[chris]

This is a NASA audio excerpt from Apollo 17 on December 7, 1972, during the flight to the Moon through cislunar space. Commander Gene Cernan, Lunar Module Pilot Harrison Schmitt, and Command Module Pilot Ronald Evans are on the recording.

They describe small bright particles or fragments outside the Apollo spacecraft, with jagged and angular shapes, drifting near the spacecraft and the separated Saturn S-IVB stage. The crew speculate that paint chips or ice chips are the likely source of the lights, and note that they twinkle and move away from the S-IVB stage.

From the recording, at 0:00:

Very bright. Particles or fragments or something that Drifting by as I do understand. Yeah, there's a whole bunch of big ones on my window that are just bright. Looks like the 4th of July out Ron's window. Yeah, and now you can see some of them in shape. They're very, uh, jagged, angular, uh, fragments, and they're tumbling.

Declassified by the Department of War under the PURSUE UAP records release (tranche of 5/22/26).
Agency: NASA
Incident: 12/7/72, Cislunar Space
Document ID: NASA-UAP-D009
Recording length: 4 minutes 36 seconds.
Photograph: NASA, Apollo 17 prime crew portrait, 1971-09-30 (NASA ID S72-50438).