Part 29 (1/2)

When the ”rock hounds” checked the recording tapes in the shack they found that several of the Geiger tubes had been triggered at 10:17AM The registered radiation increase was about 100 tiround activity

Threethe next two months the ”mineral club's”

equiprapevine reported visual sightings of UFO's One of the visual sightings was substantiated by radar

After these incidents the ”mineral club” kept its instruthis period while the radiation level res in the area dropped off too

The ”nificance of the data they had obtained

Accordingly, the scientist and the group s They had friends working on ed to visit and confer with theated the possibility of unusual sunspot activity, but sunspots had been norh radiation To clinch the elimination of sunspots as a cause, their record tapes showed no burst of radiation when sunspot activity had been abnormal

The ”rock hounds” checked every possible research project that ht have produced some stray radiation for their instru They checked and rechecked their instruht have induced false readings They let other scientists in on their findings, hoping that these outsiders ers on errors that had been overlooked

Now, more than a year after the occurrence of the mysterious incidents that they had recorded, a year spent in analyzing their data, the ”rock hounds” had no answer

By the best scientific tests that they had been able to apply, the visual sightings and the high radiation had taken placeideas are hard to kill, and this one had more than one life, possibly because of the ele saucers But the scientificthethat the investigation went on

According to my friend the scientist, a few people outside the laboratory where the ”rock hounds” worked were told about the activities of the ”roups of their own

For instance, two graduate astronomy students from a southwestern university started a sier counter as their detection unit They did not build a recorder into their equipment, however, and consequently were forced to man their equipment continuously, which naturally cut down the time they were in operation On two occasions they reportedly detected a burst of high radiation

Although the veracity of the two astronomers was not doubted, the scientist felt that the accuracy of their readings was poor because of the rather low quality of their equipment

The scientist then told me about a far s of the ”mineral club” Word of the ”rock hounds” and their work had also spread to a large laboratory in the East An Air Force colonel, on duty at the lab, told the story to some of his friends, and they decided to look personally into the situation

Fortunately these people were in a wonderful spot to ation At their laboratory an extensive survey of the surrounding area was being made An elaborate system of radiation- detection equipment had been set up for a radius of 100 miles around the lab In addition, the defenses of the area included a radar net

Thanks to the flashi+ng of silver eagles, the colonel's group got permission to check the records of the radiation-survey station and to look over the logs of the radar stations They found instances where, during the saher than normal, radar had had a UFO on the scope These events had occurred during the period fro of the tentative but encouraging findings that the colonel's group had dug out of their past records, people on both the radiation-survey crews and at the radar sites becaation A tie-in with the local saucer grapevine established a three-way check

One evening in July, just before sunset, two of the colonel's group were driving hohway they noticed two cars stopped ahead of the at soot out of their car, and scanned the sky too Low on the eastern horizon they saw a bright circular objectslowly north They watched it for a while, took a few notes, then drove back to the lab

So neaited theet near the spot where the scientists in the car had seen the UFO, and it had been traveling north A fighter had been scraet was off the scope The pilot gli that looked like the reported UFO, but before he could check further he had to turn into the sun to get on an interception course, and he lost the object

Several days passed before the radiation reports from all stations could be collected When the reports did come in they showed that stations east of the laboratory, on an approxihest increase in radiation Stations west of the lab showed nothing

The possible significance of this well-covered incident spurred the colonel's group to extend and refine their activities Their idea was to build a radiation-detection instru the tank on an F-47 Then when a UFO was reported they would fly a search pattern in the area and try to establish whether or not a certain sector of the sky was more radioactive than other sectors

Also, they proposed to build a highly directional detector for the F- 47 and atten of such equipment was started, but et any of the equipment built, some of the members left the lab for other jobs, and the colonel, who sparked the operation, was himself transferred elsewhere The entire effort collapsed

The scientist was not surprised that I hadn't heard the story of the colonel's group All the people involved, he said, had kept it quiet in order to avoid ridicule The scientist added that he would be glad to give s of his ”et the inforroup

Armed with the scientist's notes and recorder tapes, I left for ht-Patterson Air Force Base, Dayton