Documents / FOIA release

Tabulation on Unconventional Flying Object Sighted Near Baku (with Memo Attached Dated 560123, Subject: Sighting of Unconventional Flying Object Near Baku, USSR on 4 October 1955)

Central Intelligence Agency · 1956-01-24 · 4 pages · text by GLM-OCR

This Central Intelligence Agency memorandum dated 24 January 1956 forwards a summary and tabulation of statements about an unconventional flying object sighted near Baku, USSR, on 4 October 1955. Members of a party traveling by train toward Tiflis reported the object, and their accounts are compared in a chart. The chart covers shape, size, lights, motion and searchlights. The memo concludes that darkness and the brief duration of the sighting kept observers from seeing enough detail to describe the object properly.

Read from the scan by GLM-OCR; expect the odd misread word.

MOVEMENT	1 hour out of darkness	1910	1910	1910
HIDILITY	After Dark	Lights were on in train, not yet completely dark, sky was clear.	Dark but clear	Zoough daylight to see a form
NOTION OF LIGHTING	-----	6 - 7 seconds	90 seconds, about 5 seconds on ground	very short
CUSION	1 1/3 hours by rail 10 minutes by rail from AKJAYT	50 - 60 miles south of Akjayt	10 minutes by rail from AKJAYT
NOTION OF RAIL LINE	South of rail line	South of rail line	Left of rail line	South of rail line
CUSION OF RAIL LINE	Not possible to estimate distance	Not possible to estimate distance	6 miles	1 - 2 miles
HER OBJECTS LINKED	Searchlight	Searchlight, horizon	Large airfield, steel tower, hangars, several searchlights Cagpian Sea still visible	Top searchlights
ATE OF JET	Ball	Round or square, may have had stub wings	Triangular with point to rear	Round like a partial inflated balloon
TOT OF JET	May have been small on rocket	1/3 size of searchlight visible to the loft	about the size of US jet fighter	about the size of US jet fighter
NOTION OF JET	Rotated slowly as it rose	Rotation not seen	made three to seven spirals	Rotated slowly
NOTION OF JET	Hana soon	Two stationary lights like eyes	three, one on each point of the triangle, lights were red and green	2 lights on top, lights on bottom that rotated
NOTION OF JET	Not seen	Not seen	Launched like a missile	Not seen

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About this file

FOIA release, from the cia-readingroom collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. The text was read from the page images by GLM-OCR; expect the odd misread word. 4 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.