im
several months before, at which time I told him about this curious
rumor and expressed my wish to find out how authentic it was. Now, on
the phone, he told me he had just been in contact with two people he
knew and they had the whole story. He said they would be in Los
Angeles the following night and would like very much to talk to me.

I hated to fly clear to the west coast on what might be a wild-goose
chase, but I did. I couldn't afford to run the risk of losing an
opportunity to turn that old recurrent rumor into fact.

Twenty hours later I met the two people at the Hollywood Roosevelt
Hotel. We talked for several hours that night, and I got the details
on the rumor and a lot more that I hadn't bargained for. Both of my
informants were physicists working for the Atomic Energy Commission,
and were recognized in their fields. They wanted no publicity and I
promised them that they would get none. One of the men knew all the
details behind the rumor, and did most of the talking. To keep my
promise of no publicity, I'll call him the "scientist."

The rumor version of the UFO-radiation story that had been kicking
around in Air Force and scientific circles for so long had been
correct in detail but it was by no means complete. The scientist said
that after the initial sighting had taken place word was spread at
the research lab that the next time the instruments registered
abnormal amounts of radiation, some of the personnel were to go
outside immediately and look for some object in the sky.

About three weeks after the first incident a repetition did occur.
While excessive radiation was registering on the instruments in the
lab, a lone dark object was seen streaking across the sky. Again the
instruments were checked but, as before, no malfunction was found.

After this second sighting, according to the scientist, an
investigation was started at the laboratory. The people who made the
visual observations weren't sure that the object they had seen
couldn't have been an airplane. Someone thought that perhaps some
type of radar equipment in the airplane, if that's what the object
was, might have affected the radiation-detection equipment. So
arrangements were made to fly all types of aircraft over the area
with their radar in operation. Nothing unusual happened. All possible
types of airborne research equipment were traced during similar
flights in the hope that some special equipment not normally carried
in aircraft