FAA.
JULIO MIGUEL GUERRA became a pilot with the Portuguese Air Force in 1973 and was an operations officer specializing in accident prevention at Ota Air Base. In 1990 he began flying commercially with Air Atlantis, a charter of Portugal’s national airline TAP, Air Columbus, and Air Atlanta, piloting Boeing 737-200/300 jets. Since 1997, he has been a Line Captain for Portugalia Airlines. He is also a private flight instructor and an examiner for the Joint Aviation Authorities, a European body developing and implementing common safety regulatory standards. With 18,000 hours of flight time, Captain Guerra received an Aeronautic Science Degree from Lusofona University in 2009.
RICHARD F. HAINES is a senior research scientist who worked at NASA–Ames Research Center from 1967 to 1988 on projects such as Gemini, Apollo, Skylab, and the International Space Station, and managed the Joint FAA/NASA Head-up Display Evaluation Program. He was appointed Chief of the Space Human Factors Office at NASA–Ames in 1986. Dr. Haines has published more than seventy-five papers in leading scientific journals and over twenty-five U.S. government reports for NASA. Since retiring in 1988, he worked as a senior research scientist for the Research Institute for Advanced Computer Science, RECOM Technologies, Inc., and Raytheon Corporation. Currently, he serves as Chief Scientist for the National Aviation Reporting Center on Anomalous Phenomena (NARCAP).
CHARLES I. HALT was a Lieutenant Colonel when he was assigned to RAF Bentwaters, England—the largest Tactical Fighter Wing in the U.S. Air Force—as Deputy Base Commander and then as Base Commander. After becoming a full Colonel, he was Base Commander at Kunsan Air Base in Korea, the F-16 base responsible for any offensive action required on the Korean peninsula, and also was instrumental in establishing the Cruise Missile Base in Belgium. Finally, he served as Director, Inspections Directorate, for the DoD Inspector General, with total inspection oversight of the entire Department of Defense. Colonel Halt retired in 1991 and now manages a large gated community.
OSCAR SANTA MARIA HUERTAS was a jet fighter pilot with the Peruvian Air Force (FAP) for many years, with flying experience in T-41D, T-37, A-80, T-33, A-37, MB-399, and SU-22 aircraft. He was stationed in numerous military bases throughout Peru and was chief of the Academic Department and a flight instructor in the Officers School of the FAP. Santa Maria also spent eleven years in the Air Force Accident Prevention and Investigation Department. He retired with the rank of comandante (equivalent to a colonel) in 1997 but remains active, currently working as a consultant in Flight Safety and Accident Prevention for the airline industry in Peru.
PARVIZ JAFARI is a retired General of the Iranian Air Force. After joining the Air Force, he spent two years training in the United States, at Lackland Air Force Base in Texas, Craig AFB in Alabama, and Nellis AFB in Nevada. In his country, Jafari served as a base commander for several bases and an Air Force Headquarters operations officer. As a General, Jafari became the coordinating officer between the Iranian Army, Navy, and Air Force. He retired in 1989 and lives in Tehran.
DENIS LETTY is a well-known fighter pilot and Major General in the French Air Force. He was head of the Fifth Fighter Wing, Strasbourg Air Base, French Air Force South East Defense Zone, and the French Military Mission near Allied Air Forces Central Europe. As a commander, he was decorated with the Legion of Honor. After retiring, General Letty served as president of the joint venture company Aviation Defense Service, which provided electronic warfare training for the armed forces. He also became chairman of the COMETA group, a private, in-depth fact- finding committee formed to study the UFO phenomenon, which published the report “UFOs and Defense” in 1999.
JAMES PENNISTON entered the Air Force in 1973 and was assigned to the Strategic Air Command Elite Guard in Omaha, Nebraska, working security for the SAC Command Post. Subsequent assignments took him to RAF Alconbury in England and Malmstrom Air Force Base in Montana, as a Flight Security Controller for the protection and launch readiness of Minuteman ICBMs. In 1980, he was placed in charge of Security Police Plans and Programs at RAF Bentwaters, England. Numerous other assignments followed, including service in Desert Shield and Desert Storm. He retired from the military in 1993 and now works as a Human Resource Manager for manufacturing and county government in Illinois.
JOSE CARLOS PEREIRA is a Brazilian four-star Brigadier General, now retired. He was a commander of several air bases in Brazil and commander of the Brazilian Air Force Academy. In 1999, he became a commander of the Brazilian Airspace Defense Command, known as COMDABRA. From 2001 to 2005, he served as General Commander of Air Force Operations, which required his supervision of thirteen generals and 27,000 subordinates. In 2006, after retiring from the Air Force, Brigadier General Pereira was appointed President of the Brazilian Airport Infrastructure Agency, the government agency responsible for airport management, from which he has now retired.
JOHN PODESTA was the White House Chief of Staff to President William J. Clinton. He also served in the president’s cabinet and as a principal on the National Security Council. Most recently, he was a co-chair of President Obama’s transition team, for which he coordinated the priorities of the incoming administration’s agenda, oversaw the development of its policies, and spearheaded its appointments of major cabinet secretaries and political appointees. Since 2003, he has been the President and CEO of the Center for American Progress, a leading organization in the development of and advocacy for progressive policy. Podesta is the author of
NICK POPE worked for the British Ministry of Defence for twenty-one years, from 1985 to 2006. His career involved postings to policy, operations, personnel, finance, and security divisions. During the first Gulf War he was recruited into the Joint Operations Center, where he worked in the Air Force Operations Room as a watchkeeper/briefer. From 1991 to 1994, Pope’s primary duty was to investigate reports of unidentified flying objects and assess whether any sightings were of defense interest. Various promotions followed, and his last posting was to the Directorate of Defence Security. Now retired, Nick Pope works as a freelance journalist and broadcaster.
RICARDO BERMUDEZ SANHUEZA is a retired General for the Chilean Air Force who served as Chilean Air Attache in London and was Chief Commander of the Air Force’s Southern Area. He was also Director of the Technical School of Aeronautics. In 1998, he co-founded the Committee for the Study of Anomalous Aerial Phenomena (CEFAA), a branch of the General Administration of Civil Aeronautics, Chile’s FAA, to study aviation incidents involving anomalous aerial phenomena. He was appointed first President of the CEFAA and served until 2002. In January 2010, he was reinstated as Director of the CEFAA and now works full-time investigating UFO incidents involving civil or military aeronautic personnel.
FIFE SYMINGTON III was the Republican Governor of Arizona from 1991 to 1997. He was also Chairman of the Western Governors’ Association. A decorated Air Force veteran of the war in Southeast Asia, Symington is a cousin of the late Stuart Symington, Democratic Senator from Missouri. After leaving office, Mr. Symington co- founded the Arizona Culinary Institute and the Symington Group, a strategic, political, and business consulting company. In 2007, he and his partners founded the Independent Energy Group of Arizona, which specializes in the development of commercial solar arrays. A long-time pilot, he frequently flies his twin-engine Beechcraft Baron plane between his two homes in Phoenix and Santa Barbara, California.
JEAN-JACQUES VELASCO was an engineer at the French National Center for Space Studies (Centre Nationale d’Etudes Spatiales, CNES), specializing in satellite research. In 1977, he joined a new French team formed to study unidentified aerospace phenomena within CNES. He became the director of this agency in 1983, and remained in that position until 2004, becoming an international authority on the scientific study of UFOs. His advice was sought by countries wishing to establish their own government agencies to investigate UFOs, such as Chile and Peru, and by the European parliament in 1994. He is the author of several books on the subject of UFOs.
ALEXANDER WENDT is Mershon Professor of International Security at the Ohio State University. Previously, he taught at Yale University, Dartmouth College, and the University of Chicago. He is interested in philosophical aspects of international politics, and has published a number of articles in leading political science journals, as well as a 1999 book,
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
