
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, August 25, 1993                   TAG: 9308250179
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Short

GROUP SUSPECTS MARTIAN-LIFE COVER-UP

A group that says there may have been life on Mars suggested Tuesday that NASA may have intentionally disabled the Mars Observer so it could take no pictures of artificial structures on that planet.

Richard Hoagland, founder of a group that claims a city was built on Mars, said there was a possibility that a "rogue group" within NASA intentionally shut off the spacecraft so that it could not make an orbital survey of the city.

Hoagland said he has been trying for almost 10 years to get NASA to investigate what he believes is a face carved on the surface of Mars and that NASA has dismissed his research and that of colleagues in his organization.

He said a study conducted 30 years ago suggests there is a "McCarthyesque fear of fundamentalists and religious fanaticism" in NASA and that as a result the agency is reluctant to admit there is evidence that intelligent life once existed on Mars.

"There is an inside group that does not want this pursued. Maybe they literally pulled the plug," said Hoagland.

"It's absolutely the craziest thing I've ever heard," said Mars Observer project manager Glenn Cunningham.

by CNB