An RAF fighter pilot’s encounter with a UFO over Germany in 1952 was deemed so credible it got taken seriously by the then aviation minister Duncan Sandys.
In a new document released by the Churchill Archive at Cambridge University Flight Sergeant Roland Hughes describes what happened.
He was returning to base when he was followed by a ‘gleaming silver, metallic disc.’
The object disappeared at incredible speed after flying along beside him. RAF radars picked it up traveling at speeds beyond anything possible for any aircraft of the time.
In his briefing to the Government minister, he speaks of a flash of ‘silver light’ which rapidly descended towards him until he could see that it was a ‘gleaming silver-metallic disc’. Its surface was shiny ‘like tin foil’ and it had a ‘highly reflective and absolutely seamless metallic-looking surface’.
The pilot was in a de Havilland Vampire at the time and estimated the size of the UFO to be equal to the wingspan of a Lancaster bomber.
Three other pilots also returning to RAF Oldenburg in Northern West Germany did not see the object as they were executing a ‘banking turn.’
So convinced was the aviation minister by the account that he later briefed senior civil servants, telling them he was convinced of the authenticity of the sighting.
After the sighting, Flt Sgt Hughes was nicknamed ‘Saucer Sam’ and colleagues painted a flying saucer on his jet.
Source: bfbs.com/news/germany/raf-pilots-close-encounter-ufo-57746