Westover AFB — SAC Base UAP Radar Confirmation 1957

On July 14, 1957, radar operators at Westover Air Force Base — a Strategic Air Command installation in Massachusetts — detected an unidentified object at high altitude performing maneuvers over the New England region. The contact was confirmed by the base's Ground Controlled Approach radar. A B-52 Stratofortress crew on a training flight in the area was vectored toward the contact and confirmed a visual observation. An F-86 Sabre was scrambled to intercept. The F-86 pilot achieved visual contact with a bright object that maintained a consistent separation distance and accelerated horizontally when the F-86 attempted to close. The object demonstrated speeds far in excess of the F-86's maximum capability. After 35 minutes the object departed at extreme speed. The multiple radar confirmations from independent systems and the simultaneous aircrew observations made this a multi-sensor confirmation case. The Project Blue Book file on the case was classified at the Secret level and was not included in the publicly released Blue Book summary data. FOIA requests revealed the existence of the classified file but not its full contents.