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The term foo fighter was used by Allied aircraft pilots in World War II to describe various UFOs or mysterious aerial phenomena seen in the skies over both the European and Pacific theaters of operations. Though "foo fighter" initially described a type of UFO reported and named by the U.S. 415th Night Fighter Squadron, the term was also commonly used to mean any UFO sighting from that period. Formally reported from November 1944 onwards, witnesses often assumed that the foo fighters were secret weapons employed by the enemy. The Robertson Panel explored possible explanations, for instance that they were electrostatic phenomena similar to St. Elmo's fire, electromagnetic phenomena, or simply reflections of light from ice crystals.〔(Report of Scientific Advisory Panel on Unidentifed Flying Objects convened by Office of Scientific Intelligence, CIA January 14–18, 1953 )〕 == Etymology == The nonsense word "foo" emerged in popular culture during the early 1930s, first being used by cartoonist Bill Holman who peppered his ''Smokey Stover''〔See for instance; Holman, "Smokey Stover – A Dead Ringer", ''Daily News'', 21 November 1938, (retrieved 6 Feb 2009 ) or, Holman, "Smokey Stover – Movie Idle", ''Daily News'', 23 November 1938, (retrieved 6 Feb 2009 )〕 fireman cartoon strips with "foo" signs and puns.〔Moira Davison Reynolds, ''Comic Strip Artists in American Newspapers, 1945–1980'', p94, McFarland, 2003 ISBN 0-7864-1551-7.〕〔Coulton Waugh, ''The Comics'', p316, Univ. Press of Mississippi, 1991 ISBN 0-87805-499-5 (modern reprint first published 1947).〕〔(RFC3092 – Etymology of "Foo" ), Internet Society, 2001〕 The term foo was borrowed from Bill Holman's ''Smokey Stover'' by a radar operator in the 415th Night Fighter Squadron, Donald J. Meiers, who it is agreed by most 415th members gave the foo fighters their name. Meiers was from Chicago and was an avid reader of Bill Holman's strip which was run daily in the ''Chicago Tribune''. Smokey Stover's catch phrase was "where there's foo, there's fire". In a mission debriefing on the evening November 27, 1944, Fritz Ringwald, the unit's S-2 Intelligence Officer, stated that Meiers and Ed Schleuter had sighted a red ball of fire that appeared to chase them through a variety of high-speed maneuvers. Fritz said that Meiers was extremely agitated and had a copy of the comic strip tucked in his back pocket. He pulled it out and slammed it down on Fritz's desk and said, "... it was another one of those fuckin' foo fighters!" and stormed out of the debriefing room.〔Jeffery A Lindell, 1991. "Interviews with Harold Augspurger, Commander 415th Night Fighter Squadron; Frederic Ringwald, S-2 Intelligence Officer, 415th Night Fighter Squadron〕 According to Fritz Ringwald, because of the lack of a better name, it stuck. And this was originally what the men of the 415th started calling these incidents: "Fuckin' Foo Fighters." In December 1944, a press correspondent from the Associated Press in Paris, Bob Wilson, was sent to the 415th at their base outside of Dijon, France to investigate this story.〔''New York Times''. "Balls of Fire Stalk U.S. Fighters in Night Assaults Over Germany." (A.P.) 2 Jan.1945. p.1, 4.〕 It was at this time that the term was cleaned up to just "foo fighters". The unit commander, Capt. Harold Augsperger, also decided to shorten the term to foo fighters in the unit's historical data.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Foo fighter」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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