Battle of Los Angeles
Also: Great Los Angeles Air Raid
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The visual record
Illustrations, recordings and archival references — each with its own provenance. A documented source is a starting point for investigation, not a verdict on its explanation.
Los Angeles Times photograph, 25 February 1942
The Los Angeles Times page of 26 February 1942 with its photograph of searchlights converging over the city during the anti-aircraft barrage. The print was heavily retouched before publication; the beams and shell bursts are real, the 'object' at their meeting point is not established.
LA Times. · 1942 ↗Public domainLicence terms ↗Marshall memorandum to Roosevelt, 26 February 1942
Gen. George Marshall's memo to President Roosevelt the day after the barrage, reporting 'unidentified airplanes' and 1,430 rounds fired. Official document · context.
Unknown authorUnknown author · 2012 ↗Public domainLicence terms ↗American Alchemy · 1:57:54
Open the source at the cited time. The episode thumbnail is video packaging, not a photograph of the reported subject.
American Alchemy / Jesse Michels ↗YouTube-hosted preview and player; not relicensedJesse Michels · 0:08:28
Open the source at the cited time. The episode thumbnail is video packaging, not a photograph of the reported subject.
American Alchemy / Jesse Michels ↗YouTube-hosted preview and player; not relicensedIn the early hours of 25 February 1942, coastal batteries fired more than 1,400 anti-aircraft shells at objects reported over Los Angeles; no aircraft were downed and no bombs fell. The Navy Secretary called it a false alarm; the Army said unidentified aircraft may have been present. The corpus recounts it as a UFO flying down the coast.
The event
| Date | |
|---|---|
| Place | 33.9400, -118.2400 approximate · United States |
| Official response | Navy Secretary Frank Knox called it a false alarm on 25 February 1942; the War Department said up to fifteen unidentified aircraft may have been over the city; a 1983 Office of Air Force History account attributed the barrage to a weather balloon and war nerves. |
Reported by
- us army coast artillery military 37th Coast Artillery Brigade gun crews
Investigated by
- office of air force history military
Who spoke about it later
- Harald Malmgren 1:57:54 Presidential Advisor: “I Directly Handled UFO Material” (Ft. Harald Malmgren) ▶ 2025
- Richard Dolan 0:08:28 The Defense Secretary Killed Over UFOs (Ft. Richard Dolan) ▶ 2025
Mentioned in the corpus
Passages this record cites, with the stamp of the block each quote sits in.
Presidential Advisor: “I Directly Handled UFO Material” (Ft. Harald Malmgren) 22 April 2025
The Defense Secretary Killed Over UFOs (Ft. Richard Dolan) 28 June 2025
- 0:08:28 ▶ Jesse Michels
he starts with the Battle of Los Angeles but he he goes through like the really the UK
- 0:08:28 ▶ interview
- 0:08:28 ▶ Jesse Michels
Named in 2 uploads (automatic name matching, 2 mentions)
On the map
Battle of Los Angeles, Battle of Los Angeles searchlight photograph. Open the full map filtered to this record.
Sources on this record
- 1:57:54 Presidential Advisor: “I Directly Handled UFO Material” (Ft. Harald Malmgren) ▶
the Battle of Los Angeles in 1942 where a UFO shows up and like flies down the coast and George Marshall was briefed to that. And so that very interesting. Okay. So you
- 0:08:28 The Defense Secretary Killed Over UFOs (Ft. Richard Dolan) · Jesse Michels ▶
he starts with the Battle of Los Angeles but he he goes through like the really the UK
- Battle of Los Angeles