From the Oregon Journal - 5 Jan. 1947, Portland, Oregon
(Reference Incidents 5, 6, 7, 8 and 8a)
Whatever they are, there are some disc-like objects flying around in the sky.
Or else eight (8) Portland area policemen and deputy sheriffs who sighted the objects Friday, numerous private citizens, the crew of a United Air Lines plane over Boise, Idaho, and a coastguardman who claims to have photographed one near Seattle, are all wrong.
In Portland, the alert was sound over police radio at 1:6 P.M. Friday, after the East Side Station received a score of calls that the discs were overhead. Within seconds, two patrol cars reported sighting the mystery craft.
FLAKES SEEN, NOISE LACKING.
First to report in were Patrolmen Walter Liley and Robert Ellis in Car No. 32, who stopped near Orks Park. Both World War II veterans and civilian pilots, they sighted three of the objects within 30 seconds traveling at great height and speed over the park. They reported they heard no engine noises but saw flakes. The objects seemed erratic and changed direction of flight. The patrolmen agreed that without knowledge of the size of the objects it would be impossible to judge their speed or altitude.
Patrolman Earl Patterson in car no. 13 stopped at E 32nd Avenue and Foster road to look eastward from where the discs were reported. He said he saw three discs coming out of the sun. He saw them go into the west and heading southwest. The craft seemed to be disc-like or egg-shaped with a "light flash or reflection" on the side.
JAMES H. BROWN.
A former circus veteran said the object was unlike any plane he'd ever seen. He thought it was not radio-controlled because the craft could change direction at a 90° angle without difficulty.
Members of the barber union at the corner of SW Irving street street met when they heard the all-car alert. J. J. A. Brown, J. J. F., A. T. Austin and Patrolman K. C. Ellis all saw the objects and said they appeared to be going south high over the Girts mills at terrific speed. Capt. F. said the flashes kept them from a certain as whether there were three or six.
"The discs would oscillate and sometimes we would see a full disc, then a half-moon shape, then nothing at all," he reported. The objects looked more like a shiny chrome hub cap off a car which wobbled, disappeared and reappeared."
There was a plane in the sky at the time, but all were emphatic that the discs were not planes.