A Red Sphere with a Blue Flame over Lake Charles AFB

At about 03:00 Central time on 2 August 1952 two men were standing on the concrete taxiway at the east end of Lake Charles Air Force Base in Louisiana. 1st Lt. William A. Thiel was a pilot and the assistant operations officer. Airman Third Class William R. Edwards was the dispatcher on duty. They saw one small spherical red object with a blue flame trailing behind it.

It was "too dark to tell size". Its propulsion looked like a jet's or a rocket's. It flew straight and level from south to north, east of the base, at an estimated 5,000 feet and two to three miles away. It was extremely fast and made no sound. After three or four seconds it went out of sight behind the rudder of a B-29.

What is on the record

The report reached Project Blue Book as a teletype from the 806th Air Division and is filed as Unknown no. 1783. The weather was calm. A T-11 was making a low approach to the west and south of the field at the time. There was no physical evidence and no intercept. The two observers knew of nothing that could explain what they had seen, and the report rated their reliability as average. The Project 10073 record card summarises a spherical red object with a blue-flame trail flying straight and level over the base, and concludes unknown.

The teletype gives a position of 30°12'N 93°50'W. That would put the sighting west of the city rather than at the base, and it is probably a typing error. The base is used here. Catalogues spell the lieutenant "Theil", but the teletype has THIEL. Berliner's list of Blue Book unknowns, NICAP, the Hatch database, Eberhart and Johnson's calendar all carry the case.

The same Blue Book folder holds a separate sighting report that is not part of this case and is not used here.

Why it sits where it does

L4 · OFFICIAL RECORD: a released government record names who saw it. Thiel and Edwards, both on duty that night, are the two it names. The teletype is the archive's whole account. The tier measures sourcing, not truth. What passed behind the B-29's rudder is not resolved here.