Michael Collins

PersonWitness

Michael Collins

PersonWitness

Michael Collins was the Apollo 11 command module pilot who orbited the Moon alone in 1969; his crew's debriefing on an object seen en route resurfaced in the 2026 UFO files.

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Michael Collins (1930–2021) was an American Air Force test pilot and NASA astronaut who flew Gemini 10 and served as command module pilot of Apollo 11, circling the Moon alone in Columbia while Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin made the first landing in July 1969. He later became director of the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum. His connection to UAP history is the Apollo 11 crew's post-flight account of an object they could not immediately identify on the way to the Moon.

Collins was born in Rome on October 31, 1930, where his father was serving as the American military attaché. He graduated from West Point in 1952, flew F-86 Sabre fighters with an Air Force wing in France, and entered the Air Force's experimental test pilot school at Edwards Air Force Base in 1960, later completing the Aerospace Research Pilot School. NASA selected him in October 1963 as one of its third group of astronauts. On Gemini 10 in July 1966, flying with John Young, he became the first person to make two spacewalks on a single mission. In 1968 he was moved off the Apollo 8 prime crew, with Jim Lovell taking his place, and served as a capsule communicator for that flight instead.

Apollo 11 launched on July 16, 1969. Collins kept Columbia in lunar orbit while Armstrong and Aldrin landed in Eagle, and the three men splashed down in the Pacific on July 24. He left NASA in 1970, served as Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs until April 1971 and then directed the National Air and Space Museum, whose building opened on July 1, 1976, before becoming a Smithsonian undersecretary in 1978. He rose to major general in the Air Force Reserve. His 1974 memoir, Carrying the Fire, is often described as the best account any astronaut has written. He passed away in Naples, Florida, on April 28, 2021, at 90.

In the crew's technical debriefing of July 31, 1969, the three men described a bright object they had watched during the flight out, which they tried to match against the spent S-IVB rocket stage and recorded without a firm conclusion. Aldrin later said he was "absolutely convinced" they had seen sunlight reflecting off one of the panels that separated from the rocket stage, adding, "It was not an alien."

That debriefing was re-released in May 2026 in the Department of War's first PURSUE release. UFO accounts on X presented it as confirmation that the Apollo 11 astronauts had seen UFOs and claimed the crew had looked shaken on their return, although the release itself made no finding about the object. Collins's lasting place in history is as the astronaut who kept the command module ready in lunar orbit during the first landing, and as the museum director and memoirist who did much to explain spaceflight to the public.

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Interstellar

@InterstellarUAP · May 11

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Buzz Aldrin: "We saw something moving alongside us... it was a UFO" 👀🛸👽 NASA Apollo 11 crew saw an L-shaped object in their telescope. They didn't report it openly to avoid causing alarm. After the incredible Apollo 11 Technical Briefing was released this week as part of The UFO Files declassification - This testimony makes more sense. What do you think they really saw? [Quoted] 🚨 **Incredible** NASA Apollo 11 UFO Report From Buzz Aldrin, Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins 👽🛸👀 **Apollo 11...

Interstellar

@InterstellarUAP · May 9

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https://t.co/QUywuLUx6a [Quoted] 🚨 **Incredible** NASA Apollo 11 UFO Report From Buzz Aldrin, Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins 👽🛸👀 **Apollo 11 Technical Crew Debriefing — July 31, 1969** Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin & Michael Collins describe seeing a mysterious “Brighter object” tumbling past their https://t.co/jl1NsrIjMg

/u/Goose_Rocket26

May 9

socialr/

Found interesting mission transcripts on NASAs website that I am not sure people are currently aware of, I made another post earlier with more. All of these transcripts are at https://www.nasa.gov/history/mission-transcripts-mercury-gemini-and-apollo/ Gemini 10 — Mike Collins, July 1966 (Sighting One) Source: gt10-tec.pdf, pages 30–31 Collins: "Hey, I see stars! No, I see a bogey. Look out here, John." Young: "You get your head back in that cockpit!" Collins: "Look! There's a light up there....

Interstellar

@InterstellarUAP · May 8

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RT @InterstellarUAP: 🚨 **Incredible** NASA Apollo 11 UFO Report From Buzz Aldrin, Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins 👽🛸👀 **Apollo 11 Technica…

Interstellar

@InterstellarUAP · May 8

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🇺🇸 Today we learned that NASA Apollo 11 Astronauts saw UFO’s during their journey to the moon in 1969 🛸 🧑‍🚀 Neil Armstrong 🧑‍🚀 Buzz Aldrin 🧑‍🚀 Michael Collins Trump’s UFO Files declassification did not disappoint. https://t.co/0FiWP0JvJs https://t.co/ak5hdt6umG [Quoted] 🚨 **Incredible** NASA Apollo 11 UFO Report From Buzz Aldrin, Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins 👽🛸👀 **Apollo 11 Technical Crew Debriefing — July 31, 1969** Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin & Michael Collins describe seein...

Interstellar

@InterstellarUAP · May 8

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The Bombshell UFO Report released today from NASA Apollo 11 mission https://t.co/wIiExX4lTS [Quoted] 🚨 **Incredible** NASA Apollo 11 UFO Report From Buzz Aldrin, Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins 👽🛸👀 **Apollo 11 Technical Crew Debriefing — July 31, 1969** Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin & Michael Collins describe seeing a mysterious “Brighter object” tumbling past their https://t.co/jl1NsrIjMg

Interstellar

@InterstellarUAP · May 8

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Apollo 11 Technical Crew Briefing - UFO Sightings https://t.co/QUywuLUx6a [Quoted] 🚨 **Incredible** NASA Apollo 11 UFO Report From Buzz Aldrin, Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins 👽🛸👀 **Apollo 11 Technical Crew Debriefing — July 31, 1969** Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin & Michael Collins describe seeing a mysterious “Brighter object” tumbling past their https://t.co/jl1NsrIjMg

Interstellar

@InterstellarUAP · May 8

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The NASA Apollo 11 Crew were so sombre after returning from The Moon. It's now been confirmed by The Pentagon.....They witnessed UFO's 👽🛸 https://t.co/GuttkZZLDt https://t.co/WimutdIGa3 [Quoted] 🚨 **Incredible** NASA Apollo 11 UFO Report From Buzz Aldrin, Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins 👽🛸👀 **Apollo 11 Technical Crew Debriefing — July 31, 1969** Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin & Michael Collins describe seeing a mysterious “Brighter object” tumbling past their https://t.co/jl1NsrIjMg

Interstellar

@InterstellarUAP · May 8

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Preview of NASA-UAP-D4, Apollo 11 Technical Crew Debriefing, 1969

ReportAnalyzed

govMay 8, 2026

NASA-UAP-D4, Apollo 11 Technical Crew Debriefing, 1969

NASA11 pagesMay 8, 2026RELEASE-01-FILE-141-NASA-UAP-D4-APOLLO-11-TECHNICAL-CREW-DEBRIEFING-1969

The released record says the first unusual thing that the Apollo 11 crew saw was 1 day out or something pretty close to the moon, and it had a sizeable dimension. File: NASA-UAP-D004, Apollo 11 Technical Crew Debriefing, 1969. NASA-UAP-D004, Apollo 11 Technical Crew Debriefing, 1969 combines an official, downloadable document, 7 extracted claims, 2 evidence records, and 5 timeline entries across 11 source pages, and file-level provenance that can be compared with related release records.