I saw codename "pumpkinseed"

Very early yesterday morning, 2am, I was returning home from Utah to central cal.
I was travelling west bound on Ca 58 along the northside of Edwards AFB, when the steady stream of trucks headed out to I15 suddenly ceased. After a few minutes a pilot car came along followed by 4 military police vehicles and a truck trailer with something big on it and 3 more police vehicles. I came to the convoy just as they stopped under a couple streetlights, the only ones for miles, there were 2 more police cars at the crossing. The cars in front and back were situated such that you couldnt get within a half mile of the truck.
As the traffic in my direction slowed for the same rail crossing I saw what was on the trailer, it was the mythical black project aircraft who's codename is pumpkinseed.
It was not tarped but wrapped in plastic. The aircraft was on its landing gear and was about 50-60 long with a "wingspan" of about 35-40'. It had no tail controls or any visible engine intakes or cockpit.
I have followed pumkinseed since one crashed near bakersfield in the 80's. The offical stance is that it was a f117 that crashed ,but I knew someone who actually witnessed the aircraft pass overhead just before it crashed, and after the f117 was made public he said there was mo way thY was what he had seen.
This sketch from the FAS article on exotic propulsion is exactly what I saw on that trailer.

No pictures?

You know I don't doubt it at all.

I was reading the Skunk Works book by Ben Rich and he talks about how they simply plopped the SR-71 on a lowboy threw a tarp over it and drove it from Burbank to Edwards for testing. They had a caravan just like you described. the only difference was that they had a lead truck with workers who would cut down any lamp posts or sign posts that would bang into the aircraft as it was in it's caravan.

A trailing truck would then stop after each post sawed down and re attach it. they did it very early in the morning if I recall and had the posts back up before most of the morning traffic hit. pretty slick and ballsy.

So it's totally possible that you saw the pumpkin seed. folks over in that part of the desert near edwards sometimes report seeing some exotic stuff.


Can you describe the pumpkin seed better? Color, type of metal etc... I know it was sorta seran wrapped obscuring it a bit but still. did it have all rounded edges or some sharp angular ones?

Originally posted by BASSPLYR
You know I don't doubt it at all.

I was reading the Skunk Works book by Ben Rich and he talks about how they simply plopped the SR-71 on a lowboy threw a tarp over it and drove it from Burbank to Edwards for testing. They had a caravan just like you described. the only difference was that they had a lead truck with workers who would cut down any lamp posts or sign posts that would bang into the aircraft as it was in it's caravan.

A trailing truck would then stop after each post sawed down and re attach it. they did it very early in the morning if I recall and had the posts back up before most of the morning traffic hit. pretty slick and ballsy.

So it's totally possible that you saw the pumpkin seed. folks over in that part of the desert near edwards sometimes report seeing some exotic stuff.


Can you describe the pumpkin seed better? Color, type of metal etc... I know it was sorta seran wrapped obscuring it a bit but still. did it have all rounded edges or some sharp angular ones?

I watched a show on NatGeo, Secrets of Area 51, or something like that, and they pretty much said the same thing about the move of the SR71.

Wait...op. Your name is "punkinworks" and you happened to see what you claim is a project called "pumpkinseed".

By your description you had ample time to pull out your phone and grab a photo, yet all we have is a drawing that a preschooler could have done.

Good try bro. Epic fail.

Originally posted by mileysubet
No pictures?

sorry mo pics I was on my MOTO and the hiway is divided and there was no where to turn around nor qouldr I have been able to get close enough for a pic. But I was only 15-20 feet from it as I passed it. I got a really good look.

Yeah I recommend Ben Riches book. Gold in those pages.

Also, has some great stories supplied by some of the former pilots.

My favorite of many in the book is when the US was basing it's SR71 in the UK to overfly Iran. France didn't give the US permission to fly over their country with the SR71. (probably made them jealous) france made us fly all the way around them through the straits of magellan and then through the med to the mid east instead of simply flying strait there by cutting through europe.

So they are over Iran and Iran has got some of these new soviet supplied missiles. nobody really knows if the missile can hit an SR71 or not so everybody is pretty jumpy about them at the time. Sure enough iran locks on and launches a missile at them. They hit the afterburners and go straight towards the UK cutting over France. Eventually they decide the coast is clear kill the afterburners and fly at a ginger pace back to base.

Out of nowhere these angry french mirage pilots start yelling at the SR71 over the radio demanding permits to fly theSR71 over their country. The navigator/communicator (the guy telling the story) frazzled said uh let me get that permission for you hold on a sec- and before he could finish his sentence the pilot slams the afterburners on the SR71 and just smokes the two mirages in it's exhaust. Said that the pilot of the SR71 said something like here's your permit right here before hitting the afterburners.

Awesomeness.

Originally posted by BASSPLYR
You know I don't doubt it at all.

I was reading the Skunk Works book by Ben Rich and he talks about how they simply plopped the SR-71 on a lowboy threw a tarp over it and drove it from Burbank to Edwards for testing. They had a caravan just like you described. the only difference was that they had a lead truck with workers who would cut down any lamp posts or sign posts that would bang into the aircraft as it was in it's caravan.

A trailing truck would then stop after each post sawed down and re attach it. they did it very early in the morning if I recall and had the posts back up before most of the morning traffic hit. pretty slick and ballsy.

So it's totally possible that you saw the pumpkin seed. folks over in that part of the desert near edwards sometimes report seeing some exotic stuff.



Can you describe the pumpkin seed better? Color, type of metal etc... I know it was sorta seran wrapped obscuring it a bit but still. did it have all rounded edges or some sharp angular ones?

It was completely wrapped in what looked like bubble wrap, landing gear struts and all. It s surface was very smooth no bulges or bumps. Like I said no visible controls or stabilizers. There were what looked to be some sort of vents along the upper and lower sides of the trailing edge. It hqd tricycle landing gear and no intakes that I. could see

Makes sense to use some sort of plastic wrap than a tarp to me. Especially if you don't want any forign objects entering the craft. The bubble wrap might be the perfect thing to stop road debris from damaging the craft as it was transported too.

Any idea on the color. metallic, painted etc?

I think that its possible it might have been the secret aircraft that they were transporting. Many times things are kept secret for patent purposes and to protect the engineers and scientists working on the project. Cool stuff though, if you have any pictures please post them!

That sounds like the second X-47B being transported to Patuxent River, MD, for testing. The first one generated all sorts of witness reports of a "UFO wrapped in plastic on a flatbed truck." Northrop Grumman officials knew that removing the wings for transport would make it look like a flying saucer, so they made sure to leave the landing gear down so people would see that it was just an airplane.

Also, the airplane that crashed near Bakersfield, CA, in July 1986 was most definitely a Lockheed F-117A and not any sort of "pumpkinseed" or other mythical aircraft. Witnesses seeing the black airplane against the pitch black sky did not have a clear view of it before it crashed since the accident happened several hours before dawn. The accident report has long since been declassified, and there is ample physical evidence at the scene to confirm the aircraft's identity as an F-117A.

Originally posted by Shadowhawk
That sounds like the second X-47B being transported to Patuxent River, MD, for testing. The first one generated all sorts of witness reports of a "UFO wrapped in plastic on a flatbed truck." Northrop Grumman officials knew that removing the wings for transport would make it look like a flying saucer, so they made sure to leave the landing gear down so people would see that it was just an airplane.

Also, the airplane that crashed near Bakersfield, CA, in July 1986 was most definitely a Lockheed F-117A and not any sort of "pumpkinseed" or other mythical aircraft. Witnesses seeing the black airplane against the pitch black sky did not have a clear view of it before it crashed since the accident happened several hours before dawn. The accident report has long since been declassified, and there is ample physical evidence at the scene to confirm the aircraft's identity as an F-117A.

What I saw was for sure NOT the x47b, and it was not a vehicle with the wings removed for transport. There is no publicly acknowledged airframe that even closey resembles what I saw. It was riggged for a short move, not a cross country haul to md. It looked ad though it was chained down via the landing gear struts. I figure it was being transported back to palmdale, the new skunkworks are there, or to one of the other test ranges in the area.

It was far from a black plane against a dark sky, my friends that actually saw the aicraft just before the crash said that the whole plane was engulfed in flames and looked like a meteor streaming across the sky leaving a flaming trail.

reply to post by BASSPLYR


It appeared as though it was painted white, but couldn't really tell, it just gave that impression

First of all, your description sounds just like the way the first X-47B looked when it was shipped.

www.highstrangenessufo.com...

www.slashgear.com...

Since the second X-47B was scheduled to be shipped out around this time, it would make sense that this is what you saw.

This would be a much more likely explanation than some previously unacknowledged super secret craft. Occam's Razor dictates that the simplest explanation is usually correct.

Originally posted by Shadowhawk
First of all, your description sounds just like the way the first X-47B looked when it was shipped.

www.highstrangenessufo.com...

www.slashgear.com...

Since the second X-47B was scheduled to be shipped out around this time, it would make sense that this is what you saw.

This would be a much more likely explanation than some previously unacknowledged super secret craft. Occam's Razor dictates that the simplest explanation is usually correct.

I'm not sure how you knew my opinion, but you are correct, and I fully endorse this statement.

I hope this doesn't get me in too much trouble...but I have had a good friend in the Aeronautic Engineering field for many years(currently employed by the US Navy). We discussed many strange things over our years together, including what he referred to as "Pumpkinseed Propulsion". He even went so far as to describe to be how this propulsion system worked.....

I am going to pass what I was told to the good folks at ATS.

*So basically in this method of propulsion you have a seed shaped craft(obviously

) with a semi-porous heat resistant membrane that incases the craft as a shell. The craft is dragged into the upper atmosphere by another supersonic craft in the first stages of this ship's flight...during this stage of operation the skin of the craft has but 1 purpose, to leak like a sieve.

*As the two crafts build accelaration towards supersonic speeds the fuel leaks out the seed craft coating the outer membrane in jet fuel...now when the 2 vehicles reach extremely high speeds is when things get interesting.

*As the crafts reach the speed of sound the friction from the speed causes the jet fuel coating the Pumpkin Seed to ignite...and it is cut loose from the towing craft

*Simply put: As the fuel burns around the shell, the seed shape causes the vehicle to be pushed forward to even more extreme speeds...which causes more fuel to leak out of the vessel, burn, and push it even faster forward...and so on, and so on.

From what I was told, this process will continue to dominoe until the craft runs out of fuel....according to my friend these puppies will outrun anything we have with wings.

Won't work outside the atmosphere though.

reply to post by Shark_Feeder

Thanks for that, that description is consistent with what my friends witnessed at the " f117" crash,, a plane completley engulfed in flame, not just a plane on fire.

Maybe you saw this ?

www.youtube.com...#!

Could somebody embed this for me ?

Cheers

I talked with some people i know at Edwards and in the X-47B program. They confirmed that it was the X-47B that was shipped out the other night.

As to the Bakersfield crash, it doesn't really matter what the witnesses described. Eyewitness testimony of such a transient event is notoriously unreliable, and memory is even worse. Many witnesses describe airplanes breaking apart or bursting into flame prior to impact, even though subsequent investigations indicate that no such events occurred.

At any rate, the witness statement in this case is moot because they are just describing what they saw or thought they saw in the sky. The "ground truth" is all that really matters. There is documentation (declassified accident report) and there is physical evidence at the crash site. These prove conclusively that the airplane was an F-117A.