Saucer Sighted on Cuauhtémoc Highway, Reports Social Security Man by Long Distance

CHIHUAHUA, MEXICO — A flying saucer visited the state of Chihuahua on the night of August 14, 1973, or so a family man told the Heraldo de la Tarde. The paper's account, dated August 15, is reproduced in the book UFOs Over Mexico by Santiago García and republished by the blog Inexplicata with a new translation.

The witness is named as Rogelio Yapor González, a Social Security employee in Ciudad Cuauhtémoc. According to the report, he was travelling with his family toward that city when he saw a luminous object roughly 50 meters across, hovering quite close to the ground. He telephoned the newsroom long-distance to describe it.

Mr. Yapor says the object now and then slipped behind the clouds, then descended again at the speed of a jet. By his account, the display lasted 45 minutes. He watched from the Mirador, a lookout about 35 kilometers from the capital, and followed it for a further 40 kilometers along the road, driving slowly so the family could admire the spectacle.

The finale, in the witness's words, came when the saucer sped toward the mountains "at breakneck speed" until it looked like a mere star-like point and vanished.

The reporter, for his part, kept an open but cautious mind. He admits that colleagues in the newsroom laughed at the news, and argues that the age of the seventh decade of the century calls for taking seriously what ancestors dismissed as legend. He also wonders aloud whether anyone would place a long-distance call to a newspaper merely to share such details, and notes that Mr. Yapor did not give his name until asked. The article offers no explanation for what was seen.