Jonathan Weygandt's Peru crash claim
From the UAP Encyclopedia, the open encyclopedia of UFO and UAP history · 🗓️ Event
Contents 9
| Witness | Jonathan (listed also as John) Weygandt, former U.S. Marine lance corporal, Stinger/Avenger air-defence gunner |
|---|---|
| Place | Peru, near a radar station supported by the counter-drug operation "Laser Strike" |
| Date | Late March or early April 1997 |
| Claim | An egg- or teardrop-shaped craft about 20 m long, buried in a cliff and leaking a purple-green fluid; he was then detained and threatened |
| His theory | The craft had been shot down by a HAWK missile |
| Recorded | Interview with Steven Greer, October 2000; Disclosure Project Briefing Document (2001) |
| Evidence | None beyond his account |
| Topics | Crashes & retrievals (topic), Secrecy & cover-up (topic) |
| People | Jonathan Weygandt, Steven Greer |
| Testimony | Shellenberger testimony, p. 127 |
| Year | 1997 in UFO history |
| Timeline | 1997 on the UAP Timeline |
| Sources | 9 |
Jonathan Weygandt, a former U.S. Marine lance corporal, told Steven Greer's Disclosure Project in October 2000 about events in Peru in 1997. While deployed there on a counter-drug mission, he said, he came upon a crashed egg-shaped craft embedded in a cliff. He was then detained, interrogated and threatened by unidentified men.[1] His account was printed in the project's 2001 briefing document and circulates widely as a video interview.[1][4] No records support it.[1]
Background
Weygandt's service record, as he described it:[1]
- Enlistment. He enlisted through the delayed-entry programme in July 1994, while still in high school, and finished training on 8 September 1995 as an infantryman.
- Air defence. From January 1996 he retrained as a Stinger/Avenger air-defence gunner. In June 1996 he joined Battery B of the 2nd air defense battalion, 28th Marine Air Control Group, 2nd Marine Aircraft Wing, in North Carolina.
- Peru. In February 1997 he volunteered for a section supporting "Laser Strike", and in March it shipped out to Peru. The detachment provided perimeter security for a radar station that, "supposedly", tracked drug aircraft moving in and out of Peruvian and Bolivian airspace.[1][3]
The craft
Weygandt's account of the night:[1]
- The call. Around 11 p.m. or midnight, Sergeants Allen and Atkinson said an aircraft, "possibly friendly", had crashed and the site needed securing. The section set out at 3 or 4 a.m. in five or six Humvees, then hiked through the bush, arriving around dawn.
- The gash. They found "a huge gash in the land". Trees were burned through, not broken, "like something had almost cut warm butter with a knife".
- The ship. Weygandt and the two sergeants, ahead of the others, found the craft buried at about 45 degrees in the side of a 200-foot rock ridge. He estimated it at about 10 metres wide and 20 metres long, "between an egg and a teardrop". It was non-reflective, with "bumps and notches", and looked "almost like art".
- The fluid. A syrupy greenish-purple liquid, whose shade seemed to shift, dripped everywhere. It discoloured and "ate" his uniform like acid, and some of the hair on his arms.
- The details. One light slowly rotated. A deep bass hum fluctuated and then cut off. At the rear were gill-like vents, and three hatch-like openings sat a few inches below the hull surface, one half open.
- A presence. He felt a "presence" calming him and trying to communicate "telepathically". He wanted to go inside to help, until the sergeants shouted at him to get out.
He said only he and the two sergeants saw the ship. The rest of the eight-to-ten-man section saw only the crash path.[1]
Detention
When they climbed back up, Weygandt said, people he took to be from the Department of Energy were already there.[1] What followed, in his account:[1]
- Arrest. Older men in black fatigues without name tags took his gear, cuffed his hands and tied his legs, and put him aboard what he called "this huge 47". People in containment suits had also arrived.
- Threats. "You weren't supposed to be there… You are going to be dangerous if we let you go." An unidentified Air Force lieutenant colonel said, "If we just took you out in the jungle, they would never find you", and told him to sign papers saying "this situation never happened".
- Interrogation. In a room with a light in his face, for many hours, a man he recognized from the site asked whether he liked the Constitution and said, "We are on our own program. We don't obey." He was threatened that "we will do you and your whole goddamn family." He was not struck, he said, but was held without food or water for a day.
- Segregation. He was held with Air Force personnel for about three weeks at a base where he saw Chinese, Germans and other nationalities.
Back in the United States, he said, Sergeant Allen threw him out of his house rather than discuss it.[1]
The radar station
Weygandt believed the craft had been brought down by a HAWK surface-to-air missile, whose proximity-fused fragmentation warhead does not need a direct hit. He had seen "big gashes" in the rear of the craft.[1] He gave reasons for thinking the station knew of such craft:[1]
- Overheard talk. While checking IDs at the command bunker, he heard two Air Force women discussing aircraft "coming in and out of the atmosphere" at "mach ten plus".
- Logbooks. An Air Force officer collected the logbooks of such tracks three or four times while he was on duty.
- His suspicion. He wondered whether the station's real purpose was tracking UFOs, with drug interdiction as cover, and mentioned laser range-finders that rose out of a bunker.
"I am not doing this to make money or publicity," he said.[1]
Publicity
The Disclosure Project's briefing document headlined his quotations about the threats. Greer's editorial note likened them to threats reportedly made to Glen Dennis at Roswell.[1] The document was distributed at Greer's press conference at the National Press Club on 9 May 2001, where about twenty witnesses spoke.[6][7] ABC News reported that the group called for congressional hearings and that Greer claimed some 400 willing witnesses.[2][5] One later account said the press covered the event "with frolicsome derision", and no hearings followed.[7]
Video of his full interview, posted as "Full Interview - Lance Corporal Jonathan Weygandt (1997)", has circulated widely.[4][9] In 2025 the newsletter The Political Saucer published an analysis "mapping" his claims; only its opening is freely readable.[3] A Medium post on the case refused automated access.[8]
Assessment
No records support the crash, the recovery or Weygandt's detention, and neither sergeant he named has corroborated him.[1] By his own account, one of them refused to talk about it. The general setting is plausible, since U.S. forces supported counter-drug radar operations in Peru under "Laser Strike". But the account rests entirely on his testimony, recorded three years after the events.[1][3]
People and topics
- Jonathan Weygandt — Former Marine who claimed he guarded a crashed craft in Peru.
- Steven Greer — Physician who founded CSETI and the Disclosure Project.
- Disclosure Project — Steven Greer's campaign for UFO disclosure, best known for its May 2001 press conference.
On the Timeline
- Corso's doubts about autopsy reports (1997) (13 January 1997) — Philip Corso tells Vallée he may have received disinformation about alien autopsies.
- Boyd Bushman magnetic beam patent (17 April 1997) — Lockheed scientist Boyd Bushman patents a magnetic device.
See every 1997 event on the UAP Timeline →
References
- Disclosure Project Briefing Document (2001), Internet Archive (PDF) · archive.org · archived copy
- "Group calls for disclosure of UFO info", ABC News (May 2001) · abcnews.com · archived copy
- "The Marine who saw a crash site", The Political Saucer (May 2025) · politicalsaucer.substack.com · archived copy
- "Full interview — Lance Corporal Jonathan Weygandt (1997)", YouTube · youtu.be · archived copy
- 'Group calls for disclosure of UFO info' — ABC News (2001) · abcnews.go.com · archived copy
- Greer's Disclosure Project — Patrick Gross · ufology.patrickgross.org · archived copy
- A historian on the Disclosure Project — History News Network · historynewsnetwork.org · archived copy
- UFO crash in Peru 1997 — Medium · medium.com · archived copy
- youtu.be · youtu.be · archived copy
This page was last edited on 29 October 2026. Articles are written in our own words from the sources listed under References; disputed claims are attributed to the people who made them.
No discussion yet.