FILE: MTNCIRC.TXT AUTHOR: Unknown DATE: Unknown SUBJECT: Circles in the Appalachain Mountains ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I would like to inform my fellow researchers with some curious and valuable information I have gained through the years living in the mountains of southwest Virginia. For years the Air Force has flown countless training missions in the Appalachian mountains without any formal declaration to the people of this area. For years the F-4s have used these mountains as a playground and tactical training area . The sightings of training missions range from large transports practicing for air drops over the small town of Pound Virginia to treetop level dog fights . There is never any public admittance that this area (specifically Wise, Scott, Lee and Russell counties in Virginia) is designated a training ground for the Air Force. The people don't really mind, in fact most of us feel privileged to have the government involved in our area. The citizens of this area have gotten use to being waken up to the sound of F-4s ripping over their house at 3AM in the morning. There have only been a handful of accidents over the years and as far as I know civilians have never been affected. You are probably saying "so what" the military trains in mountains all over the country. Well friends I haven't told you the half of it yet. Having so much military traffic in our skies for so long we become accustomed to seeing strange sights in the night sky. There have been several important sightings and occurrences in this region including the events at Wytheville, Virginia which gained national attention. The incident I will report on is the most significant to me personally. In the summer of 1987 I was living on the family farm "Horse Gap" on Rt. 23 outside of Pound, Virginia. When returning home from work late one evening, I noticed several sets of lights coming at high across a small ridge on the north end of the farm. I was not use to seeing jets at night lit up so brightly, usually they ran with no lights for training purposes. At an altitude of about 750' they passed over me at just below mach 1. You learn to judge the relative speed from years of sonic booms and low level passes. As they passed over there was no doubt they were jets by the roar of the engines. The only confusing part was the very bright lights that didn't seem to be standard equipment of the planes usually spotted in this area. The same night at about 11:30PM another jet or group of jets passed over our house. The exact direction was impossible to determine as they were out of sight by the time I could run outside. The excitement of this soon passed and after telling a few people who were interested in the training flights I forgot all about it. The next references to time elapsed is my best guess, I didn't see at the time any reason to make a date of unusual sighting. Approximately 10 days later I discovered a ring in an unkept field about 275 yards from our house. The date was July 19, 1987. After examining the ring and feeling confident it was the genuine article and not made by animals or a hoax, I called two friends who had been to several of these circles before. They confirmed it fit the bill. The grass (4') was bent in a counter clockwise direction but not crushed. The spiral pattern had a definite center and a diameter of between 12-14m. Over the next few days the grass turned brown but didn't die, it recovered and continued to grow.