On 4 July 1947, ten days after Kenneth Arnold’s sighting, the crew of United Airlines Flight 105 reported disc-shaped objects over Washington. The object identity was never settled.
Flight 105 matters because it is an airline-crew report from the earliest days of the flying-saucer era — a case that shows how quickly the post-Arnold wave spread into aviation.
United Airlines Flight 105, a DC-3, was flying from Boise to Seattle when Captain Emil J. Smith and his crew reported disc-shaped objects.
Documented
The crew’s report is documented.
The crew reported disc-shaped objects, echoing Kenneth Arnold’s description from ten days earlier. This situates the sighting in the earliest flying-saucer wave.
Documented
The disc description is documented.
Project Blue Book recorded the case. The object identity remains disputed, with conventional aircraft or atmospheric readings proposed.
Debated
The object identity is disputed.
No photograph or radar is established. The case rests on crew testimony.
Unverified
Any extraterrestrial origin is unverified.
These sources do different jobs: Blue Book is the official record, and Wikipedia and American Heritage are secondary. None establishes the object identity.
The Air Force record.
The compiled reference.
A later treatment, recorded as secondary.