Documents / Report
This declassified U.S. Air Force file contains the final report of Project Twinkle, dated 27 November 1951 and written by Louis Elterman of the Geophysics Research Division, together with related correspondence. The project was set up to investigate the green fireballs and other light phenomena around Holloman AFB and Vaughn, New Mexico, and it was run with Askania cameras. The report calls its findings essentially negative and recommends no further funding. In March 1952 the Directorate of Intelligence declined to declassify it.
“declassified”17 pages
aerial phenomena in the vicinity of Holloman since September 1950. The populace around HAFB seem to have lost their sensitivity as observers. Even during the meteor shower of 11-12 August 1951, no alarming reports were received. However, on 14 March 1951, nine Bell personnel reported sighting between fourteen and twenty bodies "not unlike a flock of geese". On 9 July a "red glowing ball" was sighted by a sergeant stationed at the Corona Experimental Radar Site at Corona, New Mexico. (Copies of both reports are attached). More recently, a pilot reported some aerial objects which, after investigation, were identified as planets. Mr. B. Guildenberg, who is an assistant to Major Doty and an active amateur astronomer, commented that he has been spending several hours at his telescope almost every night for the past few years and never once observed an unexplainable object; that on one occasion, an excited acquaintance was pacified when a "strange object" showed up as an eagle in the telescope; that Clyde Tombaugh, discoverer of the planet Pluto and now engaged in activities at White Sands, never observed an unexplainable aerial object despite his continuous and extensive observations of the sky; that Fred Whipple in his work photographing meteors at Las Cruces, never detected a strange aerial object with his Schmidt cameras; and that the A and M College at Las Cruces engages in astronomical observations but had never observed strange aerial phenomena. DOWNGRADED AT 3 YEAR INTERVALS DECLASSIFIED AFTER 12 YEARS. DOD DIR 5200.10 CONFIDENTIAL 6 UNCLASSIFIED
Report, cited by the archive. 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. 29 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.