The Loch Raven UFO History: Loch Raven Reservoir

Last updated on July 4th, 2024 at 09:36 pm

"Loch Raven Reservoir is known for its fishing, trails, and dams. It also has a history of UFO sightings including my own Loch Raven UFO experience in 1996."

Just north of Baltimore, the Loch Raven Reservoir is a popular destination for Maryland residents seeking a place to enjoy the outdoors. The area is popular for fishing, kayaking, and trails.

Designated as a state park area, Loch Raven Reservoir provides the drinking water for Baltimore City and most of Baltimore County. Unbeknownst to most visitors is that the area has also been a hotbed of UFO activity going back to the 1950’s.

The Loch Raven UFO saga begins in 1953 but the most well-documented case happens in 1958. There are additional UFO sightings in 1978, 1983, 2000, and my own sighting in the Spring of 1996. At the time of my own experience, I was unaware of any history of UFOs in the area and didn’t find out about it until years later. Sightings near Loch Raven make up a good portion of the UFO sightings in Maryland.

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The original bridge on Loch Raven Drive built in 1906 and the site of the 1953 & 1958 UFO cases. The bridge was removed and replaced with a safer one in 1988. | Image Credit Bridgehunter.com

I’ll preface the remainder of this article by stating I don’t believe that our planet has been visited by aliens from another world or dimension (at least while humans have lived here). When I use the term, UFO, I mean it in the most literal sense of the acronym: unidentified flying object.

I believe that if aliens from another planet find us, they will be so advanced that they’d view us as nothing more than insects; we would become slaves, a food source, or simply wiped out as they assimilate the resources of the earth. I am not the only one who believes this.

Since neither of those things has happened to us, it’s a safe bet that our little blue planet has yet to be discovered by any advanced life beyond ourselves.

May of 1953: Loch Raven UFO Sighted at Loch Raven Drive Bridge with a Column of Water Beneath It

A MUFON report dated March 17, 2003, is the primary reference to this particular sighting. The witnesses chose to remain anonymous after being interrogated and allegedly threatened by 4 men who claimed to be from Project Blue Book. They claimed that between 7:30 – 8:00 PM while on their way to meet two women for a date their car died leading up to the bridge on Loch Raven Drive. They then saw an orange glowing object about 300 feet away.

Loch Raven Warren Road
Loch Raven Drive Bridge: Location of the 1953 & 1958 UFO Sightings. | Image Credit: Bridgehunter.com

The men claimed that the object was approximately 150 to 200 feet across about 50 to 60 feet tall. The men were shaken and left the vehicle to seek cover in the woods where they observed the object for about 10 minutes.

The object appeared to have a conical column of water below it until it rose and disappeared. The car wouldn’t start back up due to a burned out electrical system and eventually the men, now stranded, were picked up by police and taken to Towson where they filed a police report. Read the full MUFON report.

October of 1958: Egg-Shaped Loch Raven UFO Sighted at Loch Raven Drive Bridge

By far the most documented of the Loch Raven UFO sightings, the 1958 case was investigated directly by Project Blue Book and is still under the status of ‘unknown’.

27-year-old Philip Small & 24-year-old Alvin Cohen were driving home at about 10:30 p.m. on the night of October 26, 1958. As they approached a bridge they saw an egg-shaped craft floating just above it.

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Project Blue Book Summary Card: October 26, 1958

The object floated above the bridge at a height of 100 to 150 feet and emitted a luminescent white light. They slowed their vehicle to get a closer look and when they got about 75 feet from the bridge, their car died completely. Unable the restart the car, the men took cover behind the car and watched the UFO for 30-45 seconds.

The object then flashed a white light, causing the two witnesses to feel heat on their faces. The flash was accompanied by a loud sound, like thunder. The object rose straight up becoming brighter as it did so and within 5-10 seconds was gone. The flash was so bright that the men appeared to be sunburned on their faces.

loch raven ufo report project blue book
Excerpt from the Project Blue Book Report on the 1958 UFO Sighting

After this incident became publicly known, many other individuals living & working in the area came forward with their own stories. Most went unreported (like my own).

1978 & 1983: Ball of Light Rises from the Lake

A bright round light was observed to rise from the lake about 500 feet above the dam. The witness was a local fisherman by the name of Mitchell. He stated that it hovered over the water for a few seconds and then dove back into the lake. A similar account was told by several Baltimore City Water dept. workers in 1983.

January of 2000: Disc-Shaped Object Flies Across the Reservoir

An administrator for the Greater Baltimore Medical Center (GBMC) claimed to have witnessed a disk-shaped object that ‘looked like green fire’ fly across the reservoir while he drove home from work one evening. He didn’t report the incident until May of that same year.

Unlike the sightings in the 1950’s, this Loch Raven UFO occurred at another bridge that crosses the reservoir on Paper Mill Rd. The witness said that there was snow on the ground and this portion of the reservoir was frozen over and also covered with snow which provided excellent lighting conditions to view the object.

He stopped his car and got out, noticing a strong sickening sweet odor that made him sick to his stomach. So sick, in fact, that he said he had trouble keeping food in his stomach. He also claimed that the incident left his eyesight so impaired that he was unable to drive for nearly a month.

The man also suffered from a mysterious illness that left him with joint and back pain. About a year after the incident, he took his own life.

April of 1996: Oval-Shaped Loch Raven UFO Sighted Over the Loch Raven Large Dam

I was a freshmen in college when I had my own Loch Raven UFO sighting. If you’re not familiar with the area, Loch Raven actually has 2 dams. This sighting occurred at the large dam (the small dam is located a bit further downstream). Watch Drone Footage of Loch Raven Reservoir.

I and two college friends (who do not want their identity revealed) were at the dam late on a Friday night. Being stupid 18-year olds, we thought it would be a fun to walk across the top of the dam.

We’d scaled the gate into the service area and made our way to the edge when one of my friends asks, “You guys hear that?” As soon as he spoke, I noticed a subtle humming noise overhead. Immediately my other friend exclaims, “oh shit!” and takes off running back the way we came.

I looked up to see a glowing oval-shaped object hovering over the dam and immediately followed suit. The glow was a bluish color similar to the color of a natural gas flame, maybe a little whiter and it was just sitting in the sky above the dam. I didn’t get a good idea of the height, we were running just to get out of there, but it appeared to be at least as long as the entire dam.

We scaled the gate back out, looked back, and it was gone. The entire event happened in what was probably just 30-40 seconds.

Our initial thought was that we’d tripped some type of motion activated security light. For days we all were expecting the police to show up at our homes to file trespassing charges, but nothing happened.

Every so often we’d talk about it wondering what it really was we saw. Eventually, the whole thing faded into memory and over time, I lost contact with both of those friends. I don’t think any of us really believed it was a security light – Loch Raven Dam didn’t have anything like that at the time. We didn’t have any other rational explanation.

Years later, I was on Google looking for information regarding mountain bike trails at the Loch Raven Reservoir when I stumbled onto the 1958 UFO case. This sparked my interest in the Loch Raven UFO phenomena and had me pouring through my own memory trying to remember as many details of my experience as possible.

My friends who were with me at the time refuse to discuss it; we were, after all, breaking the law.

So What Are The Loch Raven UFOs?

As I stated at the beginning of this article, I don’t believe that our planet has been visited by aliens in spaceships. I believe that in most cases, the people really did see something they couldn’t explain. Lack of an explanation, however, should never be considered a license to create fantastical ideas to fill the knowledge gap.

The Loch Raven Reservoir isn’t far from military installations. We are also finding out over the last few decades that dams actually change the atmospheric composition around them due to decaying vegetation that gets flooded when the dam is built.

I’m confident that my Loch Raven UFO experience was either a military test, some type of rare atmospheric phenomena, or something else that doesn’t include spaceships. Nevertheless, UFO sightings in Maryland aren’t entirely uncommon.

Sharif Jameel is a business owner, IT professional, runner, & musician. His professional certifications include CASP, Sec+, Net+, MCSA, & ITIL and others. He's also the guitar player for the Baltimore-based cover band, Liquifaction.

3 thoughts on “The Loch Raven UFO History: Loch Raven Reservoir”

  1. I was living in Cockeysville Maryland in the 70s. Myself and at least 12-15 friends were sled riding on a large hill that was near Warren Road up hill from the Warren Hil Bridge that crosses Loch Raven. My friends and i saw what appeared to be a very large glowing disc hovering over Loch Raven water shed which we could see from that large hill. We all thought we were seeing things. The disc shape object was i would guess 300-500 feet long and a white/ blue color. It made No sound and was just hovering abd all of the sudden it just dropped down out of site behind the tree line. That area would be located right over the old town of Warren located next to Warren bridge road. One of my friends got very scared and ran to his house to tell his parents and they called Baltimore County police Cockeysville baracks. Well it turns out the Baltimore County police received several calls from other eyewitnesses that night before my friends parents called the police. This would had been i guess 1976-77. I will be 58 years old soon and i will never forget this experience for the rest of my life. Do i believe in UFOs and possible beings from other planets. You bet i do for sure.
    Ken
    Baltimore Maryland

  2. Hmm. As a kid in the early 70’s I witnessed a luminous, slow moving, oval/egg shaped object crossing an azimuth that I only recently determined would have put it directly over the Loch Raven Dam depending upon its distance from me at the time.

    Other people living in our subdivision reporting seeing and hearing strange things in the area and I witnessed another anomalies as well.

    1. You know, one amazing thing about finally speaking up about my experience is the number of folks who come forward having seen something similar. There are a lot of us out there who’ve seen things that have no explanation and never talked about it. Thanks for stopping by and reading it!

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