NASA-UAP-D6: Apollo 17 Technical Crew Debriefing (1973)
Date
January 4, 1973
Document Type
Mission Debriefing
Authentication
VerifiedRedaction Status
✓ Fully ReleasedIssuing Authority
NASA Manned Spacecraft Center - Crew Training and Simulation Division, Houston, Texas
Summary
The Apollo 17 Technical Crew Debriefing (MSC-07631), conducted January 4, 1973 and prepared by the Crew Training and Simulation Division, Manned Spacecraft Center. Originally classified CONFIDENTIAL. Page 24-4 documents three crew members - Commander Eugene Cernan, CMP Ronald Evans, and LMP Harrison Schmitt - reporting anomalous visual phenomena during the mission. Most significantly, Schmitt reports continuous light flashes "just about continuously during the whole flight when we were dark adapted," including one he believed originated on the lunar surface; he notes that these flashes persisted outside the ALFMED (Apollo Light Flash Moving Emulsion Detector) experiment blindfold period, suggesting the phenomenon was not entirely attributable to cosmic ray eye interactions. Declassified under E.O. 13526, Sec 3.3(a), NASA Declassification Guide, Date of Guide: May 2026; declassified May 6, 2026. Released via PURSUE Release 1.
Significance
Contains the most technically specific crew testimony on light flash phenomena from the Apollo 17 mission. Jack Schmitt's account establishes that: (1) light flashes occurred continuously throughout the translunar and lunar orbit phases when dark-adapted; (2) at least one appeared to originate on the lunar surface rather than in the crew's visual cortex; (3) the ALFMED cosmic ray experiment design included blindfold periods during which flashes were suppressed, but Schmitt directly observed flashes resuming outside those periods - a correlation suggesting the flashes were not all attributable to the cosmic ray eye-flash mechanism the experiment was designed to study. Ron Evans' "tunnel" observation during reentry and the overall crew reporting pattern across Apollo 11, 12, and 17 missions established a multi-mission anomalous visual phenomena record that NASA formally designated as UAP-relevant for PURSUE.