September 20, 1957 — Montauk, NY
3:05 p.m. A national defense alert is called when the first of two or three supersonic objects, varying in speed for the next 30 minutes from 800 to 12,000 mph and varying in altitude from 50,000 to 135,000 feet, is picked up over the Atlantic by NORAD radar at Montauk, New York.
A second (or same) UFO heads straight toward SAC headquarters in Omaha, Nebraska, in what is perceived as a threat trajectory potentially aiming for a nuclear knockout kill of the entire US nuclear force. At 3:10 p.m., interception is attempted by two F-102 jets from Kinross AFB [now Chippewa County International Airport] south of Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, and later from Truax AFB [now Truax Field Air National Guard Base] northeast of Madison, Wisconsin. At 3:24 p.m., another UFO joins the first on a similar trajectory 150 miles behind. It passes over Ontario, Michigan, Illinois, and Iowa. The UFO sends radio replies to IFF interrogation signals, on different frequencies, confirming its location on the radar plots and making it impossible to explain as a malfunction or interference.
Interception is impossible at these speeds and altitudes. SAC goes on high alert and apparently launches nuclear bombers toward Russia, but the alert is called off when the UFOs disappear. NORAD triggers a White House alert. High-level meetings of CIA and USAF intelligence, and the Intelligence Advisory Committee meet in executive session. The CIA Director of the Office of Scientific Intelligence, Herbert Scoville Jr., suggests that the object might be a maneuverable Soviet cruise missile, but that is not yet in the Soviet inventory. President Eisenhower is briefed multiple times. One year later, NORAD still cannot identify any malfunction that could possibly make the radar targets agree with the IFF signals. [Eberhart]
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Source:
Brad Sparks, Blue Books Unknowns Catalogue, Case 1253, pp. 249–250;
Michael Swords and Robert Powell, UFOs and Government, pp. 266–267;
Jerome Clark, The UFO Encyclopedia, 3rd Ed., pp. 802–804, 814–824;
Jerome Clark, The UFO Encyclopedia, 4th Ed., pp. 882–892, 894–895;
NICAP, “Multiple Radars Track 4,500 MPH Target”;
[memo], R. Roach to A. H. Belmont, “Unidentified Flying Object Reported on September 20, 1957; Intelligence Advisory Committee / Watch Committee,” September 24, 1957;
Brad Sparks, “NORAD National Air Defense UFO Alert, Sept. 20, 1957,” christophermellon.net, May 2, 2023;