U.S. Department of War releases third PURSUE tranche of UAP files

What is in this tranche?

The third PURSUE tranche, published on June 12, 2026, contains 72 entries: 53 PDF documents, 10 images, 6 videos and 3 audio recordings. At its center are three recent cases documented by the FBI and by AARO (All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office), the UAP office of the Department of War: lights near a security site in the western United States in 2023, repeatedly reported lights in the northeastern United States since 2021, and an object over Cheyenne Mountain in Colorado in 2022. Alongside them are NASA astronaut debriefings, 18 records from CIA holdings dating from 1950 to 2008, and early files of the U.S. Army, Navy, Air Force and FBI.

Western United States 2023: “orbs launching orbs”

Over two days in October 2023, at dusk, six federal agents near a sensitive national security site in the western United States reported orange “mother orbs” that appeared to release smaller red orbs. The file includes the AARO memorandum, a schematic map, five witness narratives (D079–D083), ten digital renderings and two video recreations; the FBI prepared these in 2026 at the request of the Department of War. Some narratives go beyond the lights to objects that seemed to mimic vehicles.

• DOW-UAP-D077, AARO Unresolved Case Analysis Update: Western United States Event – AARO memorandum of June 5, 2026: about 60 percent of the observations are plausibly attributable to military aircraft that deployed infrared countermeasure flares during an exercise; about 40 percent remain unresolved. According to AARO, the possibility that unrecognized technology accounts for some of them is a provisional assessment based solely on witness testimony and the elimination of competing hypotheses, without technical data or physical evidence.

  “Approximately 40 percent of the reported phenomena lack a plausible explanation after first stage analysis and thus remain unresolved.” (p. 2)

• DOW-UAP-D079, Narrative Statement 1, Western United States Event, 2023 – Witness 1: a glowing ball in front of a hillside, later orange lights from which three red lights flew out each time, accompanied by a flash. Hours later, Witness 1 takes a light for a car that leaves the road and seems to float; afterwards he sees what looked like the same barely definable object, through which a star could be seen.

  “While it was lit, it appeared three red lights flew out of and away from it.” (p. 2)

• DOW-UAP-D080, Narrative Statement 2, Western United States Event, 2023 – Witness 2: around 7 p.m., a bright orb-like light released three or four red lights and faded; until about 7:30 p.m., the process repeated about five times across the northern to eastern horizon, and the last group stayed above the southern horizon until about 11 p.m. On another evening, lights seemed to mimic vehicles and glide across rugged terrain.
• DOW-UAP-D081, Narrative Statement 3, Western United States Event, 2023 – Witness 3: a large orange orb that expelled three smaller red ones, later four red lights over an airfield. A supposed vehicle kept its distance as the agents approached and glided off into the terrain; no tire tracks were found.

  “When the orb was at approximately 45 degrees (halfway between the horizon and directly overhead), it expelled three smaller red orbs.” (p. 1)

• FBI-UAP-D016, Digital Rendering, Narrative Statement 2-1, Western United States Event, 2023 – FBI digital rendering based on the narrative of Witness 2, one of seven for that statement.
• FBI-UAP-PR005, Digital Recreation, Narrative Statement 3-1, Western United States Event, 2023 – FBI video recreation based on the narrative of Witness 3; a second one (FBI-UAP-PR006) belongs with it.

Northeastern United States 2021–2026: recurring lights

Seven FBI files and four videos concern sightings in the northeastern United States that, according to the official descriptions, originate from the same general area; eyewitnesses there have repeatedly reported lights and “orbs” since November 2021, and the July 2025 sighting occurred within 25 miles. The FBI interviewed witnesses, collected videos, surveyed the sites and observed for itself. The videos were recorded by eyewitnesses on iPhones; their official descriptions are based on the witnesses’ statements to the FBI.

• FBI-UAP-D005, FD-1057-04, Northeastern United States, 2024 – FBI interview from October 2024: the first sighting in 2021, around 5 a.m., began with a light that split and for about ten minutes formed a triangle with a light in the center. Recordings of such sightings were often corrupted, the interviewee said.
• FBI-UAP-D007, FD-1057-06, Northeastern United States, 2024 – November 2024: during a visit, FBI agents themselves observe lights along a tree line; both see a white light above a red one at treetop height at the far end of a pond. According to the file, the five photos taken by one agent are mostly blurry.

  “The white light danced around less than ten seconds, moving side to side, and then disappeared” (p. 3)

• FBI-UAP-D008, FD-1057-07, Northeastern United States, 2024 – Site survey in December 2024: the agents find nothing unusual on the ground or at treetop level. Given the tree cover, they consider night-time drone flights there unrealistic.

  “there did not appear to be anything unusual present on the ground or at treetop level” (p. 2)

• FBI-UAP-PR001, “Triangle Orbs,” Northeastern United States, 2021 – “Triangle Orbs,” November 2021, around 5 a.m.: according to the official description, a bright light source resolved into multiple lights rotating erratically relative to one another.
• FBI-UAP-PR004, “Northeastern Orb Sighting,” 2025 – July 2025: according to the official description, two witnesses saw two red orbs above their backyard that silently moved west together and appeared to merge. Two FBI interviews belong with it; they differ in places on color and size.

Colorado Springs 2022: an object over Cheyenne Mountain

In February 2022, five U.S. Army service members saw a whitish, motionless object over Cheyenne Mountain near Colorado Springs that suddenly vanished. The case comprises two FBI interviews, a digital rendering based on one of them, and an analysis for AARO. Time and duration of the sighting differ between the files.

• FBI-UAP-D001, FD-302, Unresolved UAP Report, Colorado Springs, 2022 – FBI interview from March 2025: a matte white, “bean shaped” object over a saddle of the mountain, motionless and silent for three to five minutes. When the soldiers briefly looked away, it was gone.
• FBI-UAP-D002, FD-1057, Unresolved UAP Report, Colorado Springs, 2022 – FBI interview for a forensic recreation: a “potato” shaped, creamy white shimmering object made of irregular panels that vanished after about two minutes.
• ICA-UAP-D001, Analysis: Colorado Springs UAP Incident, 2022 – Analysis by an Intelligence Community partner: possibly sunlight backscattered from snow onto low clouds, explicitly with low confidence. According to the official description, AARO considered the case unresolved as of June 2026.

NASA: astronaut observations

Eleven NASA entries: debriefings of Mercury and Gemini crews from 1962 to 1966 (one transcript dated 1967 in its title), an interview with Gordon Cooper from 1962, and two audio recordings of the Apollo 16 scientific debriefing in which a previously unreported “flash” comes up. The crews mainly discuss debris, snow and ice particles around the spacecraft, and the flashing lights of their own booster stage. Alongside them is correspondence from 1998 answering public inquiries.

• NASA-UAP-D015, Astronaut Scientific Debriefings, 1962-1963 – Records from 1962–1963 on the luminous particles John Glenn saw around his capsule in February 1962. One analysis considers snowflakes from the steam exhaust of the life-support system the most likely explanation; astronaut Carpenter released large numbers of such particles by hitting the capsule wall.

  “there is considerable evidence which points to snow as the source of the majority of the material.” (p. 61)

• NASA-UAP-D016, Preliminary Gemini 4 Crew Debriefing, Part I, 1965 – Gemini 4, debriefing aboard the USS Wasp on June 9, 1965: James McDivitt describes an object he calls a satellite. He saw it for 30 to 40 seconds before the sun came across the window; he could not judge the distance but had the impression it was quite close.

  “it was quite close because I could make out the shape of it.” (p. 83)

• NASA-UAP-D023, Interview Excerpt with Astronaut Gordon Cooper, 1962 – Walter Cronkite interviews Gordon Cooper, November 1962: according to the official description, Cooper says a large number of exceptionally well-qualified people have seen objects without a logical explanation.
• USG-UAP-D001, Congressional, White House, UFO-related Constituent Correspondence, 1998 – Responses from the White House, Congress and NASA to public inquiries, mostly from 1998. NASA writes to Senator Charles E. Grassley that most objects sighted by astronauts were identified as material from launch vehicles or spacecraft or as water droplets.

  “Most of these items were later identified by photographs or NORAD records as material from launch vehicles or spacecraft or were such items as water droplets.” (p. 4)

CIA records 1950–2008

18 records from CIA holdings, from a 1950 report from Chile to a 2008 sighting in Zimbabwe. Many concern reports from the Soviet Union, Hungary and the Himalayas; alongside them are Special Report No. 14 of Project Blue Book, the Air Force’s UFO project, and a 1971 Australian review. A 1976 report relays a Soviet radiation biologist’s explanation that flashes of light seen by Aeroflot pilots at night are caused by cosmic rays.

• CIA-UAP-002, Scientific Advisory Panel on Unidentified Flying Objects, Report, 1952-1953 – January 1953 report of the scientific advisory panel convened by the CIA (Robertson Panel): no indication of a direct physical threat, but concern that the flood of reports clogs communication channels. A CIA memorandum from October 1952 cites about 1,500 reports since 1947, about 20 percent of them unexplained.
• CIA-UAP-003, The Central Intelligence Agency and Overhead Reconnaissance; The U-2 and OXCART Programs, 1954-1974 – History of the U-2 and OXCART reconnaissance aircraft, 1954–1974: Blue Book investigators checked UFO reports against U-2 flight logs but could not reveal the true cause to those who reported them. According to the text, these flights accounted for more than half of all UFO reports in the late 1950s and most of the 1960s.

  “U-2 and later OXCART flights accounted for more than one-half of all UFO reports during the late 1950s” (p. 86)

• CIA-UAP-006, Sighting Of Unconventional Aircraft – South of Baku, October 4, 1955: from a train, a U.S. national sees a triangular object with three lights climb steeply from an airfield. While they were still watching, the steward pulled down the blinds; the source understood the steward’s gesture to mean that an officer of the Soviet Interior Ministry on the train had ordered it.
• CIA-UAP-017, Placement on High Alert Due to Perceived Aggressive Foreign Posturing – Harare, Zimbabwe, July 2, 2008: an unidentified object over the international airport, possibly observed by both radar and optical means; observers described it as disc-like with a hollow center. According to the report, a redacted Zimbabwean entity was then placed on high alert.

  “the object was disc-like in shape with a hollow center, and had a series of rotating lights on the underside of the airframe.” (p. 2)

Early U.S. Army, Navy, Air Force and FBI files 1948–1967

An Army study, a Navy reporting instruction (dated 1948 in its title), two Air Force case collections with checklists on 172 incidents, the transmission of the CIA panel report to the Secretary of Defense in 1953, and three FBI files. They mainly show how reports were collected and passed between agencies.

• DOW-UAP-D084, US Army-Flying-Saucer-Study_1949 – 1949 study by Army intelligence at the request of the General Staff’s Plans and Operations Division: do the reports stem from natural phenomena or a foreign power? According to a memorandum of April 5, 1949, the study intimated that none of the investigated cases implicated a foreign nation.
• FBI-UAP-D011, D/FBI Correspondence Referral, 1949 – Letter from a pastor to FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover dated January 31, 1949, about four beams of light converging in the Cascade Mountains. According to the official description, Hoover forwarded the letter to the Atomic Energy Commission.
• FBI-UAP-D013, Washington State ‘UFO’ Investigation, 1952-1960 – File on Washington State 1952–1960, including Pasco on June 6, 1954: the supervisor of a local ground observer group reports two half-moon shaped objects that turned into fireballs, visible for ten minutes.