A UFO reportedly crashed into a Cessna plane over Alabama in 2002. Pic credit: History/YouTube
An episode of History Channel’s Ancient Aliens recounts a perplexing UFO incident over Alabama in 2002. The incident remains unresolved more than 20 years later.
At the center of the puzzling incident was Thomas Preziose, a former NYPD pilot and veteran flight instructor.
Presioze took off in a single-engine Cessna after dark on October 23, 2002. He was expecting another uneventful freight flight from Mobile to Montgomery but ended up losing his life in one of the most tragic and bizarre UFO encounters on record.
Night Ship 282 encountered a UFO
In Ancient Aliens, Special Presentation, Season 2, Episode 4, titled Extraterrestrial Close Encounters (see video below), investigator William Henry described the UFO incident involving Preziose’s Cessna aircraft with the call sign Night Ship 282 as “alarming.”
The pilot took off on a routine flight, carrying documents to Montgomery, about 170 miles north of Mobile.
Visibility was poor after he took off from Mobile Downtown Airport off Interstate 10. He had to rely on his plane’s navigational instruments. A few minutes into the flight, he detected an object approaching.
He thought it was another plane but contacted Air Traffic Control (ATC) to confirm. While communicating, the tone of his voice changed suddenly to alarm.
He said another craft was on collision course with his plane and that he had to “deviate.” ATC lost contact with him as he maneuvered to avoid collision with the UFO. The radio transmission went mysteriously silent.
A UFO crashed into the plane
Preziose’s plane collided with a UFO and crashed into the Big Bateau Bay near Baldwin, Alabama. He died tragically in the violent collision.
However, the object his plane collided with remains unidentified despite extensive investigation by the National Transport Safety Board (NTSB).
Collision “almost vaporized the plane”
The collision entirely demolished the plane, leaving small bits and pieces of debris scattered over 200 yards of water surface. It was so forceful that the cockpit, fuselage, wings, propeller, and engine were “almost vaporized.”
What collided with the Cessna?
The debris showed that the plane collided with another object with “extreme force.” But strangely, there was no evidence of the other craft involved in the collision.
Investigators combed the area for evidence of the other craft but found no trace of one.
The situation left investigators scratching their heads. A mid-air collision of extreme force should produce two wreckages or at least some physical evidence of the other craft.
Despite an extensive search of the area, investigators found the wreckage of only one aircraft.
Strange red markings on Cessna?
An observation that deepened the mystery surrounding the circumstances of the crash was strange red markings found all over the wreckage. Investigators had no idea what the markings were or what caused them.
They speculated that the red marking might have been the paint coating of the other craft in the collision.
A search of the area also led to the discovery of small pieces of metal embedded in the body of the wreckage that might have come from the other craft.
Was it an extraterrestrial craft?
The baffling circumstances of the collision led UFO researchers to conclude that whatever hit the Cessna could not have been of this world.
According to researchers, no known human-made craft could hit another mid-air without leaving evidence in the form of bits or pieces of broken parts for investigators to collect.