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This article was published in the daily newspaper The New York Times, USA, December 18, 1969.
USAF Secretary Dr. Robert C. Seamans Jr. said in a memorandum yesterday that Project Blue Book is closed since continuation of the study of UFO's "no longer can be justified either on the ground of National Security or in the interest of Science."
Project Blue Book has investigated 12,618 sighting reports during the past 22 years, at a cost of "several million dollars." Both a committee of the National Academy Of Sciences and a U Of Colorado group concluded earlier this year that further studies of the so-called flying saucers would be a waste of time and money.
Surprisingly, the USAF decision was hailed by a number of UFO activists, but Dr. James McDonald, a meteorologist at the U Of Arizona, said USAF was "writing off the UFO problem, which cries for serious scientific study." Dr. Edward U. Condon, the U Of Colorado physicist who headed the UFO study, said recently that his investigation "was a bunch of damned - nonsense" and that he was "sorry I ever got involved in such foolishness."
USAF said UFO reports had fallen from a high of 1501 in 1952 to 146 this year. Stuart Nixon, secretary-treasurer of NICAP, said sightings still occur almost weekly and cited the report from a group of Richmond, VA policemen who said they saw an object maneuvering over the city at 5:45 on Dec 5.
