Maine, known for its vast forests, rugged coastline, and, perhaps surprisingly, a high number of UFO sightings, holds a unique place in both military history and unexplained phenomena. This article delves into the story of Loring Air Force Base, its strategic importance during the Cold War, and explores some intriguing UFO sightings reported in the state, particularly in the Exeter and Franklin areas.
Loring Air Force Base: A Cold War Fortress
Loring Air Force Base (IATA: LIZ, ICAO: KLIZ) was a United States Air Force installation in northeastern Maine, near Limestone and Caribou in Aroostook County. The base's origins began in 1947 with an order for construction of an airfield by the New England Division of the United States Army Corps of Engineers. Loring later became one of the largest air bases of SAC. The base was originally named Limestone Army Air Field, and was renamed Limestone Air Force Base following the establishment of the Air Force in 1947. It was named in 1954 for Major Charles J. Loring, Jr., USAF, a Medal of Honor recipient during the Korean War.
Loring was planned in 1947 as Limestone Army Air Field and was designed with a capacity of over 100 B-36 Peacemaker strategic bombers. This plan was only partially completed due to budget constraints. After the B-36 was phased out, the B-52 Stratofortress was based at Loring, first with D models, then with B-52Gs. Loring was home to many facilities that were a part of the base, or were nearby. Caribou Air Force Station was the weapons storage area that operated separately from Loring until it was absorbed in 1961. Caswell Air Force Station operated to the east, but had a unit associated with Loring before it became fully operational.
One of Loring's major secondary missions included serving as the headquarters for the 45th Air Division from 8 October 1954 to 18 January 1958, and on 20 November 1958. Loring's host wing was the 42d Bombardment Wing except for a small portion of its early existence. The 42nd Bomb Wing was the host unit at Loring AFB from 1953 until 1994, supporting national security objectives with mission-ready B-52G Stratofortresses, and KC-135 Stratotanker aircraft. The wing had the ability to deploy at any time to support both SAC, and later, ACC missions. All B-52s carried the "LZ" Tailcode.
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Strategic Importance and Unique Features
These sites were high-importance strategic bases for hosting long-range missiles and aircraft. The remote site consisted mostly of dense forest, shallow marshes, and wild blueberry bogs, on a slight plateau over the town, which helped keep it above the fog most of the time. Only a small part of the base was suitable for farming, so there was little impact on Aroostook County's agricultural community. Additionally, Loring was not far from sources of materials for runway, taxiway, and parking apron construction.
On 15 April 1947, construction commenced on Limestone Army Air Field, the first Strategic Air Command base designed and built to host high-speed aircraft, including the new B-36 Peacemaker. At the time, it was the largest monolithic arch roof structure in the US, and one of the largest hangars in the world. The runway was another major construction task. The airfield in northern Maine was subject to freeze-thaw cycles and had bogs and various types of groundcover; 2.1 million cubic yards of material was removed. The foundation of the runway was constructed to a depth of 70 inches (1.78 m) of a flexible bituminous-concrete pavement.
The base was one of the first constructed after World War II and also one of the first to retain as much surrounding vegetation as possible in case there was a need to camouflage the airfield and surrounding facilities. Hangars were built for the additional aircraft at the base, including the 250-by-600-foot (80 by 180 m) double cantilever hangar, one of the first built by the Air Force in response to a demand for more efficient maintenance space.
Loring was built on 14,300 acres (58 km2) of land, making it the biggest SAC base in the country. This in turn allowed for it to have the largest capacity for weapon storage and for fuel storage in all of SAC. The weapons storage capacity was the highest in all of SAC, 10,247,882 NEW (Net Explosive Weight), and it was first in all of SAC in fuel storage capacity (9,193,374 gallons). Fuel was delivered to the base via a 200-mile pipeline to Searsport, Maine. Ramp space at Loring exceeded 1.1 million square yards, which made it second among all SAC bases in total ramp space, and first in excess ramp space.
Deactivation
The 1991 Base Realignment and Closure Commission recommended that Loring be closed and its aircraft and mission be distributed to other bases in the nation. The base was closed in September 1994 after over 40 years of service.
Maine: A Hotspot for UFO Sightings
Maine is tied with New Hampshire for 5th place in 'States With The Highest Number Of UFO Sightings In The Nation?'
The number of UFOs being reported in Maine has been on the decline since 2020. During the pandemic, as folks ventured out into Nature a little more regularly, the number of sightings that year was up around 70. This year, the National UFO Reporting Center has that number at not quite 25 yet, and it's already October.
Either way, Maine has more unusual activity when it comes to the night sky than most of the other states in the nation.
Eyewitness Accounts
Franklin, Maine: Blinking Lights in a Blueberry Field
Sighted on Tuesday 20. Reported on Tuesday 20. My cousin, Kyle Pottle, and I, Daniel Morse Jr., left my house at approximately 23:15 hours in my Ford F150. We were en route to a blueberry field in Franklin, Maine. the field is parted by the George's Pond Road. we arrived around 23:35. we were going to the field to hunt coyotes. we were traveling northwest on the George's Pond Road when we noticed a "NO TRESPASSING" sign. road was icy so it took a little longer than normal to stop, and by the time i had stopped i passed the sign. so i backed up and positioned my truck to shine the headlights north to illuminate the sign so we could read the whole thing. immediately after reading the sign we noticed a steadily blinking light to the north.
We first thought it was a hunter already afield signaling to us to let us know that spot was occupied. so we watched for a few minutes. then it seemed like there were multiple lights that were moving, all the while blinking in a steady pattern, the light would flash on for about 1/3 second, then off for 1 second. then we shut off all the lights in the vehicle, figuring that if they were hunters they would stop signaling. the lights continued to pulse. it seemed like there were at least two separate lights. one appeared to have a yellow tint and the other had a faint orange tint. the lights would blink on in one location and while the light was off, it would instantly move to another location then flash back on. Kyle and I, both being UFO believers considered the possibility that it was an extraterrestrial craft.
We rolled the windows down and shut the vehicle down. we could hear no thing other than the wind. then i became very fearful and insisted we leave. as i was backing the vehicle down the road, kyle watched the lights. as he was watching he said he saw about seven lights flash on at once in a horizontal row. then we left the field. on our way to my home in Hancock,me, Kyle convinced me to go back. so on our way back to the field, we tried to call our friend Tim Sobel, who lives in Franklin, to see if he wanted to come with us. kyle's phone was getting very bad reception in an area which he normally got perfect reception. he tried calling but couldn't get so much as a ring. so we continued back to the field without Tim. when we went back to the field the lights were still blinking and watched them for a few more minutes. At 23:56 we left the field and went home, all the while Kyle watched his phone to see if his reception would improve. when we got to a hill that always has good reception he still had bad reception. so he shut his phone off. it would not turn on again. so he removed the battery and reinstalled it and his phone would turn on again. in the same location that showed only one bar of reception only a minute ago now showed a perfect four bars of reception.
Beddington Lake: Zigzagging Lights in the Sky
Myself, fiancé and our two children ages 7 and 10 were out on a night time 4 wheeler ride. We were at our camp on Beddington Lake and like to ride out to the blueberry fields to star gaze. We noticed a light that looked like maybe a star in the sky to our north zig zagging around. It looked to be over the area of Mopang Lake, north of route 9 in Beddington. It moved up and down, left to right at pretty fast speeds. It was able to change opposite directions at max speed. It would move north eventually disappearing from sight, only to come back a few minutes later. The family was terrified and wanted to go back to the camp but I insisted on staying to watch. After about 15 minutes of observing, my fiancé and son announced seeing another object to the East. It was a little bigger which I think means it was probably closer. It also appeared to have an orangish color to it. It too would zig zag around almost as if it were surveying an area. Both objects eventually moved off in the distance.
Exeter: A History of Unexplained Phenomena
Some believe there has been a continually utilized UFO window in the Exeter quadrant since the town's founding with a renewed interest and resurgence of "visitors" to the area.
The Exeter quadrangle (NW/4 Exeter 15') has long been a geographic location of extraordinary interest to researching ufologists and those who take UFO safaris about its hinterlands. But early colonial documentation reveals that Exeter's first English arrivals, the Rev. John Wheelwright and his band of antinomians, came with pre-existing notions of UFOs.
These new arrivals at the head of the river had no precognition of Exeter's future fame in ufology, but as Wiggin discovered, they arrived with an awareness of UFO occurrences, possible alien abductions and strange happenings.
Wiggin read in Winthrop's journal, "In this year (1639) one James Everell, a sober, discreet man, and two others, saw a great light in the night at Muddy River. When it stood still, it flamed up, and was about three yards square; when it ran it was contracted into the figure of a swine: it ran as swift as an arrow towards Charlton, and so up and down about two or three hours. They were come down in their lighter about a mile, and, when it was over, they found themselves carried quite back against the tide to the place they came from. Diverse other credible persons saw the same light, after, about the same place."
Rita Podalsky resides just outside Kensington center, in the middle of the Exeter quadrant and also in close proximity to Great Meadows. It was in the heavily wooded area near her home that the preschool teacher had a close encounter with Unidentified Flying Objects 31 years ago.
Podalsky reflected, "My daughter was seven at the time. The family was watching TV in the bedroom and the drapes were open to the big picture window." Podalsky and her husband noticed lights coming through the trees. The couple ran through the house and out the front door to the yard. "It looked like a big car with two bright headlights coming low and over the tops of the trees," said Podalsky. In actuality, the beams were from dual crafts, which Podalsky said were "slow and silent." They passed just over the rooftop and disappeared over the Kensington Church.
According to a source in Exeter, a group of blueberry pickers also observed a little being in the Epping Woods, across from the Star Speedway. The source, an Exeter engineer descended from an illustrious founding family (who stressed "for God's sake, don't use my name"), said the incident occurred before the highway was put in, when it was all woods.
"Blueberry pickers had gone into the woods and saw one of these creatures, about 3 feet tall, with alien features." The engineer said it was General Store-cracker barrel talk at the time, and a hot-button topic.
The engineer also told of the experiences of an Exeter High Street pillar of society, who around 1978, on more than one occasion, saw a round UFO hovering outside an upper story window. The woman, who lived a short distance from the PEA walking trails (and curiously close to the domed, PEA Grainger Astrological Observatory), could see the occupants inside the UFO, said the engineer. She became concerned after seeing the craft a number of times, but was ridiculed when she shared her experience. She vowed she would never speak of it again.
Nighttime UFO safaris have been particularly popular in the Exeter area quadrant, especially during UFO flaps.
The precedent for nighttime UFO safaris had been set by the "Incident at Exeter," when for weeks dozens of cars took nightly excursions to the notorious field. The owner of the land was forced to block off his property with wire and post "Keep Out" signs against the curiosity seekers, who littered the roadside with beer cans and cigarettes.
The bio-region of UFO interest encompasses lonely roads that wind through and past such places as Shaws Hill, Giles Hill, Hog Hill Swamp, Bugsmouth Hill, Wild Pasture Lane, Trundle Bed Lane and Stumpfield Road.
The heart of the region is bisected by Drinkwater Road. On the side opposite Great Meadows ("Incident") is another large swamp of marsh and mire known as The Cove. Two electrical power lines penetrate the interior of each swamp. The Cove is bounded to the east by Route 88, a vicinity of many UFO sightings.
It might be concluded that there has been a continually utilized UFO window in the Exeter quadrant since the town's founding. There are factors that may be leading to the renewed interest and resurgence of "visitors" to the area.