Project 10073 Record Card — Terre Haute, Indiana, 22 June 1956

On June 22, 1956, at 2155Z, a civilian witness in Terre Haute, Indiana, observed a single, black, circular object. The witness described the object as appearing to be the size of a medicine ball held at arm's length. The sighting lasted for approximately three minutes, during which the object was tracked using binoculars. The object was observed moving in a general northeasterly direction at an estimated altitude of 1,000 to 1,500 feet. The witness reported taking photographs of the object. Following the report, the film was retrieved by the operations officer of the 782d ACWRON at Rockville AFS and sent to Indianapolis for development; however, the report later noted there were no results on the film. The official military investigation, conducted under the guidelines of AFR 200-2, concluded that the sighting was caused by a weather balloon. This conclusion was supported by the fact that the object was observed below a 4,000-foot overcast, and that black pibald balloons are standardly released on cloudy days. Furthermore, meteorological data indicated that winds below 5,000 feet were blowing from the southwest, which aligned with the object's observed northeasterly flight path.