What crashed to the ground in July of 1947 near Roswell, New Mexico. It is widely excepted that something did crash. If it was an alien craft as so many people believed at that time, as well as today, could it have been kept a secret for nearly 60 years. Very doubtful. So does that mean we should accept the government's explanation - a weather baloon!

Roswell Crash

Governments keep secrets, yes, and can go to great lengths to protect these secrets. But a secret of that magnitude and for such a long time - unlikely! Or could they be trying to conceal the truth that aliens have landed, albeit crash landed!

The following is a brief chronological summary of the events near Roswell in early July 1947.

Chronology of events

July 2: The crash occurred in the evening, during a thunderstorm.

July 3: William Brazel, foreman of the Foster Ranch, went out to check for any damage caused by the thunderstorm. He found the most famous debris in modern history - the remains of a crashed flying saucer - or was it a ballon. The crash site was spread out over a large area, about half a mile and there appeared to be a trench gouged on the surface.

July 6: Because of the unusual characteristics of the debris, Brazel showed some pieces of the wreckage to the local county sheriff. The sheriff then called Jesse Marcel, the intelligence officer at the Roswell Army Air Field (AAF). Marcel inspected the pieces of the wreckage at the sheriff's office and reported his findings to Colonel William Blanchard, his commanding officer. Colonel Blanchard ordered Marcel to go to the crash site and collect more of the wreckage and deliver it to his office. It was then flown to Washington via Fort Worth Air Force base.

July 7: Marcel and other air force personnel, under orders, collected more wreckage and delivered it to Colonel Blanchard. Marcel at one stage stopped at his home to show his wife and son the strange material he had found.

July 7: Roswell radio station KSWS began transmitting the story of a crashed flying saucer out on the Foster Ranch. But the transmission was interrupted, seemingly by the FBI.

July 8: Marcel arrived back at Roswell AAF with two car-loads of wreckage. Marcel accompanied this wreckage on a flight to Fort Worth AAF.

July 8: Colonel Blanchard ordered Second Lieutenant Walter Haut, a public information officer, at Roswell AAF to issue a press release through Frank Joyce at KGFL radio station, telling the country that the Army had found the remains of a crashed flying saucer.

Roswell Daily Record

July 8: General Clemence McMullen in Washington ordered General Roger Ramey to retract the initial press release and create a cover story to quash the flying saucer story.

July 8: General Roger Ramey held a press conference at Eighth Air Force headquarters in Fort Worth in which he announced that the Intelligence officer and other military personnel had misidentified the debris and that what had crashed was a weather balloon, with a metallic radar reflector attached and not a flying saucer. He said that the earlier press release that day was an error. He showed the press the remains of a damaged weather balloon that he claimed was the actual wreckage from the crash site.

Roswell revived

The Roswell incident remained in obscurity to the general public for about 30 years. Even in UFO circles and literature it rarely got a mention and was quickly forgotton. But it was resurrected in the late 1970s when Jesse Marcel decided to comment publicaly on the strange debris he had seen at Roswell and the strange events surrounding that time. The Roswell story was further revived when the movie 'Close Encounters of the Third Kind' hit the screens in 1977. And in 1980 the famous author, Charles Berlitz, published a book on the subject.

But its difficult to seperate fact from fiction when we look back today and try and understand the events. The truth may never be known. There are so many accounts and versions of the Roswell incident. Peoples memories fade. People lie and decieve for so many different reasons. And this, accompanied by the fact that many of the people involved at the time are either dead or elderly, may mean that the Roswell incident may remain unresolved forever.

So what is the evidence supporting an alien spacecraft. and what is the evidence against this theory?