Project Blue Book Case File
Caldwell, New JerseyMarch 1959
Summary
On the evening of March 18, 1959, a resident of Caldwell, New Jersey named Wilber Price watched an unusual sight in the night sky. At 8:40 p.m. EST, he and several other observers saw two round objects with a dull reddish glow moving across the sky in a straight northerly path. The objects covered an arc of about 90 degrees overhead during roughly 50 seconds of observation. The night was clear with about two-thirds of a moon visible. Price noted that there was no sound from the objects, and he was well positioned to judge what he saw, being a graduate aeronautical engineer who had worked in flight test and aircraft performance since 1942.
As the objects moved across the sky, their appearance changed. Near the start of the sighting (position A), they stood out clearly against the star-studded, moonlit sky. At the midpoint (position B), they appeared less bright. Between positions B and C, the observers could no longer see the round shape clearly against the darker sky, but what looked like reflected light grew increasingly intense. By the time the objects passed behind some trees, they were glowing with a brilliant white light comparable to the landing light of an aircraft during approach. The witness noted that throughout the sighting, the two objects maintained the same relative position to each other.
The witnesses sent a detailed report to the Air Force's Air Technical Intelligence Center (ATIC) in April 1959. ATIC analyzed the sighting by calculating the objects' speed. Using the figure of two degrees per second arc movement and assuming an altitude of 50,000 feet, the estimated speed was around 600 knots, which falls within the normal range for jet aircraft. ATIC acknowledged that any error in the witnesses' time estimate would have affected this calculation, and that the objects could have been at a lower altitude. On June 13, 1959, ATIC concluded that the witnesses had in all probability observed aircraft lights.
The case file includes 13 pages as held by the National Archives.
Reported location
Caldwell, New Jersey
Date of incident
March 1959
State / country
NJ / US
Page count
13 scanned pages
USAF evaluation
unknown
Microfilm
T1206, Roll 35