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This 81-page Project Blue Book case file covers the Levelland, Texas sightings of the night of 2 to 3 November 1957. It holds the record card, Air Force teletype reports from the 1006th AISS and radar units, witness questionnaires, press clippings about the White Sands sightings, and analyst memos. Several witnesses said a bluish-white oval object stopped their car engines. The Air Force concluded the cause was ball lightning in stormy weather, with wet or faulty ignition systems explaining the engine failures.
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EGG-SHAPED UFO STALLS CARS ON HIGHWAY COPS CHASE SKY OBJECT MYSTERY AIR OBJECTS SEEN IN SKY OVER L.A. These eight-column headlines are only a sample of what appeared all over the national press during the first two weeks of November, 1957. Many moons have passed--two of them artificial (as of this writing)--since the press has displayed such open interest in UFOs; but then the remarkable incidents which they describe are undoubtedly without parallel in the history of "flying saucers." Following hard on the announcement of the launching of "muttnik"—whether by coincidence or not—came the first reports of what quickly developed into a startling series: near Levelland, Texas, during the night of November 2/3rd, a number of truck drivers, state and local police, and other residents described seeing a vast 200-foot luminous "egg-shaped" object that hedgehopped the countryside around Levelland, landing on highways and in adjacent fields and mysteriously affecting car motors and headlights. (This effect on automobiles had previously been reported from France, in 1954.) Terrified witnesses reported their experiences to Weir Clem, Hockley County sheriff, and Clem, together with deputies and dozens of police officers, made a tour of the areas where the object(s) had been encountered. At 2:30 a.m., saw "a streak of fire" flash across the highway to the south of his car; two highway patrolmen, following some distance behind him, confirmed his sighting. At least seven persons reported close encounters with the "egg"; at least four cars or trucks were stalled; and many others reported seeing the phenomenon at greater distance. The above headlines are from the Alamogordo, N.M., Daily News, 11/5; the Ham- mond, Ind., Times, 11/11; and the Los Angeles Times, 11/6.
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