Photo Case Directory
  Category 8, Images 
 
 


                                   
     

The Carl Hart Photos / Lubbock Lights Case
Aug. 26, 1951
Lubbock, TexasV


Fran Ridge:
Listed as item 11 under photographic evidence in the Special Evidence section of NICAP's UFO Evidence. These photographs, taken by Carl Hart, Jr., show a V-formation of large circular objects. Capt. Ruppelt, head of Air Force Project Blue Book, reported that "In each photograph the individual lights in the formation shifted position according to a definite pattern." Main photograph reproduced in True Magazine, May 1954.

Skeptics have always had a field day with this one because it seemed to be only a set of photographs, taken by a young, inexperienced photographer, of geese, later explained as moths. Little did anyone know that even the Air Force, including the professors who also witnessed the overflights, did not buy the explanations. In fact, it appears some people, alerted to UFO activity, saw birds; others saw UFOs. And the most damning evidence against birds, a professional photographer, with professional equipment and better film, could not capture lighted bellies of geese. And that's not all. A swept-back winged object was being seen around the country during the period and two radars confirmed an unknown.

Captain Edward Ruppelt:
This target was real. I quickly took out a map of the United States and drew in a course line between Lubbock and the radar station (Larson AFB, Washington). A UFO flying between these two points would be on a northwesterly heading and the times it was seen at the two places gave it a speed of roughly 900 miles per hour. This was by far the best combination of UFO reports I'd ever read and I'd read every one in the Air Force's files.

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