UFO's and World War Two In The Pacific Ocean

USS Lamson DD-328

USS Clemson

On February 23, 2009 a report was submitted to MUFON about an event that occurred during World War Two. The witnesses were on board a Clemson Class Destroyer in the Bering Sea, west of Alaska. It was a very dark night, and they were manning guns on board of the fast, but small ship. In early 1943, the US had been at war with Japan for more than a year.

The reporting witness wrote that the ship was patrolling the Bering Sea "north of the Alaskan Peninsula", heading north. By "Alaskan Peninsula", I believe he meant the Aleutian Island Chain.

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The witnesses were onboard DD244, the USS Williamson, commissioned in 1920. The date given for the event was March 1943. Kisku and Attu Islands in the Aleutian chain had been invaded and occupied by the Japanese in June 1942. The Williamson supported the US invasion and occupation of Attu in April and May 1943.

The witnesses were located on the "second deck (galley deck). . . My gun turret was above the deck house and there were no obstructions hindering my field of vision". They were on top of what we would refer to as 'the bridge', at the fore of the vessel, in front of the 4 stacks and the mast. As they were in contested waters, one can imagine that their powers of observation were certainly heightened at the time.

The full and complete report to MUFON follows below, with no changes.

I was aboard the USS Williamson (Destroyer) in early 1943 during WWII. The weather was clear with calm seas. The night was very black. At the time of the sighting, we were patrolling the Bearing Sea north of the Alaskan Peninsula, bearing north at about 20 knots.

I was on watch at the starboard 20mm gun, second deck (galley deck). It was around 2300. My gun turret was above the deck house and there were no obstructions hindering my field of vision, allowing me to have a clear 360 degree view of the sea around the ship. There were four of us together at the starboard gun (I can get crew names and captain’s name).

The attention of both port and starboard gun crews was drawn to a row of red lights off the port side, traveling parallel to and slightly forward of the bow. I did not see the lights when they first approached so do not know the direction from which they came, or if they came out of the sea. There were at least eight lights in a row, evenly spaced, canted at about 15 degrees to horizontal. I would estimate the lights were no more than 100 yards from the ship. The lights held their relative position to one another throughout the sighting, and appeared to be about 10 feet apart. I would say that the light closest to the water (the lights were canted diagonal to horizontal at approximately 15 degrees) appeared to be about 30 feet above the water.

I estimate that it would require a cantaloupe held at arms length to cover a single light. I could not see a structure associated with the lights as there was nothing but blackness between the lights. The lights were a very deep red and did not cast a beam. The lights moved parallel to our ship, holding their position relative to the ship throughout the entire sighting.

The lights continued to pace the ship as I watched. This continued for at least one hour. I was relieved from watch at 2400. When I went below the lights were still visible. I was too tired to stay on deck and went below to sleep. The next day, the midnight gun crew said that the captain turned the ship and “tried” to chase the lights. I don’t know the outcome of this maneuver. I don’t know what the circumstances were when the lights disappeared. But I do know that I have not seen anything like this before or since.

End Report

This report is worthy of further investigation. To see these lights as close and as long as they did, in such a remote and, for humans, dangerous region, is not easily explainable.

The Williamson had been chosen for several technical upgrades. On 15 May 1943, four torpedo wakes passed close to the ship, her closest call of the campaign and, indeed, her last brush with the Japanese in the Aleutian theater, according to Wikipedia.

Returning to San Diego in late spring of 1943, Williamson trained with submarines and then resumed escorting and plane-guarding for carriers on their shakedown cruises. In December 1943 Williamson was reclassified back to her original classification: DD-244. She survived the war, was decommissioned in November 1945 and was scrapped in 1948.

From Wikipedia

A truly amazing event was reported to have taken place during the opening of the 1942 Guadalcanal Campaign in the Pacific. The mass sighting was described in the August 1992 issue of the MUFON UFO Journal. Bob Gribble wrote about the incident that occurred on Tulagi Island in the South Pacific in August 1942. Tulagi in right smack in the middle of 'The Slot'. It forms an excellent protected harbor with the much larger Florida Island to the north. In 1942 it was the capitol of the Soloman Islands Protectorate.

From Wikipedia: "The Japanese occupied Tulagi on May 3, 1942, with the intention of setting up a seaplane base nearby. The ships in Tulagi harbor were raided by planes from

USS Yorktown the following day in a prelude to the Battle of the Coral Sea.

U.S. forces, primarily the 1st Marine Raiders, landed on August 7, 1942 and captured Tulagi as part of Operation Watchtower after a day of hard fighting. (The Marines were Raiders and also from the 2nd and 5th Marine Regiments.)
On 7 August 1942, 11,000 U.S. Marines landed on Guadalcanal and 3,000 U.S. Marines landed on Tulagi and nearby islands.^[43] The Japanese troops on Tulagi and nearby islands were outnumbered and killed almost to the last man in the Battle of Tulagi and Gavutu-Tanambogo . . . Thus, began the Guadalcanal campaign.

After its capture by Naval and Marine forces, the island (Tulagi) hosted a fleet of PT boats for a year, including John F. Kennedy's PT-109 as well as other ancillary facilities."
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According to Stephen J. Brickner of the First Marine Division, a flight of 150 disk-shaped vehicles flew over the troops who were expecting Japanese bombers. They were in

straight majestic lines of 10 to 12 craft each, one behind the other. The gleaming objects seemed to "wobble slightly, and every time they wobbled, they would shimmer brightly from the sun." The formation disappeared swiftly, leaving the excited witnesses open mouthed. Was this a demonstration by some alien folks to raise the awareness of the soldiers?

Lt.Col. Ware

Another incident which was claimed to have been witnessed by US sailors during WWII occurred in Fiji on January 1943. About 25 witnesses to this absolutely remarkable event were on board the USS Sea Witch and the heavy cruiser USS Chicago (CA-29). The report was phoned in to the National UFO Reporting Center on August 11, 2004 by an eyewitness. NUFORC noted: "We consider him to be an exceptional witness, and highly reliable". The entire report follows, unchanged as it appears in the NUFORC database:

Occurred : 1/18/1943 07:15 (Entered as : 01/18/1943 07:15)

Reported: 8/11/2004 11:57:20 AM 11:57

Posted: 8/11/2004

Location: Fiji Islands (S. Pacific Ocean),

Shape:

Duration:10 sec.

Crew contingents of 2 USN vessels see reconnaissance plane fly into something invisible to witnesses.

Telephoned Report: A gentleman who described himself as a former U. S. Army infantry officer during World War II, described an incident that he personally witnessed while aboard the USS “Sea Witch,” which was anchored in the Fiji Islands at the time.

He described that the accompanying navy vessel, the heavy cruiser, “Chicago,” was in the habit of launching a reconnaissance biplane most mornings, to perform surveillance of the surrounding area.

On the morning in question, the plane was lifted off the heavy cruiser, and was launched. As the plane was returning to land, the witness, together with approximately 25 other witnesses aboard his vessel, were stunned as the aircraft appeared to fly into an object, which was invisible to the witnesses, and crash in a ball of tangled metal. The pilot and observer were killed in the collision, and no recovery effort was mounted.

The witness reports that the aircraft, which had been at an altitude of approximately “200 yards,” he recounted, simply stopped flying in an instant, and fell vertically into the ocean as a ball of wreckage.

((NUFORC Note: We have spoken via telephone with this witness on a number of occasions, and we consider him to be an exceptional witness, and highly reliable. We would welcome additional reports from anyone who also may have been witness to this incident. PD))

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"No recovery effort was mounted". They didn't even attempt to retrieve the seaplane? The US Army officer who made the report was probably part of the supply base which may have been the reason the warships were at Fiji. He would have been easily able to monitor the operations around the USS Chicago CA-29 after this event.

I have alerted 'The Black Vault' about this report, as there may be some references to this event buried in US Government releases.

Wikipedia's article on the USS Chicago CA-29 states: "Early in January 1943, Chicago departed San Francisco, action-bound once more. On 27 January, she sailed from Nouméa to escort a Guadalcanal convoy."

On the map above, Noumea, New Caledonia is from 700 to 900 miles southwest of the Fijian Islands. USS Chicago's top speed was 32 knots. She could have steamed from Fiji to Noumea at top speed in about 25 hours. She could have remained in Fijian waters for a week after the January 18th event and still been off Noumea on January 27.

On the night of January 29th, 1943 the USS Chicago CA-29 was engaged in the Battle of Rennell Island, where she was disabled by 2 torpedoes from Japanese aircraft. The next day she took 4 more torpedoes while under tow, and sank. She was replaced by the USS Chicago CA-136, which was put into service in early 1945.

A link to the only report that occurred in January 1943 currently in NUFORC's database, the report posted above: http://www.nuforc.org/webreports/ndxe194301.html

On April 16, 2005 a report was filed with NUFORC from an eyewitness on a Navy ship that had notified his Officer Of The Day (O.D.) in April 1945 about anomalous aerial phenomena while in the Pacific Ocean south of Japan. The report follows as it appears in the NUFORC database:

Occurred : 4/1/1945 10:00 (Entered as : 04/01/1945 10:00)

Reported: 2/24/2005 10:43:35 PM 22:43

Posted: 4/16/2005

Location: Pacific Ocean,

Shape: Disk

Duration:all day

April, 1945 I saw a disc over our ship, all day as we neared Okinawa.

I was a lookout on flying bridge of a minesweeper approaching Okinawa. We were concerned about Kamikazes and I was scanning sky.

I found a shiny, silvery disc at a very high altitude directly over us. I reported it to the O.D. and others viewed it, too.

But as time passed nothing happened and only I watched it the rest of the day. It remained directly over us all day. At the time a Japanese weapon was a primary concern.

((NUFORC Note: Witness indicates that date of sighting is approximate. PD))

End Report

US Infantry, Amour, and Marines began landing on Okinawa on March 26, 1945. The fighting lasted almost 3 months.

Link to this report, the only one currently for April 1945 :

http://www.nuforc.org/webreports/ndxe194504.html

Finally, from the son of a Japanese participant of World War Two. His dad was a member of the Japanese Imperial Army. The following was posted to MUFON, I think it was in March 2007:

"My father seen creatures observing combat during a battle in the Pacific during WWII.

I do not know which battle, he served in the Pacific in 1942 & 1945.

He told of seeing ufo's before and after the the war."

A salute to all veterans of The Pacific Theater of World War Two. My grandfather was a SeeBee Commander, my dad's oldest brother was a medical doctor, in the Pacific Theater during the war. My dad's older brother had the best job, as a pilot. He ferried big-wigs, including entertainers, such as Betty Grable, all over the Pacific during World War Two.
My father was a Combat Engineer in the European Threater.

'We don't know one-millionth of 1% about anything.'  Thomas Edison

Irish Front Page Reports, Sea Report, Tin From Disc

MONDAY, FEBRUARY 9, 2009

Ireland and UFOs, Greece Case Leaked To News Media

A submission to MUFON on February 6, 2009 consisted of 3 photos of 
The Irish Sun newspaper. It has the highest daily circulation of any paper in Ireland.
Its parent newspaper, The Sun, also is the most popular daily newspaper in the UK.

The following is a transcript of the front page and excerpts from one inner page, used under the Fair Use doctrine, 100 words or less.


THE IRISH SUN
Thursday, February 5, 2009
IRELAND’S No1 PAPER

OUT OF THIS WORLD EXCLUSIVE

WE SAW SEVEN UFOS

Alien crafts buzzed our family Renault

By Gary Meneely
A STUNNED family have told how they
fear an alien INVASION of Ireland after
seeing SEVEN flying saucers.
Builder John Guilfoyle was returning
from the local shop {by car} when they saw 
“strange lights” hovering in the sky.
{He} ran into his home to get girlfriend
Kiera and both witnessed the UFOs spell out 
what they believe to be a THREAT. John, 31,
said: “The country could be at risk.”

Page 5, entirely devoted to:

ALIEN SIGHTING OVER RURAL IRELAND
CLARE’S
ENCOUNTER

A FREAKED family claim they saw SEVEN 
UFOs hovering over CO CLARE.

The article describes how John and Danny, 44,
“watched in shock as seven glowing crafts whizzed
above Kilkee.”
The two, along with three other family members,
“photographed the moving objects during a 40-MINUTE
encounter.” 

BLINDING
“There were seven of them and 
the lights were blinding. We saw 
red, blue and white lights. It
freaked us all out.”
A neighbor’s satellite dish froze
when the craft were visible.
Shannon Airport reportedly informed
the family that there were no flights
scheduled in the area at the time of the
sightings.
John said “It was a real clear night. . . .
The UFOs moved into different positions 
to spell out the letters ANJIN.”
He said he wanted the whole country to 
know about this, as it might be a sign, maybe
a warning of an imminent INVASION.
The article made clear his apprehension
manifested by the 40 minute light show.


Of the 14 photos he was said to have taken,
4 were printed on page 5. Two were of complex
lines of light produced by the craft. The other two
showed globs of orange light in the night sky.
Photos of the family showed them as normal caucasians.


The next day, Feb. 6, the Irish Sun again 
featured on its front page, from the fold and below,

FLYING SAUCER ALERT
ALIEN
NATION
UFO sightings all
over the country

To the right on the lower front page was a picture of 
a stylized Grey, under a disc craft, with the caption: 
Take me to your leader . . Biffo might be getting visitors

EXCLUSIVE by MARK MAY
DOZENS of UFOs have been spotted ALL
OVER Ireland.
Irish Sun readers yesterday reported
sightings in Cavan, Dublin, Louth, Clare,
Tipperary and Kilkenny.
UFO society boss Betty Meyler said: “I
think these spaceships are coming from
a mothership in Co Roscomimon.”

The Truth Is Out There – See Page 11

Since there is a 3-photo maximum for each report filed at MUFON’s reporting site, Page 11 was not included in the report.


On February 9, 2009, The Irish Sun online edition featured a report from Greece. An official Greek aviation authority report, apparently leaked to the local news media, describes a strange object seen by pilots of 3 different airliners in the early morning hours of November 11, 2007. It was also seen by aviation personnel on the ground, including those at the Athens Airport control tower. The following are excerpts from the article used under Fair Use:

The report says the captain of Olympic Airways flight 266 from Athens to London spotted an extremely unusual object moving erratically to the west of Athens.

The object was star-like in appearance however much brighter and larger with a constantly shifting shape.

Meanwhile the captains of Olympic Airways flights 730 to Kos and 700 to Rhodes reported the SAME THING.

Air force chiefs confirmed they too were visually monitoring the object from their radar station at the top of Parintha Mountain near Athens.

And staff there observed that it was travelling at incredible speed and did not fit the description of any terrestrial craft.

Two F-16s were then sent up to intercept the UFO {at about 3:20am}, while the various control towers monitored the object from earth.

The object then shot off at incredible speed skyward and the jets failed to indentify anything.

Both staff at the Athens Airport and the Parintha Mountain Air Force Radar Unit later confirmed they clearly observed the object, but their radars picked up nothing.



One of the most interesting reports I have seen out of the Emerald Isle was submitted to MUFON in mid-November, 2006. It is written in a way that gives the witness a certain extra amount of credulity. It describes a fascinating event that occurred in the seas between Ireland and Scotland on the evening of November 3, 1972. It lends support to the idea of undersea mining by the ‘Visitors’ that I mentioned in my 1st post.

A few dozens of miles to the east of those waters is the Falkirk triangle, in recent years one of the most "visited" UFO hotspots in the world. It lies to the north and west of the city of Edinburgh, Scotland.

The following report ends with a description of a possible implant the witness found years after the event. It is presented here as it was submitted to MUFON in its entirety. Some blank spaces were added to improve readability. By the way, the picture mentioned in the report was never posted in ‘The Last 20 Reports’. The map below is from Google Maps.

Larne, Northern Ireland

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Hi, I am 51 years old and have served in my younger days as a sergeant in the British army and also worked for local newspapers (as a courier) for 20 years. My wife is the Deputy Editor of a local newspaper series here in N Ireland that covers the area of this event. She has worked on these papers for 26 years. To the best of both our knowledge no one has ever reported what I am going to relate to you below, either before or since. Very few people have ever been told this story as those who have (in a weaker moment!) laugh! Therefore it is one of these things that you tend to keep to yourself. I watched a documentry last night on the History Channel about your organisation and this has inspired me to seek an answer elsewhere (if possible) after 34 years. My many years of trying have come to nought. In my army days I asked many questions of pilots (both helicopter and aeroplane) who flew this short stretch of water on a regular basis and none had seen anything out of the ordinary. There is also a regular ferry run to Scotland (on a daily basis) from Larne and those I have spoken to who worked on the boats again reported nothing. 
I have attached a picture of the area that I found on the internet and although taken from 5 miles more northerly on the coastline will give you an idea of the area. In 1972 i did not have any camera. In the backgound you can see the Scottish coastline (22 miles away) The lighthouse is arrowed in red and the approx area of exit of the objects is in black and the path followed in green.
'At approximately 10.45pm on the evening of November 3rd 1972 (I remember it well as it was my 17th birthday) I was with a girl in a covered seafront shelter at Larne (Co Antrim, N Ireland) and we were enjoying each others company! The shelter was on a hill top (100 feet above sea level) that looked out over the Irish Sea (North channel) towards Scotland that lay about 25 miles away to the east. A lighthouse (called 'The Maidens', manned at that time and 75 feet tall) is situated about 7 miles out to sea from this point and warns ships of rocks that crop up out of the sea here. I had lived beside the sea all my life (up to this point) and was familiar with the lighthouse and the pattern of it's beam. I had been out to it on field trips while at school to study the rocks it sits on. 
On this night (we had been to this place many times before) we had been friendly for a while when the girl drew my attention to a blinding green light out to sea. I turned out to look towards the sea and some distance beyond the lighthouse ( which was continuing it's usual pattern of horizontal flashes) we watched for some 15 minutes as a blinding (much much brighter than the lighthouse beam) series of green fluorescent cylinders exited the sea and shot straight and vertically heavenwards. They came every 30 seconds or so and we knew when they were coming as the sea itself around the exit point would glow bright green for a few seconds before we saw the cylinder exit the sea and fly at great speeds upwards and disappear into 'space'? Even at seven or eight miles away this glow in the sea lit up the whole area around it. After 15 minutes it just stopped! No more came, we watched for another hour. 
These cylinders were huge as I was able to determine (using the lighthose as a guide) that they were at the very least the height of the lighthouse (80 feet) and certainly as thick as it. They left no trial behind. Pattern was that the sea glowed green, cylindar emerged and shot upwards so quick that you almost cricked your neck with the upward movement of the head following it. They came at regular 30 second intervals, almost perfect timing. They all followed exactly the same path upwards, something about the timing made me feel very uncomfortable. Nothing natural would be able to do this. I was absolutely awestruck.' 
The nearest that I have come to an explanation was several years ago when information came to light that an area beyond this (The Beaufort Dyke, a deep underwater trench in the North Channel) had been used to dump munitions in since WW1 times. These munitions included phosphorus items. I wondered if some of these munitions could have caused such an event. I have since discounted this as it does not explain several things. Why has it never been reported again, does not explain the shapes (in each case they were identical), the timings of the exits, the identical path they followed up and the enormous speed of the things. The intensity of the green light was again the same with each one that emerged. They were perfectly controlled and not a random 'explosion' of anything. 
It was nothing to do with the lighthouse beam (which has always been white and horizontal) as we had a clear sight of it all the time, as the exit point was on an almost straight line between our eyeline and the beyond the lighthouse. 
Submarines have always been about in the North Channel as they make their way to Fastlane (Scotland) but what the h*** would a sub be doing launching such enormous cylinders (even if they could back then) and these things were faster than any rocket, their speed was breathtaking. 
I went out with this same girl for eight years after this event before we parted company. We had shared many many things to-gether. I met her a few years back after not seeing her for 20 years or so and the first thing she said to me was ' Remember that strange night". It had stuck in her mind all these years to the extent that it was the first thing that sprang to her mind after such a long absence. She also told me that it had 'freaked' her out and that she had never told anyone and never will speak of it again. She told me that even now she wakes up and gets very scared when she thinks of it. At the time she was too awestruck to be afraid. 
I never saw anything like this again and even to-day after huge amounts of 'logical' thought time I am still at a loss. Even with all the advances in military technology which I try to keep up with, I would still say "I have never seen anything like this"! I am glad that i have taken the time to write this down as it has vexed me many times over the years, I like explanations and this thing I cannot get to grips with even now. 
Only one other event troubles me. A few years back I woke from sleep (was at home, just a normal night) to find that the skin on the palms of my hands and the soles of my feet were bright red and burning. Had trouble walking on my feet and had to take a few days off work. This went away after a few days and a lot of cooling with water. On waking that morning my wife told me that I had something like a small black 'thorn' stuck in my right temple. It was so small that she ended up getting tweezers to get it out with. It was about one eighth of an inch long and black. I have no explanation how it got there. We thought it was some sort of wood thorn that had managed to get on the pillow and I had 'rolled' on to it in the night. I decided to cut it with a small penknife and to my great surprize it turned out to be metallic like a needle point. I then tried to cut it with a small pair of scissors but again was unable to. It started to show silver under the black as the implements had 'rubbed' the black coating off. It was the broken tip of a black needle. Sharp and pointed at one end and rough and jagged at the thicker end. 
I still have it somewhere in a small sealed plastic bag. Not sure where, but am pretty sure that it is here somewhere, unless the children have made off with the bag not knowing what was in it. So unless my wife was trying to inject me in the temple during the night without my knowing (she assures me she wasn't!!) then I have absolutely no idea how this point came to be there. I was nowhere where such a thing would have been and if it had happened i think that I would have felt the pain, after all this fragment was lodged an eighth of an inch in the side of my head.I have no recollection of anything unusual that night, went to bed, slept and got up next morning. No explanation. 
I have never spoken to my wife in great detail about the cylinders and have always insisted that i was alone, as the 'girl' with me at the time was my first wife and my present wife of twenty years and her have never been anything closer than enemies!! Would appreciate not mentioning that i was other than alone if you decide to send any emails on this subject. I have never written these stories down before and never contacted anyone about them. 
Thank you for listening and if you can offer any ideas on these events I would be more than grateful as they have perplexed me for a very long time. I know it was a long time ago and it may be of little interest to you but I felt I needed to pass it on as I have been convinced since that night that, ' there are more things in heaven and earth. Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy' . Thanks, George Martin.

"We don't know one-millionth of 1% about anything." Thomas Edison

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 7, 2009

What turns out to be tin drops out of a flying saucer "like silver rain".

Post #1  February 7, 2009

     I begin today taking an event or discovery and elaborating upon it, elucidating upon the information, and in general bringing a specific 'Most Interesting' topic to one place, once or twice every day or two or three. 

     I feel anyone that devotes time looking into our 'Visitors', their craft - UFO's, and the interactions that have occurred, can only conclude that mankind has been watched by a specie, or species, with advanced technology. And probably for thousands of years. I feel mankind is probably intelligently-designed and descended from these 'Aliens'. And I believe in God.

     I have found that a short, poorly written report submitted to Mufon (www.mufom.com, the Mutual UFO Network), appearing briefly under 'UFO Case Files' - 'Last 20 Reports', can contain some very interesting information. All it would need is expansion and clarification in order for it become an addition to our knowledge and understanding of these events.

"We don't know one-millionth of 1% about anything."  Thomas Edison

     Here is a report from Brazil in 1954, from 'On This Day'. I have really enjoyed going through this collection of reports. If they were each 3 times longer, that would be even better.

     The element Tin was involved in this event. Here's Dr. Johnson's version of the event:

From ‘On This Day - Encounters with Aliens on this Day’  

Compiled by Dr. Donald A. Johnson

http://www.ufoinfo.com/onthisday/

{my additions} – I did not witness this event.

 “Three gray disc{s} performed aerobatics over the city of Campinas, Sao Paulo state, Brazil {70 kilometers NW of Sao Paulo} on this afternoon in 1954 {December 14}. One of the UFOs peeled off, dove low over the roof of a local woman's house, and dropped a liquid substance "like silver rain." Chemical analysis revealed that the solidified material was 90% tin with other alloys. (Source: Jacques Vallee, Confrontations: A Scientist's Search for Alien Contact, p. 49).” 

     Tin turns out to be a very interesting element. Maybe magnetism is the method of flight of some disc-shaped craft. Tin is increasing in rarity, even sparking warfare, as does 'blood diamonds'. Where this has been reported, in far eastern DR Congo, is a place that has produced no vehicle or entity reports that I know of. It is a place of great suffering over the last 2 decades. But a lack of sighting or interaction reports does not preclude alien involvement. 

     Who else remembers the rather 'futuristic' newspaper articles that suddenly appeared in the American press in the mid-1970's concerning 'Seabed Mining'? 'Mineral Extraction at the Mid-Atlantic Ridge'? 'Underwater Resource Acquisition' has been a 'Visitor activity' for decades, and maybe these news articles were ordered up. It seemed odd to me at the time.

     The Peoples' Republic of China and Indonesia hold the cards for worldwide known deposits of tin. Future posts will look at boron and argon, separately.

Tin – from Wikipedia

“Isotopes

Tin is the element with the greatest number of stable isotopes (ten), which is probably related to the fact that 50 is a "magic number" of protons.  28 additional unstable isotopes are known, including the "doubly magic" tin-100 (100Sn).

“Applications

Tin becomes a superconductor below 3.72 K {-452.974 F}. In fact, tin was one of the first superconductors to be studied; the Meissner effect, one of the characteristic features of superconductors, was first discovered in superconducting tin crystals {see superdiamagnetism}. The niobium-tin compound Nb3Sn is commercially used as wires for superconducting magnets, due to the material's high critical temperature (18 K, {-427.27 F}) and critical magnetic field (25 T). A superconducting magnet weighing only a couple of kilograms {about 4.5 pounds} is capable of producing magnetic fields comparable to a conventional electromagnet weighing tons.

{1991} “. . . the burning oil-wells in Kuwait, where firefighters used "Corrugated Tin Heat Shields".  . . . seem to reflect heat the best . . ..

“It is estimated that, at current consumption rates and technologies, the Earth will run out of tin that can be mined in 40 years. However Lester Brown has suggested tin could run out within 20 years based on an extremely conservative extrapolation of 2% growth per year.

“The recovery of tin through secondary production, or recycling of scrap tin, is increasing rapidly. While the United States has neither mined since 1993 nor smelted tin since 1989, it was the largest secondary producer, recycling nearly 14,000 tons in 2006.

“In 2007, the People's Republic of China was the largest producer of tin . . . with 43% of the world's share, followed by Indonesia, with an almost equal share, and Peru at a distant third, reports the USGS {United States Geological Survey}.

“After the discovery of tin in what is now Bisie, North Kivu in the Democratic Republic of Congo in 2002, illegal production has increased there to around 15,000 tons. This is largely fueling the ongoing and recent conflicts there, as well as affecting international markets.” 

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North Kivu, Democratic Republic of Congo