The green-blue light over Kodiak Naval Air Station

On the evening of April 8, 1949, Deputy U.S. Marshal Paul Herring told Navy intelligence he watched a green-blue flame cross the sky over the U.S. Naval Operating Base at Kodiak, Alaska.

It was not the only report that night. A Navy operations officer, a taxicab driver, and a base bus driver also described a fast luminous object moving west to east near the air station and Chiniak Bay. The witnesses did not agree on every detail. They did agree on the direction, the approximate time, and the fact that something bright crossed the base area.

The first report

Herring reported the sighting to the intelligence officer on April 11. The Navy report says he saw a "flaming greenish-blue object" at about 2,500 feet, moving from Anton Larson Bay toward Puffin Island and Chiniak Bay. He estimated the speed at 1,500 miles per hour and said it was visible for about 15 seconds.

His first impression was not a spacecraft. According to the file, he thought it could be a jet fighter or an aircraft on fire. That changed after he called the Naval Air Base and was told there were no aircraft of any description in the air near the Naval Air Station.

Three more witnesses

Lieutenant Commander D. Shepard, the operations officer at the U.S. Naval Operating Base, reported a strange object near Old Woman Mountain around 2040 hours. He described it as a reddish ball of fire roughly two feet across, moving west to east at about 2,500 feet, with no tail, on a shallow downward track toward Chiniak Bay.

Lawrence B. Shaw, a taxi driver in Kodiak, said he saw a bright blue object with a short pinkish streamer while driving from the enlisted men's club to the administration building. He thought it would have struck Chiniak Bay if it had continued on the same course. He also told investigators he did not think it was a meteor or shooting star.

Paul Kreuger, a bus driver on the base, described a greenish-blue object flashing from Old Woman Mountain toward Nyman Peninsula. His estimate put it much lower than the others, about 500 feet over hangar 3, and he compared it to a large greenish tracer shell.

The file's edge

The Navy Weather Central at Kodiak logged the 2000-hour weather: 3,000-foot ceiling, scattered clouds, 15 miles visibility, north-northwest wind at 15 knots, and 27 degrees. The report also says no witness reported noise from the object.

Because the witnesses were close on position, altitude, course, and time, the report evaluated the existence of the luminous manifestation as probable. It did not evaluate the nature. The witnesses varied on shape, size, and color, and efforts to determine what it was did not succeed.

It records a specific night, a base, four witnesses, a weather check, a no-aircraft detail, and a hand-drawn flight path. The object is logged. The nature of it is not.

Related UAP Logbook notes

• What is PURSUE? The UAP records release program explained
• war.gov UFO files: PURSUE portal, UAP videos, and old cases
• Air Materiel Command, December 1947: "Flying discs still a matter of concern"
• AARO, PURSUE, and UAP file releases

Sources

• PURSUE Release 01: 342_HS1-416511228_box186_319.1 Flying Discs 1949, released May 8, 2026. Kodiak report: "Intelligence Report, Serial 13-49 at Kodiak, Alaska", dated April 23, 1949, pages 51-53 in the extracted local transcript and corresponding PDF pages.
• Office of Chief of Naval Operations, Intelligence Division: "US/Alaska - Meteorological Phenomena - Luminous Energy", source for the April 8, 1949 witness summaries, weather entry, no-aircraft detail, no-noise detail, and final evaluation.
• Paul Herring drawing, Enclosure A to DIO-17ND, CONF NNI-96, Serial 13-49, dated April 23, 1949. Source for the feature image and reported flight path.