William E. Smith Interview, 25 August 2001(b)

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JK:This is the same site that had the alarms?
WS:Yes. The team had gone to check it out. And he indicated that he had found a low-level type of radiation on the site, and so I was concerned about that of course because he had indicated that it was not where the missile was, but was off to the—I'm trying to think what they called it, the support part of the site where you—it's graveled area. I want to say just a huge parking lot essentially is what it was.
TT:Within the perimeter fence?
WS:Yes. It was inside the perimeter fence and was somewhat elevated on the actual sites; everything was contained within the fence. The access road, of course, was outside the fence, but when you got there, you opened up and the fence just went down a little bit, everything was somewhat elevated I'm sure for drainage and everything sort of set up a little bit, but then there was a huge area for parking and that's where he said he found the radiation. He said it was a large circular pattern of radiation. He did indicate that.
JK:I would think it would be tight to land a helicopter in there.
WS:I know they would take somebody out by helicopter and drop them off from time to time. It's elevated and raised, so once you set that thing down, got the people out you could take off without a problem. All of the security part was much removed from that. We had many times set up the security on the site while vehicles were still on the site itself because it didn't cover everything. It just covered the part where the missile was and the entry part, and parts of the missile, so there was a large parking area off to the side, but it was big enough to land an aircraft.

[Responding to questions regarding his the work environment at Minot AFB].

WS:As a matter of fact, I don't think I worked at that site very long come to think of it. I think right after that—I was telling you about how I went to the Standardization Team. I think fairly soon after that I left and, let's see this is October 24th so I think I became Standardization personnel later than that. But if I'm not mistaken, they moved us around too, you know I went to Mike [Flight] for a while, and I was at Oscar, then Lima. I worked three sites while I was there and when they need to train someone, or to be the person in charge they moved you around. So on many occasions, I just met the guys, they worked for me and that was about it, so we didn't have long-lasting relationship in many cases.
TT:Were impressed by this event?
WS:It had an impact on me that even in my classes from time to time when we talk about various things that happen, they say, "Well, do you believe in UFOs?" I don't discount that could be a possibility because I think I've had a significant event happen in my life that shows me that anything is possible. People will tell me "Well, you probably didn't see anything," and that may be true, but I know I saw something that I can't explain, that's not explained by the normal parameter of things that normally happen in my rational mind so therefore, I have to leave it open as a possibility. And so, I didn't see enough. I'd loved to have seen more to be able to report, but what I saw was not, uh, and the events that happened around me let me know that I don't control all that I need to know about these things, and so I respect it. Very definitely, it was a changing event in my life.

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