Government and military
The Air Force UFO studies from 1947 to 1969: Sign, Grudge, Blue Book and the Condon study. 116 events, newest first.
Military1953
Capt. Edward Ruppelt, who had run the Air Force's UFO project through the 1952 wave, left Project Blue Book and the Air Force in 1953. His 1956 book says he asked for a transfer in December 1952, no replacement came, and he was again handling Blue Book cases in August 1953.
Photo: Associated Press, Public domain
Government31 Dec 1952
Project Blue Book's Status Report No. 8 summarized summer 1952 conferences its contract astronomer, J. Allen Hynek, held with 44 professional astronomers. Five had seen things they could not readily explain; most were neither hostile nor very interested in the subject.
Photo: Unknown author, Public domain
Government4 Dec 1952
At the CIA director's request the Intelligence Advisory Committee discussed UFOs and agreed the DCI should enlist selected scientists to review the evidence and draft a security directive. Air Force intelligence chief Maj. Gen. John Samford offered cooperation; the review became the Robertson Panel.
Government2 Dec 1952
CIA science intelligence chief H. Marshall Chadwell sent the Director of Central Intelligence a memo urging National Security Council attention to UFOs and outside scientific study. Two days later an intelligence advisory committee agreed to convene scientists, which became the Robertson Panel.
Photo: US Government, Public domain
Close encounters20 Nov 1952
George Adamski claimed he met a man from Venus beside a landed scout ship near Desert Center, California, after leaving six companions down the road. His 1953 book with Desmond Leslie told the story and sold widely; Blue Book chief Ruppelt recounted it with open skepticism.
Photo: Los Angeles Times, CC BY 4.0
Close encounters19 Aug 1952
Florida scoutmaster Sonny DesVergers said a hovering craft engulfed him in a red mist, singeing his arms and cap, while three scouts waited in his car. Blue Book chief Edward Ruppelt wrote it off as the best hoax in UFO history, though investigators never proved how it was done.
Military1 Aug 1952
An Air Defense Command radar near Bellefontaine tracked a fast target north of Dayton, and two Wright-Patterson F-86 pilots photographed a silver sphere on gun-camera film. Blue Book first carried it as unknown, then attributed it to a jet and a weather balloon.
Photo: USAF photo 82042 AC, Public domain
Military29 Jul 1952
An Air Defense Command radar in central Michigan tracked a fast target over Saginaw Bay and vectored an F-94. The crew reported a bright light and a brief airborne radar lock-on before the target pulled away. Blue Book chief Edward Ruppelt later wrote that it had no good explanation.
Photo: US Air Force, Public domain
Military24 Jul 1952
Two Pentagon-based Air Force colonels flying a B-25 from Hamilton AFB reported three silver, tailless delta craft passing them at high speed over Carson Sink. Blue Book chief Edward Ruppelt wrote that checks for aircraft and balloons found nothing and the case stayed unknown.
Photo: Airwolfhound from Hertfordshire, UK, CC BY-SA 2.0
Sightings14 Jul 1952
The crew of a Pan American airliner flying from New York to Miami reported eight UFOs near Newport News, Virginia. Blue Book chief Edward Ruppelt lists it among the July 1952 reports leading up to the Washington radar sightings later that month.
Military2 Jul 1952
Navy photographer Delbert Newhouse filmed a group of bright points milling in the sky north of Tremonton while driving with his family. The Robertson Panel concluded the images were sunlight off seagulls; the Condon study found the film consistent with birds.
Photo: Project Blue Book, Public domain
SightingsJul 1952
1952 brought the Air Force more UFO reports than any year before, about eight times the totals for each of the previous two years per the Condon Report. Project Blue Book chief Edward Ruppelt dated the 'Big Flap' from about June 1, with reports peaking in July, including the Washington radar cases.
Photo: Associated Press, Public domain
Government29 Apr 1952
Air Force Letter 200-5 told every Air Force base to wire UFO reports to the Air Technical Intelligence Center and the Pentagon, followed by fuller reports by mail. Edward Ruppelt wrote that it also let Project Blue Book contact any Air Force unit directly.
MediaApr 1952
A Life magazine article researched by Bob Ginna raised the possibility that saucers were interplanetary, quoting scientists who took the idea seriously. Ruppelt, then Blue Book chief, wrote that senior Pentagon officers had unofficially encouraged it.
GovernmentMar 1952
The Air Force reorganized its UFO investigations as Project Blue Book. By the time it closed in 1969, the Air Force programs had logged 12,618 reports, 701 of them still listed as unidentified.
Photo: US Governement, Public domain
Military1952
After the Air Force photo lab failed to identify the Tremonton, Utah film, Navy photo analysts at Anacostia spent about two months on it and told the Robertson Panel the lights were not aircraft or birds. The panel rejected this and concluded the images were sunlight on seagulls.
Close encounters1952
Coral Lorenzen founded the Aerial Phenomena Research Organization at the start of 1952; the Condon Report calls it the first civilian UFO study group to work on a national scale. Its first mimeographed bulletin went to 52 members that July, and by 1968 it claimed 8,000 members.
Military1952
Project Blue Book planned cameras fitted with diffraction gratings to split UFO light into a spectrum and tell meteors, aircraft and balloons apart. Chief Edward Ruppelt later wrote that in tests they could not usefully photograph a bright flare at 450 yards, but were sent out anyway.
Photo: US Air Force, Public domain
GovernmentNov 1951
Starting in November 1951, the reactivated Project Grudge, renamed Blue Book in March 1952, issued a series of 12 classified status reports on its work. They were declassified in 1960 but, per the Condon Report, were hard to obtain until NICAP published them in 1968.
Photo: US Air Force, Public domain
Military10 Sep 1951
Army Signal Corps radar at Fort Monmouth tracked fast and high targets over two days, and a T-33 crew reported an object near Sandy Hook. The reports reached Gen. Charles Cabell and led to a revived Project Grudge under Edward Ruppelt; investigators later blamed an airplane and balloons.
Photo: Acroterion, CC BY-SA 4.0
Sightings25 Aug 1951
Texas Tech professors reported formations of soft glowing lights over Lubbock, and student Carl Hart Jr. photographed a formation days later. Blue Book's Edward Ruppelt investigated; birds reflecting new streetlights was the main lead, but he reached no firm conclusion on the photos.
Sightings15 Mar 1951
A chief aircraft engineer at the Delhi Flying Club and about 20 others reported a long, bullet-shaped object trailing a white cloud that looped over the field and left at high speed. The case is in the Project Blue Book files, and NICAP says Blue Book listed it as unidentified.
Photo: Ashish Bhatnagar, CC BY-SA 3.0
Sightings20 Jan 1951
After Sioux City tower controllers reported a bright light, the pilots of a Mid-Continent Airlines DC-3 said a large wing-shaped object passed their nose and flew beside them briefly. The Air Force blamed a B-36; Blue Book chief Edward Ruppelt later wrote that no B-36 could have done it.
Photo: Project Blue Book, Public domain
Sightings15 Aug 1950
Baseball manager Nick Mariana filmed two bright lights crossing the sky over Great Falls on 16mm film. The 1953 Robertson Panel attributed them to sunlight off two Air Force interceptors; the 1969 Condon study left the case unexplained, though it said aircraft could not be ruled out.
Photo: parkerdonaldmusic, Public domain
Sightings11 May 1950
Paul Trent took two photos of a disc-shaped object his wife Evelyn saw over their farm near McMinnville; a local paper and then Life ran them. A Condon study analyst found them consistent with a real distant object but could not rule out fabrication; skeptics call them a hoax.
Photo: Paul Trent, Public domain
