Any number of astronauts, retired or active Air Force pilots could tell us the same thing if they were allowed to talk about it.
Knew an old guy who was one. Watched ancient aliens with him once and he laughed. I asked what was up. Said it was all a ruse to deflect what we were actually doing with aircraft. Couldn’t believe it was on tv.
My dad was in an AC&W squadron, and he would vector pilots to blips from time to time with - shall we say - unusual results. Dad didn't talk about it much, but I distinctly remember him telling me that most of the pilots at that time had already flown in WWII and were hard to rattle, but he had some radio conversations with very excited and/or agitated pilots. Pretending it didn't happen was SOP.