139,459 sightings · 1906–2026 · a Thaumatica archive
The record, before the argument.
Every sighting this archive can reach — witness reports, landmark cases, and the official paper trail — cited to its source, linked across archives, and graded by what the record actually says.
sightings on file
curated case files
source archives
years covered
The case files
Events with a paper trail
24 JUNE 1947
ContestedThe Kenneth Arnold sighting
A private pilot searching for a downed Marine transport watched nine crescent objects skip past Mount Rainier at an estimated 1,700 mph. A reporter's paraphrase — 'flying saucer' — named the era.
JULY 1947
IdentifiedThe Roswell incident
An Army airfield announced it had recovered a 'flying disc' from a ranch northwest of Roswell, retracted it within hours, and spent fifty years watching the retraction fail. The Air Force's own answer, when it came, was a classified balloon train.
24 APRIL 1964
UnexplainedThe Socorro landing (Lonnie Zamora)
A police sergeant chasing a speeder broke off to investigate a roar and flame, and watched an egg-shaped craft with two small figures beside it rise from an arroyo. Blue Book investigated and left it unidentified — its most famous unknown.
26–28 DECEMBER 1980
ContestedRendlesham Forest
USAF security personnel at the twin bases RAF Bentwaters/Woodbridge twice entered the forest to investigate lights, one patrol reporting a small triangular craft at ground level. The deputy base commander's memo to the MoD is titled, simply, 'Unexplained Lights.'
NOVEMBER 1989 – APRIL 1990
ContestedThe Belgian wave
Thousands of Belgians, gendarmes among them, reported low, slow, silent triangles over five months; one March night the Air Force scrambled F-16s whose radars briefly locked something they could not hold. The Air Force put its general on stage with the civilians.
13 MARCH 1997
ContestedThe Phoenix Lights
Two events one evening: a silent V of lights that crossed Arizona at 8 p.m. before thousands of witnesses, and a 10 p.m. arc of lights over the Sierra Estrella that the Air National Guard identified as flares. The second explanation is documented; the first is still argued.
14 NOVEMBER 2004
UnexplainedThe Nimitz 'Tic Tac' encounter
After a week of anomalous radar tracks, two F/A-18 crews from USS Nimitz were vectored onto a white, wingless object maneuvering over a disturbance in the sea. The Navy's FLIR video of the follow-up intercept is one of three the Pentagon has officially released as unidentified.
On this night
September 3, across the years
1947 · CIRCLE · OSWEGO, OR
Oswego, Oregon. 12:15 p.m. PDT. Witness: housewife Mrs. Raymond Dupui. Watched for unknown length of time as 12-15 round, silver objects flew an unstated pattern. Oct., 1947; Dodgeville, Wisconsin. 11 unnamed civilian man. Watched for 1 hour while an undescribed object flew counterclockwise circles.
1950 · DISK · SPOKANE, WA
Spokane, Washington. 2 p.m. Witnesses: Maj R.J. Gardiner, Mrs. Gardiner and neighbor (former saw three objects, others saw one). Metallic bronze discs, 20-30' long, 2-6' thick. Moved independently and erratically for 5 minutes.
1952 · UNSPECIFIED · TUCSON, AZ
Tucson, Arizona. 99 a.m. Witnesses: civilian pilots McCraven and Thomas. One shiny, dark ellipse made three broad, curving sweeps in 1.5 minutes.
1955 · UNSPECIFIED · BELLINGHAM, WA
Bellingham, Washington. Witness: observer Saunders for Ground Observer Corps. One white pinhead moved slowly across 30^ of sky in 15 minutes. No further information.
1965 · OVAL · EXETER, NH
Exeter, New Hampshire. 2 a.m. Witnesses: Exeter Patrolmen Eugene Bertrand, Jr. and David Hunt, and Norman Muscarello. One large, dark, elliptical object with a row of red lights around it, moved slowly and erratically around houses and trees, while lights blinked in sequence. Farm animals were very noisy. Sighting lasted about 1 hour.
The instrument
The paper trail, live
Where this archive's documents come from: Freedom of Information requests filed and chased in the open by Aletheca, the house instrument. Refusals are published with the same weight as releases.
ALT-2026-0160 · NARA
NARA accession and disposal records for Record Group 341 UAP holdings
No records · overdue
ALT-2026-0097 · FAA
FAA radar data and ATC audio for the Salt Lake City sector event of 11 March 2026
Released in full · overdue
ALT-2026-0142 · AARO
AARO case-resolution memoranda for the Eglin AFB incident of 26 January 2023
Processing · overdue
ALT-2026-0118 · NRO
NRO collection-tasking records referencing unidentified aerial phenomena, 2021–2024
Glomar · overdue
ALT-2026-0061 · FBI
FBI records concerning the retention and transfer of Project Blue Book material after 1970
Released in part · overdue
The log
Latest entries
December 20, 2023 · 5:30 AM · SPHERE
Norwalk, OH
At first, it looked like one light then I zeroed in on my phone, and it looked like blue and white lights a layer of them. You would have to see the picture. It was not acting like a plane at all with the human eye I’ve seen the stink satellites way up way higher and look different. This is like the third identified object. Me and my wife have seen in three months and our location, don’t know what this is just curious . [NUFORC annotation: Planet/Star - Possible]
December 20, 2023 · 2:00 AM · SPHERE
Irmo, SC
Round-shaped sphere in nature, but was made of spindles that extended out in sections. Red and white lights appearing as dots flashed. The object remained stationary. I took videos from outside with my iPhone, When viewing visually from the outside, I saw the intricate details of the object. The quality of the iPhone videos taken do not pick up these details. Over the last summer, in this exact same siting area, I visually saw a stationary v-formation of five ufos… [NUFORC annotation: Planet/Star - Probable]
December 19, 2023 · 6:24 PM · OTHER
Hope, ME
Husband and wife out walking the dog at 6:24pm on 12/19/23. Avid skywatchers, we were looking up at the clear sky, when we spotted a smallish light in the western sky that looked “different”. We watched it lengthen - to give an idea of its width, from our perspective, it looked like a short pencil line. It looked almost like an ASCENDING fireball - definitely going up, not down! It appeared to be at the same altitude as planes flying overhead - 30,000 - 40,000 feet. Both have experience as trained observers, and after decades of sky watching, have not seen anything like this before. Checked flight app on phone, nothing. Checked with Starlink launches, etc., and that didn’t appear to fit either, although there was a Starlink launch the night before, in Cape Canaveral (2000 miles south of us). Having seen Starlink in the past, it looked nothing like that to us. AND, Starlink didn’t just “disappear” the way this one did. Unfortunately, being nighttime, the video doesn’t give a good perspective for the viewer to judge distance, altitude, etc.. The surrounding land is wooded and sparsely populated. After zooming in a few seconds into the video, we attempted to keep the camera as steady as possible, to show the movement of the object. (We are including the second video, attempting to photograph the object disappearing. It shows up on the phone, not so much when it’s translated to this computer.). Its trajectory was “straight up”, or appeared to be, from where we were standing (on a mountain in the midcoast region of Maine). After observing for about 1-1.5 minutes, the object seemed to “fade out” and disappear. There was very slight cloudiness here and there in the sky, however, if this object had gone behind a cloud, it theoretically would have emerged at some point. We stood outside for several minutes after the sighting, until it was apparent that it was not going to reemerge.
November 16, 2022 · 4:00 PM · CYLINDER
Acton, CA
Two Tic Tac shaped craft traveling together from North to South at high speed about 4000 ft up, they caught my eye while I was driving NB on the 14 freeway, when the setting sun reflected off of one of them for a split-second flash. Fast movers coming towards me, they were traveling side by side with one slightly ahead of the other at a consistent speed, both white in color, no wings, no sign of propulsion, got a fairly good look at them as they went over just in front of me, and they looked like flying propane tanks. They came from over the Sierra Palona mountains, went across Acton, CA and were headed south towards the San Gabriel Mountains and they were perfectly round as viewing the tail ends of them as they went out of my view.
December 19, 2023 · 7:00 PM · CHANGING
Nashville, TN
Starting filming at 6:19 Several videos and one still Video enlarged in some captures Still visible
December 19, 2023 · 6:53 AM · UNKNOWN
Early, IA
The object flying headed from West to East at a fairly slow pace, there were two white/yellow blinking lights close together flashing at the same time. The object suddenly shifted very slowly to the South and went a little further before one light went out, the other dimmed and the object stopped. It then sat for about one minute before it slowly turned back to the West and that light dimmed even further. I looked down to send a message to a friend about it and then when I looked back up no lights were further visible and it was nowhere in sight. It was too windy and early in the morning for me to think it was a drone, but seemed smaller than a regular air craft. It didn’t look to be that far away but it was dark and difficult to get a shape on it. It flew flat, not ascending or descending. My son watched it fly with me but we couldn’t figure out what it was. [NUFORC annotation: Aircraft - Possible]
"We do not tell you what to believe. We tell you what is known, what is claimed, and where the two part company."
Seen something yourself? File a report. It enters the catalog as-reported, like every other entry — September 3, 2026 or any night since 1906.