mustangdriver wrote:
Well one fact I do have is the USAF base was contacted there right away, and they responded with "No we have no aircraft flying tonight". Then after the UFO story hits , they come back with "Oh wait now that you mention it we did have some F-16's up, like 10 of them". Now I don't know where I stand with the UFO stuff, but that seems pretty strange.
Not really.
There is not one omniscient central brain that knows all in the AF. Every Public Affairs officer doesn't have access to every flying squadron's schedule every day. MOAs are used by many different units. He11, even within one unit people don't know all. If asked right now, I couldn't tell you with 100% certainty where everyone in
my squadron flew yesterday -- and I was on the flying schedule. If RAF Lakenheath was asked if we were flying over East Anglia, we could only tell you what WE were doing...not any of the other USAF units in the country or even USAF units in Europe (who also fly over England's airspace).
So, they may have asked one organization, who replied with, "nope, we weren't flying that night"...when in fact maybe another unit WAS flying in the MOA that night.
It would be nice if PA officers were able to know all, see all, and tell all...but the fact of the matter is that they don't.
It's probable that the original person who made the original statement just didn't do all of their homework before saying something. Then, when there turned out to be a bunch of brouhaha about the event, they actually went back and found out the real info, and perhaps even had access to information they didn't previously have.