Dr. Allen Hynek consultant for the Air Force on projects SIGN and BLUE BOOK, divided UFO reports into categories. A Close Encounter of the First Kind involves no interaction with the environment.

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Close Encounters of the "Right Stuff"

Many believe that our "Final Frontier" may just be a highway for extraterrestrials. Therefore many also assume that our brave men and women who travel in space will meet E.T.

Many astronauts have indeed reported their own close encounters, however, most of these sightings are explainable. Still some remain Fascinating Mysteries.

Mercury-aurora
Scott Carpenter
May 24, 1962
Scott Carpenter allegedly photographed a UFO on his mission. The photo, however, was missing after the film was processed.

Mercury-Faith
Gordon cooper
May 16,1963
Cooper was passing over Perth, Australia, when he supposedly taped alien transmissions on a special NASA radio frequency. He also made visual contact with a large UFO that was also observed by a tracking station on Earth. Cooper nor the tracking station, however, has never verified this information.

Gemini 4
McDivitt and White
June 3, 1964
McDivitt says:"During Gemini 4, while we were in drifting flight, I noticed an object out the front window of the spacecraft. It appeared to be cylindrical in shape with a high fineness ratio. From one end protruded a ling, cylindrical pole with the approximate fineness of a pencil. I had no idea what the size was or what the distance to the object was."

"I do not feel that there was anything strange or exotic about this particular object. Rather, only that I could not identify it."

James Oberg, a flight controller at the Johnson Space Center, contends all McDivitt saw was the Titan II second stage. McDivitt could not identify the object because his eyes were burned and watery due to an accidental urine spill.

Gemini 7
Borman and Lovell
December 4, 1965
Transcript of radio communications:
SPACECRAFT: Bogey at 10 o'clock high.
CAPCOM: This is Houston. Say again 7.
SPACECRAFT: Said we have a bogey at 10 o'clock high.
CAPCOM: Gemini 7, is that the booster or is that an actual sighting?
SPACECRAFT: We have several, looks like debris up here. Actual sighting.
CAPCOM: ...Estimate distance or size?
SPACECRAFT: We also have the booster in sight...
The afore mentioned James Oberg agreed with the astronauts and concluded this was debris from the stage separation.

Gemini 10
Young and Collins
July 18, 1966

The crew on this mission made visual contact with pinpoint lights. These unidentified lights seemed to follow the capsule. Oberg once again ruled in favor of debris.

Gemini 11
Gordon and Conrad
September 12,1966
The crew thought they saw the satellite known as Proton 3 while orbiting over Madagascar. The data, however, showed Proton 3 to be about 350 miles away from the crew at the time of the sighting. This close Encounter remains to this day a Fascinating Mystery.

Apollo 8
Borman, Lovell, Anders
December 12, 1968
 While the crew orbited the moon they supposedly sighted disc-shaped UFOs. They radioed mission control:
"We have been informed that Santa Claus does exist." (Santa Claus is believed to mean UFO)

Apollo 11
Armstrong, Aldrin, Collins
July 16, 1969
 Rumors surround this mission to the moon. NASA former chief of communications and designer of the Apollo communication and data-processing system, Maurice Chatelain, claims Armstrong reported seeing two "other spacecraft" on the rim of a crater. Some have rumored Armstrong has sense privately confirmed Chatelain's statement. Rumors also fly of alien colonist and mines. According to these rumors first contact was made and mankind was warned off the moon.

Shuttle Discovery
STS-48
Reightler, Buchli, Gemar, Brown, Creighton
 This encounter has been well publicized on TV shows like "Encounters" and "Sightings" play the incident taped by Discovery's rear camera. The video shows several bright objects following the shuttle slowly then moving away quickly. A "beam" of unknown origin hits the vacated location of the largest object. People theorized that either this beam came from another UFO or a "Star Wars" beam from Earth. NASA stated the objects were frozen urine crystals that sped off when caught in Discovery's exhaust. (Keep checking Fascinating Mysteries: Theories for a different explanation.)

NASA has an explanation for each sighting except the Gemini 11 encounter.