Project Blue Book begins

In March 1952 the Air Force launched Project Blue Book at Wright-Patterson, its longest-running UFO study.

1952 CE · 39.82, -84.05 · status: official

The account

First led by Capt. Edward Ruppelt, Blue Book logged 12,618 reports by 1969, of which 701 stayed 'unidentified'. Astronomer J. Allen Hynek served as its scientific consultant throughout. Its records, with names redacted, are held by the US National Archives. A CIA Office of Scientific Intelligence review of September 1952 found that ATIC's saucer group was three officers and two secretaries. Battelle Memorial Institute had been hired to machine-index the reports. Of about 1,500 official reports since 1947, 20% stayed unexplained. CIA judged the case-by-case method valid but unable to settle what the phenomena were.

The sceptical view

Critics both inside and outside Blue Book (including Hynek, later) said it was understaffed and leaned toward explaining cases away rather than investigating them.

Connections in the atlas

• Project Blue Book Special Report No. 14
• Blue Book Special Report No. 14
• ? Can ball lightning explain UFO reports?
• The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects
• ▶ The government UFO files
• Project Blue Book case files
• Lubbock Lights
• Air Defense Command on 'fast tracks' and radar phantoms
• Project Blue Book records at the National Archives
• Project Grudge
• The CIA's 1952 flying-saucer study (Chadwell memos)
• The Robertson Panel

Sources

1. Wikipedia: Project Blue Book
2. NARA: Project Blue Book records
3. OSI 'Flying Saucers' file: Chadwell memos and briefings, Aug-Oct 1952 (CIA, CIA-RDP81R00560R000100020012-7)
4. Chadwell memo 'Flying Saucers' to the DCI, 2 Oct 1952, with Tab A of 24 Sep 1952 (CIA, DOC_0005515933)
5. 'Effect of Flying Saucers on Air Defense Operations' and RDB 'Radar Phantoms' memo, Oct-Dec 1952 (USAF/ADC/CIA, CIA-RDP81R00560R000100020001-9)