BOSTON UP — Nineteen men aboard Texas Tower II off Cape Cod Wednesday night sighted an unidentified object which sank before a boat arrived to make an investigation, the Coast Guard reported Thursday.
The tower, 130 miles east of Chatham, once was part of the early warning radar defense network but has since been abandoned and now is being dismantled under contract.
The Coast Guard offered no explanation for the object. It said a plane from Quonset Point, R. I., Naval Air Station searched the area for more than an hour but found no debris.
The object was sighted by the dismantling crew between 7.15 and 7.35 p.m., the Coast Guard said.
“They sent a boat out to investigate but the object sank before it could get to the scene,” a spokesman said.
“They said it had a controlled white light and smoke appeared on the surface and seemed like steam.”
BOSTON UP — Nineteen men aboard Texas Tower II off Cape Cod Wednesday night sighted an unidentified object which sank before a boat arrived to make an investigation, the Coast Guard reported Thursday.
The tower, 130 miles east of Chatham once was part of the early warning radar defense net work but has since been abandoned and now is being dismantled under contract.
The Coast Guard offered no explanation for the object. It said a plane from Quonset Point, R.I., Naval Air Station searched the area for more than an hour but found no debris.
The object was sighted by the dismantling crew between 7:15 and 7.35 p.m. the Coast Guard said.
“They say visibility was excellent,” a Coast Guard spokesman said, “and all 19 men, including the foreman, who is Patrick Laureno of 168 Retford Ave., Staten Island. NY, saw it for 20 minutes.
“They sent a boat out to investigate but the object sank before it could get to the scene.
“They say it had a controlled white light and smoke appeared on the surface and seemed like steam.
“This was estimated about three miles southeast of the tower.
“They searched for 15 minutes and found no debris, so when they notified us we sent a plane, which searched from 8:40 to 9:46 and they found nothing. They dropped flares to search the area but found no debris.”
The spokesman said the tower personnel, amplifying the first report, “say the only vessels in the area were on the horizon far from this spot.”
