Documents / Official release
This FBI file serial collects 1947 Army Air Forces reports on flying disc sightings. It includes Air Defense Command interviews from September 1947 with Pan American pilot Alpheus Powell and navigator Walter White about orange objects seen near Boston on 4 August 1947. It also holds a Birmingham, Alabama report with a photograph, newspaper clippings and a sergeant's sworn statement, Newfoundland and Alaska sighting reports, notes on an instrument found in Illinois, and a Weather Bureau memo on a metallic disk.
From the source: Release of 2026-05-08 Incident: N/A, N/A. The FBI's 62-HQ-83894 case file includes investigative records, eyewitness testimonies, and public reports concerning Unidentified Flying Objects and flying discs documented between June 1947 and July 1968. The records include high-profile incident accounts, photographic evidence from sites like Oak Ridge, TN, and technical proposals regarding potential propulsion systems. Additional topics include convention programs, researcher accounts, and extensive media coverage from the period. This file is partially posted on FBI vault with more redactions and some pages missing. Included here is the complete case file with several newly declassified pages and only minor redactions.
Read from the scan by GLM-OCR; expect the odd misread word.
A citizen of Fairfield Highlands said the flying discs came over his residence at a speed of about 1,500 miles an hour. "They would go in opposite directions, stop, and bump into each other." he reported. Gene Plumstead, program manager of WSGN, reported the flying discs over Edgewood Lake. J. A. Hatmer, 3301 Avenue I, Ensley, said the lights appeared like a spot thrown by a huge searchlight. He said, however, he could see no beam such as would come from a searchlight. A number of "whites round things" were seen in the skies over West End by Mrs. Alfred Hackbarth, 1760 McMillan Avenue. L. M. Cadenhead, 2000 48th Street, Central Park, saw the lights over Powderly. "They looked like saucers," said Mr. and Mrs. J. R. Martin and Mr. and Mrs. Frank Arnold, 732 47th Way, South. "Some of them went as fast as bullets, while others floated around. They were the size of an automobile tire." Mr. and Mrs. William Howell, 1004 East Court, South, reported seeing 11 discs about 8:30 a.m. "About 15 of them passed over our house shortly before 8," said Mrs. Helen Mallory, 1404 North 12th Court. Mrs. Mallory said the objects were first sighted by her son, Milo, who called the rest of the family. "They looked like a flash of light that went by in such a hurry you couldn't describe it," she said. Frank S. Lovelace, policeman for the Tennessee Coal, Iron and Railroad Company, reported seeing eight or 10 of the objects. "They looked about the size of a dishpan," he said. "They came out of the southeast and whirled-around several minutes." S-Sgt. I. L. Livingston, of the Birmingham Army Airfield, observed the discs from his Green Acres residence. "They were going xigzag from East to West," he said. R. H. VAUGHN, III, who served as an anti-aircraft gunner in Europe, saw the "flying saucer" display with his father from their home in Ensley Highlands. "I never shot at anything moving as rapidly as they were," he said, Vaughn believes the "discs" are some sort of natural phenomena, like the Aurora Borealis. Jimmy Dewberry, 11, of 1030 16th Avenue, South, said he saw a "Dying saucer" while visiting at his grandmother's on 14th Avenue, South. "It looked like a shooting star," Jimmy said, "but it was too low for that. It had a long red tail." Searchlight Reflection The mysterious "Flying discs" observed in Birmingham last night may be a carnival beacon Light at Siluria, about 20 miles south of Birmingham. That was a solution offered this That was a solution offered this morning by William B. Hayes, of the Reconstruction Finance Corporation in the Corner Building here. Mr. Hayes, who served in the Army in the Pacific, said he and others there had seen similar sights throughout the South Pacific islands caused by searchlights. He based his theory on high overcast skies last night and said the beacon at the Siluria carnival probably struck the high clouds and gave the indication of being "flying Mr. Hayes is a pilot.
Official release, from the pursue 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. 126 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.