Foo fighter

This article is about sightings of unidentified flying objects during World War II. For the band "Foo Fighters" see Foo Fighters .

As Foo Fighter denote the ufology and Parawissenschaften luminous phenomena that ostensibly during the Second World War were observed by Allied air crew during their sorties. The term goes back to the US comic Smokey Stover and is an Anglicism of the French word feu for "fire".

description

In the few official documents, the Foo-Fighters are described as the size of a fist or basketball, brightly shining or shiny metallic objects of white, yellowish or reddish color. Their shape varies - depending on the report - from spherical to disk-like. There are reports of day and night sightings. What all the information has in common is the surprising appearance and disappearance of the flying objects. In some cases the objects are said to have carried out flight maneuvers that were unusual and inexplicable for the conditions at the time.

Known sightings

On 14 October 1943, a Bomber Squadron of the US flew Eighth Air Force , the munitions factories of Schweinfurt to this attack. During the attacks, the pilots observed a formation of small, shimmering, disk-shaped objects that suddenly appeared, moved slowly and were on a collision course with aircraft BF-026 . Since the completely surprised pilot could no longer evade, he flew right through the swarm of unknown objects in flight. To the astonishment of all combatants, the aircraft suffered no damage, although the pilot reported impact noises. Subsequent fighter pilots observed strange, black debris that slowly sank to the earth. Two other fighter planes also flew through the formation, they were also not damaged.

On the night of November 23, 1944, a three-man crew of the 415th Night Fighter Squadron flew over the Rhine near Strasbourg on the French border. There the crew observed about eight to ten glowing orange spheres in the sky at a great distance, which they initially believed to be particularly bright stars. But shortly afterwards, the glowing spheres flew over the aircraft at a speed that the pilot later described as "simply unbelievable".

A third report contains a detailed description of foo fighters during a daytime sighting. The objects were about the size of a basketball and looked like crystal balls. The objects followed the aircraft and accompanied them as if they were magnetized . Soon afterwards, just like ordinary planes, the objects simply turned and flew away.

Investigations and Theories

Since reports about "Foo Fighters" were initially only available from the US, the US Air Force believed that the mysterious objects were a kind of new secret weapon of the German Air Force or Japanese fighter pilots. It soon turned out that the other side also knew about mysterious phenomena to report. German pilots described orange “fireballs” that accompanied their planes and often even circled at high speed. Japanese pilots also observed strange luminous objects. Each side of the war accused the other of being responsible for the phenomena.

Over the years, physicists , engineers , meteorologists and ufologists have put forward a wide variety of theories that should explain the origin and nature of the Foo Fighters . According to a common thesis, it should have been ball lightning and sprites . However, physicists and ufologists interject that most of the objects sighted hovered motionless, appeared in clear skies and / or performed intelligent flight maneuvers. This would be in clear contradiction to the typical behavior pattern of ball lightning observations. The longevity (up to twenty minutes) also contradicts a natural, electrical phenomenon such as sprites. Supporters of the theories about extraterrestrial life see in the Foo Fighters typical UFO observations, although even the contemporary sources do not admit or even doubt this.

literature

• Charles Berlitz : Charles Berlitz's World of Strange Phenomena . Stonesong Press, New York City 2012, ISBN 978-0-9837949-2-9 .
• William H. Young, Nancy K. Young: World War II and the Postwar Years in America 2 Volume Set: A Historical and Cultural Encyclopedia, Volume 1 . ABC-CLIO, 2010, ISBN 0313356521 , p. 735.
• David Clarke, Andy Roberts: Phantoms of the Sky: UFOs - a Modern Myth? . Robert Hale, Indiana 1990, ISBN 0709040865 , pp. 71, 110-112.
• Keith Chester: Strange company. Military encounters with UFOs in World War II , San Antonio, TX (Anomalist Books) 2007. ISBN 9781933665207 . ISBN 1933665203