UFO Sightings in Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania's signature UAP event is the December 9, 1965 Kecksburg incident — one of the best-documented modern civilian-witness UFO cases in U.S. history. On the evening of December 9, hundreds of witnesses across six U.S. states and Ontario observed a fireball streak across the sky; in Kecksburg, Westmoreland County, witnesses reported an acorn-shaped metallic object with hieroglyphic-style markings around its base resting in a wooded ravine. The U.S. Army cordoned off the site for several hours, and townspeople reported a flatbed truck departing the area carrying a covered object. The U.S. Air Force officially attributed the event to a meteor or possibly a re-entering Soviet Kosmos 96 probe. PURSUE Release 01 does not contain any incidents geolocated to Pennsylvania. The Kecksburg case has been the subject of multiple FOIA lawsuits, including a 2007 NASA settlement that produced additional records.

“Acorn-shaped object with hieroglyphic markings in a Westmoreland County ravine.”

PURSUE catalog coverage

Pennsylvaniadoes not have any incidents publicly geolocated to it in the PURSUE catalog. The Pentagon's catalog covers 29 named incidents geographically; many “Western United States (undisclosed)” PURSUE entries — including the 2023 “Eye of Sauron” federal-agent encounter and the 2025 ODNI senior-intel-officer helicopter encounter — may include Pennsylvania locations that were redacted to protect facility identity.

Famous historical sightings in Pennsylvania