Northern French Morocco: Air Force radar tracks returns shifting between V, W and M shapes
On December 16, 1953, at 17:54 UTC, radar personnel of Detachment 2, 737th AC&W Squadron, tracked unidentified returns over northern French Morocco and the Mediterranean that kept changing between V, W and M shapes and faded after several minutes. Electronics personnel of the 316th Air Division judged anomalous propagation, ship-borne radar jamming or geese or storks in flight to be the cause.
Background
According to a U.S. Air Force Air Intelligence Information Report of December 23, 1953, from the 316th Air Division (Defense), an air surveillance operator of Detachment 2, 737th AC&W Squadron, observed the returns on a TPS-1D radar at night. They changed shape between a series of V’s, W’s and M’s, were about two or three degrees wide, numbered from one to twelve depending on the sweep and lay in a straight line on an azimuth of 250 degrees from 20 to 40 miles out; they stayed comparatively stationary and faded out after several minutes, and because the height finder was out, no elevation angle was available. The weather was overcast with nine-tenths cloud cover and five miles visibility, and the form records no other unusual activity and no physical evidence. Radar maintenance personnel at the site offered no possible cause, but electronics personnel at the division named anomalous propagation, ship-borne jamming of the detachment’s radar, or geese or storks in flight, and the report concludes that one of these possibilities is the cause of the return. The details are taken from records released by the U.S. Department of War in PURSUE Release 07 (record code DOW-UAP-D160) and do not represent an independent determination by From Beyond Space.