Status: Corroborated — radar operators and pilots reported it. The Air Force publicly attributed it to temperature inversions and misidentified lights.
Credit: Unknown photographer (1944) · Licence: Public domain (per Wikimedia Commons) · Source
On two consecutive weekends in July 1952, unidentified objects were reported over the nation's capital. At 11:40 p.m. on July 19, air traffic controller Edward Nugent at Washington National Airport saw seven unidentified targets on his radar south-southwest of the city. His supervisor Harry Barnes watched them, and Barnes had the equipment checked and found it working normally. Controllers in the airport tower also reported blips and a bright light, and radar at Andrews Air Force Base also tracked an object at one point.
Airline crews and a base airman reported glowing lights matching some of the radar contacts. Two F-94 jet interceptors were sent up, and the targets reportedly vanished from the scopes as the jets arrived and returned after they left. A second round of sightings followed on July 26 and 27.
The story made front pages nationwide. On July 29, Air Force intelligence chief Maj. Gen. John Samford held a well-attended Pentagon press conference. He said the visual sightings could be explained by misidentified stars, meteors and other lights, and the radar targets by temperature inversions that bend radar beams. Many witnesses and researchers have not accepted that explanation, and the episode is often cited as the climax of the 1952 UFO wave.
Sources: Wikipedia: 1952 Washington, D.C., UFO incident
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