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Government Cover-up of a Classic UFO Case?

Philip J. Imbrogno

original source |  fair use notice

Summary: Discussion of a possible government cover-up of the Hudson Valley sightings.

What ever UFOs are they do exist and the phenomenon is world wide! Over the past thirty-five years most un-biased UFO research that has been made available to the general public has been by civilian organizations and individual investigators. A question often asked by members of the media to UFO researchers is" After all these years what have you found out?" The answer to this question is we found out plenty. We have proven by the great number of case studies, video tapes, and Government documents that UFOs are real! A recent Gallop pole showed that most Americans believe that UFOs exist. It has also been shown, due to the great efforts of Citizens Against UFO Secrecy (CAUS) that when it comes to UFOS, our Government knows more than it's telling. This is apparent in the multitude of documents that CAUS was able to obtain under the Freedom Of Information Act. Still, quite a few documents were withheld because of reasons of National Security.

During September of 1987,just before the publication of my book NIGHT SIEGE THE HUDSON VALLEY UFO SIGHTINGS, I received a certified letter from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). The letter stated that I would be contacted very shortly by an officer of the Air force in regards to my investigations into the UFO phenomenon in the Hudson Valley. The letter went on to say that I would be contacted by a Lt. Col. Bennet whose official title was the officer in charge to the Air force's representative branch to the Federal Aviation Administration.

About one week later I received a call from a Major Andrews of the Air force from Burlington Mass. He told me that the Air force was well aware of the sightings in the Hudson Valley and that they have been collecting reports over the past ten years. He said that there was no official investigation into the sightings, but still they do check out reports of unknown aircraft reported by the FAA. I talked with Major Andrews for over forty minutes and the main concern of the Air force seemed to be that the publication of NIGHT SIEGE might cause a UFO panic in the Hudson Valley and nearby area. Major Andrews informed me that there were secret military flights over the area, the purpose of these missions he did not know. He then agreed to send me information that he had in his files about UFO reports in the area. He then asked if I would keep him updated on the locations of new sightings. His interest, he said was just personal. This seemed a little strange to me, since when does the Air force call a UFO investigator regarding a UFO case. I believe that I was one of the first civilians in a very long time that was contacted by the Air force via telephone in the past twenty years. This must mean that what ever the Hudson Valley UFO was, the Air force was very interested in it.

About five days later I received the packet of UFO material from Major Andrews. In it were some documents from local bases and the FAA regarding UFO sightings. There were also quite a few letters sent to the FAA and the Air force from residents in the New York, Connecticut and Massachusetts area who have had UFO sightings. The oldest of these reports dated back to 1972. What was puzzling was the fact that some of the letters were addressed to local newspapers, several of the national tabloids and a well known author on the UFO phenomena, but how did they get into the hands of the Air force? I contacted this well known author who informed me that he never got the letter.

There was one curious memo dated August of 1983 from the FAA at Kennedy Airport asking where they should send a UFO report. The bottom of the memo indicated that the report was sent to the Department of the Air force in Washington D.C. I called them and was told that reports of "UNKNOWNS" are channeled to other" concerned agencies" and that procedure is protected under National Security. Then the woman who I was talking to after taking my name and address politely hung up on me.

Was there a connection between our Government and the UFO sightings in the New York area? If so what was the connection? Was there an experimental craft belonging to the Air force being tested in the area, or was the UFO that has been now spotted over most of New England the product of an alien intelligence? I was not sure, but it was quite clear there was some type of Government involvement. This was to be more evident as the months went on.

There have been literly thousands of UFO sightings in the Northeast since 1982.The center of concentration of the sightings seems to be around the Hudson Valley of New York. Here my research team and I centered our investigation. We have been researching these sightings since 1982 and by 1987 we had hundreds of reports entered on our computer's floppy disks. We found out that the majority of reports took place on a Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday night from 8-11 PM. The center of activity within the high concentration of reports in the Hudson Valley was around the Kent New York area. Interesting enough, highway I-84 was right in the middle of this area. This information was made available by use of the computer, without it, this would have taken months to figure out.

For the past several years the UFO sightings seemed to have taken somewhat of a pattern. On certain days of the month it would appear in an area at a certain time, then disappear in another location. We thought we did indeed spot some type of pattern and with the help of our computer predicted the next sighting date to be on October 29 1987 at about 8:20 Pm around the Kent-Brewster New York area. This information was obtained on October 15th,plently of time to prepare and check our data.

We prepared four cars, all equipped with CB radios and decided to use highway I-84 as the center of our operations. We also had one car with a police scanner so that we can listen in to police in the area. in the past local and State police were the first to get reports of the UFO.

We then started driving on Highway I-84 West bound at about 8:10 pm. Each car was spaced about two miles apart. I was in the second car and at 8:20 PM I lost communication with our lead car. As I approached a rest stop just before the Taconic Parkway turn off I saw our lead car pulled over to the side of the road. The driver was Chris Clark and he was already out of the car looking at a group of lights in the northern section of the sky. I stopped the car and got on my radio to inform the others "That we had something strange here" I then instructed the other cars to pull off to the side of the road since the lights seemed as if they were going to head east, in their direction.

I then got out of the car and saw a formation of about eight yellowish white lights, very bright heading straight for our location. Chris said that he had been observing them for five minutes and they did a kind of "dance" in the sky before they took on the present shape. The lights appeared now like a straight line, Much brighter than the landing lights of a plane. They were about forty degrees above the horizon and moving very slow in our direction.

As we watched the lights we heard no sound at all. It was then I realized that this was the Hudson Valley UFO, the one I had been tracking for the past five years. The lights continued to approach, then they moved sideways, then began heading east. At no time did I see a physical structure connecting the lights, but they moved so smoothly and in such perfect order that I could not imagine them being separate objects. At this point I could see the back of it and it appeared to be in a boomerang shape., I then saw about eighteen other lights of various colors, The purest reds, Greens and ambers that I ever saw. The back seemed to be made up of red lights only, while the middle had red lights, green and amber and blue. The front was composed of these very bright yellowish-white lights.

I then called on the radio to Fred Dennis who was about two miles east of my position on I-84. There was also another car between Fred and myself. I Said "Fred, Its heading in your direction" At that time I lost the object over a hill. Fred then got out of the car with his binoculars looking all around for something. He said to himself" What are they seeing, there's nothing here" He radioed back to inform us that he saw nothing in the sky. Then his voice went silent. About forty seconds later Fred got back on the radio and yelled," I SEE IT, It's HUGE". It seems as Fred was scanning the skies the UFO came out from behind a hill that was blocking the North west. Fred then observed it with his binoculars. The object was so huge, he said that it spilled out of the field of view. This would make it an enormous object since the field of view with those binoculars is 500 feet at a thousand yards.

The object was observed by every member of our team. One of our researchers also had it in binoculars as it passed right over his car. He reported a series of multicolored lights attached to some type of dark grey structure. The object was so colorful against the clear night sky that it looked like a Christmas Tree.

The UFO continued to head toward the east, to Danbury Connecticut. We were still all heading West, so we had to get off the exit and get back on the other side of I-84 and head east. We did this and started heading east. The time was now 8:55 pm. We drove for about five minutes and then saw the object again, this time it was going west! We stopped our cars and watched it drift slowly ,just above the hills at an estimated distance of three miles from the highway. We watched it for about five more minutes. We saw a multitude of red lights which made up the back of the object. As we watched it all the lights went out and the UFO simply vanished before our eyes.

We were all quite excited by what we saw. At the time of the sighting there were also other cars pulling over to the shoulder of the highway also observing the object. We could also hear the Truck drivers talking about it over the CB radio. We learned later that the object was seen in the Danbury Connecticut area and hovered above a main road for several minutes. Most of the people who saw it in Danbury indicate it was at least the size of a 747 and was no more than 1,000 feet in the air. One couple in Danbury Connecticut reported that as it hovered above their car, the UFO began to descend, this really upset them. As they watched it, the UFO then slowly gained altitude then it moved away to the west. A for our team we did have a video camera and still cameras, but were disappointed the way the pictures came out.

It is not common for UFO investigators to see the UFO that they are researching. With all the sightings in the Hudson Valley and the entire northeast it was only a matter of time before we got a real good look at the UFO, and we did! We had thought we had found a real pattern to the appearance of the Hudson Valley UFO, but when we tried to predict later sightings we saw nothing. Therefore we must assume that our sighting was a coincidence and if there was a real pattern to the UFO we had not yet found it.

In the days to follow we received dozens of letters and many phone calls from people in the area who also saw it that same night. We got one report that was to provide a lead to a possible cover-up of the UFO sightings. This report indicated that after the UFO disappeared about twenty minutes later a formation of planes was seen tracing the exact same route that the UFO took.


Cover-up
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Make no mistake about it, there is a real unknown object in New York's Hudson Valley. Since the publication of NIGHT SIEGE there has been a regular appearance of a formation of planes over New York and Connecticut. Members of our research team have spotted them on numerous occasions. These planes were also observed in binoculars by several independent witnesses. We had these people draw the outline of the shapes of the planes that they saw. The drawings were all very similar, o we sent them to two pilots that we know. One is a ex-military pilot, the other a ex-commercial pilot who used to fly missions for the CIA. All of our aircraft experts and our two pilots agree that the design was that of an O-2 type aircraft. The O-2 is a medium duty aircraft with a single engine. It is made by Cessna Aircraft. It is capable of long range and is used by the CIA for surveillance missions. It has a very quiet "souped up" engine and the newer models have on board flight computers in them for greater stability in the air. We have reports that as many as eight planes were seen flying together in a tight formation with the winds gusting up to twenty-five miles an hour!

They seem to be trying to fake a UFO and many people feel that it is an attempt to discredit the sightings and to try to convince everyone that all they saw was a bunch of planes. These planes have been seen only on a Thursday night, the official night the Air force flies night maneuvers. They have been seen all over Southern New York and most of Connecticut.

They fly for about two hours and then they land, but where? They have been seen circling Stormville Airport in Stormville, New York giving the impression that they are going to land there. They then break formation and head West (One plane has been reported landing at Stormville then taking off again). On more than one occasion they have been tracked to Stewart International airport (an old air force SAC base) in Newburgh New York. Stewart is located West of the Hudson River not far from I-84. The base is official operated by the Air National Guard and the Marine Corps. The planes then land, one at a time over a period of one hour, but not on the main part of the base. They seem to lad on a isolated section of Stewart which is a very large airport.

Our research team visited Steward airport and found an isolated fenced off large airfield away from the main landing area marked "RESTRICTED" The Restricted area had a well kept flight line and grounds. On the grounds were several buildings which looked like hangers large enough to harbor several planes of medium size. For the several hours that we were there we saw no activity at all.

We filed a Freedom Of Information Act request( FOIA) with the CIA to find out if the CIA was in fact using this area for some type of operation using small aircraft. We received an answer several weeks later from the CIA. In a lengthy double talking letter the CIA denied our request for information about their activities at Stewart. The reason they gave was National Security. This denial in our eyes is an admission that the planes do in fact belong to the CIA. It is also apparent that the pilots who fly these planes are expert military type pilots with years of experience in formation flying.

What was going on in this restricted area? I was contacted by a member of the local Newburgh New York media. This person told me that about six months before our visit to Stewart he found the restricted area on the base, became curious and started to walk toward the inside perimeter. Out of no where a jeep came screaming to a halt and three military police (Airforce) got out of the jeep and took him by force to a building just inside the gate. He was placed in a room that was dimly lit with just a table and chair. After about fifteen minutes two men entered the room dressed in dark suits and began to question him. They had a computer print out in their hands and it had his name on it. He told me that they knew everything about him.

After about one hour of questions, they then called his supervisor at his Job to pick him up. They then placed him in a jeep and took him to the public area of Stewart Airfield. This member of the media is a newsperson in the Newburgh area and does not want his name used at all in regards to the experience he had at the restricted area at Stewart. He is still fearful that who ever they were that questioned him might be keeping an eye on him. He told me that he felt they were with the CIA and they meant business.

During our investigation concerning this restricted area at Stewart we found out that the base now harbors several C-5A's the largest transport jet that our Air force has. We also found out from personnel at the base that these C-5A's landed on the restricted airfield several years ago and cargo was unloaded. We also found out through a document search that the Air National Guard is no longer officially running the un-restricted area of the base. It is now under the command of the Navy and the Marines are running it and have been since 1973! This was strange since when we visited Stewart we saw Air force personnel there and even had a talk with a Master Sergeant.

We also found out that the Department of Agriculture was also using a section of the restricted area. After a great deal of getting the run around we found out that they are using the area for a holding place for animals. We found out that a great deal of cattle and other animals were flown in to this area. We are still waiting for documents from the USDA explaining where the animals are coming from, why cattle and where are they going from there. Of course when we found out that cattle were being flown into this area the thought of cattle mutilations crossed our minds. What was the strange connection with the mutilations and the UFOS. What was the connection between the restricted area at Stewart, the CIA, the mystery planes and the USDA and the cattle.

North Putnam County and parts of Westchester county are the site of many old abandoned iron ore mines. Most of the mines have been closed down with the openings sealed. Many of these openings are located in miles of thick woods overgrown with brush, almost impossible to find. I received a phone call from a well known UFO investigator who suggested that these old mines might be the location of an alien base and that the CIA as well as other agencies were operating out of Stewart to keep "an eye" on their operations. I don't know about this theory, but can only relate the facts. There are and have been thousands of UFO reports in the Hudson Valley and Connecticut since 1982. Aircraft have been seen on a regular basis since the publication of NIGHT SIEGE. These Air craft are without a doubt trying to discredit the sightings. These aircraft have been tracked to Stewart Airfield where they land in a restricted area. These aircraft are of the O-2 type used by the CIA. The CIA will not provide any information about their activities at Stewart because of reasons of National Security.

In September of 1988 I did a number of TV shows ,newspaper and radio interviews I talked about the possibility that the CIA was trying to cover-up the UFO sightings by flying special aircraft with non-regulation lighting. In the days to follow the mystery aircraft were no longer reported in the skies over the Hudson Valley and have not been seen since. Our investigation still continues.

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Hudson Valley Sightings