Missing Gun Camera UFO Footage?

There seems to be plenty of reports of Military jets encountering UFOs (or being scrambled to pursue them) so where's the gun camera footage?

According to MUFON International Director John F. Schuessler in his article about missing UFO information 'not one frame of gun camera film has ever been released'.

Where is it then - is there a film archive somewhere containing all the withheld footage?

Unidentified Flying Objects: The Missing Information

A significant number of UFO reports and rumors of UFO reports since WW-II have involved various government individuals or organizations. UFO investigators have been endeavoring to get answers to these cases, but the results I have seen have been less than satisfying. Often inquiries are met with total denial. When replies were given, they usually contained blank or censored segments, even when requested through official FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) channels. This has resulted in the feelings of distrust between citizen and government and the continual cry of ‘cover-up.’

There is little doubt that government officials could put an end to this mystery if they were motivated to do so. Files could be opened. Satellite data could be released. Films could be released. Military and other government officials could be relieved of security oaths were UFO reports are concerned. NORAD, Dew Line and other tracking systems data sets could be released. NASA files could be released and crewmembers given permission to speak freely. This all should all be done while the principle players are still alive.

In the case of the older reports in government files, none of this would hurt national security because none of the older technology is still in use today. For newer cases the UFO information could be separated from sensitive material and fully released. Either way, it is time for some forthright help from government officials. The mass of information awaiting release is phenomenal..

Some of the material I would like to see officially disclosed follows:

Military aircraft gun cameras have filmed thousands of UFOs, according to pilot reports; however, not one frame of gun camera film has ever been released. At the same time thousands of feet of airplanes being shot down have been released. These films were archived at several locations and should be released. In addition, videotape has now replaced film and these tapes should also be released. Years ago, Major John A. Samford acknowledged that thousands of pilots had tried in vain to intercept UFOs, a fact acknowledged by most pilots today. It was acknowledged that two jet interceptors near Wright Patterson Air Force Base on August 1, 1952 did take gun camera film, a standard operating procedure.

Full List

The full list contains some pretty comprehensive info about missing official UFO investigation reports, radar information, UFO photographs, Military/FAA records, astronaut transcripts etc.. and is well worth a read but would like to try and keep this thread solely about military gun camera UFO footage or speculation behind reasons for the lack of it.

There's also news articles below which report that even as far back as 1947 there were U.S. fighter planes with gun and telescopic cameras being kept ready to take off and pursue 'flying saucers' and I can certainly think of quite a few UFO cases since then which involve military aircraft and UFOs.. so where is the footage?

“FLYING SAUCER SCARE IN U.S.”, 7 July 1947

Six Oregon National Guard fighter planes, equipped with gun and tele-scopic cameras are being kept ready to take off after any flying saucers. The Army last night announced that it had a fighter plane standing by at Muroc airbase, California, to join in the chase..

News Archive

Links:

Scrambling After UFOs
The Missing UFO Evidence Thread

Top stuff Karl, this is one of those that has done the rounds of the UFO community and to my knowledge, everyone who has been around for a time on the scene has heard the self same tales. Even one of the Rendlesham people claims that, as part of their debriefing, they were shown a film of "numerous incidents" of gun camera footage of strange and unknown objects

I strongly suspect however, that as the various arms of the military have no more clue now, than they did 70 years ago, what these objects are, they simply sit on any such documentary evidence as it would force them into a position that is an anathema to any such organisation. That being.... "We don;t know what and therefore, possibly whose they are and we can't stop them either"

Originally posted by FireMoon

I strongly suspect however, that as the various arms of the military have no more clue now, than they did 70 years ago, what these objects are, they simply sit on any such documentary evidence as it would force them into a position that is an anathema to any such organisation. That being.... "We don;t know what and therefore, possibly whose they are and we can't stop them either"

That's a distinct possibility my friend and maybe nobody knows WTF is going on - I know you've probably seen these paragraphs before from U.K. Under Secretary of State Ralph Noyes but he also mentions secret screenings of UFO Gun camera footage for Air Defense staff as far back as 1970 - he also mentions there was no trace of the films in the archives in the 1990's..

Ralph Noyes - Head of Defense Secretariat 8 (DS8)

The files include a letter from a retired senior MoD official, Ralph Noyes, who confirms that the "subject remained something of a joke (albeit an uneasy one on occasion)" in Whitehall in the 1950s. However he describes seeing gun camera film of UFOs taken by RAF fighter pilots in 1956 that was shown at a secret screening for air defence staff in 1970. A search of the archives in 1993-94 found no trace of these films.

link

He also states here that he and a number of MOD colleagues became convinced there was something going on in British airspace that they could not explain.

"Here we had a number of object seen coming in across the North Sea on coastal radar. It looked like a Russian mistake. Jet aircraft were scrambled. The objects were travelling at quite impossible speeds like 4-5000 mph and then came to an abrupt halt near to one of these stations not very high up. Jet aircraft picked them up on aircraft radar. The objects then simply made rings round them."

"Inevitably this led to the sort of enquiry which you would put in hand if you had any military responsibilities. Had something gone wrong with ground radar or with aircraft radar? We experienced pilots going out of their minds? Were people having fantasies? We *had* to investigate cases of that kind. Over the years - although there were not an enormous number of such cases - there were a sufficient number to persuade me, and a number of air staff friends with whom I had to work, that something was going on, sporadically, in British airspace which we could not explain."

"But we did not particularly want to make public statements about that. Not for something that we had no explanation."

Ralph Noyes,Senior Official with British Air Ministry - retired as Under Secretary of State in 1977

link

Cheers.

Like i said in another thread of my own there must be a real project blue book still running somewhere,not only with camera footage,but also with radar bleeps,faa reports,military reports, everything.Might be under a different name but someone somewhere is researching all this data.

Originally posted by karl 12
There seems to be plenty of reports of Military jets encountering UFOs (or being scrambled to pursue them) so where's the gun camera footage?

According to MUFON International Director John F. Schuessler in his article about missing UFO information 'not one frame of gun camera film has ever been released'.

Where is it then - is there a film archive somewhere containing all the withheld footage?
snip

Of all of the alleged gun-camera UFO footage filmed since the beginning, Astronaut Gordon Cooper's claim is the one I would vote #1 and would love to see. Below is one of the million or so sources on Google where Cooper mentions the filming, edited by me for brevity.

www.ufocasebook.com...
GORDON COOPER & UFOs: AN ASTRONAUT SPEAKS OUT by Timothy Green Beckley
UFOs were to continue to haunt him when the Air Force Colonel was transferred several years later to Edwards Air Force Base Flight Test Center in the California desert.

What happened one afternoon while he was on duty at this military base is evidence enough that the government definitely does keep a lot of secrets when it comes to UFOs!

The incident took place in the late 1950s, either 1957 or 1958 - as Cooper can best recall; and to this day, the photographic evidence of an actual UFO touching down upon the Earth is being kept under wraps.

During this period, Cooper was a Project Manager at Edwards Air Force Base, just three or four years before entering America's space program. After lunch this particular day, Cooper had assigned a team of photographers to an area of the vast dry lake beds near Edwards.

In a taped interview with UFOlogist Lee Spiegel, the former Astronaut disclosed that while the crew was out there, they spotted a strange-looking craft above the lake bed, and they began taking films of it.

Cooper says the object was very definitely 'hovering above the ground. And then it slowly came down and sat on the lake bed for a few minutes.' All during this time the motion picture cameras were filming away.

'There were varied estimates by the cameramen on what the actual size of the object was,' Cooper confesses, 'but they all agreed that it was at least the size of a vehicle that would carry normal-sized people in it.'

Col. Cooper was not fortunate enough to be outside at the time of this incredible encounter, but he did see the films as soon as they were rushed through the development process.

'It was a typical circular-shaped UFO,' he recollects. 'Not too many people saw it, because it took off at quite a sharp angle and just climbed straight on out of sight!'

...

After he reviewed the film at least a dozen times, the footage was quickly forwarded to Washington. Cooper no doubt expected to get a reply in a few weeks' time as to what his men had seen and photographed, but there was no word, and the movie *vanished* - never to surface again....

Well, the Belgian Air Force only had radar data rather than photography from one of the two F-16s engaged in a chase, but they played back and explained the radar recording at a press conference. And they said the target was seen on five NATO radar screens. This is well known, discussed on ATS, and covered in various documentaries available on YouTube.

In Flying Saucers from Outer Space Major Donald Keyhoe described at some length the case in which Major James B. Smith had to fly his F-86 straight up to get gun-camera footage of a disc above him after being scrambled in response to a sighting by ground radar, August 1, 1952.

Originally posted by The Shrike
Of all of the alleged gun-camera UFO footage filmed since the beginning, Astronaut Gordon Cooper's claim is the one I would vote #1 and would love to see.

Hi The Shrike,

If you are interested in that footage, I can send you some stills from it. I may make the effort to get hold of a copy of the footage itself shortly, although the stills are rather unimpressive so I've treated following this up as a low priority.

We all know that the best stuff will never be released anytime soon. Would love to see it all and I'm sure there's gonna be some stuff in those videos that would be absolutely breath-taking.

Additionally, if all the best UFO footage is going missing, isn't that proof that there's a group or organisation that's gathering this stuff?

Originally posted by Zcustosmorum

We all know that the best stuff will never be released anytime soon.

Thanks for the replies and yes I suppose we do - when military aircraft get scrambled to 'intercept' UFOs like in the Tehran case and Edwards Air Force base incident, I'd say it's a fair bet there are gun cameras on board the aircraft - I'd also say it's a fair bet that no-one who has posted on this thread is ever going to see the footage.

Here's one I'd love to see - the pilot got within 300 feet of the object.

At this point, I came within about 300 feet of the UFO. It was about 30 feet in diameter. It was an enameled, cream-colored dome, with a wide, circular, metallic base. It had no engines, no exhausts, no windows, no wings or antennae. It lacked all the typical aircraft components, with no visible propulsion system.

link

Originally posted by Zcustosmorum

Additionally, if all the best UFO footage is going missing, isn't that proof that there's a group or organisation that's gathering this stuff?

That's a good point well put and it would be interesting to compile a list of all the military aircraft UFO encounters that involve missing gun camera film - maybe there's a specialist cinema in a Deep Underground Military Base somewhere.

Not wanting to get off topic but I bet the NRO is also withholding some interesting images.

SECRET US INTELLIGENCE AGENCY HOLDS UFO ANSWERS

Cheers.

Well, UFOs are said to be capable of temporarily shutting down electrical systems and supposedly could disable a movie camera if it got to close.

And about withholding footage, at least we know that the film from Project Twinkle was and is being withheld and has possibly been destroyed.

Even so, 3D footage taken from two wingtip cameras rather than 2D from a single nose-mounted camera would be great.

Originally posted by xpoq47

Well, UFOs are said to be capable of temporarily shutting down electrical systems and supposedly could disable a movie camera if it got to close.

Good point, hadn't really thought of that - it's been pretty well established that UFOs cause electromagnetic interference and Richard Haines report lists quite a few examples but have never heard of E.M. effects affecting a camera before (have heard of batteries being drained though).

"Reported E-M effects included radio interference or total failure, radar contact with and without simultaneous visual contact, magnetic and/or gyro-compass deviations, automatic direction finder failure or interference, engine stopping or interruption, dimming cabin lights, transponder failure, and military aircraft weapon system failure. We're not dealing with mental projections or hallucinations on the part of the witness but with a real physical phenomenon."

Dr. Richard Haines, Psychologist specializing in pilot and astronaut "human factors" research for the Ames NASA Research Center in California-Chief of the Space Human Factors Office

Electromagnetic Effects Associated with Unidentified Flying Objects

Originally posted by xpoq47

And about withholding footage, at least we know that the film from Project Twinkle was and is being withheld and has possibly been destroyed.

Yes mate, it's certainly a shame about that - here's what the USAF Directorate of Intelligence had to say about the project not being declassified.

"The Scientific Advisory Board Secretariat has suggested that this project not be declassified for a variety of reasons, chief among which is that no scientific explanation for any of the fireballs and other phenomena was revealed by the report and that some reputable scientists still believe that the observed phenomena are man-made."

And it's stated in another letter from the Directorate of Intelligence to the Research Division of the Directorate of Research and Development that..

"It is believed that a release of the information to the public in its present condition would cause undue speculation and give rise to unwarranted fears among the populace such as occurred in previous releases on unidentified flying objects. This results from releases when there has been no real solution."

Originally posted by xpoq47

Even so, 3D footage taken from two wingtip cameras rather than 2D from a single nose-mounted camera would be great.

It most certainly would (providing the U.S. Government decided to release any gun camera footage at all).

Here's another military case which involves more claims of missing footage.

The first case occurred in the late 1950s. Jay Mallet, a navy pilot, was making dry runs at a target on the bombing range when he suddenly encountered a dozen small silver disks at about 10,000 feet altitude. It was approximately 9:30 am; visibility was good, and there were few clouds.

He described the metallic disks as being about the size of large garbage can lids. They had no lights, windows, markings or other features. "They simply looked like a squadron of flying saucers", he later reported. As he followed them they dropped down to about 1,000 feet.

Mallet was ordered to take photos using his gun cameras, but was never shown the film from the cameras. He was later sworn to secrecy about what he had seen.

link

Cheers.

Originally posted by karl 12

Here's another military case which involves more claims of missing footage.

..The first case occurred in the late 1950s. Jay Mallet, a navy pilot, was making dry runs at a target on the bombing range when he suddenly encountered a dozen small silver disks at about 10,000 feet altitude. It was approximately 9:30 am; visibility was good, and there were few clouds.

He described the metallic disks as being about the size of large garbage can lids. They had no lights, windows, markings or other features. "They simply looked like a squadron of flying saucers", he later reported. As he followed them they dropped down to about 1,000 feet.

Mallet was ordered to take photos using his gun cameras, but was never shown the film from the cameras. He was later sworn to secrecy about what he had seen...

Cheers.

On the question of movie versus stills and 3d, I think early jet interceptors just had a single camera which caught still images. I believe in the F-89, the camera was in the front of a tip tank.

I am assuming that the camera was setup to be automatically triggered when the pilot fired his guns or rockets, plus the pilot could manually trigger the camera.

I did read somewhere that the USAF did have a program for capturing UFO images using the gun cameras.
And of course, it seems all of those images remain classified. I do suspect that there is some sort of org inside the USAF that collects and analyses UFO incident data. Plus I also assume that NORAD must also have a similar program (or the two are one and the same).

I doubt anyone is going to tell us anything about the existence of such an ongoing program. You would figure that some retired members of the USAF might know more details, but maybe they are reluctant to tell the public due to ongoing "security oaths" or whatever reasons.

I figure that most of the early gun camera imagery was probably low quality, but I would figure that they must have some high quality images from more advanced camera systems from recent decades.

Originally posted by bluestreak53
I figure that most of the early gun camera imagery was probably low quality, but I would figure that they must have some high quality images from more advanced camera systems from recent decades.

Hola Bluestreak53, thanks for the reply and I'd figure that as well - here's some more interesting claims about UFOs being captured on gun camera, this time involving three silver disk-shaped objects being photographed by a military jet over North Bay base - an Air Force Captain is also claimed to have said they have been tracking UFOs for many years on radar.


Shown Actual Photograph of UFOs Taken From Gun Camera Film.mp3

Cheers.

the sooner we see footage the better... not sure why they'd withhold this...

Just one more little point I'd like to make about the notion of mounting a camera in each wing instead of the nose is that if they were PTZ cameras with powerful zoom, they could be controlled by the target-lock system to get 3D closeups in the course of a chase. If they aren't doing that, one might suspect that the CIA is satisfied with the gun-camera footage they already have and won't release, which would presumably only be the case if such footage clearly showed artificial craft obviously not of human manufacture or the whole UFO phenomenon were an elaborate hoax perpetrated by the CIA and USAF (both of which came into existence as a result of a bill rushed through Congress a few weeks after the Roswell incident).

reply to post by bluestreak53


The F-89 didn't have any guns that I am aware of. Also there is plenty of gun camera footage from WW2 and it isn't still images. The quality isn't great but you can clearly see planes as they are being shot at.

Originally posted by prvtnewbie
reply to post by bluestreak53

 

The F-89 didn't have any guns that I am aware of. Also there is plenty of gun camera footage from WW2 and it isn't still images. The quality isn't great but you can clearly see planes as they are being shot at.

I stand corrected. They were using movie cams for gun cameras even back to WWII.
I was thinking that movie cameras back then were too big, but I forgot that even back in the 1950s people had portable movie cams that shot onto 4mm film (rather low quality).

So I wonder what sort of film they used in gun cameras?

In any case, the early F-89B and F-89C models had six 20mm machine guns mounted in the front fuselage. The gun firing trigger controlled the camera and gun operation. The camera was mounted in the nose of the right wing tip tank.

In the F-89D, the machine guns were replaced with rockets, that were contained in pods in the forward part of the wing tip tanks.

reply to post by bluestreak53


Thanks for the update/correction. I would think any gun camera footage would just have been confiscated and eventually destroyed.

I can't believe they would ever release that footage.

Just a bit of a follow up...
I was watching a doc on cable about a World War II Canadian Air Ace. One thing they mentioned is the Spitfire used 16mm film on its gun cameras. That is actually quite high res.

I like your posts carl !

Interesting point about the gun cameras, didn't know nothing gets out.