Incident Report — Brekkens Corner, Montana, 12 August 1964

This document consists of an Air Force incoming message and a follow-up letter regarding a UFO sighting reported on 12 August 1964 near Brekkens Corner, Montana. The witnesses, who were traveling in an automobile on State Highway 24, reported seeing an object that appeared to be a 'burning haystack.' They described the object as crescent-shaped and orange in color, noting that it rose from the ground and moved through the sky before disappearing behind a knoll. The observers continued to monitor the object intermittently until approximately 0645Z. They insisted that the object was not a star, describing it as an unusually bright yard light that was too high in the sky to be a standard light. The official conclusion reached by the Air Force and supported by J. Allen Hynek was that the sighting was astronomical in nature, likely involving the moon or the star Formalhaut. Hynek's follow-up letter to Major Quintanilla highlights significant skepticism regarding the witness's reliability, noting that the witness was 'badly mixed up on directions' and lacked 'any semblance of crisp accuracy.' Hynek concluded that the moon was the most probable explanation, as it was in the identical part of the sky and the witness failed to report the moon separately during the observation.