uly 14, 1959--Pampulha, Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais State. Luminous object followed FAB (Bra- zilian Air Force) B-26, hovered near airport. [X].

Section X provides us with more information.

July 14, 1959. A Brazilian Air Force pilot checked on a hovering light observed from the control tower at Pampulha, Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais State at the request of the tower operator. After landing, the pilot reported that the unidentified light had followed him for about an hour while he was enroute from Pico do Couto. The control tower operator then fired some flares in the direc- tion of the UFO, and it changed color from white to amber to intense green. Then it turned white again, and darted upwards, disappearing in the darkness. [22]2

The source of this information comes came from a NICAP Advisor in Sao Paulo, who obtained the official report from the Brazilian Air Force.

Additional Sources

The summary in the UFO evidence document is not very clear so I decided to look elsewhere
about this case for additional information. Loren Gross had an entry in his UFO history about this case that provided specifics:

14 July Pampulha airport, Brazil. (7-8:25 p.m.) The bomber and the UFO.

This report was recorded on the Pampulha airport logs and then transmitted to the Brazilian Air Force. A Commander Hulvic Brant Aleixo passed the information on to J. Escobar Fario, co-editor of the UFO Critical Bulletin:

“On July 14, 1959, at about 8:25 p.m. the tower controller at the airport of Pampulha saw a light hovering in the sky, azimuth 270 degrees. In order to be sure it wasn’t a balloon, he phoned the Meteorological Institute, which answered that no balloons were up. Then he radioed to the commander of a military plane who was asking permission to land:

“ ‘Please make a 180 degree turn, and then put the nose of your plane at 270 degrees. Please confirm or disconfirm the appearance of a luminous object on that course.’

“The commander, an officer piloting a Brazilian Air Force B-26 north toward his base at Natal, immediately did what was requested. Then he landed quickly and confirmed the sighting.

“The controller was disappointed that he had landed so promptly. Taking a signal pistol, the controller aimed in the direction of the Light and gave intermittent signals in green, yellow and red. Just at that moment, the UFO began to change color from amber to intense green, then back to its original white. Then it darted up and disappeared in the darkness of the night. This startled the controller even more, and he decided to phone the pilot who was already in the canteen. He told the pilot he was surprised by his indifference about the strange phenomenon, and his avoidance of a closer investigation. The officer replied that he didn’t want to get closer to the UFO, but on the contrary he wanted to escape from the aerial object which had followed his plane for almost an hour from the vicinity of Pico do Couto.

“Twenty minutes later the officer asked the controller for permission to take off without any lights on his medium bomber, to avoid pursuit by the UFO. The B-26 was heavily armed and carried a crew of five.” (48)3

Reference 48 is the UFO-Critical Bulletin. Vol. Ill, #4. July-August 1959. pp.7-8. J. Escobar Faria, the NICAP advisor in the UFO evidence document, was editor for this newsletter. Therefore, this description of the event in Gross’ history is from the same source as found in the NICAP document with additional details clarifying what transpired.

There was no project Blue Book file on this incident.

Analysis

My usual rule of thumb in these types of cases involving an apparently stationary light at night is to check for an astronomical solution. I was not disappointed to see that the planet Venus was setting in the west at the time and date in question. At 2025 (2325 UTC), the Planet Venus at magnitude -4.6 was at azimuth 281 degrees and 3.5 degrees elevation. It set at 2045 LT (2345 UTC) at azimuth 279 degrees.

In the stories about the case, the witnesses never mention comparing the object to Venus or stating that the object was there in addition to Venus. In the Best Evidence account, the pilot had stated it had followed him for about an hour while he was flying from Pico Do Couto. This was about 200 miles to the south of the airport. Since a B-26 had a cruise speed of around 200 mph4, this implies that the pilot had seen it through most, if not all, of his flight. Stating it followed him, could easily be interpreted that it was in the same position as he flew north. In the case of Venus, it would have been off his port side.