An unidentified silver ball-shaped object was observed by seven male military witnesses, two of them an experienced observors, in a warplane for 90 seconds. Its appearance and behavior indicated a conventional explanation.

Ruppelt's account:

The first hysterical report of the flurry came from the Air Defense Command. On September 23, 1951, at seven fifty-five in the morning, two F-86's on an early patrol were approaching Long Beach, California, coming in on the west leg of the Long Beach Radio range. All of a sudden the flight leader called his ground controller--high at twelve o'clock he and his wing man saw an object. It was in a gradual turn to its left, and it wasn't another airplane. The ground controller checked his radars but they had nothing, so the ground controller called the leader of the F-86's back and told him to go after the object and try to identify it. The two airplanes started to climb.

By this time the UFO had crossed over them but it was still in a turn and was coming back. Several times they tried to intercept, but they could never climb up to it. Once in a while, when they'd appear to be getting close, the UFO would lazily move out of range by climbing slightly. All the time it kept orbiting to the left in a big, wide circle. After about ten minutes the flight leader told the ground controller, who had been getting a running account of the unsuccessful intercept, that their fuel was low and that they'd have to break off soon. They'd gotten a fairly good look at the UFO, the flight leader told the ground controller, and it appeared to be a silver airplane with highly swept-back wings. The controller acknowledged the message and said that he was scrambling all his alert airplanes from George AFB. Could the two F-86's stay in the area a few more minutes? They stayed and in a few minutes four more F- 86's arrived. They saw the UFO immediately and took over.

The two F-86's with nearly dry tanks went back to George AFB.

For thirty more minutes the newly arrived F-86's worked in pairs trying to get up to the UFO's altitude, which they estimated to be 55,000 feet, but they couldn't make it. All the time the UFO kept slowly circling and speeding up only when the F-86's seemed to get too close. Then they began to run out of fuel and asked for permission to break off the intercept.

By this time one remaining F-86 had been alerted and was airborne toward Long Beach. He passed the four homeward-bound F-86's as he was going in, but by the time he arrived over Long Beach the UFO was gone.

All the pilots except one reported a "silver airplane with highly swept-back wings." One pilot said the UFO looked round and silver to him.

The report ended with a comment by the local intelligence officer. He'd called Edwards AFB, the big Air Force test base north of Los Angeles, but they had nothing in the air. The officer concluded that the UFO was no airplane. In 1951 nothing we had would fly higher than the F-86.

This was a good report and I decided to dig in.…With all the confidence in the world, I attacked the Long Beach Incident, which I'd had to drop to go to Lubbock, Texas. But if saucers could laugh, they were probably zipping through the stratosphere chuckling to themselves, because there was no neat solution to this one.

In the original report of how the six F-86's chased the high-flying UFO over Long Beach, the intelligence officer who made the report had said that he'd checked all aircraft flights, therefore this wasn't the answer.

The UFO could have been a balloon, so I sent a wire to the Air Force weather detachment at the Long Beach Municipal Airport. I wanted the track of any balloon that was in the air at 7:55A.M. on September 23, 1951.

In a few days the data from the Long Beach Incident came in and I started to put it together. A weather balloon had been launched from the Long Beach Airport, and it was in the vicinity where the six F- 86's had made their unsuccessful attempt to intercept a UFO. I plotted out the path of the balloon, the reported path of the UFO, and the flight paths of the F-86's. The paths of the balloon and the F-86's were accurate, I knew, because the balloon was being tracked by radio fixes and the F-86's had been tracked by radar. At only one point did the paths of the balloon, UFO, and F-86's coincide. When the first two F-86's made their initial visual contact with the UFO they were looking almost directly at the balloon. But from then on, even by altering the courses of the F-86's, I couldn't prove a thing.

In addition, the weather observers from Long Beach said that during the period that the intercept was taking place they had gone outside and looked at their balloon; it was an exceptionally clear day and they could see it at unusually high altitudes. They didn't see any F- 86's around it. And one stronger point, the balloon had burst about ten minutes before the F-86's lost sight of the UFO.

Lieutenant Metscher took over and, riding on his Fort Monmouth victory, tried to show how the pilots had seen the balloon. He got the same thing I did--nothing.

On 23 September 1951 at 0810 PST, an unidentified object was sighted over Long Beach, California. Two F-86 aircraft were scrambled and the object was sighted by them over Muroc, California. On attaining an altitude of 4.3,000 ft. the F-86's reported the object to be orbitting March AFB at an estimated altitude of between 50,000 ft. and 55,000 ft. The object appeared to be a swept wing, fighter type aircraft.

Weather: Unavailable at this time.

Status of Investigation

Radiosonde balloons were released from San Diego, Long Beach and Santa Maria, California at approximately 0700 PST. All of these weather-stations were checked by OSI personnel and although the balloons were released, all weather station personnel stated that it would be very doubtful if their balloons would have traveled the course that the object traveled.

All of the major aircraft factories and installations conducting experimental flight tests were contacted. No experimental aircraft airborne at the time of the sighting.

Additional information has been requested as to additional details of the incident such as times and locations during the attempted interception by the F-86's find other possible balloon launchings.

I. DISCUSSION OF INCIDENT

The first report of this incident, which appeared in Status Report No. 1, proved to be incomplete and misleading. Further investigation has corrected the discrepancies and the following account of the incident is considered to be accurate.

At approximately 0700 PDST, two F-86 aircraft were scrambled from George Air Force Base, California, on a routine mission. The flight was vectored to 118° 40' W - 33° 50' N by GCI. The flight orbited the position and took up a heading toward Long Beach Radio.

At approximately 0755 PDST the flight reported to GCI that they observed an unidentified object high at 12 o'clock The flight was 30 seconds out of long Beach Radio at this time. The object appeared to be in a left orbit at about 50,000 ft. The object could not be picked up by the ground radar, however, visual contact was maintained. The object continued a left orbit and passed over the two aircraft. Attempts were made by the F-86's to identify the object but they were unsuccessful due to the altitude of the object and a fuel shortage.

At approximately 0810 or 0815 the flight was released by the ground controller and they returned to George Air Force Base. The object appeared to be an aircraft with 45° swept wings and bright silver in color. When last seen the object was in a left orbit, or circling to the left. The pilot's opinion was that it was a swept wing type aircraft.

At approximately 0800 PDST four additional F-86 aircraft were scrambled from George AFB to relieve the two above mentioned F-86's. The four aircraft split into two, two-ship elements, denoted as Flight 2-A and 2-B on the enclosed overlay. Flight 2-A was vectored to a position at 117° 30' W and 30° 20'N. They arrived at this position at approximately 0810 and sighted the object high at 12 o'clock at what appeared to be over Muroc AFB. A steady climb was made to 43,000 ft. and the object was found to be near March AFB. The object appeared to be in a controlled orbit to the right and left at 50,000 to 55,000 ft. The two aircraft stayed in the area for 10-15 minutes before breaking off the intercept due to a fuel shortage and landed at 0845 EDST. The object appeared to be a swept wing aircraft.

The second element of the group, noted as Flight 2-B on the overlay, observed the object soon after take-off. The object appeared to be going south. The flight made a series of climbing, turns, under the object as they climbed to 43,500 ft. The object was in a wide right turn. At approximately 0925 PDST the aircraft broke off the attempted intercept and returned to their base. This flight reported that the object appeared to be round and silver.

No more intercepts were attempted. At no time was the object observed on the radar screen nor was it reported to be observed visually from the ground. The F-86's, however, were continually tracked by radar. The F-86's were unable to climb to the estimated altitude of the object due to the fact that they were carrying external fuel tanks and elected not to jettison them.

II. STATUS OF INVESTIGATION

At 0700 PDST a radiosonde balloon was released from the Long Beach Municipal Airport. This balloon was lost at 0743 PDST, eight miles from the airport on a bearing of 95° true, due to a malfunction of the tracking equipment, (see Point A on overlay.) At this time the balloon would have been at approximately 40,000 ft. The winds above 40,000 ft. are unknown but it is logical to assume that at this altitude they will be relatively constant in direction. Assuming a relative constant direction of 270° and an average velocity of 30 knots above 40,000 ft. (the wind at 40,000 ft. was 280° at 21 knots) the possible flight path of the balloon can be plotted on the overlay.

The original sighting by Flight 1 could very possibly have been the balloon as their heading was toward Long Beach Airport. The altitude of the F-86's at the time of the sighting is unknown but was probably below 40,000 ft. At 0755, the time of the original sighting, the balloon would be at 50,000 to 55,000 ft. and approximately ten miles directly ahead of the two aircraft. The apparent orbiting of the balloon cannot be explained. The balloon would make a gradual turn due to wind shifts but these are so gradual that it is doubtful if the movement would be apparent from an aircraft as fast as an F-86.

Referring to the ground track of Flight 2-A, if a 30 knot wind at 270° is assumed, at 0810, the approximate time the F-86's sighted the object from a 355° TC, the balloon would be at B on the overlay. The balloon would probably be at an altitude of 60,000 ft. and nearly straight ahead of the aircraft, due to the size of the balloon, the distance could have been misjudged and the balloon could have appeared to be near Muroc. Once again the orbiting of the object cannot be explained.

The attempted intercept by Flight 2-B cannot be explained. If the ground track given by the leader of Flight 2-B is correct it is very doubtful that the flight was observing a balloon. The time that they sighted the object is not known but if it is assumed that they flew beneath the object for 30 minutes, it is highly doubtful that a wind shift of nearly 360° could occur above 60,000 ft. to give the illusion of a turn..

The possibility of this object being an experimental aircraft from some southern California aircraft plant, naval airfield, or from Edwards Air Force Base, was checked with negative results.. No other balloons were released in the vicinity.

III. CONCLUSIONS

With the information available, it cannot be concluded that the object was definitely the radiosonde balloon released from Long Beach Municipal Airport. However, since the balloon was near the flight path of two of the F-86 elements, and assuming that the orbiting of the object was an illusion due to the relative motion between the balloon and the aircraft, it can be concluded that the unidentified abject, was very possibly a radiosonde balloon.

The third attempted intercept, the one in which the object was followed in a wide turn, cannot be explained. It is not believed that further interrogation would produce any additional significant details due to the fact that some of the personnel involved have been transferred overseas and due to the time since the incident.

Google map of this location.