Honolulu, HawaiiFebruary 1961

Insufficient Data

Summary

On February 28, 1961, three pilots in Honolulu, Hawaii reported seeing a fine contrail (a thin trail of condensation) that broke apart into three separate pieces and burned out. The observation was made in daylight and lasted a short time.

The Air Force received a report of the sighting through the Pacific Air Force command around 0537 hours (5:37 a.m.) on February 28. The initial assessment suggested it might be a satellite burning up during reentry. However, after investigation, the Air Force determined there was no known satellite reentry on that date.

The Air Force concluded the sighting was most likely a meteor, also called a bolide. The characteristics of what the pilots observed, including the bright contrail followed by fragmentation and burnout in daylight, matched the known behavior of a daylight meteor event. This evaluation appears on the official case record card marked "unknown," though the comments section notes the sighting is typical of a bolide observation.

The full case file is reproduced below as held by the National Archives, 10 pages.

Reported location

Honolulu, Hawaii

Date of incident

February 1961

State / country

HI / US

Page count

10 scanned pages

USAF evaluation

unknown

Microfilm

T1206, Roll 41

Original case file scans

Original case file · scanned by NARAPage 1 of 10

View transcribed text

3 wR PROJECT 10073 RECORD CARD A
I. DATE 2. LOCATION 12. CONCLUSIONS 4
3 {
| : O Wos Bolloon
| 28 Feb 61 Honolulu, Hawaii 0 Probably Balloon | |
3. DATE-TIME GROUP i. TYPE OF OBSERVATION FI de dhl | |
| ea 0 Ground- Visual O Ground-Radar a Probably Aireraf
i GM yg. OUGGSIE O Air Visual O Air-Intercept Radar O Possibly Aircraft
5. PHOTOS Ae oa g Yas Asronomi cal METRE
a Yes Probably Astronomicol
B No Military DO Possibly Astronomicel
7. LENGTH OF OBSERVATION 8. NUMBER OF OBJECTS | 9. COURSE CR RE Re CR
o 114 -ckbor Deta for Evaluation |
o |
1 to 3 nknown
| 10. BRIEF SUMMARY OF SIGHTING Fine contrail followed (11. COMMENTSNO reentry this date. Therefors
by breakup into 3 parts and burnout. probably a meteor since sighting is chajx-
y acteristic of daylight observation cf |
bolide.
1 ATIC FORM 329 (REV 26 SEP 52)
: p |
] x ‘
| .
El le lh

/ 10

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Source: National Archives Catalog · NAID 28991653