May 1949 — five cases: Dr. Donald Menzel's Holloman AFB sighting; Joseph C. Shell's Hart Mountain formation; the Rogue River, Oregon disc; the Hanford Site intercept; and the ongoing Fort Hood, Texas UFO Wave.
1949: May UFO|UAP & Entity Sightings Archive
May 1949 holds two of the year’s standout cases: Dr. Donald Menzel’s own unresolved sighting at Holloman AFB on May 12 — notable since Menzel later became one of ufology’s most prominent professional skeptics — and pilot Joseph C. Shell’s formation sighting near Hart Mountain, Oregon on May 27, a Blue Book Unknown. The month also carries the ongoing Fort Hood, Texas UFO Wave and ordinary reports from Alaska to Japan.
Date: May 1949
Location: Los Alamos, New Mexico
Time: 10:30
Summary: Thirteen saucer-shaped objects were observed in a straight-line formation for about 45 minutes at roughly 9,000 ft by an AEC technician and hundreds of other witnesses (Hunt).
Source: NICAP
Date: May 2, 1949, BBU
Location: Elko, Nevada
Time: 11:40 a.m.
Summary: CAA radio operator Mr. Small, using field glasses, saw three flying discs, 30 ft in diameter, at 14,000 ft, moving SW at 300-400 mph. They made a left turn and departed ahead of a United Airlines flight taking off from Elko airport. Duration 3-4 minutes.
Source: FOIA; FUFOR Index
Date: May 3, 1949, BBU
Location: Sidney, Ohio
Time: 9:00 a.m.
Summary: Store owners Wilford and Sprague saw a bright, shiny disc high overhead at about 85° elevation, heading NE, wavering and climbing and descending slightly on a straight path. Duration 2 minutes.
Source: FOIA; FUFOR Index
Date: May 3, 1949
Location: Jefferson County, Missouri
Time: 20:00
Summary: One object was observed.
Source: Doubt Magazine
Date: May 4, 1949, BBU
Location: 4.5 miles W of Maplewood, Ohio
Time: 6:30 p.m.
Summary: Ms. Wical saw a bright silver, flat, circular object to the SE, traveling NE, with sunlight glaring off its surface, spinning at high altitude, with no sound or trail.
Source: FOIA; FUFOR Index
Date: May 5, 1949, BBU 376
Location: Fort Bliss, Texas
Time: 11:40 a.m.
Summary: Army officers Maj. Day (or May), Maj. Olhausen, and Capt. Vaughn saw two oblong white discs flying at about 200-250 mph make a shallow turn; a 3-inch object passed through the field of fire on the Waco #4 firing range. Duration 30-50 seconds.
Source: Berliner
Date: May 5, 1949
Location: Oakland, California
Time: Evening
Summary: More than two objects were observed by one witness briefly (Smith).
Source: Doubt Magazine
Date: May 6, 1949, AFOSI Case 63
Location: Los Alamos, New Mexico
Time: 01:05
Summary: One observer, rated reliable, saw a round green object about 1/8th the size of the full moon, 5° above the horizon to the north, descending at a 30-35° angle at very high speed before it disappeared west of the Jemez Mountains. Duration a fraction of a second.
Source: NICAP
Date: May 6, 1949
Location: Los Angeles, California
Time: Before 08:00
Summary: One object was observed.
Source: Doubt Magazine
Date: May 6, 1949, BBU
Location: Sidney, Ohio
Time: 8:30 a.m.
Summary: Stump, Herman, and Quinn saw a bright object about half a mile to the west, moving south at high speed with no trail or sound; one witness said it was too bright to make out its shape, the other described it as flat and circular. Duration 2 minutes.
Source: FOIA; FUFOR Index; Jan Aldrich
Date: May 6, 1949, BBU 379
Location: Livermore, California
Time: 9:35 a.m.
Summary: C. G. Green saw two shiny, disc-like objects rotate around each other and bank; one shot upward with a grey trail and rejoined the other. Duration 5 minutes.
Source: Berliner
Date: May 6, 1949
Location: Saratov, Russia
Time: Daytime
Summary: A decorated Soviet test pilot named Apraksin was flying over the Volga River, 40 km north of Saratov, when his aircraft’s electrical system reportedly failed after he attempted to approach a cucumber-shaped object, which struck him with a cone of light. He was blinded but managed to land the crippled aircraft in an emergency landing before losing consciousness; he was hospitalized to recover. Single citation only; no cross-referencing source found.
Source: Weinstein, Dominique. Aircraft UFO Encounters, Project ACUFOE, Paris, 1999
Date: May 7, 1949, BBU
Location: South St. Louis, Missouri
Time: 7:00 p.m. (CST)
Summary: Just after sunset, witness Vaughn saw the sun glinting off a flat, reddish-brown, “somewhat triangular” object, oscillating, about the size of a private plane but moving faster.
Source: FOIA; FUFOR Index
Date: May 7, 1949
Location: Serbia
Time: ?
Summary: A flying disc was observed.
Source: Hill, H. Edward. Catalog Through 1950
Date: May 7, 1949
Location: Fort Hood, Texas
Time: 19:40-21:05
Summary: Lieutenant Mardell Ward, at the Army’s UFO observation post, along with another observation site (four observers total, rated reliable), tracked a brilliant white diamond-shaped object at a triangulated distance of 15,000 ft and 1,000 ft altitude, heading NW. It was tracked for about 40 minutes as it changed color from white to reddish to greenish, covering roughly 15-20 miles horizontally while dropping altitude, before dimming and disappearing. No sound was noted throughout. Later the same night, Ward and two other posts sighted a brilliant diamond-shaped object to the west moving NW or NE at 1,600 ft, slowly dropping, for about 9 minutes, with severe radio interference during but not after the sighting. One source (Loren Gross) erroneously places both sightings at Los Alamos. Part of the Fort Hood, Texas UFO Wave. [Full Report]
Source: FOIA; Jan Aldrich; Sparks Database of Bluebook Unknowns, Version 1.7, Dec. 31, 2003
Date: May 8, 1949, AFOSI Case 67
Location: Tucson, Arizona
Time: 9:30 a.m.
Summary: Four witnesses reported a motionless, metallic, circular object at 4,000 ft that began moving west, then turned north, moving horizontally before a rapid 45° climb to 20,000 ft, where it went out of sight. Duration 10-20 minutes.
Source: AFOSI Case 67
Date: May 9, 1949, AFOSI Case 68
Location: Tucson, Arizona
Time: 2:30 p.m.
Summary: One observer of unknown reliability saw a round, flat, silvery object about 25 ft in diameter moving SW to NE at 750-1,000 mph before fading from view. Duration 6-10 seconds.
Source: Project Bluebook
Date: May 11, 1949
Location: Houston, Alaska
Time: 10:30
Summary: Four gray discs flew over Houston, Alaska, heading north. Witness George Mertz said they had thicker tops and flew with a “decided list to the port side” at over 1,000 mph; their diameter was estimated at 80-100 ft.
Source: Sullivan, Edward. CSI/LA investigation files
Date: May 11, 1949
Location: Fresno, California
Time: 15:25
Summary: A group of objects was observed by four witnesses for over one minute.
Source: Doubt Magazine
Date: May 11, 1949
Location: Ontario, Canada
Time: 22:30
Summary: One object was observed.
Source: Doubt Magazine
Date: May 12, 1949
Location: Highway 70, outside Holloman AFB, New Mexico
Time: 9:30 p.m. (MST)
Summary: AF contract solar astronomer Dr. Donald H. Menzel, of Harvard Observatory, was being driven by military car from Holloman AFB toward Alamogordo when he saw two small round white lights, possibly greenish-tinged, appear low over the Sacramento Mountain ridge in a horizontal line about 3° apart, brightening as if rising above a haze layer before vanishing one after the other. His own calculation, based on the near-absence of parallax over a 3-mile driving baseline, put the objects roughly 180 miles away. Menzel later became one of ufology’s most prominent professional skeptics; this remains his own unresolved sighting. [Full Report]
Source: Sparks; Blue Book NARA Microfilm Roll 88, pp. 904, 920-921; Roll 91, pp. 424-425; Maxwell Roll 6, pp. 241-249
Date: May 12, 1949
Location: Kingsport, Tennessee
Time: Dusk
Summary: One object was observed by over 100 witnesses for a few seconds.
Source: Newspaper
Date: May 12, 1949
Location: Bristol, Virginia
Time: Around 20:00
Summary: One object was observed by a male witness.
Source: Newspaper
Date: May 12, 1949
Location: Pulaski, Virginia
Time: Around 20:00
Summary: A flying disc was observed by a male witness.
Source: MUFON
Date: May 14, 1949
Location: Ernest Harmon AFB, Newfoundland, Canada
Time: ?
Summary: A flying disc was observed and photographed at an airfield; newspaper columnist Walter Winchell reported “USAF photographs UFOs here.”
Source: Hatch, Larry
Date: May 14, 1949
Location: Houston, Alaska
Time: 09:10
Summary: Two gray discs were observed briefly by one witness (Mertz), traveling the same route as the May 11 sighting at slightly higher elevation.
Source: Sullivan, Edward. CSI/LA investigation files
Date: May 15, 1949
Location: Houston, Alaska
Time: 11:30
Summary: One gray disc was observed briefly by one witness.
Source: Sullivan, Edward. CSI/LA investigation files
Date: Mid-May 1949
Location: Virginia (various locations)
Time:
Summary: A period newspaper article reporting that Virginia residents continued to see flying discs following the Bristol and Pulaski sightings earlier in the month. [Full Report]
Source: Newspaper
Date: May 16, 1949
Location: Medford, Oregon
Time: ?
Summary: One object was observed.
Source: Doubt Magazine
Date: May 16, 1949
Location: Davis-Monthan AFB, Arizona
Time: 5:00 p.m.
Summary: A ground/visual military source described a black, round, flat object resembling a washtub. It held the same altitude, fluttering, before disappearing behind an obstacle. Duration 8-10 seconds.
Source: Undocumented
Date: May 19, 1949
Location: New Orleans, Louisiana
Time: 16:15
Summary: A 20-ft-diameter disc flew north over New Orleans; it was reportedly seen twice this day.
Source: MUFON
Date: May 19, 1949
Location: Fort Bliss, Texas
Time: 8:30 a.m.
Summary: Numerous military witnesses observed a round, thin, silver object rocking to give edgewise and sideways views, at about 30° altitude, in sight for approximately 5 minutes while moving 15-20 miles with an irregular rolling and tilting motion, slowly rising as it moved away.
Source: Undocumented
Date: May 19, 1949
Location: Pueblo, Colorado
Time: Around 17:00
Summary: One object was observed by three witnesses (Preston).
Source: Doubt Magazine
Date: May 21, 1949, BBU
Location: Moses Lake AFB / Hanford, Washington
Time: Afternoon
Summary: A silvery, disc-shaped object hovering at 17,000-20,000 ft over the Hanford site was sighted visually and confirmed on radar by personnel of the Hanford radar station and the 637th Air Defense Control Center (Wallace and Blish). A USAF F-82 fighter, piloted by Walter, was scrambled from Moses Lake AFB to intercept, but the object suddenly accelerated away to the south before the F-82 could reach it.
Source: Bluebook
Date: May 21, 1949
Location: Fairfield, Connecticut
Time: Night
Summary: More than two objects were observed.
Source: Doubt Magazine
Date: May 24, 1949
Location: Rogue River, Oregon (Gold Beach)
Time: 17:00
Summary: Five people fishing near the mouth of the Rogue River — including two NACA Ames Aeronautical Laboratory employees (a draftsman and a wind-tunnel mechanic) sharing 8x Navy binoculars — watched a silver, coin-shaped disc with a single trailing-edge fin approach from the northeast, hover for about two and a half minutes, rotate on its vertical axis without banking, and then accelerate south at near jet speed, completely silent throughout. The sighting was reported privately to the Moffett Field security office rather than the press, prompting an AFOSI investigation; Blue Book Special Report #14 (the Battelle/Project Stork study) later ranked it among its best unknowns. [Full Report]
Source: U.S. Air Force Project Blue Book Special Report #14 (Battelle Memorial Institute/Project Stork, 1955); AFOSI case investigation; Dr. Bruce Maccabee, The UFO-FBI Connection; NICAP
Date: May 1949 (day unspecified)
Location: Gold Beach, Oregon
Time: 17:00
Summary: NACA Ames Research Lab employees Don Heaphy and another colleague, along with Mrs. Oliver, Elizabeth McBeth (a pharmacist), and their spouses, saw a hamburger-shaped metallic disc, roughly 25-35 to 100 ft wide with a tail fin and a “dirty,” rough, wrinkled rear surface, in the east at azimuth 60°. It was at about 5,000 ft and 1-4 miles away, traveling at C-47 speed before accelerating to jet speed and flying south, azimuth 170°. Observed with 8x binoculars. This appears to be a second-source account of the Rogue River sighting above.
Source: Project Bluebook
Date: Late May 1949
Location: White Sands, New Mexico
Time: Morning
Summary: An object was observed using optical instruments. One object, about 1 foot across, was observed by several witnesses near a missile (McLaughlin).
Source: Heard, Gerald. Is Another World Watching?, Harper & Brothers, New York, 1951
Date: May 25, 1949
Location: Loudon, Tennessee
Time: 12:00
Summary: One metallic disc was observed by five witnesses on a farm; a flapping sound was heard.
Source: Hatch, Larry
Date: May 27, 1949, BBU 404
Location: Near Hart Mountain, south-central Oregon
Time: 2:25 p.m. (PST)
Summary: Joseph C. Shell — an oil company vice-president, U.S. Navy Reserve pilot, and former Army Air Forces flight instructor — flying an SNJ trainer from Red Bluff, California to Burns, Oregon at 9,000 ft, saw 5-8 (most likely 6-7) oval metallic objects flying in tight trail formation near the Hart Mountain bluffs, each under 20 ft in diameter, holding a constant spacing pattern as if towed, at one point closing to about 5.5-7.5 miles and 1,000-1,500 ft below his altitude before disappearing on the horizon. Visibility that day exceeded 60 miles. Filed as Blue Book Unknown 404. [Full Report]
Source: Sparks; Berliner; Jan Aldrich; Footnote.com images 6313041 ff.
Date: May 31, 1949, BBU
Location: Misawa AFB, Honshu, Japan
Time: 11:10 a.m.
Summary: USAF pilot Giles, flying an F-80, saw a circular object moving at high speed and disappearing into a cirrus cloud overcast.
Source: Project 1947; FUFOR Index
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The Skeptic’s Own Sighting, and a Formation Over Hart Mountain
Two of the month’s cases were rich enough to become standalone full reports rather than single archive lines: Dr. Donald Menzel’s May 12 sighting at Holloman AFB, and Joseph C. Shell’s May 27 formation sighting near Hart Mountain, Oregon (Blue Book Unknown 404). Both entries remain fully filled out here with a link to their full report, rather than replaced by a bare header link. The Rogue River/Gold Beach, Oregon sighting on May 24 is likewise linked to its own full report; a second, undated May entry describing the same event from a different source has been cross-referenced to it rather than presented as a separate case. Raw catalog metadata dumps (May 6 Los Alamos, May 9 Tucson) were rewritten as prose, and the Fort Hood entry’s duplicate narrative/metadata versions were merged.
“Each light was white, possibly slight greenish tinge… apparently sharpening in edge contrast.”
From Dr. Donald Menzel’s account of the May 12, 1949 Holloman AFB sighting.
