U.S. Army Colonel Hayes green fireball sighting.

AFOSI Summary:

Time: App 2200; Number of Observers: 1; Reliability: good; Area: Vaughn, New Mexico; Altitude: 400' - 500'; Course: descending slowly in vertical manner; Color: bright white; Sound: none; Shape: round; Size: larger than basketball; Speed: descending slowly; Disappearance: exploded.

Ruppelt's account:

The green fireballs streaked into UFO history late in November 1948, when people around Albuquerque, New Mexico, began to report seeing mysterious "green flares" at night. The first reports mentioned only a "green streak in the sky," low on the horizon. From the description the Air Force Intelligence people at Kirtland AFB in Albuquerque and the Project Sign people at ATIC wrote the objects off as flares. After all, thousands of GI's had probably been discharged with a duffel bag full of "liberated" Very pistols and flares.

But as days passed the reports got better. They seemed to indicate that the "flares" were getting larger and more people were reporting seeing them. It was doubtful if this "growth" was psychological because there had been no publicity--so the Air Force decided to reconsider the "flare" answer.

Google map of this location.