Socorro UFO Incident — The Pursuit and Initial Sighting

Socorro UFO Incident — The Pursuit and Initial Sighting

The Speeder Pursuit

At approximately 5:45 PM on Friday, April 24, 1964, Socorro Police Sergeant Lonnie Zamora was on routine patrol in the outskirts of town when he noticed a vehicle traveling at speed in a southerly direction on U.S. Highway 85. Zamora gave chase in his patrol car, heading south from the downtown area.

As he pursued the speeder south of town, Zamora heard a loud roar from his left — to the southwest — and simultaneously observed a blue-orange flame in the sky in that direction. His immediate interpretation was that a dynamite shack near an abandoned mine in the area had exploded.

Zamora broke off the speeder pursuit and turned his patrol car southwest toward the source of the roar and flame, following a rutted gravel road that ran toward the arroyo area. The road was rough, requiring careful navigation. He drove along the mesa road, stopping briefly when the terrain required.

Initial Visual Contact

As Zamora crested the mesa road and looked down into the arroyo below, he observed at a distance of approximately 150 to 200 yards what he initially took to be an overturned white car in the arroyo, with two figures standing beside it who appeared to be dressed in white.'

His first impression was that two people — possibly teenagers — had been in a vehicle accident and needed assistance. This prosaic initial interpretation is significant: it establishes that Zamora's first cognitive response was a mundane explanation, not a UFO hypothesis.

Approach and Closer Observation

As Zamora drove and then walked toward the object, his interpretation changed rapidly:

• From a distance, he had taken the figures for adults; closer, they appeared smaller than average — not quite full adult size
• The "car" was not a car. It was shaped wrong — oval or egg-shaped, not rectangular
• It appeared to rest on angular leg-like structures rather than wheels
• As he approached to within approximately 100 yards, one of the figures appeared to notice him and both seemed startled

The First Roar

At this point — before Zamora had gotten close enough to examine the object in detail — a sudden loud roar erupted from the vicinity of the object, accompanied by a blue-orange flame shooting from the underside of the craft.

Zamora, believing the object might be about to explode, dropped to the ground, lost his glasses in the fall, then got up and ran back toward his patrol car. He ducked behind the car's engine block for protection, expecting an explosion.

No explosion followed. Instead, the roar subsided to a whirring, and when Zamora looked back, the object was rising from the arroyo floor.

Radio Contact with Dispatcher

Recovering his composure, Zamora got back to his patrol car radio and contacted dispatcher Nep Lopez, asking him to look out the window to see if the object was visible from the police station. Lopez reported he could not see it. Zamora was clearly agitated in this radio exchange, which Lopez later described as genuine distress — not the tone of a man reporting a routine incident.