The Roswell Incident: What Happened in New Mexico?

In July 1947, rancher W.W. "Mac" Brazel discovered unusual debris scattered across his property near Roswell Army Air Field, New Mexico. The U.S. Army Air Forces initially issued a press release stating they had recovered a "flying disc." Within days, they retracted this, claiming the debris was from a weather balloon—a explanation that stood for decades.

In the 1970s and 80s, ufologists reignited interest, alleging a cover-up of an extraterrestrial spacecraft crash and recovery of alien bodies. The controversy peaked in the 1990s.

The U.S. Air Force eventually released two major reports (1994, 1997) concluding the debris was from Project Mogul, a top-secret program using high-altitude balloons to detect Soviet nuclear tests. The "alien bodies" were attributed to anthropomorphic test dummies dropped in later high-altitude parachute tests (1950s), conflated in witnesses' memories over time.

While the Mogul explanation is widely accepted by historians and scientists, the Roswell incident remains a cultural touchstone for UFO lore and government conspiracy theories.