James McDivitt and Ed White are astronauts who left a mark by circling the Earth 66 times during the famous Gemini IV mission. During this mission, they’ve also captured an obscure cylindrical object which is famous as one of the best UFO images in the history.
The Gemini IV mission was the second manned spaceflight in NASA’s Project Gemini and the tenth manned American Spaceflight.
Brigadier General James McDivitt was the commander of the mission while Ed White was the pilot. In June 1965, they both participated in the first multi-day space flight by the US.
The mission intended to discover whether it’s possible for humans to stay in space for longer periods.
McDivitt and White rounded the Earth 66 times in a period of four days. In particular, White hovered outside the spacecraft for around 20 minutes. This performance counts as the first spacewalk ever done by an American astronaut.
Besides the aforementioned, the Gemini IV mission also represents one of the very first space pursuits of NASA which involved a series of scientific space experiments.
But most likely, this mission will remain remembered for something else. Namely, during the mission, astronaut McDivitt managed to capture a peculiar image where an unknown object is visible in orbit.
The internet is full of many UFO claims. Only one simple search will bring out many stories, videos and photos about possible extraterrestrial visits on Earth.
But even there is abundant material evidence, nobody still hasn’t managed to completely prove ‘the other world’ is real. However, the UFO sightings of the astronauts are likely the most believable ones. This story is one of them.
UFO pursuers consider the Gemini IV mission’s UFO sighting as one of the best images on the subject. It shows a weird object in low orbit around Earth.
This image, according to an article by UFO Evidence, was even able to confuse the super-skeptical Condon Committee in 1969.
This image was dubbed as one of the best UFO photos ever made. But even so, McDivitt still didn’t make a big deal out of it. Instead, he considered the object to probably be a man-made portion of orbital debris.
NASA was full of doubts regarding this image. As a matter of fact, they suggested that there is nothing strange or extraterrestrial on the image. According to other rationalists, the object was actually McDivitt’s booster rocket.
“I was flying with Ed White. He was sleeping at the time, so I don’t have anybody to verify my story. We were drifting in space with the control engines shut down, and all the instrumentation off (when) suddenly (an object) appeared in the window. It had a very definite shape — a cylindrical object — it was white — it had a long arm that stuck out on the side. I don’t know whether it was a very small object up close or a very large object a long ways away.”
“There was nothing to judge by. I don’t know how big it was. We had two cameras that were just floating in the spacecraft at the time, so I grabbed one and took a picture of (the object) and grabbed the other and took a picture. Then I turned on the rocket control systems because I was afraid we might hit it. At the time we were drifting — without checking I have no idea which way we were going — but as we drifted up a little farther the sun shone on the window of the spacecraft.”
“The windshield was dirty — just like in an automobile, you can’t see through it. So I had the rocket control engines going again and moved the spacecraft so that the window was in darkness again — the object was gone.”
“I called down later and told them what had happened, and they went back and checked their records of other space debris that was flying around, but we were never able to identify what it could have been. The film was sent back to NASA and reviewed by some NASA film technicians. One of them selected what he thought was what we talked about, at least before I had a chance to review it. It was not the picture — it was a picture of a sun reflection on the window.”– McDivitt’s description of his UFO on the Dick Cavett Show in November 1973.