CONGRATULATIONS pjhunters AND 57Doc on being the First To Find this Virtual geocache!!!
Following a supersonic test flight in 1972, a Viking space probe awaits recovery at White Sands Missle Range, New Mexico
***PLEASE NOTE***
1. To fulfill the requirements of this Virtual Cache, you will need something to write with, something to write on, and your phone's camera.
2. This site, known as the "Mac Brazel UFO crash site," belongs to the New Mexico Bureau of Land Management (BLM), and it was opened to the public on Thursday, July 5, 2018 after being closed off for 71 years. Updated 2/1/2025 (many thanks to local geocachers, and FTFers, pjhunters and 57 Doc for the updated info): The BLM has created parking here at: N 33° 57.245 W 105° 19.896, and they are in the planning stages of creating a trail to the site. Orange flags mark the proposed trail. It is approximately a 1-mile walk from parking to the crash site.
***Please note the locked gate at these coordinates: N 33° 57.484 W 105° 19.924 is on private land, and visitors MAY NO LONGER access the site from this point. Heed the No Trespassing signs here!***
Welcome to one of the most sought-after locations in New Mexico! After a summer storm pummeled the state in July of 1947, rumors of flying saucer sightings in the area were swirling. At this location, rancher W.W. "Mac" Brazel discovered strange wreckage of debris consisting of rubber strips, "tinfoil, paper, tape, and sticks." The findings, explained the first investigator on the scene, were "not of this Earth."
According to reports, Air Force officials initially identified the object as a flying saucer; however, they later retracted that statement, saying it was actually a weather balloon. Brazel told newspaper reporters, "I am sure that what I found was not any weather observation balloon." Major Jesse Marcel, who was stationed at the nearby Roswell Army Air Field, was one of those tasked with returning with Brazel back to his ranch and gathering the materials. Interviewed later in a press conference in Fort Worth, TX, Marcel described the wreckage as "parts of a weather device" composed of "tinfoil and broken wooden beams."
However, in interviews in the late 1970s and 80s, Marcel stated that the "weather balloon" explanation from the press conference was a cover story and that he now believed the debris to be extraterrestrial. On September 20, 1980 the TV series In Search of..., hosted by Star Trek actor Leonard Nimoy, aired an interview in which Marcel described his participation in the 1947 press conference:
They wanted some comments from me, but I wasn't at liberty to do that. So, all I could do is keep my mouth shut. And General Ramey is the one who discussed – told the newspapers, I mean the newsman – what it was, and to forget about it. It is nothing more than a weather observation balloon. Of course, we both knew differently.
Though home to fewer than 25,000 people, Roswell suddenly found itself on the map. In the years following the incident, some locals established hotels and museums, founding a tourism industry devoted to the event.
Decades later, a declassified report finally revealed that the "flying disk" was actually malfunctioned spyware built to eavesdrop on Soviet nuclear testing sites. This is the Air Force's current posting for "The Roswell Report" on their website:
In July 1994, the Office of the Secretary of the Air Force concluded an exhaustive search for records in response to a General Accounting Office (GAO) inquiry of an event popularly known as the "Roswell Incident." The focus of the GAO probe, initiated at the request of a member of Congress, was to determine if the U.S. Air Force, or any other U.S. government agency, possessed information on the alleged crash and recovery of an extraterrestrial vehicle and its alien occupants near Roswell, N.M. in July 1947.
The 1994 Air Force report concluded that the predecessor to the U.S. Air Force, the U.S. Army Air Forces, recovered debris from an Army Air Forces balloon-borne research project code named MOGUL. Records located describing research carried out under the MOGUL project, most of which were never classified (and publicly available) were collected, provided to GAO, and published in one volume for ease of access for the general public.
The aeroshell of a NASA Voyager-Mars space probe just prior to launch
This report discusses the results of this exhaustive research and identifies the likely sources of the claims of "alien bodies" at Roswell. Contrary to allegations, many of the accounts appear to be descriptions of unclassified and widely publicized Air Force scientific achievements. Other descriptions of "bodies" appear to be actual incidents in which Air Force members were killed or injured in the line of duty.
The conclusions are
Air Force activities which occurred over a period of many years have been consolidated and are now represented to have occurred in two or three days in July 1947.
"Aliens" observed in the New Mexico desert were actually anthropomorphic test dummies that were carried aloft by U.S. Air Force high altitude balloons for scientific research.
Alderson Laboratories anthropomorphic dummies of the type dropped from balloons
The "unusual" military activities in the New Mexico desert were high altitude research balloon launch and recovery operations. Reports of military units that always seemed to arrive shortly after the crash of a flying saucer to retrieve the saucer and "crew," were actually accurate descriptions of Air Force personnel engaged in anthropomorphic dummy recovery operations.
Claims of "alien bodies" at the Roswell Army Air Field hospital were most likely a combination of two separate incidents:
Executive Summary
1. ) a 1956 KC-97 aircraft accident in which 11 Air Force members lost their lives; and,
2. ) a 1959 manned balloon mishap in which two Air Force pilots were injured.
This report is based on thoroughly documented research supported by official records, technical reports, film footage, photographs, and interviews with individuals who were involved in these events.
But some remain unconvinced. For a time, a stone marker commemorating the event (possibly placed in cooperation with The History Channel) was placed on the southwest corner of the site, but it has since been removed. You can still make out the spot on which the marker was placed.
What happened at this location in the summer of 1947? Maybe your visit will provide you, and others, with the answer!
***To Qualify For This Virtual Find***
1. Stand at the posted coordinates for Ground Zero of this geocache, in the middle of this circular geographic feature.
2. Create a "sign" on a piece of paper, cardboard, fabric, etc., write your geocaching name and the date you visited this site.
3. Take a picture of this sign, and any other possessions and/or (decent) body parts of yourself that you wish, facing the southwest wall of the site--so, facing the fallen rock cairn, former site of the stone marker, location of the current physical geocache (as of January 13, 2025)--and post it with your FOUND log.
4. OPTIONAL: In your log--it doesn't have to be long--state what you think happened that summer night in New Mexico in 1947: Aliens? Weather balloon? Failed military experiment? Egyptian time travelers?
Electronic Found Logs without picture attached within a week of your logged visit will be deleted.
THANK YOU FOR VISITING! FEEL FREE TO CRASH HERE, AGAIN, ANYTIME!!!
Virtual Rewards 4.0 - 2024-2025
This Virtual Cache is part of a limited release of Virtuals created between January 17, 2024 and January 17, 2025. Only 4,000 cache owners were given the opportunity to hide a Virtual Cache. Learn more about Virtual Rewards 4.0 on the Geocaching Blog.