TIME Magazine content is available exclusively for TIME subscribers.

Current subscribers for full access. Not a TIME subscriber? .

Science: Foo-Fighter

If it was not a hoax or an optical illusion, it was certainly the most puzzling secret weapon that Allied fighters have yet encountered. Last week U.S. night fighter pilots based in France told a strange story of balls of fire which for more than a month have been following their planes at night over Germany.* No one seemed to know what, if anything, the fireballs were supposed to accomplish. Pilots, guessing that it was a new psychological weapon, named it the "foo-fighter."

Their descriptions of the apparition varied, but they agreed that the...

Time.com on Digg

POWERED BY digg

Quotes of the Day »

DAVID CAMERON, British Prime Minister, on England's soccer manager, Fabio Capello, who resigned after challenging the FA's decision to strip John Terry of the captaincy; Terry denies a charge of racially abusing QPR's Anton Ferdinand
For use in rail of Articles page or Section Fronts pages. Duplicate and change name as necesssary to distinguish.