Retired Air Force Officer Claims UFO Encounter Disabled Nuclear Missiles

A retired US Air Force launch officer believes he encountered UFOs that disabled multiple nuclear missiles during his service at a Montana base years ago.

Robert Salas, who is now 85, asserts that a mysterious phenomenon disrupted the control of ten Minuteman I missiles, equipped with nuclear warheads, at Malmstrom Air Force Base in 1967.

On March 24, 1967, while he and his partner were in an underground control room, security guards reported seeing an unidentified aircraft. It was around 10 p.m., and the tension was palpable.

Salas recounted the moment when a lead security guard informed him, “Sir, there’s a strange light in the sky flying directly overhead.” Initially skeptical, he dismissed it as a prank—until the guard called back in distress.

“He’s screaming. He’s babbling. He’s scared,” Salas remembered, reflecting on the urgency in the guard’s voice. After calming him down, the guard described a strange craft hovering over the base, emitting a “pulsating reddish light.”

As the guard inquired about the next steps, Salas told him to do whatever necessary. Then, in a concerning twist, the guard mentioned that one of his teammates was “injured” before abruptly ending the call.

Upon that, Salas woke his partner, and suddenly, an alarm blared from the air traffic control system, signaling an issue with the missile. He saw one missile “go from green to red,” indicating it was no longer operable. “Right after that, bing, bing, all 10 of us fell down. They were all bright red,” he explained.

They quickly reviewed their checklist, finding that two launch sites, spaced miles apart, indicated possible unauthorized access to the secured missile area.

Salas dispatched security to investigate further and spotted a light hovering over a launch site. “They were scared to death,” he said of his team’s reaction. They hesitated to proceed, feeling fear toward the hovering objects.

Later reports suggested the injured guard may have hurt himself either while trying to unjam his rifle or cutting his hand on barbed wire during the incident. It was revealed that security personnel had seen the aircraft reverse direction and perform a silent 90-degree turn just days before this event.

A former official from the missile unit shared that an investigation led by Boeing was unable to determine what caused the missiles to lose functionality, stressing that the system was designed to prevent such interference.

“They had no idea how this signal was injected into each missile,” he said, adding that the communication cables used were highly shielded against electromagnetic disruptions.

Salas expressed a belief that an advanced civilization visited Earth to prevent a nuclear catastrophe. “Another civilization out there is visiting us and is concerned that we will destroy this planet by nuclear war,” he theorized. “There are many reasons for that, and perhaps we don’t even understand why.”

Following the encounter, Air Force investigators required Salas and his commander to sign strict non-disclosure agreements, warning them of potential prison time for discussing the incident. Years later, Salas discovered similar accounts in a UFO book and felt compelled to share his own experience, which he ultimately published.