---------------------------------------------------------------- ================================================================ PROJECT 10073 RECORD CARD -- TRANSCRIPTION File: 1951-10-7011055-TerreHaute-Indiana.pdf Transcribed from document image by Claude Sonnet 4.6 ================================================================ FIELD 1 -- DATE: 9 October 1951 FIELD 2 -- LOCATION: Terre Haute, Indiana FIELD 3 -- DATE-TIME GROUP: Local 1342 / GMT 09/1942Z FIELD 4 -- TYPE OF OBSERVATION: Ground-Visual [X] Ground-Radar [ ] Air-Visual [ ] Air-Intercept Radar [ ] FIELD 5 -- PHOTOS: No FIELD 6 -- SOURCE: Civilian FIELD 7 -- LENGTH OF OBS: 15 Seconds FIELD 8 -- NUMBER OF OBJECTS: One FIELD 9 -- COURSE: SE FIELD 10 -- BRIEF SUMMARY: Round silver object without fins or protrusions observed in flight from overhead to disappearance over the horizon. Flight straight. Total observation 15 seconds, conservation. Size of 50 cent piece at arm's length. No sound. Witness considered "hard headed". [Note: "conservation" appears to be a line-break artifact for "conservative" -- consistent with context and supporting documents which describe the 15-second estimate as "conservative."] FIELD 11 -- COMMENTS: Possible a/c sighting, however, to duration of 15 seconds for flight from [illegible] zenith to point over the horizon in 15 seconds is not consistent with this analysis and the case is carried as unidentified. [Note: Three characters before "zenith" are unclear in both available copies -- possibly "the" or a reference marker.] FIELD 12 -- CONCLUSIONS: Other UNIDENTIFIED [X] (handwritten/typed next to "Other" checkbox) Form: ATIC FORM 329 (REV 26 SEP 52) Note: Form revision date (September 1952) postdates the October 1951 incident. Record card was completed retrospectively, consistent with standard ATIC filing practice for cases investigated under Project Grudge prior to the Blue Book reorganization. Additional documents in this file: - Spot Intelligence Report 12D 1-11-100, 25 October 1951, signed LeROY BITCON, Lt Col, USAF, District Commander, 12th District Office of Special Investigations, Chanute AFB, Illinois - Air Intelligence Information Report IR-56-51E (AF Form 112, Parts I and II), 30 November 1951, prepared by Major J.L. Hudelson, approved by Lt. Col. Bruce K. Baumgardner, Director of Intelligence, Hq EADF, Stewart AFB, N.Y. - Multiple Appendices (Status Reports I and II) covering Terre Haute, Indiana -- 9 October 1951 - Multiple teletype messages and Joint Message Forms between EADF, ATIC (Wright-Patterson), OSI Chanute, USAF Washington, ADC Ent AFB, dated 10 October through 25 October 1951, including one bearing the signature of Lt. E.J. Ruppelt, ATIA-2c (later director of Project Blue Book) ================================================================ SEARCH INDEX TERMS ================================================================ Terre Haute Indiana Vigo County Hulman Municipal Airport State Road 42 1951 October CAA Civil Aeronautics Authority civilian aircraft communicator professional observer Claude Sonner Charles Warren pilot private plane round silver disc sphere silent no sound no fins no protrusions no vapor trail southeasterly 15 seconds half dollar fifty cent piece arm's length UNIDENTIFIED speed 2880 MPH 600 MPH stationary reversed direction hover dual sighting corroborated ground visual air visual Paris Illinois Newport Indiana Atomic Energy Plant Army chemical weapons depot TPS-13 radar Rockville Indiana no radar contact CAVU clear weather 5000 feet Project Grudge Project Blue Book ATIC Wright-Patterson Chanute AFB 12th District OSI Ruppelt Hudelson Baumgardner Bitcon Farris Eastern Air Defense Force EADF Stewart AFB hardheaded skeptic credible observer institutional response teletype ================================================================ CASE ANALYSIS -- Claude Sonnet 4.6 ================================================================ THE OFFICIAL CONCLUSION The Project 10073 record card carries this case as UNIDENTIFIED, and the wording of Field 11 is unusually candid about why. The investigator's comment acknowledges that an aircraft sighting was considered, then explicitly rejected: the 15-second transit from directly overhead to the horizon is "not consistent with this analysis." This is not a default or a shrug. It is a considered conclusion that the known facts did not support a conventional identification. A separate evaluation in the Air Intelligence Information Report (IR-56-51E, 30 November 1951) takes a softer position, suggesting a second sighting three minutes later and thirty miles away may indicate the objects were jet aircraft whose appearance was distorted by sun reflection. This hypothesis appears as a speculative working note rather than a supported conclusion, and it does not appear to have overridden the UNIDENTIFIED label on the record card. The two documents reflect the tension that ran through the entire Blue Book era: field investigators and record keepers reaching one conclusion while the reporting chain searched for a comfortable conventional explanation. WHAT THE EVIDENCE SHOWS The primary observer was Claude W. Sonner, Chief Aircraft Communicator for the Civil Aeronautics Authority at Hulman Municipal Airport. His professional position placed him in daily contact with aerial traffic; he was trained to observe, report, and characterize aircraft. The record card notes he was considered "hard headed" -- language echoed almost word-for-word in a United Press news release on 10 October 1951, which described him as "a hardheaded CAA official" who had now "joined the ranks of those who believe in flying saucers." This phrasing is significant. It implies prior skepticism, and it means Sonner was not the kind of observer who would report something he could identify as ordinary. The press treated his account as newsworthy precisely because he was not expected to make such a report. At 1342 CST on 9 October 1951, from a position directly overhead at Hulman Airport (approximately five miles east of Terre Haute on Indiana State Road 42), Sonner observed a single round silver object. It was featureless: no fins, no protrusions, no exhaust or vapor trail, and no sound. Its apparent size was that of a half-dollar coin held at arm's length. It traveled a straight southeasterly path, moving from directly overhead to the horizon in approximately 15 seconds -- a figure Sonner himself described as a conservative estimate. Observation conditions were ideal: clear day, bright sun, no clouds or haze, flat terrain, and no obstructions between the observer and the horizon. The investigators calculated that if the object was at 200 feet altitude, it was traveling approximately 2,880 miles per hour. They further noted that the actual speed would scale upward with altitude -- meaning this figure represented a lower bound, not a ceiling. Three minutes later, at 1345 CST, a corroborating report came in. Pilot Charles Warren was flying a private aircraft at 5,000 feet on a route from Greencastle, Indiana to Paris, Illinois. Just east of Paris -- roughly thirty miles from Hulman Airport -- Warren observed a silver object. Crucially, the object appeared stationary at approximately his altitude. As his aircraft approached, the object did not change apparent size, indicating it was not moving toward or away from him. It then reversed direction and was last seen heading northeasterly, south of the Atomic Energy Plant at Newport, Indiana. If both sightings represent the same object, the investigators calculated a maximum transit speed of approximately 600 MPH (thirty miles in three minutes). That figure is below Sonner's ground-observation estimate but is still at or near the performance envelope of the fastest jet aircraft operationally available in 1951 -- and this object left no sound, no trail, and showed no conventional propulsion signature. The TPS-13 electronic surveillance radar at Rockville, Indiana was queried and reported no contact with the object. POINTS OF INTEREST The flight path merits attention. The object was seen heading southeast from Terre Haute, then reported northeast of Paris, Illinois, and last observed south of the Atomic Energy Plant at Newport, Indiana. Newport in October 1951 was home to the Army's Newport Chemical Depot (formally Newport Army Ammunition Plant), an active facility for chemical weapons production situated on the Wabash River approximately thirty-five miles north-northeast of Terre Haute. Whatever the object was, its observed trajectory in both sightings placed it in proximity to a significant and sensitive military-industrial installation. This detail would have heightened official interest beyond a routine unexplained sighting, and the institutional response confirms that it did. The administrative and communications chain this case generated is unusual in scope. Within days of the incident, teletype traffic was flowing between the 12th District OSI at Chanute AFB, Eastern Air Defense Force at Stewart AFB in New York, ATIC at Wright-Patterson, USAF headquarters in Washington, and ADC at Ent AFB in Colorado. The case was tracked under Project Grudge, the active UFO investigation program of the period. One of the ATIC communications in this file carries the signature of Lt. E.J. Ruppelt -- Edward J. Ruppelt, who would become director of Project Blue Book within months and who later wrote the most significant firsthand account of the Air Force's UFO investigation apparatus. His administrative involvement, even in a routing capacity, places this case squarely within the institutional attention of the people who ran American military UFO investigation during its most serious period. The direction reversal reported by Warren is among the most difficult details to accommodate with a conventional explanation. A jet aircraft at 5,000 feet changing heading would present a turning arc to an observer in another aircraft at the same altitude. Warren described an object that was stationary -- not diminishing or approaching -- and then simply began moving in the opposite direction. This is not consistent with jet aircraft behavior, and it is not addressed in any document in this file that proposes the jet-reflection hypothesis. The complete absence of acoustic and vapor signatures across both sightings also resists the jet explanation. In October 1951 the fastest American operational jets were loud. Sonner, positioned at an active regional airport with a trained ear for aircraft, heard nothing. BOTTOM LINE This is one of the more compelling cases in the archive on the merits of the witness pool alone. The primary observer was a trained aviation professional with documented skeptical credentials, observing under ideal daytime conditions from a fixed known position. The corroborating witness was an airborne pilot who added independent details -- particularly the apparent hover and direction reversal -- that the first observer could not have provided from the ground. Neither observer identified what they saw. The Air Force, after routing the case through multiple commands and referencing it to Project Grudge, recorded it as UNIDENTIFIED. The jet-reflection hypothesis offered in the Air Intelligence Report is not unreasonable as a general category of explanation for some daytime silver-object sightings in 1951, but it does not fit the specific reported behaviors here: no sound, no trail, apparent stationarity at altitude, and reversal of direction without a visible turning arc. The record card evaluator was right to reject the aircraft explanation, and the UNIDENTIFIED label was honestly earned. Whatever Sonner and Warren saw over Vigo County and Edgar County on 9 October 1951, it moved faster than they could explain, left no trace a radar or human ear could catch, and ended its observed flight south of an Army chemical weapons plant. The Air Force could not explain it. Neither can this file. ================================================================ END OF DOCUMENT ================================================================ ----------------------------------------------------------------