 60 passengers unaware of the drama. At first, the pilots didn't tell pals about the UFO, in case of ridicule. But BA bosses were informed and they sent a detailed log and sketches to the Joint Air Miss Working Group, which is part of the Civil Aviation Authority. An inquiry was launched into the January 6th incident. But a CAA spokesman said yeterday: "We have not been able to trace the aircraft involved." The pilots refused to comment. A colleague said: "They are high grade, sensible guys. Everyone's talking about what they saw." Theories that the UFO could have been a new military aircraft were discounted by experts. A spokesman for Jane's Defence Weekly said: "We know of nothing at all being developed that could account for this sighting."

November 17, 1995 22:20 (EST)  23 Jumaada al-THaany 1416 A.H.  24 Heshvan 5756
Lufthansa 405 (747) departing JFK at 9:20pm bound for Frankfurt at 25,000 feet, south of Long Island, reported an object flying directly opposite its course about 2-3,000 feet above them. Confirmed by British Airways 226 (747). Directly north of W-105. Large bright light in front, no red or green beacons, long green light in rear and left a vapor trail. "It was looking strange". "Looked like a green trail on it, and a very bright light on the front of it". "It was looking very strange, with a long light, in the tail". "It did have a very strong trail to it...a vapor trail, which looked more like smoke. And the light on the front was very, very bright" "It didn't have any lights...((normal)) lights, beacon lights, or red or green lights. Only a white light in the front, and with a long green light. (The FAA transcript of the controller - pilot conversations on this incident may be found elsewhere at this website)

November 17, 1995?
November 17 is considered the most probable date based on Lufthansa sighting above but alternative dates are November 22, 1995, February 2, 1996, or March 8, 1996 with March 8 being the second most likely date.
Missile or rocket launch from I95 in Connecticut off the highway. Author of this website was driving along Interstate 95 (Connecticut turnpike) going to Stamford and was between exits 4 and 6 when suddenly to the right front side of his car there was a flash through the trees and then a very white, bright streak, was observed rising, accelerating extremely rapidly in the direction of Long Island Sound and arching across the sky. The incident was reported to the FBI witin a few days of the downing of TWA 800 but was rejected as irrelevant.

March 17, 1996    Private Communication
"Has anyone ever reported any information about USAir Flight 3684 from Baltimore to MacArthur (Islip, Long Island) Airport the evening of March 17, 1996 -- four months to the day before TWA Flight 800 went down? Just after dark, the plane was beginning its approach to MacArthur, when there was an explosion just forward of the tip of the right wing -- a ball of bright orange that appeared from inside the plane to be about 20 feet in diameter, followed by a concussion that shook the plane. Everyone looked at everyone else: "What the hell was that?" No announcement from the cockpit. As we got off the plane, we asked the flight attendant, who didn't have a clue. Next day and on several occasions afterwards, I sought information from the airline, the media, the FBI (Sorry, we can't comment on that, Ma'am). What happened? I could never find out. Does anyone know? If so, please refer me to sources".

June 25, 1996
Three weeks to the day before TWA 800 was shot down, at the same time in the evening, in approximately the same location as the TWA 800 downing, and within hours of the Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia, the Coast Guard received a report of "three red flares" launched 25 miles south of Shinnicock Inlet. An air and surface search was carried out which found nothing out of ordinary. An ex-FBI agent tried to bring this event to Mr. Kallstrom's attention (Click to read two letters) but he was ignored.

July 12, 1996 "In the Blink of an Eye" - Pat Milton  Page 124
Report that a video of a possible missile was shot around dawn heading out to sea on 7/12/96. Milton reports that Pentagon analysts confirmed that it "might" be a missile but that it was discarded as irrelevant because it was some days earlier than the TWA 800 event on July 17, 1996

July 15 and July 16, 1996   Private Communication on Observations by a Long Island resident

On the night before the crash of TWA flight 800 (and the night before that), I witnessed what I thought were "missiles" streaking across the night sky. Both incidents occurred around 8:15 to 8:30pm (est). I live in Medford, New York. Medford is located on Long Island. On both occasions, I was in our swimming pool, in our backyard with my family. The first incident (2 nights before TWA 800) |involved what I thought were two (2) missiles streaking through the night sky. They appeared to be at 10,000 feet or so in altitude. Both objects were in level flight. Neither appeared to "wobble" or vary.

The objects were travelling at a high rate of speed. One object was almost one (1) second ahead of the other. There appeared to be a blue streak following both objects. Both objects had a white looking round "plume" in the front. Both looked as if they were travelling in a straight line, parallel to each other. The sighting lasted approx.5 to 6 seconds. The first one sort of "fizzled" out, as if "out of gas". The second one did the same, about one second later. The objects first appeared to me from the Southeast. From my vantage point, I would estimate the Smith Point Beach area in Mastic / Shirley. They both streaked along to my North. I would say, it appeared to me, that they closely followed William Floyd Parkway (County Road 46) travelling due North. The area they "fizzled" out over (in my estimation) would be at the intersection of William Floyd Parkway and Middle |Country Road (Route 25) in Ridge, NY or Calverton, NY.

The next day (one night before TWA 800), I witnessed pretty much the same event, except from a different direction.In this sighting, both objects were parallel to each other and even in location (neither ahead of the other). The objects first appeared to me as coming from the Captree Island / Bay Shore area (near Robert Moses State Park).That would put them Southwest of my location by about 15-20 miles. Both lasted 6-7 seconds before "fizzling out". They were travelling in a North-Northeast direction. When they "fizzled out". I would estimate the location as over the Selden / Farmingville area. Point of reference: Having flown numerous times from Islip-MacArhtur Airport, I'm fairly familiar with the runway alignment there. I'm not sure of the runway number, but I think either number 4 or 24. That's the path they seemed to follow. The runway starts near Johnson Avenue and Route 454 (Veterans Highway)and continues to Linclon avenue in Holbrook.

I reported both incidents to the FBI| (on the telephone). The FBI called me on|two occasions to "re-interview" me. Since I had not seen anything on the actual night of TWA 800, they dismissed my sightings as non-related.

Since I am not an expert on missiles or aircraft, I can only report what I saw in laymen's terms. What I saw was NOT an aircraft, helicopter or weather balloon. These were not meteors, asteroids, UFO's or an aurora.

I've never witnessed an actual missile firing. I have no idea how fast a missile travels or even how large or small a missile could be. I do know the direction and path of the two sightings I witnessed. I also know that they terminated firing at the stated destinations (Ridge, NY and Farmingville, NY).

I must confess, I can't state matter-of-factly where exactly they originated from. In my humble opinion, they most certainly appeared to have originated from where I indicated they did (Smith Point and Captree State Park). Perhaps they were higher or lower in altitude than I suspected. They could have originated much closer to me than I thought.

This is what, where and when I saw it. It's been five years and I can't stop thinking about it on occasion. Although even I dismissed it, I reconsidered sharing my sightings after viewing the files at www.twa800.com.

I had no idea others reported viewings before and after I did. Now it holds a much higher significance to me.

I cannot say I actually saw a missile. I never saw the actual object itself. I only saw a white "ball" looking type haze in the front, followed by a blue looking streak in the rear. (Note from website author: The "white ball" is water vapor being made visible by the shock wave as the object traveled faster than the speed of sound. A photo of a fighter jet at low level and supersonic shows only the cockpit and fuselage back to the leading edge of the wings.)

The above report is absolutely amazing in view of this communication to the website author received on August 9, 2002

My wife Wanda and I continue to be ABSOLUTELY amazed that no one has ever investigated the fact that TWA 800 on the night prior to the tragic crash unexplainedly returned to Kennedy after venturing approximately 45 minutes on its course to Paris. My wife's brother and nephew were on the 800 flight that went down but were preceded the night before by his wife and two ( 2 ) surviving children. Why was the 800 flight the previous night turned back to Kennedy, allowed to land , inspected by TWA personel for some reason and then permitted to resume its flight?

July 17, 1996     1 Raby` al-awal 1417 A.H.      1 Av 5756   
TWA 800  
James Kallstrom: "We do have information that there was something in the sky. A number of people have seen it. A number of people (Click for eyewitness accounts)  have described it similarly. It was ascending."  The Press-Enterprise reported that reddish residue found on several seat backs was shown by laboratory analysis to be consistent with solid missile fuel. Sikorsky aircraft in Stratford CT [less than 100 miles from the disaster] indicated that Sikorsky's radar at its airport picked up an air to air missile. The radar was on tape and was turned over to the FBI. Sikorsky is a manufacturer of helicopters for the military and has extensive facilities in Stratford, which is on Long Island Sound.

August 29, 1996    14 Raby` al-THaany 1417 A.H.        14 Elul 5756
(Reported in the NY Times on September 9, 1996)
The pilot of an American Airlines jet reported that he saw a missile off the wing of his 757 plane while he was traveling from San Juan to Boston. The plane was over Wallops Island, VA. According to the NTSB's report on the near-miss, "the missile was a Black Brant V missile, with an inert payload and was launched ... in support of the Department of Defense."

November 16, 1996 22:00 (EST)    4 Rajab 1417 A.H.       5 Kislev 5757
Pakistan International Airlines Flight 712 Leaving Kennedy at 9:25pm, bound for Frankfurt. The pilot, W. Shah, said his co-pilot saw an orange light coming from the left hand side to the right hand side of the airplane. The object was 3 - 4 miles in front of the aircraft and above it. Shah was told by Boston controllers that there were no military exercises in the area. Boston apparently confirmed 'two unidentified blips' on radar. The tapes have been turned over to the FBI and NTSB. The object(s) rose directly out of Long Island Sound and ascended almost vertically. The Pakistani crew just saw a flash, and apparently a TWA crew, which was behind the Pakistani, saw the whole thing. The TWA crew was so alarmed by what they had just seen that they considered returning to JFK. Later, they requested clearance to skirt the area where the light had been seen. Radio 5 in the U.K. reported that the object which crossed the Pakistani aircraft had exploded. (On a subsequent McNeill - Lehrer newshour when asked about the direction of the object Mr. Kallstrom replied, "ascending".)  

Another report on this incident stated: This evening I flew flight 1504 FLL to BOS. It was an extremely clear night over the Eastern Seaboard. You could see the Connecticut shoreline from Cape May, NJ. We were at FL 330 just east of JFK proceeding direct to PVD. It was about 10:15 PM when an aircraft asked center the following question: were there any fireworks going off in the area. Center replied in the negative, to the best of their best knowledge. The aircraft then reported they had something streak up towards them from the left and pass in front of them and through their altitude. There was silence on the frequency. I asked center the position of the aircraft reporting the event. Center replied 20nm south of HTO. It was a foreign carrier, but judging by the accent of the pilot, I would say it was Air India or Pakistan Intl. I didn't get a call sign, and to my surprise, center did not ask any more questions. It was a crystal clear night, and we could see the Hamptons from our position. There were no fireworks taking place anywhere. Unless the controller was working both frequencies, the aircraft was at least climbing to or in the high sector. I did a little bit of checking, and found out Air India leaves at 7:30. PM, and Pakistan Intl. leaves at 9:45 PM from Kennedy. It doesn't really matter who it was. Fact is someone reported a streak that came from the ground and to the left of them and passed in front and through their altitude. It was 10:17 when center replied to me that the aircraft was 20nm south of Hampton. Is it merely a coincidence this is close to where TWA 800 blew up, or is something else going on? I don't believe the aircraft was flying inverted and that was a meteor that streaked by their windshield. Again I was amazed at the silence of the controller after the report. This event certainly got our attention.

November 17, 1996     WCBS-TV  
WCBS-TV reports that last night Pakistani International Airlines flight 712 radioed Logan International (Boston) that a missile had just flown by their plane (the story implied 'just missing them') ...Boston confirmed 'two unidentified blips' on radar at the same time as the PIA report.

November 17, 1996     Associated Press
FBI spokesman Joseph Valiquette said Sunday, "At this point we don't know what, if anything, was seen." Shah (pilot of PIA 712) said they were told by Boston air traffic controllers that there were no military exercises in the area. He also said the pilots were interviewed by officials with the U.S. Embassy in Frankfurt... A TWA plane flying immediately behind the Pakistanis jet Saturday made a similar sighting and asked to turn around .... The TWA plane was rerouted and the air corridor used by the Pakistan Airlines flight was closed. (For a transcript and audio file of this incident see The Tale of the Tapes)

December 12, 1996     1 SHa`baan 1417 A.H.      2 Tevet 5757
A Saudi Arabian Airlines crew reported sighting a bright greenish object streaking by their plane as it approached Kennedy Airport Thursday morning. It was approaching Kennedy airport, 15 miles south west of East Hampton, at about 12,000 feet when the object appeared on radar. At least one crew member saw the object from the cockpit window for about two seconds.

February 7, 1997     28 RamaDHaan 1417 A.H.      30 Shevat 5757
Passenger (Charlotte - see also August 12, 1997 item below) from JFK to Atlanta on Delta Flight 592 (which has a scheduled departure of 6:45 am) between 7:15 and 7:30 am seated on the left side of the plane observed a missile/rocket. It was an early morning flight and after a delay of about half an hour the plane took off. It was a very clear morning with excellent visibility. Charlotte had taken a window seat on the left side of the plane. About 10 minutes into the flight the plane had just finished a rather wide turn and had reached about 8-10 thousand feet. It was still climbing but had taken a course heading that took it over the coast. Passenger could see the coastline all the way down to her left and the ocean beyond. As she looked down she saw a trail of light gray smoke pouring out of a missile that came up from the ground (she could see the smoke trail) it arched out pouring smoke from the rear, wobbling as it went and took a heading parallel to the coastline. There were no visible fins or coloration of the fuselage. It was about 2,000ft below the left side of the plane moving she believed in an easterly direction following the coastline but inland perhaps a mile or two. The plane was, she believes, heading in a southerly direction directly across the coast and then over the Atlantic. At the time she was a bit amazed at what she was seeing and remember saying to herself  "Thank God it is going in the other direction."  The missile was land launched missile about  2 or 3 miles inland from the coast of eastern Long Island.

She did not speak of this to anyone at the time, it seemed too unbelievable that TWA Flight 800 had been lost and here was a missile going up in the same general area. She finally broke her silence after reading frequent articles and hearing news reports about the authorities leaning toward mechanical failure in spite of the many reports of (missile) sightings ....... She called Delta Airlines on 4/16/97 in Atlanta and spoke to Warren Garland (Mgr. of Consumer Affairs?). Her presence on the flight was confirmed and great interest was shown in what she had to relate. She also called TWA on 4/17/97 and again much interest was expressed. She then called the Airline Pilots Association (AOP) in Virginia and again there were many questions and much interest. She finally called the FBI in Melville on the same day or within a day or two. The person who handled the call showed no interest compared to the others - almost no questions - a whole different reaction. On 5/12/97 she called a Newsday reporter after seeing a TV interview of one of the Newsday reporters who said almost everyone believed the TWA crash was due to mechanical failure. She spoke to a woman reporter who was very interested and called her back with more questions.

Witness also flew to San Diego via Los Angeles on July l0, 1997. She got into a conversation with passenger seated next to her - a radar expert from Long Island who travels around the world setting up and checking on radar installations. They talked about TWA800 and he related that he had a close relative at the beach that evening. She and some thirty other people she was with saw a streak from the water go up and the plane exploded.

March 17, 1997 19:15 (EST)    8 Thw al-Qi`dah 1417 A.H.    8 Adar II 5757
Northwest Airlines D93 Flight 775 Newark to Minneapolis and Flight 361 A320 Laguardia to Minneapolis report missile both departing at 6:55 PM about 15 Minutes into flight. Plus Delta and US Airways flights. A Reuter report of April 10, 1997 indicated that Northwest Airlines pilots reported that they saw what appeared to be a missile or a rocket over the New York area the evening of March 17, the Saint Paul Pioneer Press reported Thursday. In a copyrighted story, the Pioneer Press reported that investigators are piecing together tapes of air traffic control radar recorded the night of the sightings.  Two other flight crews, from Delta Airlines and US Airways have filed similar reports, the newspaper said. The possibility that missiles are flying in commercial airspace is particularly significant in the aftermath of last summer's crash of TWA flight 800 minutes after takeoff from JFK International Airport in New York, the Pioneer Press said. The pilots of a Northwest Airlines DC-9 reported a possible missile sighting about 15 minutes into their flight from Newark International Airport in New Jersey in March, according to the Newspaper. A second Northwest flight crew, in an aircraft that left from La Guardia Airport in New York reported a similar sighting. (For a transcript and audio file of this incident see The Tale of the Tapes)

March/April? 1997
(Personal communication from a BA Flight Officer but not confirmed by an independent source). A BA Concorde from JFK passing FL 270 on the climb before Nantucket Island had a near miss with a missile. The plane was still subsonic and the missile was within 1/2 mile. The British Government may have complained to the U.S. Department of Defense.

May 23, 1997 (1:20am)    16 MuHarram 1418 A.H.     16 Iyyar 5757
Witness states: We were driving south on Route 67 in Oxford.. heading home... It was about 1:20am and my first 'thought' was that a plane was coming into Oxford Airport...but they usually don't have planes coming in at that time of night (I may be mistaken, but I believe Oxford Airport does not stay open 24 hours a day)... But even before I finished formulating the 'thought' that it was a plane coming into Oxford Airport, I then thought   "Gee, it's coming in at a strange angle, looks like it might crash..."...and almost immediately it dawned on me we were too far south on 67, not too far from the Seymour town line, for the light to be a plane going to Oxford Airport......it was around the area of the Hawthorne Inn and Oxford Plaza, heading south towards Seymour...southbound on Route 67, which goes basically NW to SE...so we were basically facing approx. SE...What we saw was a bright green light, just slightly paler than a traffic light, going at high speed, coming from a generally NNW direction heading generally ESE -- basically, coming generally from the direction of Danbury (Poughkeepsie?) and heading generally to some point east of New Haven.......IF it had made it that far! That's what REALLY drew our attention to this thing -- there was this strange bank of clouds, not very wide but spanning almost the entire sky from NNE to SSW....there was a full moon that night, and periodically, when the clouds would drift that way, you could see the moon thru them, so they weren't particularly thick...they were approximately 50 or so degrees above the horizon...This strange green light streaks at a high speed coming from behind us and to our right, passes in front of our line of vision, enters this strangely shaped bank of clouds...AND DISAPPEARED! At the speed it was going, it should have emerged within a second or two from the other side, but it blinked out like someone turning off a light switch... It was this phenomenon that really made us notice this thing...until that point, neither of us had commented on it, but when that happened we turned to each other and said "Did you see that?" (and were very glad that the other HAD, else we'd wonder if we were seeing things). Weather clear, except for a weird band of clouds in front of us, spanning the sky approx. 50 degrees up from the horizon, maybe 10 or so degrees wide....the rest of the sky displayed stars, and the moon just west of apogee (in front of us and somewhat to our right)... We ended up explaining it away as a meteor, but it seems strange that the 'meteor' could 'burn itself out' at the exact time it entered that cloud bank.... For the first few seconds I 'thought' (really not consciously thinking) that it was the 'headlight' of an aircraft coming towards us...but I immediately realized that was wrong, because the light was green and heading away from us... The light was not blinking, it actually looked like a blowtorch, a bright point of green light with a paler triangular vaporous 'tail' behind it....it was pretty bright, but not brighter than the moon, which was pretty full that night...No sound was heard, but we had the windows of the car up... I didn't see any 'launch', i.e. we didn't see anything rise up from the horizon...what we saw was streaking in basically a horizontal path, slightly downwards, approx. 70 or so degrees above the horizon...if it WAS a missile, it either came from an airborne vehicle, or was shot from the ground well behind us to the north and west, and had reached apogee and was just starting to descend...trajectory would have put a 'launch' beyond Danbury, somewhere in the Hudson Valley, perhaps even west of the Hudson...I'd guess Poughkeepsie, or its environs...If the thing hadn't 'burnt out', it would have continued south and east, probably crossing the coastline somewhere around East Haven or Branford, and definitely would have gone over the eastern end of Long Island, crashing somewhere well out into the Atlantic...I wonder if it would be worth anything to check the air traffic that night out of JFK, Laguardia, Newark, check even Tweed-New Haven, to see if any airliner could have been on a flight path at that time which may have put it on a possible collision course, which may explain the sudden 'burn out', perhaps a decision was made to scrap the 'missile' (if indeed that is what it was) rather than risk another TWA800)...

August 9, 1997    5 Raby` al-THaany 1418 A.H.     6 Av 5757
Washington, September 26 (Reuter) - A Swissair passenger jet flying over New York had a close encounter last month with a weather balloon, the Federal Aviation Administration said on Friday. The crew aboard the Swissair 747, flight 127 traveling from Philadelphia to Boston, said the encounter occurred on Aug. 9 at 5:10 p.m. local time over Deer Park (Long Island), New York. The crew could not identify the object, which the airplane passed at an elevation of 23,000 feet (7,000 metres). The airplane was traveling about 500 mph (800 kph) at the time. A United Airlines flight passing through the same area a short time later identified the object as a large balloon, the FAA said. An FAA investigation of the incident "concluded that it was indeed a weather balloon,'' FAA spokesman Jim Peters said. He said the National Weather Service balloon had been cleared in advance to be in that area. Swissair spokesman Ulrich Wohn said the pilot followed standard procedure by reporting the close encounter. He said the flight landed on time in Boston and continued on to Zurich without incident. "At no time were any of the passengers at risk,'' said Wohn. "They didn't even see it.''

September 26, 1997 11:42:10 PDT (Drudge Report)
An unidentified object narrowly missed a Swissair Boeing 747 while the aircraft was at 23,000 feet, passing in air space between Philadelphia and New York, on Aug 9, Swiss radio reported this morning. Major newswires are taking the story and moving it. The pilot described the object, which passed within 50 yards of the aircraft, as "white, elongated and without wings," and strongly rejected U.S. explanations that the object was a weather balloon, the radio report said. The object was moving at very high speeds, Swissair spokesman Erwin Schaerer tells the NTSB. The plane was Zurich-bound, from Philadelphia. AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE is reporting that there may be passenger witnesses to the incident...

September 27, 1997 (Neue Zuricher Zeitung)
Swissair has revealed that an unidentified flying object almost collided with one of its planes over the United States last month. The captain and his co-pilot said an oblong and wingless object shot past at great speed - only fifty metres away from their Boeing Seven-Four-Seven. The American air traffic authorities said it was probably a weather balloon.

September 27, 1997      Electronic Telegraph Issue 856  
An unidentified object narrowly missed a Swissair jumbo jet with 64 passengers aboard at 23,000 feet near New York, a company spokesman said yesterday. The object was described by the 747 captain as "elongated, white and without wings" but the co-pilot recalled it as being "more spherical". American aviation authorities dismissed speculation that the object was a missile and said it was a weather balloon. Swiss Radio reported the captain as saying he did not find that explanation credible although neither he nor his co-pilot thought it was a missile. The near-miss occurred on Aug 9, close to the spot where a TWA airliner exploded in July last year with the loss of 230 lives. Swissair flight 127 was travelling from Philadelphia to Zurich via Boston.

March 5, 1999    www.cbcnews.com    Ottawa (CP)
A Swissair pilot reported his 747 jet was nearly hit by an unidentified flying object, possibly a missile, near the area off New York where a TWA airplane crashed in 1996, The Canadian Press has learned. Swissair Flight 127 was cruising at 23,000 feet on Aug. 9, 1997, when the pilot interrupted an address to passengers to report the near miss by a round white object, says a report by the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board. "Sir, I don't know what it was, but it just flew like a couple of hundred feet above us," he radioed Boston air traffic control. "I don't know if it was a rocket or whatever, but incredibly fast, opposite direction." "In the opposite direction?" asked the controller. "Yes sir, and the time was 2107 (Greenwich mean time). It was too fast to be an airplane." The controller asked another aircraft if its crew saw anything like a missile in the area. The reply was negative. He then asked the Swissair pilot again how far above the plane it was. "It was right over us, right above, opposite direction, and, and I don't know, two, three, four hundred feet above. All that I can tell, 127, is that (we) saw a light object, it was white, and very fast." Investigators interviewed the captain and first officer on Aug. 10, 1997. The flight engineer hadn't seen the object and was not interviewed. The report, filed under NYC97SA193, said the flight was opposite John F. Kennedy Airport at 5:07 p.m. Eastern time - near the area where TWA Flight 800 went down July 17, 1996..... The transportation safety board report said the Swissair captain saw the cylindrical object for less than a second. He did not see any wings and was not sure it was an aircraft. "He had never been so close to other traffic before," said the report. "It passed over the cockpit, slightly right of centerline. If it had been any lower, it would have hit the aircraft. "As the object passed by, there was no noise, no wake turbulence, and no disruption or anomalies with any of the flight or engine instruments." The plane was flying in clear weather to Boston from Philadelphia at the time. The sun was at the pilot,s back. He apparently did not have time to take evasive action. "There was no exhaust or smoke, no fire, and he could not accurately discern its size. The captain reported his total time as 15,000-plus flight hours. He had never seen a missile in flight." The first officer, whose flight time totalled 7,500 hours, said he was bent over to adjust the volume on his headset when he looked up and saw the object pass overhead "very quickly." "It was close enough that he ducked his head because he thought it would hit them. . . . He thought it passed about 100 to 200 feet above the airplane and between the right side of the fuselage and the No. 3 engine." The first officer said no markings were visible and the object appeared to be the size of a thumbnail held at arm's length. He said he had previously encountered a weather balloon over Italy, and the object did not look like the balloon. He had witnessed missile launches from the ground previously, the report said. The report said the nearest weather balloons are launched from Upton, N.Y., 43 nautical miles northeast of JFK twice daily, at 7 p.m. and 3 a.m. Eastern time and usually take 25 to 28 minutes to reach 23,000 feet. Balloons are light tan or brownish, or black and red, said the report, adding the wind was blowing from the north, almost at right angles to the aircraft. Investigators also checked radar data and plotted the plane's flight path. "There was no evidence of an opposite direction target, either beacon or non-beacon," said the report.

August 12, 1997  8:40pm      8 Raby` al-THaany 1418 A.H.     9 Av 5757
Bruce Cornet (bcornet@monmouth.com) reports video taping a possible missile attack on a Boeing 767 jetliner over Sea Bright, NJ on 12 August 1997 on approach to JFK. Sea Bright is located on the northeastern coast of the Atlantic Ocean near Long Island, not far from the area where the TWA Flight 800 exploded. Bruce caught... eight frames of the possible missile.... on video (Click for jpg file). The missile or possible space debris was video taped descending toward the airliner flying at a lower altitude. (Click for animated gif file)   In the first frame, the ... missile appears to be glowing at the top of the frame and heading down toward the aircraft. The second frame shows a brilliant flash around the missile. In the third frame, the missile appears to be on fire. The fourth frame shows the missile smoking and turning sideways. This frame shows a definite cigar or missile shaped object and not a meteorite. A loud sound is also heard probably from the explosion or the swoosh of the missile. The missile then appears to fall into the inter-coastal waterway. The missile appears to have malfunctioned, and only partly detonated, but fortunately did no known damage to the jetliner. The FBI and other authorities are examining the video in detail.

Bruce commented:  I actually saw the aircraft well enough as it turned above me, but the image is too dark to be certain of the insignia on the tail. It looked like a Boeing 767, although my identification of aircraft is new and it might have been an airbus. Its shape and size, however, fits the smaller 767. I contacted the FBI. At first I was put off and told to check with Kennedy security to see if they are interested. I did, and was told to check with the county police over jurisdiction. Special Agent Sean M. Cavanagh spoke to me. I told him what I had. He said send me a video copy, which I did. Then he and the FBI contacted me with apologies for giving me the run-a-round. They scheduled an apointment to interview me at my house. Sean Cavanagh, and Special Agents Theodore J. Otto III and Pamela Ann Culos came to my house on 23 September 1997 for the interview. Ted said that he was in charge of the FBI investigation into the TWA flight 800 disaster, and was following up on any leads involving missile sightings. He and Sean said that they had reviewed my video copy dozens of times and spent hours discussing the possibilities or interpretations. They were interested in my interpretation, because I was there. They were particularly interested in the sound I thought I heard and which was recorded at the time of the incident. I played the original tape on my Sony Hi-8 camcorder for them, pointing out the faint swoosh that can be heard as the apparent missile passed the jetliner. Ted and Pam acknowledged that they could hear the sound. Ted instructed me about what a missile in flight would look like, and pointed out that the bright light at the rear of the missile was the rocket exhaust burning, and that one could not see the missile itself at night, only its exhaust. The agents thanked me for my help and cooperation, and left. Ted said he would make a Hi-8 copy of my original and send it to me, along with paperwork for the original. I have received nothing in the mail from them to date. On the video you see the jetliner approaching low and slow over Sea Bright, then banking to its right as it turned over the inner coastal waterway. I followed the jet with my camcorder as it moved north away from me, and about 20-30 seconds after it turned the missile or its fire flashed by it to the left of the jetliner as the animated gif reveals. The jetliner continued on its course towards Kennedy without further incident. The sound that was heard could have been coupled with the sound of it splashing into the waters of the inner coastal waterway. Aside from the flash just as the apparent missile passed over the jetliner, there was no apparent explosion. Whatever it was, it was solid, rod-shaped, and travelling just below the speed of sound. I calculated its speed by using the wingspan of the jetliner for comparison. I calculated a speed of about 730 mph. I have trouble with it being a rocket booster on re-entry from space or a piece of space debris, because its speed was not supersonic. The place where it came down could have been on a trajectory from a ship or plane out at sea, timed to pass over or near the jetliner just after it turned in a predictable fashion. It may not have been designed to explode, but to cause an electrical malfuction or to shoot shrapnel into the aircraft. If it was a hostile missile, it apparently failed. These possibilities were discussed with the FBI agents.

Mid June 1998     The UFO Research Coalition Report on Swissair 127 ISBN 1-928957-00-5 (1999) Page 26
Bobet (Captain of Swissair 127 involved in the August 1997 incident reported advised that Swissair had experienced another UFO sighting in the vicinity of JFK International Airport in mid-June. The airplane had been airborne only several minutes, and was en route to Zurich. All three cockpit crew members saw the object. No report was made to Air Traffic Control authorities at the time, and apparently no notification of U.S. authorities was made subsequently. Only Swissair management was briefed by the crew.

June 12, 1998   Reported on September 15, 1999    BBC News Published at 18:29 GMT 19:29 UK
A UFO that narrowly avoided colliding with a passenger jet flying from London's Heathrow Airport has baffled aviation experts. The metallic grey-coloured object was spotted by the pilots of an Oslo-bound McDonnell Douglas MD81 plane on 12 June 1998, and passed just 20-50 metres from them. The captain said the object was the size of a small aircraft, while the co-pilot described it as a "bright light, very close". Reporting to an air traffic controller, the captain said "a flare or something passed 20 feet from our aircraft", but nothing had been recorded on the radar screen. The pilot later filed a near-miss report, known as an airprox, in which he said the object looked similar to a fighter. But a report by the Civil Aviation Authority found no explanation for the incident, which has also confounded local military experts and local police. "Air traffic controllers were certain that even a very small aircraft would have been detected, particularly on Heathrow radar," said the report. Although the evidence of the unnamed airline's crew is considered to be reliable, the report notes that they only caught a brief glimpse of the object.

September 9, 1999     The Financial Times
A cargo airline yesterday said it had suspended flights to Pakistan after the pilots of one of its aircraft reported seeing a mysterious "flash and explosion" shortly after taking off from the Karachi airport several days ago. Lufthansa Cargo India ... filed a complaint to India's Director - General of Civil Aviation saying the pilots .... saw the bright flash of an apparent explosion at around 2:30 am local time on Monday about five miles from the Karachi airport. According to the complaint, Lufthansa officials speculated that it could have been a missile explosion. Just before the blast, ... the Karachi air traffic control directed the aircraft to turn right. As the aircraft turned and crossed an altitude of 3,000 feet, the pilots saw the bright flash near the aircraft on their left side. India's Director - General of Civil Aviation said ... the explosion "appeared to have narrowly missed the aircraft" and "brightly" lit up the cockpit. The statement said it seemed to the light crew the flash had "a trajectory coming from the ground". The Lufthansa crew reported the incident to the Karachi radar tower, and two other incoming aircraft - a Pakistan International Airlines flight and a private Pakistani carrier - reportedly confirmed seeing the explosion.

February 21, 2002   'Rockets' reported fired at two jetliners Tom Ramstack THE WASHINGTON TIMES
An Alexandria woman said she saw a "flare or rocket" ascending toward a US Airways flight landing at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport last month, similar to a report from a Southwest Airlines pilot landing at Baltimore-Washington International Airport Sunday. The Federal Aviation Administration is investigating a report by the pilot of Southwest Flight 454 that he saw what looked like a model rocket pass on the left side of his aircraft Sunday evening.  The FAA says it has no reports of the rocket sighting by the Alexandria resident, Joyce Mucci. The trade association public relations coordinator said she observed the incident while driving home from work Jan. 20 at sunset near Reagan Airport. "It was like a rocket, kind of a reddish thing that came up from the river bank," Mrs. Mucci said. "It was aimed toward the back of the jet. Maybe the pilot didn't see it." Mrs. Mucci said she doubted it was a model rocket. "It did not look like any model rocket I've ever seen," she said. Her son used to play with model rockets when he was a child. "When he was a kid, we used to make model rockets, and they don't look like that. It was right toward the back of the jet, right behind the engine. It went at an angle like it was aimed at the jet."  She added, however, that the object did not get close enough that it could have brought down the airplane. "It may be nothing, but it's important for somebody to follow up on this," Mrs. Mucci said. She said the "flare or rocket" rose from a spot down the slope of the Potomac River beyond the jogging trail next to Reagan Airport, halfway between Memorial Bridge and the airport.  She said she called a Federal Aviation Administration telephone number the next day. She left a message on voice mail but received no reply. After news accounts of the incident at BWI Sunday, Mrs. Mucci called the FBI yesterday. "The FBI guy said, 'Hold on a minute,'" Mrs. Mucci said. "Then a woman in the background said, 'I don't want to talk to another psychic.' Then I was put through to somebody's voice mail and I didn't leave a message." FAA Eastern Region spokesman Jim Peters said he had no information on Mrs. Mucci's January report. "We have no record of receiving a call from Mrs. Mucci on or about that day," Mr. Peters said. He also said he had "no idea" of how often other people say they have seen rockets near airplanes. FBI spokesman Chris Murray said, "Our office is unaware of that incident."

Southwest Flight 454 was on approach 12 to 14 miles southeast of BWI at 3,000 feet at 7:10 p.m. Sunday when the pilot said he saw the rocket. The FAA acknowledged the incident at BWI publicly for the first time Tuesday. Mr. Peters said yesterday the agency was looking into it. Fraser Jones, spokesman for the national office of the FAA, said reports of rockets flying toward airplanes are rare. "We don't tally those that I'm aware of," Mr. Jones said. "I have not heard of reports of that kind before."  Local airport authorities also said they are unaware of a "flare or rocket" near Reagan Airport in January.  "I haven't heard anything about that," said Tom Sullivan, spokesman for the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority, which manages Reagan and Washington Dulles International airports. "If it was reported by our tower, our police would have been alerted." Mrs. Mucci's report was the first time he heard of someone seeing a projectile apparently fired at a commercial airplane in the Washington area. Occasionally, passers-by mistakenly report "near misses but not rockets," Mr. Sullivan said. The only similar report of a rocket fired at a commercial airplane in the United States followed the explosion and crash of TWA Flight 800 off the coast of New York on July 17, 1996.The National Transportation Safety Board explained the witness' reports by saying that after the front part of the plane broke off during an electrical fire and fuel-tank explosion, the wings and rear part of the fuselage continued climbing at a sharp angle, creating an upward streak of light.

February 26, 2002   E-mail to author of this website from Joyce Mucci who provided the information to the Washington Times mentioned above
Dear Michael:
(Name Witheld) forwarded your email to me after my story was published in the Washington Times. I called the newspaper out of frustration with the FBI (in particular) and the FAA. Needless to say, I do not have to tell you that I "saw what I saw". However, I am convinced that unless you are a paid informant, pilot, law enforcement officer or lawyer, the FBI and the FAA have no use for your information. So much for the public relations outreach by the administration. The area that I witnessed the "rocket, flare or whatever" is inaccessible by car. Additionally, if someone was down there with a missile no one from the bike path or the road would see them. The rocket was on a trajectory out and up toward the aircraft (just aft of the right engine). It seems complete nonsense to believe that it was a kid's rocket. Someone fired something at the jet while on final approach to Reagan. It also interesting to note that the area from where the rocket came is between the Memorial Bridge and the 14th Street bridge. It would be difficult to fire a missile on planes approaching from the south because on the east side of the Potomac is Bolling Airforce Base and on the west is Old Town Alexandria. Keep up the good work. By the way, if my plane is shot down coming out of the Reagan, tell everyone it was not a center fuel tank explosion.
Regards,
Joyce Mucci

July 5, 2002   Newsmax.com   Report: El Al Plane in Near Missile Miss
Israeli Minister of Transportation Ephraim Sneh announced Friday afternoon (Israeli time) that he debriefed the pilot of the El Al flight who reported seeing a surface-to-air missile explode near his plane Thursday night, according to the Israeli news service Arutz Sheva.The El Al aircraft was in international air space over Russia at the time."Sneh, a retired IDF brigadier-general explained the El Al pilot is a veteran Israel Air Force fighter pilot, a person who knows how to differentiate between aeronautical or weather entities and a missile," Arutz Sheva said. The transportation minister said that although the missile exploded only kilometers from the plane, he suspects it was an accident - and not a deliberate attempt to bring the El Al plane down.

July 5, 2002 Posted: 9:11 AM EDT (1311 GMT) CNN
KIEV, Ukraine -- Israel and the Ukraine have downplayed an El Al pilot's report that he saw an air-to-surface-missile explode as he flew over the former Soviet state. The pilot of the Israeli national airline said he saw the missile during a flight between Tel Aviv and Moscow, Israel's Transport Minister said on Friday. The reported incident comes nine months after a Russian plane was downed by a Ukrainian missile as it flew over the Black Sea during a journey from Tel Aviv to Siberia, killing 78 people. The Ukraine military regime initially denied responsibility for that incident before admitting it had been one of its missiles that had accidentally been fired. The El Al pilot, in the latest incident, is an experienced combat veteran of the Israeli air force. A Ukrainian pilot also reported seeing a bright light in the sky over the Ukraine on Thursday, Interfax Ukraine quoted an unidentified source in the Transport Ministry Department for Aviation as saying. But both the Ukrainian and Israeli authorities were stressing the El Al plane did not come under attack on Thursday. Israeli Transport Minister Ephraim Sneh said the Israeli plane was never in danger and voiced doubt it had come under attack, Reuters reported. Amos Shapira, El Al's Managing Director, told Army Radio: "The (El Al) pilot saw a flash ... It was at least 10 to 100 miles (16 to 160 km) away. The plane was in no danger." The Ukrainian Defence Ministry said its army had not conducted any missile launches since last October's disaster. Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma, quoted by Interfax Ukraine in Copenhagen, where he is attending an EU meeting, called the suggestion that the incident involved a Ukrainian missile "absurd." Konstantin Khyvrenko, a Ukrainian Defence Ministry spokesman, said the reported sighting "could be anything -- something from the natural world, like a sudden change of temperature (or) lightning strike." Despite that, Israel Radio said Israeli security authorities had asked the United States for any satellite data indicating a missile had been launched over Ukraine on Thursday.

July 27, 2002; Page B02  Washington Post
For Renny Rogers, it was strange enough that military jets were flying low over his home in Waldorf in the middle of the night. It was what he thinks he saw when he headed outside to look early yesterday that floored him. "It was this object, this light-blue object, traveling at a phenomenal rate of speed," Rogers said. "This Air Force jet was right behind it, chasing it, but the object was just leaving him in the dust." Military officials confirm that two F-16 jets from Andrews Air Force Base were scrambled early yesterday after radar detected an unknown aircraft in area airspace. But they scoff at the idea that the jets were chasing a strange and speedy, blue unidentified flying object. "We had a track of interest, so we sent up some aircraft," said Maj. Douglas Martin, a spokesman for the North American Aerospace Defense Command in Colorado, which has responsibility for defending U.S. airspace. "Everything was fine in the sky, so they returned home." At the same time, military officials say they do not know just what the jets were chasing, because whatever it was disappeared. "There are any number of scenarios, but we don't know what it was," said Maj. Barry Venable, another spokesman for NORAD. "It was a routine launch," said Lt. Col. Steve Chase, a senior officer with the wing, which keeps pilots and armed jets on 24-hour alert at Andrews to respond to incidents as part of an air defense system protecting Washington after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Rogers remains convinced that what he saw was not routine. "It looked like a shooting star with no trailing mist," he said. "I've never seen anything like it."

October 20, 2002, at 4:20 p.m. EDT, FOX 23 News videographer    
Brandon Mowry, was filming a weather segment for WXXA-TV in Albany, New York. While the camera was still running, he lifted the camera 180 degrees to get another shot of a plane taking off.  He caught seven frames (1/3rd second) of digital videotape of the jet airliner passing out of upper right corner and a strange, missile-like, unidentified aerial object rapidly passing through sky and seemingly through cloud estimated to be at 5,000 feet or more. Videotape © Fox 23 News WXXA, Albany, New York. View video

October 29, 2002 Albany, N.Y. http://www.earthfiles.com/news/news.cfm?ID=426&category=Environment  -
On Sunday, October 20, 2002, at 4:20 p.m. EDT, FOX 23 News videographer, Brandon Mowry, was filming a weather segment for WXXA-TV in Albany, New York. While the camera was still running, he lifted the camera 180 degrees to get another shot of an airliner taking off. He did not know at the time that he caught ten frames (1/3rd second) of digital videotape of the jet airliner passing out of the upper right corner and a strange, missile-like, unidentified aerial object rapidly passing through sky and seemingly through a cloud estimated to be at 5,000 feet. He discovered the rapid object in the editing room and showed it to his colleagues. Someone called the police who went to the edit room, saw the tape, and promptly called the FBI. Here now is Brandon Mowry, the cameraman, with his story about what happened that day and with the FBI.

Interview:
Brandon Mowry, Videographer, Fox 23 News WXXA, Albany, New York:
Last Sunday, nine days ago (Oct. 20, 2002), I was shooting a weather shot for the news that evening. I was at the Albany International Airport at the end of a runway. It was 4:30 p.m. EDT and I was filming a plane taking off towards me and eventually heading directly over my head. As I was following the plane, it came directly above me, I had to adjust the camera 180 degrees and catch the plane taking off away. It was during that adjustment when I wasn't looking through the viewfinder that this UFO, or ?, flew by. Like I said, I didn't notice it until I got back to the station. I drove directly back to the station, threw it into the edit machine and was checking the stillness of the shots, seeing which one would be best to use and saw this thing fly by. It was very, very fast. I saw it. I rewound it and paused it to see what it was. I saw something very, very strange. And very, very interesting. Then I grabbed the person closest to me who was an editor and showed him. He couldn't believe it. Then I began showing everybody else at the station. At that time, I decided that I needed to go out and shoot an accident. So, I left immediately and went and shot an accident. A half an hour later when I got back to the station, there were police there checking out the footage. They were in the process of calling their Captain to come in to check it out. Also, when the Captain got there, he took one look at it and called the FBI and the FBI was at the station within the hour.

WHAT IS ON YOUR VIDEOTAPE? It's very distinct, even when you don't blow it up. We zoomed in on it and kind of cleaned it up to take a closer look at it. It's a very thin rod or cylinder-shaped, round cylinder rod, dark, with two sets of wings. One set in the front and one set in the back. And the wings were white. Small little appendages. It looks a lot like a missile.

I SAW A FRAME SOMEBODY E-MAILED ME AND I THOUGHT IT WAS EXTREMELY STRANGE IN STRUCTURE. BUT WHAT REALLY IMPRESSED ME WAS HOW ALMOST TRANSPARENT IT SEEMED. Right. I don't know. We talked with some ex-military personnel because a lot of people are saying this thing looks like a missile. A lot of people think it is some kind of secret military craft. He looked at it and said that it doesn't look like any missile he's ever seen before. But still, a lot of people are saying it looks like a missile. It resembles more of a missile than anything else. But it could be anything, you know.  The SR-17 Blackbird, I understand, and the B-2 bombers ­ the technology was there and we had those, the military had those 20 years before the public knew about them. Maybe this is something the military has that no one knows about. But it's just as possible that it could be a UFO.

WHAT HAPPENED WHEN THE FBI GOT THERE? WHAT KIND OF QUESTIONS DID THEY ASK AND WHAT HAPPENED? OK. The FBI got to the station. Talked to me about half an hour in the break room and had me meet three other FBI agents up at the airport to show them exactly where I shot this thing, where it came from, what direction, where the plane was and everything like that. Then they confiscated my tape. It was the original tape. I said, 'I would like to keep this. I shot it.' They said, 'Well, it's evidence. You have to give it to us.' I didn't throw any punches or anything. I was a little upset, but I just did it. They took it and that tape is in Washington right now being analyzed, from what I can understand.

AT THE FBI. Right. Then two days later, the FBI called me up in the morning and asked me to come down. They needed to ask me a couple of questions that they forgot to ask me. So, I went down and they talked to me in a little room for about an hour.

THIS IS IN ALBANY? Right, in FBI headquarters here. And after they were done talking to me, then they said, 'You know what's next.' I said, 'What's that?' They said, 'We're going to ask you if you will take a polygraph test.' And I didn't have anything to hide so I said, 'Sure, I'll take one.' They took me to the New York State Police Department where there was a polygraph examiner and I went upstairs with him into a room. He told me how it worked, everything like that. They ran a couple of pre-tests on me to see if I was able to be polygraphed. I guess one out of ten people aren't. I was, though, according to them. Then they told me the questions that I was going to be asked. I was really nervous, but then they asked me and we ran through a kind of pre-test of everything they were going to ask me and then we did the actual test. And that took about three hours in this room with this guy.

WHAT KIND OF QUESTIONS DID THEY ASK YOU? The first and last questions were: 'Do you live in the United States?' That was the first question. The last question was: 'Do you live in Canada?' And all the questions in between were like, 'Have you ever lied to the FBI? Have you ever committed a felony? Did you tamper with that tape?' And one strange question was, 'Did you receive $500 from a Clifford somebody that used to work at Fox that wanted revenge on FOX because he got fired from there?'  I checked that out at the station and nobody has ever worked there named Clifford. So, I don't know what that was about. Then another, I went through with everything. Granted, I was nervous and my heart was pumping even through those questions like, 'Do you live in the United States?' My heart just started racing even though I had nothing to hide. Then they told me that after the test, they came and sat down in front of me and told me I didn't do too well. I said, 'What do you mean I didn't do too well?' They go, 'Well, you failed.' I said, 'What? I failed? That can't be!' He said, 'You're lying. You're not telling us something. It just doesn't add up, Brandon. There's too many coincidences here.' I just couldn't believe it. He kept pushing me and pushing me and saying, 'You're going to lose your job. This is going to be on the front page of the paper. You were on the radio show this morning. People are going to think you are insane. You are going to give FOX a bad name and you're going to lose your job. So, you better tell us what is going on.' And I just kept telling them. And he goes, 'What do you think is going to happen when that tape comes back and it says you tampered with it?' I said, 'That's impossible! I guarantee 100% when that tape comes back, it will not ­ it will say I did not tamper with it.' I just looked at him and he drove me to tears. He was just pushing me and pushing me and I did not know what was going on. He drove me to tears and then got up and grabbed the polygraph papers and left the room. I was in there for fifteen minutes by myself and all I could say over and over was, 'What's going on?' I couldn't believe it. What's going to happen? I'm not lying, you know? Then, a few minutes later, he comes back in and tells me, 'I'm sorry. I apologize. I re-examined the polygraph and it turns out you were telling the truth and I can't say I'm sorry enough.'

WHEN DID THIS OCCUR? This was last Tuesday, a week ago today. I think it was a whole game. I think that was their whole plan to do exactly what they did to intimidate me and try to make me admit to something I didn't do and maybe it would go away.

COULD YOU GO BACK TO THE EDITING ROOM WHEN THE FBI FIRST SHOWED UP ­ BECAUSE YOU WERE THERE, RIGHT? Right.

WHAT WAS THE DEMEANOR WHEN THEY CAME INTO THE EDITING ROOM AND WHAT WERE THE FIRST THINGS THEY DID AND SAID AND ASKED THEN? They came in. There was only one guy at first and he came in and it was ­ he just kind of looked at it. You could tell, he was like, 'Wow!' look on his face. But it wasn't like anyone else who had seen it before who were like 'Wow, what is that?' He just kind of kept to himself. He had a notebook and he looked at it over and over and over. It was business after that. You could tell that this was something that is a problem or needs attention. And he went right at it and interviewed me and wrote down everything he asked me. He asked a bunch of questions about my past, stuff like that.

HOW OLD ARE YOU? 24.

AND YOU'VE BEEN WORKING IN TELEVISION FOR ABOUT 2.5 YEARS. Right.

SO, YOU'VE REALLY GONE FROM HIGH SCHOOL TO WORK WITH A COUPLE OF YEARS IN COLLEGE. Right.

SO, FOR THEM TO QUESTION EVEN YOUR BACKGROUND, THERE REALLY ISN'T MUCH FOR THEM TO QUESTION BECAUSE YOU HAVE BEEN WORKING AS A VIDEOGRAPHER FOR 2.5 YEARS RIGHT OUT OF SCHOOL? Right, yeah. They were asking people around at work when I wasn't around what kind of a person is Brandon? Would he ever do something like this? Does he seem like a person who would make up something like this? I don't see how ­ maybe they are doing their job. And that's good that they are covering all the bases. I hope they would do that. But this is on tape and the time line is documented. 4:20 I told them I shot that plane. The plane that was in the shot, they checked the airport and found out that that plane took off at 4:20. I was back at the station at 5 or before discovering this thing and showing it to everybody. So, that's 40 minutes I had to supposedly doctor this tape. Thirty of those minutes were spent in the news car on the way to the station. All I have in that news car is a scanner and a cell phone.

YOU ARE SAYING WITHOUT QUESTION THAT YOU DIDN'T EVEN KNOW THAT THIS WAS ON THE TAPE UNTIL YOU SCREENED IT IN THE STATION? Exactly. I wasn't even looking through the viewfinder when this thing flew by. It's been 9 days now and we haven't heard anything. This tape has been in Washington for a week now and we haven't had any explanation as to what this thing is.

YOU HAVE A GOOD DUB OF IT? Yeah. It's a 2nd generation dub, but this is digital video. I think the big thing about this is that we shot it on really good equipment, a $20,000 camera, whereas most, a lot of, UFOs are shot on home videos. And this thing ­ what saved me here ­ people have said this is an insect. 'It's an insect close to the screen.' Or, 'It's an error in the tape.' But that's all discredited because if you see the whole video, there is one cloud in the upper left hand corner and this thing goes behind that cloud. It's so easy to see. That's not an insect, you know!

IT'S SOMETHING AS FAR AWAY AS THE CLOUD AND GOES BEHIND IT AND HAS THIS VERY STRANGE, LONG, MISSILE-LIKE STRUCTURE WITH THESE APPENDAGES AT THE FRONT AND BACK AND HAS WHAT SEEMS TO BE ALMOST AN EFFORT TO CLOAK ITSELF IN A KIND OF INVISIBILITY THAT REFLECTS THE BLUE SKY. I never thought of it like that but I guess you could say that. Yeah. I guess you could say that.

I'M ALSO CURIOUS IF IN THAT FIRST ARRIVAL OF THE FBI IN THE EDITING ROOM, DID THE FELLOW WHO WAS TAKING NOTES ASK TO YOU OR ANYONE ELSE AT THE STATION ABOUT THIS BEING AN UNIDENTIFIED FLYING OBJECT IN THE CONTEXT OF SOMETHING EXTRATERRESTRIAL? No, no, they never said anything like that. There was a lot of talk around the station like that. But, no ­ the FBI never said anything like that. But I would like to add that this thing that is flying through the screen ­ it's only ­ we checked what the cloud ceiling was that day. And the cloud ceiling was 5000 feet. This thing was at least 5,000 feet in the air and it was almost as long as that plane, which is about 300 feet in the air, from that (longer) distance. And it's only on the screen for about 7 frames. We shoot, those cameras shoot 30 frames a second. So this thing was in the screen for a third of a second. And it's that far away. When you see like a jet up there flying, it looks like it's a snail because it's so far away because of our perception, it looks like it's going slow. But this thing is just ­ a third of a second through that frame and it's gone at least 5,000 feet in the air. I mean, I don't know of anything that can go that fast that's on earth.

HOW BIG IS IT REALLY? Exactly. It looks huge and it's so far away. It's got to be hundreds of feet in length and going thousands of miles an hour.

WHEN YOU WERE LAST TUESDAY SUBJECTED TO THAT LIE DETECTOR TEST FOR THE THREE HOURS AND ALL OF THE QUESTIONS THAT WERE ASKED, DID ANYONE IN THAT PROCESS EVER EVEN BRING UP THE LETTERS 'UFO' OR 'EXTRATERRESTRIAL?' No. No. Not at all.

DID THEY BRING UP ANY WORDS AT ALL THAT WOULD SUGGEST THEY EVEN HAD AN IDEA WHAT IT MIGHT BE? No. What was weird was at the end. I had tears in my eyes when I came back down. The agent who brought me to the New York State Police Dept. He was downstairs and the other guy who administered the test looked at the agent and he said, 'Brandon is a little upset with me.' Tears are rolling down my face. He's like, 'I told him that I misread the polygraph test and I told him that he didn't pass and he got a little upset with me, but he did OK.' And then the guy just looked at me, the FBI agent, and smiled and goes, 'I knew you would pass. I knew you would do it. I just knew you were telling the truth." And he was shaking my hand. But he said, 'We still don't know what this thing is and I'm going to need your help to find out what this thing is.' And I just looked at him. In the heat of the moment, I was so upset. It was close to one of, on the top of the list, of one of the worst days in my life emotionally. He looks at me and says, 'I'm going to need your help. I'm going to give you a call. You still need to help us figure out what this is.'"

Note from website author - For further analysis of this incident see http://www.nuforc.org/CB021020.html

November 28, 2002 The Associated Press Filed at 8:33 a.m. ET
BEN GURION INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT, Israel (AP) -- Passengers targeted in Thursday's failed missile attack on an Israeli aircraft said they heard a loud "boom" just after takeoff, but were told by the crew it was a technical problem. Kerry Levy, 25, said the aircraft's wheels had just lifted off the runway at Mombasa airport in Kenya shortly after 8 a.m. when she felt a rattle."It felt like something fell off the wing," she said after the plane landed safely at Ben Gurion International Airport later Thursday. Two missiles were fired toward the plane from a white four-wheel-drive vehicle parked more than a mile from the airport, said Kenyan police spokesman King'ori Mwangi. The three men in the vehicle escaped, Mwangi said. The jet's captain, Rafi Marek, said the crew felt a "kind of bump" on the plane and initially believed they hit a bird. He and some passengers saw two white vapor trails on the left side of the aircraft. "The passengers saw the white vapor trails. We calmed them down,'" Marek said at a news conference at the airport near Tel Aviv. ``There was no unnecessary excitement. The passengers were very calm." After the missile attack, the pilot considered an emergency landing in Nairobi, Kenya, to check whether the plane was damaged, but after consultations it was decided to continue to Israel, he said at the news conference.

July 25, 2005  http://homelandsecurityus.com/SOsborne.asp   Sean Osborne Military Affairs and Senior Analyst The Northeast Intelligence Network
The following report has been corroborated by a high ranking US military source. This report states in essence that a USAF B1-B Lancer, a long-range strategic bomber, was targeted for shoot down by three suspected Islamic terrorists one week ago at Tinker Air Force Base, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. The terrorists were forced to abort their mission when run off by alert USAF Security.
SITUATION:  On 14 Jul 05, three individuals were observed outside of the perimeter of Tinker AFB, OK.  They were looking through binoculars, taking pictures and one appeared to be holding a large weapon at chest level.  The weapon appeared to be aimed towards a low flying aircraft.  The three individuals were described as being of Middle Eastern descent and left the area when approached. The weapon was later identified as a rocket launcher (MANPAD) and the low flying aircraft to be a B-1 Bomber.  FBI in Oklahoma City and AFOSI determined the threat to be credible.  Due to this and other recent incidents and security concerns surrounding Tinker AFB, OK, the potential for suspicious activity in the Tinker AFB (TAFB) Area of Responsibility (AOR) has increased.  While there is no specific threat information directed towards the TAFB AOR, it is imperative that all personnel remember their responsibilities to report any and all suspicious activity they observe.

Friday, September 16, 2005
An American West Flight out of New York was apparently fired upon by a surface to air missile.  The pilot and passengers witnessed it and were questioned by the FAA and FBI.  America West 17 took off from JFK at 6:05pm EDT.  The captain reported an ‘irregularity’ to air traffic control as the plane was ascending.  The plane continued to Phoenix and landed safely at 8:55pm MST. The sighting was reported near Colt’s Neck, NJ, which is a major route south out of NY. FAA set up a small temporary flight restriction around the area while checking radar files.

Monday, September 26, 2005  http://www.nuforc.org/webreports/046/S46635.html
Location: Kings Park, NY. About 10:00 PM Sky was partially cloudy - Was sky watching - followed movement of jet heading due north - I would assume that it was over Long Island Sound or nearso as I live less than a mile from the sound. As jet approached a thin cloud, a ball shape light up - like a lightbulb being turned on - but got bright very rapidly - it was a perfect circle shape when it was lit. It was at least the size of the jet or larger. It may have been my imagination but it appeared that the jet altered course to avoid it or stay away from it. As the jet left the vicinity the light went out. Unfortunately I have not seen any other report of this - I would imagine that somebody on the jet must have seen it - at the very least the pilot and copilot as it appeared they swerved or altered course slightly to avoid it.

Saturday, December 3, 2005   Pilot Reports 'Missile' Fired at Jetliner Near LAX (11/28/05)
http://www.kyw1060.com/news_archives_detail.cfm?newsitemid=50753

FBI agents and Homeland Security officials spent the weekend investigating the report of a possible missile fired at an American Airlines plane taking off from Los Angeles International Airport on November 28. Sources tell ABC News the pilot of American Airlines Flight 621, en route to Chicago, radioed air traffic controllers after takeoff from LAX. He told them a missile had been fired at the aircraft and missed. The plane was over water  about 6000 feet off the shoreline when the pilot said he saw a smoke trail pass by the cockpit. FBI agents believe it was a flare or a bottle rocket, but say they may never know if that's what it actually was.