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Museum surveillance video shows three people driving into the back alley, loading the spaceship into the bed of a red pickup and driving off, according to Roswell police.

“There are certainly a good number of spaceships/flying saucers in Roswell, but if you happen to see one that looks a little out of place, please give RPD a call,” the Facebook post said.

The museum is just around the corner from police headquarters.

The flying saucer has been a fixture of the UFO Museum for 24 years: It originally was mounted on the front of the museum’s first location on Fourth Street before it moved to the current building.

“It’s a historical piece of our building,” said Karen Jaramillo, the museum’s interim executive director. “It was just fiberglass and a stainless steel bowl wrapped with rope lights that changed colors at night. It’s sad that it is not with us anymore. We hope it is returned.”

The Facebook post about the theft had garnered more than 120 “likes” and dozens of comments by Tuesday.

“Someone stole Roswell’s mascot,” a woman identified as Holly Wood Hill commented. “For shame and you can’t even put it in your front yard ’cause everyone knows.”

In a nod to the “Roswell Incident” of 1947 in which an unidentified flying object crashed on a ranch northwest of Roswell, setting off a decades-old controversy – or conspiracy theories – about what the object really was, a man identified as Steven Johnson, wrote, “It’s not a flying saucer, it’s a weather balloon.”

Several others simply stated the obvious: “Only in Roswell.”

“Someone stole Roswell’s mascot,” a woman identified as Holly Wood Hill commented. “For shame and you can’t even put it in your front yard ‘cause everyone knows.”