F-89 Scorpion Lost Over Lake Superior 1953

On November 23, 1953, First Lieutenant Felix Moncla Jr. and Lieutenant Robert Wilson were scrambled from Kinross Air Force Base in a Northrop F-89C Scorpion to intercept an unidentified radar contact over Lake Superior. Ground radar operators at Kinross and at Canadian radar stations tracked the F-89 closing on the unidentified contact. The two radar blips appeared to merge into one on the Kinross radar scope — and then only one blip continued, moving at the speed and track of the original unidentified contact. The F-89 disappeared. An extensive search of Lake Superior found no wreckage, no oil slick, and no bodies. The USAF initially attributed the disappearance to a Canadian air force aircraft but Canada denied this, stating their aircraft was not in the area. No definitive explanation was ever provided. The Kinross case remains unique in the documented history of radar-tracked military aviation in that radar operators appear to have witnessed two radar returns merge into one, with the known aircraft never reappearing.