“It was a tank at least eight meters long. Five hundred years from now perhaps someone will tell us why and how it stood there still, suspended in the sky, thirteen thousand feet in the air.”
Italian Air Force Pilot Marshal Giancarlo Cecconi
This famous Italian case history is important for a number of reasons. First, because it is a radar-visual case with several witnesses: the main one is even a military pilot of undoubted experience and with a respectable professional record.
Another sure reason of interest is that, at the time of the sighting, Air Force Pilot Marshal Giancarlo Cecconi was in the air at the controls of a G-91R fighter bomber/reconnaissance aircraft equipped with cameras optimized for tactical reconnaissance and was thus able to "capture" the mystery object in some 80 frames.
The photographs – most of which were never disclosed by the military authorities – unleashed heated debates over the case and the alleged official identification of the object as “a cylindrical-shaped balloon made of black plastic bags”. After subsiding for several years, the controversy forcefully re-exploded in the summer of 1995, unpredictably regaining some space in the media press.
Unfortunately, the revival of the case has also been coupled with the topic of that moment, the affair of the Roswell alleged UFO-crash footage, in a sly - not to say suspicious - and instrumental manner. This contributed to give the case sensationalist overtones mostly providing botched and highly inaccurate accounts.
We will therefore try to re-establish a core of historical truth and put some order back into what has been written recently, often inappropriately, about a case that for its implications certainly remains one of the most important Italian sightings. To this end, we will begin by reviewing in detail what took place over the Treviso sky on that June 18, 1979.
First of all, however, we would like to thank the witness for the precious and disinterested collaboration provided as early as September 1994 - and thus well before the fuss was raised again around his affair. His help allowed us to reconstruct the facts with precision. Unfortunately, very soon after our meeting Marshal Cecconi was struck by a serious illness, which he has only recently begun to recover from. This article is therefore intended as an opportunity to pay tribute to his seriousness and determination in maintaining over the years his interpretation of the event that saw him as a protagonist.
A TARGET TO INTERCEPT
June 18, 1979, 11:30 a.m. (daylight saving time).
Pilot Marshal Giancarlo Cecconi, serving with the 14th Group of the Air Force 2nd Reconnaissance Bomber Fighter Wing, stationed at Treviso Sant'Angelo Airport, is returning to base after carrying out a photographic reconnaissance mission over the Ligurian Apennine mountains at the controls of a G-91R aircraft [1].
Suddenly, an unknown target appears in the sky of the Treviso Sant'Angelo Airport: the radar center at Istrana (near Treviso), that registers the intruder on its screens, gives Cecconi the directions for the approach maneuver after having obtained confirmation that he had sufficient residual range to intercept the object.
Diverting an aircraft from its mission to check unknown aircrafts that have penetrated restricted areas is indeed usual within the Air Force.
Having still usable film in the cameras, the pilot operates all four of them and begins making passes near the object, up to a minimum distance of 70-80 meters and at a speed quantifiable at about 300 knots (450-500 km/h). Also the airport personnel follow the scene from the ground with binoculars: at one point, the Treviso control tower calls Cecconi on the radio frequency he’s using to communicate with Istrana, warning him that a strange “bluish trail” is coming out of the object. However, he doesn’t notice such trail, even though he has come very close to the object.
When the pilot begins his passes close to the object, this is at an altitude of 7,000 feet [2]. It then begins to climb and descend with shifts of about 1,000 feet at a time, until it reaches approximately 13,000 feet of altitude. Cecconi makes seven or eight passes close to the object and each time he’s ready to film it with his cameras, obtaining a total of 82 frames portraying the intruder.
Even though the UFO appears stationary relative to the G-91, the radar center confirms to Cecconi that it is instead moving, with definite course and speed. The pilot tries to pass (and photograph) the object exactly sideways, but this fails because it “seems to maneuver” to place itself in a frontal or otherwise angled position, without ever fully exposing its side [3].
The object “appearance” reminds the witness of a dull black “fuel tank”. Its dimensions appear to be 8 meters in length and two and a half, three meters at most in diameter. An interesting detail noted by Cecconi is the presence of a kind of white or otherwise clear-colored, but not transparent, “dome” placed on the upper, slightly flattened side of the object. The term “dome” is, however, forcibly vague, because rather than an actual canopy it reminds the witness of a kind of shaping or fairing similar to those found on sports cars.
As Cecconi is making yet another turn for a new set of photographs, Istrana calls him and informs him that just at that instant the object has suddenly vanished from the screens, between radar “beats”.
After a few seconds, the Treviso control tower confirms that also the observers on the ground can no longer see it: the object has inexplicably disappeared in the space of a few moments. In fact, even the pilot can no longer see it.
A few minutes later, the plane lands at Treviso Airport and, as usual, specialists remove the film canisters and bring them to the Wing’s laboratory for developing and printing. The pilot is very curious to see how the photos turned out and so he goes to examine them, even obtaining one in which the object can be seen quite well, including the white “dome” The background also shows, prominently, the structures and runway of the airport, as well as the urban area of Treviso.
INVESTIGATIONS AND INVOLVEMENT OF OFFICIAL AUTHORITIES
Towards the end of 1979 ufologist Antonio Chiumiento was investigating a sighting at the Treviso airport when he accidentally learned that in June a pilot of the 2nd Wing had photographed a UFO from aboard his plane. Chiumiento started to investigate, managing to discover the name of the witness, whom he went to interview accompanied by fellow investigator Maurizio Caruso.
Cecconi was on that occasion somewhat reluctant to talk (he was still on active duty at the 2nd Wing), however he told the facts to the two investigators requesting them to keep it confidential. He also showed them the photograph, depicting the mysterious object, which he had kept for himself.
In 1983 Cecconi left his service in the Air Force, and Chiumiento thought it appropriate to interview him again to elaborate on the information he had received on the first occasion. The witness could provide more information, although he continued to ask for discretion.
In 1984, the Ministry of Defense, in response to a July 10 parliamentary question, officially declared that all data pertaining to the UFO phenomenon could be consulted by civilian agencies and scholars through the Cabinet of the same Ministry.
Thus, Chiumiento on August 24th officially asked the Ministry of Defense for the release of the photos taken by Marshal Cecconi, as well as the opinion of military authorities on what they represented.
The next day the initiative received considerable press coverage: journalists from local daily newspaper La Tribuna di Treviso easily managed to identify the pilot involved, so they disclosed his personal details in an article published on the 26th. At this point Chiumiento felt free to act publicly by releasing the reconstruction of the event received directly from Cecconi.
For the next two months, the news was widely echoed in both newspapers and weekly magazines: many of them also published the artist’s impression made by the illustrator and painter Ugo Furlan on the basis of Chiumiento's and Caruso's recollections of the photograph shown to them by Cecconi.
Let us open here a parenthesis on the ethics of research. During our meeting in September 1994, Pilot Marshal Cecconi, recalling the affair, expressed his irritation with those who had disclosed to the press the confidential information he had shared. We will not argue here what the best behavior might have been on that occasion; we can only stress that ufological research is based first and foremost on a relationship of utmost mutual trust between investigator and witness.
Often the witness is reticent because of fear of ridicule or because of his professional standing: he confides in the investigator on the condition that his personal details or any confidential information he may have received not be disclosed, using them solely for study and research purposes. In the case of Cecconi the requested confidentiality should have probably been handled better.
THE MINISTRY'S RESPONSE
The Ministry responded to Chiumiento on November 2nd, 1984. In addition to a brief description of the event (a few lines), the official letter stated, “The object in question, which was immediately spotted, was photographed with the on-board cameras and unequivocally identified by the photo-interpretation staff as a cylindrical-shaped balloon made of black plastic bags”.
Newspapers grabbed hold of the news. On November 12th , Il Gazzettino (a daily newspaper from Veneto region) published an article by Leopoldo Petto, “The UFO seen in Treviso was only a hot air balloon”. The article quoted statements by a certain Luigi Milan, a technical applications teacher at the secondary school in Azzano Decimo (near Pordenone, a town not far from Treviso), who claimed to be the builder, along with his schoolchildren, of the hot air balloon that was launched from the schoolyard in early June and that allegedly gave rise to the sighting.
The article also carried a photo of the balloon, which in truth did not seem to have much to do with the object described by the pilot.
But a new turning point in the affair came with the publication in Epoca illustrated weekly, on April 19, 1985, of the “UFO secret report” article by Remo Guerrini. The article endorsed the explanation given by the Ministry (toy balloon) and published three photographs of the object received from the Ministry itself as an exclusive scoop.
In response, on Stampa Sera daily of May 7th Antonio Chiumiento claimed that the photo shown to him by Cecconi was much more interesting than those published by Epoca, wondering among other things why the most important photos had not been released.
Later, on the basis of alleged inconsistencies between the photo showed by Cecconi and those published by Epoca, Chiumiento went so far as to claim that the latter might not belong to the series taken by the pilot.
On February 17, 1986, the Cecconi case resurfaced in several newspapers following the release by the Air Force General Staff of the ”Extract of sightings of unidentified flying objects for the period March 1979-April 1985”. In the file, the case in question was described as “unidentified”, which is strange, bearing in mind the previous “unequivocal” identification.
OUR INVESTIGATIONS
One of the first incidents to be investigated within the CISU newly activated AIRCAT Project (4), in September 1994, was indeed the Cecconi case. As a result of some telephone conversations and interviews conducted in person with Giancarlo Cecconi in Treviso, where he was still residing, we were able to reconstruct the affair in detail, as outlined above.
During our first meeting, a very interesting point emerged: as we showed him the three photos published by Epoca illustrated weekly in 1985, Cecconi recognized them as being part of the series he took on June 18, 1979. This statement is important because, as we have already mentioned, at the time of their publication those photos had been at the center of the controversy, with suggestions that they were not part of the series taken by Marshal Cecconi.
At the same meeting with the witness, we were unfortunately unable to examine the famous photograph he possessed and had already shown to the first investigators. Cecconi gave us to understand that the photograph had been lost over the years, perhaps taken away by people who had visited him in the meantime.
Our investigation also went in other directions, with the aim of obtaining detailed information about the Ministry of Defense's release of the three photographs published by Epoca magazine. Photographs that had also been requested at the time to the Ministry itself by Antonio Chiumiento.
Our contacts with journalist Remo Guerrini, in 1985 the author of Epoca article "UFO Secret Report" and more recently editor of Focus magazine, allowed us to ascertain that he himself was able to view directly at the Ministry about thirty photographs belonging to the Cecconi series, later receiving some of them for exclusive publication in Epoca.
Unfortunately, Guerrini does not remember the final destination of those photographs, although he speculates that at least some of them later ended up in the Mondadori archives. It seems safe to say, however, that the photographs were given to Guerrini solely by virtue of his excellent relations with the Air Force, that had been the subject of a series of demanding reports he authored.
On our part, a request was also sent in September 1994 to the Ministry of Defense aimed at obtaining the release of any new declassified information regarding the case in question, as well as copies of the most significant photograms. However, the 2nd Department of the Air Force General Staff informed us on October 11, 1994 that the records do not contain the requested aerial photograms or any further documentation.
On the other hand, our request for clarification sent on February 4, 1995 to Prof. Luigi Milan was left unanswered. As you will recall, Prof. Milan is the teacher of technical applications who in 1984 had claimed that the object photographed by Cecconi was nothing more than a hot air balloon built by himself and his pupils. In the meantime, unfortunately, the extremely serious event we mentioned at the beginning of this article happened: very few days after our interview in Treviso, Cecconi was struck by a serious illness that left him in a critical condition for several months, and that he only gradually recovered from it.
LATER DEVELOPMENTS
During our telephone conversation with Pilot Marshal Cecconi (the first in many months) on August 2, 1995, we found out two very interesting pieces of news, coincidentally linked by a curious chain of events.
The first piece of news, of absolute importance, was that quite unexpectedly the famous photograph in Cecconi's possession had resurfaced.
The second piece of news was that coincidentally, after a period of absence from the ufological scene and just when the photograph had resurfaced from the Cecconi’s archives, Antonio Chiumiento had gotten back in touch with the Marshal and had the photograph delivered to him to make copies.
In the following days we, too, went to Treviso for a brief visit to the witness, which took place in the presence of his family members. As we talked to Mrs. Cecconi, she expressed her concern about the possible use of the photograph in a non-confidential manner.
The scoop was in the air and materialized with the release of full-page articles, both locally and nationally, on August 19. Particularly significant to us, given the importance and circulation of the newspaper, is the full-page spread devoted by Il Giornale to UFOs in general and the Cecconi case in particular. The latter was used as a sounding board to amplify the ufological news of the moment: the soap opera of the alien autopsy footage linked to the Roswell case.
The article contains some inaccuracies and has a rather sensationalist slant, immediately highlighted by the publication of the important photograph supplemented, on one side, by the reconstruction of an alleged alien that obviously has nothing to do with the case in question. We quote the opening period of the article: "One of the most significant of the 84 photos of a UFO taken from aboard a military fighter jet in the skies over Treviso in 1979 emerges from the files of the 2nd Department of the Air Force General Staff, as if to confirm the presence in Earth's space of cosmic visitors that the alleged autopsy footage of the Roswell alien would like to prove".
The claim that the photo was released by the Air Force General Staff - while we know it instead came out of Cecconi's home - as well as blatantly wrong, is also misleading in that it seems to imply an official confirmation of the presence in our skies of extraterrestrials, that would be nothing but the same ones from the Roswell autopsy. A conclusion that is twice incorrect, first because the Ministry had nothing to do with the disclosure of the photo, and then because it is one thing to label an unknown object as a "UFO", quite another to assume it is an extraterrestrial spacecraft. Proper ufological information should always emphasize that the extraterrestrial origin is only one of the many hypotheses put forward to explain the mystery of UFOs, and not the definitive explanation; but unfortunately this is almost never the case.
Another inaccuracy concerns the identification of the reconnaissance cameras contained in the nose of the G-91R with cinephotographers: these are different devices with different purposes and modes of use.
The only really new thing in the article is indeed the photograph of the UFO, together with the admission that the photos published in 1985 by Epoca were part of the series taken by Cecconi. This important information had already been directly confirmed to us by the witness, as mentioned above, in September 1994.
Just to give an idea of the frame where the scoop is placed, here are the titles of the other articles appearing on the same page: "Autopsy of two E.T.'s under scrutiny by scholars" and "Face to face with killer flying saucers". Any comment appears pointless.
In the days immediately following, several newspapers picked up on the news, publishing articles aligning to opposing sides (extraterrestrial UFO vs balloon).
Among other things, a witness has emerged who allegedly saw an object similar to the one photographed by Cecconi, and there has been a veritable proliferation of people allegedly launching the toy balloon that misled the pilot. One of them claims to have launched the balloon one morning in June together with his son near Treviso and to have subsequently observed a G-91 circling it. However the witness is anonymous and the day unspecified. Even in the Messaggero Veneto of August 19, Prof. Milan (now retired) resurfaced to advocate for his hot air balloon as a possible trigger for the sighting.
Seemingly in favor of the UFO-Solar (toy balloon) hypothesis is also Lieutenant Colonel (on leave) Bruno Patelli, Cecconi's former comrade (in fact at the time he was also at the 2nd Wing of Treviso, although not in the 14th Group but in the adjoining 103rd) and a witness to the event from the ground. An interview with him appeared on the Tribuna of August 20, with his surname misspelled as Battelli. We also talked to Lt. Colonel Patelli on the phone: we will discuss this in the next paragraph.
What can we take from this sensational reopening of the Cecconi case? In fact, with hindsight, it does not seem to have borne any particular fruit from the point of view of ufological research.
The one undoubtedly new topic, the photograph obtained by Cecconi, has been mishandled, feeding it to a press eager for sensational headlines in a summer monopolized by the ambiguous Santilli footage affair. No new investigation or analysis was conducted on the new photo: rather, a sensationalist impact was favored in search of unlikely official endorsements. The one sure consequence was that Marshal Cecconi and his family were again exposed to popular curiosity against their will - and certainly at a very sensitive time.
Our idea of the relationship with a UFO witness is quite different. If the witness asks for confidentiality we have a duty to ensure it, to reward him in the most proper way for the trust he has honored us with. Ufology needs mature and responsible research, not sensational headlines in the newspapers.
THE DIFFICULT UFO-SOLAR DILEMMA
In ufology, as a rule, before claiming that the phenomenon or object seen was a UFO, all possible solutions should be cross checked to exclude any known human or natural cause.
In this respect, the Cecconi case is certainly peculiar, because the very characteristics of the sighting, for example, intuitively rule out possible natural meteorological or astronomical explanations.
The peculiarity of the case lies in the fact that what Cecconi observed and photographed is definitely an artifact of some kind, as incontrovertibly documented by the photographic evidence and the confirmation of the Istrana radar. Therefore, it will have to be investigated in the direction of a solid, made object. It seems that we can certainly exclude from the list of possible candidates any type of conventional aircraft, given the absolute lack of wings and empennages that can be clearly ascertained from the published photographs.
Several types of balloons should also be eliminated from the list for obvious incompatibility, starting with the one launched in that month of June by Professor Milan of the secondary school in Azzano Decimo. In fact it was a conventional hot air balloon totally incomparable, both in shape and flight dynamics, to the object photographed by Cecconi. Other types of balloons, such as meteorological balloons and those for high-altitude scientific research, can be ruled out for similar reasons. However, the same cannot be said for the toy balloon made of black plastic bags that military authorities offered as an explanation as early as 1984.
In the late 1970s, a toy balloon, significantly called "UFO-Solar", was commonly sold in newsstands and tobacco shops, black or otherwise very dark in color, measuring - when inflated - about 3 m in length by 70 cm in diameter. Such an object, made of a very thin wall of very light plastic, bore clearly visible on its side “UFO-Solar” in block letters and had both ends open. In order to make it operational, it was enough - after closing one end - to hold the open end against the wind and, once the balloon was inflated, to close as well that end with a string. At this point it was necessary to wait for the Sun to heat the air inside the cylinder, enough for it to take off by overcoming the resistance provided by the very light plastic casing.
As one can easily guess, the flight of such balloons was totally out of control, subject at all times to the vagaries of the wind and the convection currents that resulted from the relative heating or cooling of the air within it, as one portion of the balloon was more exposed to the Sun than another. The uncontrollability of the balloon caused a few too many hazards for air navigation, to the point that after a few missed collisions between aircrafts in flight and some of these balloons, the commercialization of the UFO-Solars was finally banned by decree in 1985.
In addition, the balloon was extremely fragile and prone to breaking and tearing, due to its light weight and thinness of the material used, which were necessary for the balloon to take flight. These technical considerations clearly apply both to the original UFO-Solars as well as to any homemade balloons, perhaps of different size but of similar concept. Having said that, our opinion is that the UFO-Solar, or similar balloons, is not a convincing explanation of the Cecconi case for the following reasons.
As we have seen, the UFO-Solar was about 3 meters long and 70 centimeters in diameter, while Cecconi describes the object he observed as a "fuel tank" eight meters long and at least three meters in diameter.
Now, anything is possible, but we highly doubt that an experienced and trained pilot with "Combat ready" status and thousands of flight hours under his belt could pass within 70 to 80 meters of a flying object and take such a colossal blunder regarding its size. In addition, Cecconi claimed that he did not see any markings on the sides of the object, markings that should have been clearly present, at least in the case of an original UFO-Solar.
Let us remind the reader that such markings do not appear in the few published photos, and we must suppose that they do not appear in the others either, because in all likelihood the Ministry of Defense would certainly have disclosed them, as further confirmation of their proposed UFO identification with such a balloon. Another detail that cannot be reconciled with a traditional UFO-Solar is the presence of the opaque white dome (or fairing) noted by Cecconi on the upper side of the object.
Thus, we could say that there are at least three differences between the object photographed by Cecconi and its possible identification with a UFO-Solar: the size, the absence of the side markings, and the presence of the mysterious white fairing.
It could be argued, however, that there is no limit to human imagination and that it is therefore possible that some creative inventor conceived and built a balloon conceptually inspired by the UFO-Solar, much larger, with no markings and something white on top. Indeed, as widely documented in the press of the time, such self-built models did exist and had the most imaginative shapes.
However, the object's radar observability and its flight dynamics would also rule out the toy balloon hypothesis. Indeed, a UFO-Solar (or similar) is not radar-observable: the material used to build it, which was necessarily very thin to allow flight in its particular conditions of use, did not make radar reflectivity possible in any way.
Therefore, given for certain - according to Cecconi's testimony - that the Istrana radar center recorded the presence of the object above Treviso Sant'Angelo, it seems inevitable to conclude that such an object had to be quite different from the UFO-Solar type balloons.
Lt. Col. Patelli himself, while being quite inclined to accept the UFO-Solar explanatory hypothesis, confirmed to us that if indeed a radar was able to pick up the object, then its structure must have been, if not metallic, at any rate quite different from a very thin plastic film.
One final element would seem to exclude this hypothesis, namely the flight profile of the object. As already anticipated, the flight of a UFO-Solar type balloon was decidedly erratic and unpredictable, completely at the mercy of the whims of the wind because of its overall lightness. Its internal convection currents contributed to making it even more unstable and inconsistent in its movements. This in no way matches Cecconi’s claim, that with respect to his own passages he was under the impression that the object remained virtually motionless. In addition, Cecconi himself stated that he received communication from the ground that the object was actually moving through the air, with relatively moderate speed and steady course.
Let’s not forget, then, that Cecconi claimed that the mysterious white dome kept itself constantly on the upper side of the object, thus suggesting a stable object and not a very light balloon that tends to change attitude and spin at the slightest gust of wind.
It should also be considered that the G-91 repeatedly passed within 70-80 meters of the object without causing any change in its flight attitude. Now, it is true that in a small and fast aircraft such as the G-91R the turbulence effect was limited to its wingspan, or just a little more, and that this effect materialized mainly in its wake rather than laterally. However, it is hard to believe that a fighter jet passing 80 meters from a UFO-Solar at a speed of about 500 km/h would not destroy its very thin envelope or, at least, disorderly push it far away.
Finally, let us recall that, again according to the pilot, the object in a few minutes went from the initial 7,000 feet up to more or less 13,000, alternating between ascent and descent phases.
Even this fluctuating rate of ascent does not seem to reconcile too well with what one might expect from a UFO-Solar, original or otherwise.
And what about the strange blue trail that people on the ground, but not Cecconi, saw coming out of the object? And what to make of the object's sudden disappearance, both from sight and from the radar screen at virtually the same time?
It’s difficult to give answers without objective data. Therefore, we can only suspend the judgement on the Treviso UFO, because too many questions remain unanswered nor is the UFO-Solar hypothesis able to explain the case satisfactorily, at least on the basis of the data available at present. On the contrary, these data would tend to disprove it.
Of course, on our part, we do not consider the investigation closed, because there is always hope that some new information, perhaps from official sources, may sooner or later help shed new light on the affair.
NOTES
[1] It may be useful to recall that the G-91R, in addition to ground force support missions, was normally used precisely for tactical reconnaissance missions, being for that purpose equipped with four Vinten cameras (one frontal, two lateral on the right and left in the nose, one on the underside) optimized for that purpose.
[2] The foot is the linear unit of measurement used in aviation and corresponds to 30.48 cm. Therefore, the initial altitude of 7,000 feet corresponds to about 2,100 meters, while the final altitude of about 13,000 feet corresponds to 3,900 meters.
[3] Obviously, this statement should be taken with a pinch of salt, in the sense that there is no evidence that the object was in any way controlled or piloted, while it is nevertheless curious that it always came to be in a particular position with respect to the plane's passes.
[4] See in this regard our article "UFO sightings and aircrafts" in UFO - Rivista di informazione ufologica, Issue No. 14, July 1994.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The author wishes to thank all those who helped him in carrying out the investigation, with special reference to Dario Bortolin, Bruno Patelli and Remo Guerrini.
Marshal Cecconi - already thanked at the beginning of the article for his essential cooperation - proved to be not only a very valuable professional in his field, but also a true gentleman, and the author considers it a privilege to have been able to know him and meet him in person. Sincere thanks also go to Mrs. Cecconi who, although at a certainly difficult time, did not fail to welcome the CISU researchers with great sympathy and much patience.
Finally, credit is due to those within our association who collaborated so that the investigation into the Cecconi case could be put on the right track, from Renzo Cabassi to Alessandro Cortellazzi, from Paolo Fiorino to Roberto Raffaelli.
[This article was first published in UFO - Rivista di informazione ufologica, journal of the Italian Center for UFO Studies (CISU), No. 17, February 1996; © CISU, P.O. Box 82, 10100 Turin - cisu@ufo.it
English translation by Giorgio Abraini]
