Project 10073 Record — Dixon, Illinois, 3 July 1966

This document is a Project 10073 record concerning an unidentified aerial phenomenon sighting that occurred in Dixon, Illinois, on July 3, 1966, at 0345Z. The primary witness, a 17-year-old male, reported observing a single object for 18 seconds. He was accompanied by two other witnesses, a 38-year-old woman and an 8-year-old child. The witness described the object as having a front section that appeared as a truncated cone on fire, colored extremely bright red, and a rear section that looked like a solid parachute with many bright lights inside, colored bright white. The object was observed moving in a south-southeasterly direction over houses and trees. The witness noted that there was no sound associated with the object. The sky was clear and the weather was dry at the time of the sighting. The witness completed the U.S. Air Force technical information questionnaire on December 3, 1966, and expressed a willingness to submit to a lie detector test to verify his account. The official conclusion recorded on the document states that there was insufficient data for evaluation, with a handwritten note suggesting the object was likely a meteor combined with imagination.