Let me explain visually what I saw on my radar screen.
‘‘Once ‘lock on’ is accomplished, two circles of light appear on the screen. One was a complete
circle in the centre of the radar screen, about an inch in diameter, the other about 3 inches in
diameter with a half inch segment darkened to indicate the overtake speed. If the dark segment
was at 12 o’clock, it meant 0 overtake. If the segment was at 6 o’clock, then we had about 600
knots of overtake. (Note: 1 mile per hour = 1.15 N knot). The maximum overtake was in the 9 o’
clock position. The overtake I had on this particular intercept, was in the 7 or 8 o’clock position,
which indicate close to an 800 knot overtake. I was really hauling coals!
To complete the description of the radar scope, there were two other significant pieces of data
displayed. One is the horizontal indicator which gave a gyro stabilised reference to the horizon,
enabling the pilot to avoid referring to his flight instruments. The second is a steering dot, which
was nothing more than computer data, indicating which way the aircraft should fly to accomplish
the intercept, i.e. if the dot was above centre, the stick should be pulled back to climb, if it was to
the right, then a turn to the right would centre the dot. The idea was to have the dot centred in
the smaller circle.
A normal intercept proceeds from the ‘lock on’ phase, with the constant manoeuvring to centre
the dot. When the aircraft is in a position to accomplish its intercept, the dot would be centred.
The outer circle will start to shrink at 20 seconds from rocket release. The circle in the centre,
shrinks to about a quarter inch and keeping the dot centred, requires small rapid manoeuvres.
At about the time the outer circle reaches three quarters of an inch in diameter, a small quarter
inch line appears in lieu of the inner circle. This is the signal to pull the trigger for rocket release
and to make only up and down corrections as the computer calculates the point of release for
the azimuth. With the trigger pulled and switches set, the rockets are released by the computer.’’
Milton John Torres.
With only 10 seconds to go before Milton launched his full salvo of 1.75 inch Aeromite rockets
(nicknamed ‘Mighty Mouse’) from the weapons crate slung beneath his aircraft, he realised that
his UFO target was accelerating away from him so fast it was leaving him standing even though
he was still flying flat out at mach .92 with his ‘afterburner’ on! In his own words, ‘‘……my
impression was, that whatever the aircraft or spacecraft was, it must have been travelling in 2
digit mach numbers, at least mach 10, to have done what I witnessed!’’
NOTE: At mach 1, the speed of sound at sea level is approx 761mph. However, this figure
varies, dependant upon atmospheric pressure and air temperature. At the altitude of 32,000 feet
(the height they were at) the speed of sound would be approx 750mph. Therefore, at mach 10,
as indicated by Milton’s cockpit instrumentation and to avoid his impending salvo of rockets, the
UFO must have instantly accelerated up to 7,500mph!
ITEM 2.) MY FOIA REQUEST RESPONSE.
On the 17th of October 2007, I filed a Freedom of Information Act request to the MoD,
regarding this incident and any other scrambles and attempted intercepts from 27th April up to
20th May, 1957. By reviewing his personal copy of his Form F5, his flying log, Milton has now
estimated that the date of this ‘historic’ mission was May 20th 1957.
I eventually received a very detailed reply from the AHB2 (RAF) at RAF Bentley Priory,
Stanmore, Middlesex. Not surprisingly, I was informed that they did not have any primary
information sources that related to RAF Fighter Command operations on the dates in question!
Therefore they were unable to confirm that any interceptor aircraft were vectored to
‘unidentified’ targets up the East coast during that period!
However, I was helpfully given several document references for the old RAF Fighter Command H.
Q. Control & Reporting System records which include entire Unit Operations Record Books,
RAF Form 540’s. These were in essence a unit diary which was usually submitted monthly from
each Sector Operations Commander (SOC), to the Air Defence Operations Centre (ADOC)
ironically at Fighter Command H.Q. Bentley Priory! Apparently these are all now deposited in
The National Archives at Kew.
I do not personally believe that for such a serious issue, firing on a UFO, that a SOC would take
sole responsibility, then inform the ADOC a month later in his routine report! Furthermore, I
would expect that any such F540 date entry, recording such an incident, would probably be
censored out before the F540’s were released to the TNA/PRO at Kew! (Public Records Office).
Would weeks of ploughing through all these records down at Kew reveal the actual High
Command order to fire and by whom precisely? I very much doubt it! If any of these official
documents did record this event, and were subsequently made available to the general public,
then this would be more vital ‘official’ evidence which would contradict the years of
MoD/Government policy regarding their repeated stance of denial, or any serious interest in the
whole UFO issue! This particular incident certainly would be even MORE ‘of major defence
significance’ than this declared testimony from the pilot!
It is worth noting here that there was another RAF radar report of a large UFO being tracked by
radar over the Irish Sea, during April 1957! This report, leaked to the Press shortly after, was
from RAF West Fruegh, Wigtownshire, Scotland. This incident led to questions in the House of
Commons!
Furthermore, just eight months earlier, on the night of 13/14th of August, 1956, again in East
Anglia, RAF Neatishead radar was involved in tracking a UFO in the vicinities of two RAF Bases
occupied by the USAF, Lakenheath and Bentwaters! Apparently, this again triggered aircraft
intercept attempts involving the RAF but no contact was made, or so the Air Ministry claims? The
former Air Ministry DDI(Tech) and Air Intelligence Offices at RAF Fighter Command at Bentley
Priory would have surely been aware and involved in the Manston scramble and UFO attack
incident, as I am sure they would have been with the Lakenheath/Bentwaters incident!
Is it also more than just a coincidence that these Suffolk USAF Bases are located not far from
the Ipswich area where the UFO that Milton Torres was scrambled to intercept, in 1957, was
tracked by radar hovering and making strange aerial motions, before it moved away eastwards
and off the Suffolk coast! It would seem that there was plenty of UFO activity in this area, long
before the ‘Rendelsham Forest’ event of 1980!
Article by David Cayton - Contact him at davidacayton@hotmail.com
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ITEM 3.) THE RAF BASES/UNITS INVOLVED WITH ORDERING THE MANSTON SCRAMBLE
AND AUTHORISING THE UFO ATTACK?
First of all, to recap a little. During telephone chats with Milton in Florida, I pressed him to recall, if
possible, the RAF Units he had referred to in his mission account, with who he was always in
radio contact with? He frequently mentions ‘GCI’ (Ground Control Intercept) and ‘Met Sector’?
He had no problem with identifying his GCI as RAF Bawdsey Manor on the Suffolk coast, just
south a short distance from the RAF Stations of Woodbridge and Bentwaters! He knew this for
sure because he, along with other pilots from Manston, had been sent there on a previous liaison
and familiarisation visit. I have now established that this RAF Station was No.144 Signals Unit
(now closed). The Radar vectoring of enemy targets during the ‘Battle of Britain’ and the ‘Cold
War’ with the subsequent radio instructions to pilots were then sent out from there, to guide them
to the ‘target’. It is very probable that Bawdsey were tracking the UFO from here and also
possibly the Early Warning Radar Station at RAF Neatishead in Norfolk.
Milton was not sure about the location or identity of ‘the Met Sector, even though he and fellow
pilots were also directed to visit some secret underground base, some 15 miles north east of
London. He does remember that this bunker was out in open fields with access via a small
bungalow building. Alan Turnbull of www.secret-bases.co.uk thought that this the most likely
location, from two he suggested? In response to my FOIA request, the MoD’s Air Historical
Branch (RAF) confirmed this to be the RAF’s Sector Operational Command Centre (SOC) secret
‘cold war’ bunker at Kelvedon Hatch in Essex. This Base was responsible for controlling the
military London Metropolitan Sector area at that time. (‘The Met Sector’) Nowadays it is open to
the public as a privately run museum. This Unit had advised Milton that the target ‘blip’ (the
UFO) had entirely gone off the scope in just two sweeps at the GCI site and then instructed
him that his mission was considered ‘classified’. Furthermore he would be contacted the
following day to be ‘debriefed’. This was conducted by an officer from The National Security
Agency (NSA) based at the American Embassy in London!
The commanding officer at Kelvedon Hatch (The SOC) would ‘report’ up to the ADOC (Air
Defence Operations Centre) at RAF Fighter Command H.Q. at Bentley Priory, Stanmore.
I suggest that, almost certainly, the ORDER to fire would have been AUTHORISED by the ADOC
at Bentley Priory, the order then would have been ISSUED by the MET Sector, Kelvedon Hatch
and then relayed to the pilots via the GCI Signals Unit at Bawdsey? I firmly believe this would
have been the 'chain of command'. Milton knew for certain that his USAF 406th. Fighter Wing
was operating under the control of the RAF’s ‘Control and Rotor System’ and the USAF would
most definitely NOT be allowed to independently authorise the firing of ANY weapons in the
United Kingdom airspace!
IN THE 1950’S, A DIFFERENT AIR FORCE ATTITUDE IN THE UNITED STATES TO THE UFO
SITUATION!
Historical records show, following a large rash of UFO sightings over the United States including
two very public waves of UFO’s being tracked by three different radar locations, as they flew
over the Capitol, the Pentagon and The White House, on July 19th and July the 26th 1952!
These events resulted in a major Air Force investigation. The ‘sightings’ were headlined in
newspapers all over the United States, and in some places replaced the Democratic National
Convention on the front page!
A CIA Report by Gerald K. Haines so alarmed the White House, it lead the Truman
Administration to give the order that the flying saucers be shot down! On 26th July 1952, the Air
Force obeyed and the Chief of Staffs issued the order ‘to shoot them down’, if they refuse to land!
A telegram from a number of prominent scientists, including Albert Einstein, protested the order
to the White House and urged that the command be rescinded, not only in the interest of future
intergalactic peace but also in the interest of self-preservation! It was also argued that
extraterrestrials would look upon an attack by the primitive jet firepower, as a breach of the
universal laws of hospitality!
The ‘shoot them down’ order was consequently withdrawn on White House orders by five o’
clock that afternoon! That very night, the flying saucers were back! Two days later, on July 28th,
at the request of President Truman, Captain Edward Ruppelt; who had just taken over ‘Project
Blue Book’, was called to brief Truman’s air aide, Brigadier General Landry on the Washington
sightings and the phenomena itself!
Timothy Good tells me that in his revised paperback version of his book, ‘Need To Know’, that
the U.S. Defence Dept. Statistics record, in just four years, 1952-56, the U.S. AF and Navy had
lost in crashes, a total of 18,662 aircraft of which 1,773 were caused by ‘unknown factors’!
‘Destruction or disappearance of military aircraft during interceptions of UFO’s continued apace.
General Benjamin Chidlaw, former commanding general of Air defence Command, told Robert C,
Gardner (ex-USAF) in 1953: ‘‘we have stacks of reports of flying saucers. We take them
seriously, when you consider we have lost many men and planes trying to intercept them’’!
Furthermore, the former Air Force intelligence officer and UFO researcher, Leonard Stringfield,
was told by a reliable source in the 1950’s, that the Air Force was losing about a plane a day
to UFO’s!
Thankfully, Milton Torres and his wingman on that night in April 1957, did not end up just being
another statistic!
© David Cayton February 2008.
As a ‘postscript’ I would like to mention that I have been recently been given as gift from one of
my daughters a new book, only published in August of last year. This contains a mountain of
more solid data which corroborates the information that I have mentioned in the last part of my
article! This important new research by author Frank C. Feschino Jr. in collaboration with
Stanton T. Friedman is titled: ‘SHOOT THEM DOWN! The Flying Saucer Air Wars of 1952’.
Stunning stuff! How can Governments go on denying the reality of UFO’s with all this hard data?
After all, the Commander-in-Chief (Truman) had authorised that his Air Force must shoot
the flying saucers down! Just who added the ridiculous caveat, ‘but only if they refuse to land’
we will never know! Did they really believe that their pilots could have the means of
communicating with the saucer crews and even if that was achievable, did they honestly think
that the superior craft would respond by dutifully complying and land under escort at their Air
Force Base!! This book is a must read!
With acknowledgements to Grant Cameron for his www.presidentialufos.com
Timothy Good for data from his book, 'Need to Know'. Richard Chenery and John Hill (two of my
ex RAF photographer friends) for their recent specially commissioned photos taken at the
Kelvedon Hatch bunker and Fighter HQ.Bentley Priory, respectively. For his kind assistance,
Clive Richards of the Ministry of Defence Air Historical Branch (RAF) at Bentley Priory, Stanmore.
Finally ,my special thanks for additional research and use of low level aerial photographs of the
RAF Units and Bunkers provided by ‘‘Pilot’s Eye View, courtesy of Alan Turnbull, www.secret-
bases.co.uk
If any reader has more information about this incident, or any other Air Force scrambles and
UFO intercepts within the U.K. airspace, please contact me on 0161 483 4956, mob.
07899941291, or by email: davidacayton@hotmail.com
Comment By Colin Andrews
23 April 2009.
I was presenting last weekend at the X-Conference in Washington D.C. along with other speakers
including Milton Torres, who was introduced by Nick Pope (seen in photo above).
After Milton's presentation there was what seemed to be an awkward moment during the question
time, when his son came to the microphone and seemed partly to be prompting his father to say
a little more about the wingman and also seemed partly to be questioning him. At one point I
thought Milton seemed offended or unhappy his Son was doing this. His son asked who the
wingman was that day and Milton replied that he did not know. He said that when they landed
they were debriefed and he was told to keep his mouth shut, to say nothing to anyone, not even
his commanding officer (as David Cayton reports here). He went on to say that the Wingman
was not around any longer to ask or speak to. This seems to be in contradiction with the
interview he had with David, also one wonders why the other name is not available in the
released MOD documentation of this event. In reading David's background notes it would also
seem that there were several scrambles for UFOs not just this one.
USAF PILOT WAS ORDERED TO FIRE AT A UFO IN U.K. AIRSPACE !
THIS MATTER SURELY HAD SIGNIFICANT ‘DEFENCE IMPLICATIONS’?
Continued:
THIS MATTER SURELY HAD SIGNIFICANT ‘DEFENCE IMPLICATIONS’?
Continued:
Milton with F86D and rocket pod, September 2007
Kelvedon Hatch - Secret bunker, Essex.
Entrance to Kelvedon Hatch secret bunker, Essex
Fighter Command Headquarters, R.A.F. Bentley Priory.
| Written by Frank C. Feschino, Jr. Select image to buy. |