An astrophysicist and a UFO investigator in Ohio have debunked a YouTube video that purports to show an angular object floating as a UFO near Wright-Patterson Air Force Base.
The video, posted by a website called Secureteam 10, went viral this weekend with nearly 800,000 views as of Tuesday afternoon since it was posted Saturday. A narrator claims the video was shot by an unidentified Dayton area couple last week near Wright-Patterson. The video was played on the Fox News Channel and picked by by media outlets from England to Australia this weekend.
Joesph Childers, an astronomy educator at Boonshoft Museum of Discovery in Dayton, wasn’t a true believer of the video.
“Not even myth-busters time,” he said in an interview. “It’s garbage.”
Thomas Wertman, a UFO investigator in Cleveland and Ohio state director of the Mutual UFO Network, also doubts the video’s authenticity, and said someone is making money from the advertising each time it’s viewed.
“I don’t know how much. I know it’s more than me because I’m a volunteer,” he said.
The website, which does not reveal its name or address or the original source of the video, did not respond to a request for an interview Tuesday.
A base spokeswoman said Tuesday that Wright-Patterson was not involved in any activities that would contribute to the activity purportedly seen in the video.
Wright-Patterson has long disavowed any connection to UFOs or aliens hidden on base, once home to the former Project Blue Book which investigated more than 12,600 reported UFO sightings between 1947 and 1969 around the world.
In 1985, Wright-Patterson issued a statement that said the Air Force concluded Project Blue Book showed no UFO sighting was a threat to national security, demonstrated technology beyond present-day sciences, and no evidence indicated extraterrestrial vehicles.
“Periodically, it is erroneously stated that the remains of extraterrestrial visitors are or have been stored at Wright-Patterson AFB,” the statement concluded. “There are not now, nor ever have been, any extraterrestrial visitors or equipment on Wright-Patterson Air Force Base.”
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