Case files
Every qualifying incident receives its own dossier: what was reported, what evidence is publicly available, what official investigators concluded, and what remains unknown.
Anomaly Index currently indexes qualifying incidents found within the official collections listed in the methodology.
1940s
Battle of Los Angeles Anti-Aircraft Barrage
Los Angeles metropolitan area, CaliforniaIdentifiedAnti-aircraft units fired roughly 1,430 rounds over Los Angeles during a night alert after radar and visual reports of unidentified aircraft, two nights after a Japanese submarine shelled an oil facility at Ellwood. No wreckage was recovered.
Nov–Dec 1944415th Night Fighter Squadron Light Reports
Rhine Valley, western Europe (France–Germany border region)Unresolved: insufficient dataAircrews of the 415th Night Fighter Squadron reported bright, maneuvering lights near their aircraft during night patrols along the Rhine in late 1944, prompting a wartime intelligence inquiry that reached no confirmed explanation.
24 June 1947Kenneth Arnold Cascade Mountains Sighting
near Mineral, Washington (Cascade Range, Mount Rainier area)Unresolved: insufficient dataPrivate pilot Kenneth Arnold reported nine bright objects flying in formation near Mount Rainier, Washington, estimating speeds far exceeding known aircraft. Army Air Forces intelligence found him credible but concluded he had seen a mirage.
7 July 1947Roswell Debris Recovery
Foster Ranch, near Corona, New MexicoIdentifiedRanch debris recovered near Roswell, New Mexico prompted a brief military announcement of a "flying disc," retracted within a day. A 1995 Air Force review traced the material to an unrecovered Project Mogul balloon train.
7 January 1948Mantell F-51 Intercept and Crash
near Franklin, Kentucky (Simpson County)Likely identifiedCapt. Thomas Mantell died when his F-51 crashed near Franklin, Kentucky, after he climbed without oxygen to pursue an unidentified object. The Air Force's initial Venus explanation was later replaced by a Skyhook balloon assessment.
1950s
McMinnville (Trent) Farm Photographs
Trent farm, near McMinnville, OregonUnresolved: insufficient dataA farm couple near McMinnville, Oregon, photographed a metallic, disk-shaped object they said passed slowly over their property. The two resulting negatives became one of the most reproduced UFO images of the twentieth century and remain the subject of disputed photographic analysis.
19 July 1952Washington National Airport Radar and Visual Sightings
Washington National Airport, Arlington, VirginiaLikely identifiedAir traffic controllers, a commercial pilot, and Air Force radar operators reported unidentified radar targets and lights over Washington, D.C. on two consecutive weekends. The Air Force attributed most of the activity to temperature inversion, a finding several of the radar operators involved continued to dispute for decades.
13 August 1956Lakenheath and Bentwaters Radar-Visual Events
RAF Lakenheath and RAF Bentwaters, Suffolk, EnglandUnresolved: corroboratedGround radar at two RAF stations, an airborne interceptor's own radar, and multiple ground and air observers tracked fast-moving, sharply maneuvering targets over Suffolk, England for several hours. A scrambled RAF fighter briefly locked onto one target before it appeared to move behind the aircraft.
17 July 1957RB-47 Electronic Intelligence Aircraft Encounter
Gulf Coast to Texas-Oklahoma flight corridor (near Duncanville, Texas)Unresolved: corroboratedThe crew of a U.S. Air Force RB-47 electronic-reconnaissance aircraft reported a light that was tracked, at different points and sometimes simultaneously, by their onboard cockpit view, an airborne signals intercept receiver, and ground radar over more than 700 miles and roughly ninety minutes.
2 November 1957Levelland Vehicle-Interference Reports
Levelland, TexasUnresolved: insufficient dataOver roughly six hours, at least a dozen drivers and residents around Levelland, Texas, reported a brilliant, low-flying object accompanied by the engines, headlights, and radios of their vehicles briefly failing. The Air Force attributed the reports to ball lightning during an electrical storm, an explanation weather records did not support.
1960s
Socorro Police Officer's Close-Range Sighting and Ground Traces
Socorro, New Mexico (arroyo southwest of town)Unresolved: corroboratedA Socorro, New Mexico police officer reported an egg-shaped object and two figures in an arroyo southwest of town; a second officer and Air Force investigators documented burned brush and ground depressions at the site within hours.
16 March 1967Malmstrom AFB Echo Flight Minuteman Missile Shutdown
Echo Flight missile field, near Winifred and Hilger, Montana (Malmstrom AFB missile complex)Unresolved: insufficient dataTen Minuteman missiles in Echo Flight at Malmstrom Air Force Base lost strategic alert within seconds of each other on the morning of 16 March 1967; a declassified unit history documents the event, and later testimony has linked it to reported UFO activity at the missile field.
3 March 1968Zond IV Re-entry Misperception Reports Over the Eastern United States
Eastern United States (observed on a track from Kentucky to Pennsylvania)IdentifiedHundreds of observers across at least seven eastern states reported a slow-moving, cigar-shaped object with rows of lighted windows on the night of 3 March 1968; NORAD and the Condon Report identified the display as the atmospheric breakup of Zond IV probe and booster debris.
1970s
1980s
Rendlesham Forest Events
Rendlesham Forest, Suffolk, England (near RAF Woodbridge / RAF Bentwaters)Unresolved: insufficient dataOver three nights in late December 1980, U.S. Air Force security personnel at RAF Woodbridge, Suffolk, reported moving lights and a glowing object in the adjacent forest, followed two nights later by additional lights observed and measured by the deputy base commander.
1984–2004Hessdalen Valley Recurring Light Phenomena
Hessdalen valley, Holtålen, Trøndelag, NorwayUnresolved: insufficient dataResidents of the Hessdalen valley in central Norway have reported recurring unexplained lights since the early 1980s; a sustained instrumented research campaign beginning in 1984 has recorded the phenomenon optically and on radar without reaching a settled explanation.
17 November 1986Japan Air Lines Flight 1628 Events
Interior Alaska, along the Fort Yukon–to–Anchorage air corridorUnresolved: insufficient dataThe crew of a Japan Air Lines cargo flight reported unidentified lights pacing their aircraft over interior Alaska for roughly 30 to 50 minutes, during which ground and airborne radar recorded brief, inconsistent returns that the FAA's investigation could not positively explain.
1990s
Belgian F-16 Scramble and Radar Locks
Wavre-Brussels region, Belgium (Thorembais-Gembloux to Beauvechain Air Base flight corridor)Unresolved: insufficient dataGround observers and gendarmes reported triangular light formations over the Wavre-Brussels region, prompting the Belgian Air Force to scramble two F-16s that obtained a series of brief radar locks on airborne targets during a ninety-minute intercept attempt, without either pilot visually acquiring an object.
13 March 1997Phoenix Lights
Phoenix metropolitan area and Barry M. Goldwater Air Force Range, ArizonaLikely identifiedHundreds of witnesses across Arizona reported a large, silent formation of lights around 8:30 p.m. and a separate sequence of stationary, fading lights around 10 p.m. on 13 March 1997, with the second sequence matching military flare drops later acknowledged by Air National Guard personnel.
2000s
2010s
Chilean Navy Helicopter Infrared Recording
Pacific coast between San Antonio and Quintero, Valparaíso Region, ChileUnresolved: insufficient dataA Chilean Navy helicopter crew testing a new infrared camera off the Valparaíso coast recorded an unidentified object for roughly ten minutes; Chile's official aviation-anomaly office studied the footage for two years and classified it as unidentified, while an independent analysis proposed a match to a commercial airliner's contrails that the official investigators reviewed and rejected.
January 2015GOFAST ATFLIR Video
Atlantic Ocean off the Florida coast (Jacksonville operating area)Likely identifiedA Navy F/A-18 aircrew recorded infrared video of an object crossing rapidly over the ocean off the Florida coast; a 2025 Department of Defense reanalysis concluded the apparent speed was a parallax illusion and the object was likely a slow, wind-driven object at high altitude.
c. 2015GIMBAL ATFLIR Video
Atlantic Ocean off the Florida coast (Jacksonville operating area)Unresolved: insufficient dataA Navy F/A-18 aircrew from the USS Theodore Roosevelt strike group recorded infrared video of an object that appears to rotate in place while maintaining its flight path off the Florida coast; the Department of Defense later confirmed the footage as authentic while it remains officially unidentified.
July 2019Channel Islands Multi-Destroyer Drone Swarm Encounters
Pacific Ocean near the Channel Islands, Southern CaliforniaLikely identifiedMultiple U.S. Navy destroyers off the Channel Islands, Southern California, reported groups of small unmanned aircraft flying near and around them on several nights in July 2019; Navy intelligence officials later testified they were reasonably confident the best-documented footage correlated with conventional drones.