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◆ CASE FILEThe facts, corroborated

A Green 'Whirling Disc' over Pinellas County

In the small hours of 31 January 1949 the police chief of Safety Harbor, Florida, and a local plumber saw a huge round "whirling disc" throwing off greenish light. The next day two visitors on the Gulf beaches reported a green disc "shooting fire" past their windows. The reports survive only as newspaper clippings inside an Air Force file on a sighting at Orlando that same night, whose record card reads "Possible Aircraft". This is the record of what they reported, not a verdict on what crossed Pinellas County.

◆ THE SHORT VERSION

  • A Green 'Whirling Disc' over Pinellas County is a reported UAP case in Safety Harbor and the Gulf beaches, Pinellas County, Florida, USA, 31 January 1949, about 01:30 (Safety Harbor); 1 February 1949 (Gulf beaches).
  • Safety Harbor police chief H. E. Benson and plumber W. Gussie Wilson reported a round "whirling disc" throwing off greenish light, "as large as four of the biggest army planes", on 31 January 1949.
  • The next day two visitors from Dayton, Ohio, staying on the Pinellas Gulf beaches, reported a green disc the size of a wastepaper basket that "shot fire" past their windows.
  • Both accounts survive only as newspaper clippings inside a Project Blue Book file on an Orlando AFB sighting the same night.
  • That file's record card, written for the Orlando sighting, says "Duration and speed rules out meteor" and concludes "Possible Aircraft".
  • For this case Fractured Realities holds 1 distinct source, 1 corroborating primary document and 4 distinct claimants on its resolved list.
  • The archive grades it L4 · OFFICIAL RECORD — a released government record names who saw it, the top of our scale, though no independent testimony sits beside that record.

Counts are resolved totals of what sources say, computed 2026-10-12; the reported details above are claims in the record, not findings. A record of reports, not a verdict on what happened.

A Green 'Whirling Disc' over Pinellas County
From the case file · released government record · Project Blue Book 1940s case files, p. 2 of the case folder · US Air Force record, via the Internet Archive ↗
EVENT DATE
31 January 1949, about 01:30 (Safety Harbor); 1 February 1949 (Gulf beaches)
LOCATION
Safety Harbor and the Gulf beaches, Pinellas County, Florida · USA
COORDS
27.99°N 82.69°W
INDEPENDENCE
L4 · OFFICIAL RECORD
SOURCES
1 distinct
CLAIMANTS
4
STATUS
Known from released government records
NUMBERS COMPUTED 2026-10-12 · RESOLVED COUNTS, NOT A VERDICT
VIEW ON ATLAS →

It was about 01:30 on 31 January 1949. H. E. Benson, the police chief of Safety Harbor, and W. Gussie Wilson, a plumber, saw a large round "whirling disc" heading south. They put its speed at 400 to 500 miles an hour and its size at "as large as four of the biggest army planes". It formed a circle and threw out greenish light streaked with white.

The next day, 1 February, Mrs J. C. Bonner and Mrs Mary Jackson were staying on the Pinellas Gulf beaches, visitors from Dayton, Ohio. They saw a bright green disc the size of a wastepaper basket "shoot fire" past their windows and then shoot up over the Gulf.

What is on the record

Neither account comes from an investigator's pen. Both are newspaper clippings filed in a Project Blue Book case on Orlando Air Force Base: the St Petersburg Independent of 1 February 1949 and the next day's St Petersburg Times. The Independent has the chief quoted as "Chief Wilson", a newspaper slip, since Wilson was the plumber. The Orlando case itself concerns a green to blue-green light seen around the base between 01:15 and 02:00 that same night by five Air Policemen and three civilian police officers. The Office of Special Investigations looked into it. In March 1949 an OSI agent interviewed Benson, who said the object had gone off south-west towards the Gulf between Clearwater and Indian Rocks.

The record card was written for the Orlando sighting, not for Pinellas. It notes "Duration and speed rules out meteor" and concludes "Possible Aircraft". No catalogue entry for the Pinellas reports has been found, so the two clippings are their only outside sources.

Why it sits where it does

L4 · OFFICIAL RECORD — a released government record names who saw it. Benson and Wilson are identified, along with the two visitors Bonner and Jackson, all through clippings the Air Force kept. This is a thin file with nothing first-hand beside it, and the stronger evidence in it belongs to Orlando. What the chief saw over Safety Harbor is not resolved here.

◆ CORROBORATION
✓1949 01 6792429 OrlandoAFB Fla (government primary)
✓4 resolved claimants
◆ SOURCES

Everything this file draws on, in the open — reports, not reality. Check us.

Documents & published sources

Government records, papers and journalism the archive links to this case.

government record · 1
Project Blue Book (NARA/archive.org) · 1
UNEXPLAINED LIGHTGOVERNMENT RECORD1949USA

CASE FILES STATE THE RECORD AS OUR ARCHIVE HOLDS IT — FACTS, NOT OPINION. REPORTS, NOT REALITY.

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A Green 'Whirling Disc' over Pinellas County — Case File · Fractured Realities