THE AZTEC RECOVERY 1948

 

THE AZTEC RECOVERY 1948

It was the columnist Frank Scully who first alerted the world to sensational

stories of recovered flying saucers and little men in his best-selling book

"Behind the Flying Saucers" published in 1950.  Scully claimed that up to that

time there had been four such recoveries, one of which was alleged to have

taken place around Aztec, New Mexico, when sixteen humanoid bodies were

recovered together with their undamaged craft.  According to Scully's

informants, the disk that landed near Aztec was 99.99 feet in diameter, its

exterior made of a light metal resembling aluminum but so durable that no

amount of heat (up to 10,000 degrees was applied) or diamond-tipped drill had

the slightest effect.  The disk apparently incorporated large rings of metal

which revolved around a central, stabilized cabin, using an unfamiliar gear

ratio.  There were no rivets, bolts, screws or signs of welding.  Investigators

were eventually able to gain entry.  Scully was told, because of a fracture in

one of the portholes, which they enlarged, revealing a knob inside the cabin

which when pushed (with a pole) caused a hidden door to open.  Sixteen small

humanoids, ranging in height from 36 to 42 inches, were supposedly found dead

inside the cabin, their bodies charred to a dark brown color.  Scully was told

that the craft landed undamaged, having landed under its own guidance.  The

craft was eventually dismantled, the investigators having discovered that it

was manufactured in segments which fitted in grooves and were pinned together

around the base.  The complete cabin section, measuring 18 feet in diameter,

was lifted out of the base of the saucer, around which was a gear that fitted a

gear on the cabin.  These segments, together with the bodies, were then

transported to Wright Field (Wright Patterson AFB).  Some of the bodies were

later dissected and examined by the Air Force, and were found to be similar in

all respects to human beings, with the exception of their teeth, which were

perfect.

New Supportive Evidence? 

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According to important information published by William Steinman in 1987 there

is a large grain of truth in the Aztec story, and he has managed to acquire

some astonishing supportive evidence.  Like Scully, he is unwilling to divulge

his sources, which inevitably lays him open to charges of fabrication.

Steinman discovered that the Aztec disk came to earth on 25 March 1948, having

been detected by three separate radar units in the southwest, one of which was

said to have disrupted the craft's control mechanism.  The area of impact was

calculated by triangulation and this information was immediately relayed to Air

Defense Command and Gen. George C. Marshall, then Secretary of State, who

allegedly contacted the MJ-12 group as well as the Interplanetary Phenomenon

Unit (IPU) of the Army Counterintelligence Directorate.  The IPU operated out

of Camp Hale, Colorado, at this time, Steinman claims, and its main function

was to collect and deliver disabled or crashed disks to certain specified

secret locations.

     The craft was recovered within hours by the IPU scout team about 12 miles

northeast of Aztec.  General Marshall ordered Air Defense Command to go off

alert status, and the radar units were advised that there had been a false

alarm.  Marshall then gave orders to the commander of the IPU to organize a

recovery team and contacted Dr.  Vannevar Bush - the head of MJ-12 - to gather

together a team of scientists to accompany the IPU to the crash site.  Steinman

has named these scientists as follows:

     Dr. Lloyd Berkner

     Dr. Detlev Bronk

     Dr. Carl A. Heiland

     Dr. Jerome Hunsaker

     Dr. John von Neumann

     Dr. Robert J. Oppenheimer

     Dr. Merle A. Tuve

     Dr. Horace B. van Valkenberg

     Four of these scientists, it will be noted, were members of the original

MJ-12 panel set up in September 1947.  Dr. Carl A. Heiland was a geophysicist

and magnetic sciences expert who was the head of the Colorado School of Mines,

and according to Steinman leaked details of the recovery to one of Scully's

sources, Leo GeBauer.  Dr. Horace B. van Valkenberg was an inorganic chemist

associated with the University of Colorado.  Dr. Merle A. Tuve worked for the

Office of Scientific Research and Development during World War II, and is

chiefly remembered as a geophysicist for his techniques of radio wave

propagation of the upper atmostphere.  Dr. Robert J. Oppenheimer distinguished

himself primarily as leader of the Los Alamos atomic bomb project, commanding

the allegiance of the world's top physicists.  He was the Director of the

Institute of Advanced Studies at Princeton from 1947 and became Chairman of the

General Advisory Committee of the Atomic Energy Commission.  Dr. John von

Neumann, the famous Hungarian born mathematician, became a consultant on the

atom bomb (Manhatten Project) in 1943.  His main area of expertise lay in the

design and development of computers.  The scientists, according to Steinman,

were told by Dr. Bush to assemble at Durango Airfield, Colorado, 35 miles to

the north of Aztec, with the minimum delay.   All those involved in the

recovery were sworn to an above top secret oath.

     The IPU convoy used a route to the site that avoided main roads, and on

arrival road blocks were set up at strategic points within two miles of the

recovery area.  The owner of a ranch and his family were allegedly held

incommunicado and told never to discuss the matter (cf. the Roswell incident).

Equipment hauling trucks were camoflaged to look like oil drilling rigs during

the operation.

Inside the Craft 

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     The team of scientists arrived at the site a little later than the IPU

team and began inspecting the disk.  According to Steinman, they entered the

craft one by one, entry having been gained via a fractured porthole as

discribed in Scully's account.  The portholes themselves looked metallic and

only appeared translucent on close inspection.   Inside the craft they found

two humanoids, about two feet in height, slumped over an instrument panel,

charred deep brown.  Another 12 bodies lay sprawled on the floor in a chamber

within the cabin, making a total of 14 bodies (not 16 as Scully had been told).

     An instrument panel supposedly had several pushbuttons and levers with

hieroglyphic-type symbols, as well as symbols illuminated on small display

screens.  Bush and von Neumann discovered that the control panel had drawers

which rolled out, but no wiring could be detected.  A book composed of

parchment-like leaves with the texture of plastic also contained the strange

hieroglyphs - similar to Sanskrit, Oppenheimer thought.  This was given to

General Marshall, who then passed it on to two leading cryptological experts

for analysis, William F. Friedman and Lambros C. Callihamos (who both later led

distinguished careers in the National Security Agency).

     Dr. Bonk, a physiologist and biophysicist, examined the bodies and asked

Bush to get hold of cryogenic equipment with which to preserve them.

Cryogenics specialist Dr. Pual A. Scherer, a colleague of Bush's, was contacted

and advised Bush to obtain some dry ice.  Meanwhile, another small group of

scientists and military personnel examined the craft and were eventually able

to dismantle it when several interlocking key divices were found which opened

up seams at specific points.

     Three days later the segments were loaded onto three trucks, together with

the bodies, and were with a tarpaulin marked "Explosives".  The convoy headed

at night by the least conspicuous and often most laborious route to the

restricted Naval Auxilary Airfield complex at Los Alamos, arriving one week

later.  Here theyy remained for over a year, Steinman claims, before being

transported to another base.

The Bodies 

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     Dr. Paul A. Scherer eventually obtained special preservation containers

for the least damaged bodies, Steinman relates.  One of the ocmpanies which

supplied equipment was the Air Research Corporation, of which Scherer was

Director of Research and Development; it supplied the liquid nitrogen pump,

circulation system and refridgeration units.  Other specimens were given a

complete autopsy, by a team headed by Dr. Bronk, of biophysicists,

histochemists and pathologists.  The results were put in a report, part of

which, Steinman claims, appeard in the "Air Force Project Sign (Grudge) Report

No. 13" which has never been released.

     According to the report, the bodies were described as averaging 42 inches

in length.  The facial features strongly resembled "mongoloid orientals" in

appearance, with disproportionately large heads, large "slant" eyes, small

noses and mouths.  The average weight was about 40 pounds.  The torsos were

very small and thin, with very thin necks.  The arms were long and slender,

reaching the knees, with hands containing long and slender fingers with webbing

between them.  There was no digestive or gastrointestinal tract, no alimentary

or intestinal canal, and no rectal point.  No reproductive organs were

apparent.  Instead of blood there was a colorless liquid with no red cells

which smelled similar to ozone.

                                                  -Timothy Good