Hottel Memo

Content of the Memo

The March 22, 1950 memorandum states:

• Three flying saucers had been recovered in New Mexico.
• Each craft was described as circular with a raised center, approximately 50 feet in diameter.
• The craft were occupied by humanoid figures approximately three feet tall, dressed in metallic suits.
• According to a source identified as "Mr. Carl Howe," the discs were found in New Mexico because high-powered radar in the area interfered with the craft's control mechanisms, causing them to crash.

The memo does not specify the exact location of the recoveries, the date they occurred, or the identity of the Air Force investigator who provided the information. Hottel transmitted the information as received but did not conduct an independent investigation or verify the claims.

Source and Chain of Custody

The information in the Hottel Memo originated with an Air Force investigator, believed to be affiliated with the Air Force Technical Intelligence Center (ATIC). The investigator relayed the claims to Hottel, who in turn transmitted them to FBI headquarters. The ultimate source was Carl Howe, about whom little is known and whose credibility has never been independently established.

Historical Context

The memo was written in March 1950, approximately three years after the July 1947 Roswell crash and two years after the alleged 1948 Aztec, New Mexico Crash. Its timing places it in the midst of heightened US government interest in UFOs, during the period when Project Grudge (the Air Force's second official UFO investigation) was active and when Wilbert B. Smith was meeting with Robert Sarbacher in Washington to discuss the classification level of flying saucer programs.

The reference to three recovered saucers has led to speculation about whether the memo describes:

• The Roswell crash and two other separate incidents.
• The Aztec crash and related contemporaneous events.
• A fabricated or conflated account with no basis in actual recoveries.

Radar Interference Theory

The memo's claim that high-powered radar caused the crashes by disrupting control mechanisms became a recurring theme in early UFO literature. Frank Scully's 1950 book Behind the Flying Saucers advanced a similar theory, and Robert Sarbacher told Wilbert B. Smith that Scully's book was "fundamentally correct." The proximity of radar installations at White Sands Missile Range, Holloman Air Force Base, and other New Mexico sites lent surface plausibility to the theory, though no technical documentation confirming radar as a causal factor has been publicly released.

Release and Public Impact

The Hottel Memo was declassified and released through Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests. It later became accessible via the FBI's online public vault and gained widespread attention as internet access expanded public awareness of declassified UFO documents. According to the FBI, the Hottel Memo became the most-viewed document in the vault, driven by its explicit reference to recovered flying saucers and humanoid occupants.

The FBI has publicly stated that the memo is a single piece of correspondence relaying unverified information and that no follow-up investigation by the Bureau is known to have occurred.

Assessment

The Hottel Memo is significant not because it provides proof of UFO recoveries, but because it documents that such claims reached the desk of the FBI Director in 1950 through official channels. Whether the information Guy Hottel transmitted was accurate, fabricated, or based on misidentification remains unresolved. The memo stands as evidence that UFO crash retrieval claims were circulating at the highest levels of US law enforcement during a period when multiple government insiders — including Robert Sarbacher and Eric Walker — later confirmed that such programs existed.

Sources

• Video - Dr. Robert Sarbacher & the US Government's Secret UFO Crash Retrieval Group