FOX-TV "Encounters"Collides with Realityof "Astonauts& UFOS"/J

- FOX-TV "Encounters"collides with realityof "Astonauts& UFOS"/J. Oberynea 5,'94

WhenI first ftafied my assessmentof ftle December4, 1994FOX-TV "Encounte$" programsegment on 'Asfonauts ard UFOS", my text was full of argrywords about "a newlow in tabloidtelevision sleaze", or a "favestyon investigative ethics", or "baldlies". ThenI calmeddown and decided to let factsrather than ftetoric makethe damning indictmentHere's a partiallisting of whatI seeare the the factual atrocities ard blunders commitledby the programproducen:

Theinterviewee named Maudce Chatelain is fa.lselyidentified as an "ex-employee" of NASA'Swho spent years within theprogram leafling UFOsecrets. Chatelain actualyonly bdeflyworked for NorthAmerican Aviation (the NASA contactorfor theApollo commandmodule) in LosAngeles in tlle mid-1960s(he sometimes claims he was "Chief of Communications"for Apollo, but he wasn't). He never worked for NASAand alt the thingshe refers to wereleamed fuom outside sources (orjust imaginedhimself.l, not from withinany NAsA-relaied organization.

Chat€lainclaims Jim McDivitton Gemini-4 in 1965saw a "silverycylinder" which rapidly approachedhis spacecraftand missed it only by a few meters.ENCoUNTERS then ominouslyclaims that "McDivitt kept silent" about this event. This is pureignorance: McDivitt timeand time again has patiendy explained to UFObuffs and others about the beer-canshaped object (not "silver") he spotted on his flight, hanging outside his window at anunknown range -- ardnot in anyway "approaching" him. He lost sight ofit when --/ sunlightglared across his window.He thinksit wasanolher man-made satellite, while a goodcase can be made it washis ownbeer-can shaped second stage on a retumingorbit. Meanwhile,McDivitt hasnever "kept silent" on thisinteresting but hardlyexhaordinary flight event,which has been widely discussed in theliterature and even in theAL Force's CondonReport in 1968.

Chatelainrefers to theApollo- 11 moon landing and asserts ftat afterlarding, Armscrong andAldrin sawUFOS on theedge of a crater.A film of dancinglights over the lunar horizonis thenshown. The program claims that "What they saw on themoon has never beenexplained", but thisis blatentlyunlrue since that film, takenfrom orbit theday before thelanding, shows only windowreflections of LM inleriorlights, as anyone at ttrephoto Iibraryat NASA couldhave told l}leinvestigators. This case - andChatelain's other ctaims,which date back to themid-1970s -- wa6explained in detailin my 1982book, "UFOSand Outer Space Mysteries", a[d thechapter on Apollo-l1 has been in the AmedcaOnline OMM AntimatlerFiles since last July. No seriousUFO rcsearcher has everthought the original story was a.nything but a iabloidconcoction, either.

Chatelainhas made Other claims, including that Apollo-13 was carrying a smallnuclear bombto setoff on lhe moonas a seismicexperiment, which is why UFOSzapped the missionin self defense.ENCOUNTERS omitted this crazy story, for goodrcason. Theprogmm mentions astonaut Godon Coope/sletter to theUN (about1973, after he hadleft NASA)encouraging studies of UFOS,and claims falsely that "Cooper's letter was sweptunder the official carpet"-- a bizaxreassertion that has no basisin reality.Cooper referedfo a l95l encounterhe had in Gemany,but when serious investigators checked up on thatcase, none of his fellow pilotsftom theNeubiberg Air Base,none of thelocal Germannews media or L'FOgroups, nothing in BlueBook flles, nobody even in Cooper's ownfamily couldreca.ll the incident. Whalever Cooper was remembering somehow slippedthe minds ol dozensof otherwitnesses. Naturally this research remains unpublishedin the pro-UFO media.

Theprogram quotes extensively from tack Kasherabout STS-48 dancing blips - allcging five proofstiey can'tbe ice andtherefore by elimination(groan!) must be alien spacecmft ButKasher's illogic seeps flrough with his claim that since STS-48, all NASAspace TV becamescrcened (an inconect claim, in anycase) to "plugleaks" and hide UFOS. But then hepoints to 5T5-61(Hubble Repair) tlight video of otherstreaking do{s as further proof of UFOs- eventhough he claimed NASA was screening all suchvideo to preventpeople fromever seeing such UFOS! You can't have it bothways .- andremain rational.

Kashermade a claimthat the STS-48 "Main Object" stopped for a full halfsecond du ng the"flash" (the jet firing),which he said ice couldn't do. People watching the video ncver sawit "stop",but on Kasher's pdnted report (not shown on TV) thereis a flatarea in the graphof objectmotion. But Kasher doesn't seem to realizethat since tlere is nostandard frameof reierencefor motionin space,the "stopping" could have shown up on the TV screenas motion in ANY direction.It didnot, and that's the overlooked clue - i[ stopped ONLYin referenceto theTV's field ofview, which suggests rhe "stopping" was an artifactofthe TV scan,not of theobject's actual motion. This is bomeout by Kasher,s t€chnicalpaper: since the TV imageis digitized(i.e., in discretepixels, no[ in analog continuousform), every position is "roundedoff' to thenearest whole pixel. A proper chartshould have included "error bals" which show fte entfespan of theview which is mappedinto each specitic digital position. When that is done,the curved change of course of thepanicle fits entfuelyand smoothly into theelror-bar covered region. There is NO "stop"-- it is anillusion of naivedata processing by Kasher.

Thda.lleged NASA spokesman,identified as "Paul Lowman" seems to havebcen deliberatclychosen for his ignoranceof "UFOlore" andhis unfamiliadrywith earlier investigadonsdone by NASA andothers into thecases brought up. He couldn'thave been a betterpatsy if hehad been paid to reada script.And so far, I've beenunsuccessful in findinganyone at NASA who's ever heard of him....[Stand by for updates].

Thisepisode is asad piece ol televisionso-called-joumalism. Yourcally have to wonder whatthe show's producers thought of theintelligence and credulity of thetarget audience. Peoplewho can be.expected to swallowthese kinds of storiescan probably be expeciedto swalow (andpay for) an]'thing- whichis probablywhy the whole show was inlerspersed with promotionsfor theFox sister show "The X-Files". CAVEAT EMPTOR ! !