Documents / Report
This August 1949 technical report from the US Air Force Air Materiel Command presents Project Grudge's investigation of unidentified flying objects through January 1949. Drawing on consultants including Dr. J. A. Hynek, Rand Corporation, the Air Weather Service and Dr. P. M. Fitts, it explains most of 244 incidents as balloons, aircraft, astronomical phenomena, hoaxes or psychological errors. It concludes the objects pose no direct threat to national security and recommends reducing the investigation in scope.
## UNCLASSIFIED Inident x19 --- Dayton, Ohio --- 20 Cateter 19-17 Information given here is insufficient to exclude possibly the possibility that the objects observed were a close pair of fireballs, but this seems extremely unlikely. Since the length of time in sight is not stated nor the speed estimated, it is impossible to draw any definite conclusions. Assuming these to be appropriate, if one were to stratify the description to its very limits and make allowances for the remarks of an untrained observer, he could say that the "alger-like shape" might have been an illusion caused by rapid motion and that the bright sunlight might have made both the objects and the trails nearly invisible. This investigator does not prefer that interpretation, and it should be resorted to only if all other possible explanations fail. In short, while it is not out of the realm of possibility that the ob- jects were an unusual double fireball, it is most unlikely.
Report, from the classic collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is under it. The text was read from the page images by an OCR model; expect the odd misread word. 413 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.