THINK ABOUTIT UFO|UAP SIGHTINGS REPORT

1950: Howard, Kansas: C-47 Officers See Silver Football UFO

At 2:10 p.m. on January 6, 1950, three Air Force officers flying a C-47 from Carswell AFB, Texas, to Offutt AFB in Omaha looked down from 5,500 feet, seven miles west of Howard, Kansas, and saw a bright silver object shaped like a football, with what one of them described as a red nose, sliding along in straight, level flight below them. The sky was cloudless. All three agreed on the color and the shape. They disagreed, as witnesses do, about the size, the speed and the distance, and the object faded from view in less than two minutes.

Because the witnesses were Air Force aircrew, the Strategic Air Command’s Inspector General asked the Office of Special Investigations to look into the Howard, Kansas UFO sighting, and agents worked through the Air Force’s full “Unconventional Aircraft” questionnaire, complete with coordinates and checks for balloons and test flights. The result is one of the fuller paper trails of any January 1950 military UFO sighting, and it ends with a twist: the Project Blue Book card that summarized the case carries a handwritten conclusion that appears to read “A/C,” for aircraft.

Date: January 6, 1950

Sighting Time: 2:10 p.m. CST (1410 hours)

Day/Night: Day

Location: In the air seven miles west of Howard, Kansas, USA (37°28′ N, 96°27′ W), aboard a C-47 en route from Carswell AFB, Texas, to Offutt AFB, Omaha, Nebraska

Urban or Rural: Rural (airborne over Kansas farm country)

No. of Entity’s: Not Applicable

Entity Type: Not Applicable

Entity Description: Not Applicable

Hynek Classification: DD (Daylight Disc)

Duration: Less than two minutes

No. of Object(s): 1

Description of the Object(s): A bright silver, football-shaped object with a red nose, in straight, even flight. No control surfaces or air ducts were apparent, and no sound was heard.

Shape/Size/Color of Object(s): Elongated oval, “like a football”; 30 to 60 feet long (one witness judged 30 to 40 feet, two judged 50 to 60 feet); very bright silver, with a red nose noted by Capt. Howard

Distance to Object(s): Two witnesses stated about 2 miles; one thought 5 to 10 miles

Height & Speed: About 2,000 feet (the C-47 was at 5,500 feet); heading 90 to 100 degrees; speed judged at 300 mph by one witness and 500 mph by the other two

Number of Witnesses: 3 (Capts. Robert E. Zimmerman and Frederick E. Howard and 1st Lt. Harold G. Simpson, all assigned to Headquarters Eighth Air Force, Carswell AFB)

Special Features/Characteristics: Three flying officers, two of them experienced pilots with three years’ combat service; cloudless sky (CAVU); the whole object reflected light the way an aluminum aircraft would; no contact with the ground; OSI inquiry requested by SAC’s Inspector General

Case Status: Explained (probable aircraft). The OSI file offers no explanation, but the Project Blue Book record card carries a handwritten conclusion that appears to read “A/C” (aircraft). NICAP’s chronology lists the case as a Blue Book unknown, so the two sources disagree.

Source: AFOSI 13th District Report of Investigation by Special Agent Cass W. Riddle, 18 January 1950 (file 24-68), with the completed “Unconventional Aircraft – Special Inquiry” questionnaire; Project Blue Book (Project 10073) record card; Loren E. Gross, UFOs: A History, 1950: January–March; NICAP 1950 UFO Chronology

Summary/Description: Three Air Force officers in a C-47 seven miles west of Howard, Kansas, saw a bright silver, football-shaped object with a red nose, 30 to 60 feet long, in straight, level flight below them at about 2,000 feet. It stayed in sight under two minutes in clear weather and faded from view. AFOSI investigated at the request of the Strategic Air Command’s Inspector General, and Blue Book’s record card appears to conclude “aircraft.”

Related Cases: Kansas City, Missouri, Bendix employees’ sighting (January 6, 1950, 7:26 p.m.); Denver, Colorado, eight-pilot flame sighting (January 18, 1950); Blackstone, Virginia, C-45 encounter (January 24, 1950); Gulf of Mexico B-29 radar case (January 12, 1950)

Detailed Report

The Flight

On January 6, 1950, Capt. Robert E. Zimmerman, Capt. Frederick E. Howard and 1st Lt. Harold G. Simpson, all assigned to Headquarters Eighth Air Force at Carswell Air Force Base, Texas, were flying a C-47 transport to Offutt Air Force Base at Omaha, Nebraska. At 2:10 p.m. Central time, at 5,500 feet and about seven miles west of Howard, Kansas, they saw an unidentified object below and ahead of them.

What They Saw

All three officers described the object as a very bright silver, and Captain Howard added that it had a red nose. They called its shape an elongated oval, like a football, and could not say what it was made of. One officer judged it 30 to 40 feet long, while two judged it 50 to 60 feet. It was flying straight and level on a heading of 90 to 100 compass degrees, at about 2,000 feet according to the report. The questionnaire records no control surfaces, no air ducts and no sound, and notes that the entire object reflected light as an aluminum aircraft would. There were no clouds, and the object did not touch the ground or come near another aircraft.

Where the Estimates Differ

Distance is the weakest number in the file. Two of the officers said the object was about two miles away and one thought it was five to ten miles away, and their estimates of speed split the same way, with one officer judging 300 mph and the other two 500 mph. Every estimate of size depends on the distance, which is why the report gives a wide range of 30 to 60 feet. Two of the three are described as experienced pilots with three years of combat service, and all three said they were alert and not fatigued. The object was in sight for less than two minutes and faded from view.

The Inquiry

The investigation began when the Inspector General at Strategic Air Command headquarters asked the commander of the 13th District of the Air Force Office of Special Investigations, at Offutt Air Force Base, to look into the incident. Special Agent Cass W. Riddle interviewed the officers and completed the Air Force’s “Unconventional Aircraft – Special Inquiry” questionnaire, and the 13th District’s report is dated January 18, 1950. The report marks the case closed and states that all logical leads had been covered. The 13th District forwarded it to Air Materiel Command at Wright-Patterson AFB, with information copies to SAC and OSI headquarters.

The Blue Book Card

The Project 10073 record card, typed later from the OSI report, repeats the essentials: three officers, two of them pilots, a bright silver object with a red nose, football-shaped, 30 to 60 feet long, at 2,000 feet on a course of 90 to 100 degrees magnetic, moving at 300 to 500 mph, in sight less than two minutes. In the conclusion position a hand has written what appears to be “A/C.” The card does not spell the abbreviation out, and the most natural reading is aircraft.

RESEARCHER’S NOTES

Three Officers, One Silver Football, and a Card That Says A/C

Names in the File: The witnesses’ names are blacked out in the questionnaire copies. They appear in the OSI synopsis, which is where the names on this page come from, and the questionnaire mentions Captain Howard by name in noting the red nose.
Estimates That Disagree: Two witnesses put the object about two miles away and one put it five to ten miles away; speed estimates ran from 300 to 500 mph; length estimates ran from 30 to 60 feet. The three officers agreed on color, shape, heading and straight, level flight.
Looking Down: The C-47 was at 5,500 feet and the object was placed at about 2,000 feet, so the officers were looking down at it as it moved level at 300 to 500 mph on a roughly eastward heading. The questionnaire notes the object reflected light as an aluminum aircraft would.
Blue Book Versus NICAP: NICAP’s chronology lists the case as a Project Blue Book unknown. The record card’s handwritten conclusion appears to read “A/C.” This archive follows the card, which is the primary record, and flags the disagreement.
A Neighboring File: The microfilmed Howard file also contains the OSI’s inquiry into the Kansas City, Missouri sighting reported the same evening, including its check with the Olathe Naval Air Base weather officer. The two cases were hours and well over a hundred miles apart, and nothing in the files links them.
Institutional Backdrop: The Air Force had announced the end of its flying-disc project days earlier, and the reporting directives were formally voided on January 12. This sighting was pursued through the Inspector General and OSI channels, not through the project that had just been closed.

The Howard, Kansas sighting is a clean, short report from three trained observers in clear daylight, with a full OSI inquiry behind it. It is filed here as Explained on the strength of the Blue Book card’s apparent “aircraft” conclusion, with two cautions: the conclusion is handwritten and unspelled, and NICAP treats the case as unexplained. What the file shows most clearly is the Air Force’s reporting machinery still running in January 1950: three officers, an Inspector General request, a district investigation, a closed case, and a card with a one-word answer.