Project Blue Book Case File
Dayton, OhioApril 1952
Summary
On the evening of April 29, 1952, a civilian working at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base near Dayton, Ohio, spotted an unusual object in the sky. He was looking toward the east from his home near Beaver Creek School House on Route 35 when he noticed the object. Using 3X 30 binoculars (magnifying glasses designed for observing distant objects), he watched it hover in one spot for approximately 45 minutes.
The object's appearance was striking. It had a brilliant red spot at its center. As the witness continued to observe it, the object glowed bright red and then shifted to a hazy blue color. The object made no sound that he could detect, and it did not move from its position in the sky.
On May 7, 1952, the Air Force's Office of Special Investigations at Wright-Patterson sent a formal report up the chain of command to the Air Technical Intelligence Center. The report noted that the witness should be contacted for a more detailed account. The case file indicates the object's speed and altitude could not be determined, and the exact time of the sighting was not clearly recorded.
The Air Force marked this case as "unidentified," meaning investigators could not explain what the witness had seen.
The full case file, as held by the National Archives, is reproduced below and consists of 8 pages.
Reported location
Dayton, Ohio
Date of incident
April 1952
State / country
OH / US
Page count
8 scanned pages
USAF evaluation
unidentified
Microfilm
T1206, Roll 9