September 8, 1958 — Offutt AFB, NE
6:40 p.m. At Offutt AFB, Omaha, Nebraska, SAC Operations Officer Maj. Paul A. Duich, plus several officers from USAF Ballistic Missiles Division, Los Angeles AFB in El Segundo, California; many other air base officers and airmen; and Offutt air traffic control tower personnel see a brilliant-white, elongated, cylindrical object hovering in the west just after sunset. The object is oriented vertically with the blunter end highest. After several minutes, the object turns dull orange-red and becomes sharper in outline. A swarm of about 10 “black specks” appears to “cavort” around the lower end of the object for about one minute before disappearing. Then the cylindrical object begins to rotate counterclockwise and starts drifting slowly to the south from due west and drops in elevation angle over about 5 minutes. During the final 5-minute observation, the object continues angular descent and gradually decreases in angular size, but it begins rotating clockwise until it disappears by fading into the slight atmospheric haze. A USAF colonel takes several color photos with a 35mm camera on a tripod but later claims nothing came out. [Eberhart]
Sources:
Brad Sparks, Blue Books Unknowns Catalogue, Case 1342, p. 265;
Richard Hall, The UFO Evidence, pp. 25, 27;
Thomas M. Olsen, The Reference for Outstanding UFO Reports, UFO Information Retrieval Center, November 1966, sec. 3, pp. 58-59;
Loren E. Gross, The Fifth Horseman of the Apocalypse: UFOs, a History: 1958 August–September, The Author, 1999, pp. 59–63;
Herbert S. Taylor, “Satellite Objects and Cloud Cigars,” IUR 29, no. 1 (Spring 2004): 5–6;
Michael Swords and Robert Powell, UFOs and Government, p. 280;
