Apollo Program UFO Sighting from 1960's Comes to Light

     (Washington State MUFON, March 21, 1988.)  An interesting 
UFO report from the 1960's involving the test firing of an Apollo 
space program booster rocket recently came to light as a result 
of follow-up to the January 21, 1988 Whidbey Island UFO sighting.   
Dan MacIndoe of Oak Harbor, Washington received many phone calls 
from other UFO witnesses as a consequence of reporting his UFO 
sighting to a local radio station and giving out his phone 
number.  One of them was from Paul J. Allen of Snohomish, 
Washington, who told him of his encounter with a UFO while 
working for GE/NASA in the summer of either 1966 or 1967.  

     A quality control inspector working for General Electric at 
the NASA Mississippi Test facility at the time, Mr. Allen was at 
work during the first captive test firing of the second stage, 
Saturn IV-B rocket.  He doesn't recall the exact date but he 
believes it was probably during the summer of either 1966 or 
1967.  [The date should be easily obtainable from archived
historical records of the Space program.]

     At approximately 11:00 p.m. he stepped outside the Data 
Processing Center building for a smoke and to view the test 
firing.  He noticed a bright light approaching rapidly from the 
east, which he took to be a light from a plane at first.  However, 
it approached the Test Facility at an unbelievable speed, slowing 
over the Saturn V-B test stand before continuing on towards the 
Saturn IV-B test stand, whereupon it stopped and stood over the 
exhaust blast from the test firing for a minute to a minute and a 
half.  He described the UFO as 200 feet in diameter.  It hovered 
at 3,000-5,000 feet during the stage 2 captive firing, directly 
over the exhaust blast updraft until the firing ended.  Then it 
approached at about 30 mph, came over the data processing 
center for about another minute, and left travelling almost 
straight up.  

     Mr. Allen states there were 19 people who witnessed the UFO 
where he stood and another 9 to 11 people on the roof of the 
Control Facility Building, who had been filming the test firing 
and also saw it.  No pictures of this test firing were ever shown 
to his group although they were shown film footage of all other 
firings.  They were told that a weather balloon with a flashlight 
attached had been the cause of the UFO report and that was what 
they had seen.  They were also told that if they discussed the 
sighting with the public they would lose their jobs.  

     A complete report of this sighting is being sent to MUFON 
national headquarters and to CAUS.