Williston, FloridaOctober 1955

On the night of October 30, 1955, a city police officer in Williston, Florida was making his rounds when he spotted several bright lights in the sky. He drove a few miles out of town to get a better view. At around 10:15 p.m., one of the objects descended to within 150 feet of his car, and the light was so intense it was blinding. The object then vanished. The next night, the same officer saw three more bright lights hovering about 200 feet above the ground. The lights were so brilliant they lit up the ground enough to see a needle on a gravel road. As he watched, the officer spotted nine bomber-type aircraft flying in formation at about 7,000 feet, with a passenger plane above them.

Two other police officers in nearby Ocala also reported seeing six bright lights. One of them said the objects resembled a bright star, came from the south going northwest, and made several passes over Taylor Field. The other officer described seeing six lights in a straight line that made left turns and then repeated the same pattern a few times. All three officers emphasized that there was no sound and the objects seemed to accelerate and brighten as they sped up.

The U.S. Air Force investigated the sightings. Investigators checked with nearby air bases and learned that during the times of the sightings, the Strategic Air Command (SAC) had been conducting a mid-air refueling operation. Fourteen B-47 bombers and fourteen KC-97 tanker aircraft were refueling in central Florida, and the colored lights (red, amber, green, and white) visible during refueling at 15,000 feet could explain what the officers saw. The Air Force concluded that the sighting on November 1 was caused by the SAC refueling operation, and suggested that the earlier sighting on October 31 might have been as well. The case file also includes a note that a radio disk jockey in Gainesville had announced flying saucers on the air that Halloween evening, causing many residents to rush outside to look, before the refueling operation was explained.

The full case file, totaling 13 pages, is reproduced below as held by the National Archives.