From: UFO UpDates - Toronto <ufoupdates.nul>
Date: Fri, 09 Dec 2005 16:51:15 -0500
Fwd Date: Fri, 09 Dec 2005 16:51:15 -0500
Subject: Leslie Kean Pressing NASA For 'UFO' Files




Source: The Times-Leader - Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, USA

http://www.timesleader.com/mld/timesleader/news/local/13360634.htm

Thu, Dec. 08, 2005


Sci Fi Channel-Backed Researcher Pressing NASA For 'UFO' Files
Joe Mandak

Associated Press

PITTSBURGH - Researchers and witnesses who believe a UFO landed
in the woods of western Pennsylvania 40 years ago are marking
another anniversary on Friday: two years since a lawsuit was
filed to get NASA to release records of what happened.

A National Aeronautics and Space Administration spokesman says
there's no cover-up: the "UFO" was a Russian satellite but
government records documenting it have been lost.

Leslie Kean, an investigative reporter backed by the Sci Fi
Channel, and a group connected to the cable TV channel sued the
NASA two years ago under the Freedom of Information Act.

Kean wants files on what happened Dec. 9, 1965, in the
unincorporated hamlet of Kecksburg, about 30 miles southeast of
Pittsburgh. Witnesses described a "fireball" in the evening sky,
and a metallic, acorn-shaped object about 12 to 15 feet high and
8 to 12 feet in diameter that landed gently in the woods,
according to media accounts at the time.

Kean's attorney Lee Helfrich said she'll file a new court motion
on Friday seeking to "jump start" NASA's search for the
information.

"NASA has been stonewalling for too long, and in the process has
given us a great record to show that it's recalcitrant and
acting in bad faith," Helfrich said. "What is NASA trying to
hide?"

Nothing, NASA spokesman Dave Steitz said.

The object appeared to be a Russian satellite that re-entered
the atmosphere and broke up. NASA experts studied fragments from
the object, but records of what they found were lost in the
1990s, Steitz said.

"As a rule, we don't track UFOs. What we could do, and what we
apparently did as experts in spacecraft in the 1960s, was to
take a look at whatever it was and give our expert opinion,"
Steitz said. "We did that, we boxed (the case) up and that was
the end of it. Unfortunately, the documents supporting those
findings were misplaced."

Kean and Helfrich don't believe that explanation.

Kean said Nicholas L. Johnson, NASA's chief scientist for
orbital debris, determined the object couldn't be a Russian
satellite or any other manmade object, after studying the
orbital paths of known satellites and other records from 1965.

Johnson didn't immediately return calls for comment Thursday to
his phone number listed on NASA's Web site. Steitz referred
questions on Kean's claims to NASA's Johnson Space Center in
Houston, which didn't immediately comment.

Witnesses claim military personnel cordoned off the site,
removed the object and threatened residents who questioned the
incident. The military later called the object a meteor.

On Saturday, Kean, Helfrich and others connected to a Sci Fi
Channel documentary will speak at the Kecksburg fire hall, where
a mock-up of the object is on permanent display.

Kean said a pair of West Virginia University scientists who
examined the reported landing site made two recent discoveries.

Forestry professor Ray Hicks counted tree rings and determined
that trees in the area were damaged in 1965. Hicks, however,
said the trees were likely damaged by ice, and then snapped off
by the wind. He says his findings don't support Kean's claim
that "something physically landed" at the site.

Geoarchaeologist J. Steven Kite says he found no evidence to
support the high-speed impact of a meteor or other large object
- which Kean says supports witness accounts that a spacecraft
landed softly.


[Thanks to Stuart Miller of http://www.uforeview.net for the lead]