The Levelland Vehicle Stoppages

Background

Levelland, a farming town of roughly 10,000 people, lies west of Lubbock on the flat South Plains of Texas. The sightings came in the first weeks of the space age: the Soviet Union had launched Sputnik 1 about four weeks earlier, and Sputnik 2 was launched on November 3, Moscow time, which was the evening of November 2 in Texas. Most Americans did not hear of that launch until the following day, so the timing of the Levelland reports is generally treated as coincidence.

Early November 1957 was also the peak of a national wave of UFO reports, and Project Blue Book logged some 330 reports for the period. Reports of electrical equipment failing near a luminous object were a recurring feature of that wave.

What was reported

By most accounts, the first call to the Levelland police came on the evening of November 2 from two farm workers, Pedro Saucedo and Joe Salaz. Saucedo said their truck stalled on a road outside town after a blue flash, as a torpedo- or rocket-shaped object passed over. Gross’s account quotes him as saying it sounded like thunder and rocked the truck. Officer A. J. Fowler, on the desk, reportedly took it for a joke.

Many more calls followed. Jim Wheeler said an egg-shaped object blocked the road and killed his car’s engine until it left. Jose Alvarez described a glowing object about 200 feet long. Texas Technological College student Newell Wright said that around 12:05 a.m. his headlights failed and his headlights and engine failed while a bluish-green oval sat on the highway for several minutes. Farmer Frank Williams, and truck drivers Ronald Martin and James Long, told similar stories of engines and lights dying near a glowing object and returning as it lifted away, and some said it left with a sound like thunder.

Around 1:30 a.m., Sheriff Weir Clem and a deputy drove out and saw a large, glowing red oval in the distance. Gross’s account says Clem reported no electrical trouble. Fire Chief Ray Jones, whose title appears as fire marshal in some accounts, said his headlights dimmed and his engine nearly died as a bright streak passed. Police logged about fifteen UFO-related calls. Times and details vary between sources.

Investigations and official findings

Project Blue Book sent one man, Staff Sgt. Norman Barth, to Levelland. According to the Black Vault’s summary of the file, he spent about seven hours there. Wikipedia’s account says he interviewed Saucedo, Wheeler and Wright and learned that thunderstorms had passed through earlier in the day. He concluded that an electrical storm, probably ball lightning or St. Elmo’s fire, had produced the sightings and that wet ignition circuits had stalled the vehicles. Air Force Press Release No. 1108-57, as described by the Black Vault, gave the same explanation. The Black Vault notes that the two phenomena are distinct and that the release did not clearly choose between them.

Blue Book’s file reportedly held that only three witnesses had seen an object at close range, and, in the investigator’s conclusion, that a severe electrical storm had excited the populace and inflated some witnesses’ stories. The Black Vault reports that no physical trace of a landed object was found, and Wikipedia says Blue Book judged Saucedo’s account unreliable, citing his limited education and inconsistent answers. Critics, including the group NICAP, called the inquiry superficial and more like public relations than investigation.

Explanations and debate

Several ordinary explanations were offered. Harvard astronomer Donald Menzel backed ball lightning and, according to the Black Vault, also suggested drivers had flooded their engines by ‘nervous foot’. He acknowledged, as Wikipedia puts it, that ball lightning leaves no evidence and so cannot be proven. The Black Vault adds that Harvey Nininger also suggested ball lightning, and Lincoln LaPaz a fireball meteor. Historian Curtis Peebles noted that there was no uniform description of the object.

The weather is the sharpest point of dispute. In a statement submitted to the House Committee on Science and Astronautics in July 1968, atmospheric physicist James McDonald said that nine vehicles suffered ignition failures within about two hours, that his check of weather data showed no thunderstorms anywhere close to Levelland, and that no rain capable of wetting ignitions had fallen. He said Sheriff Clem and a local newspaperman confirmed there had been no rain or lightning, and wrote that the incidents ‘cannot be regarded as explained’. He also argued that engines restarting the moment the object left made the wet-ignition idea unreasonable. Hynek later said, as Wikipedia reports, that he had agreed with the Air Force hastily while busy tracking Sputnik. Critics have argued that Blue Book never interviewed nine of the fifteen witnesses, and that its final report did not mention them.

Why it still matters

Levelland is the standard example of the ‘vehicle interference’ report: many independent-seeming witnesses, a short time window, and a consistent effect on engines and lights. The case is also a standing test of how officials explained sightings. Blue Book’s answer rested on weather that its critics say did not occur, and the file is publicly available for anyone to check. Hynek said in an April 27, 1960 banquet talk at Eglin AFB that the Levelland reports were real reports, though not necessarily real objects.