Rabat, Fr. Morocco, September 1952September 1952

On September 21, 1952, thousands of people across French Morocco witnessed a bright, fast-moving object streaking across the sky. The sighting began around 1815 hours (6:15 p.m.) near Tangier, where observers at a beach 17 kilometers away saw a luminous disk about the size of the setting sun flying horizontally from east to west. After holding its course for roughly 12 seconds, the object suddenly emitted two large bursts of flame and vanished. Within minutes, the object or a similar phenomenon appeared over other Moroccan cities, including Fes, Casablanca, and Rabat, traveling consistently from east to west and leaving a white or white-green smoke trail behind.

Multiple witnesses gave varying descriptions of the object, calling it an orange-colored ball of fire, an arrow, or a cone-shaped object. Some observers noted it trailed a bright green-blue cloud of smoke. The object appeared to travel at roughly the speed of a conventional aircraft, at an altitude of about 1,000 meters (roughly 3,300 feet). One pilot, a former military flyer named Creze, reported the closest encounter. As he was preparing to land in Casablanca at 1825 hours, he spotted the object about 30 meters to the left of his aircraft, flying parallel to his course. Traveling at 220 kilometers per hour, Creze watched the object move roughly twice as fast as his plane. He described it as a bright blue-green flame with an oblong, cigar-like shape. A ground mechanic later confirmed seeing a luminous object in the same location. After passing Creze's aircraft, the object disappeared over the sea. About 6,000 spectators at a boxing match in Casablanca also observed the passage. In Azemmour, a French couple and farm workers heard a loud explosion as the object passed overhead, marking the first reported sound from such a sighting.

A Moroccan newspaper, L'Echo du Maroc, suggested the object was likely a meteor based on its rectilinear (straight-line) trajectory, its failure to maneuver in the manner "saucers" were said to do, and the fact that its entire body appeared incandescent (glowing from heat), which would not be true of a flying machine. The object remained visible for only a few seconds, though a thin white smoke trail persisted for about five minutes afterward. The U.S. Air Force's evaluation of this case is listed as unknown. The full case file is reproduced below as held by the National Archives across 13 pages.