Holloman cigar-shaped object film (1950)
From the UAP Encyclopedia, the open encyclopedia of UFO and UAP history · 🗓️ Event
Contents 9
| Date | A hot day in July 1950 (exact date not recorded) |
|---|---|
| Place | An Askania theodolite station about three miles north of range control, Holloman AFB, Tularosa Basin, New Mexico |
| Witnesses | An electronics engineer (identified in APRO's files as Cliff Booth) and an Askania operator |
| Description | Metallic, cigar-shaped object with a straw-coloured iridescent sheen, fins and at least three dark oblong ports |
| Film | 14 frames shown to a witness: a blurred ellipsoid with a dark centre |
| Source | Coral Lorenzen, APRO director, written 1962, published 1966 |
| Official record | Not in the Blue Book files; base report EHO-41 documents other 1950 filming |
| Topics | Disinformation & hoaxes (topic) |
| People | Cliff Booth, Coral Lorenzen |
| Testimony | Shellenberger testimony, p. 42 |
| Year | 1950 in UFO history |
| Timeline | 1950 on the UAP Timeline |
| Sources | 5 |
In 1950 Holloman Air Force Base, in New Mexico's Tularosa Basin, was a major missile test range, where the civilian contractor Land-Air, Inc. ran Askania cinetheodolite cameras to track launches.[1][2] Air Force records show that range crews filmed unidentified objects several times that year.[1][2][3] An account preserved by the civilian Aerial Phenomena Research Organization (APRO) describes the filming of a metallic, cigar-shaped object in July 1950.[1] That film was never released, and the case is not in the Blue Book files.[1]
The July 1950 account
APRO's director, Coral Lorenzen, described the case in a book written in 1962 and published in 1966. She placed Holloman nine miles west of Alamogordo and about thirty miles north of White Sands.[1] Her account runs as follows:[1]
- The call. On a hot day in July 1950 an electronics engineer, identified in APRO's files as Cliff Booth, was having lunch in a contractor's building at Holloman when the range telephone reported an unidentified object. He and an Askania operator went to a station about three miles north of range control and found the object with a manually operated theodolite.
- The object. It looked cigar-shaped and metallic, with "a straw-colored irridescent radiance or luster". It had fins a third of the way back and at least three dark, "smoky" grey oblong ports, and hovered almost horizontally to the north-east at an elevation of 20–25 degrees.
- Its movements. It turned towards the camera, showing a round front with the fins sticking out, then dropped abruptly "as though beginning to fall" and stopped. It repeated the sequence, showing its side again.
- The loss. The theodolite needed two operators. When one left the controls to phone "Queen-1" so other range stations could join in, the engineer could not keep tracking, and they never found it again.
The engineer had previously seen high groups of shiny objects and accepted that some unidentified phenomenon existed.[1]
The film
The two men handed their film to the base's Data Reduction Division. What followed, in Lorenzen's account:[1]
- The questioning. Seven to ten days later a young first lieutenant they did not recognise questioned them repeatedly about what they had seen and photographed.
- The frames. One man was shown 14 frames on a Recordak projector: a blurred ellipsoid with a dark centre, and no detail.
- An explanation. A mathematician-analyst at Land-Air suggested the blur came from the object oscillating. APRO's consultants preferred the idea of an invisible "enveloping field – probably ionic".
- The end. Their superiors then told them "to forget the whole thing".
Project 1947 notes that APRO's microfilmed records lack the written account, though the drawing illustrating it survives at frame 635. The reason is unknown.[1]
Holloman's own investigation
A Holloman report, EHO-41, dated 25 July 1951, describes an organised effort that began after many reports "by reliable individuals":[2]
- February 1950. An observation post with theodolite, telescope and camera was set up on 21 February. A photograph taken from Datil, New Mexico, on 24 February was analysed by the meteor expert Lincoln LaPaz, who ruled out the moon, planets and stars.
- The Vaughn watch. Because of reports from Vaughn, New Mexico, a three-point program was set up there: Askania triangulation by Land-Air, spectrum-grating cameras, and radio-frequency analysis. The Land-Air contract was increased by $20,000 to keep watch for six months.
- Films. On 27 April 1950 a Land-Air employee filmed an object with an Askania while preparing for a missile shot. On 24 May several objects (8–10) were filmed by two stations, but they had tracked different objects, so no triangulation was possible.
- August 1950. Objects appeared during missile launches on 30 and 31 August. A great deal of film was shot on the 31st, but they appeared too sporadically to triangulate.
- Interceptors. F-86 fighters from Kirtland were put on call. The squadron "continually asked if they were authorized to shoot at the phenomena", and "a satisfactory answer was never forthcoming".
- The result. The Vaughn surveillance was "virtually negative". The report concluded that the year of watching had "tended to relieve the question of the security danger" and recommended a stand-by watch.
A secret Blue Book status report of March 1952 summarised the Holloman report. It said "some type of object did exist", while noting that the Askania films gave no usable data. That summary dated the second filming to 29 May 1950 rather than 24 May.[1] The Blue Book file for the April–May films concludes "insufficient data; triangulation could not be effected".[3]
Project Twinkle
Holloman's work fed into the Air Force's Project Twinkle, run by the Geophysics Research Division to investigate the "green fireballs" and other lights over the south-west.[4] Its final report of 27 November 1951, by L. Elterman, called the findings "essentially negative". It attributed most observations to aircraft, balloons, rockets, birds, clouds and meteors. Twinkle's grating cameras had barely operated because their military operators were withdrawn for the Korean War.[4] It recommended no further funding.[4] An alternative copy of the APRO account at Project 1947 could not be retrieved.[5]
Assessment
That Holloman's camera crews photographed unexplained objects in 1950 is documented in the base's own report and in Blue Book. Those films, though, yielded no usable data.[2][3] The July 1950 cigar-shaped object rests on a second-hand account published more than a decade later. It is not in the Blue Book files, the written account is missing from APRO's records, and the original film has never been released.[1]
People and topics
- Holloman Air Force Base — An Air Force base next to White Sands.
- U.S. Air Force — The U.S. military service that ran the official UFO projects from 1947 to 1969.
- APRO — A civilian UFO research group founded by Coral and Jim Lorenzen in 1952.
- Cliff Booth — Engineer named in an APRO account of a cigar-shaped object filmed at Holloman AFB in 1950.
- Coral Lorenzen — Co-founder of the Aerial Phenomena Research Organization (APRO).
- Project Blue Book — The Air Force's public UFO investigation from 1952 until its closure in December 1969.
On the Timeline
- RAND memorandum RM-365 (14 April 1950) — An Air Force-funded RAND paper studies using superstition and the paranormal for psychological warfare.
- Proposal to collect UFO home movies (1950) (6 July 1950) — An Air Force officer wants to quietly collect UAP home movies from the public with FBI help.
See every 1950 event on the UAP Timeline →
Further reading
- Holloman Air Force Base — Wikipedia · en.wikipedia.org · archived copy
References
- "APRO's Holloman AFB 1950 case", Project 1947 · mail.project1947.com · archived copy
- "Holloman AFB report EHO-15", Project 1947 · project1947.com · archived copy
- Blue Book file: Holloman AFB, New Mexico, May 1950, UFO Scans · ufoscans.com · archived copy
- Project Twinkle final report (27 Nov 1951), Project 1947 · mail.project1947.com · archived copy
- project1947.com · project1947.com · archived copy
This page was last edited on 29 October 2026. Articles are written in our own words from the sources listed under References; disputed claims are attributed to the people who made them.
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