this journalist has been besieged with non-stop calls and emails mostly from media outlets wanting interviews.
It didn't take any time for the post to go global, especially with the help of
Tyler Rogoway and The War Zone.
Tyler gets the credit with doing the leg work, taking the raw data and leaning on American Airlines and the FAA to give up some information with the thing being that the issue here is not if it's a UFO but that it must be considered a threat to safe navigation of civilian and commercial aircraft.
At first American Airlines tried to deflect the incident saying as much and that they didn't know who made the radio report to Albuquerque Center but eventually being forced to acknowledge it was in their best interest to admit the incident took place and there is now an active investigation into what the flight officers on AA2292 saw last Sunday ripping across the skies of northwestern New Mexico.
Speculation on what it it was are being bounced around on chat boards and social media platforms, from posters running the gamut from rabid UFO true believers to more scientific and data based aeronautical experts, amateur plane spotters and internet space and aviation junkies (some self-proclaimed insiders who claim they know but would have to kill us if they told us ) but in spite of all that we don't have any concrete answers.
That said FOIAs have been filled, phone calls to all the military commands in the area, all denying they had anything flying that afternoon and as a result we are no closer to the truth.
In the middle of this flying circus one person persisted in getting in contact with me. He tried first through my employer, who gave him my cell phone number and email address, tried calling me (which I bounced because they were from unknown callers) before he finally catching up me at a rare down moment at my desk (at lunch time) one of the few quiet minutes I have had since this all began.
He then identified himself and told me his story of his encounter that was remarkably similar to the encounter AA Flight 2292 experienced but with lots more detail. He also told me he felt compelled to talk to me that since his encounter he's had to endure some skepticism from an industry where just talking about "UFOs" can get you labeled as half a bubble off plumb.
He also added that in aviation circles, when pilots are off work kicking back having a few beers and dropping their guard and talk, they trade very similar stories of encounters with flying wedge type objects crossing their flight paths and they are much more common than one would like to think. He said, "over the last few years something definitely odd is going on in our crowded skies and no one seems to want to acknowledge it."
"Carl" as I will call him ( I chose to protect his anonymity not him) told me his story.
He was a corporate pilot flying above 50,000 feet over NW Texas on his way to North Carolina on a sunny day in Feb of 2018.
Unfortunately at the time of his encounter his co-pilot was "hitting the head" military talk for using the bathroom and as fate would have it that's when a wedge-shaped-object flew by the aircraft at high speed a few thousand feet above his aircraft. Carl got a good look at it. He described it as a highly swept triangular wedge with two winglets either side - more like wing tip canards. The shape was surrounded by a bright yellow halo-plasma like envelope so bright it stood out even in broad daylight.
His co-pilot returned and couldn't help but notice the look on "Carl's" face, white as if he had seen his life flash before his eyes. He told his copilot what he had seen and asked if he should report it to air traffic control. Worried about the safety of other aircraft on the same route they decided they had to. ATC asked for a description and heading and if they wanted to file a report. He said yes.
Right after his report he radioed to see if any other aircraft in the area had also seen the object, none had with some even jokingly ridiculing the sighting as "swamp gas - did you see little green men" etc.
Note here, pilots often use discrete frequencies to talk to each other most notably 123.450 MHz - an easy frequency to remember since it's unassigned and all one just has to dial in is: 12345.
Military pilots have similar channels like "WINCHESTER" MAGNUM, SHOTGUN" etc. - with them being 303.00 MHz (30/30) 351.700MHz (like the handgun 357 magnum) and 300.600 (SHOTGUN) thirty-ought-six.
To make my point and a long story short, as the
War Zone has pointed out and as more pilots are seeing the media buzz that continues to grow around the encounter "Carl" encourages pilots to come forward. He says "Among pilots it's considered a dirty little secret we don't talk about officially but we do to each other."
Carl worries that some day there will be a mid-air collision with one of these objects and no one will literally know what hit them.
-Steve Douglass
