Athens, GeorgiaApril 1954

On April 26, 1954, multiple observers at the University of Georgia in Athens watched a formation of objects move across the sky in broad daylight. The main witness, a U.S. Air Force officer with 15 years of service, first spotted the group and called others on a porch to look up. The objects appeared roughly the size of grapefruits and had a grapefruit color. Arranged in a formation that looked like a check mark or "V" shape, they entered the sky from the south at 12:09 p.m. and flew due north beneath clouds at 6,000 feet. The entire sighting lasted about ten seconds. What impressed the witnesses most was how smoothly and silently the objects traveled through the air.

Colonel L. G. Duggar, a senior pilot with approximately 4,000 hours of military flying time and the Professor of Air Science and Tactics at the university, addressed the possibility that the objects were aircraft. He noted that any jets flying below cloud level in the normally quiet Athens area would have been easily heard at that altitude range. He also stated that no flights in or out of Athens were scheduled at that time and that Athens was not on any standard airway.

After the main formation disappeared into the night sky heading north, one of the witnesses reported seeing a separate white object about the size of a baseball streak southwest at tremendous speed. This object passed through scattered clouds and vanished before the witness could alert the other observers.

The Air Force classified this sighting as unidentified. The complete case file, consisting of 7 pages as held by the National Archives, is reproduced below.