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UFO or not UFO? Area 51 declassifying pours cold water on theory..
The Tech Herald ^ | April 12th, 2009 | Rich Bowden

Posted on 04/13/2009 11:39:11 AM PDT by TaraP

A former engineer at the top secret airfield "Area 51" in Nevada has spoken out about UFO sightings in the region in the 1960s, saying the witnessed flashes of light were part of top secret US aircraft experiments.

In an interview with ABC News, Thornton "T.D." Barnes, 72, a former special-projects engineer at Area 51 said: "No one really knew we existed. Even our wives didn't know where we were going when we left Monday morning and came back Friday evening."

Barnes was an electronics engineer for NASA who also specialised in advance radar and Soviet MiG fighter aircraft and was asked to join a team of CIA experts who would work on secret military projects at the infamous base.

UFO folklore has it that Area 51, about 80 miles north northwest of Las Vegas, is where captured aliens and their spacecraft have been stored by the US military. The conspiracy theory comes in part because of the preponderance of strange, unaccounted for lights that have been seen in the region of the top secret military base.

However Barnes poured cold water on the theory saying the "alien spaceships" were in fact light flashes from top secret spy planes being flown at 2,000 miles per hour at altitudes of 90,000 feet.

The experimental planes produced light flashes that some interpreted as alien spaceships and this was considered helpful by the team in covering their activities.

"We considered it to be a bonus," said Barnes. "They made it easier to conceal what we were doing."

However some ufologists have said the area has only been partly declassified and UFO work at the base may well have carried out though in a region unknown to engineers such as Barnes.

"Those guys who came forward may very well be telling the truth, with the caveat that they wouldn't know if there was something going on," said Stanton T. Friedman, a nuclear physicist, lecturer and top UFO researcher.

Friedman added that evidence coming out of places such as Area 51 proved how much was going on in the country without peoples' knowledge.

"National security has a real place in all of this stuff. There is no way to tell your friends without telling your enemies," he said. "A lot of Americans woke up to the fact that there's a lot going on that they don't get told about."


TOPICS: Conspiracy; UFO's
KEYWORDS: aatip; area51; fringe; mystery; ohsomysteriouso; uap; ufo; ufos; usaf
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To: marbren
You feel you are alive right? What if you are actually dead.

What if I’m alive but just dreaming about the existence of a website named FreeRepublic and some imaginary poster named marbren who is just a figment of my overactive imagination?

Do you still feel alive?

So let’s make a bet. So let’s say you and I both stay home from work tomorrow and see if anyone notices. The first one fired from their job wins!

And being that tomorrow is April 15th, let’s both not file our income tax returns as an exercise to see which one of us are really alive or not. ;),
501 posted on 04/14/2009 4:22:57 PM PDT by Caramelgal (When the past no longer illuminates the future, the spirit walks in darkness.)
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To: editor-surveyor

INDEED.

Though trying to get a naysayer to accept reasonable fact . . .

doesn’t sound very reasonable, to me.


502 posted on 04/14/2009 4:23:19 PM PDT by Quix (POL Ldrs quotes fm1900 2 presnt: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/2130557/posts?page=81#81)
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To: Caramelgal

Are you bucking for membership in the group?


503 posted on 04/14/2009 4:24:27 PM PDT by Quix (POL Ldrs quotes fm1900 2 presnt: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/2130557/posts?page=81#81)
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To: TaraP

I’m not at all convinced that good angels had anything to do with the Pleades.

Certainly God could have arranged things however He chose . . . I just haven’t seen any convincing evidence of that.


504 posted on 04/14/2009 4:26:14 PM PDT by Quix (POL Ldrs quotes fm1900 2 presnt: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/2130557/posts?page=81#81)
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To: Caramelgal

I suppose it’s technically true about some folks . . . though I don’t recall meeting anyone like that on these threads.

There’s lots of stuff that doesn’t meet my criteria for fact, truth etc. in the subject area.


505 posted on 04/14/2009 4:27:39 PM PDT by Quix (POL Ldrs quotes fm1900 2 presnt: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/2130557/posts?page=81#81)
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To: Caramelgal

However,

if you’re itching to be considered a naysayer, I’m sure we could oblige without tons of trouble.


506 posted on 04/14/2009 4:28:14 PM PDT by Quix (POL Ldrs quotes fm1900 2 presnt: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/2130557/posts?page=81#81)
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To: razorboy

Naw.

In terms of the well vetted cases . . .

Occam’s razor is on our side.

Most Truly scientific, rational folks recognize that readily.


507 posted on 04/14/2009 4:29:31 PM PDT by Quix (POL Ldrs quotes fm1900 2 presnt: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/2130557/posts?page=81#81)
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To: Caramelgal

I am self employed. Taxes are filed and refund spent.


508 posted on 04/14/2009 4:30:17 PM PDT by marbren
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To: Quix

Yes I see your point...

I am going to read more about that one!


509 posted on 04/14/2009 4:32:01 PM PDT by TaraP (The RAPTURE: Separation of Church and State)
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To: razorboy; editor-surveyor

Thar ya go agin . . .

WRONG.

Editor-surveyor . . . has no NEED to prove any such thing to any naysayer, per se.

He may do so for jollies or indulging silly folks or for temporary amusement, however.


510 posted on 04/14/2009 4:32:08 PM PDT by Quix (POL Ldrs quotes fm1900 2 presnt: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/2130557/posts?page=81#81)
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To: editor-surveyor

Now ES, be kind

logic is not their forte.

/s


511 posted on 04/14/2009 4:33:44 PM PDT by Quix (POL Ldrs quotes fm1900 2 presnt: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/2130557/posts?page=81#81)
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To: Quix

Great! Need to be refreshed for another round with naysayers!


512 posted on 04/14/2009 4:34:34 PM PDT by TaraP (The RAPTURE: Separation of Church and State)
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To: marbren

I don’t recall . . . in the last 10 years on FR . . .

any serious naysayer

ever

learning much from any serious evidence . . . logical, scientific, solid, multi-sourced . . . or whatever.

Their capacities to make excuses for their rigid narrow biases to remain unphased is truly Olympian.


513 posted on 04/14/2009 4:35:25 PM PDT by Quix (POL Ldrs quotes fm1900 2 presnt: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/2130557/posts?page=81#81)
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To: razorboy

NOPE.

Some naysayers have convoluted things here and there in some minor areas to occasionally leave such an impression for the easily impressionable.


514 posted on 04/14/2009 4:36:24 PM PDT by Quix (POL Ldrs quotes fm1900 2 presnt: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/2130557/posts?page=81#81)
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To: Quix

Those type of mindless idiots sometimes just, well I think you know what I mean.


515 posted on 04/14/2009 4:36:24 PM PDT by stockpirate (" My bother George and I want Obama to succeed." Jeb Bush 4/10/09)
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To: razorboy

What proof are you looking for?

Do you really think if the Gov’t had an Alien in there custody they would be so revealing to expose him on CNN or Fox?


516 posted on 04/14/2009 4:36:55 PM PDT by TaraP (The RAPTURE: Separation of Church and State)
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To: editor-surveyor

There’s no evidence that the Roswell crash critters were hybrids.


517 posted on 04/14/2009 4:37:00 PM PDT by Quix (POL Ldrs quotes fm1900 2 presnt: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/2130557/posts?page=81#81)
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To: editor-surveyor

Ahhhhhhhhh but naysayers tend to consider

THEMSELVES

to be the paragon intellects and everyone else mental gnats.


518 posted on 04/14/2009 4:37:42 PM PDT by Quix (POL Ldrs quotes fm1900 2 presnt: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/2130557/posts?page=81#81)
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To: TaraP

There’s all kinds of stories about

GOOD “races” of “ET’s”

But imho, sooner or later . . . other sources assert convincingly that all such are seen to be in the cooperative company of baddies.

I don’t believe that any of the crop of ET’s of the last 60 years are anything ABOVE fallen angels. They may be lower than or equal to. I don’t believe any of them are above that level of critter.

My own bias from all I’ve read.

BTW, what’s so . . . psychologically difficult for naysayers to note that they have incredible biases?

I know. I know. I’m the psychologist. LOL.


519 posted on 04/14/2009 4:41:40 PM PDT by Quix (POL Ldrs quotes fm1900 2 presnt: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/2130557/posts?page=81#81)
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To: TaraP

Not sure how many rounds I’m up for.

I need to write a satire on:

CHILD ABUSE IN CHURCH

vis a vis music volume being equal to snowmobiles, pneumatic drills etc.

Sigh. GRRRR.


520 posted on 04/14/2009 4:43:05 PM PDT by Quix (POL Ldrs quotes fm1900 2 presnt: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/2130557/posts?page=81#81)
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