(1944-45) Three Sightings at the Hanford Nuclear Production Facility

"I was vectored out one afternoon to make contact with one of these blips. This one appeared to be very high ... "

On the banks of the Columbia River in Washington State lies a small set of buildings that were crucial to winning the Second World War. Over the years it’s gone by many names – the Hanford Project, the Hanford Engineer Works, and the Hanford Nuclear Production Facility, but most researchers and academics simply call it the Hanford Site.

The Hanford Site became relevant to UFO research with the growing idea that UFOs might somehow be interested in our nuclear technology. At a high level, the thought was that our development of nuclear weapons during the Second World War is what ultimately attracted their attention and may explain why UFO sightings were so frequent during the post-war period.¹ If that thesis is correct, it would stand to reason that any UFOs would have been very interested in the first nuclear production facilities ever built. The Hanford Site is one of these facilities and there are three key UFO sightings during its first year of operation.

In this post, we’re going to look at these sightings as a package, explore some important context, and assess the credibility of the people offering these accounts. By grouping these sightings together, it’s my hope that you’ll be able to see these cases from a slightly new angle and reach an informed opinion about what may be a very underrated part of our history.

Lets start by looking at:

The Manhattan Project

The U.S. government started thinking about nuclear weapons shortly before the Second World War broke out. Even though there was some interest in building one, the project stayed small and theoretical until the United States was attacked at Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. Its entry into the Second World War kicked that effort into high gear and what became known as The Manhattan Project was born.²³

The Manhattan Project was going to try and build an atomic bomb using one of two explosive materials: (1) uranium, or (2) plutonium. Ultimately, they ended up pursuing both options with uranium development located at Oak Ridge, Tennessee and plutonium development located in Hanford, Washington.

Construction of the world’s first full scale plutonium production reactor began in Hanford on October 10, 1943. About a year later (September 6, 1944) “B Reactor” was complete and running. At the time, this made Hanford the first and only plutonium production facility in the world.⁴ Within about three months, unidentified flying objects began appearing over the Hanford Site just as the facility was completing additional reactors and ramping up its ability to make more plutonium.  What followed were three major groups of sightings, some of which could be explained by conventional means and some of which could not.

The Japanese Balloon Bomb Campaign

One of the factors that “muddy the waters” on these UFO sightings is the simultaneous existence of the Japanese “Fu-Go” Balloon Bomb Program. This historically underrated program involved the Empire of Japan launching 9,300 balloon bombs into the pacific jet stream where they were intended to sail across the ocean, reach the United States, explode, and cause fires, damage, and public panic.

Each balloon bomb took about 60 hours to reach the United States and because they were travelling immense distances with no guidance other than the wind, they were notoriously inaccurate. Of the 9,300 launches between November 1944 and April 1945, only about 300 were recovered or observed in the United States.⁵⁶

Washington State, where the Hanford Site is located, would see about 25 of these incidents over the duration of the Balloon Bomb Program. Most of them involved the discovery of balloon fragments on the ground and only four of these were within 50 miles of the Hanford Site.⁷ But two notable accounts from the period add color to these statistics. Franklin Matthias, the U.S. Army Officer in charge of the Hanford Site would go on to indicate that a balloon bomb successfully struck a power line near the facility and severely reduced its power for three days.⁸ Vincent Whitehead, a U.S. Army Counter-Intelligence Agent would state that he found a Japanese Balloon Bomb flying over the site while he was in a spotter plane. Whitehead claims that he personally brought it down by throwing a brick at it and recovered the balloon on landing.⁹

Neither of these accounts are present in standard military reporting during the period and that suggests that (1) there were issues coordinating a response to the balloon bombs at the time, and (2) some security issues at the Hanford Site were deliberately left out of reports so as not to betray the Top Secret purpose of the facility. Those two things should be kept in mind as you form an opinion about the three sightings outlined below.

Sighting #1 – (Cmdr. R. W. Hendershot)

c. Dec 23, 1944 to Jan 23, 1945

The first sighting of an “unidentified aircraft” over the Hanford Site occurred in late December 1944. A second one followed soon after. While a single F6F “Hellcat” fighter was sent out to investigate, on both occasions the pilot was unable to find anything by the time he arrived.

These sightings were clocked by radar moving “about as fast as a [spotter plane]” travelling northwest to southeast across the area. Given the lack of visual confirmation, it’s possible that radar was actually picking up Japanese Balloon Bombs or one of the ad-hoc security flights similar to those flown by Vincent Whitehead. It’s impossible to tell, but a conventional explanation should be considered based on the available information.

In early January, the military responded by moving a battery of searchlights into the area, installing radar at the Hanford Site, and requesting that two night fighters be permanently assigned to intercept any aircraft. To try and further narrow down the objects they were seeing, the airspace was declared a “Danger Area” and “Restricted Area” to prevent all accidental civilian and military flights.

Sometime between January 15^th and 23^rd, radar once again picked up an aircraft over the Hanford Site. Cmdr. R. W. Hendershot was asked to investigate “two radar blips that were very high up in the air.” On a clear afternoon, he flew a T6 “Texan” training aircraft over the facility. While he would later state that it was his belief “there was something there” he was unable to find anything in the area on his intercept. He rotated out of the nearby Pasco Naval Air Station on a different assignment soon after, closing the book on this initial group of sightings.¹⁰¹¹¹²

Sighting #2 – (Lt. j.g. Clarence Clem)

January 9, 1945 to February 15, 1945

Lt. Cmdr. Richard Brown, Lt. (j.g.) Clarence Clem, and Ensign C.T. Neal were rotated on to the Pasco Naval Air Station in early January for a short training exercise. One afternoon, while they were sitting in the Officer’s Club, they received a call about another unidentified aircraft over the Hanford Site and were ordered to intercept it.

Brown entered an F6F “Hellcat” and took to the air to investigate. Neal waited in a second Hellcat on the tarmac to support Brown, if needed. And Clem positioned himself in the Air Traffic Control tower to coordinate radio communications during the intercept. According to Brown, he observed an object that he described as “looking like a ball of fire” in a controlled hover directly above the Hanford Site. He chased the object which promptly outran him and disappeared from radar travelling in a northwest direction. On returning to Pasco Naval Air Station, he described the object as “so bright he had trouble looking at it.”

Brown’s encounter with a ball of fire is similar to the “Foo Fighter” phenomenon that was reported by Allied Airmen over Europe during this period. Notably, it’s the first account of a flying object located over the Hanford Site that is unmistakably unknown.

There were two additional intercepts that occurred before the squadron left Pasco Naval Air Station on February 15, 1945. The second intercept involved a radar contact that disappeared before Neal was able to get airborne and chase it. A third intercept occurred but the details were similarly unremarkable. Shortly after, all three men rotated off the base, closing the book on this second group of sightings.¹³¹⁴

Sighting #3 – (Lt. Cmdr. Rolan Powell)

c. July 22, 1945

In early July, Cmdr. Rolan Powell was transferred on to Pasco Naval Air Station to form a new squadron and train for carrier operations. On a date around July 22, 1945 Powell and his fellow aviators were on the airfield when a “General Quarters” alarm sounded and they were directed to intercept an unidentified aircraft that was said to be in a holding pattern above the Hanford Site.

According to Powell, six F6F “Hellcat” fighters took off at approximately noon on an otherwise clear day. On arrival to the Hanford Site, Powell describes seeing a large, oval-shaped, streamlined object that was “pinkish” in color. The object was holding in place at about 65,000 ft and emitting vapor around its outside edges from what appeared to be portholes and vents. Powell estimated the size of the object as about “three aircraft carriers side by side.” Using the dimensions of a WWII-era aircraft carrier, this would make the object roughly 800 by 270 ft (244 by 82 m).

According to Powell, all six planes tried to climb to co-altitude with the object, but they were limited by the technology of their time. The Hellcats were only rated for a ceiling of 37,000 ft. Powell indicated they were able to push it to 42,000 ft before their engines began to fail and fuel consumption got critical. After hovering in a fixed position for about twenty minutes, the object disappeared going straight-up and the six Hellcats returned to base.

Notably, this is the second time an unknown object was visually identified over the site and the first indication of any saucer-like craft operating in the area. This was Powell’s only encounter with a UFO and he rotated off the base not long after.¹⁵

Are These Accounts Credible?

While all three sightings are from the same year during the Second World War, not all of them came to light at the same time or in the same way.

R. W. Hendershot is speaking for himself as well as his memory of the earliest intercept attempts by another (unnamed) pilot. His claims are corroborated by other military documents at the time and as neither he nor the other pilot made any visual contact, the burden of proof for his claim is pretty low. It should also be noted that his written account of the experience was provided to noted UFO Research advocate, Donald Keyhoe, likely sometime in the 1950’s when Keyhoe was most active in the field. This means that in addition to the corroborating documents, Hendershot is providing an account not that long after the events in question.

Clarence Clem is speaking for himself as well as his two fellow aviators (Richard Brown and C.T. Neil). Of the three, only Brown is said to have made visual contact with an object and he was deceased at the time that Clem brought this forward. It should also be noted that Clem’s account was provided for the first time in 2009, 64 years after the events he is speaking of. While he did put his name to an on-the-record interview in 2013, unfortunately there is no other document to corroborate Clem’s account and the other pilots are not alive to co-sign his version of events.

Rolan Powell is speaking for himself and does not recall the names of the other five aviators who would have been present at his intercept. Unlike the first two men offering accounts, Rolan had a commercial incentive associated with his story which appears in his self-published autobiography, Living on the Edge: An American war hero's daring feats as a Navy fighter pilot, civilian test pilot, and CIA mercenary. With full disclosure, I haven’t been able to get a copy to assess the overall tone of his other claims in the book but like Clarence Clem, Powell’s account was provided quite late, only coming to light for the first time in 1996 (and restated in a subsequent interview in 2008). These are respectively 51 and 63 years after his claimed event. Unfortunately, there is also no other document to corroborate his account.

So what are we supposed to make of that? Well, it should be clear that the story of UFOs over the Hanford Site is complicated. Some of these claims are unlikely and others more likely to be the product of conventional flight. And while I have an opinion on the credibility of accounts like Rolan Powell’s, I also have to acknowledge that these incidents were occurring in the middle of a war, above a Top Secret military project, at a time when security breaches were not being written down. It may be unrealistic to expect a slew of supporting documents and its possible that these former pilots were attempting to flag an important experience in their last remaining years.

Like many prominent UFO cases, these three remain a little murky. And if you’re trying to form an opinion on what is going on out there, sometimes that’s the perspective you need to hear.

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P.S. By grouping these sightings together, this article provides a brand new take on these “classic cases.” Until now, they’ve usually been discussed in isolation and without some of the important context you might need to understand them. If you think this new assessment might be helpful, please:

1. Hastings, Robert. “UFOs and Nukes: The Secret Link Revealed.” UFOs and Nukes a Film by Robert Hastings, April 10, 2016. http://www.ufosandnukes.com/#trailer.

2. Hewlett, Richard G, and Oscar E Anderson. The New World, 1939/1946, A History of The United States Atomic Energy Commission, Volume I. University Park, PA: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 1962.

3. Rhodes, Richard. The Making of the Atomic Bomb. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, 1986.

4. Marceau, Thomas, David Harvey, Darby Stapp, Sandra Cannon, Charles Conway, Dennis Deford, Brian Freer, et al. History of the Plutonium Production Facilities at the Hanford Site Historic District, 1943-1990. U.S. Department of Energy Office of Scientific and Technical Information. DOE-RL-97-1047. Richland, WA: Hanford Cultural and Historic Resources Program, U.S. Dept. of Energy, 2002. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/807939. Pg 35, 504-505.

5. Matthias, Franklin. “Japanese Balloon Bombs ‘Fu-Go.’” Atomic Heritage Foundation, August 10, 2016. https://www.atomicheritage.org/history/japanese-balloon-bombs-fu-go#:~:text=On%20November%203%2C%201944%2C%20Japan,in%20the%20continental%20United%20States.

6. Mikesh, Robert. “Japan's World War II Balloon Bomb Attacks on North America.” Smithsonian Annals of Flight 9 (1973). https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.5479/si.AnnalsFlight.9. Pg 17.

7. Note: I chose the 50-mile radius as a threshold and worked from the G2 Army Intelligence table provided in Mikesh (Pg 69) to tabulate 25 incidents in the state and 4 incidents within 50 miles.

8. Groueff, Stephane. Colonel Franklin Matthias's Interview (1965) - Part 2. Other. Voices of the Manhattan Project, October 2012. https://www.manhattanprojectvoices.org/oral-histories/colonel-franklin-matthiass-interview-1965-part-2.

9. Langer, S L. Vincent and Clare Whitehead's Interview - Part 2. Other. Voices of the Manhattan Project, May 17, 1986. https://www.manhattanprojectvoices.org/oral-histories/vincent-and-clare-whiteheads-interview-part-2.

10. Office of the Commanding General. Daily Diary United States Headquarters Fourth Air Force . Project 1947. 4 January - 25 January 1945. San Fransico, CA: Headquarters Fourth Air Force, 1945. http://www.project1947.com/fig/1945b.htm#hanford.

11. Cunningham, Ross. “Hanford Made Material For Atomic Bomb That Hit Japs.” The Seattle Times, August 8, 1945. http://www.project1947.com/fig/1945b.htm#hanford.

12. Hendershot, R W. Letter to Donald E. Keyhoe. “Statement on Unusual Radar Blips at Pasco Naval Air Station.” Project 1947, October 16, 2015. http://www.project1947.com/fig/hendershot.htm.

13. Hastings, Robert. Former World War II Fighter Pilot Bud Clem’s 1945 UFO Experience at the Hanford Plutonium Production Plant. Other. The UFO Chronicles, August 8, 2009. https://www.theufochronicles.com/2009/08/former-world-war-ii-fighter-pilot-bud.html.

14. Warren, Frank. Navy Fighters Chase UFO Over Hanford Atomic Plant in 1945. Other. The UFO Chronicles, October 3, 2015. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ieZB_nk3HY.

15. Andrus, Walt. UFO Sighting Over Nuclear Reactor. Other. The National Investigations Committee On Aerial Phenomena, July 19, 2006. https://web.archive.org/web/20060719222255/http://nicap.org/hanford.htm.