FBIUnknown
Unidentified aerial object photographed near Passaic, New Jersey — July 1952
Jul 31, 1952Passaic, New Jersey
⟳ Deeper read pending. This record is from the FBI 62-HQ-83894 flying-disc file, whose cursive, clippings and faint scans are under-read by automated OCR. It is flagged for a vision-transcription pass and likely undercounts what the source contains — see the documents collection note.
Analysis — our summary
George Stock of Passaic, New Jersey, photographed an alleged unidentified aerial object on July 31, 1952, while John Riley, a civilian photographer, witnessed and developed the film. The Air Force OSI requested the FBI to perform background checks on both men. The FBI Newark Division found no criminal records or history of fraud for either individual. The photographs were forwarded to the 5th OSI District at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base for evaluation by a staff writer from The Herald News.
As reported — verbatim from the document
“"Stock did photograph an allegedly unidentified aerial object and that Riley witnessed the incident and developed and printed the exposed film which was subsequently forwarded to the 5th OSI District, Air Technical Intelligence Center, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base"”
Analyst notes — caveats & confidence
FBI role limited to background checks on witnesses. No description of object shape, color, or maneuvers in this document section. Film transferred to ATIC; no analysis results present. OCR quality is moderate.
Provenance
Source document65_HS1-834228961_62-HQ-83894_Section_7.pdf
Document typecorrespondence collection
Reporting agencyFBI
Source pages205
Redaction markers in doc3
DeclassifiedFirst public at this release (2026)
Held classified~74 years (≥, to this release)
Extraction confidence LowHow cleanly this record could be parsed from the source — driven by legibility & redaction. It is not a measure of how credible or anomalous the sighting is.