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Speaker 1: You're listening to part two of Unexplained, Season four, episode eleven.

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Speaker 1: New Dawn fades down at the Officers Club on Roswell

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Speaker 1: Army Airfield, Forty year old Major Jesse Marcel had just

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Speaker 1: settled in to eat lunch when an unusual call came

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Speaker 1: in from the Chavers County Sheriff's Department. Taking it in

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Speaker 1: his office, he listened carefully as the man on the

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Speaker 1: other end of the line, Sheriff George Wilcox, proceeded to

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Speaker 1: relay what he himself had just been told by local

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Speaker 1: rancher Mac Brazel, that something appeared to have broken up

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Speaker 1: over a section of ranch land that he managed, and

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Speaker 1: that he had no idea what it was. That's all

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Speaker 1: very well, Sheriff said Mars A little confused. But what's

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Speaker 1: it got to do with us? Well, said Wilcox, pausing

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Speaker 1: for a moment. He thinks it might have something to

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Speaker 1: do with those flying discs we've all been hearing about.

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Speaker 1: In July nineteen forty seven, Major Jesse Marcel was the

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Speaker 1: Base Intelligence Officer of the five O ninth Bombardment Group.

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Speaker 1: Prior to this, he worked for Shell Oil as a

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Speaker 1: specialist in constructing maps from aerial photography before volunteering for

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Speaker 1: the US Air Force shortly after the outbreak of the

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Speaker 1: Second World War. After excelling an intelligence officer training in

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Speaker 1: nineteen forty three, Marcel was dispatched to the South Pacific

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Speaker 1: as a squadron intelligence officer for US Air Force Fifth

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Speaker 1: Bomber Command, where he remained until the end of the war.

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Speaker 1: Marcel's service earned him a number of medals, as well

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Speaker 1: as the Bronze Star and eventually a promotion to major.

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Speaker 1: Well respected by his colleagues, Marcel had little interest in

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Speaker 1: science fiction or speculation about Little Green people. However, there

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Speaker 1: was good reason to be concerned about just what exactly

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Speaker 1: had come down on the ranch. Ever since Kenneth Arnold's

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Speaker 1: apparent strange sightings the previous month, the US military had

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Speaker 1: been on high alert for unidentified flying objects, the emphasis

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Speaker 1: being unidentified. It's a common misconception that the term UFO,

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Speaker 1: which wouldn't be coined until nineteen fifty three, refers exclusively

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Speaker 1: to objects of extraterrestrial origin, when in fact, it refers

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Speaker 1: merely to any object in the sky that has yet

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Speaker 1: to be identified. Back in nineteen forty seven, military personnel

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Speaker 1: tended to label such things as simply bogies, a catch

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Speaker 1: all for anything appearing unexpectedly on radar that had the

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Speaker 1: potential to be hostile. And what concerned the US military

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Speaker 1: in nineteen forty seven, far more than the possibility of

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Speaker 1: interplanetary attack, was a somewhat earthlier fear of the unknown,

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Speaker 1: more specifically, the unknown capabilities of the Soviet Union's military,

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Speaker 1: a fear heightened by paranoia at what secrets they might

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Speaker 1: have unearthed, having acquired a number of Germany's leading scientists

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Speaker 1: at the end of the war. After all, it was

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Speaker 1: only recently that the US government learned of the German

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Speaker 1: army's vie to rocket program, not to mention that the

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Speaker 1: US government themselves maintained a number of secretive programs of

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Speaker 1: modern weapons development. It was only reasonable to speculate, therefore,

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Speaker 1: that all these reports of flying sources could have something

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Speaker 1: to do with new Soviet technology. It was late in

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Speaker 1: the afternoon of Monday, July seven that Major Marcell jumped

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Speaker 1: into an Army geep and sped off toward the Foster Ranch,

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Speaker 1: accompanied by counterintelligence officer Sheridan Cavit, pulling up to the

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Speaker 1: ranch house a few hours later, with the sun already

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Speaker 1: dipping below the horizon, they were greeted by Mac Brazell.

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Speaker 1: Mack wasted no time in showing them the scraps of

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Speaker 1: material he had taken back to the ranch. Though they

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Speaker 1: were certainly unusual, thought Marcell, he was keen to see

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Speaker 1: the rest of the debris to get a bigger picture. However,

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Speaker 1: with the light fading fast, there was little point in

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Speaker 1: heading out there that evening, and so the three of

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Speaker 1: them bedded down for the night and waited for morning.

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Speaker 1: Shortly after five am the following day, Marcel and Cavit

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Speaker 1: awoke to the cool, pink haze of a New Mexico sunrise.

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Speaker 1: Gathering their things, they jumped back into the jeep and

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Speaker 1: along with Brazel, drove out into the desert. After twenty

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Speaker 1: minutes cruising through the scrub, Brazel instructed them to stop there,

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Speaker 1: he said, pointing to the bush where he'd attempted to

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Speaker 1: gather at the rest of the broken pieces. Cavet turned

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Speaker 1: off the engine, and together the three of them jumped

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Speaker 1: out and headed on toward the debris headlined Diston July eighth,

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Speaker 1: nineteen forty seven, the Army Air Forces has announced that

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Speaker 1: a flying disk has been found and is now in

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Speaker 1: the perfection of the Army. Of a matter of fact,

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Speaker 1: the five hundred and ninth Atomic Bond Group headquarters at Rockwell,

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Speaker 1: New Mexicol, report that it has received one of the

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Speaker 1: disks which landed on a rant outside Rockwell. A disk

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Speaker 1: landed at a rant at Corona, New Mexicol, and a

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Speaker 1: ranter turned it over to the airport ranker. WW Brazel

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Speaker 1: was the man who discovered the toper. Colonel William Blanchard

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Speaker 1: of the Rockwell Airbey produited to give detail of what

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Speaker 1: the flying desk looked like. The press release had been

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Speaker 1: ordered by Colonel Blanchard soon after Marcel briefed him and

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Speaker 1: what they had discovered at the ranch. The excited radio

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Speaker 1: broadcasts would continue thick and fast throughout the day, and

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Speaker 1: the afternoon's newspapers would soon follow suit, as all over

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Speaker 1: the world the public began to hear about the extraordinary news.

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Speaker 1: The eighth of July edition of the Roswell Daily Record

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Speaker 1: lad with Roswell Army Airfield captures flying saucer on ranch

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Speaker 1: in Roswell, as the article went on to state, according

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Speaker 1: to information released by the Intelligence Office of the five

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Speaker 1: o ninth, the disc was recovered on a ranch in

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Speaker 1: the Roswell vicinity after an unidentified rancher had notified Sheriff

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Speaker 1: George Wilcox here that he'd found the instrument on his premisive.

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Speaker 1: Major Marcel and a detail from his depart went to

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Speaker 1: the ranch and recovered the disc. The Intelligence Office stated

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Speaker 1: that no details of the sources, construction, or its appearance

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Speaker 1: had been revealed. Having delivered a significant amount of the

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Speaker 1: debris from the ranch back to Roswell Airfield, Major Marcel

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Speaker 1: was then ordered to ship out with it immediately to

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Speaker 1: the Air Force base at Fort Worth in Texas. From

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Speaker 1: there it would be reviewed by more senior personnel before

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Speaker 1: they decided what to do with it next. And so

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Speaker 1: it was that only a few hours later Major Marcell

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Speaker 1: touched down in Texas at the offices of the Fort

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Speaker 1: Worth Star Telegram, just six miles east of the Army airfield,

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Speaker 1: Editor Callum Greene listened with astonishment as the radio reports

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Speaker 1: came in about the Flying Sources discovery. A short time later,

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Speaker 1: he received the wance in a lifetime tip off that

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Speaker 1: the wreckage of the apparent flying disc was heading to

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Speaker 1: Fort Worth. Seeing twenty year old military editor and photographer

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Speaker 1: John Von Johnson at his desk, Green hurried over to him.

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Speaker 1: You're going to want to take your camera for this one,

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Speaker 1: he said with a smile. Within minutes, Johnson was at

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Speaker 1: the wheel of his Ford Club coupe, speeding off toward

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Speaker 1: the Army airfield. Johnson had been a police reporter for

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Speaker 1: The Telegram since nineteen forty three, but by forty seven

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Speaker 1: he was also a pilot officer in the Civil Air Patrol,

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Speaker 1: having joined the Army Air Force as a trainee during

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Speaker 1: the war, a fact that Green hoped might help him

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Speaker 1: gain access to the base. Excited by the prospect of

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Speaker 1: his first solo assignment, or Johnson could think about was

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Speaker 1: getting there in time to publish the story for that

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Speaker 1: night's edition. Arriving in double quick time, he was relieved

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Speaker 1: to find he was the first one there. After announcing

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Speaker 1: himself at the front gate, he was swiftly ushered through

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Speaker 1: and told to head directly for the office of Brigadier

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Speaker 1: General Brogier Raymie. Arriving outside his room, the first thing

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Speaker 1: that struck Johnson was the intense, acrid, burning odor coming

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Speaker 1: from inside it. It reminded him of the burned out

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Speaker 1: buildings he encountered back when he was a police reporter

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Speaker 1: knocking on the door. He was then invited in by

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Speaker 1: Colonel Thomas Dubouse, who informed him that Raymie would be

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Speaker 1: joining them shortly. Inside, he saw on the floor in

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Speaker 1: front of him a jumble of broken rods and ripped

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Speaker 1: sheets of what appeared to be some kind of foil.

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Speaker 1: These bits and pieces, he assumed were remnants of the

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Speaker 1: apparent flying saucer, or at least some of it. Realizing

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Speaker 1: he only had a few minutes to set up the

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Speaker 1: camera and get the shot, Johnson attempted to make the

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Speaker 1: pieces more presentable, but none of it seemed to fit

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Speaker 1: together in any logical way. Moments later, Brigadier General Raymie appeared,

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Speaker 1: along with Major Jesse Marcel, who seemed oddly reserved. Johnson

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Speaker 1: then asked Raymie if they determined what it was exactly,

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Speaker 1: but Raymie had no idea, and so, without wanting to

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Speaker 1: waste any more time, Johnson had Raymie debase and Major

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Speaker 1: Marcell posed for a few photographs alongside the debris. Having

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Speaker 1: taken six photos in total, Johnson was thanked for his time,

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Speaker 1: and with the scoop in hand, he headed straight back

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Speaker 1: to the Star Telegram to develop the pictures. An hour later,

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Speaker 1: he handed the finished Prince to his editor and headed home.

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Speaker 1: Later that afternoon, as Johnson was driving home back at

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Speaker 1: the Fort Worth Air Force Base, another press release was

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Speaker 1: being hastily arranged. Something it seemed had shifted in the narrative.

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Speaker 1: At some time around three pm, Bricadier General Raymie is

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Speaker 1: thought by some to have received a call from his superior,

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Speaker 1: General McMullen, instructing him to put out a new release.

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Speaker 1: General Raymie described the object as being a flimsy constructor

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Speaker 1: almost like a box type. He says that it was

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Speaker 1: so battered that he was unable to determine whether it

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Speaker 1: had a disf form, and he does not indicate its tide.

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Speaker 1: Raymie says that, so far as can be determined, no

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Speaker 1: one saw the object in the air, and he described

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Speaker 1: it as being made of some sort of tinfoil. Other

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Speaker 1: Army officials say that further information indicates that the object

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Speaker 1: had a diameter of about twenty to twenty five feet,

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Speaker 1: and that nothing in the apparent construction indicated any capacity

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Speaker 1: for speed, and that there was no evidence of a

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Speaker 1: power plant. But diff also appeared j Clemley to carry

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Speaker 1: a men, now back to Taylor grant in your yacht.

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Speaker 1: By the following morning, the apparent flying saucer discovery had

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Speaker 1: been mixed entirely, or as the July ninth edition of

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Speaker 1: the Roswell Daily Record declared, General Ramy empties Roswell's saucer.

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Speaker 1: The article continued. An examination by the Army revealed last

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Speaker 1: night that mysterious objects found on a lonely New Mexico

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Speaker 1: ranch was a harmless high altitude weather balloon and not

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Speaker 1: a grounded flying disc. Excitement was high until Brigadier General

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Speaker 1: Roger Ramy, commander of the eighth Air Forces with headquarters here,

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Speaker 1: cleared up the mystery, describing the materials as being nothing

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Speaker 1: more than a bundle of tinfoil, broken wood beams, and

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Speaker 1: rubber remnants of a balloon. The General said the objects

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Speaker 1: were the crushed remains of a ray wind target used

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Speaker 1: to determine the direction and velocity of winds at high altitudes.

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Speaker 1: A number of other papers followed suit, with many carrying

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Speaker 1: the pictures that Johnson had taken of the material in

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Speaker 1: Ramy's office. Most meteorologists, on examining the pictures, agreed that

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Speaker 1: the supposed crash debris was indeed pieces of a weather balloon. However,

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Speaker 1: there was one additional photo now circulating in the press

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Speaker 1: which hadn't been taken by Johnson or any other known

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Speaker 1: press photographer. The picture showed Warrant Officer and Army weather

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Speaker 1: forecaster Irving Newton, who had not been present for Johnson's

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Speaker 1: original photo session. Newton was put forward as an expert

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Speaker 1: by the Army Air Force, confirming the weather balloon interpretation.

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Speaker 1: The materials were eventually flown on to the Army's scientific

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Speaker 1: and technical labs at right Field Base in Ohio, where

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Speaker 1: the weather balloon explanation was again officially confirmed. Are you

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Speaker 1: Unexplained Podcast. The same day that people were waking up

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Speaker 1: to the news that the apparent flying saucer was nothing

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Speaker 1: but a weather balloon. The full account of mac Brazel's

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Speaker 1: story was also published in the Roswell Daily Record. Brazel's

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Speaker 1: description of the debris was markedly underwhelming and clashed significantly

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Speaker 1: with all original reports of a flying disc. When the

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Speaker 1: debris was gathered up, he stated the tinfoil, paper, tape

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Speaker 1: and sticks made a bundle about eighteen or twenty inches

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Speaker 1: long and about five inches thick. The article continued. In all,

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Speaker 1: he estimated the entire lot would have weighed maybe five pounds.

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Speaker 1: There was no sign of any metal in the area

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Speaker 1: which might have been used for an engine, and no

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Speaker 1: sign of any propellers of any kind. There were no

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Speaker 1: words to be found anywhere on the instrument, although there

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Speaker 1: were letters on some of the parts. Considerable scotch tape

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Speaker 1: and some tape with flowers printed upon it had been

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Speaker 1: used in the construction. No strings or wire were found either,

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Speaker 1: but there were some eyelets in the paper to indicate

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Speaker 1: that some sort of attachment may have been used, all

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Speaker 1: of which was in keeping with the Army Air Force's

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Speaker 1: explanation that it was merely a weather balloon that had

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Speaker 1: broken up. Tantalizingly, however, Brazel, who had seen a number

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Speaker 1: of such devices on the ranch before, concluded by stating

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Speaker 1: that whatever it was he had found, he was certain

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Speaker 1: it was not a weather balloon either way. Within days,

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Speaker 1: the whole roswell for Roar had all but completely blown over,

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Speaker 1: though an ordinate amount of disks were apparently spotted flying

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Speaker 1: in the skies throughout the rest of the year, for

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Speaker 1: the more skeptical of the public, the story was completely dead.

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Speaker 1: For a start. With the Cold War heating up, there

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Speaker 1: were far more pressing concerns than little green people, and

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Speaker 1: even for the most ardent of UFO believers, this intriguing

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Speaker 1: event soon vanished almost completely from public consciousness, but not

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Speaker 1: every one had forgotten about it, Unlike the majority of

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Speaker 1: the public. Far from ignoring the UFO flap of nineteen

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Speaker 1: forty seven, the U. S. Army Air Force began to

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Speaker 1: secretly investigate it. As mentioned earlier, this is unsurprising considering

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Speaker 1: the heightened fear of possible attack to the nation at

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Speaker 1: the time. Either way, the reports make for some interesting reading.

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Speaker 1: As one official document is said to have noted, dated

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Speaker 1: July thirtieth, nineteen forty seven. From a detailed study of

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Speaker 1: reports selected for their impression of voracity and reliability, several

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Speaker 1: conclusions have been formed the flying saucer situation is not

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Speaker 1: at all imaginary or the result of seeing too much

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Speaker 1: in some natural phenomena. Something is really flying around. On

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Speaker 1: twenty eighth of October nineteen forty seven, General George Shulgan,

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Speaker 1: chief of the US Air Force Air Intelligence Requirements Division,

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Speaker 1: issued a secret memo outlining the commonly reported features of

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Speaker 1: what he termed the flying saucer type aircraft, and instructed

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Speaker 1: all military personnel to be on the lookout for such

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Speaker 1: a device. Contrary to the opinions of some, however, the

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Speaker 1: original memo did not include the statement that some elements

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Speaker 1: in the military believed these objects represented into planetary craft. Nonetheless,

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Speaker 1: the United States Air Force continued to monitor and assess

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Speaker 1: all UFO sightings for at least the next twenty years.

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Speaker 1: This began with Project sign which was then superseded by

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Speaker 1: Project Grudge, which eventually in turn became the more well

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Speaker 1: known Project Blue Book. In nineteen fifty, former Marine Corps

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Speaker 1: naval aviator Donald Kehoe gave an interview in the US's

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Speaker 1: True magazine, claiming to know for a fact that the

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Speaker 1: Earth had been under close range examination by living, intelligent

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Speaker 1: observers from another planet. The US Air Force responded with

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Speaker 1: a six hundred page report detailing and explaining away two

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Speaker 1: hundred and thirty seven apparent UFO cases, and so the

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Speaker 1: dance would continue between believers and the military. Project Blue

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Speaker 1: Book was formally shut down in nineteen sixty nine, though many,

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Speaker 1: of course believed the US government merely continued their efforts elsewhere.

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Speaker 1: It may be surprising to learn, however, considering its notoriety today,

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Speaker 1: the Roswell UFO incident had barely been men since, but

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Speaker 1: all that was about to change. At the turn of

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Speaker 1: the nineteen seventies, nuclear physicist Stanton Friedman had forged a

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Speaker 1: reputation as one of the leading experts in his field,

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Speaker 1: working for the likes of General Electric and Aerojet, amongst

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Speaker 1: many others. Stanton's specialty was finding ways to incorporate nuclear

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Speaker 1: technology as a power source for planes, rockets, and even

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Speaker 1: space travel. By nineteen seventy, however, Freedman had given it

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Speaker 1: all up to investigate the possible existence of intelligent alien life.

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Speaker 1: His fascination in the subject had begun in nineteen fifty

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Speaker 1: eight after coming across a report on unidentified flying objects

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Speaker 1: written by former Air Force officer and creator of the

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Speaker 1: term UFO, Edward Ruppelt. As his own interest in the

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Speaker 1: utility of nuclear power expanded, Freedman became intrigued by the

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Speaker 1: prospect that beings from another planet were using it to

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Speaker 1: visit Earth. In February nineteen seventy eight, Friedman was in

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Speaker 1: a TV studio in Louisiana preparing for an interview to

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Speaker 1: promote a talk he was giving on UFOs later that night.

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Speaker 1: During a quick coffee break, he got talking to the

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Speaker 1: show's director, who suggested he get in touch with a

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Speaker 1: friend of theirs that lived nearby who claimed that they

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Speaker 1: had not only seen a UFO, but had also touched it.

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Speaker 1: By then, Freedman was something of a ufology celebrity and

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Speaker 1: this sort of interaction was par for the course. Nodding

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Speaker 1: along politely, he thanked the director for the suggestion and

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Speaker 1: made a mental note to add the name to the

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Speaker 1: vast list of other individuals who'd contacted him claiming the same.

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Speaker 1: Freedman hadn't given the name much thought, but with some

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Speaker 1: time to kill at the local airport the next day,

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Speaker 1: he made a quick call to Information and asked them

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Speaker 1: for a number for a man named Jesse Marcell. Dialing

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Speaker 1: his number moments later, Friedman waited patiently until finally an

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Speaker 1: elderly sounding man picked up the phone. Friedman introduced himself,

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Speaker 1: and the man in turn confirmed that he was indeed

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Speaker 1: Jesse Marcel, formerly Major Marcell of the five h ninth

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Speaker 1: Bombardment Group. The story of the Roswell incident would never

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Speaker 1: be the same again, according to Friedman. For whatever reason,

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Speaker 1: when Marcel answered the call that day, he decided to

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Speaker 1: come clean about what really happened back in the summer

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Speaker 1: of nineteen forty seven. As he went on to explain Firstly,

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Speaker 1: when he arrived at the location of what he referred

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Speaker 1: to as the crash site, he didn't find the remaining

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Speaker 1: pieces all neatly bundled up and stashed under a bush,

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Speaker 1: or that all the pieces had already been picked up

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Speaker 1: by mac Brazell, as some reports claimed, but instead he

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Speaker 1: found a vast array of it was still there, covering

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Speaker 1: an area of roughly three quarters of a mile long

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Speaker 1: and several hundred yards wide. More importantly, he claimed the

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Speaker 1: materials were like nothing he had ever encountered before. Some

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Speaker 1: of it he described as being as thin as the

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Speaker 1: foil from a cigarette packet, but extremely strong and impossible

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Speaker 1: to break or tear. Other bits looked like thin beams

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Speaker 1: of wood, but were in fact inordinately strong and had

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Speaker 1: strange markings on them. When he later escorted the pieces

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Speaker 1: of the wreckage to Fort Worth, Marcel claimed that only

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Speaker 1: a small portion of them were taken out to show

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Speaker 1: the press, while the rest of it was flown on

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Speaker 1: to right Field in Ohio. He also claimed that he

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Speaker 1: was given strict instructions to stay silent throughout the process,

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Speaker 1: and slowly more and more alternative versions of the story

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Speaker 1: began to emerge in seventy nine, an associate of Freedman's

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Speaker 1: was told by Marcel's son, a medical doctor and ironically

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Speaker 1: an aircraft accident investigator in his own right, that his

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Speaker 1: father had actually brought some of the wreckage home, Though

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Speaker 1: only eleven at the time, Doctor Jesse Junior Marcel claimed

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Speaker 1: to distinctly remember seeing a series of characters from an

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Speaker 1: unknown language imprinted along the edges of some of the beams.

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Speaker 1: The images, he said, reminded him of hieroglyphics. Friedman published

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Speaker 1: these claims soon after, becoming known as the first civilian

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Speaker 1: to investigate the apparent UFO crash near Roswell, But these

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Speaker 1: revelations seemed only to be at the tip of an iceberg.

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Speaker 1: Before long, more witnesses came forward, claiming secret knowledge of

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Speaker 1: the events, that it wasn't only a spacecraft that was recovered,

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Speaker 1: but bodies too, one of them possibly even alive. Dates

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Speaker 1: were questioned as to when exactly at all occurred. Stories

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Speaker 1: and interviews given at the time were scrutinized and reevaluated

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Speaker 1: for any sign of coercion or a wider plot to

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Speaker 1: keep a lid on the real truth, each interested party

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Speaker 1: invariably finding in the evidence whatever they wanted to find,

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Speaker 1: the rumors eventually escalating to incorporate that most secretive of

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Speaker 1: US Air Force sites, Area fifty one, the place where

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Speaker 1: some claimed today the Roswell craft and its occupants was

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Speaker 1: eventually taken and reverse engineered for its secrets. In nineteen

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Speaker 1: ninety four, the US Air Force, spurred on by the

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Speaker 1: disproportionate attention that seemed to be directed at what they

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Speaker 1: considered to be such an innocuous event, released its own

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Speaker 1: findings into the Roswell incident. Incredibly, the Roswell Report, fact

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Speaker 1: versus fiction in the New Mexico Desert, concluded that there

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Speaker 1: had been a cover up and that the weather balloon

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Speaker 1: story had indeed been entirely manufactured to hide the truth. However,

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Speaker 1: it wasn't due to any alien technology the Air Force

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Speaker 1: had found, but rather to keep secret the existence of

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Speaker 1: its own. It wasn't the innocuous weather balloon they first claimed,

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Speaker 1: but rather a device that was being used as part

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Speaker 1: of a secret operation known as Project Mogul. The project's

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Speaker 1: purpose was to keep track of any atomic tests that

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Speaker 1: the Soviet Union might be conducting. They did this by

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Speaker 1: flying microphones at high altitudes to pick up on signature

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Speaker 1: sound waves that such tests would give off for the

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Speaker 1: true believers. However, this was just yet another smoke screen

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Speaker 1: and the real truth, as they say, is still out there.

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Speaker 1: If you enjoy listening to Unexplained and would like to

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Speaker 1: help support us, you can now go to Unexplained podcast

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Speaker 1: dot com forward slash support. All donations, no matter how

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00:27:14,000 --> 00:27:19,720
Speaker 1: large or small, are massively appreciated. All elements of Unexplained

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Speaker 1: are produced by me Richard McClain smith. Please subscribe and

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00:27:24,080 --> 00:27:26,840
Speaker 1: rate the show on iTunes, and feel free to get

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00:27:26,880 --> 00:27:29,679
Speaker 1: in touch with any thoughts or ideas regarding the stories

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Speaker 1: you've heard on the show. Perhaps you have an explanation

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00:27:33,160 --> 00:27:36,440
Speaker 1: of your own you'd like to share. You can reach

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Speaker 1: us online at Unexplained podcast dot com or Twitter at

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Speaker 1: Unexplained Pod and Facebook at Facebook dot com, Forward slash Unexplained.

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Speaker 1: Now it's time to take care of your self. To

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00:28:01,000 --> 00:28:04,679
Speaker 1: make time for you. Teledoc gives you access to a

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400
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