The Aztec Crashed Saucer Hoax (1948)
In 1949, journalist Frank Scully claimed in his columns, then in a bestselling 1950 book, that a 30-meter-wide flying craft had crashed in March 1948 near Aztec, New Mexico, and that the military had recovered the wreckage along with sixteen alien bodies. The story, marketed as "the other Roswell," caused an enormous media stir at the time.
Witnesses
no verified witnesses
Why it endures
Included here precisely as a textbook case: one of the most influential and enduring UFO hoaxes in history, revealing the disinformation mechanisms that have shaped the phenomenon's popular culture.
Official version (contested)
The story was exposed as early as 1952: its authors, Silas Newton and Leo GeBauer, were con men seeking to sell fake alien technology. Aztec residents have always unanimously denied that any such event took place.