The Kaliszewski Balloon-Crew Sightings

The General Mills Aeronautical Research Laboratories in Minneapolis built balloons for the Skyhook project, a cosmic-ray programme run with the Office of Naval Research. Joseph J. Kaliszewski supervised their manufacture. He was a former Air Force P-38 pilot. The aerologist in charge of Skyhook was Charles B. Moore Jr. These were people who watched the sky for a living.

Wednesday, 10 October 1951. About 10:10 in the morning. Kaliszewski and co-pilot Jack Donaghue were flying about 10 miles east of St. Croix Falls, Wisconsin, climbing toward a balloon at about 20,000 feet. "At 6,000 feet I noticed a strange object crossing the skies from East to West, a great deal higher and behind our balloon," Kaliszewski said. It "had a peculiar glow to it."

It came in at a slight dive. It levelled off for about a minute and slowed down. Then a sharp left turn, and a climb at 50 to 60 degrees into the southeast "with a terrific acceleration." It crossed about 45 degrees of sky in roughly two minutes. It left no vapor trail. Then it was gone.

Thursday, 11 October. About 6:30 a.m. Kaliszewski was aloft again, this time with pilot Dick Reilly at 10,000 feet north of Minneapolis. Again there was "a brightly glowing object to the southeast," moving east to west "at a high rate and very high." This one "had what can be described as a halo around it with a dark undersurface." It moved at about 50 degrees per second. Then it slowed and began to climb in lazy circles. "The pattern it made was like a falling oak leaf inverted." After a few minutes it accelerated and disappeared to the east. A second object followed, briefly. Neither left a trail.

Kaliszewski radioed the tracking station at the University of Minnesota airport in New Brighton. Doug Smith and Dick Dorian turned their theodolites skyward. They "couldn't keep the theodolite going fast enough to keep them in the field." One operator saw "a blur for about two seconds." A "smokey grey cigar shaped object" with no vapor trail and no reflection.

Project Grudge called the witnesses "experienced high altitude balloon observers." Its report recorded their view that "the object definitely appeared to be controlled." Further investigation "produced no additional information as to the identity of the object." The verdict was blunt. "No conclusions can be made." Project Blue Book later filed the first day as "Aircraft" and the second as "Unidentified." Kaliszewski could not understand why two similar sightings got different labels.

In January 1952, Edward J. Ruppelt, newly in charge of the Air Force UFO project, visited General Mills. He spent most of a day with the crews. Every time he hinted at a natural explanation, he later wrote, "I just about found myself in a fresh snowdrift."

Astrophysicist Donald Menzel argued that General Mills crews had seen refracted images of their own balloon. He appears to have meant their sightings in general, not these two days. On 10 October, Kaliszewski saw the object and the balloon at the same time. Brad Sparks, who lists both days among his Blue Book unknowns, wrote of the first sighting that he "found the events could not be explained as aircraft or anything else I could propose."

In early 1952, Moore and Kaliszewski went public with three "aerial objects of undetermined origin." In 1968, James E. McDonald put the case before the House Committee on Science and Astronautics. The reports, once classified, were later cleared for release. The objects were never identified.