The Maury Island Washington UFO Sighting - UFO Appeared To Be Releasing Debris

Location, Maury Island, Washington
Date: June 21 1947 Time: 1400

Harbor patrolman, Harold Dahl, his teenage son Charles, his dog, and two other crew members were patrolling the East Bay area close to the shore. This day the sea was rather rough and there were numerous low hanging clouds. As Dahl looked up from the wheel on his boat he noticed six very large doughnut shaped aircraft. They were about 2000 feet from the water and almost directly overhead. At first glance he thought they were balloons as they seemed to be stationary. However upon further observance, five of these strange aircraft were circling very slowly around the sixth one which was stationary in the center of the formation. It appeared to Dahl that the center aircraft was in some kind of trouble as it was losing altitude fairly rapidly. The other aircraft stayed at a distance of about two hundred feet above the center one as if they were following the center one down. The center aircraft came to rest almost directly overhead at about five hundred feet above the water. All onboard the boat were watching these aircraft with a great deal of interest as they apparently had no motors, propellers or any visible sings of propulsion, and to the best of their hearing, they made no sound. In describing the objects Dahl estimated that they were at least 100ft in diameter. Each had a hole in the center, approximately 25ft in diameter. They were all a sort shell-like gold and silver color. Their surface seemed of metal and appeared to be burled because when the light shone on them through the clouds they were brilliant; not all one brilliance, but many brilliance’s something like a Buick dashboard. All of the aircraft seemed to have large portholes equally spaced around the outside of their doughnut exterior. These portholes were from five to six feet in diameter and were round. They also appeared to have dark, circular, continuous window on the inside and bottom of their doughnut shape as though it were an observation window. All onboard the boat were afraid that the center object would crash into the bay. This center object remained stationary at about 500 feet from the water while the other five objects kept circling over it. After about five or six minute’s one of the aircraft from the circling formation left its place in the formation and lowered itself down right next to the stationary aircraft. In fact it appeared to touch it and stayed stationary next to the center aircraft as if were giving some kind of assistance for about 3 or four minutes. It was then that they heard a dull thud, like an underground explosion or a thud similar to a man stamping his heel on damp ground.
Immediately following the sound the center aircraft began spewing forth what seemed like thousands of newspapers from somewhere on the inside of its center. These “newspapers” which turned out to be a white type of very light metal, fluttered to earth, most of them alighting in the bay, and then it seemed to hail on the witnesses, in the bay and over the beach, black or darker type of metal which looked similar to lava rock. They assumed that this metal was also coming from the craft. However since these fragments were of a darker color, they did not observe them until they started hitting the beach and the bay. All of these latter fragments seemed hot, almost molten. When they hit the bay, steam rose from the water. They ran for shelter under a cliff on the beach and behind logs to protect themselves from the falling debris. In spite of their protection, Dahl’s son was injured on the arm and the dog was hit and killed. They buried the dog at sea on their return to Tacoma. After this rain of metal seemed over, all of these strange aircraft lifted slowly and drifted out to the westward, which was out to sea. They rose and disappeared at a tremendous height. The center aircraft which had spewed the debris did not seem to be hindered in its flight and still remained in the center of the formation as they all rose and disappeared out to sea. The men attempted to pick up several pieces of the metal or fragments but found them very hot, but after some of them had cooled they loaded a considerable number of the pieces aboard the boat. They also picked up some of the metal which had looked like falling newspapers. Curious events followed this encounter. The next day, early in the morning, Dahl was visited and interrogated by a stranger who was driving a black Buick car to his house. Dressed in a dark suit, was around 40 years old and Harold Dahl described him as “an insurance agent”. Dahl got out his own car and drove downtown—with the stranger following him. Over breakfast in a hotel, Dahl was asked some curious personal questions: Stranger “Are you happy at your job, and in your family?” Dahl: “What the blazes are you getting at?” Then the stranger proceeded to tell Dahl of the events that occurred on Maury Island the day before.
“Mr. Dahl, said the stranger still smiling, “you have better forget what you have seen, and stop talking. Silence is the best thing for you and your family. You have seen what you ought not to have seen!” The stranger then abruptly got up and left the hotel.

HC addendum
Source: “Maury Island Incident” UFO Area Type: H or E?
Comments: Dahl was later questioned by two Air Force intelligence officers, Frank Brown and William Davidson; when they set off by air to return to their base, the plane crashed and they were killed. Two days later Kenneth Arnold, who had also investigated the affair, was flying home when his engine cut out and he was forced to crash-land. It has become common for writers to say that Dahl admitted that they story was a hoax, but an August 1947 teletype from the Seattle FBI Special Agent George Wilson to J. Edgar Hoover stated that: “Please be advised that Dahl did not admit to Brown that his story was a hoax but only stated that if questioned by authorities he was going to say it was a hoax because he did not want any further trouble over the matter.”