Ask an Amateur Scientist: Washington UFO Flap

I. The Setup

Our nation’s capital has always been a hotspot for odd sightings. Residents have been known to bear witness to roving bands of congressionally hired prostitutes. Paper currency literally seeps from the pores in lobbyists’ skin. Joggers along the Potomac have snapped blurry photos of a mysterious creature known only as Ted Kennedy. And if you walk down any Washington, D.C. street, you’re likely to see something you won’t see anywhere else: American citizens with absolutely no federal representation.

It’s a weird place for sure. Compared to its normal supply of signs and wonders, something like the 1952 UFO flap seems downright pedestrian. After all, what are a few unexplained radar blips and contradictory eyewitness reports when stacked up against the kind of genetic anomalies that result in Rep. Henry Waxman’s face?

But if you were to read one of the ubiquitous UFO books clogging Barnes & Noble’s “New Age” section, you’d think the so-called “Washington incident” was actually interesting. You’d also probably find a few Penthouse Forum-esque accounts of steamy woman-on-lizard-alien action, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves. (Unless you want to stop reading this now and go check out the emerging literary field of crypto-erotica. And believe me, you do.)

So what actually happened those hot July nights back in the golden age of communist paranoia and vacuuming in pearls? It’s hard to tell for sure, and that’s mostly the fault of the aforementioned UFO books. Throw a few sub-Unsolved Mysteries Discovery or Travel Channel specials (seriously, why does the Travel Channel ever show anything about UFOs?), and the waters of reality become a little muddied. Even the ever-reliable Wikipedia, where I just recently read my own assertion that penguins are actually fish, comes up short. Sure, there are plenty of details. The incident was spread out over a couple of weekends. Radar operators and air traffic controllers at various Washington airports spotted what they thought were mysterious fast-moving objects on their screens. There’s even the occasional quote from a pilot or stewardess or police officer who saw something speeding through the sky.

But what really happened during those two weekends? And does it have anything to do with steamy woman-on-lizard-alien action?

II. The Findings

First, some context. In 1952, America was riding high on the flying saucer craze. The first major sightings had already been reported, and more were flowing in. This craze should have punched some holes in the UFO business’ credibility. It’s always suspicious when something gets national attention and dozens of identical stories come immediately pouring in. People want attention, and they’re willing to jump on board whatever bandwagon the world’s attention seems to be pulling. That’s how the early ‘80s saw so many reports of Satanic cults plaguing the night. That’s why so many people nowadays believe they have the singing chops to be personally judged by a listing, drooling Paula Abdul. Regardless, the UFO sightings were taken seriously by our government, which was itself in the midst of another craze: the red scare. They wanted to know whether there were unidentified flying objects invading U.S. airspace, and they wanted to know if Khrushchev was piloting them. Or whoever was in charge of the USSR at the time. My research skills only go so far.

So it’s no wonder that a few unexplained radar blips over the capital would cause a stir. And given the current state of pop culture, it’s no wonder that such a stir would translate to “Aliens Over Washington!” headlines. But when you try and uncover the actual extent and seriousness of the event these days, you start to run into problems. Almost all of the popular sources of information on the subject-be they books, websites, or Wikipedia entries-come from dubious “investigators” with a pro-UFO agenda. It’s a lot easier to sell a book about how aliens may be invading the country than it is to sell one all about how nothing interesting happened one summer over half a century ago. The aforementioned Wikipedia entry on the incident, for instance, mostly cites only one source for all its information: Jerome Clark’s The UFO Book: Encyclopedia of the Extraterrestrial. Doesn’t exactly have the same kind of academic ring as Britannica, does it?

Most likely, the incident didn’t spread far beyond some mysterious radar blips. But even taking all the alleged eyewitness reports at face value, they’re contradictory. Some say they saw flaming orange balls shooting through the sky with tails. (And before you ask, yes, they’re sure it wasn’t a comet.) But other reports talk about white balls of light. Or multicolored balls of light. And sometimes they didn’t even move-they just winked out of sight. Assuming these stories aren’t completely made up to sell books (which is a distinct possibility), they all bear the tell-tale signs of bandwagon hysteria.

Of course, that still doesn’t explain the radar anomalies. The common story is that groups of objects were thought to be moving at high rates of speed across the D.C. area, and these objects were picked up on two consecutive weekends. Without hard evidence from the time, it’s hard to say what those airport employees were seeing. Luckily, we have some hard evidence from the time.

The Civil Aeronautics Administration (now known as the FAA) conducted an investigation into the event almost immediately after it happened. Oddly, this investigation is almost never referenced in any of the Washington Flap articles, books, or TV shows. I guess it’s not as exciting as low-rent computer-generated animations of glowing blobs of light. But the CAA’s explanation sure seems a lot more likely than extraterrestrial Mavericks buzzing Washington control towers just for the hell of it. Maybe if some hard rocking Kenny Loggins music was picked up on the radios there’d be something to this theory.

Unfortunately, the radar blips are easily explained by a phenomenon called temperature inversion. Under these conditions, cool, dry surface air meets a layer of warm, moist air above it-causing radar to bend and register solid objects. The kind of primitive radar used by the Washington National Airport in 1952 was particularly susceptible to this, and it has been known to happen almost everywhere there’s a similar climate. On top of that, the July months are the most opportune time for temperature inversion to occur. The blips eventually disappear once the air settles down, but the inversion follows the path of a front. In other words, a fake object will appear on radar, disappear, then seem to reappear somewhere else as that area’s air begins to mix. If a radar operator were to assume that these two objects are one and the same, it would create the illusion of movement-and pretty damned fast movement at that.

Could have been aliens, though. You never know.

III. The Conclusion

I’m sure there are those who would claim that the CAA, as a government agency, would have a motive to cover up the UFO flap to maintain the MJ-12 conspiracy. And if you know what the MJ-12 conspiracy is, then you probably are one of those people. But even still, their explanation is more plausible than the alternative. That’s got to count for something, right?

Now if we could all move on to the real mysteries of Washington, D.C.-like why do I still have to pay money to go to the hospital?

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About The Amateur Scientist: Brian Thompson is a professor of amateur science at a major imaginary university. He has been able to read and write for over seventeen years.

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