In 2005 NASA released new information on the Keckburg case which contradicts everything they and the Airforce has claimed for years;

Original (lie) Explanation.
Air Force Project Blue Book documents indicating that a three-man team was being sent from an Air Force radar-installation near Pittsburgh to investigate the Kecksburg crash. They reported back to Blue Book that nothing was found.

2005: NASA changes story to "Russian satellite"
In December 2005, just before the Kecksburg crash 40th anniversary, a NASA spokesman finally admitted NASA had examined metallic fragments from the object and now claimed it was from a re-entering "Russian satellite." Furthermore, the spokesman claimed all records were lost. According to an Associated Press story:

The object appeared to be a Russian satellite that re-entered the atmosphere and broke up. NASA experts studied fragments from the object, but records of what they found were lost in the 1990s, Steitz said.
"As a rule, we don't track UFOs. What we could do, and what we apparently did as experts in spacecraft in the 1960s, was to take a look at whatever it was and give our expert opinion," Steitz said. "We did that, we boxed (the case) up and that was the end of it. Unfortunately, the documents supporting those findings were misplaced." (AP story)
This new explanation from NASA contradicts the official Air Force explanation in 1965 of the fireball being from a meteor and of nothing being found.

the claim contradicts what journalist Leslie Kean was told in 2003 by Nicholas L. Johnson, NASA's chief scientist for orbital debris. As part of the new Sci Fi investigation, Kean had Johnson recheck orbital paths of all known satellites and other records from the period in 1965. Johnson told Kean that orbital mechanics made it absolutely impossible for any part of the Cosmos 96 Venus probe to account for either the fireball or any object at Kecksburg. Johnson also stated there were no other manmade satellites or other objects that re-entered the atmosphere on that day.

Thus, this raises the question as to what "Russian satellite" could account for the debris that NASA now admits they examined. Furthermore, Kean and others deem it highly questionable that NASA could actually lose such records. As of December 2005, new court action was planned to get NASA to search more diligently for the alleged lost records.

#1. Nothing was recovered and was a meteor.
#2. It could not have been any other man-made satellites or other known objects that re-entered the atmosphere on that day.
#3. Now Nasa says we (may have) recovered a "Russian" satellite on that day.

Which directly contradicts #1 and #2. Many witnesses reported that the object crash-landed. That is, it had some control and was making turns. Furthermore, if it was a satellite then we are taken to another contradiction. It would not have survived re-entry. If the fragments were very small, then how did they determine it was a russian satellite? I really think they just assumed it must have been. Furthmore, if the evidence in this case has been lost..

THEN HOW DID THEY JUST RECENTLY DISCOVER THAT IT WAS A RUSSIAN SATELLITE IN 2005?

Glasnost.

Actually, your account is a bit hard to follow. Perhaps a few links to primary sources, and less use of bold text and ALL CAPS in favor of clearer language?

In re your last paragraph, do you mean to say that because observers described the object as having "crash-landed," it must have been under control during the terminal phase? This does not seem obligatory to me. Furthermore, parts of spacecraft do survive re-entry -- cf. Skylab. And to go forward, in the 60's there were only two space-faring nations. Since the Air Force investigators knew it wasn't one of ours, it would be elimination be Russian.

And re evidence being lost...perhaps you've heard of some missing tapes concerning Apollo 11? It does happen. People aren't perfect.

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[quote=nomuse;852602]Glasnost.

The entire sequence of events over the years is hard to follow:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kecksburg_UFO_Incident

I'm saying they noticed the craft had some form of control as it crash landed. I also think it's important to understand that in this case it's hard to claim you can trust the Airforce or NASA more than the witnesses. If there's anything we've learned in this case it's that our government can make mistakes and be flat out wrong or lie. Depends on your point of view.

With one problem - according to NASA it could not have been. I suppose my question is this - if the object was litterally unknown, would NASA, given that all they had were fragments, conclude the object was anything other than Russian? What if it was just an unknown space vehicle with no alien body?

Well theres more to it than that. I don't understand how, after years of questions about this case, NASA suddenly comes up with this "explanation" What changed in the last few years that suddenly this explanation is available? Weather they actually lost the data or it was hidden/destroyed is for everyone to decide on their own.

However, I do find it fascinating to consider the potential implications of this case. Please read the link above (to wikipedia) for more information the case. Its kinda confusing and the deeper you go in it, the more you realize how this case has been totally contradicted and has nowhere else to go.

First off, Welcome to the BAUT Forums, nothingbutme

Let's begin with a look at your post:

First, I'd like a cite on that. Secondly, you have to remember what Project Bluebook was. It was a study of unidentified flying objects. Both a meteor, and a Russian satellite, both qualify as identified. Indeed, as far as Project Blue Book would be concerned, there "is nothing to report" in either version of the story.

That's a little disingenuous, no? NASA never claimed anything different. AKA, NASA never had a story to change from - it is the only explanation they have ever offered. It was the Air Force, not NASA, that offered up an apparently different version of the object found, according to your OP. NASA and the Air Force are two different entities. Military cover-ups are not only known but frequent, and often for good reason. This should surprise noone. However, that does not in any way impact NASA.

Again - making the object recovered at the site not only identified, but identified by an organization independant of the military and who posess the highest credentials. NASA was (and is) supremely qualified to make that assessment. And again, making it irrelevant to Project Bluebook, it being an identified object.

It could be just me, and if it is, I apologize in advance, but the only "Associated Press" stories I could find were merely parrots to some degree of the Sci-Fi Channel press release. This would, for instance, be the same Sci-Fi channel whose mission is to provide entertaining fiction, and whose documentary credentials were long ago shattered with the fake documentary of M. Schmayalan, that they tried to pass off as genuine to pound up publicity for his upcoming movie. You know, speaking of lies and misleading and whatnot.

Sounds reasonable. Do you see any problems there? Given the situation, the Air Force likely took posession of any material and documents, so going after NASA for those is likely barking up the wrong tree.

Mistakes and misplacements do happen. It's dogged the space program since it's inception. There are several members here who can give you a good idea of the particulars, and none of them suggest conspiracies.


"This new..." is purposefully misleading to sound sensational. It's also the ONLY explanation NASA has ever given

The Air Force has demonstrated itself to be, in the past, not above public disinformation to protect top-secret projects or security matters. This has to be hardly surprising to anyone. However, I fail to see why finally discovering it was a satellite is anything scandalous.

Can you provide cites? Any corroborating material? In some quick googling, the only evidence, again, that I could find of this are articles quoting the Sci-Fi Channel press release. We definately need sources to take this seriously.

It's theoretically possible, if we can prove beyond any doubt, that it was impossible for any known or unknown (prior to landing) Russian satellites to re-enter that day, to be skeptical. But this would have to be proven first.

Kean and others can deem it highly questionable that the sky is blue, but that still doesn't change the fact that occasionally things come up missing at NASA. It happens. It's happened before. Likely to happen again. I think the process is akin to what happens to pairs of socks you put in your dryer, and yet only one emerges. As a matter of fact, I think I'll start calling that the NASA syndrome

1) Nothing was recovered that was relevant to Project Blue Book.
2) This has yet to be demonstrated or proven
3) Yep

Directly contradicts 1. 2 is yet to be established as credible.

Eyewitness testimony is notoriously shaky and contradictory. There are likely as many eyewitnesses that will testify it flew straight as an arrow and made nary a sound. This is a well-known phenomena. And once you add aliens or the para-normal in the mix, you have people "remembering" doing alien autopsies, "remembering" pulling little green men out of crash sites, and "remembering" getting anal probes from alien who look remarkably like the ones they just read about it Strieber's "Communion"

Utterly untrue. The space programs of the world are resplendant in thier examples of objects surviving re-entry. Sometimes amazingly intact.

How much do you think it would take? A few parts, a few tiny peices, known to be parts of Soviet satellites would have sufficed. Or even a single, tiny piece engraved or stamped with Soviet writing....

The assumption being made there is by you.

You are assuming there is no one alive that has a direct recollection of the event. You are also assuming they never told anyone there, so that even if they are all gone, nobody there would have been briefed on the info. You also assume that non-technical documents don't exist. There may well be a duty log from that day that mentions "Examined debris from Air Force. Obviously a Russian Satellite", without going into any technical detail or descriptions. Such a document would re-inforce the findings, without being at all what the Science Fiction channel is searching for in the way of specifics.

But please - can you cite sources for the above, preferrably multiple, that aren't either from Sci-Fi channel or merely passing on the press release or parroting it to some degree? We MUST have those to take any of this seriously in the long run ;-)

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"Those are the people that wonder how a thermos knows whether to keep something hot or keep something cold." ~ NeoWatcher

For what it's worth, my amateur interpretation is this:

- It was a Soviet satellite whose trajectory wasn't recorded;
- The US Air Force recovered it, but let the meteor story out as a cover;
- The US Air Force gave parts to NASA to examine;
- 40 years down the track there's no need for secrecy, so NASA reveals what it had previously kept secret.

The main challenge to this would be the accuracy of information about Soviet satellites. For example, what sort of record would there be of the satellite if it re-entered the Earth's atmosphere on its first orbit? Is it possible for a spacecraft launched from the USSR to follow any of the claimed paths?

Oops, my apologies...

Welcome to the BAUTforum nothingbutme.

My "glasnost" thought is that so much paperwork is still being revealed by the remains of the Soviet empire, that it is quite possible something was revealed in 2005 that would cause NASA to firm their belief that the Kecksburg crash was one of theirs. The timing is just about right for some old papers to come to light -- maybe that Venus probe wasn't going quite in the direction anyone thought it was at the time. Or maybe the Russians had something else come down that was sensitive enough they didn't want to go into it at the time.

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"You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."

Some previous discussion on this thread:
Kecksburg "UFO"....

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"The truth may be out there, but lies are inside your head" Terry Pratchett

If NASA only had fragments, then what was there to hide?

Does the phrase "Cold War" mean anything to you?

At the time, if we could get our hands on Russian space hardware it would be really hard to pass that up. But the moment anyone admitted "Yeah, it was Russian" world opinion would force us to turn it over.

__________________
"You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."

Possibly that in the midst of the Cold War, having bits of a Soviet satellite is something the US may have wanted to keep secret, so we could have a chance to learn from it rather than have them demand to get the chunks back, like they did when the MiG-25 anded in Japan.

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A Nerd can figure out how long it will take the original Enterprise traveling at warp 6.5 to travel from Regulus to Antares.
A Geek with think he can use that to pick up a girl in a bar.
A Dork knows he can't pick up the girl with it, but will hang around for hours anyway, just in case she asks.
She might. You never know.

Why would they not hide the fact that they had fragments, from their Cold War enemy, the Soviet Union.

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0 1 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 ...

Who knows? Something the Soviets had that either A) We didn't want them to know we had (most likely), or B) Something we didn't want the general public to be aware the soviets had the technology to orbit

I don't know why having fragments (or even the entire object) affects this?

LOL - Four of us had the same thought within 1 minute of each other

__________________
"I have this theory that the Apollo missions were faked when NASA found out that general relativity was wrong because the Earth was expanding due to the Sun's iron core being influenced by magnetic waves from the electric universe after being perturbed by Planet X and thereby causing global warming. Where should I start a thread about this?" ~ ToSeek

"Those are the people that wonder how a thermos knows whether to keep something hot or keep something cold." ~ NeoWatcher

Get outta my brain!

__________________
A Nerd can figure out how long it will take the original Enterprise traveling at warp 6.5 to travel from Regulus to Antares.
A Geek with think he can use that to pick up a girl in a bar.
A Dork knows he can't pick up the girl with it, but will hang around for hours anyway, just in case she asks.
She might. You never know.

If NASA only had fragments, then what was there to hide?

You mean you need that spelled out to you? Think about it a bit.

You and I are in a cold war, your satellite (secret or not) falls into my backyard.

Senario 1) I tell the world I have parts of your satellite, what do you do?
Senario 2) I tell the world that I found nothing it was a meteor, what do you do?

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Apollo: The History and the Hoax
Enter the World of Athran

Oddly enough, in the only source you cite, the Wiki, the trajectory is recorded and work out as a straight line, with the object in descent. This in no way is indicative of intelligent control.

Furthermore, at the "crash site", there appears to be some degree of tree damage corresponding to that year, but at least one scientist to study it attributes it to ice, not aliens. In addition, there is no impact crater, no markings of a hard landing of any kind. Although it could be speculated that "the aliens put the brakes on and landed softly", the simplest explanation is that there is no impact crater or extensive damage because only fragments of a satellite hit the Earth there.

I don't buy that. "Mistake" is very subjective and depends heavily on your personal definition, as you point out. But I don't find it hard at all to believe NASA more than the eyewitnesses. Although, to be fair, it is to their credit and speaks well of them that they haven't built a tourist industry out of the incident.