Project 10073 Record Card — Battlecreek, Michigan, 8 January 1956

This document is a Project 10073 record card detailing a UFO sighting that occurred on January 8, 1956, in Battlecreek, Michigan. The report, filed by the Air Technical Intelligence Center (ATIC), documents a sighting by a civilian witness who observed a single, round, reddish-white object for a duration of 20 minutes. The object was described as maintaining a straight, level flight path toward the southeast, with an observed elevation of 40 degrees and an azimuth of 150 degrees. The weather conditions at the time were reported as clear. The report includes a teletype communication from the Air Technical Intelligence Center at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base to the Director of Intelligence, USAF, and other military commands, referencing the sighting under the guidelines of AFR 200-2. The teletype confirms the details provided on the record card and notes that the Civil Aeronautics Administration (CAA) had three aircraft in the area flying east at the time of the incident. Despite the detailed observation, the official conclusion reached by the evaluating agency was that the object was a 'possible balloon.' However, due to the lack of consistent reporting regarding the direction of movement and other variables, the case was ultimately classified as having 'insufficient data for evaluation.' The document serves as a standard record of the military's investigative process for aerial phenomena during the mid-1950s, highlighting the reliance on civilian reports and the subsequent cross-referencing with military and civil aviation traffic to determine the nature of the observed objects.