United States.Avalon · a resident sees an orange-red light drop straight down

One night in March 1955, Paul J. Carr, a resident of Avalon on Santa Catalina Island (California), happened to notice a light in the sky. According to the teletype (a printed wire message) that passed on his account, the object was round, very bright, the size of a nickel held at arm's length, and orange turning to red. It appeared at 45 degrees of elevation, halfway between the horizon and straight overhead, toward the north-northwest (bearing 340 degrees), and fell straight down to 10 degrees of elevation in the same direction, where it faded out. It all lasted two seconds. No sound was heard, no detail could be made out, it is not known whether it left a trail, and Carr used no instrument. The teletype gives neither the date nor the time of the sighting, only "night".

The alert was sent by the operations center of the 670th Aircraft Control and Warning Squadron, an Air Force radar unit at San Pedro, across the channel. It was addressed to the 27th Air Division (Defense) at Norton Air Force Base (California), with copies to the Commander of Air Defense Command at Ent Air Force Base (Colorado), the Air Technical Intelligence Center (ATIC) at Wright-Patterson (Ohio) and the Air Force Director of Intelligence in Washington. Its first line cites regulation AFR 200-2, whose outline it follows point by point. The weather was clear, dry and cool, with unrestricted visibility, thin clouds and westerly winds of 25 to 80 knots between 10,000 and 80,000 feet. Under the item that asked for any unusual activity or condition that might account for the sighting, the teletype answers "none". There was also no interception, air traffic or physical evidence to note.

It was prepared by Captain Clifford E. Brant, an Air Force intelligence officer, who added his judgment: "Flight path and length of time in sight, suggest UFOB was probably a meteor". He proposed it even though the teletype noted no unusual condition that could explain the sighting. Someone wrote the same idea by hand on the first sheet: "Prob. Meteor".

Blue Book, the U.S. Air Force program that logged these sightings, kept two cards on the case. The first types "Meteor" next to the astronomical boxes and comments "Probable meteor". The second checks "Possibly Astronomical" and adds that, given the brevity of the sighting, the 4602d Air Intelligence Service Squadron (4602d AISS) did not deem further investigation worthwhile.

The date is less firm than the cards make it, since they give March 15, 1955. By this case's own calculation, the date-time group in the teletype's heading (151900Z) and its transmission time (15/2231Z) correspond to 11:00 and 14:31 on March 15 Pacific standard time, with the Sun 40 degrees high at the second. Since the teletype places the observation at night, it most likely happened the night before, March 14 to 15, and the cards took the date and time of the message. The release's official description on war.gov places it "on the evening of March 15, 1955", which does not fit a teletype sent that same afternoon.

The case rests on a single witness, identified by name, and on an official report from the nearest military unit, sent by teletype on March 15. There is no instrumental record: the observation was made by eye from the ground and the teletype mentions no radar contact, interception or air traffic.

Captain Brant's explanation rests on the two facts the teletype gives: a very bright light that falls straight down and fades out in two seconds. By this case's own calculation, covering 35 degrees of sky in two seconds is about 17 degrees per second, an angular speed that an aircraft or a balloon would reach only very close to the observer and that a meteor reaches easily. That it was "very bright" points, if it was a meteor, to a fireball (an especially luminous meteor). The apparent size says less: a nickel at arm's length spans about 2 degrees, four times the apparent diameter of the Moon, but witnesses tend to overestimate the size of a bright light. The change from orange to red and the fading without explosion or sound do not contradict that reading either.

Nothing in the record refutes it, but it could not be confirmed either. Without a time, no other sighting of the same meteor can be searched for, and among the California Blue Book cards of March 1955 that could be dated, none records a similar light that night. The investigation was closed in the teletype itself: the officer who passed on the account proposed the cause, and the 4602d squadron wrote that further investigation was not worthwhile given the brevity of the sighting. One card calls it a probable meteor; the other, possibly astronomical.