1957 cia dir

Sept. 20, 1957. Montauk, New York - Benton, Penna. 4 p.m. National air defense UFO alert (previous cases on Dec. 6, 1950, Apr. 17, 1952, not in BB files apparently; see subsequent alert of Apr. 18, 1962, in BB files). High speed 2,300 mph radar target on E-W path at 50,000 ft altitude tracked by multiple radars, including 1-min track by FPS-3 at Montauk Point and 9 mins by CPS-6B at Benton, from E Long Island to Buffalo, New York (with alleged 11 min gap in between??), triggering a White House alert, high level CIA, USAF Intelligence, IAC Watch Committee, and IAC Executive Session meetings. Speed varied from 1,500 to 4,500 mph. (FOIA; Sparks; FBI files) 20+ mins ? multiple witnesses multiple radars

Francis Ridge:
In the 1978 FOIA lawsuit for UFO documents, the CIA released a memo of Sept 21, 1957, to the Acting Director of Central Intelligence, Gen. Charles P. Cabell (former AF Intelligence Director involved with many famous UFO case including Ft. Monmouth), from the director of the CIA Office of Scientific Intelligence (OSI), Dr. Herbert Scoville, Jr. Several additional CIA and FBI documents fill in further details, including the fact the incident raised concerns in the US Intelligence Community that went high up into the White House, but that fact was never made public at the time.

The documents state that an unidentified flying object (UFO) was tracked by US radars at Montauk, NY, and Benton, PA. It was flying on a relatively straight course from the eastern tip of Long Island to the vicinity of Buffalo. The object was reportedly moving westward at an altitude of 50,000 feet and speed of 2,000 knots, varying from 1,500 mph to 4,500 mph. "Jamming" was reported by several radars in this vicinity and westward as far as Chicago.

The case is in the BB files but copies have not been obtained yet.

Brad Sparks:
Although the FBI memos bring up the possibility of a secret flight of Project AQUATONE (later known as the U-2 flown by CIA) the U-2 was a subsonic aircraft. The unidentified radar target was flying at up to Mach 7, or 4,500 mph. The Mach 3 CIA aircraft the A-12 OXCART (the USAF version was the SR-71) was not even conceived of yet in 1957.

The incident was reported to the White House and the Watch Committee, a subcommittee of the "board of directors" of the US Intelligence Community, then called the IAC (Intelligence Advisory Committee), now called the National Foreign Intelligence Board (NFIB). Initially Scoville said that a meeting of the full IAC would not be called. But concerns must have escalated over the next few days as an Executive Session of the IAC was held on Sept 24, 1957, to discuss the incident off the record (hence "executive session"). Fortunately the FBI liaison representative reported what transpired as the only CIA documentation appears to be Scoville's handwritten notes.