IncidentRoswell Incident (July 1947)
The 509th Composite Bomb Group issued a press release stating it had recovered a 'flying disc' near Roswell, New Mexico, then retracted the statement the same afternoon and identified the debris as a weather balloon.
What's documented
On 8 July 1947 Lt. Walter Haut, the Roswell Army Air Field public information officer, issued a press release on the orders of base commander Col. William Blanchard stating that personnel of the 509th Composite Bomb Group — the only atomic-weapons-capable unit in the world at the time — had recovered a ‘flying disc’ from a ranch near Roswell. Within hours, 8th Air Force commander Brig. Gen. Roger Ramey held a press conference at Fort Worth identifying the debris as a weather balloon. The 1995 USAF report ‘The Roswell Report: Fact vs. Fiction in the New Mexico Desert’ attributed the debris to Project Mogul, a classified high-altitude balloon array for detecting Soviet nuclear tests. The 1997 follow-up report attributed witness reports of ‘bodies’ to crash-test dummies used in 1953–59 high-altitude parachute tests, more than six years after the alleged event.
Notable & intriguing
-
The 509th Composite Bomb Group at Roswell was the only atomic-weapons-capable air unit in the world in July 1947; the press release identifying its personnel as the recovery team was signed off by base commander Col. William 'Butch' Blanchard.
Roswell Daily Record, 8 July 1947, p. 1; RAAF press release, retained in 509th unit files
-
The 1994 GAO investigation requested by Rep. Steven Schiff (R-NM) found that all outgoing RAAF administrative messages from October 1946 through December 1949 had been destroyed without authorization.
GAO report GAO/NSIAD-95-187, July 1995, p. 3
-
The 1997 USAF report attributed witness reports of 'small bodies' to crash-test dummies used in high-altitude parachute research at Holloman AFB; the dummies were used in tests beginning in 1953 — six years after the Roswell event.
The Roswell Report: Case Closed, USAF, 1997, Headquarters United States Air Force