Something Was in Orbit Before Sputnik
March 23, 2026 – March 29, 2026
- Mystery drone swarms hit Barksdale AFB – waves of 12–15 jam-resistant drones overflew the B-52 nuclear bomber base for nearly a week; Air Force could not stop them
- Independent study confirms pre-Sputnik orbital objects on 1950s photographic plates – two observatories, two archives, same result
- Sub-second flashes with narrow profiles match reflections from flat, rotating objects in Earth orbit
- Christopher Mellon is a named co-author on a peer-reviewed VASCO paper connecting the research to UAP disclosure
Tuesday, March 25
Mystery Drone Swarms Hit Nuclear Bomber Base – “Air Force Not Able to Stop Them”
Multiple waves of 12–15 sophisticated drones flew over sensitive areas of Barksdale Air Force Base – home of Air Force Global Strike Command and the 2nd Bomb Wing’s B-52H nuclear bombers – for nearly a week beginning March 9. A confidential military briefing obtained by ABC News described the drones as custom-built, jam-resistant, with non-commercial signal characteristics and long-range control links. The base ordered shelter-in-place and temporarily raised its force protection condition to FPCON Charlie on March 9.
Gen. Gregory Guillot, Commander of NORTHCOM/NORAD, told the Senate Armed Services Committee that only about 25% of detected drones over U.S. military installations can currently be defeated. Former Deputy Assistant SecDef Mick Mulroy called the activity “deliberate and intentional.”
No suspects have been identified. Full sighting report
“It looked like this was deliberate and intentional to see just how they would react.” – Mick Mulroy, former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense
Independent Study Confirms Pre-Sputnik Orbital Objects on 1950s Photographic Plates
A preprint posted to arXiv by Ivo Busko, a senior systems software engineer at the Space Telescope Science Institute, reports that an independent analysis of 1950s photographic plates from Hamburg Observatory has confirmed findings from the VASCO Project – mysterious sub-second optical flashes consistent with sunlight reflecting off flat, rotating objects in orbit around Earth. The plates date from 1954 to 1957. Sputnik did not launch until October 1957.
Busko analyzed pairs of plates taken roughly 30 minutes apart and found 35 good transient candidates. The flashes exhibit systematically narrow profiles compared to real stars – exactly what you’d expect from a sub-second event on a long-exposure plate. This matches what VASCO lead Beatriz Villarroel (Nordita / IAC) found on entirely different plates from Palomar Observatory, including nine simultaneous transients on a single 1950 plate.
Christopher Mellon – former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Intelligence and chairman of the UAP Disclosure Fund – is a named co-author on the peer-reviewed VASCO citizen science paper (Universe, 2022), directly linking this line of astrophysics research to the UAP disclosure world. Full article
“Our findings independently confirm that these transients exhibit systematically narrow full width at half maximum compared to stellar point spread functions. This provides further support for their interpretation as sub-second optical flashes, consistent with reflections from flat, rotating objects in orbit around Earth.” – Ivo Busko, arXiv:2603.20407
