A story says a Cuban MiG-21 vanished while chasing an unknown sphere
March 1967 · Northeastern Cuba · Sighting · Secondary sources only
According to a story that surfaced in the late 1970s, in March 1967 Cuba scrambled two MiG-21s against a bright metallic sphere flying near Mach 1 at about 33,000 feet. When it did not answer the radio, the lead pilot was ordered to fire, and his wingman said the lead jet disintegrated without a visible explosion. The object then climbed away. The account came from a former member of the US Air Force Security Service, whose unit at Key West monitored Cuban air-defense communications, and was passed to researcher Stanton Friedman.
Why it matters (2/5)
A widely retold Cold War story with no confirming record; included because it is often cited.
Caveats
No official record confirms it. Cuban aviation historian Maikel Mederos Fiallo calls it an invention: it is absent from his history of Cuba's MiGs, he has traced every military aircraft Cuba received, and former Cuban pilots he consulted, including Bismark Torres Sosa, call it an urban legend. Claims that the intercepts went to the NSA and that the FBI visited a researcher in 1978 at the NSA's request come from the story's tellers.
Sources
- El misterioso caso del caza MiG-21 que desaparecio persiguiendo un ovni en Cuba (Periodico Cubano), context