Cigar over Cortez-Bradenton, FL
Investigated by a competent body and left unresolved. The rarest grade, and never awarded by us — only recorded.
The report, as filed
Cortez-Bradenton, Florida. 10:20 p.m. Witnesses: Capt. Sames, acting chief of the Aircraft Branch, Eglin AFB, and Mrs. Sames. They watched for 25 minutes while a cigar-shaped object as long as two Pullman cars and having seven lighted square windows and throwing sparks, descended and then climbed with a bouncing motion at an estimated 400 m.p.h.
Held as-reported from Project Blue Book, United States Air Force. Witness text is preserved verbatim, including its spelling; nothing is edited beyond formatting.
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Sightings from the Project Blue Book era (through 1969) live in Record Group 341 at the National Archives. Through Aletheca, the house instrument, anyone can commission the request — filed, chased, and published in the open, refusals included. The draft goes over already written: the records sought, and the date window they would live in.
Routed to: National Archives and Records Administration · records window 1949-01-24 → 1949-02-10