This incident is not listed among the
original BB Unknowns, but has been included in the updated list by Brad
Sparks, the Comprehensive Catalog of Project Blue Unknowns.
June 29, 1947. About 20 [15?]
miles ENE of Las Cruces, New Mexico (at 32.4° N, 106.5° W).
About 1:15 [1:20?] p.m. USN Naval Research Lab (NRL) rocket
scientist-engineer Dr. Carl J. Zohn, Admin Asst., Rocket Sonde Section,
White Sands Proving Ground (WSPG), NRL scientist Curtis C. Rockwood and
his wife, and WSPG technician John R. Kauke, were driving in a car from
Las Cruces to WSPG headed NE when they saw to their right front [E] a
rotating silvery or shiny disc or sphere with no appendages, wings,
tail, propellers, reflecting sunlight [pulsating?], crossing the sky at
high speed heading N at about 8,000-10,000 ft which suddenly
disappeared in mid-air in a clear cloudless sky. Kauke had stopped the
car and briefly saw a short vapor trail at one point not reported by
the others. Zohn on the passenger side rolled the window for an
unobstructed view.
(FOIA; cf. Ruppelt, p. 20;
FUFOR
Index; Randle-Schmitt; Bloecher 1967;
etc.)
