Spécialement pour le New York Times.
Unidentified Object, on Radar, Flew at 1,500 M.P.H.
PARIS, Feb. 19 (AP) ? Aviation circles were speculating today on the identity of a strange object, alternately hovering and flying at speeds in excess of 1,500 miles an hour, picked up Friday night by radar operators at Orly International Airport.
The object made a "blip" on the radar screen approximately twice as large as that of the average airliner, according to technicians. It apparead to be at an altitude of about 5,000 feet and was seen to follow aircraft taking off or coming in for a landing at Orly.
A radio beacon station soutwest of Paris also reported the object but neither the radar at Le Bourget Airport nor the Paris Observatory reported contact. A spokesman at the observatory suggested that it might have been a United States weather ballon launched in Germany and blown west by the "jet stream" air currents.