Ep.28 The Socorro Sighting

On April 24, 1964, in the dusty desert of Socorro, New Mexico, police officer Lonnie Zamora witnessed something that would shake UFO history. While pursuing a speeding car, he spotted a roaring, flame-spewing object in the sky, landing in a remote gully. Approaching, he saw a gleaming, egg-shaped craft and two small, humanoid figures nearby. Moments later, the craft blasted off, leaving scorched earth and physical evidence. In this episode of Brief Encounters, host Nik unpacks Zamora’s credible, chilling account, the physical traces investigated by Project Blue Book, and why this case remains one of the most compelling UFO sightings on record. Was it a secret military test, a hoax, or an encounter with something beyond Earth? Join us as we revisit this pivotal moment in UFO lore.

Brief Encounters is a tightly produced, narrative podcast that dives headfirst into the world of UFO sightings, the paranormal, cryptids, myths, and unexplained legends. From ancient sky wars to modern close encounters, each episode takes listeners on a journey through some of the most mysterious and compelling cases in human history. Whether it's a well-documented military sighting or an eerie village legend whispered across generations, Brief Encounters delivers each story with atmosphere, depth, and cinematic storytelling. Episodes are short and binge-worthy perfect for curious minds on the go. In just 5 to 10 minutes, listeners are pulled into carefully researched accounts that blend historical context, eyewitness testimony, and chilling details. The series moves between eras and continents, uncovering not only the famous cases you've heard of, but also the forgotten incidents that deserve a closer look. Each story is treated with respect, skepticism, and wonder offering both seasoned enthusiasts and casual listeners something fresh to consider. Whether it’s a 15th-century sky battle over Europe, a cryptid sighting in a remote forest, or a modern-day abduction report from rural America, Brief Encounters is your guide through the shadows of our world and the stories that refuse to be explained.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:11):
The SoCoRo Sighting. On a quiet Friday afternoon in April
nineteen sixty four, in the desert outskirts of a small
New Mexico town, a police officer named Lonnie Zamora witnessed
something he would never be able to explain. What he
saw wasn't just a light in the sky or a
fleeting glimpse of something strange in the distance. He came

(00:32):
face to face with an object that landed on the ground.
He saw it in broad daylight. He saw beings, he
heard sounds, and then it was gone. This was not
the kind of encounter that left room for much imagination.
It wasn't fuzzy. It wasn't seen through binoculars or filtered
through half sleep. It was direct, vivid, and grounded in

(00:54):
the real world, so much so that it would become
one of the most thoroughly investigated UFO sightings in American history.
The Air Force's own Project Blue Book would mark it
as unexplained. This is the story of SoCoRo. This is
Brief Encounters. I'm Nick, and this is episode twenty eight.

(01:15):
The SoCoRo Sighting. April twenty fourth, nineteen sixty four, five
forty five pm. Lonnie Zamora was a patrol officer for
the SoCoRo Police Department. At five forty five pm, he
was pursuing a speeding car near the outskirts of town.
The area was flat, dry and scattered with brush, a

(01:36):
classic desert stretch with a few winding roads, open scrub land,
and distant hills. As he was driving, Zamora suddenly heard
a loud roar and saw a flame in the sky.
It wasn't a typical explosion, and it wasn't coming from
the direction of the car he had been following. The
sound was strange, deep and mechanical, unlike anything he'd heard before.

(02:01):
Zamora stopped the chase and turned his car toward the
source of the noise. He drove up a small hill
and came to a stop at the top. What he
saw next changed the course of his life. In the
arroyo below, less than two hundred feet away was a
white egg shaped craft. It was resting on what appeared

(02:21):
to be four landing legs. It was about the size
of a small car, roughly fifteen to twenty feet long
and maybe ten feet high. It had no windows, no
visible seams, and a strange insignia painted on the side
a red inverted V with a line or bar across
the top. Next to the craft, Zamora saw two figures.

(02:46):
They were small, dressed in white coveralls and standing near
the object as if they were examining or repairing it.
At first he thought they might be children or possibly
technicians in protective suits, but the presence, combined with the
strange craft, instantly put him on edge. He radioed the

(03:06):
dispatcher to report a possible aircraft crash, then moved closer
on foot to get a better look. As he approached,
one of the beings turned and seemed to notice him.
Almost immediately, the figures disappeared behind the object, and within
seconds the craft emitted a loud, high pitched sound. Then

(03:27):
it lifted off the ground. Zamora described a sound as
almost deafening. It wasn't a wind, and it wasn't like
a jet. It was a shrill, rising roar that shook
his chest. The craft began to rise slowly on a
column of flame and dust. There were no visible engines,
no rotors, no wings, and no propellers. The entire object

(03:51):
lifted straight up into the air without tilting or shifting.
Once it was about twenty to thirty feet off the ground.
The flame and noise suddenly stopped. Then the object moved
silently away, speeding off into the distance in a straight line.
The entire encounter had lasted just two minutes, maybe free

(04:13):
at most, but for Zamora it felt much longer. He
was stunned. Whatever it was, it wasn't any aircraft he
had ever seen, and as a police officer who had
worked in the area for years, he knew every type
of plane, helicopter, and weather balloon used in that region.
This was different. It didn't match anything in the local inventory,

(04:36):
and it had landed with legs and visible contact with
the earth. Zamora called for backup, and other officers soon
arrived at the scene. Among them was Sergeant Sam Chavez,
who found Zamora visibly shaken but coherent. Zamora pointed out
the location and they began inspecting the site. There in

(04:56):
the dirt were impressions from the craft's landing, four clear
depressions forming a rectangle spaced exactly as Zamora had described.
The brush underneath the craft was scorched, small rocks were
blackened and cracked. The soil itself was baked. There were
no footprints, no tire marks, no signs of hoax equipment

(05:19):
or prank materials. What they found matched Zamora's account in detail.
Within hours, the FBI and the Air Force were notified.
Agents from White Sand's missile range and Kirtland Air Force
Base were brought in, Project blue books sent investigators. Over
the next few days, military and civilian experts combed the site.

(05:42):
Soil samples were taken, photos were snapped, measurements were logged.
The case quickly moved from local curiosity to national level incident.
One detail that stood out was Zamora himself. Investigators noted
that he was a reliable witness. He didn't see seek attention,
he didn't exaggerate, his story never changed. He wasn't interested

(06:06):
in money or fame. In fact, he was embarrassed by
the entire situation and wanted it to go away, but
he never recanted. One of the most intriguing details of
the Soucoro sighting was the symbol Zamora described on the
side of the craft, a red inverted V with a
horizontal bar. This was not a military insignia. It didn't

(06:28):
resemble any known aerospace or testing logo. Investigators took note
of it, but couldn't match it to any existing organization.
Years later, that symbol would show up in a handful
of other reported sightings. In one case, a witness in
France described a very similar emblem on a cigar shaped craft.

(06:50):
In another, a drawing of the SoCoRo symbol appeared in
a letter from a child who claimed to have seen
a landing in Argentina. Whether these were coincident, mental, or
influenced by Zamora's account is impossible to say, but it
added to the mystery. Despite intense investigation, no conventional explanation

(07:10):
ever emerged. The Air Force considered and rejected several possibilities,
a lunar lander test. No such test was scheduled or
authorized near Sikoro at that time, a hoax too elaborate,
with no evidence of human involvement, a weather balloon. The
physical traces left behind made that impossible. Project Blue Book

(07:35):
ultimately labeled the SoCoRo incident unexplained. Zamora's citing became a
benchmark for UFO researchers. It had all the right elements,
a credible witness, physical evidence, multiple investigators, a four government response,
and no clear answer. It was considered a classic close

(07:57):
encounter of the second kind fighting that includes physical evidence
but no direct contact with beings. Still, not everyone agreed.
Some skeptics argued that the craft might have been a
secret military prototype, But if that were true, why land
it in plain sight? Why allow a civilian officer to

(08:19):
witness it so clearly and then never offer a cover
story or plausible explanation. Others suggested it could have been
a misidentified helicopter, but Zamora was familiar with helicopters, and
they don't land on legs or rise straight up on
silent propulsion after lifting off with flame and thunder. There

(08:41):
were also psychological theories stress sunlight illusions, but Zamora had
no history of hallucinations, he was in good health, and
he wasn't alone. Sergeant Chavez and others saw the landing marks,
the scorched earth, the heat damage. Something landed there. That
much was certain. It's easy to reduce a story like

(09:03):
this to the bullet points, date, time, craft symbols. But
what makes the SoCoRo incident stand out isn't just the data.
It's the man. Lonnie Zemora didn't want this attention. He
wasn't a believer a conspiracy theorist or a fame seeker.
After the incident, he became withdrawn. He stopped giving interviews,

(09:26):
he avoided the press, and when asked in later years
if he thought what he saw was extraterrestrial, he always
answered the same way, I don't know what it was.
I just know what I saw. That honesty gave his
story weight. He didn't speculate, he didn't theorize, he didn't
turn his experience into a platform. He simply reported it,

(09:50):
helped with the investigation, and went back to work. He
remained in SoCoRo for years after eventually retiring from the
police department, but he never changed his account, not once.
The Socorro sit in is one of the few UFO
cases where everything lined up, a credible witness and still

(10:10):
no answers. For all our technological advancement, for all the theories
we've explored, we still don't know what Lonnie Zamora saw
that day. But we know he saw it, and maybe
that's enough to keep looking. Next time, on Brief Encounters,
we head to New Hampshire in the fall of nineteen
sixty one, where a couple driving home late at night

(10:32):
found themselves at the center of one of the most
famous abduction cases in history. That's episode twenty nine, the
Betty and Barney Hill abduction,