1956-08-17 — Vicinity of Poughkeepsie, New York (32 deg 50 min N / 73 deg
Narrative
On 17 August 1956 at 0145Z (night), the pilot of Eastern Airlines DC-4 Flight 49 enroute Poughkeepsie-LaGuardia at 6,000 ft heading 195 degrees at 185 knots observed a bobbing orange-and-white basketball-sized light. Object moved across sky for 20-25 minutes with diving, climbing, and circling motion, passing within 40 ft of aircraft from above and below. Aircraft took evasive action. LGA tower operator also sighted object at 0125Z. Operations officer's possible cause: heavenly body or free balloon. Subsequent investigation suggested possible balloon activity in the area.
extracted via: llm_subagent_v1
Witnesses (1)
- [anonymous] military pilotrole_pattern
Source documents (1)
Click filename to view on Internet Archive (where these are mirrored as public-domain US-government records).
- 23857158-012-043NARAvalue 1.7[direct]
Score evidence (3)
Why this event scored the way it did. Every contribution is traceable.
p
- docs=1 (+0.5)
- single agency (+0.5)
evid
- narrative only (base 1)