The date of the report is: 2148 EST 11/10/2022 | 0248 UTC 11/11/2022 though the actual time of sighting may differ.

The text related to the incident, as sent via email to The Black Vault, stated the following:

TIME/DATE: 02:39z 11/11/2022

TYPE OF INCIDENT: UNIDENTIFIED AERIAL PHENOMENON: HOUSTON TRACON/ATCT (I90), HOUSTON, TX, (TRACON)

INCIDENT DETAILS: Initial/Closeout
Call Sign: N1439X
Aircraft Type: PA28
Origin: 3T5 LA GRANGE
Destination: VFR VFR
New Destination: N/A
Remarks:
2148 EST / 0248 UTC 11/11/2022
PIC of N1439X/PA28 reported an unidentified aerial phenomenon while westbound at 3,000 feet, 10 NM SE of La Grange, TX (3T5). The unknown phenomenon was bright rotating lights about the size of a C172 traveling at a high rate of speed SW bound at approximately 4,000 feet.

ACTIONS/FOLLOW-UP/RECOVERY:
N/A

DIAGRAM MAP: N/A

SOURCE OF INFORMATION:
DEN

On November 15, 2022, The Black Vault filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for information related to the incident. The result was a visual of the radar data, laid over the ATC recordings. That clip is below.

It begins with the edited version created by The Black Vault to clip out long pauses, and non-UAP related banter. Edits are notated by a flash on the screen. It is then followed by the entire ATC recording, which plays in full, unedited and in real time.

NOTE: The Black Vault has NOT done a formal investigation on this incident. Rather, the page you are on now was setup to archive a confirmed sighting archived within the FAA’s files. Should any independent investigation add anything to this story, the page will be updated if the information is verifiable.

The Aircraft

The Flight – Compliments of FlightAware

Possible Explanation?

Twitter user “Flarkey” has submitted a possible explanation for the event:

By comparing the @blackvaultcom radar video and @flightradar24 data I think the actual sighting was at Nov 11 2022 at 02:07hrs UTC. This coincides exactly with a fireball meteor sighting seen by at least 4 other people across Texas…@amsmeteorshttps://t.co/cjKN2TFPJJ pic.twitter.com/3okQU2zabN

— 𝔽𝕝𝕒𝕣𝕜𝕖𝕪 (@flarkey) January 4, 2023

Agree? Disagree? Feel free to comment on the thread above via Twitter.

FOIA Release Letter

The post “Very Bright… Rotating White Light” UFO over Texas Described by Pilot in FAA ATC Recordings – 2148 EST 11/10/2022 | 0248 UTC 11/11/2022 first appeared on The Black Vault.

The following was printed in Wikipedia, and is being used here to give a brief overview of the case. The full official Project Blue Book case file is available below.

On the evening of November 2, 1957, two immigrant farm workers, Pedro Saucedo and Joe Salaz, called the Levelland police department to report a UFO sighting. Saucedo told police officer A.J. Fowler, who was working the night desk at the police station, that they had been driving four miles (6 km) west of Levelland when they saw a blue flash of light near the road. They claimed their truck’s engine died, and a rocket-shaped object rose up and approached the truck. According to Saucedo, “I jumped out of the truck and hit the dirt because I was afraid. I called to Joe but he didn’t get out. The thing passed directly over my truck with a great sound and rush of wind. It sounded like thunder and my truck rocked from the flash…I felt a lot of heat.” As the object moved away the truck’s engine restarted and worked normally. Believing the story to be a joke, Fowler ignored it. An hour later, motorist Jim Wheeler reported a “brilliantly lit, egg-shaped object, about 200 feet long” was sitting in the road, four miles (6 km) east of Levelland, blocking his path. He claimed his vehicle died and as he got out of his car the object took off and its lights went out. As it moved away, Wheeler’s car restarted and worked normally.

At 10:55 pm a married couple driving northeast of Levelland reported that they saw a bright flash of light moving across the sky and their headlights and radio died for three seconds. Five minutes later Jose Alvarez claimed he met a strange object sitting on the road 11 miles (18 km) north of Levelland, and his vehicle’s engine died until the object departed. At 12:05 am (November 3), a Texas Technological College (now Texas Tech University) student named Newell Wright was surprised when, driving 10 miles (16 km) east of Levelland, his “car engine began to sputter, the ammeter on the dash jumped to discharge and then back to normal, and the motor started cutting out like it was out of gas…the car rolled to a stop; then the headlights dimmed and several seconds later went out.” When he got out to check on the problem, he saw a “100-foot-long” egg-shaped object sitting in the road. It took off, and his engine started running again. At 12:15 am Officer Fowler received another call, this time from a farmer named Frank Williams who claimed he had encountered a brightly glowing object sitting in the road, and “as his car approached it, its lights went out and its motor stopped.” The object flew away, and his car’s lights and motor started working again. Other callers were Ronald Martin at 12:45 am and James Long at 1:15 am, and they both reported seeing a brightly lit object sitting in the road in front of them, and they also claimed that their engines and headlights died until the object flew away.

By this time, several Levelland police officers were investigating the reports. Among them was Sheriff Weir Clem, who saw a brilliant red object moving across the sky at 1:30 am. At 1:45 am Levelland’s Fire Chief, Ray Jones, also saw an object and his vehicle’s lights and engine sputtered. The reports apparently ended soon after. During the night of November 2–3, the Levelland police department received a total of 15 UFO-related reports, and Officer Fowler noted that “everybody who called was very excited.”

Document Archive

Project Blue Book: Levelland UFO case, November 2-3, 1957 [81 Pages, 22.5MB]

The post Project Blue Book: Levelland UFO case, November 2-3, 1957 first appeared on The Black Vault.

On January 8, 2008, Stephenville gained national media attention when dozens and later hundreds of residents reported observations of unidentified flying objects. According to reports, residents observed several types of UFOs, the descriptions ranging from triangular looking craft to discs. Several residents described the crafts as the size of a football field, while others said they were nearly a mile long. Some observers reported military aircraft pursuing the objects.

CNN’s Larry King covered the story in the days following the incident, and according to Steve Allen, a private pilot who witnessed the UFO, the object was travelling at a high rate of speed which supposedly reached 3,000 feet in the air. Allen said it was “About a half a mile wide and about a mile long. It was humongous, whatever it was.” The History Channel show, UFO Hunters did an investigation on the UFO sightings.

On January 23, after initially denying that aircraft were operating in the area for operations security purposes, the US Air Force said they were conducting training flights in the Stephenville area that involved 10 fighter jets. The Air Force said they were merely F-16 Fighting Falcon jets conducting night flights. Disgruntled employee, Angelia Joiner, who during this period was the Stephenville Empire-Tribune reporter covering the story, left the paper because they ceased covering the topic Washington Post blogger Emil Steiner reported that her termination may have been related to pressure from the Stephenville town fathers.  MUFON has released reports about the UFO incident here. The report alleged that a UFO had flown over the Bush’s Crawford Ranch. The other MUFON report is a radar related report on this matter. Inquiries made about the UFO incident have been stonewalled by the USAF.

On 2/27/2009, I submitted a FOIA request relating to the Stephenville UFO event.

The request was worded, “Recently, the magazine Skeptical Inquirer published an article about the Stephenville Lights that were seen on January 08, 2008.  It stated,
Astronomer (and retired Air Force pilot) James McGaha (see the accompanying ?The Trained Observer? piece) investigated.

On January 17, he contacted the Federal Aviation Admin­istration and asked if any aircraft that night had entered the Brownwood Military Operating Areas (MOAs). These MOAs begin ten miles southwest of Stephenville?a 3,200-square-mile area used for military aviation training. The FAA informed McGaha on January 18 that a group of four F-16s from the 457th Fighter Squadron entered the operating area at 6:17 pm local time. A second group of four F-16s entered the same area at 6:26 pm. They departed at 6:54 and 6:58, respectively. The time the aircraft were flying in the MOA accords with the time of the sightings.

I respectfully request a copy of all documents that authenticates this statement.  Please also include any documents pertaining to Mr. McGaha’s communications, if any exist, with the FAA.

Additionally, I respectfully request all documents relating to the aircraft that entered this airspace, their mission, etc. Please include all letters, memos, emails, recordings, reports, etc., that  pertain to my request.”

1. FAA Radar Data & Skeptical Magazine Inquiry Documents

The CD-ROM Contents

The following is a list of the contents that was received on the CD-ROM disk. I recommend reading the Readme.doc file listed on the top of the index for an explanation on what the .txt files are.  Please note, most of the .txt files over approximately 4-6mb in size.

1. Readme.doc
2. FTW_08Jan2008_2200.txt
3. FTW_08Jan2008_2230.txt
4. FTW_08Jan2008_2300.txt
5. FTW_08Jan2008_2330.txt
6. FTW_09Jan2008_0000.txt
7. FTW_09Jan2008_0030.txt
8. FTW_09Jan2008_0100.txt
9. FTW_09Jan2008_0130.txt
10. QAZ_08Jan2008_2200.txt
11. QAZ_08Jan2008_2230.txt
12. QAZ_08Jan2008_2300.txt
13. QAZ_08Jan2008_2330.txt
14. QAZ_09Jan2008_0000.txt
15. QAZ_09Jan2008_0030.txt
16. QAZ_09Jan2008_0100.txt
17. QAZ_09Jan2008_0130.txt
18. QOO_08Jan2008_2200.txt
19. QOO_08Jan2008_2230.txt
20. QOO_08Jan2008_2300.txt
21. QOO_08Jan2008_2330.txt
22. QOO_09Jan2008_0000.txt
23. QOO_09Jan2008_0030.txt
24. QOO_09Jan2008_0100.txt
25. QOO_09Jan2008_0130.txt
26. QYS_08Jan2008_2200.txt
27. QYS_08Jan2008_2230.txt
28. QYS_08Jan2008_2300.txt
29. QYS_08Jan2008_2330.txt
30. QYS_09Jan2008_0000.txt
31. QYS_09Jan2008_0030.txt
32. QYS_09Jan2008_0100.txt
33. QYS_09Jan2008_0130.txt
34. RSG_08Jan2008_2200.txt
35. RSG_08Jan2008_2230.txt
36. RSG_08Jan2008_2300.txt
37. RSG_08Jan2008_2330.txt
38. RSG_09Jan2008_0000.txt
39. RSG_09Jan2008_0030.txt
40. RSG_09Jan2008_0100.txt
41. RSG_09Jan2008_0130.txt

Other Related Stephenville UFO Documents

1. Dyess Air Force Base Tower Logs for January 08, 2008 [3 Pages, 170k]

The post UFO Case: Stephenville, Texas (January 08, 2008) first appeared on The Black Vault.