UAP AnalysisIndependent · the declassified record
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NASAExplainedConventional

Apollo 17 Schmitt reports continuous light flashes during flight — translunar/transearth coast

~Dec 1972Translunar / transearth coast and lunar orbit (Apollo 17 mission)
Analysis — our summary

LMP Schmitt reported light flashes were visible 'just about continuously during the whole flight when we were dark adapted.' He noted one flash he believed was on the lunar surface, and that flashes ceased during the blindfolded ALFMED experiment interval, then resumed afterward. All three crew members experienced the phenomenon. The flashes are consistent with cosmic-ray interaction with the retina, a well-documented spaceflight phenomenon studied by the ALFMED experiment.

As reported — verbatim from the document
SCHMITT: "We had light flashes just about continuously during the whole flight when we were dark adapted. I had one which I thought was a flash on the lunar surface. That one period of time when we had the blindfolds on for the ALFMED experiment there were just no visible flashes."
Analyst notes — caveats & confidence

OCR quality is fair; some scanning artifacts in the header area. The correlation with the blindfold ALFMED experiment interval (flashes absent when eyes covered) strongly supports the retinal/cosmic-ray mechanism rather than external light source. The lunar surface flash mention is brief and unverified. Included as documented anomalous visual phenomena per spec.

Associated imagery
NASA-UAP-VM6-Apollo-17-1972
Provenance
Source documentNASA-UAP-D6-Apollo-17-Technical-Crew-Debriefing-1973.pdf
Document typecrew debriefing
Reporting agencyNASA
Source pages2
DeclassifiedFirst public at this release (2026)
Held classified~54 years (≥, to this release)
Extraction confidence HighHow cleanly this record could be parsed from the source — driven by legibility & redaction. It is not a measure of how credible or anomalous the sighting is.