Roswell Turns 60

July, 2007 was the 60th anniversary of that fabled UFO crash at Roswell, New Mexico. But, is it a fable or did an extraterrestrial ship actually crash in New Mexico back in 1947? Did our United States government, as many allege, cover up evidence of this incident? And what of the craft itself and its non-human passengers? Are they neatly tucked away in some secret government hangar in Area 51? Let's take a closer look.

First of all, in our known Universe which extends some 15 billion light years in every direction and is filled with trillions upon trillions of galaxies each populated by hundreds of billions of stars, it is literally inconceivable that the only planet orbiting the only star that is the sole home of intelligent life is this small green orb we call Earth! It is now accepted that most middle aged stars, as is our sun, have planetary systems. If only one ten thousandth of one percent of all the planets in the Universe have any life at all, then our known Universe is jumping with life forms: many, by shear statistics, far more advanced than are we! But, have they come here?

Let's assume that some distant civilization is peering through its telescopes, listening to radio signals and using other forms of advanced technologies that humans have not yet even dreamed of to seek out intelligent life. As advanced as their devices may be, we must accept that all electromagnetic transmissions get weaker with great distances and the integrity of those signals will be proportionally degraded. Also, as galaxies are separated by distances of millions of light years, and any radio signal or image would be that old, it is unlikely that an advanced civilization would even attempt to locate or communicate with another outside its own galaxy: let alone ever attempt the trip there.

No! It is much more reasonable to assume that our alien friends may have detected our earthy radio signals. These signals would, for reasons that we cannot go into here because of time limitations, stand out above the random background noise of the Universe. If these ETs could figure out that these transmissions were of intelligent origin, they would certainly be more than a little curious about the author of these signals. As radio came into being in the 1920s, our signals could not have been traveling out into the galaxy for more than about a quarter of a century to have reached their ears by 1947. That's assuming these aliens were capable of faster than light speed travel, and could get here from literally anywhere in almost no time at all after receiving our signals.

If we buy into all this, then where is the real nuts and bolts evidence of their arrival? I've interviewed dozens who have claimed to have seen a UFO! Only a few brought any kind of photographic evidence. Almost all were obvious fakes or so blurry, they could just as well have said it was a photo of the Easter Bunny. Even that "Alien Autopsy" film, which for a while seemed to be the UFO "Holy Grail", has itself proved to be a fraud!

While I have a hard time believing we are alone in our vast Universe or even within our interstellar neighborhood, I have an even harder time believing that planet Earth was visited by extraterrestrials in 1947 or at any other time in recorded human history. Until the Jupiter 2 lands in my back yard and ET steps out and says, "Klatu Berrada Nitku", I'm afraid I'm still a skeptic!

Live long and prosper.

Dave Allen, Radio Daddio