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The Lonnie Zamora incident was a UFO close encounter of the third kind which occurred on Friday, April 24, 1964, at about 5:50 p.m., on the southern outskirts of Socorro, New Mexico. Several primary witnesses emerged to report stages and aspects of the event, which included the craft's approach, din, conspicuous flame, and physical evidence left behind immediately afterward. It was however Lonnie Zamora, a New Mexico State police officer who was on duty at the time, who came closest to the object and provided the most prolonged and comprehensive account. Some physical trace evidence left behind—burned vegetation and soil, ground landing impressions, and metal scrapings on a broken rock in one of the impressions—was subsequently observed and analyzed by investigators for the military, law enforcement, and civilian UFO groups. The event and its body of evidence is sometimes deemed one of the best documented, yet most perplexing UFO reports. It was immediately investigated by the U.S. Army, U.S. Air Force, and FBI, and received considerable coverage in the mass media. It was one of the cases that helped persuade astronomer J. Allen Hynek, one of the primary investigators for the Air Force, that some UFO reports represented an intriguing mystery. After extensive investigation, the AF's Project Blue Book was unable to come up with a conventional explanation and listed the case as an "unknown". == The sighting == Alone in his patrol car, Sergeant Lonnie Zamora was chasing a speeding car due south of Socorro, New Mexico on April 24, 1964, at about 5:45 p.m., when he "heard a roar and saw a flame in the sky to southwest some distance away — possibly a 1/2 mile or a mile." Thinking a local dynamite shack might have exploded, Zamora broke off the chase and went to investigate. Though Zamora says he did not pay much attention to the flame, that the sun was "to west and did not help vision", and he was wearing green sunglasses over prescription glasses. In interviews with Air Force investigators for Project Blue Book he goes to some lengths to describe the long, narrow, funnel-shaped "bluish orange" flame. He thought there might be some dust at the bottom, and attributed it to the windy day. The weather was "Clear, sunny sky otherwise — just a few clouds scattered over area." He describes the noise as "a roar, not a blast. Not like a jet. Changed from high frequency to low frequency and then stopped. Roar lasted possibly 10 seconds" as he approached on a gravel road. "Saw flame about as long as heard the sound. Flame same color as best I can recall. Sound distinctly from high to low until it disappeared." He explains that his car windows were down. Zamora notes no other possible witnesses except possibly the car in front, which he estimates might have heard the noise but not seen the flame because it would be behind the brow of the hill from their viewpoint. Zamora struggled to get his car up the steep hill. Successful on the third attempt, he noted no further noise. For the next 10–15 seconds he proceeded west, looking for the shack whose precise location he did not recall. It was then that he noticed a shiny object, "to south about 150 to 200 yards", that at first he took to be an "overturned white car ... up on radiator or on trunk", with two people standing close to it, one of whom seemed to notice him with some surprise and gave a start. The shiny object was "like aluminum — it was whitish against the mesa background, but not chrome", and shaped like a letter "O". Having stopped for a couple of seconds, Zamora approached in his car meaning to help. Zamora only caught a brief sight of the two people in white coveralls beside the "car". He recalls nothing special about them. "I don't recall noting any particular shape or possibly any hats, or headgear. These persons appeared normal in shape — but possibly they were small adults or large kids." Zamora drove towards the scene, radioing his dispatcher to say he would be out of his car "checking the car in the arroyo." He stopped his car, got out, and attended to the radio microphone, which he had dropped, then he started to approach the object. According to Zamora, Keeping the object in view he ran behind his car, bumping his leg on the rear fender and dropping his glasses, and continued running northwards away from the object, which was still near the ground. He now gives a more detailed description of the object. "Oval in shape ... smooth — no windows or doors ... Noted red lettering of some type. Insignia was about 2½' high and about 2' wide I guess. Was in middle of object ... Object still like aluminum-white." He also noted that the object was still on the ground when the roar started. Zamora describes how the object took off: Zamora went back to his car and contacted the Sheriff's office by radio: He watched the object fly away, swiftly but silently and without flame: Zamora inspected the area and was soon joined by a colleague, Sergeant Chavez, who did not see the object: Zamora says that he had noticed that the object had what looked like legs: Zamora tries to account for the disappearance of the two people: 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Lonnie Zamora incident」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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