The Lubbock Lights
On late summer evenings in 1951, professors in Texas watched a curved formation of soft lights glide silently overhead.
What was reported
On 25 August 1951, a group of professors from Texas Technological College, sitting outside in Lubbock, saw a semicircle of faint, bluish-green lights pass quickly and silently overhead. They saw it again on several later evenings, as did many residents.
A college student, Carl Hart Jr., took photographs of a V-shaped formation of bright lights, which were published widely and became some of the most famous UFO pictures of the time.
Explanations offered
Project Blue Book concluded that many sightings were of migrating plovers, birds whose pale undersides reflected the town's new mercury-vapour streetlights. One professor later suggested a natural effect in the atmosphere. Hart's photographs have never been fully explained, but were never shown to be faked.
- When
- August – September 1951
- Where
- Lubbock, Texas, USA
- Witnesses
- University professors, residents and a teenage photographer
- Status
- Mostly explained
Famous cases are real, widely reported events. Each file sets out what witnesses said and the explanations that have been offered, without taking a side.