The Missile Shutdowns

1. On the morning of March 16, 1967, all ten Minuteman nuclear missiles at Malmstrom’s Echo Flight suddenly go offline. Air Force records confirm the shutdown.
2. Former launch officer Robert Salas says that on another night, guards at his site reported a glowing reddish-orange object hovering over the front gate, rifles drawn, just before his own ten missiles were disabled.
3. Air Force and Boeing engineers traced the Echo shutdown to an electronic ‘noise pulse’, and the unit history says UFO rumors were ‘disproven’. Echo’s two launch officers say no UFO was involved, and Air Force records list no shutdown at Salas’s flight.
4. In 2025, The Wall Street Journal reported that Pentagon investigators had traced such stories to secret Air Force tests of a device that simulated an electromagnetic pulse and could glow orange. Salas rejects that explanation.

Key witnesses: Robert Salas (launch officer); Capt. Eric Carlson and Lt. Walter Figel (Echo Flight) dispute the UFO account
Status: DEBATED