For UFO Study? - The Black Vault

Strange items of UFO lore like "space grass" and "saucer nests" came
magnetic fields from UFO's were sup- earth—and they became a celebrated
posed to be responsible. By experiment "proof" of other-worldly UFO's. Jim and
the Colorado group found that stopping a Coral Lorenzo of APRO generously
car engine (whose ignition coil proved loaned these crown jewels of saucer lore
the most vulnerable point) would take a to the Colorado project for study,
magnetic field at least as powerful as At a Bureau of Internal Revenue labo-
20,000 gauss. And, Ford experts advised ratory, a sensitive neutron-activation
it, a telltale test could readily show if a analysis was made of the "UFO" magcar
had actually met with all that mag- nesium—and also of commercial magnenetism:
sium furnished by Dow Chemical Corn-
Like a nail laid north-south and ham- pany. The "UFO" specimen was "not
mered on an anvil, sheet metal becomes nearly as pure" as the commercial sammagnetized
when it's formed
pie; it's supposed ultrapurity
was a
into a car's door panels, ^^^HJ^^HH^^^I
m yth. Its only claim
hood, deck, and fenders. Con- ^^^^^^l^^^l
to oddity—an abnormal consequently
a car has a distinc- ^^^^^^^^^^^1 tent °^ ^e element strontium
tive magnetic pattern—alike ^^^^^f l^^^^l —vanished when Dow recfor
all cars of a given make ^^^^f ^^^^1 ords showed they'd made exand
model—which can easily ^^f j^^^^l perimental batches of stronbe
mapped by exploring the ^^V J^^^l tium-rich magnesium,
body with a compass needle. ^^B ^^^^1 UFO fans complained bit-
But exposure to a strong ^^H ^^^^1 terly, as the study went on,
magnetic field should detect- ^^K j^^^H that relatively few of their
ably change this pattern. ^^^^ ^^^1 reports were acted upon. So
(Even a horseshoe magnet's ^^^Bk l^^H many UFO incidents were
modest 1,000-gauss field did, ^^^^H^»__^^H reported, Dr. Condon replies,
a trial by the Colorado group ^^^^^^•hg^^H tnat investigators could tackconfirmed.)
^^HHHHI^^^IH le only the most promising
Three cars said to have Mischievous planet Venus ones. And field teams came
tangled with UFO's were thus (pictured through astro- to feel like firemen answering
tested. One was a 1964 nomical telescope) chased false alarms, he says, as even
Chrysler convertible; its STconTo^^rt ^ these top-grade cases kept
owner, a western business- sometimes spectacularly falling apart under close inman,
said a red-orange sau- bright, it figures in many spection. Here are examples:
cer seen late at night had re P° rts of UFO sightings. An UFO scare that scramstopped
it and put off its
bled three waves of fighter
lights and radio. But compass readings planes at a Pacific coast air base was
showed its magnetic pattern just the traced to visual and radar mirages of dissame
as that of another 1964 Chrysler tant ships, caused by exceptional atmosconvertible,
found in a used-car lot. Test pheric conditions.
results with the other two cars were An UFO spying on a military-rocket
equally negative.
launching—or so it appeared, from a
The cars, it was proved, had met with tracking-camera movie film—proved to be
no unusual magnetic fields from UFO's. the planet Venus. As the camera tilted
Why they balked, and what the drivers downward to follow the receding missile
really saw, remains anyone's guess; their toward the horizon, it made Venus apunsupported
"single-witness" stories could pear to shoot upward past the rocket,
neither be refuted nor verified.
When a skyball, sometimes red and
sometimes blue, reportedly chased police
Case of the "unearthly" metal
cars in central Georgia at up to 75 m.p.h.
Fragments of magnesium metal al- on successive nights, Venus again was
legedly fell to earth from an UFO that ex- positively identified as the culprit. At the
ploded over Ubatuba, Brazil, in 1957. A time, the planet was at its spectacular
Brazilian government analysis reported- brightest, and magnified by mist near the
ly found them of a purity unattainable on horizon—where it also took on startling
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