Wartime Prime Minister Winston Churchill reported banned media coverage of a UFO incident during the war. Pic credit: via Wikimedia/Public Domain
Britain’s wartime Prime Minister Winston Churchill reportedly banned media reporting about a UFO sighting incident to prevent mass panic.
UFO files declassified in 2010 revealed that an RAF pilot and crew reported a disturbing UFO sighting during the war.
However, the former wartime prime minister ordered officials to keep a lid on the alarming incident out of fear that the populace could panic due to the stress of the German Blitz.
RAF crew sighted a mysterious metallic UFO
An alarming UFO sighting by an RAF crew off the east coast of the British Isles alarmed government officials and raised concerns about how the people would react, the Express reported.
The alleged sighting occurred during the return flight from a mission over continental Europe. While approaching the east coast, they noticed a metallic UFO trailing them. It was a silent and fast-flying object.
They took photographs and shared them with their superiors when they returned to base.
Officials debated what it was. Some suggested it could be a missile, but experts disagreed. It was the early days of missile technology, and experts could not conceive of a projectile with such advanced capabilities.
Churchill became very concerned because British experts could not explain it.
Churchill banned media coverage of the incident
Fears that media reports about the sighting could lead to mass hysteria led Churchill to ban news coverage of the incident.
He ordered the ban during a top-secret meeting attended by senior British and American officers, including future U.S. President General Dwight Eisenhower.
Churchill’s order allegedly prohibited the media from reporting the incident for 50 years.
Churchill’s aide shared the story with his family
Claims that Churchill banned UFO reports first surfaced in the 1990s when a British scientist revealed that his grandfather, who had served as Churchill’s bodyguard, told his family about it.
The grandson reportedly contacted the British MoD to inquire about the mysterious incident Churchill feared could spark panic.
The British authorities kept the letters the person wrote to the MoD among their classified files until 2010 when they declassified them.
Govt destroyed UFO files from WW2 period, expert claimed
According to British UFO expert Nick Pope, the person who inquired about their grandfather’s disclosures was a British physicist from Leicester.
The physicist investigated the allegation that Churchill and Eisenhower teamed up to cover up a UFO sighting and concluded that they did so because they feared it could cause mass panic.
Pope also suggested that Churchill feared the masses were not ready for the news that extraterrestrial life existed. A disclosure that challenged people’s religious worldviews could cause culture shock.
Pope added that the incident that prompted Churchill to issue the ban was not the only sighting during the war.
RAF and USAF pilots reported many incidents. The sightings occurred regularly, and pilots nicknamed the strange crafts Foo fighters.
Some of the best-known accounts of Foo fighter encounters came from the USAF 415th Special Operations Squadron.