THINK ABOUTIT UFO|UAP SIGHTINGS REPORT

1950: Teaticket, Massachusetts UFO: Two Cylinders, One Fireball

At 5:10 p.m. on February 5, 1950, Marvin Odom, owner of Falmouth Airport on Cape Cod and a former Navy fighter pilot, glanced through his office picture window and saw two odd, bright lights about 25 degrees above the western horizon. With Lt. Philip Foushee of Otis AFB and two others he went outside and watched what looked like two long, cigar-shaped bodies, not attached to one another, converging and drifting apart. Something like a fireball dropped from the left one. Then both climbed high in the western sky at great speed and were lost.

None of the four men could match it to anything they knew. Odom said he had “pooh-poohed” flying saucers for years and now wondered. The Teaticket, Massachusetts UFO sighting reached the Air Force through a public-information teletype that forwarded the Cape Cod Standard-Times story of February 6, and the Project Blue Book card that summarized it carries a single handwritten word: UNIDENTIFIED.

Date: February 5, 1950

Sighting Time: 5:10 p.m. EST (1710)

Day/Night: Dusk

Location: Falmouth Airport, Teaticket (Falmouth), Cape Cod, Massachusetts, USA; the lights were in the western sky

Urban or Rural: Rural (small-town airport)

No. of Entity’s: Not Applicable

Entity Type: Not Applicable

Entity Description: Not Applicable

Hynek Classification: NL (Nocturnal Light)

Duration: About 10 minutes: the objects began to climb about ten minutes after the original sighting

No. of Object(s): 2

Description of the Object(s): Two bright, illuminated cylindrical bodies, apparently maneuvering as a pair though not attached to each other; a fireball-like body dropped from the left object

Shape/Size/Color of Object(s): Long, cylindrical (“cigar-shaped”); size not estimated; very bright, bright enough to throw reflections inside the airport ready room

Distance to Object(s): Far away, according to the witnesses; not measured

Height & Speed: About 25 degrees above the western horizon (course 270 degrees); they hovered, converged and drifted apart, then climbed high in the western sky at great speed

Number of Witnesses: 4 at the airport: Marvin Roger Odom (airport owner, former Navy fighter pilot), Lt. Philip Foushee (Otis AFB pilot), John Roger Augusta Jr. (Odom’s brother-in-law) and Raymond Wood (Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution employee and student pilot)

Special Features/Characteristics: Two pilots among the witnesses; the fireball dropped from one object; the lights lit the interior of the ready room; clear western sky, cloud directly overhead; the newspaper story was forwarded by an Air Force public-information teletype

Case Status: Unidentified. Project Blue Book’s record card carries the conclusion UNIDENTIFIED.

Source: Project Blue Book (Project 10073) record card (report source: newspaper article, 8 February 1950); Air Force teletype forwarding the Cape Cod Standard-Times story of 6 February 1950; Hyannis Cape Cod Standard-Times, February 6, 1950, as cited by NICAP; Loren E. Gross, UFOs: A History, 1950: January–March; NICAP 1950 UFO Chronology

Summary/Description: Two ex-pilots and two others at Falmouth Airport, Cape Cod, watched two bright cylindrical lights about 25 degrees above the western horizon at 5:10 p.m. on February 5, 1950. The lights converged and drifted apart, a fireball dropped from one, and after about ten minutes both climbed at great speed and vanished. Blue Book’s card concludes UNIDENTIFIED.

Related Cases: Davis-Monthan AFB, Arizona, fiery object with smoke trail (February 1, 1950); Alameda, California, “flying ice cream cone” (February 7, 1950); Tampa, Florida, B-29 rocket-trail sighting (February 8, 1950); Datil, New Mexico, photographed light (February 24, 1950)

Detailed Report

The Airport

Falmouth Airport, in the Teaticket section of Falmouth, was busy that Sunday afternoon with civilian and military aviation people. Marvin Roger Odom owned the field and had flown Navy fighters. Lt. Philip Foushee, an Air Force pilot from Otis AFB, was there, along with Odom’s brother-in-law John Roger Augusta Jr. and Raymond Wood, a Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution employee who was also a student pilot at the airport. The Cape Cod Standard-Times said the first two men had thousands of hours of aerial experience between them.

The Lights

At just about 5:10 p.m., Odom saw two bright, far-off lights through the office window, about 25 degrees above the western horizon. As he made out long cylindrical bodies that were not attached to each other but seemed to be maneuvering, the group went outside for a better view. The sky in the west was clear, while cloud lay directly overhead. As they watched, something dropped from the body of the left-hand object. Foushee said whatever fell was ablaze, a sort of fireball with no smoke. The two lights converged at times and then drifted apart, and about ten minutes after the first sighting they climbed at great speed and were lost to view.

What the Witnesses Said

Foushee told the Standard-Times reporter that he had flown conventional aircraft and jets and knew weather balloons, and had never seen anything like these. The objects looked cigar-shaped, operated as a pair without being attached, and kept different distances from each other. Wood, contacted at home that night, corroborated Odom and Foushee, said the objects looked a long way off and entirely unlike any aircraft he knew, and added that the lights were bright enough at first that he saw reflections inside the airport ready room. Odom said he had ridiculed flying saucer stories for years and that what he saw was beginning to make him wonder.

The Paper Trail

An Air Force public-information teletype forwarded the February 6 Cape Cod Standard-Times story “for your information” to higher headquarters. The Project 10073 record card, typed later, lists the source as a newspaper article dated February 8 and the observers as two ex-pilots, and summarizes the sighting: two illuminated cylinders about 25 degrees above the western horizon, a fireball seen to drop from one, the objects drifting together and apart, and a rapid climb after ten minutes. It gives the time as 1710 EST, the course as 270 degrees, and the conclusion as UNIDENTIFIED.

RESEARCHER’S NOTES

Two Pilots, Two Cylinders and One Word on the Card

The Date: Loren Gross places the sighting on February 6. The Standard-Times story is dated February 6 and says the sighting was “yesterday afternoon,” the card gives February 5 as the date of information, and NICAP dates it February 5. This report follows the card and the newspaper.
Pilots on Both Sides of the Window: Odom and Foushee were both trained pilots. Foushee, an active Air Force pilot from a nearby fighter base, said in print that he knew aircraft, jets and weather balloons and had never seen these objects. The card’s source line reads “Two ex-pilots.”
A Corroborated Fireball: The dropped fireball is the detail every version repeats: Odom saw it, Foushee described it as ablaze without smoke, and Wood corroborated the account.
Only a Newspaper Source: The Air Force file consists of the card and the forwarded newspaper story. No Air Force interview, sketch or weather check appears in the file, so the detailed account rests on the Standard-Times reporter’s interviews.
Sunset Timing: The sighting fell at dusk in February on the New England coast, with a clear western sky. The card records the elevation of 25 degrees and course 270 degrees and does not discuss any astronomical or aircraft explanation.
Not Alone in February: The same month brought the Davis-Monthan fireball with its smoke trail, the Bay Area cone and the Tampa B-29 sighting, all reported by aviation people within a week of Teaticket.

The Teaticket sighting is a short, tidy case from credible witnesses: four men at an airport, two of them pilots, watching two cylindrical lights for about ten minutes in a clear western sky. It is one of the few February 1950 cases whose Blue Book card says UNIDENTIFIED, and the file behind it is thin, a forwarded newspaper story and a card. It is filed here as Unidentified for that reason, with the caution that no Air Force investigator interviewed the witnesses.