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This 217-page Project Blue Book desk file on the 24 April 1964 Socorro, New Mexico sighting by policeman Lonnie Zamora comes from the Rob Mercer collection. It contains the Blue Book record card, which carries the case as unidentified pending more data, along with Foreign Technology Division messages and resumes and a narrative of the sighting. It also holds inquiries about lunar modules, helicopters and VTOL craft, soil and radiation findings, and a letter by J. Allen Hynek rejecting Donald Menzel's hoax hypothesis.
“Hill”20 pages
Nrtuttrlt turning :Nrnt.u NEWAR K, N. J. 0. 278,945 SU N. 417,195 MAY 6 1964 . ~~ Ne,vSights Of Saucers;5ti? Strang~ Objects Seen . by S'everal Persons i in New Mexico I I . ALBUQUERQUE. N.M. (UPI) ' -In New Mexico, first test site of the atomic bomb and now a space-age military bastion. citi· zens in the last two weeks say they have seen, shot at and n m from "flying saucers" in shapes from bananas to bathtubs. The unidentified Flying Oh· ject craze is a periodic epidemic i.A the state. The latest flur ry of reports started April 24 when a Rio Grande Valley policeman said he saw a bathtub-sharwd object standing on four girder- . like legs at dusk. 1 '-''hen it flew away. SocGno.! N.M., policeman J!>nnie Zamora I said he ran from 1t. 1 Since then, reports of strange objects have · gained - speed '\ throughout New Mexico, . Wyo- ming and into Montana m the , high Rockies \ Some Explanations '11le Air Force sent its top fly- \ 1ng saucer chaser to New Mex- . ico and there have been many I IICi.entific and military expla~~- , tions for the sightings, but Clti· ' zens keep looking. .. · One scientist said a "Super- 1 Pogo'' military . craft may ~e · causing the scare. The ~1.1' 1 Force said low-flying jets takmg l pictures with bright strobe-lights might be the answer. . 1 The scientist, Dr. Lmcoln La-' paz, Institute of .Meteoritics , d i~ 1 rector at the Uruverstty of Ne'' Mexico, said there is no danger of outer-space invasion because .. "anvonE> livirig outside this t.rou-' bled giobe would be displaymg absolute nonsense tO come here." I Dr. J. Allen Hynek, head of the astronomy department at Northwestern university and the I Air Force's top consultant on unidentified fl ying objects, came i· to the state to investigate but soon left, saying h~ believes ra-1dar would have ptcked up any- 1thing that human eyes saw. Plenty or Radar I ."It is my understanding that New Mexico has more than its 1 share of radar installations," Dr. ! Hynek said. "It seems strange to me that radar did not pick up anydting." White Sands Missile Range, Holloman Air Force Base and Kirtland Air Force Base are among the many military instal- , lations in New Mexico with elab- . orate radar gear. . ~- Zamora started it all when he said he saw the shiny, bathtub- shaped object in a field at So-1 1 corro, about 50 miles from where the first atomic homo was ex- 1 ploded at White Sands. IWhen he approached it, he said it flew away. Air Force ! Mficials confirmed that grass · and bushes around the area were 1 burned and that there were four indentations in the ground. Dr. Hynek took soil samples to be analyzed. Peculiar Aircraft Lapaz•said he believes Zamora saw a vertical short-takeoff and landing aircraft. He said the craft behaves much like the ob- ject Zamora said he saw. Lapaz said he saw a picture of the craft in the March issue of the U.S. Naval Institute pro- ceedings. He said the picture is several years old and that some military agency probably is secretly test- ing a "Super-Pogo" type craft with different markings. "The newer models probably are highly classified," Lapaz 1 said.Rob Mercer
Document, cited by the archive. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. 217 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.