One of the original Mercury Seven astronauts, pilot of Faith 7 in 1963 and commander of Gemini 5, and the most senior American astronaut to describe unexplained objects on the record.
What he described
Formations of metallic discs over Germany in 1951 while he was flying F-86s, at altitudes he said were above the service ceiling of any fighter of the period; and a daylight landing at Edwards Air Force Base in 1957 filmed by a camera crew he had sent out, with the film forwarded up the chain and, on his account, never seen again. He put the second account in writing in a letter to the United Nations in 1978.
The evidential position
Cooper never claimed to have seen anything from orbit, and he is often misquoted as having done so; Glenn’s Fireflies and the STS-80 Object Sequence are separate matters. What his account rests on is his own recollection, and the Edwards film has never surfaced. The Day After Roswell relays claims about it at second hand and without citation, which is the weakest form the story takes.
Connections
The Day After Roswell · Glenn’s Fireflies · STS-80 Object Sequence · Edgar Mitchell · Philip J. Corso