IncidentLonnie Zamora / Socorro Incident (24 April 1964)

aka Lonnie Zamora / Socorro Incident (24 April 1964)

Socorro, New Mexico police officer Sgt. Lonnie Zamora witnessed an egg-shaped object on the ground with two figures in white coveralls beside it; the landing site preserved four symmetric burn-marked impressions and scorched vegetation.

phenomenologically-open A single police witness, but ground traces documented same-day by the FBI and the Air Force — Blue Book's only unidentified with physical evidence it could not explain. Hynek considered it the best case in the file.

status history (1)

2026-06-09 · unannotated → phenomenologically-open — initial annotation sweep (Epic J.F4)

▸ Deep dive — full timeline, named personnel, sensors, theory-by-theory analysis, and the conventional explanations weighed against the open questions →

Officer Lonnie Zamora's sketch of the egg-shaped craft seen near Socorro, New Mexico, 24 April 1964. Wikipedia Commons · CC BY-SA 3.0 · JMK · 2018

A second view from Zamora's sketches of the Socorro object. Wikipedia Commons · CC BY-SA 3.0 · JMK, and M Thomson · 2018

At approximately 17:45 on 24 April 1964, Sgt. Lonnie Zamora of the Socorro Police Department was pursuing a speeding vehicle south on US 85 when he heard a roar and saw a flame in the sky. He diverted to investigate a possible dynamite shed explosion. He approached a shallow arroyo and saw a shiny, oval craft standing on legs, with two small figures in white coveralls beside it. The figures returned to the craft, which then lifted off with a roar and departed silently to the southwest. FBI Special Agent Arthur Byrnes of the Albuquerque field office arrived within hours; Project Blue Book chief Maj. Hector Quintanilla arrived the next day. The site contained four wedge-shaped depressions, burned greasewood, and a charred juniper. Project Blue Book classified the case as ‘unidentified’ — one of 701 cases in that category at program closure.

Notable & intriguing

Sgt. Lonnie Zamora’s report describes two figures in white coveralls ‘about the size of small adults or large children’ standing beside the craft; he saw them for approximately two seconds before they re-entered the object.

Sgt. Zamora signed statement to Project Blue Book, 28 April 1964; Blue Book case file 8780
Project Blue Book chief Maj. Hector Quintanilla wrote in the official case file: ‘This is the best documented case on record, and still we have been unable, in spite of thorough investigation, to find the vehicle or other stimulus that scared Zamora to the point of panic.’

Maj. Hector Quintanilla, Project Blue Book final report, 1964; declassified 1976
Soil samples from the four wedge-shaped depressions were analyzed at the Air Force Materials Laboratory at Wright-Patterson AFB; no foreign material was identified, but vegetation in the immediate area showed thermal damage inconsistent with ordinary combustion.

AFML analysis report, 12 May 1964; Project Blue Book case file 8780
FBI Special Agent Arthur Byrnes of the Albuquerque field office filed a confirmatory report within 48 hours; J. Allen Hynek, scientific consultant to Blue Book, later named the Socorro case ‘the best Blue Book case of the 1960s.’

FBI Albuquerque field office report, 26 April 1964; J. Allen Hynek, The UFO Experience, 1972, p. 144

Public-record items already documented about this subject. Folklore is labelled. Sources cited where the specificity warrants it.

Suggested watching

UFO Files — UFO Cop (2005) episode

dir. various · History / various · 44m

Reconstruction of Sergeant Lonnie Zamora's April 24 1964 close encounter outside Socorro, New Mexico. The case Hynek considered among his most unexplainable.

primary-source heavy on Zamora's report

Appears in interpretive theories

Extraterrestrial hypothesis — cites as evidence

More — incident