Chilean government releases video of disturbing UFO sighting

This is a screen grab from a YouTube videopublished by “ufosontherecord” taken on Nov. 11, 2014, by a Chilean Navy helicopter (Airbus Cougar AS-532) equipped with an infrared FLIR high-definition camera, according to a report by Chile’s CEFAA, which is an agency within DGAC (an agency similar to the FAA but part of the Chilean Air Force). less This is a screen grab from a YouTube videopublished by “ufosontherecord” taken on Nov. 11, 2014, by a Chilean Navy helicopter (Airbus Cougar AS-532) equipped with an infrared FLIR high-definition camera, ... more Photo: Government Of Chile Via Ufosontherecord Photo: Government Of Chile Via Ufosontherecord Image 1 of / 8 Caption Close Chilean government releases video of disturbing UFO sighting 1 / 8 Back to Gallery

A video from a helicopter flown by the Chilean navy showing an unidentified flying object releasing something into the atmosphere has been confirmed by an agency in the Chilean government to be official and unexplained so far.

"The incident remains open as we cannot be absolutely certain of its nature, contrary to other incidents whose nature has been proved," said Jose Patricio Lay Lagos, acting director of CEFAA, which is an agency within Chile's DGAC (an agency similar to the FAA but part of the Chilean Air Force).

According to the official report, translated here by Google:

On November 11, 2014, a helicopter from the Chilean Navy (Airbus Cougar AS-532), equipped with an infrared FLIR high-definition camera, was patrolling in the coastal sector between the port of San Antonio and Quinteros a At 16.48 UTC, when the camera operator detected an unknown object, apparently flying at a constant speed similar to that of the helicopter, and moving forward. The sighting was visually confirmed by the two officers who made up the crew (pilot and camera operator) and lasted more than 10 minutes. Officers questioned Air Traffic Control whose radar failed to detect the object. They also received no response from the unknown traffic when trying to interrogate it in the frequency prepared for these cases. The DGAC's radar control system failed to capture the object but confirmed, in turn, the absence of authorized traffic in the vicinity of the helicopter.

The video shot by the helicopter crew was released on Jan. 5, as reported in a lengthy exploration of the encounter in the Huffington Post. The videos below were published with that Huffington Post story, which Lay said was "the real version," and embedded from YouTube.

His agency, Lay said, is not seeing UFOs everywhere or jumping to wild conclusions when it runs into one.

"For your information," he wrote in an email exchange, "the Committee's scientific group, all doctorates in diverse disciplines, from Astronomy to Physics, they are all Skeptics. That is of great help for us to keep our feet firmly on the ground and not get carried away by ufologists at large."

Here are three videos clips of the main points of interest in the longer video above.

And,

"The incident did not cause any particular reaction," Lay said. "In Chile the phenomenon is regarded in a natural way, without fuzz or secrecy." He said the pilots didn't make any statements about the sighting. "They just handed over the video and described the situation as rather unusual," he said.

The journalist who broke the story on Huffington Post, Leslie Kean, wrote that several explanations of the UFO as an aircraft discharging water or other liquid waste have been shot down by the Chilean agency.

The agency wrote:

On two occasions, the object seems to throw a trail of some element that could not be specified. Some analysts have suggested the hypothesis that it is a medium-sized line aircraft and that the stelae of the detachable element may be the reserve water inside the apparatus, thrown by the crew. However, meteorology asserts that neither the altitude at which the object moved, nor the ambient temperature of that moment, allowed such a wake of condensation. The object disappeared lost in the clouds.

Kean added in her story "Groundbreaking UFO Video Just Released By Chilean Navy":

Data from the various reports eliminate other conventional explanations. Meteorologists determined that no weather balloons were in the sky at that time, and noted that a balloon would not move horizontally along with the plane because the wind was blowing from the west towards the shore. Comparing the footage to similar IR satellite imagery with known temperature values, they stated that the object's temperature must have been higher than 122 degrees F (50 C). The object was not a drone; all drones require registration with the DGAC and whenever flown, the DGAC is informed, just like it is with aircraft. Also, radar would register drones. CEFAA staff went up the chain of command to a Navy Admiral who informed them that there were no joint Naval exercises underway with the US or any other country. The Admiral confirmed that this could not have been a US drone, or any type of espionage or secret vehicle from a foreign country.

Whatever the craft was, it's fairly disturbing to wonder just what it was releasing into the atmosphere. Of course, there's no end of conspiracies about contrails ...

But hey, happy skywatching!

Jake Ellison can be reached at jakeellisonjournalism@gmail.com. Follow Jake on Twitter at twitter.com/Jake_News. Also, swing by and *LIKE* his page on Facebook. If Google Plus is your thing, check out our science coverage here.