Declassified UAP

NASA-UAP-D010

Mercury Atlas 9 Audio Excerpt, May 15, 1963

Agency
NASA
Format
Audio
Incident date
5/15/63
Released
Release 02, May 22, 2026
Source
DVIDS
Topics
Spaceflight, Military aircrew, Debriefings & transcripts

Description from war.gov

Approximately one hour and 41 minutes into the final and longest flight of Project Mercury, Mercury-Atlas 9 mission (MA-9) Faith 7 Pilot L. Gordon Cooper Jr. notes that he sees “John’s fireflies,” referring to John Glenn’s term from the Mercury-Atlas 6 mission. NASA later determined that the “fireflies” are attributable to frozen condensation separating from the spacecraft body. The white, green-hued appearance of this phenomenon results from sunlight reflecting off frozen condensation.

Transcript

And now at one hour, at this time, I have one hour and 21 minutes, and I am observing John's fireflies, lifting away from me. I can observe him, sort of, he departing from the spacecraft and drifting out to the rear. I can see some of the considerable distance out to the rear, and just coming up behind me, I am again going to get the glow on the cloud. Fireflies appear to be white, very whitish, with almost a green like rail fireflies. Clouds on the earth are changing color, they are getting quite light. Fireflies appear to be white, very whitish, very whitish, very whitish, very whitish. I am now on the day side, decided not yet quite out, and I am observing stars. The earth is light below me, the sun is still behind me, the sky looks dark above me, and I can see stars, very distinctly.
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Machine summary

Written by Claude Sonnet 4.6 (Anthropic) on May 22, 2026, from the record's text and war.gov's description. It is not part of the record and can contain errors; check it against the document.

NASA-UAP-D010 is an audio transcript excerpt from the Mercury-Atlas 9 (Faith 7) mission, dated May 15, 1963. The document records astronaut L. Gordon Cooper Jr. describing luminous particles surrounding his spacecraft approximately one hour and twenty-one minutes into the flight, in low Earth orbit. Cooper refers to them as "John's fireflies," invoking John Glenn's earlier description of a similar phenomenon during the Mercury-Atlas 6 mission. He characterizes the objects as white with a greenish hue, drifting away from and behind the spacecraft, visible against both dark sky and sunlit cloud cover below.

The record is notable primarily as corroboration that the "firefly" phenomenon was repeatable across Mercury missions and multiple astronauts. NASA's internal determination attributed the particles to frozen condensation separating from the spacecraft hull and reflecting sunlight. No portions appear redacted. The document is relevant to the UAP record as an early instance of formally catalogued, anomalous visual observations in space by credentialed military test pilots, later given a mundane explanation.

Most frequent words

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fireflies whitish hour mercury john white minutes atlas mission frozen condensation spacecraft green observing rear behind appear earth quite light stars approximately final longest flight project faith pilot gordon cooper

Low Earth Orbit, 5/15/63

  1. NASA-UAP-D011 Mercury Atlas 9 Audio Excerpt, May 15, 1963 NASA Audio 5/15/63

Closest matches by the text of the documents.

  1. NASA-UAP-D013 Mercury Atlas 7, May 24, 1962 NASA Audio 5/24/62
  2. NASA-UAP-D012 Mercury Atlas 8 Audio Excerpt, October 3, 1962 NASA Audio 10/3/62
  3. NASA-UAP-D023 Interview Excerpt with Astronaut Gordon Cooper, 1962  NASA Audio November, 1962
  4. NASA-UAP-D015 Astronaut Scientific Debriefings, 1962-1963  NASA Document 1962-1963