Submarine encounters study (1952)
From the UAP Encyclopedia, the open encyclopedia of UFO and UAP history · 🗓️ Event
Contents 4
| Date | 24 April 1952 |
|---|---|
| Topics | Secrecy & cover-up (topic), Government programs (topic), Congress & law (topic) |
| People | Timothy Good, Edward Ruppelt |
| Testimony | Shellenberger testimony, p. 45 |
| Year | 1952 in UFO history |
| Timeline | 1952 on the UAP Timeline |
| Sources | 6 |
Submarine encounters study (1952) — Air Force and Navy intelligence study nine undersea UAP encounters reported by U.S. submarines.
According to Timothy Good's 2006 book Need to Know, Air Force and Navy intelligence carried out a study in 1952 of nine encounters between U.S. submarines and unidentified underwater objects. Good reproduces documents and accounts that he says came from former intelligence sources, and links the study to the broader Air Force intelligence effort that year.
1952 was the busiest year for UFO reports in U.S. history, including the July radar-visual sightings over Washington, D.C. The surge led the Air Force to reorganize its investigation as Project Blue Book, and Blue Book chief Edward Ruppelt later wrote that Air Force intelligence was then conducting more thorough field investigations than his own project. It also prompted the CIA's Robertson Panel in January 1953.
The Office of Naval Intelligence has not released any reports matching the submarine study, so the claim relies on Good's sources. Underwater objects, often called USOs, have become a renewed focus since the 2010s, with Congress asking the Pentagon's AARO about "transmedium" objects that move between air and sea.
People and topics
- U.S. Air Force — The U.S. military service that ran the official UFO projects from 1947 to 1969.
- U.S. Navy — The U.S. naval service, whose pilots reported the UAP encounters revealed in 2017.
- Unidentified anomalous phenomena — The U.S. government's current term for unidentified objects in the air, in space and underwater.
- Timothy Good — British author of books on UFO secrecy including Above Top Secret and Need to Know.
- Unidentified flying object — An object in the sky that can't be identified; the older term for UAP.
- Project Blue Book — The Air Force's public UFO investigation from 1952 until its closure in December 1969.
- Edward Ruppelt — Head of Project Blue Book in 1952–53 and author of The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects.
- Central Intelligence Agency — The U.S. foreign intelligence agency, which has followed UFO reports since the 1940s.
- Robertson Panel — Robertson Panel
- AARO — The Pentagon office set up in 2022 to investigate UAP.
- Transmedium — Able to move between air, space and water.
On the Timeline
- Project Twinkle kept classified (1952) (19 February 1952) — The Air Force's science advisers recommend keeping Project Twinkle, a UAP study at atomic sites, classified.
- Garrison, Utah crash and burial claim (1953) (20 May 1953) — An anonymous Air Force official claims a craft crashed and was buried near Garrison, Utah.
See every 1952 event on the UAP Timeline →
References
- Timothy Good, Need to Know (2006) · andrewlownie.co.uk · archived copy
- CIA's role in the study of UFOs, 1947–90 — CIA (PDF) · cia.gov · archived copy
- archive.org · archive.org · archived copy
- textfiles.com · textfiles.com · archived copy
- archive.org · archive.org · archived copy
- nicap.org · nicap.org · archived copy
Further reading
- Project Blue Book — Wikipedia · en.wikipedia.org · archived copy
- Project Blue Book records — National Archives · archives.gov · archived copy
- Project Blue Book files — The Black Vault · theblackvault.com · archived copy
- U.S. congressional hearings on UFOs — Wikipedia · en.wikipedia.org · 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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