Portage County police chase
- Date
- 17 Apr 1966
- Place
- From Route 224 near Ravenna, Ohio, east to Freedom (Conway), Pennsylvania, United States
- Record
- Curated case
- Assessment
- Contested
- Evidence strength
What was reported
At about 5 a.m. Portage County deputies Dale Spaur and Wilbur Neff, checking an abandoned car, saw a bright disc-shaped object rise near the road and were told by their sergeant to follow it. They chased it for about 85 miles to near Freedom, Pennsylvania, and officers from other jurisdictions joined the pursuit and reported seeing it too. Project Blue Book (record 10073) became involved after congressional pressure; Hector Quintanilla's brief telephone interview of Spaur, partly transcribed in Hynek's The UFO Experience, became a stock example of poor investigation. The official conclusion was that the officers first saw a satellite and then chased the planet Venus. Sheriff Ross Dustman told UPI he had never seen Venus 50 feet above a road moving from side to side.
What officials concluded
Resolved
A satellite, then the planet Venus (Project Blue Book)
Strongest ordinary reading
Venus and a satellite are the official answer; the reported low altitude and lateral motion do not fit it well
Evidence profile
- Yes: Visual
- No: Infrared
- No: Radar
- No: Video
- No: Photo
- No: Film
- No: Audio
- No: Night vision
- No: Other sensor
- No: Civilian
- No: Military aircrew
- No: Military ground
- No: Airline crew
- No: Sensor operator
- Yes: Law enforcement
- No: Scientist
- No: Astronaut
- No: Intelligence official
- No: Other
- No: Light only
- No: Orb or sphere
- Yes: Disc
- No: Triangle
- No: Cylinder
- No: Cube
- No: Other shape
- No: Physiological
- No: Physical trace
- No: Electromagnetic
- No: Sound
- No: Silent
Outside sources
- Wikipedia: Project Blue Book (Portage County)en.wikipedia.org
- Patrick Gross: Portage County 1966 case fileufologie.patrickgross.org
On the map
41.16° N, 81.24° W, plotted at the centre of the region named in the record
Show on the map