SKYLITE: The Project to Mimic UFOs

 

The US government asked the McDonnell Douglas aerospace company to research the construction of an imitation flying saucer in 1970. At the time, the United States was led by President Richard Nixon, and Richard Helms served as Director of the Central Intelligence Agency. The Cold War with Russia  was hot. The US was mired in the Vietnam war and facing an expansion of the Soviet Union’s military forces in Cuba.

The UFO project may have been an offshoot of a prior contract with the CIA. In 1967 the CIA was doing business with McDonnell Douglas Company, and Project AQUILINE was to develop expendable unmanned aerial reconnaissance vehicles. According to CIA files, “Concentrated study was performed on a wide range of aerodynamic lift devices including balloons, ballistic glider, powered glider and helicopter types for this application. The powered glider was selected...” Aquiline was a small bird-like drone, test flown at Area 51.

From CIA files on Project AQUILINE

Meanwhile, McDonnell Douglas had a study project from 1967 to 1970 led by Dr. Robert M. Wood with the goal of duplicating the performance and propulsion reported in UFOs. Dr. Joseph M. Brown talked about working on the Advanced Propulsion Research Group in his 2004 book, The Grand Unified Theory of Physics.

“Dr. Robert M. Wood (was) the deputy director of Research at Douglas Aircraft Company, in Santa Monica, California… Wood believed that unidentified flying objects (UFOs) were spacecraft built and manned by extra-terrestrials… Furthermore, he had great confidence in his ability. ‘If extraterrestrials can build a flying saucer, so can I.’”

Describing the team, Dr. Brown said,

“Dr. Darell B. Harmon, Jr… held beliefs about UFO’s similar to Dr. Wood... that UFO’s were powered by anti-gravity propulsion and I was researching gravity so he hired me in spite of my disbelief in extraterrestrials. Thus the Wood-Harmon-Brown team was formed to invent a new propulsion system… In addition to the mathematical physicist, Leon (A. Steinert), we hired an experimentalist Harvey Bjornlie, a retired Los Angeles, California police detective Paul Wilson, a UFO ‘buff” Stan Friedman, and a psychic Chan P. Thomas... Our budget was less than $100,000.00 per year."

Dr. Wood described the group’s origin in his article for the October 2008 issue of the MUFON Journal, "McDonnell Douglas studied UFOs in 1960s," saying, “we opened up an account with an insipid title (Advanced Concepts) and internally called it the BITBR project (for Boys In The Back Room).”  Wood said he managed a team saying he devoted only about 10% of his time to the project, “Only Brown, Thomas and Wilson were full time (and later, Friedman).” During its four years of operation and $500,000 expended, the group conducted research including everything from lab experiments to field studies, investigating haunted houses, ESP and interviewing UFO Contactees.

In BITBR’s 59-page “Advanced Vehicle Concepts Research” presentation, May 2, 1968, the team summarized the goals of the project for management and stated what they had achieved to date. Page 50 mentioned the goal of building a UFO-like spacecraft, a DFO, (possibly for Douglas Flying Object). 

“A DFO can be built within our scientific limits.” It also mentioned, “analysis and duplication of UFO data.” The presentation closed by asking for another year’s funding, and stated, “Bring in DoD at end of year if results warrant.”

The company hoped to build flying saucers for the US government. That almost happened. In a section near the end of Wood’s MUFON article he revealed:

"Covert Applications
The only contact with the government about the Project came towards the end of the spring of 1970 when there was interest expressed by one of the intelligence agencies. This resulted in a draft proposal to ‘mimic, imitate or duplicate the observables associated with UFOs.’ We called this potential opportunity Project Skylite, and prepared a good deal of technical information in anticipation of contract work. It never materialized with McDonnell Douglas to my knowledge."

MUFON UFO Journal, Oct. 2008

The footnote for the passage cited: "Wilson, P. ‘Charts Defining Parameters of Design.’ Six pages, dated June 2, 1970."

The timing for Skylite was strange. The US government shut down Project Blue Book at  the end of 1969, so this would seem to have been unrelated to any study of UFOs. They must have been working towards some other goal. Earlier Project Aquiline CIA documents stated that “The obvious risk is loss of an unmanned aircraft over denied territory and the resulting political implications therefrom.” They thought that since the aircraft was small and unarmed, the risk was minimal. However, it’s possible the CIA considered developing another spy platform, something that would be unrecoverable, vanish like something unearthly.

 

The Project Skylite Documents

BITBR hired W. Paul Wilson, Jr. for his detective skills to be used in interviewing UFO witnesses, but he was also an engineer, and he also assisted the team in technical research. Files on the McDonnell Douglas UFO study and Project Skylite surfaced when UFO archivist Louis Taylor purchased them from the owner of a house previously occupied by Paul Wilson's widow. “The documents were found rotting away out in the barn.”  Material on the BITR study was published online back in 2007. The Project Skylite material was finally published online by Louis Taylor in October 2020, documents and parametric studies, all hand written by Paul Wilson between April and June of 1970.

Paul Wilson’s first page of an outline of the Project Skyline objectives, dated 4/5/70.

Electrical & Mechanical Systems to Produce Simulated UFO Observables

1. Illusion of physical objects with three-dimensional positivity in space - long & short term affects.

A. Sensed by visual, acoustical, photographic, radio and other EM instrumentation.

B. Large, very light, transparent bags inflatable with ionizable combustible gases. Spherical or saucer shaped.

(1) Bag should be constructed of highly combustible materials that completely vaporize or disintegrate without residue when contain gases or plasma is ignited.

 (2) Ionize contained gas is by means of high energy radar beams (local or objective operated).

(a). The geometric configuration of inflated bags are held to those dimensions that would resonate with the frequencies of exciting radiation.

(b) Parabolic umbrellas for maximum energy concentration.

(c) Spherical resonate cavities for maximum energy absorption.

 (3) Gas mixture and/or system may contain, short half-life high energy radioactive materials to initiate ionizations & emit particle radiation signals.

 (4) Combustible gases at critical mixtures and/or temperatures may be ignited by radio controlled igniters, laser beams, or by spontaneous combustion at predetermined times.

 

Electrical & Mechanical Systems to Produce Simulated UFO Observables

Proposed shape and structure for the Skylite UFO simulators

“UFO simulator” is how the project was referred to in early internal documents. BITBR went well beyond just spoofing the appearance of a UFO in flight, they also wanted to duplicate other “UFO observables” such as the shape, illumination, sounds, that were reported. Apparently for this project duplicating high speed flight was not a goal except perhaps in the “vanishing” of the balloon when it disintegrated. As for the radar cross-section and electromagnetic signature they desired, that would be accomplished with a “metallic coating for maximum reflectivity.” 

Skylite Parametric Studies, 5/18/70

The aerial platform was intended to be built around Edmund Scientific “Giant Weather Balloons” in the 8 and 16-foot sizes.

Edmund Scientific Weather Balloon ad and product, circa 1968

It was determined that an airborne platform alone was insufficient for generating the spectrum of desired effects and a ground based would be required to generate some of the electromagnetic properties and secondary characteristics.

The timing of shortly the US government’s interest in the BITBR project is strange. It came shortly after the Condon Study’s conclusion was published in 1969 that there was no scientific benefit to studying UFOs. The closure of Project Blue Book followed, so it would seem the US government’s interest here was not scientific. Various notes throughout the Skylite documents give a clue as to the purpose of the project. “Significant information as to an observer’s observational capabilities – with decoy & confusion features.”

Illustrations from Using a Giant Weather Balloon to Create Artificial Moonlight

There’s no clear documentation that any Project Skylite flight experiments took place, but some of the parametric studies suggest there may have at least been a few balloon tests. Describing the overall BITBR experiments to duplicate UFO characteristics, Dr. Wood said they tried to see “whether the speed of light could be influenced by a large magnetic field,” and a later “a second attempt to use magnetic fields… measured whether there was any change in forces… with respect to gravity. Again the result was null.”

The lack of results from the UFO study prompted McDonnell Douglas to spend the money elsewhere, and Wood said, “the consensus was that we should cancel the BITBR project.” Skylite died with it. If the US government pursued the simulated UFO project, it was without Wood’s McDonnell Douglas team. The CIA responded to our FOIA request for records relating to Project Skylite with a form letter about UFO document requests.

Further Sources and Recommended Reading

For other US government attempts to duplicate UFO characteristics and performance, see our article from May 6, 2020, UFO Study Programs and US Military Technology. For more on deception and exploitation of the UFOs by military intelligence, see the 2010 book by Mark Pilkington and John Lundberg, Mirage Men: A Journey into Disinformation, Paranoia and UFOs. 

The McDonnell Douglas UFO Study

Douglas Aircraft – UFO Research Documents (1967 – 1969)

Keith Basterfield has written extensively on McDonnell Douglas’ BITBR project: The McDonnell Douglas UAP study. See also, Project Skylite papers uploaded.

Information Dispersal by Louis Taylor: Project Skylite Documents

Project Aquiline

CIA Documents: Project Aquiline

John Meierdierck was in charge of the CIA’s Project Aquiline operations at Area 51, and wrote an account of why the project was scrapped in 1971. See Flying Stories: Project Aquiline

The CIA's Bird-Shaped Aquiline Drones Could Still Be Caged Up At Area 51 by Brett Tingley

 

 

UFO Witness and Author: DeWitt S. Copp

From 1954 to 1960, there were three UFO teleplays by the same author, Dewitt Copp, a flying saucer witness himself, a pilot and author with an interesting career path. The bio of DeWitt S. Copp, 1916-1999 from his book, Frank M. Andrews: Marshall’s Airman, 2003:

"The name DeWitt Copp is known within the Air Force community primarily as the author of the widely acclaimed two volume series on the development of air power before and during World War II, A Few Great Captains and Forged in Fire, first published in the early 1980s by the Air Force Historical Foundation. Earlier, Mr. Copp, known as “Pete” to his friends, had served as a pilot in the Army Air Forces during World War II and afterwards wrote a number of books and films on military and civilian aviation. A onetime history teacher and global newsman, he worked in Europe and the Far East as a correspondent for the Washington weekly Human Events, and for the North American Newspaper Alliance. His novels Radius of Action and The Far Side won wide acclaim here and abroad, and his drama, The Long Flight, was featured on NBC television. He also served for several years as a member of the former Air Force Historical Advisory Committee. He lived in Manchester Center, Vermont, with his wife Susan, until his death in 1999."

Some additional information from Psychological Operations Principles and Case Studies, edited by Editor Frank L. Goldstein, Col, USAF, 1996, where Copp contributed the chapter, “Soviet Active Measures.”

“Copp has served on the staff of "Voice of America" as a writer-editor and with the United States Information Agency as policy officer on Soviet disinformation.”

  

Copp’s obituary in the New York Times provided many additional details of interest:

"Mr. Copp wrote more than 30 books, fiction and nonfiction, and many articles about the cold war and espionage, as well as another passion, aviation. A flight instructor and pilot, he served in the Army Air Corps during World War II. Later as the international marketing director of the Weather Engineering Corporation, he helped develop equipment that created artificial rain by using airplanes that dropped silver-iodide crystals into clouds."

After discussing some of his non-fiction works, there’s a casual mention of some of his other jobs:

"Mr. Copp also taught history and civics at St. Luke's School in Wilton, Conn., and worked for the Central Intelligence Agency."

Exactly when the CIA work began they did not say. In the early 1950s, Copp was having a good run selling teleplays to the networks. He also did volunteer work with the Ground Observer Corps. Due to the Soviet menace, once again civilians were asked to watch the skies:

Ground Observer Corps was reformed during the Cold War as an arm of the United States Air Force Civil Defense network which provided aircraft tracking with over 200,000 civilian volunteers... established in early 1950... By 1952 the program was expanded in Operation Skywatch with over 750,000 volunteers... The program ended in 1958 with the advent of the automated 1959 USAF radar network...

(From the description of the Civil Defense Ground Observer Corps film, “The Sky is Your Target,” by PeriscopeFilm.)

Illustrations from LIFE magazine, Feb 8, 1943.

New Canaan, Connecticut, is a residential suburb just forty miles from downtown Manhattan, and it housed a Ground Observer Corps tower, with a glass enclosed platform from which volunteers could operate. On Dec. 30, 1955, DeWitt Copp was on watch there when he spotted something spectacular:

 The Kokomo Tribune, June 20, 1956

“TV-Radio Highlights” by Margaret Burhman

U.F.O.

Perhaps by chance, Copp had written an episode of a television crime show featuring a flying saucer that was broadcast the year before. It was a fictional story, with a premise similar to his own sighting, a volunteer skywatcher who’d seen a flying saucer.

“Man Against Crime” (later syndicated as “Follow That Man”) was a half-hour crime drama featuring the adventures of hard-boiled detective, Mike Barnett. Copp’s episode aired in early 1954, and was titled, “U.F.O.”

The Honolulu Advertiser March 14, 1954

'Man Against Crime’ Concerns Flying Saucer

Mike Barnett, played by Ralph Bellamy, becomes involved with a flying saucer and other unidentified flying objects during “U.F.O.” episode on the NBC-TV “Man Against Crime” series tonight on KONA Channel 11. at 9:30.A high school professor reports a flying saucer during his turn as an airplane spotter, but is ridiculed by the townsfolk. Barnett is asked to investigate.The search starts with the finding of mysterious footprints and a dead man. Barnett solves the death in a surprising finish, but still wonders about flying saucers.

The episode itself is rare, but the best later description of it seems to be from The Early Shows: by Richard Irvin, 2018: “Mike Barnett and journalist Ed Butler investigate a reported sighting of an unidentified flying object. They find that two men — Phil Rice (Phil Lipson) and Tom Gorman (Jim Boles) were attempting to prank a professor into thinking he witnessed a UFO.”

The Kinross Incident

DeWitt Copp had his own UFO sighting in Dec. of 1955, but the same month an important book was released. In it, Donald E. Keyhoe introduced the Kinross incident as a UFO case in The Flying Saucer Conspiracy:

"It was the evening of November 23, (1953) and wintry darkness had settled over Michigan. At an isolated radar station Air Defense operators were watching their scope in a routine guard against possible enemy attack. Suddenly the "blip" of an unknown machine appeared on the glass screen... In less than two minutes an F-89 from Kimross (sic) Field was streaking toward the locks. At the jet's controls was Lieutenant Felix Moncla, Jr., a veteran at 26. Behind him was Lieutenant R. R. Wilson, 22-year-old Oklahoman, acting as radar observer. ... the strange craft changed course... The UFO, flying as fast as a jet airliner, was heading toward Lake Superior... the F-89 raced after it... Nine more minutes ticked by... The two blips had suddenly merged into one... locked together, as if in a smashing collision...  boats joined the hunt as American and Canadian flyers crisscrossed a hundred-mile area. But no trace was ever found of the missing men, the F-89--or the unknown machine..."

The Air Force did not consider the missing plane a UFO case, and had no file for it in Project Blue Book. There’s brief mention of it in another case file, though.

PBB: The Kinross Incident

Donald Keyhoe made the incident famous, a staple of  UFO literature, and there’s no doubt that Dewitt Copp was influenced by it. Fran Ridge’s NICAP site hosts a page with an excellent collection of links to coverage of the controversy: UFO Intercept/Missing F-89 Case, November 23, 1953, Kinross AFB, Michigan

Keyhoe’s book also introduced many to “angel hair,” supposedly dropped by UFOs. “A mass of a strange white substance... Apparently the ‘angel's hair’ was some kind of a fuel exhaust confined specifically to the cigar-shaped saucers.” He described how in one case, the witnesses reported a saucer that “left a 3-mile trail of milky-white asbestos-like strands which settled over trees, bushes, and telephone lines.” They recovered a sample. “When they pulled one strand into a thread... it could hardly be broken. But a few moments after they had touched it, the substance disappeared.”

Flying Object At Three O'Clock High

After his own sighting in 1955, Copp was driven to write a teleplay about UFOs. To do so, he conducted some research and worked some UFO cases and terminology into the script.   Besides Keyhoe’s book, he was reading ORBIT,  the monthly newsletter by Leonard Stringfield of Civilian Research, Interplanetary Flying Objects (CRIFO)

Instead of appearing in a science fiction program, Copp’s story reached a mainstream audience on a well-respected NBC program. Kraft Television Theatre was an anthology, broadcast live, presenting a different teleplay each week. Perhaps the most interesting aspect is that NBC chose to highlight the author in the promotion of the episode, particularly in regards to the fact that he was an experienced aviator - but especially the part about Copp being a UFO witness himself.

The Indianapolis Star June 20, 1956

The Pittsburgh Press June 20, 1956

From a period newspaper listing for the show, which neglected to mention the role played by actor George Peppard, who also appeared in it, one of his earliest screen roles:

"Kraft TV Theatre — Everett Sloane, Biff McGuire, Robert Simon in 'Flying Object At Three O'clock High,' story of an Air Force investigation of a collision between an unidentified flying object and a plane carrying secret data to Washington, WRCA-TV (4), 9 p.m."

The story opened with two radar operatives watching in horror as a UFO swallowed up an F-101 on their screen. Jets were scrambled to pursue the UFO, but were unable to catch it. Biff McGuire played the reporter trying to cover the story, while Everett Sloane played the Colonel protecting the Air Force’s deep secrets about flying saucers. The episode was well-received, and both the UFO community and the Air Force had something to say about it. The New York-based Civilian Saucer Intelligence wrote in CSI News Letter, June 24, 1956:

"UFO Fiction on TV: On Wednesday, June 20, at P.M., Kraft Theatre (Channel 4) presented drama called 'Flying Object at 3 O'clock High', by DeWitt Copp. The plot concerned the "kidnapping" of an Air Force jet by UFO, and the Air Force's attempts to hush up the affair. Although the play went off the deep end during the last act, showing the pilot returned by the UFO in dying condition, up to that point it was outstanding in its adherence to reality. The Kinross case and the angel-hair phenomenon were referred to. The Air Force was depicted (following Keyhoe) as knowing all about the extraterrestrial nature of the saucers, but paternalistically keeping it from the public's knowledge. The acting was on decidedly more convincing level than that in (Unidentified Flying Objects: The True Story of Flying Saucers) the Greene-Rouse film. Mr. Copp and Kraft deserve our thanks for well-done job showing knowledge and taste. Probably its qualities were lost on the public at large, if we may judge by Jack O'Brian's review (N.Y, Journal-American): he found it 'an extended Space Cadet caper.'"

Project Blue Book mentioned the show in passing in a report from Colonel H.K. Gilbert, dated 16 October 1956, “ Subject Analysis of Material Allegedly from Flying Saucer.” He notes that:

“In August of this year, the Kraft TV hour, among others, gave this so called “angels – hair” nationwide attention in a science fiction drama whereby this gossamer-like substance is shown vanishing without leaving any residue before the eyes of ATIC chiefs.

https://www.fold3.com/image/1/7071206

Encounter

Alcoa Presents: One Step Beyond was a half-hour ABC anthology series, and its specialty was stories of the occult or the paranormal. UFOs were a bit out of their range, but Copp wrote an atmospheric piece that fit well with the mood of the series.

Alcoa Presents: One Step Beyond  “Encounter” April 12, 1960

From the newspaper description of the episode:

"An airplane pilot is mysteriously abducted out of the sky, disappears for days, then suddenly reappears minus his plane 1,000 miles from his last known position in "Encounter." The pilot had taken that 'one step beyond.' Robert Douglas, a fine character actor, lends his talent to this strange tale. He has the role of the pilot's boss."

Fortunately, this broadcast is much more readily available than Copp’s other UFO shows, and can even be found on YouTube. 

All the UFO action takes place offscreen, but there’s a discussion of flying saucers, the Kinross case, in particular, and once again, “angel hair” is a big part of the story. When the missing pilot somehow reappears days later a thousand miles away, the team flies to pick him up. On the way, Blake, the pilot, muses about flying saucers, “We’re on the verge of space exploration ourselves. Why is it so hard to believe that others may have beaten us to it?”

Copp's plot sounds like it was another take on his earlier story for Kraft, the abduction of a pilot by a UFO, but minus the military cover-up angle. It also bears a a great similarity to Graham Doar’s “The Outer Limit,” but as if it were told solely from the point of view of the people on the ground, not from the pilot. The mystery that “proves” the involvement of aliens is the same, though; the return of a vanished pilot long after he should have perished due to his plane running out of fuel.

“Encounter” seems to be Copp’s last UFO story, though. He wrote one other TV show in 1963, but otherwise focused on his books which were chiefly about aviation, espionage and war. about the closest thing to UFOs would be his 1978 book, A Different Kind of Rain, which was fiction, but based on Copp’s own experience of weaponizing weather by seeding clouds.

DeWitt Copp, died at the age of 80 in Burlington, Vermont on Nov. 29, 1999.

Postscript

Maybe this is one for the weird coincidences department, but Dewitt Copp had an interesting association with a notable government figure with ties to the intelligence community and to UFO studies. When Captain Edward J. Ruppelt was preparing his 1956 book, The Report On Unidentified Flying Objects, he made notes on the significant players, including the ones behind the scenes. One of them was Dr. Stefan T. Possony:

"Steve Possony was the acting chief of the D/I (Directorate of Intelligence) special study group and he had a direct channel to (General John A.) Samford. Steve was pretty much sold on the whole thing. He did a lot of investigating on his own hook and he had Father Hayden (Francis J. Heyden), the astronomer, as his special consultant. Steve and his crew used to cruise all over the U.S. and Europe and during these travels they picked up a lot. Steve was behind (Dewey) Fournet 100% and tended to push him. He was smart enough to know that the UFO situation was hot so he used Fournet, who was a reserve and didn’t plan to stay in the Air Force any longer than he had to, to try out his ideas. Possony didn’t much care what he said, however, and he used to go to battle with any or all of the more vocal skeptics. He really got teed off at (Dr. Donald Menzel)  and went to all ends to find out everything about the man. It turned out to be very interesting. Possony had a good reputation in the Air Force. Besides being a fairly sharp intelligence man, he is a professor at Georgetown University and he has written quite a bit on strategy and concepts of airpower."

Here’s a clipping showing Copp and Possony together on the staff of the American Security Council: Washington Report, a right-wing anti-communist organization.

In the introduction to his article, “The Invisible Hand of Strategy. A Brief Introduction to Psychology Strategy”, Defence and Foreign Affairs Strategic Policy. No. 1, January 31, 1996, they described him in this way:

"DR STEFAN T. POSSONY, one of the founders of both Defense & Foreign Affairs publications and the International Strategic Studies Association, was called "the greatest strategic philosopher of the 20th Century". But he was also one of the very few people who looked at the overall discipline of "psychological strategy", and all of its component parts, including propaganda, disinformation, psychological warfare, psychological operations: however they are defined."

It's interesting that two saucer buffs like Dr. Possony and Dewitt Copp wound up working together, but then, it's a small world. 

Cover-Up, 1955: UFO Shot Down with Advanced Technology

A crash retrieval of a UFO by the US military. Rumors of advanced technology and small bodies in the wreckage - all followed by official denials. This is the story of something so secret, the US military shot down a craft and then ordered soldiers to jump out of planes to protect it.

There may be no aliens in this flying saucer story, but it's a true example of a cover-up by the military, and seeing it exposed may provide insight as to how the US government hides bigger secrets.

Hot Air

In mid-September 1955, there were several stories about flying saucers and how they were really only scientific research balloons launched by the Air Force.

Belleville Telescope, KS, Sept.15, 1955

AP Wirephoto, Sept. 15, 1955

Pacific Stars and Stripes, Sept. 14, 1955

A Crash Retrieval Story

An unintentionally public operation occurred on September 12, 1955 near Fowler, Indiana. Something strange was seen to fall from the skies, and it was captured by the military. The guards said the balloon was shot down by an "electrical impulse gun," and that the mysterious cargo included valuable scientific equipment, and even live animal test subjects.

San Bernardino Sun, Sept. 13, 1955

Greensburg Daily News, IN, Sept. 12 1955

Parts of the story were true. The USA's under Aeromedical Field Laboratory (AMFL) at Holloman AFB was conducting balloon flights of test animals such as mice and guinea pigs. Interestingly, the mice were flying in saucer-shaped capsules.

From "History of Research in Space Biology and Biodynamics," 1958, 

author: Air Force Missile Development Center:

"Eight flights originated at Sault Sainte Marie with biological specimens ranging from radish seeds to monkeys... Another six Holloman flights in the fall of 1954 and the first part of 1955 set the stage for the last northern series to date... the series of eleven launchings from South Saint Paul and International Falls, Minnesota, which took place 18 July through 20 September 1955. Winzen Research again directed flight operations under contract, although on several occasions uninvited tracking assistance was received from jet fighters of the Air Defense Command which went aloft as a result of balloon inspired flying saucer reports."

This project tested the effects of high altitude flight on mammals in preparation for manned flight into the outer atmosphere. However, the balloon downed in Indiana was not from one of the AMFL experimental flights.

Cover-Up in Fowler

The press attention was unwelcome and the Air Force was as confused in their reaction and replies as they were in flying saucer matters. A true denial of animal experimentation:

San Bernardino Sun, Sept. 13, 1955

A true denial of the use of advanced technology, "electrical impulse gun," appeared in the September 13, 1955, The Kokomo Tribune from Indiana:

WAYWARD BALLOON -- M/Sgt. LeRoy Estes holds the main section of the Air Force weather balloon which floated to earth near Logansport Sunday. The balloon was sent up at Lowry Air Force Base in Denver, Colo, last week and was brought to earth three days after schedule. (Tribune Photo) 

High-Flying Balloon Falls In Field Near Logansport

The main carriage of the mysterious "Fowler Balloon" floated to earth about four miles southeast of Logansport, creating a near-riot as sightseers rushed to get a glimpse of it. The Air Force revealed late Monday. The balloon, a weather research device, carrying more than $1 million of scientific equipment was released last Tuesday by the 1110th Air Support Group at Lowry Air Force Base in Denver, Colo., according to M/Sgt. LeRoy Estes, public information officer at Bunker Hill Air Force Base. M/Sgt. Estes said the balloon had been sent aloft to gather data on weather conditions. It was to have been brought down Thursday,  but remained out of range of its electronic controls, the Air Force announced.

Part of the balloon came down near Fowler Sunday after two case filled with C-ll9s had tracked it to the area. The main section, however, remained aloft for an additional 52 miles finally, falling to earth at the site near Logansport.' It landed only a short distance from the spot where an Air Force jet trainer crashed several weeks ago. 
Early accounts of the balloon said the object had been downed by "electrical impulse guns" from the plane. M/Sgt. Estes said, however, that radio controls from the ground and from the planes brought the balloon down. He said the "Gun story" was "Buck Rogers stuff."

The balloon was spotted Sunday afternoon about 700 feet over downtown Logansport by State Trooper John Leavitt. Leavitt followed it to the area where it landed. He said there were a couple thousand spectators already at the scene when he arrived. The device itself is a large plastic balloon, over two stories high. Attached to it was a nylon parachute which opened when radio controls dropped sand ballast from two boxes on either end of a bar suspended from the balloon. Hanging from the bar was a case filled with various weather recording devices. Both the parachute and the balloon were torn in numerous places as souvenir hunters closed in on the field in which it lay. Announcement of the balloon's landing was delayed until Monday pending clearance from Air Force officials in Washington.

There was a military secret on the verge of being exposed. In The Moby Dick Project: Reconnaissance Balloons Over Russia, (1991) Curtis Peebles described the events following the parachute recovery. 

Two trucks from Chanute AFB showed up to haul away the packages. The comments sparked newspaper reports and inquiries. Winzen Research, a balloon manufacturer, suggested "electrical impulse guns" were radio control devices. Officials at Lowry denied animals were carried on the balloon flights and Chanute AFB said the balloon project was classified "and we can't talk about it." Such attention was dangerous, as it generated speculation and further leaks. To spike the rumors, the Air Force invited the press to watch the launch of a WS-119L balloon from Lowry AFB on September 14. They saw the 176-foot-tall balloon being inflated, then launched...  By being forthright about the balloons, the Air Force was able to conceal the true purpose of the program. To prevent any more "speaking out of turn," a commander's call was held to discuss "certain newspaper articles."

The press coverage of the decoy performance balloon launch at Lowry AFB:

Bennington Evening Banner VT, Sept. 16, 1955

The Real Secrets

The balloon recovered in Fowler Indiana was part of the development of the US Air Force's balloon program to study the upper atmosphere was called Moby Dick.

Department of Defense Statement on Meteorological Balloons, January 8, 1956 AIR FORCE METEOROLOGICAL SURVEY EXPANDED IN NORTHERN HEMISPHERE An Air Force meteorological survey, commonly known as "Moby Dick" here in the United States, is being expanded to include other areas in the Northern Hemisphere. This research program has been in progress for the past two years to obtain meteorological research data above 30,000 feet. 

However, this was just a smokescreen for a CIA-military intelligence program. B.D. Gildenberg explained in The Cold War’s Classified Skyhook Program: A Participant’s Revelations:

"Project Moby Dick’s stated purpose was to study stratosphere wind trajectories, as defined via three-day Skyhook flights... Moby Dick was in fact a cover-up for top-secret project WS-119L. Beside the alphanumeric title, secret projects have secret names that vary for different phases. This program was called Project Gopher at our Alamogordo AFB launch site. It later accumulated titles including Grayback, Moby Dick Hi, Genetrix, and Grandson. Even the WS prefix was a cover-up, since it was not a weapon system. The actual project goal was balloon reconnaissance of the Soviet Union."

At left is a schematic drawing of the 1956 operational version of the USAF/General Mills WS-119L GOPHER/GENETRIX reconnaissance balloon payload. Right, close-up of the base of the 1.5 meter tall, 220 kg camera package. From Joel Carpenter's UFX article on Project GOPHER.

The camera package was in the gondola, and when the balloon reached a secure recovery area, the reconnaissance payload released by radio command to drop by parachute for retrieval. The airman's description of the radio-activated release spawned the "electrical impulse guns" rumor.

The domestic testing for Genetrix showed the technology worked, but the launches over Soviet territory were far less successful. The Soviets detected the ballon overflights, and the majority of the flights were shot down, malfunctioned or the cameras couldn't be recovered. The job of aerial reconnaissance was handed over to spy planes and satellites, but the spy balloon program remained classified until the 1980s. Like its successors, the balloon program was hidden in plain sight. Its existence was widely known, only its true purpose and operational details remained secret.

. . .

Further Reading and Additional Sources

The Moby Dick Project: Reconnaissance Balloons Over Russia (1991) by Curtis Peebles. 

"Observation Balloons and Weather Satellites," Donald E. Welzenbach

https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/docs/DOC_0000253109.pdf

Reconnaissance Balloons (WS-119L / WS-461L)

http://www.designation-systems.net/dusrm/app4/ws-119l.html

GOPHER / Moby Dick / GENETRIX
https://www.globalsecurity.org/intell/systems/gopher.htm

For more on the Aeromedical Field Laboratory (AMFL) projects, see "History of Research in Space Biology and Biodynamics," 1958, author: Air Force Missile Development Center.

http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a323170.pdf

There's some interesting reading in the AMFL report. From Part V, a discussion of the "Daisy Track," a rail track system used to approximate rocket acceleration.

"... in November 1957 the laboratory held the last, the most elaborate, and certainly the most interesting of all its yearly meetings with outside representatives on automotive crash problems. Entitled Third Annual Automotive Crash and Field Demonstration Conference, it brought over a hundred persons to Holloman for a three-day session and featured... the first use of one of the laboratory's recently acquired bears as a test subject, on a twenty-g Daisy Track deceleration run.")