In New York the day after the sighting Captain Killian gave a telephone interview to Radio Station WCHS, Charleston, West Virginia, describing his experience. Following the customary procedure, intelligence officers from Mitchell Air Force Base questioned him and filled out the usual report form[III-2]. In the radio interview and in the talk with intelligence officers Captain Killian made the same statements he had made to American Airlines officials: he didn’t know what the lights were, and he couldn’t tell how far away they had been because he didn’t know their size or their altitude[[III-10]].
Not for months had such a good flying-saucer story appeared, and the newspapers made the most of it. Among the first to assert that the unknown lights had been flying saucers was the UFO Research Committee of Akron, Ohio (see [Chapter XIII]). Members of the committee had received the news by telephone, even before Captain Killian’s plane landed at Detroit, from the pilot of a United Airlines plane who had watched the lights on his flight to Akron. During the days following, Captain Killian’s copilot gave an interview on Long John Nebel’s after-midnight radio program in New York. Captain Killian himself described the UFOs to members of a New York UFO organization, Civilian Saucer Intelligence (CSI), and appeared on several radio and TV programs. Both saucer addicts and newsmen besieged Air Force representatives, demanding an immediate explanation of the sighting. Finally, on February 28, only two days after receiving the report from American Airlines, ATIC yielded to public pressure and produced a tentative theory: it was possible that the pilots might have sighted the stars of Orion, as Captain Killian had first suggested. However, the release added, no definite conclusion could be reached until all the facts had been studied.
Promptly rejecting the possibility that he might have been looking at Orion, Captain Killian stated in an interview with the New York Herald Tribune, “I am sure there are people on other planets and that they have solved the problem of space travel.... I sincerely believe that their vehicles are coming close to earth.”
While the saucer believers were keeping the story alive, applauding Captain Killian and denouncing the Air Force, the experts at ATIC had been collecting facts and trying to analyze them. The basic piece of evidence was Captain Killian’s own report to American Airlines, made a few hours after the incident took place. After describing the circumstances of the sighting, the appearance and behavior of the lights, the statement continues:
“The only possible explanation other than flying saucers could be a jet-tanker refueling operation. Never having witnessed refueling operations at night, I am not aware of the lighting of the jet tanker.
“My air speed during this complete flight was 250 knots indicated. I also do not know the air speed of tankers during operation if this could be so. I contacted ATC to find out if they had any airplanes on a clearance and no three airplanes were given.
“In summary, it was difficult for me to believe they were jets because of low speed and configuration. If they weren’t jets I still don’t know any more than I did before even though I watched them for forty minutes before. Due to the dark and strong lights I was not able to ascertain any size or shape. The altitude of the objects was 30 degrees above my horizon. Distance away is unknown.”[[III-2]]
Almost equally important was the evidence of other witnesses. During the forty-minute period of observation, the crews of five other planes, all flying west in the Pennsylvania-Ohio region, had watched the lights for varying lengths of time. Several persons on the ground in and near Akron had seen them between 9:15 and 9:30.
Air Force investigators methodically gathered the facts and made their analysis and on March 16, only twenty days after the sighting, they released a summary to the press. The mysterious lights belonged to normal terrestrial aircraft. Although ATC at Detroit had apparently not had the information when first asked, three B-47 bombers of the Strategic Air Command had been carrying out a night refueling operation from KC-97 tankers at the time and place reported. The tanker has several groups of lights which, from a distance, can seem to be one or more lights, and would have looked very much like the three objects described by Captain Killian. Such a refueling operation takes from about forty minutes to more than an hour.
Captain Killian had been flying at an altitude of 8500 feet, and he had given the location of the unknowns as 30 degrees above his horizon; this agreed with the position of the tankers, which were operating at an altitude of 17,000 feet. Captain Killian had been flying west at an indicated air speed of 250 knots; the refueling tankers had also been flying west at a true air speed of 230 knots (ca. 270 mph). Since the courses of plane and tankers were roughly parallel, the tankers had remained in view and would have arrived over Akron at about 9:15, the time that ground observers reported the lights.