The cases of Project Blue Book offer a fascinating lens through which to examine our ever evolving understanding of the unknown. I am diving into these historical accounts of UFO sightings and investigations in hopes of gaining fresh perspectives on these cases.
Project Blue Book was more than just a collection of reports and a few photographs; it also included intriguing video evidence submitted by witnesses. Videos like the Montebello UFO Sighting.
Watch video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_taOmWSRZMc
On December 1, 1957, a mysterious sighting was filmed on 8mm film in Montebello, California.
The filmmaker’s children called his attention to six UFOs moving slowly west. Although he claimed six objects in the sky, the strip of film only shows 2 paired objects moving back and forth slowly, in unison.
The man who shot the film (whose name is redacted from official Air Force documents), gave his film to the Air Force’s Pictorial branch in Hollywood, Ca. The office even were the ones to develop the film. This film was ultimately given to Project Blue Book.
Richard D. Schaller, Captain USAF, interviewed the filmmaker on February 4th, 1958.
Q. What is your estimate of the altitude of the objects which you photographed?
A. About the same height as the light airplanes which I frequently see fly over the house, between 3,000 and 4,000 feet.
Q. Were they at any time as high as jet aircraft which make vapor trails?
A. No, definitely not.
Q. Did you see any smoke trail or any kind of trail from the object?
A. No, there was no visible trail of any sort.
Q. What was the direction of the flight?
A. The first pass sighted by the children came from the West and went in a northerly direction.
Q. Were they in any sort of formation?
A. Yes, a very close or tight formation in a 3/4 circular formation.
Q. At what speed, compared to a light plane passing over?
A. About the same speed, maybe a little slower.
Q. What direction was the second pass?
A. They came from the East heading West in an enlarged formation, split into pairs, with the point of the V formation to the right side of the formation.
Q. What was the speed of the pass?
A. About the same as the first pass, slightly slower than a light airplane.
Q. What about the third pass?
A. This pass was not photographed, but the boy said they went over in a straight-line formation, opposite the viewer’s position at a very fast speed, at about the same altitude.
Q. What were the size of the objects?
A. That’s hard to say.
Q., Would you say they were as big in circumference as a circle including the wing tips and tail to nose section of a light airplane?
A. Yes, about the same size.
Q. Were they all the same size?
A. Yes.
Q. What shape?
A. They were circular, and relatively flat.
Q. What color?
A. Sort of white-blue-green glowing objects.
Q. What do you think they were?
A. I don’t know, but they were certainly not balloons or airplanes, like any I had seen before.
Richard D. Schaller’s conclusion was “probably balloon” in his official report.
Despite the official conclusion that the objects were simply weather balloons, this explanation feels inadequate. The filmmaker was adamant that what he captured on film was not a balloon, so why dismiss such clear eyewitness testimony? The addition of multiple objects being filmed and witnessed also brings doubt into my mind about the weather balloon explanation. Why would multiple weather balloons be clustered in the same area? Would it not make more sense for these weather balloons to be spread out to be the most effective? Did anyone actually investigate if any companies had weather balloons in the skies those days? This specific video and account leave me with more questions than answers. Questions that could possibly be answered if a man’s name wasn’t redacted.
Bri Matts is the producer of the Contact In The Desert Conference and the Beyond Contact Podcast. Her interest in the UFO topic began with personal encounters, leading her “down the rabbit hole”. Bri first started attending Contact In The Desert in 2015 and never missed a show since. She also has a background in podcasting about UFO's, which became the path that enabled her to switch from behind the microphone, to behind the Contact In The Desert team. Bri firmly believes her unwavering passion, curiosity, and dedication to the integrity of the UFO phenomenon, is what manifested her life today.
