Documents / Report
This confidential progress report from the U.S. Naval Photographic Interpretation Center in Washington, dated May 1953 and addressed to the Director of Naval Intelligence, analyzes motion picture film of unidentified objects. The footage was taken in Utah on 2 July 1952 and in Montana in 1950. Analysts used frame plots and densitometer readings, and most of the group judged the images to be light sources. They computed velocities and accelerations that ruled out birds, aircraft and balloons, and concluded the objects could not be identified as natural phenomena or commonly known man-made objects.
From the source: Release of 2026-08-07 Incident: 1950, 1952, Montana, Utah. This file contains a memorandum relating to the U.S. Naval Photographic Interpretation Center’s assessment of two films allegedly depicting unidentified airborne objects, captured in Montana and Utah in 1950 and 1952, respectively. The file documents the Center’s analytic process, assumptions that constrained its confidence level, tentative conclusions, and recommendations for future research. The Center assessed, generally, that the objects depicted in the film demonstrated characteristics that were inconsistent with those of natural phenomena or commonly known aerospace technologies. The memorandum documents the Center’s recommendation for a more well-resourced investigation to corroborate its presumptive findings, citing a lack of funding and personnel. The accompanying charts compare the film’s luminosity with the apparent angular size of the phenomena, using contemporary mathematical modeling and photogrammetric analysis techniques.
.·Code 01/HWW/lbh Jl2 Serial: fl • r • -'' QQNFB}ENTIAL SECURITY Th1FORMATION Subj: Interpretation of Movies of Unidentified Objects; progress report on 4. All objects appear to have the same characteristics in re gards to shape, color, size and relative motion. 5. The shape of the objects appears to be oblate or disk shaped, c o~or; blue-white, and maximum and minimum size; 98 a nd 16 f eet . The size is based on the assumption that the objects are five miles from the observer. 6 . Fade i n a nd fade out of the objects were analyzed ae in 3 above. I n this case the group movement vas such that the distance between the ob jects a nd camera was increased so that the objects could not be recorded on the film thereby causing the apparent fade out. Fade-in as attributed to a shortening of the distance from the fade-out area to the camera station . .I 7. Plots of the groups indicate that the objects move counter clock-wise relative to t he axis of fli ght path. However, nothi ng has been detected which indicates motion of the individual objects about their own axis a l though this motion appears to be likely. 8 . In determining the velocity of the objects three assumptions were ma.de: a. The camera was held s tea.dy during Part III of the film. b. The objects were moving perpendicular to the opticeJ. aY..is, a nd c. The objects were five miles from the camera. It is obvious that (b) is a fallacy ; however, this assumption vill give the minimum velocity and the actual velocity is greater than computed. The assumption that the objects are five miles from the camera i s a n arbitrary oue. However , based on the emulsion speed and focal length, an object 50 feet in diameter a nd five miles from the camera will be recorded on the film with sufficient resolution to identify major detail s of the object. It is felt that if these objects were closer than five miles at the time of recording , details would appear on the film. Velocity is computed to be 3780 mph for a shift of l mm per :t'rame 1:f the objec t is five miles from the observer. From 55 measureme nts taken from Part III of the Utah film, the maxi mum and minimum velocities COUFIB-Em?IAL SECURITY INFORMATION 5 ' U ~:E~Mooavw Da-f;rF@oowr£1'ifa@oo
Report, from the pursue collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. 23 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.