The Kenneth Arnold Incident

From my course Exploring UFO Sightings co-taught with David Metcalfe

“My Grandfather was the first credible witness to report 'flying saucers' of the Modern UFO Era. His sightings jump-started the study of UFOs in the 20th Century."

-- Shanelle Schanz, Kenneth Arnold’s granddaughter

In the summer of 1947, two events occurred in close succession that have come to define the modern era of UFOs: the Kenneth Arnold sighting and the Roswell UFO Incident. This section of the course describes what happened to pilot Kenneth Arnold in 1947. It also provides a broad overview of these two decades, the '40s and '50s, including information about several less publicized UFO incidents such as the Chiles-Whitted incident on July 24, 1948. We also consider that these incidents coincide with the development of experimental aircraft, some of which resemble large flying saucers.

The Kenneth Arnold case inaugurated the modern era of the UFO as we know it, characterized by belief in potential extraterrestrial spacecraft, government programs like Project Sign created to try to identify UAP, and government secrecy about the topic. In short, all the elements we see at play in today’s climate began during the 1940s.

A Brief Overview of Kenneth Arnold’s Book, The Coming of the Saucers

One of the readings assigned for this section is Kenneth Arnold’s book about his sighting and its aftermath, called *The Coming of the Saucers*, which he wrote with Raymond Palmer, the famous author and editor of science fiction, in 1952. We will see that Palmer, an advocate for belief in extraterrestrials and esotericism, had a profound impact on Arnold. The most recent version of Arnold’s book was published by his granddaughter, Shanelle Schanz, in 2023. She includes artwork from his great-granddaughter as well as her own commentary about her grandfather.

We recommend Arnold’s book as it is a first-person account of arguably the most famous UAP sighting in history. He tells the story of his sighting of what he called saucers, as well as the things that happened to him afterward, including his meetings with military intelligence personnel and strange occurrences that fall under the category of paranormal. The book is not an academic book, but it is an important primary source of information about a UAP sighting, which, to this day, is still unexplained.

The book begins with his sighting and then focuses on the aftermath. He not only became famous overnight but also found himself involved in a series of very strange scenarios. It appears that he became integrated, unbeknownst to himself, within a US intelligence cell. He also describes things that happened to him that he could not understand. He accidentally crashes his own airplane, through a mistake that he believes he would never make and doesn’t remember making. He attended a meeting at a house which he returned to within four days and observed that the house was completely abandoned, covered with cobwebs, and looked as if it hadn’t been inhabited for years.

He and Palmer also include several interesting chapters that summarize reports of UAP from Project Saucer, which was the public name for Project Sign. For context, 1947 saw several historical developments: June 24, 1947: Kenneth Arnold's UFO sighting; July 2, 1947: Discovery of debris in Roswell, New Mexico; July 6, 1947: Marcel Brazel reports the debris; July 8, 1947: Press release about the "flying disc" from Roswell Army Air Field (RAAF) with a quick retraction later the same day; September 18, 194: Establishment of the United States Air Force and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)

German Horton 229 Ho 229 V3 captured by US troops in mid-1940s. Image Public Domain.

Project Sign was initiated in late 1947, shortly after the Kenneth Arnold sighting and the Roswell Incident. It was the first official U.S. military program to investigate UFO sightings and determine their potential threat to national security. Project Sign’s report, which is summarized in Arnold’s book, suggested that some UFOs might be of extraterrestrial origin. They didn’t conclude that they were, but they were open to the possibility. This specific program was officially closed in early 1949, and allegedly its report was destroyed.

Arnold's book also includes a section on UAP from historical sources, including descriptions of UAP from London in 1773 of aerial objects that look like Arnold’s saucers.

Arnold’s Experience

On June 24, Kenneth Arnold set out to look for a lost military marine transport plane in the vicinity of Mt. Rainier, Washington state. While he flew his plane in airspace around Mt. Rainier at about 9200 feet, a flash of blinding light lit up the surfaces of his airplane. He thought he was going to have a midair collision with another airplane. He actually did see another plane. But the flash happened again in the same part of the sky, and he looked around and saw a formation of nine objects which he at first thought were jets. They didn’t have tails, which confused him. One of the craft looked different than the rest and darker. He attempted to clock their speed. He later worked out that they were going between 1,200 to 1,700 mph. He noticed that while they flew in formation, they flew erratically. He later described them as being like a saucer, if you skipped it across the water. He also said that they seemed to be attached to each other. Their speed and agility shocked him, and at the time he attributed it to very skilled aeronautical engineers, but he also reported that he had a very eerie feeling about the whole thing.

Arnold then proceeded to do something that is a common pattern of UFO events. He went over the experience again and again. He just couldn’t square what he saw with what he believed the US had in terms of aviation technology. Also, he noted that the human body at that speed and that velocity, coupled with the erratic movements of the vehicles, would not survive. He concluded that they must have been unmanned craft. He eventually would come to think of them as conscious vehicles.

In the immediate aftermath of the sighting, he was interrogated by military personnel of every type. This indicated to him that they were very concerned. He thought that if they were concerned, that meant that what he saw was probably not US technology.

At one point after his sighting, he decided to question his mental health to prove to himself and others that he was psychologically sound. The Harvard research psychiatrist John Mack wrote a whole book on the topic of experiencers’ mental health. Mack’s conclusion was that, as a group, they were as healthy and normal as anyone in the general population. The only difference was that they had witnessed an unknown aerial event. I’ve known many people who did exactly what Arnold did. Arnold maintained his ability to be a commercial pilot, which meant his mental health was cleared.

After Arnold’s sighting and when he landed his plane, he immediately told people about the objects he saw. Soon, reporters took his report. He described what he saw as plates or saucers, and reporters coined the term, “flying saucer." His story went viral and spread throughout the United States and the world.

More of The Aftermath

1947 was a year of hundreds of sightings of disc-like aerial objects. Soon after his sighting, Arnold met Captain E.J. Smith and his co-pilot Ralph Stevens, who had flown the United Airlines flight 105. During that flight, they, and their entire crew, saw objects similar to Arnold’s flying saucers. The reputations of pilots Smith and Stevens were exemplary. Arnold felt vindicated that what he saw was also being seen by other credible witnesses.

In terms of the aftermath of the sighting, Arnold stated:

"I am positive that any pilot at the same place at the same time would have observed what I did. By no stretch of the imagination can I classify my observations in the categories of illusion, hallucination, apparition, or vision. Since that day I have been repeatedly questioned and investigated by such agencies as Military Intelligence, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Bureau of Internal Revenue, Central Intelligence, Marine Intelligence, private detective agencies, individuals, and just plain busybodies. I have been subjected to ridicule, much loss of time and money, newspaper notoriety, magazine stories, reflections on my honesty, my character, my business dealings. In short, the amount of actual persecution that has come about (whether intended as such or not) because of my accidental involvement in what has become the strangest story ever told, has been a continual source of amazement to me."

Arnold describes his first meeting with military intelligence: "I can say that I was extremely impressed with my first meeting with Military Intelligence officers. Their courtesy, politeness, and consideration were beyond reproach." He said, “they quietly but firmly impressed me with the idea that if anything of an unusual nature came to my attention or if I needed help in any way I was to phone them or write them collect in care of A-2, Fourth Air Force, Hamilton Field, California. They also mentioned that it would probably be better for all concerned if I refused to discuss my experiences further with outsiders.”

But a year later, he had this to say: "Major Sander is a phony dressed up in a lot of sheer intelligence as to how psychologically to handle men. I had bumped into a few of these fellows in my life. From the things they say, it is pretty tough to decipher what they really mean."

In explaining the very strange things that occurred, like revisiting the house where he had had a meeting four days prior and seeing it completely abandoned and in seeming disrepair for years, as well as almost crashing his own plane, he wondered if he was being subjected to mind control:

"I was curious to see if my engine would start again. I scooted around the wing and back into the cockpit. There I discovered what had caused my engine to stop. Until this is written, I have kept this secret to myself. My fuel valve was shut off. I knew instantly there was only one person who could have shut that fuel valve off - and that was myself. I didn't tell anyone what had happened for the simple reason that no one would believe me. The realization that my thought or mind in some peculiar way was being controlled or dictated to or that it could have caused this to happen would seem perfectly preposterous to anyone who had not experienced what I had just experienced."

Arnold included data from the report of Project Sign of the UAP sightings that were declared, at least initially, as unidentified and potentially extraterrestrial:

The Chiles-Whitted UFO sighting was named after two Eastern Air Lines pilots who reported the UFO near Montgomery, Ala. Ground observers had seen an object an hour prior to the observation by the pilots.

This is from Project Saucer: “All reports agreed it was going in a southerly direction, trailing various colored flames and that it behaved like a normal aircraft insofar as disappearing from the line of sight was concerned. The pilots, Capt. C.S. Chiles and John B. Whitted described the phenomena as a 'wingless aircraft, 100 feet long, cigar-shaped and about twice the diameter of a B-29 with no protruding surfaces.' 'We saw it at the same time and asked each other. "What in the world is this?"' Chiles told investigators. 'Whatever it was, it flashed down toward us and we veered to the left. It veered to its left and passed us about 700 feet to our right and above us. Then, as if the pilot had seen us and wanted to avoid us, it pulled up with a tremendous burst of flame from the rear and zoomed into the clouds, its prop wash or jet wash rocking our DC-3.” Years later, investigators from Project Blue Book, the third governmental UAP program, explained that this was a meteor.

Arnold, as verified by his granddaughter, came to interpret his experience as spiritual and religious. He saw the objects in a few different ways: potentially as vehicles for the dead, as living beings, or as Ray Palmer had conceived of them, as spiritual spacecraft or ethereal machines. He created “cards,” which mimicked prayer cards, which his daughter Kim called philosophy cards, and he handed them out to people as a way to spread the word about the saucers. In his book, he also mentioned that during one of his fishing excursions with friends he encountered a river of red water, which was the effect of the salmon run. However, his mention of this would indicate that he was referencing a scene in the Biblical book of Revelation. Many people, at that time, associated the mass sightings of the UFOs with some Christian denominations’ version of the End Time or Apocalypse.

On the back of his philosophy card, Arnold wrote this:

"Many people have inquired as to my philosophy – due to my involvement in the phenomenon known as 'Flying Saucers.' The following I accept as worth thinking about. A great man is the unbelieving man; he is without spiritual sight or spiritual hearing; his glory is in understanding his own understanding. It is he who subdues the forest, tames the beasts of the field to service. He goes alone in the dark, unafraid. He follows no man’s course, but searches for himself; the priests cannot make him believe, nor the angels of heaven; none can subdue his judgment. He says: why permit others, even priests, to think for you? Stand on your own feet –be a man. Through his arm are tyrants and evil kings overthrown. Through him are doctrines and religions sifted to the bottom and the falsehood and evil in them cast aside. Who but the Creator could have created so great a man as the unbeliever?"

Researcher Curt Collins identified that this is a quote from the sacred scripture of a New Religious Movement called OAHSPE, which was a document written, through automatic writing, by John Ballou Newbrough (1828–1891). Beliefs of this new religious movement include the idea that Jehovih (their spelling) and angel ambassadors created the universe, humans have moral obligations to lift each other up, and it is the human destiny to be guided by spiritual beings. Ray Palmer was a member of this movement.

Arnold would have understood himself to have direct communion with spiritual beings through his saucer encounters and as indicated to him by the life he led, which he experienced as a string of synchronicities and meaningful coincidences. He, therefore, would not need the help of spiritual intermediaries like priests or rabbis. He would have seen himself as having direct spiritual knowledge.

I’d like to leave this section with the words of Kim Arnold, describing her father:"No one believed in God – the Divine Creator – more than my father, Kenneth Arnold. From his perspective, God had created everything that ever has been or ever will be. As a way of honoring his belief in God, he felt history should be preserved and science should be respected. This is why he protected the authenticity of his sighting on June 24, 1947, his entire life. Even though he stated that he was not a spiritual man, he was the most spiritual man I have ever known. I believe he linked the meaning of spirituality to being a member of organized religion. Being a member of a church of organized religion was not his path in life. You are taught in organized religions that you have to think the way that they think. My father believed that you should question everything. He believed his gift as an individual was to question and make his own decisions. I would consider my father to have been a man’s man. He was the kind of man that other men looked up to, admired, and respected."

Citation: Arnold, Kenneth; Schanz, Shanelle; Palmer, Ray. *The Coming of the Saucers* (pp. 6-7). Kenneth Albert Arnold Ray Palmer Shanelle Schanz. Kindle Edition.