It’s July 19, 1952 over White House forbidden airspace and Captain William Patterson observes unidentified aerial lights over Washington DC skies. He has been checking with ground intercept radar at Bolling Air Force Base, and among those present is Major Dewey Fornet of Project Blue Book. Over the last few days, a number of unknown radar targets and visual sightings have been reported by airline pilots and traffic controllers. Captain Patterson is flying the F-94 C Starfire. According to Captain Edward Ruppelt, Project Blue Book Director, the F-94 is the hottest plane that is in the Air Force inventory! Even faster than the F-86 Sabre, legendary dogfighter over MIG Alley in the Korean War. It is the first US fighter to have an afterburner which allows the combat jet to accelerate faster and increase its speed to record levels.

However, the Starfighter has one drawback. It is a straight winged configuration and this holds it back from being able to break the sound barrier. So, it’s top speed will be less than 740 miles per hour at sea level. Even the F-86 Sabre can break the sound barrier in a dive but not in level flight. Not only is the United States in the midst of a UFO Flap (A massive number of reports from all over the country) as was predicted by Captain Ruppelt in his book entitled “The Report on UFO’s” circa 1956, but the Korean War was also in full swing. Yet, front page headlines read, “Interceptors Chase UFO’s Over the White House” eclipsed even news of the Korean War!

Captain Patterson gives chase to a cluster of UFOs at full afterburner, but he cannot close on the aerial objects. Each time on several consecutive nights whenever fighter jets attempt to intercept the UFOs over White House airspace, radar blips disappear, but as soon as the jets depart the area, the blips re-appear! Was an extraterrestrial power exhibiting cloaking or stealth capability in 1952? The official explanation was that these were false targets generated by thermal inversions, but veteran radar operators insisted that the targets they observed were solid and that there were no problems with their radar equipment.

Senior Controller, Harry Barnes claimed that he was convinced that the UFOs were listening to the radar center and pilot cockpit conversations and reacted as such! At one point Captain Patterson was surrounded by the unidentified radar blips that were closing in on his warplane and the pilot got nervous asking the radar control center what he should do. Some versions of the story say that Patterson asked permission to shoot, but scientific advisors advised that this could start a war with an extraterrestrial civilization! The answer to Patterson from the air traffic control center was nothing more than a tense silence until the radar blips who had been playing a cat and mouse game suddenly turned aggressive. Finally, the unidentified airborne intruders backed off to the relief of one Air Force pilot and the group monitoring the event on radar!

A day later with the nation in a panic over the unstoppable incursions over the nation’s capital, US Army General John Samford, held the largest military press conference since World War II to try and explain what had happened to a concerned public. Although admitting that a number of flying saucer sighting went unexplained and some of these incidents were fantastic, they did not seem to pose a threat to national security! Strangely, Captain Edward Ruppelt was prevented from attending the press conference as the Air Force would not fund his per diem for travel so that he could get to the US Capital! Perhaps, they were afraid that the captain who dealt with UFO sightings on a regular basis would reveal some inconvenient truths.

Captain William Patterson in his F-94 C Starfire may well have been the most crucial witness to every have had contact with UFOs and live to tell about it. Although he was quicky debriefed upon landing back at his base with a US Air Force intelligence officer waiting there to interview him, that debriefing has never been made public to this day! That would sure be an interesting piece of information! The “Washington National Sightings” as these incidents were know, are perhaps some of the strongest evidence of mysterious intervention in human affairs ever, and demonstrated complete impunity to our best efforts.