NORWALK, CONN., January 1952January 1952

On the evening of January 22, 1952, a woman driving through Norwalk, Connecticut saw what she described as a large, dome-shaped object hovering over the town. According to her account, the craft had bright headlights, a band of white light running horizontally around its middle, and visible machinery inside. She watched it move slowly across the sky, stop above a local armory building, and then disappear over a hill. The sighting lasted roughly eight to eleven minutes.

The woman did not report her experience until August 1952, six months later, fearing she would be ridiculed. When she finally came forward, the U.S. Air Force's Office of Special Investigations interviewed her at length and gathered background information through her employer, the local post office, and neighbors. All sources described her as honest and dependable. However, investigators also learned that she had undergone brain surgery as a child. Her former supervisor at Raytheon noted that under emotional stress, she could become "difficult to talk to," though under normal conditions she was pleasant and intelligent.

A week after the main sighting, the woman reported seeing a similar object again, briefly, traveling at high speed across the sky while she sat in a research laboratory at her workplace. Her mother also reported witnessing a brief flash of light around the same time.

The case file includes a detailed map of Norwalk and a diagram of the object as described by the witness, showing the headlights, tail light, and patterned underside. Investigators checked police records and found no corroborating reports. The file notes that the source "is considered by some to be a bit neurotic" and that "the sighting probably is a fragment of the observer's imagination," though no formal conclusion about the object's identity appears in the available documents.

The full case file, comprising 19 pages, is reproduced below as held by the National Archives.