Pilot Report Unclassified Complete

733667-02-001-0003

National Archives and Records Administration

Released
Published
Added to archive
Jun 16, 2026
Department
National Archives and Records Administration
Original size
1.3 MB
External ID
1a7cb37dafd729d9f62e62d23f85784b694f5bbcc9850945bd3421a4f03c7a31
Confidence
85%
Credibility
90%

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Intelligence summary

This document recounts the experiences of Japan Airlines pilot Kenju Terauchi during a flight over Alaska on November 17, where he observed mysterious lights and objects in the sky, leading him to believe they were extraterrestrial in origin. Despite some speculation that the lights were reflections from ice crystals, Terauchi remains convinced of their otherworldly nature.

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AviationExtraterrestrial LifePilot ExperiencesUFO sightings AviationExtraterrestrialSightingUAPUFO

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Jun 16, 2026

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Ingestion Date for 733667-02-001-0003

Jun 16, 2026

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Document Record Date for 733667-02-001-0003

Jun 16, 2026

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FLIGHT TO REMEMBER: |__ Continued from Page At | after that first sighting of ts are some of the most blzarre in Alaska aviation _ history. Since first becoming Public in late December, the reports have transformed this soft-spoken, 47-year-old, An- chorage-based pilot into an international celebrity, inter- viewed by People magazine, Tokyo television and more a dozen other national and international publica- tions, Terauch! has lived quietly fo a comfortable house in Anchorage, his base for the lest three years. He spends several weeks 2 month flying polar routes between Europe and Alaska. During his time off, he enjoys fishing for red and allver salmon. » This week, Terauchi 1s home . His phone rings Es th reporters eager to about his strange No- vember flight, ‘Terauchi has an impressive So eal weleht ty ee we w Ta’ incredible tale. He hes 29 years experience. He says he hasn't often navigated: the Iceland-Greeniand-An- chorage route, but he has rou- tnely flown other trana-polar foutes. o o- Until November, Terauchi 7 says, he never believed in i UFOs. Now, he does. He : thinks they’re sent by visitors . from outer space. In fact, last sunday, Teenenl gale re- Ho po Mysterious ts of a ‘Spaceship during a flight to ‘ Anchorage, " | ,This time, however, he ad- "’ ,Inits he made a mistake. He ‘© “Ow concedes that there was a f. , more terrestrial explanation "3 * to what he saw. He agrees es.with Federal Aviation Ad- ministration officials who Co- arate speculated that the second sightings were the lights of villages reflected off ice crys- tals in the atmosphere. But Terauchi remains con- vinced that the lights he saw in November were spaceships of some unknown, extra-ter- restrial origin. In interview | after interview, he methodi- cally makes his case, charting the events of the sighting on flight maps of the arctic sky. One day, he’s convinced someone else will see the crafts, and his account will take on hew meaning. “I think we have to keep this record....'" Terauchi's encounter began with his sighting of the two belts of amber lights. To check them out, he radioed Anchorage air traffic control- lers, The controllers replied that no military or civilian, flights were in the vicinity: @ two belts of light con- tinued to dance in front of the plane. Terauchi grabbed for his camera, ie chgeeeet Pg taking a ‘picture wou futile Pua ‘there was pet enough t to expose the film properly. . Five ainites after the lights first appeared in front of the plane, they suddenly moved farther out ahead of the plane, he said. He could then make out the shapes of the crafts — cylinders wrapped in lateral lines of light that extended from a darker centéer..The lines ap- peared to be exhaust outlets, and they alternately pulsated t from the two sides of @ cylinder, They appeared to be controlled by comput- ers, he said. As the two ob- jects reversed direction, the exhaust lights appeared to flare brighter, lot Tamefuji, in a sep- terview, also reported Veteran JAL pilot recounts sighting of strange company Above is an Iilustration based on a description Japan Alr Lines pilot Kenju Teraucht provided * + Buatration by Wiliam Hays Ulustrator William Hays. it shows two smaller craft Tereuchl says hovared in front of the cockpit window of his 747 cargo plan-on Nov. 17. At adi ag they moved closer, square (ac cre-wn here). He direction of the darker panel In the mile, which he with glowing orango ombers. seeing the two strange lights. “I saw several lights in front of us, and then I couldn’t see them, and the captain told me they were on the left-hand alde,” he said. . After about 15 minutes, the first two Hghts disappeared, Terauchi said. Then, on his’ left, he saw a big band of glowing white light, similar to the’ light emitted by a fluorescent bulb. He turned on his weather radar and tuned it to a 20-mile radius. At eight miles, on the left side of the screen, the radar showed a tiny ball, Terauchi radioed the FAA flight control. center in An- stance they appeared rectangular and, described the lights as pulsating in the said said resemblog bleck charcoal dotted chorage. Three controllers monitoring radar saw what they thought was an object at about the same reference Polnt on their monitor, ac- cording to Sam Rich, an air traffic controller, and Paul Steucke, an FAA spokesman, Steucke, however, said sub- sequent examination of the radar tape showed the object to be a split-image of the JAL plane. Rich said none of the controllers, at the time, thought that was the case. As the plane flew over Fairbanks, the lights of the city gave Teraucht a better view of the new object. He says the band of light circled a huge walnut-shaped object that appeared to be twice the size of an aircraft carrier, As the lights of the city faded, Terauchi again could see only the white band of light. To try to lose the ob- ject, he got permission from a controller to descend from 35,000 to 31,500 feet. The ob- ject descended “in forma- tion,” he said. & _ Then Terauchi, after epn- sulting with the controllers, made two 45-degree turns to ‘the right, then completed a 360-degree turn. The object remained in view, ‘ As the JAL plane flew post Mount McKinley, controllers asked a Fairbanks-bound United Airlines flight to try to confirm the sighting. The United plane veered off to follow the JAL flight path at a lower altitude. Just before the two planes passed one another, the white Hight disappeared. “It was Uke a dream. Un- believable,” Terauchi said. Mulling things over in the living room of his Anchorage home, Terauchi postulates that whatever he saw was friendly. “I can't understand the technology, but it was not dangerous. It was completely controlled." 50m If he sees. the cbjects again, he's ready to‘{fy communicat- ing. Perhaps four blinks, gf-. the wing lights, then. 470" ier more. B73 In Morse code, he ‘says js that's “HI.”