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The original was posted on /r/ufos by /u/PaddyMayonaise on 2024-09-14 21:14:20+00:00.
TL;DR: Man flying small cargo plane collide with an unidentified object in midair and crashed. The other object he collided with was never found. The official determination by the NTSB was a midair collision with an unknown object.
Thomas Preziose died on October 23, 2002 when the Cessna 208B Caravan he was piloting crashed in Alabama.
Preziose was flying the cargo plane with Mail and packages on board when his plane mysteriously crashed shortly after takeoff.
At the crash site, NTSB investigators found evidence of an air-to-air collision. They found red “transfer marks”, aka streaks on his plane suggesting a collision with another craft. They also found black anodized aluminum embedded in the exterior of his craft. Neither of these things could have been caused by his own craft.
The NTSB rules out freezing as a cause since the freezing altitude was way above his flying altitude.
The only known aircraft in his vicinity was a DC-10 that was 2 miles ahead of him and flying away from him at a faster speed than his own.
Despite this, Preziose claimed, “I got him above me right now.”
He then immediately called ATC stating, in repeat, stating, “I need to deviate. I need to deviate.”
He then went into an u controllable decline and crashed into a swamp.
What’s especially bizarre is that the transfer makes were found all over his airplane. It’s not like he was bumped, but something catastrophic happened. They even found the transfer marks within the landing gear wheel.
Here’s a part a lot do you will like.
The damaged parts were sent to Wright Patterson Air Force base in Ohio for evaluation.
While those parts were being evaluated, they ground the DC-10 and its air crew. Even though radar showed the two planes never came closer than a mile to each other, it was the top suspect in the cause of the crash. However, the investigation and analysis determined it had no role in the crash.
The emanated parts that were sent to WPAFB? They came back inconclusive. They could not identified what could have caused those transfer marks or where the black anodized aluminum came from.
Amongst the leading ideas and speculation for what caused the crash are a military drone or a drug smuggling plane. Both are doubted by NTSB officials, however, as if a crash did occur, it is likely the drone or the drug plane would have also crashed. Also, there is no known reason why a military drone would cause red transfer marks.
Additionally, some have speculated that Preziose’s plane was shot down by a missile, but there is absolutely nothing to substantiate that claim beyond the simple fact that it’s obvious something collided with his aircraft and there’s no evidence of another plane crashing.
Some have claimed that the red transfer marks were caused by the barge the plane was stored on after crashing, but the NTSB does not concur.
So what did the NTSB officially conclude was the cause in their report?
They concluded that Preziose’s Cessna 208B Caravan collided in-flight with an unknown object.
Some links for reference:
The official public NTSB Investigation Report.
Years later the NTSB updated their report to call it “pilot error”