A first-hand account from Gerald Anderson similarly offered descriptions that seemingly matched dummies: "thought they were plastic dolls," he said. He also described a "blimp," further suggesting a misidentified military recovery operation. (p. 61) A description of a "jeep-like truck that had a bunch of radios in it" sounds very much like a modified Dodge M-37 utility truck not used until 1953, further suggesting a confusion about dates. In 1997, the Air Force, in response to Congressional inquiries, issued the second of two reports which they asserted accounted for the reports of aliens recovered at Roswell in 1947. The report, entitled The Roswell Report: Case Closed had a section which specifically dealt with the Dennis claims. While identifying a possible match to the nurse Dennis had said was a witness (see above), the report additionally linked descriptions of bodies and high security to several known and documented incidents, albeit ones which occurred years after 1947. As evidence that the event Dennis described contained elements from much later real events, the report cited the presence of a black sergeant paired with a white officer, a pairing it described as unlikely as the Army Air Force was racially segregated in 1947, and Dennis' use of the term "airman," a term not employed until 1952.[6](p. 86) A June 26, 1956 aircraft accident supplied many of the elements of Dennis' account, said the report. On that day, 11 crew members were killed when a propeller blade punctured the plane's fuel tank, creating an inferno. The charred and mangled remains of the crew were taken to Walker Air Force Base (the former Roswell base) and identification specialist George Schwader arrived from Wright-Patterson AFB. He said in an interview that he was frequently mistaken for a pathologist because of his working garb. The corpses had to be moved to a refrigerated part of the base, owing to the overpowering odor of the bodies. Three of the victims were autopsied by Dr. Alfred Blauw, a local physician, and the autopsies were performed at the Ballard Funeral Home, where Dennis was employed. A second incident accounts for the description of the "canoe-like" object Dennis said he saw in the back of a vehicle, and some of the high-handed treatment he received from officers at the base, including from a tall red-headed captain. A May 1959 accident of a low-altitude balloon, part of the Excelsior program, saw the three injured crewmen flown to Walker AFB. The mere fact of the accident caused consternation for the crewmen as the project was controversial and there was a very real prospect that word of the accident might lead to the program's cancellation. The controversy surrounded the wisdom of parachuting attempts from balloons some 100,000 feet in the atmosphere. Accordingly, much secrecy surrounded the project, as can be corroborated by a 1961 book written by a participant, Captain Joseph Kittinger, "The Long Lonely Leap."[6](p. 109) Kittinger, redheaded and six foot one, likely was the red-headed captain Dennis referred to who Dennis claimed said "You did not see anything. There was no crash here. You don't go into town making any rumors that you saw anything or that there was any crash." The report asserts that Dennis was in fact witnessing the arrival of the three injured crewman and was subsequently warned to be quiet, but so as to preserve the Excelsior program. (p. 110) Kittinger would go on to make those high-altitude leaps, one at 102,800 feet in 1960 still stands as the all-time record. The three-man Excelsior crew had been escorted by ambulances, and descriptions by Dennis closely match what would have been present that day. He reported what he thought was wreckage in the back of one ambulance which "was kinda like the bottom of a canoe... like stainless steel... with a kind-of bluish-purplish tinge to it." This description, the report notes, accurately describes two steel panels painted Air Force blue on a converted ambulance for this mission. (p. 113) Other descriptions such as wreckage all over the floor looking like "broken glass" corresponds to the clear plastic polyethylene balloon recovered from the mission. The heightened state of security Dennis described sounds very much like the extra security which occurred upon the arrival of the Excelsior team. The very presence of the balloon crew, who had arrived unannounced, likely led many base personnel to believe they may have posed a security threat or were a team from Strategic Air Command testing the nuclear-armed facility's alertness. Either way, the base's personnel would have been far more vigilant that day, and this may account for the heavy-handedness reported by Dennis. The balloon crew themselves were greeted by machine-gun-armed personnel upon their arrival. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glenn_Dennis

• published: 09 Feb 2014