This is a list of American Astronauts who have seen, reported and commented on UFOs believed to be alien controlled crafts. This list does not include every astronaut quote available. What was learned while creating this list was there were numerous US and Russian Astronauts who have reported experiences with UFOs while in outer-space.
Leroy Gordon Cooper, Jr.
Key points
Leroy Gordon Cooper, Jr., also noted as Gordo Cooper, was an American astronaut. Cooper was one of the seven original astronauts in Project Mercury, the first manned-space effort by the United States.
Cooper claimed to have seen his first UFO while flying over West Germany in 1951, although he denied reports he had seen a UFO during his Mercury flight. In his memoirs Cooper wrote he had seen other unexplained aircraft several times during his career and also said hundreds of similar reports had been made, often by military jet pilots responding to radar or visual sightings from the ground. He further claimed these sightings had been “swept under the rug” by the US government. Throughout his later life Cooper was convinced he had seen extra-terrestrial crafts and described his recollections for the documentary Out of the Blue.
Major Cooper also testified before the United Nations: “I believe that these extra-terrestrial vehicles and their crews are visiting this planet from other planets… Most astronauts were reluctant to discuss UFOs.”
James Lovell and Frank Borman
James “Jim” Arthur Lovell, Jr., is a former NASA astronaut, most famous as the commander of Apollo 13, which suffered an explosion enroute to the Moon but was brought back safely to Earth by the efforts of the crew and mission control. Lovell was also the command module pilot of Apollo 8, the first Apollo mission to enter lunar orbit. Lovell is a recipient of the Congressional Space Medal of Honor and the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Frank Frederick Borman, II is a retired NASA astronaut, best remembered as the Commander of Apollo 8, the first mission to fly around the Moon. He was also the chief executive officer (CEO) of Eastern Air Lines from 1975 to 1986. Frank Borman is a recipient of the Congressional Space Medal of Honor.
In December 1965, Gemini astronauts James Lovell and Frank Borman also saw a UFO during their second orbit of their record-breaking 14 day flight. Borman reported that he saw an unidentified spacecraft some distance from their capsule. Gemini Control, at Cape Kennedy told him that he was seeing the final stage of their own Titan booster rocket. Borman confirmed that he could see the booster rocket all right, but that he could also see something completely different.
During James Lovell’s flight on Gemini 7:
Lovell: BOGEY AT 10 O’CLOCK HIGH.
Capcom: This is Houston. Say again 7.
Lovell: Said we have a bogey at 10 o’clock hight.
Capcom: Gemini 7, is that the booster or is that an actual sighting?
Lovell: We have several…actual sighting.
Capcom: …Estimated distance or size?
Lovell: We also have the booster in sight…
Donald Slayton
Donald Slayton a Mercury astronaut revealed in an interview he had seen UFOs in 1951:
“I was testing a P-51 fighter in Minneapolis when I spotted this object. I was at about 10,000 feet on a nice, bright, sunny afternoon. I thought the object was a kite, then I realized that no kite is gonna fly that high.
“As I got closer it looked like a weather balloon, gray and about three feet in diameter. But as soon as I got behind the darn thing it didn’t look like a balloon anymore. It looked like a saucer, a disk.
“About the same time, I realized that it was suddenly going away from me — and there I was, running at about 300 miles per hour. I tracked it for a little way, and then all of a sudden the damn thing just took off. It pulled about a 45 degree climbing turn and accelerated and just flat disappeared.”
NASA pilot Joseph Walker
On May 11, 1962 NASA pilot Joseph Walker said that one of his tasks was to detect UFOs during his X-15 flights. He had filmed five or six UFOs during his record breaking fifty-mile-high flight in April, 1962. It was the second time he had filmed UFOs in flight. During a lecture at the Second National Conference on the Peaceful Uses of Space Research in Seattle, Washington he said:
“I don’t feel like speculating about them. All I know is what appeared on the film which was developed after the flight.” – Joseph Walker
To date none of those films has been released to the public for viewing.
NASA’s Scott Carpenter
“At no time, when the astronauts were in space were they alone: there was a constant surveillance by UFOs.”
Edgar Mitchell
A former astronaut who walked on the moon says he think aliens have crash-landed on Earth. Edgar Mitchell, the sixth man to walk on the moon, said he believes some military and other planes use technology derived from alien spacecraft that have been captured and disassembled.
“We know all that the UFOs are real. Something arrives to us up there. You acquire a total conscience, a general orientation, a dissatisfaction of the state of the world and an irresistible desire for curing it.”
Maurice Chatelain
In 1979 Maurice Chatelain, former chief of NASA Communications Systems confirmed that Armstrong had indeed reported seeing two UFOs on the rim of a crater. Chatelain believes that some UFOs may come from our own solar system – specifically Titan.
“The encounter was common knowledge in NASA, but nobody has talked about it until now.”
“…all Apollo and Gemini flights were followed, both at a distance and sometimes also quite closely, by space vehicles of extraterrestrial origin – flying saucers, or UFOs, if you want to call them by that name. Every time it occurred, the astronauts informed Mission Control, who then ordered absolute silence.”
“I think that Walter Schirra aboard Mercury 8 was the first of the astronauts to use the code name ‘Santa Claus’ to indicate the presence of flying saucers next to space capsules. However, his announcements were barely noticed by the general public. It was a little different when James Lovell on board the Apollo 8 command module came out from behind the moon and said for everybody to hear: ‘PLEASE BE INFORMED THAT THERE IS A SANTA CLAUS.’ Even though this happened on Christmas Day 1968, many people sensed a hidden meaning in those words.”
NASA astronaut Dr. Jerry Linenger
During his five months stay on the MIR Russian space station, NASA astronaut Dr. Jerry Linenger saw unidentified objects in space several times, according to his own statement. In November 2002, four years after his stay on MIR, he said on the Bur Juman Retail Conference in the Emirate Towers Hotel in presence of journalists:
“I have been asked that question so many times. In five months in space, I have seen unidentified flying objects for sure.
“Sometimes I looked out of the window and I could see a metallic thing like a spoon flying methodically. The biggest problem in space is that it is very hard to judge distance. It could have been a spoon or a space ship thousands of miles away.
“Let me tell you one thing, I have never heard someone knock at the door and say – Hey Jerry let me in!”
Neil Armstrong, Oct 21, 1999.
We have no proof, But if we extrapolate, based on the best information we have available to us, we have to come to the conclusion that … other life probably exists out there and perhaps in many places…
