Highway 17 sighting near White Sands, New Mexico
29 June 1947 · Highway 17, White Sands, New Mexico
Summary
Four employees and a spouse of the Naval Research Laboratory's Rocket Sonde Section were driving northeast on Highway 17 from Las Cruces toward the White Sands V-2 firing grounds on Sunday, 29 June 1947, between 1:00 and 1:30 p.m. A Naval Research Laboratory interview report dated 18 July 1947 names them as C. H. Zohn, J. R. Kauke, C. C. Rockwood and Mrs. Nancy Rockwood. Kauke was driving and called the object to the attention of the others.
The report records that the object moved horizontally north across the highway, from right to left, and that all occupants saw it. Zohn estimated its altitude at about 10,000 feet, and Kauke put it at 8,000 to 10,000 feet. Zohn gave the shape as uniform, with no protuberances such as wings. He saw some solar specular reflection that changed in intensity, and he said the object was lost from sight after an estimated 30 seconds. He suggested the reflection angle may have changed abruptly. Kauke thought he saw vapor trails at one point.
The press reported Zohn's account first. The Washington Post of 8 July 1947 quoted him describing a bright, silvery disc at 10,000 feet: "It was clearly visible—and then it wasn't there." The Army Air Forces asked the Naval Research Laboratory's liaison office to interview him. Major William P. Mellen's report states that Dr. H. E. Newell said Zohn had recently been in the Navy and knew most aircraft types and meteorological balloons. Zohn said no one in the car was intoxicated.
The Air Force later logged the event as Incident #90 on a check-list form. It records one object, 30 seconds in sight and no sketches or photographs. A second copy of the same form carries identical entries. The 1948 Air Intelligence Division Study No. 203 listed the sighting among its selected reports. It describes a party of three, two of them scientists, seeing a large disk or sphere in sight for about 60 seconds. The 1949 edition of the study repeats that wording. None of the documents gives an identification for the object.
Where the files disagree
Two documents give different accounts of the same detail. Both are quoted as written; we don't say which is right.
Length of the sighting
“There was apparently some solar specular reflection which seemed to change in intensity as the object receded until it was lost from sight after an estimated 30 seconds from the time first noticed.” page 106 →
“The object was in sight for about 60 seconds before it disappeared to the northeast.” page 21 →
What the files say
“There was apparently some solar specular reflection which seemed to change in intensity as the object receded until it was lost from sight after an estimated 30 seconds from the time first noticed.”
Page 106 →“It was clearly visible—and then it wasn't there.”
Page 112 →“Altitude between 8,000 and 10,000 ft (Mr. Zohn put little credence in the estimates)”
Page 234 →“The object was in sight for about 60 seconds before it disappeared to the northeast.”
Page 21 →
Explanations in the record
What the documents themselves say the event was, as recorded. Not our assessment.
- Zohn suggested the object may have vanished because the angle of solar reflection changed abruptly. — FBI file on 1947 flying saucer wave, Arnold sighting, page 106