Chronicle year
1949
1949-07-26 / Kansas City, Kansas
In July, August, and September 1949, and again in January 1950, military and civilian witnesses filed reports under Flight Service Regulation 200-4 describing flying objects over Kansas, Washington, Oregon, Ohio, South Carolina, and New York. Objects were described variously as dish-shaped, circular, and cylindrical, with reported speeds exceeding that of a B-29 and, in one case, an orange and white flame exhaust more than twice the length of the object. Reports were submitted by Lowry, Olmsted, McChord, Maxwell, and Wright-Patterson Flight Service Centers to the Commanding General, Air Materiel Command, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base.
1949-07-24 / Campbell Air Force Base, Camp Campbell, Kentucky
On July 24, 1949, a fireball was reported over the general neighborhood of Socorro, New Mexico at 8:26 p.m. Researchers W. D. Crozier and Ben K. Seely of the New Mexico School of Mines then made systematic airborne particle collections at Socorro from July 25 through August 1, finding copper-bearing opaque particles and three apparently perfect spherical cobalt-indication particles twelve microns in diameter in the July 26 afternoon collection.
1949-05-27 / Los Angeles, California
FBI headquarters file 62-HQ-83894, Section 5, contains 1949 investigative records on flying saucers, including a letter Walter Winchell received from Peter Camerlon Jones of Los Angeles, who claimed to have seen a large silver object shaped like a child's top in the mountains near Los Angeles in August 1947. D. M. Ladd directed the Los Angeles field office to discreetly check Jones's background and interview him, but efforts to locate Jones were negative. The FBI wrote to Ernest Cuneo on July 21, 1949, suggesting the original letter may have been a prank.
1949-04-28 / Virginia
The U.S. Air Force Directorate of Intelligence issued Air Intelligence Report No. 100-203-79, "Analysis of Flying Object Incidents in the United States," Study No. 203, dated April 28, 1949. The study examined approximately 210 reported incidents involving flying objects, described in three categories: disk-shaped, rough cigar-shaped, and balls of fire, with observers including U.S. Weather Bureau personnel, USAF rated officers, and experienced civilian pilots.
1949-02-15 / Washington 25, D.C.