A Navy Patrol Plane Chases a 'Refuelling Formation' That Wasn't, Portland to Portsmouth

Lieutenant J. H. Boak was flying a radar-equipped P2V of Patrol Squadron 26 on a local flight out of Naval Air Station Brunswick on the evening of 16 September 1952. Near Portland, Maine, he and his co-pilot Lieutenant C. G. Prentiss saw two objects flying south at about 4,000 feet. One sat above and ahead of the other, "much as a towing or refueling formation". The upper one was large, dark and unlit. The lower carried four or five lights in a circle. The P2V's APS-31 radar held them on and off at three to five miles. When Boak tried to work into a better position the objects took evasive action. They kept their formation and accelerated to about 300 knots. The crew followed for about 20 minutes over some 70 nautical miles. Near Portsmouth, New Hampshire, one object turned towards the P2V. Boak broke off and headed north, and the objects flew south-west out of sight.

What is on the record

Blue Book case 2099 holds teletypes and a follow-up questionnaire, and the times shift between them. The first teletypes give about 19:22 EDT, with a break-off at 19:15 or 20:10. The questionnaire fixes visual contact at 2349Z to 0005Z, which is 19:49 to 20:05 local, and radar contact at 2352Z. The ground radar at Brunswick was down for maintenance.

ATIC suspected a KC-97 refuelling operation and questioned the two KC-97 commanders of the 26th Air Refueling Squadron. Their times and courses did not match. They had never flown in formation together, and neither saw any aircraft following them. The record card's evaluation is Unknown. Berliner lists the case among the Blue Book Unknowns and NICAP files it as a radar-visual case. Berliner and Overmeire describe "a group of five lights" and a "long, thin blip", which differs from the record's dark upper object and lit lower one, and Berliner gives the time as 6:22 p.m.

Why it sits where it does

L4 · OFFICIAL RECORD: a released government record names who saw it. The file names Boak, Prentiss and Ensign Hara of VP-26, and the rest of the crew go unnamed. No account from outside the file has reached the archive. The grade measures sourcing alone. What the P2V chased to Portsmouth is not resolved here.