Record 005 · 5 May 1955
Project Blue Book Special Report No. 14
U.S. Air Force / Battelle Memorial Institute · United States
Ledger illustration of the record — not a scan of the original paper. — Night Ledger illustration of the file
Special Report 14 is the Air Force’s large statistical pass at the early saucer files, contracted to Battelle. It sorted thousands of reports by reliability and by how ordinary the explanation was. The headline at the time was that most cases were identified. The quieter finding, still in the tables, is that the better-documented reports were more likely to stay unidentified, not less.
The Air Force used the report to say the problem was shrinking. Independent readers used the same tables to say the opposite. The paper is public. The argument is in the percentages, not in a hidden annex.
Public file: U.S. Air Force / National Archives Blue Book
Cases this paper belongs to
- Lubbock LightsLubbock, Texas, United StatesAugust–September 1951
- Flatwoods, Braxton CountyFlatwoods, West Virginia, United States12 September 1952
- Kelly–Hopkinsville nightKelly, Kentucky, United States21–22 August 1955
- Mariana film, Great FallsGreat Falls, Montana, United States15 August 1950
- Tremonton film, UtahTremonton, Utah, United States2 July 1952
- Joe Simonton and the pancakesEagle River, Wisconsin, United States18 April 1961
