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DOW-UAP-D102: Project Blue Book File on Tremonton Film, Utah, 1952

Department of War · 2026-09-18 · 156 pages · text from the file's own layer

This Department of War release reproduces Project Blue Book records on the Tremonton, Utah film of 2 July 1952. In them, Navy Chief Photographer Delbert C. Newhouse explains how he filmed a group of bright objects near Tremonton. ATIC memos and a December 1952 travel report record Navy and General Mills balloon specialists judging that the objects closely resembled pillow balloons. A January 1953 memorandum discusses publicly releasing the film. The file also includes unrelated sighting reports from Phoenix and Massachusetts, plus material about Donald Keyhoe.

• •UNCLASSIFIED
COPY
CSAF ITEM 2/; TT-27
26 Feb 1953
ATI
OLOUl, YOUNG
Reference Item 2 ATIC Telecon 15, 5 Feb 53 the following
statement is for ATIC coordination prior to release to PIO:
I- This color film provides an instance of a sighting being
substantiated by motion pictures and confirms the faith of
the USAF in the veracity of the many citizens who have
reported sightings of unidentified objects or phenomena in
the air. ' The film was forwarded to the USAF by Warrant Officer
Delbert c. Newhouse , Aviation Supply Depot, Naval Supply Center,
Oakland, California.1 Warrent Officer Newhouse stated that the
film was exposed 7 miles North of Tremonton, Utah, on the U.S.
Highway 30 at 11:00 a.m. MST, 2 July 52: and that he was using
a Bell and Howell Auto Master(hand-held) with a three inch
telephoto lens at F/8 for the first few feet of the film and
the balance at F/16 all at sixteen frames per second.
Examination of the film to date allows a deduction that the
images were caused by surfaces having good reflective qualities,
(:mch as seagulls o~ balloon~., or by bodies or substances possessing
high intensity light sources. Images appearing on the film are
nonsufficiently defined to permit identification or determination
of form or substance and should have been caused by unknown objects
or undetermined known obJects. The absence of any reference ooints,
even clouds, in the bac·ground has made it impossible to estimate
the distance of the obJects from the camera, thus precluding a
I
determination of aiz.e 'and linear speed. Measurements of angular
UNCLASSIFIED
DECLASSIFIED Authority NND 923007

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