Five defining cases from the May 1950 UFO record, headlined by the McMinnville, Oregon Trent photographs.
1950: May UFO|UAP & Entity Sightings Archive
May 1950 delivered fewer reports than the enormous March and April waves, but the month is disproportionately significant: it produced the McMinnville, Oregon Trent photographs — one of the most analyzed UFO images ever taken — alongside a close encounter with a paralyzing “Michelin man” entity in rural France, a claimed landed-saucer-with-dead-crew story from Argentina, a violent physical assault claim near the Loire, and a near-collision between a Capital Airlines DC-6 and a glowing spindle-shaped object over Virginia. Several of the month’s strongest cases are documented in full via the standalone reports linked below.
Date: May 1950
Location: Florence, Tuscany, Italy
Time: Unknown
Summary: Two discs were observed by one male witness (Donnini).
Source: Newspaper
Date: May 1950
Location: Flagstaff, Lowell Observatory, Arizona
Time: Unknown
Summary: An object was observed using optical instruments; one disc was observed by one experienced male witness (Hess).
Source: Flying Saucers, Flying Saucers Magazine (Palmer)
Date: May 1950
Location: Albany, New York
Time: Unknown
Summary: A daylight disc was observed by a female witness.
Source: Eberhart, George M. A Geo-Bibliography of Anomalies Greenwood Press, Westport, 1980. ISBN: 0-313-21337-2
Date: May 1950
Location: Navasota, Texas
Time: Unknown
Summary: More than three objects were observed by several witnesses for over one minute (Miguez).
Source: Unknown
Date: May 1950
Location: Vaux-en-Dieulet, near Buzancy, Ardennes, France
Time: 06:30
Summary: Fourteen-year-old Madeleine Pierrard was crossing a meadow to check on the cows, accompanied by a family dog, when she cried out and pointed at what she first took for the sun. A strange noise — “hou, hou, hou” — accompanied a ball of fire that approached and passed in front of her before stopping and hovering. It resolved into a saucer-shaped object made of a completely translucent, glass-like material. Inside, motionless, stood a small being about 1.40 meters tall, arms at its sides, wearing a tight-fitting diving-style suit resembling the “Michelin Man,” with a motorcycle-style helmet and a clear Plexiglas-like visor connected by two pipes to bottles above its shoulders. Both witnesses felt completely paralyzed and enveloped in a wave of heat throughout the roughly two-minute observation. The object then rose, turning slightly on itself in successive steps while repeating its earlier noise, and departed in the direction of Buzancy. A scorched patch was later found on the ground. Accounts of the case differ on whether Madeleine was accompanied that morning by her father or by an uncle (a Mr. Pierrard) — the surviving sources are inconsistent on this point, and it is noted here rather than resolved.
Source: Jean-Michel Ligeron, UFO in the Ardennes, 1981
Date: May 1950
Location: Desierto de los Leones, Distrito Federal, Mexico
Time: Evening
Summary: Samael Aun Weor (Victor Manuel Gómez Rodríguez), later the founder of a prominent Gnostic religious movement, reported watching a spherical craft, flattened at the top and resting on tripod-style landing gear, descend into a clearing. A thin, bronze-skinned, blue-eyed man of medium build emerged via a small metal ladder, followed by several similar male and female figures. The witness approached and greeted them in Spanish, which they answered fluently; they told him they knew every language on Earth. He asked to be taken to Mars; their leader, apparently puzzled by the request, convened the group in a brief discussion before one of the women offered a parable about worlds absorbing the “positive vibrations” of others, adding that Earth alone seemed resistant to the effect. Told only “we will watch you along the way,” the witness understood he was not yet deemed ready, and watched the group re-board and the craft rotate and depart at high speed. This entry is preserved as a self-reported esoteric contact narrative from a figure later well known in independent religious history, rather than as a corroborated sighting.
Source: Samael Aun Weor, AGEACAC
Date: May 1, 1950
Location: Filer, Idaho
Time: Unknown
Summary: An object was observed and photographed; one banana-shaped object was observed by a male witness (Mueller, W).
Source: Arnold, Kenneth Coming of the Saucers Authors, Amherst, 1952
Date: May 1, 1950
Location: Boux-sous-Salmaise & Dijon, Burgundy, France
Time: 15:00
Summary: One object was observed by multiple witnesses.
Source: Plantier, Jean La Propulsion des Soucoupes Volantes Mame, 1955
Date: May 1, 1950
Location: Kirtland AFB, New Mexico
Time: 15:10
Summary: Two observers saw a silver, lucid, metallic, cylindrical object moving from southwest to northeast at an altitude of a few thousand feet, angling downward, at tremendous speed, for less than a second before it vanished in a flash of brilliant white light. No sound was heard.
Source: AFOSI
Date: May 3, 1950
Location: Savoyeux, Haute-Saône, France
Time: 15:00
Summary: Several girls saw a large cylinder shooting silvery rays fly rapidly from south to north; observed in a residential area for over one minute.
Source: Lumières Dans la Nuit
Date: May 3, 1950
Location: Neuville-sur-Sarthe, Pays de la Loire, France
Time: 16:30
Summary: Four flying discs were observed by numerous witnesses in the city for 30 minutes.
Source: Vallee, Jacques
Date: May 3, 1950
Location: Louisa, Kentucky
Time: 21:00
Summary: One object was observed by several witnesses on a river for a few seconds (Vinson).
Source: Newspaper
Date: May 4, 1950
Location: Birmingham, Alabama
Time: 22:00
Summary: Nocturnal lights were reported in the city for ten minutes (Reid).
Source: Project Bluebook
Date: May 6, 1950
Location: Rome, Lazio, Italy
Time: 16:30
Summary: A daytime disc was reported in the city for ten minutes.
Source: Boncompagni, Solas UFO in Italia, Volume I (Periodo 1907-1953) Tedeschi, Firenze, 1974
Date: May 7, 1950
Location: English Channel
Time: Unknown
Summary: One disc was observed by one witness.
Source: Weinstein, Dominique Aircraft UFO Encounters Project ACUFOE, Paris, 1999
Date: May 7, 1950
Location: Llantarnam, Wales, United Kingdom
Time: 09:45
Summary: A daytime disc was reported.
Source: Hill, H. Edward Catalog Through 1950
Date: May 7, 1950
Location: Lyon, Rhône-Alpes, France
Time: 13:30
Summary: One object was observed.
Source: Vallee, Jacques
Date: May 7, 1950
Location: Ely, Nevada
Time: 18:45
Summary: A couple and their grandson, returning from a picnic about 14 km south of Ely, saw a silvery-white object at treetop level. It hovered for ten minutes, then oscillated “as if attempting to rise” before suddenly flying out of sight at high speed.
Source: Magonia 79
Date: May 10, 1950
Location: Bahía Blanca, Buenos Aires, Argentina
Time: Unknown
Summary: A 35-year-old male witness observed an object on a highway; physical traces were reportedly found at the scene, and the witness is said to have later died. No further detail on the cause or timing of death, or on the nature of the traces, survives in the available record.
Source: Stringfield, Leonard H.
Date: May 11, 1950
Location: McMinnville, Yamhill County, Oregon
Time: Early evening, just before sunset
Summary: Farmers Paul and Evelyn Trent photographed a large, silvery, metallic disc gliding silently over their farm, taking two frames before it tilted and departed to the west. The negatives, published in Life magazine weeks later, were formally analyzed seventeen years later for the Condon Committee by astronomer William K. Hartmann, who found the photometry consistent with a real, distant, artificial object — though skeptics have since argued the images show a small model suspended from the power lines visible in frame. The case remains unresolved to this day. See the Full Report.
Source: McMinnville Telephone-Register; Life magazine, June 26, 1950; Condon Committee (William K. Hartmann)
Date: May 11, 1950
Location: Kirchberg, Austria
Time: Unknown
Summary: Nocturnal lights were reported.
Source: Schoenherr, Luis
Date: May 13, 1950
Location: Sutter Buttes, California
Time: Unknown
Summary: Several white objects were observed for five minutes.
Source: Gross, Loren E. UFOs: A History. 1950: April-July Author, Fremont, 1982
Date: May 13, 1950
Location: Wilmette, Illinois
Time: 20:50
Summary: Nocturnal lights were reported for over one minute.
Source: Gross, Loren E. UFOs: A History. 1950: April-July Author, Fremont, 1982
Date: May 14, 1950
Location: St. Louis, Missouri
Time: 14:30
Summary: A cream-colored, disc-shaped UFO about ten feet in diameter flew at 1,500 feet altitude; observed by four witnesses for over one minute.
Source: Newspaper
Date: Mid-May 1950
Location: Cheyenne, Wyoming
Time: 08:30
Summary: 20 objects were observed by a male witness for ten minutes (Mitchell).
Source: Bloecher, Ted R.
Date: May 15, 1950
Location: Near Epu Pel / General Acha, La Pampa, Argentina
Time: Afternoon
Summary: An Italian-born architect driving alone across La Pampa reported spotting a silver disc tilted on a rise of ground and entering it to find three small humanoid occupants, all apparently dead, amid a strong ozone-and-garlic odor. Returning the next day with friends, they found the craft gone, replaced by a smoking pile of silver-red ash, and reported seeing identical discs and a cigar-shaped carrier departing overhead. The account did not surface publicly until an anonymous 1955 Caracas newspaper item. See the Full Report.
Source: El Universal (Caracas), 1955; Le Courrier Interplanétaire; Leonard H. Stringfield
Date: May 16, 1950
Location: Zaragoza, Spain
Time: 20:50
Summary: Nocturnal lights were reported.
Source: Ballester Olmos, Vicente-Juan
Date: May 18, 1950
Location: Cañon City, Colorado
Time: Around 22:00
Summary: Physiological effects were noted; more than one object was observed by two witnesses.
Source: Data-Net Report
Date: May 19, 1950
Location: 100 miles east of Honshu, Japan (BBU)
Time: 10:30 a.m.
Summary: Two military aircraft pilots saw a stationary, kite-like object independently tracked by ground radar; more than three witnesses and the radar together confirmed a single balloon-like object.
Source: Project 1947; McDonald list
Date: May 19, 1950
Location: Loire River, France
Time: 16:00
Summary: One object was observed by one witness.
Source: Vallee, Jacques Passport to Magonia Henry Regnery, Chicago, 1969
Date: May 20, 1950
Location: Flagstaff, Arizona
Time: 12:15
Summary: An astronomer at Lowell Observatory saw a dark UFO against a bright cloud, moving southeast to northwest, perpendicular to the cloud drift, at roughly 100 mph. The sphere- or disc-shaped object, partially lit by sunlight, was estimated at 3 to 5 feet in diameter.
Source: Michel, Aimé The Truth About Flying Saucers Pyramid T1647, New York, 1967
Date: May 20, 1950
Location: Cours-les-Barres, Cher, France
Time: 16:00
Summary: A woman walking along the steep banks of the Loire was suddenly engulfed in a blinding light and seized from above by two enormous, cold, black hands with no visible arms attached, which pressed violently over her eyes, nose, and mouth and dragged her backward through brush at great speed while a voice above her said “There she is. We’ve got her.” After roughly fifteen to twenty minutes she was released among brambles, badly lacerated, as a violent wind and a second blinding light accompanied the assailant’s sudden departure. Investigators later found scorched and flattened brush and damaged fencing at the site; the witness had reported a stopping, ascending “shooting star” the previous evening. See the Full Report.
Source: Joel Mesnard, MUFON UFO Journal #309; Vallee, Jacques Passport to Magonia
Date: May 21, 1950
Location: Montrose, Colorado
Time: 07:30
Summary: A round, huge object hung in the sky and was joined by a second; the pair headed north, then turned east. Two round objects of huge size were observed by four male witnesses, typically around age 60, for five minutes (Linscott; Seevers; Zanon).
Source: Newspaper
Date: May 22, 1950
Location: Warren AFB, Wyoming
Time: 14:00
Summary: Four objects were observed by six witnesses at the airfield for two minutes (Duquoin).
Source: Newspaper
Date: May 23, 1950
Location: Loveland, Colorado
Time: 20:00
Summary: Two objects were observed by two witnesses for over one minute (Johnson).
Source: Newspaper
Date: May 24, 1950
Location: Holloman AFB, Alamogordo, New Mexico (BBU)
Time: Unknown
Summary: During an MX-674 Tarzon controllable-bomb test, Floyd Fannon and other USAF crew members saw eight unidentified objects and separately tracked and filmed two of them down the North American Aviation missile range. Cinetheodolite station P-8 filmed one object moving south for six frames (1.0 second); station P-10, 5.68 miles north along the range, filmed a second object moving north for 74 frames (14.6 seconds) — the two stations viewing different objects, so no triangulation of a single target was possible.
Source: Sparks
Date: May 25, 1950
Location: Upton, Wyoming
Time: 03:00
Summary: Two objects were observed by numerous witnesses for several hours (Messersmith).
Source: Newspaper
Date: May 25, 1950
Location: Cañon City, Colorado
Time: 22:00
Summary: 11 objects were observed by two witnesses for 11 minutes (Herzel).
Source: Newspaper
Date: Late May 1950
Location: La Porte, Indiana
Time: 10:00
Summary: A hovering flying disc was observed by two male witnesses for 12 seconds (Gulledge).
Source: Hartle, Orvil R. A Carbon Experiment Author, La Porte, 1963
Date: May 29, 1950
Location: Sawbill Bay, Ontario, Canada
Time: Daytime
Summary: A four-foot-tall dwarf-like figure, wearing a shiny suit, was seen with a hose extending into the lake.
Source: Pereira, Jader U. Les Extra-Terrestres, Phenomenes Spatiaux, Paris, 1974
Date: May 29, 1950
Location: About 7 miles west of Mt. Vernon, Virginia (BBU)
Time: 9:20 p.m.
Summary: Capt. Willis T. Sperry, with roughly 10,000 flying hours, and his DC-6 crew narrowly avoided a head-on collision with a 150-foot spindle-shaped object carrying an intense blue tail light. After an evasive turn, the object crossed in front of the moon at about 5 miles’ distance, clearly showing a submarine-like silhouette, then circled to pace the aircraft for 20-30 seconds before climbing away to the east at “fantastic” speed. See the Full Report.
Source: Sparks Database of Bluebook Unknowns
Date: May 29, 1950
Location: Trasimeno, Umbria, Italy
Time: Night
Summary: Nocturnal lights were reported (Donnini).
Source: Boncompagni, Solas UFO in Italia, Volume I (Periodo 1907-1953) Tedeschi, Firenze, 1974
Date: May 30, 1950
Location: Anadarko, Oklahoma
Time: Daytime
Summary: One object was observed by one witness (McCarland).
Source: Newspaper
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
A Quieter Month, Anchored by Three Landmark Cases
May 1950 saw a genuine lull in overall report volume after March and April’s dense waves, but the month is remembered for the quality rather than the quantity of its strongest cases. The McMinnville, Oregon Trent photographs remain, three-quarters of a century later, one of the most rigorously and inconclusively analyzed UFO images ever taken. The Vaux-en-Dieulet, France encounter offers one of the era’s most detailed “small suited entity” descriptions, complete with paralysis and scorched ground. And the Mt. Vernon, Virginia DC-6 near-collision, now documented in full, stands alongside April’s TWA Flight 117 case as one of the two strongest airline-crew sightings of the year.
The month also carries two of this archive’s most cautionary cases: the Epu Pel, La Pampa “burnt saucer” story, whose vivid interior detail rests entirely on a single witness’s account that did not surface for five years, and the Bahía Blanca, Argentina entry, whose claim of a witness’s later death is recorded without any surviving detail on its circumstances. Both are preserved honestly as documented claims rather than verified events.
“The simplest reading of the images matches exactly what the witnesses had described.”
— William K. Hartmann, Condon Committee analysis of the McMinnville, Oregon photographs
