CRASH AT CORONA

Long-awaited report by Friedman, a nuclear physicist and well- known UFO buff, and Berliner (Want a Job? Get Some Experience. Want Experience? Get a Job, 1978) on the most controversial UFO case in US history: the purported crash of a saucer, complete with aliens, on July 3, 1947, near Corona, New Mexico. The ostensible crash and subsequent government coverup have received much attention over the years, notably in a 1980 bestseller by Charles Berlitz (Roswell Incident) and a novel by Whitley Strieber (Majestic, 1989). What do Friedman and Berliner add to the tale? High melodrama, with tinges of 1950's sci-fi and Red-menace movies (``Man had just come face to face with beings from another world,'' the authors declaim, said encounter being buried by ``brilliant covering-up by the entire American government''). Lots of reports from first- and second-hand witnesses, who remember seeing alien corpses and handling bits of mysterious, hieroglyphic-covered metallic foil. An intriguing theory of a second crash several miles away. A pointless description of the crash site today. Attempts to shore up ``documents'' about the crash (the so-called ``Majestic-12'' papers) that most UFO researchers reject as fakes. And last but not least, a subtext of embarrassing infighting among UFO researchers, who will win no awards for scholarly detachment. No great shakes, but a decent updating of Berlitz's report. Corona, New Mexico, still awaits its Schliemann, or at least its Jim Garrison; ufology still awaits its Homer. (Photographs—not seen.)