Releases / 5 / FBI-UAP-D024

FD-302, “Airborne Lights and Triangle,” 2002, 2023-2024

File

FBI-UAP-D024

Type

Document, 3 pages

Agency

FBI

Date

2002, 2023-2024

Place

Northeastern U.S.; Afghanistan

Released

Release 5, August 7, 2026

Open the original on war.gov

The government's description

This document is an FBI FD-302, a form the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) uses to record interviews. This FD-302 records a March 2024 interview with a former U.S. military pilot, in which the interviewee describes several incidents potentially involving unidentified anomalous phenomena (UAP) in 2023 and 2024. The interviewee also recalls a 2002 incident potentially involving UAP, while deployed as a military reservist in Afghanistan. An FBI digital rendering based upon the observer’s description accompanies this document, under the title FBI-UAP-D025.

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FD-302 (Rev. 5-8-10)

FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION

Date of entry

-

04 .

/2024

in
.
Agent

, was intervi ewe
, s

· was referred to the FBI by ~ After being advised
of the identity of the interviewing Agents and the nature of the interview,
provided the following information :

stated that starting in October 2023, a l ot of pilots have been
seeing the same event occurring, namely seeing lights in the sky. Pilots
have been discussing the events over
Pi l ots
typical l y saw them between midnight and 3 AM. did not know i f the
events occurred at that time because that was when it was dark enough or i f
it was because that was when the l i ghts were present.
first observation of the lights occurred in October 2023. was flying from Boston, MA to Dublin, Ireland where he saw the l ights in the
northeast towards Gander, Canada. was at an elevation of 37,000 feet
and believed the lights were h i gher than him, probably at 50,000 feet or
higher . The lights were white in color, would start out as dim, and get
br i ghter before they eventua l ly faded out . The fu l l cycle of the lights
would range from 10 seconds to one minute. The l ights looked like airp l ane
landing lights, but knew that it was not them, nor did he think it was

Investigation on

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by
This document contains neither recommendatiollll nor conclusions of the FBI. It is the property of the FBI and is loaned to your agency; it and its contents are not
to be distributed outside your agency.

FD-302a (Rev. 5-8-10)

ContinuationofFD-302of ■

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Interview of _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ ,On

03 .

/2024

,Page

2 of 3

Starlink, Starlink flares, satell i tes, or meteors. I t ranged between one to
four lights at a time in the sky . Some lights did not move , while others
moved in straight lines, somet i mes changing d irection, and typically did not
move in a coordinated fashion.
Since spotting the lights the first time, has seen them
approximately ten times . At times the lights would disappear for mi nutes
before returning. has seen the lights for 45 minutes up to two
hours . has seen the lights in all directions except for towards the
south. saw the lights three times in the direction of North Dakota
while flying to either Seattle or Phoenix. He has also seen them off the
west coast and mid-Atlantic coast. d i d not know how far away they
were but ventured the y were between 200-500 miles away. never saw the
lights below the horizon a nd had not heard about them prior to October 2023 .
During a trip on February _
, 2024, was able to capture video on
his Samsung Galaxy S22 phone an event involving white lights. stated
the lights were brighter in-person than on the camera, and the lights were
similar in elevation to him or were slightly higher . The video is filmed
from the cockpit of his aircraft with the lights turned off . was
located approximately 150 miles northwest of Minneapoli s, Minnesota and was
flying towards the east. The lights were seen towards the north in the
North Dakota region at around 4:36 AM Eastern Standard Time on a clear
ni ght .

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As captured on the video, white lights were seen , sometimes ten or more
present at once, moving around in straight lines a nd getting
bri ghter/dimmer. At the 3:27 mark i n the v ideo, was not sure if two
of the lights were really close together or if it was a single light with a
tail. At the 3 : 47 mark, did not know if it was three separate
lights . At the 5 :22 mark you can see the flight panel, showing that the
airplane was traveling at approximately .80 Mach, and that the airplane was
40 - 50 miles northeast of Sioux Fal l s and coul d see the KFSD airport on the
radar. never felt unsafe from the white lights, and did not believe
the lights were within 100 miles of him .
witnessed occurred back i n June 2002. While
A thi rd event that as a reservist , got activated to go to Afghanistan. One

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FD-302a (Rev. 5-8-10)
ContinuationofFD-302of ■
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Inter view of _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ ,On
03 .
/2024
,Page
3 of 3
night he was outside looking at the stars with another pilot. At
approx imately 4:30 AM local time, noticed that the stars were getting
blacked out over Bagram . It appeared as if something huge went overhead,
from west to east, and was an equilateral triangle shape. The object was
moving silently, at a consistent speed and altitude , possibly 150 knots ,
with no lights visible. estimated it was 500 feet in size, but he
could not fully see the shape of the object. The other pilot with also observed the triangle, and when it passed over stated, "did you see
that?" stated he did not further discuss the sighting with anyone
else nor did he hear anyone else discussing the sighting .
Looking through the data, never found information that could explain what he saw in Afghan istan in
not aware of anything that would explain what he had seen.
Overall, believed that not a lot of discussions were happening
openly about the events with the lights . did not think there was as
much st i gma surrounding these events, but people were just not used to
talking about it.
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