April 8, 1956 — Schenectady & Oswego, NY
10:15 p.m. Capt. Raymond E. Ryan, First Officer William Neff, flight attendant Phyllis Reynolds, and many passengers take off on American Airlines Flight 715 from Albany, New York, heading north then nearly due west at 260 mph and 6,000 feet north of Schenectady, when a brilliant white light about 2–3 miles away is spotted about 90° to the left appearing like an airliner heading in to land at Albany. The white light moves about 90° to dead ahead position about 8–10 miles away at high speed, estimated at about 800–1,000 mph, where it changes color to orange and seems to block the airliner’s path or risk collision. It disappears briefly and reappears as an orange light again but standing still ahead of the airliner to the west. The Convair airliner contacts Griffiss AFB [now Griffiss International Airport], Rome, New York, where controllers ask Ryan to turn his lights off and on to help identify aircraft. He is told the airliner is seen and the orange UFO are to the south. The airliner is ordered to maintain course to follow the UFO to the west, skipping its scheduled landing at Syracuse after nearly 30 minutes of following the object. The promised fighter jet interception is never seen. The object disappears at high speed to the northwest towards Oswego, New York. [Eberhart]
BB Record Cards:
Case Summary:
Sources:
“Airliner Chases Bright Light Miles across the State,” Buffalo (N.Y.) Evening News, April 10, 1956, pp. 1, 11;
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-buffalo-news-thebuffalonews19560/192409532/
https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-buffalo-news-thebuffalonews19560/192409536/
“Unidentified Aerial ‘Bright Object’ Mystifies Area Fliers, CAA Man,” Albany (N.Y.) Times-Union, April 11, 1956;
“Sees ‘Fantastic’ Objects in Sky,” New York Herald-Tribune, April 11, 1956;
“Theories on Bright Object Differ As Reports Continue,” Amsterdam (N.Y.) Recorder, April 12, 1956;
“April 8, 1956,” CSI News Letter, no. 14 (May 6, 1956): 5–6;
“Cover-Up Suspected in Reported Air–UFO Chase,” UFO Investigator 1, no. 3 (January 1958): 10–12;
Donald Menzel, “The Ryan Case”, The World of Flying Saucers, 1963; [Galley proof from Blue Book file]
Richard Hall, The UFO Evidence, p. 117;
Brad Sparks, Blue Book Unknowns Catalogue, Case 1183, p. 244;
Loren E. Gross, UFOs, a History: 1956, January–April, The Author, 1993, pp. 59–75;
https://cufos.org/PDFs/UFO_History_Gross/1956_01_04_History.pdf#page=66
NICAP, “Air Force Requests Plane Loaded with Passengers to Chase UFO”;
“American Airlines CE-II Pilot Case of 4-8-1956 – Capt. Ryan and Co-Pilot Neff,” Ufology: A Primer in Audio, 1938–1959, November 21, 2013;
Congressional Correspondence
