Pentagon baffled by 8,000 mysterious UFO orbs hovering over US military bases

• MORE: Mysterious 'UFO' caught hovering over Disney World before vanishing into the darkness

By CHRIS MELORE, US ASSISTANT SCIENCE EDITOR

An invasion of small metallic orbs has been spotted hovering over the US in recent years, leaving the Pentagon scrambling to identify these mysterious UFOs.

A new report from the crowdsourced platform Enigma, which allows people to report sightings of unidentified flying objects (UFOs), reveals more than 8,000 sightings across the US between December 2022 and June 2025. 

Among these, 422 reports specifically describe metallic orbs, with the majority observed between 1am and 4am near military installations in New York, California, and Arizona. 

Eyewitnesses, including civilians, pilots, and military personnel, reported seeing the spheres hover silently before moving at extreme speeds, leaving no trace of their departure. 

Some of the sightings have been captured on video or radar, though many remain unexplained. 

'I was walking into work when I looked up and saw two metallic liquid-like objects hovering for about two minutes,' said one witness over Brooklyn's Fort Hamilton in June 2024. 

Another in California described seeing a metallic orb above Los Angeles shortly after a squadron of planes flew by. 

The Pentagon's All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) has been charged with investigating claims of UFOs and has dismissed many as natural phenomena like flocks of birds, conventional aircraft, drones, balloons, or other explainable objects. 

Military drone footage from the Middle east in 2022 revealed a metal sphere flying through the sky in broad daylight (circled in purple)

The crowdsourced platform Enigma reported that over 8,000 orbs have been seen over the US since December 2022

However, some cases have remained unsolved, reportedly due to a lack of data. Of the 757 UFO cases between May 2023 and June 2024 released in AARO's annual report, 21 cases were classified as unresolved sightings.

Although the Pentagon and civilian groups like the National UFO Reporting Center (NUFORC) have also been cataloging these incidents, many have continued to baffle military officials, who have no way of explaining what was seen.

While the new report focused on the thousands of sightings in the US over the last three years, strange orbs have been documented all over the world, from Puerto Rico to the Middle East.

Moreover, these tiny craft have apparently been visiting our skies for decades, with pilots during World War II reporting similar orbs over the skies of Europe.

Enigma revealed that more than 360 'metallic orb' reports took place within a few miles of military bases here on US soil.

In three of those cases, witnesses revealed that the orbs got within five miles of Fort Hamilton in New York, Papago Military Reserve in Arizona, and Los Angeles Air Force Base on multiple occasions.

These mystery orb sightings include one shocking encounter revealed by Dr Sean Kirkpatrick, the former director of AARO, which was captured on a MQ-9 Reaper drone's camera in the Middle East in 2022.

Enigma revealed that witnesses spotted strange orbs flying above Fort Hamilton military base in New York multiple times

Even more close calls were documented around Los Angeles Air Force Base in California between 2022 and 2025

Kirkpatrick warned that if these videos didn't prove that aliens exist, then they're evidence that a rival foreign power could be 'doing stuff in our backyard.'

Some theories have suggested these orbs could be surveillance devices from foreign powers like China or Russia.

Government officials believed they might be advanced drones, due to their tremendous agility and ability to avoid radar, according to a 2022 report in the New York Times.

This theory exploded into rampant paranoia last year, when countless drones were spotted flying over the East Coast, including over key military sites and President Trump's property in New Jersey.

As for Enigma's report, many of the orb sightings have been concentrated in Texas and Florida. 

In fact, visitors at Disney World's Epcot in Florida got an unexpected sight this month, when a glowing orb appeared over the amusement park.

After searching online and finding no information about drones or satellites in the area, Morgan Huelsman, digital director of The Bobby Bones Show, described the object as a 'UFO,' adding, 'definitely a UFO with aliens.'

The Enigma platform has also received sightings from all over the US, over critical infrastructure such as power plants, and over naval vessels at sea.

The Buga Sphere recovered in Colombia (pictured) remains one of the only pieces of physical evidence tied to metallic orb sightings worldwide

However, the most convincing proof of this invasion of mysterious orbs has been found in Colombia, where locals actually recovered a metallic sphere that was seen hovering over the town of Buga in March.

The 'Buga Sphere' has become a major topic of discussion among UFO researchers, with scientists claiming the object contains a maze of fiber-optic wires that suggest it can send and receive signals.

After striking a power line and crashing to the ground, the object also appeared to have somehow dehydrated the field it landed in, killing all the grass and soil where it touched down.

Scientists suggested this was proof that the object produced some kind of energy field, but researchers had not attempted to forcibly cut the object open so far. The sphere has since been taken to Mexico for further analysis.

However, UFO researcher Dr Julia Mossbridge from the University of San Diego is among the many who doubt the authenticity of the Buga Sphere, calling it a 'man-made art project.'

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Interstellar object caught emitting mysterious metal that suggests 'technological origin'

• READ MORE: Mysterious interstellar object aiming at Earth 'not natural'

By STACY LIBERATORE, US SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY EDITOR

An interstellar object speeding through our Solar System has been spotted spewing a metal unlike anything seen in natural comets.

The Very Large Telescope (VLT) in Chile detected an unusual nickel plume from the object, known as 3I/ATLAS. Unlike natural comets, which always emit nickel alongside iron, 3I/ATLAS shows the metallic element without any detectable iron. 

Harvard physicist Avi Loeb highlighted the anomaly described in a new study, noting that this nickel signature is a hallmark of industrial production of nickel alloys.

'Is this anomaly another clue for a possible technological origin of 3I/ATLAS?' Loeb wrote in a blog post.

'The paper suggests that chemical formation occurs through the nickel carbonyl channel, an extremely rare process in comets, but a standard technique in industrial nickel refining,' he added.

The new study, published by astrophysicists in Chile on Wednesday, found that 3I/ATLAS is shedding nickel at roughly five grams per second and cyanide at 20 grams per second, with both rising sharply as the object moves closer to the sun. 

Researchers noted that the mechanisms driving these emissions are not typical of natural cometary processes.

They hypothesized that nickel might be released from dust through gentle processes, such as sunlight, causing it to evaporate or breaking down small nickel-containing compounds.

A new study has revealed that the interstellar object 3I/ATLAS is releasing nickel without iron, an anomaly that a Harvard physicist said could hint at industrial or technological processes

Traditional comets are typically water-rich and release gases such as water, carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide as they approach the sun.

They also emit nickel and iron together, as both elements are produced in the same cosmic processes, like supernova explosions.

3I/ATLAS, however, deviates sharply from this pattern by releasing nickel without any detectable iron.

Additionally, both nickel and cyanide emissions rise steeply as it approaches the sun, unlike the more gradual outgassing seen in normal comets.

NASA also released new observations of 3I/ATLAS this week, taken by SPHEREx and the James Webb Space Telescope, showing that its gas plume is dominated by carbon dioxide and only five percent water.

This makes it unlike the vast majority of comets seen because most of its brightness comes from the cloud of dust around it, not its solid core. 

'These results add to the chemical anomalies implied by the SPHEREx space observatory and Webb space telescope [are] very different from an expected water-rich comet,' Loeb shared in a blog post.

'The idea that the nucleus is much smaller than the 29-mile diameter inferred from the 1-micron data collected by SPHEREx requires a dense coma of dust to reflect nearly all the sunlight from 3I/ATLAS. 

NASA's James Webb captured its first look at the interstellar object this month, showing it is not 12 miles in diameter as originally thought. It's closer to 1.7 miles long

'In that case, the dust would be pushed by solar radiation pressure to trail the nucleus, forming a prominent cometary tail.'

Loeb added that observations from NASA's Hubble Space Telescope failed to identify a cometary tail.

The object was first identified in July 2025 by the ATLAS telescope network, which searches for objects that might hit Earth.

Earlier images taken by the Vera C Rubin Observatory in Chile had unknowingly photographed the object, but no one realized it was there at the time.

Until now, 3I/ATLAS has been a total mystery, as early scans suggested the object was larger than anything that had ever passed through the solar system, and might even be generating its own light.

These characteristics have led Loeb to suggest other possibilities, such that 3I/ATLAS is an artificial craft developed by an extraterrestrial civilization.

The idea has been dismissed by many scientists, including Chris Lintott, an astronomer at the University of Oxford, who said Loeb's theory is 'nonsense on stilts,' calling it 'an insult to the exciting work going on to understand this object.'

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It looks like a giant frying pan, or a crash-landed alien spaceship. 

Whatever it is, Google Maps users are getting seriously freaked out after discovering this strange object in Antarctica. 

The round entity, described as a 'UFO', is hiding under what seems to be a cliff about 90 miles from Antarctica's coast.

With no known origin, people are questioning whether this strange relic at the bottom of the Earth is man-made – or something not of this world. 

One American ufologist suggested the object – almost Oreo-like in appearance – might be stuck under the rock. 

Alternatively, it could be deliberately half-hidden – strategically-placed to make it difficult to spot – as it carries out a mysterious assignment. 

Scott C. Waring, who runs the UFO Sightings Daily website, posted a YouTube clip of the sleek disc being found on Google Maps. 

He said: 'The UFO is still there! Too hard to recover or still being used?' 

Google Maps users are baffled after spotting a 'UFO' hiding under a cliff in Antarctica, which one ufologist suggested might be stuck under there

On Google Maps, the unusual structure can be located simply by entering the coordinates in the search bar – 66°16'24.5"S 100°59'03.5"E. 

As users can see, it is around 45 miles from Mill Island, a domed ice-island 30 miles long and 18 miles wide, close to the Antarctic coast. 

It is also about six miles away from the A. B. Dobrowolski Polar Station, an occasionally active Polish research base. 

Intriguingly, the object seems to have a sliverish line going around the rim, which corresponds with traditional depictions of UFOs from pop culture. 

But otherwise, it has a consistently uniform black colour, which very clearly contrasts with the jagged rock and snow surrounding it. 

Although heavily pixelated, the image also reveals peculiar black lines stretching between the disc-shape and the adjacent rock. 

Philip Mantle, a British UFO researcher, called the disc 'a new one for me', adding that he'd 'never seen it before', but declined to speculate on what it might be.

UFO stands for 'unidentified flying object' and so the term doesn't necessarily describe an object with an extraterrestrial origin. 

Whatever it is, the mysterious Oreo-like object looks rather out of place among the natural geology of Antarctica

Based on clues from reported sightings, the typical UFO has a round shape, usually described as spherical or an orb, with lights emanating from it

On Reddit four years ago, someone posted a screenshot with the caption: 'Any thoughts on the UFO “crash” site in Antarctica?' 

The post received several interesting suggestions from users, who variously described the disk as a 'weather balloon', a 'Nazi base' and a 'pond of meltwater'. 

One commentator said: 'If I had to ditch an advanced spacecraft on a populated planet, I would put it down on an unpopulated continent, and wait for rescue', while someone else joked: 'So that's where my giant pancake ended up after I threw it out the window...' 

Another simply posted 'Antarctica got some weird stuff', while another said it 'looks ominous'. 

Professor Bethan Davies, a glaciologist at the University of Newcastle, said that the feature is simply a 'small lake in a rock basin'. 

'There is a small patch of snow and the warmer lake water has a lower albedo so it absorbs more solar radiation,' she told the Daily Mail. 

'This is melting the snow, giving it the semi circular arc – not a UFO.' 

The object seems to have a sliverish line going around the rim, which corresponds with traditional depictions of UFOs. Pictured, cover of the pulp science fiction magazine Amazing Stories from October 1957, featuring a UFO with lights around the rim

Visible on Google Maps, the unusual structure is stationed in a remote spot in Nevada, about 80 miles (130km) northwest of Las Vegas 

Laura Gerrish, mapping specialist at the British Antarctic Survey, said: 'From the satellite imagery, this round feature looks like a small lake. 

'This area is called the Bunger Hills, which is a largely ice-free region along the Knox Coast in Antarctica - and it has lots of small lakes and ponds. 

'We see that the lakes often form these very smooth edges along the edge of the ice.' 

It’s far from the first time that strange features located on Google Maps have gone viral. 

In April, social media users were captivated by a triangular tower stationed at Area 51 in the Nevada desert.

The imposing structure’s location led conspiracy theorists to speculate that it is somehow involved in alien contact.

However, there was a rational explanation for the tower – not to do with aliens or global warming as people speculated.

This followed a structure in a mountainous region of New Mexico taking the internet by storm, sparking claims of UFOs.

Meanwhile, a 'doorway' spotted in Antarctica, just southeast of the Japanese-run Showa Station, sparked a similar wave of theories across the internet, with one describing it as 'bigfoot's vacation home'.

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Archaeologists unearth structures 7,000 years older than Stonehenge in discovery that reshapes human history

• READ MORE:  Archaeologists discover world's oldest calendar

By STACY LIBERATORE, US SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY EDITOR

Archaeologists have unearthed ancient structures in Turkey that could represent the world's earliest human settlement.

The discovery was made at Mendik Tepe, near Göbekli Tepe, the 12,000-year-old site known for its monumental stone pillars and early rituals.

Experts revealed this week that the newly uncovered structures likely predate Göbekli Tepe, placing them 7,000 years before Stonehenge and extending the timeline of organized settlements and monumental building beyond what scholars once thought. 

The site, located in the rural Payamlı neighborhood of Şanlıurfa's Eyyübiye district, is part of a network of prehistoric settlements that are transforming our understanding of early human societies in the Fertile Crescent.

Unlike Göbekli Tepe, famous for its T-shaped pillars adorned with intricate carvings, Mendik Tepe features upright rectangular stones, suggesting a distinct architectural and cultural identity.

Since excavations began in 2024, the team has uncovered a range of oval-shaped structures, some with elaborate stone walls and fragments of decorated stone vessels.

These findings indicate a sophisticated society capable of complex construction and artistic expression.

Dr Necmi Karul, project coordinator, said: 'Mendik Tepe is an extremely important site for understanding the first settlers in the region.' 

The team uncovered buildings used for food storage, dwellings and ritual spaces

The structures vary significantly in size and function, offering clues to the social organization of these ancient communities.

Smaller buildings, measuring a few feet across, may have served practical purposes such as storage or food preparation, while medium-sized structures could have been dwellings.

Larger buildings, some reaching 13 to 16 feet in height, feature meticulous stonework that suggests ritual or communal significance.

Professor Douglas Baird, leading the excavations, highlighted a large structure's stonework, noting it may have served a ritual or communal purpose.

Preliminary findings suggest Mendik Tepe may date to the earliest phases of the Neolithic period, potentially predating both Göbekli Tepe and Karahantepe, another nearby site known for its anthropomorphic pillars.

This chronology positions Mendik Tepe as a critical piece in understanding Neolithization, the process by which humans adopted agriculture and settled communities.

The Taş Tepeler Project, launched by Türkiye's Ministry of Culture and Tourism, encompasses a dozen Neolithic sites across Şanlıurfa, including Göbekli Tepe, Karahantepe, Çakmak Tepe, and Sayburç. 

These sites, dating back approximately 11,500 years, are rewriting the history of human development by revealing evidence of monumental architecture, social institutions, and early plant cultivation.

Experts noted that the new structures may predate Göbekli Tepe and are likely at least 7,500 years older than Stonehenge, placing them at the very cusp of the Neolithic Revolution

Mendik Tepe's discoveries challenge earlier assumptions that Göbekli Tepe was primarily a ritual site, as its mix of domestic and ceremonial structures suggests a more complex settlement pattern.

The presence of cereal processing and water management systems at nearby sites further indicates that these communities were experimenting with proto-agriculture, a precursor to the agricultural revolution.

'This year, we will focus on understanding the functional differences between these structures,' Professor Baird told AA. 

'Were the smaller ones for storage or food preparation? Were the larger ones residences or ritual spaces? These questions are key to unlocking the site's story.'

Geographically, Mendik Tepe is a hill with an elevation of approximately 3,346 feet, located in a sparsely vegetated region with a Mediterranean climate.

The site is considered a precursor to Göbekli Tepe, which features monumental round, oval, and rectangular megalithic structures built by hunter-gatherers during the Pre-Pottery Neolithic period, between 9,600 and 8,200 BCE.

The Göbekli Tepe site is the oldest man-made structure ever found.

It features  T-shaped stones while the newly found sit was designed with smaller, rectangular stones

These monuments were likely associated with rituals, most probably of a funerary nature.

The distinctive T-shaped pillars, carved with depictions of wild animals, offer valuable insight into the lives and beliefs of people living in Upper Mesopotamia around 11,500 years ago.

Archaeologists recently identified the structures as an ancient calendar, making it the oldest in the world.

The findings suggested that ancient humans had accurate ways to keep time 10,000 years before it was documented in Ancient Greece in 150 BC.

The 2024 research also revealed carvings depicting a comet strike that triggered a 1,200-year mini ice age, leading to the extinction of large animals and spurring the development of agriculture and complex societies. 

Experts said the memorialized event served as the defining moment that forced the ancient people to switch from hunter-gatherer lifestyles to more permanent settlements.

The site features several stone pillars, and after a recent analysis, researchers at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland concluded that one structure was carved to be a calendar.

In 2024, researchers found that Göbekli Tepe was constructed to be a calendar 

The pillar featured a 'V' symbol to represent a single day, which the team found 365 etched throughout.

The structure also included 12 lunar months with 11 additional days.

The pillar was divided into two sections with rows of 'V' symbols at the top and smaller box symbols in the lower main portion, which shows a bird holding a circular disc symbol above a scorpion.

According to the study, published in Time and Mind, the pillar features a disc that represents the sun and the scorpion is representative of the Greek Scorpion constellation.

The team also identified a tall bird bending down toward a wriggling snake, which could depict the autumnal constellation Ophiuchus.

The discovery has suggested that people recorded dates using precession, the wobble in Earth's axis which affects the movement of constellations across the sky.

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The interior of Mars is not smooth and uniform, as depicted in the familiar illustrations in textbooks. New research shows that it is more like an uneven cake than a glazed cookie, as it is usually depicted. The reason for this is traces of ancient collisions.

Collision between Mars and an asteroid. Source: phys.org

InSight mission data

We often imagine rocky planets such as Earth and Mars as having a smooth, layered internal composition — with a crust, mantle, and core stacked on top of each other like the biscuit base, caramel center, and chocolate coating of a Millionaire’s Shortbread cookie. But the reality for Mars is somewhat less neat.

Seismic vibrations detected by NASA’s InSight mission revealed minor anomalies, prompting scientists from Imperial College London and other institutions to uncover a more chaotic reality: Mars’ mantle contains ancient fragments up to 4 km wide, preserved since its formation, like geological fossils. 

History of Giant Collisions

Mars and other rocky planets formed about 4.5 billion years ago when dust and rocks orbiting the young Sun gradually coalesced under the influence of gravity. 

When Mars was almost fully formed, giant objects the size of planets fell onto it as a result of a series of near-catastrophic collisions — the kind that probably also formed Earth’s moon. 

“These colossal impacts released enough energy to melt large parts of the young planet, turning them into huge magma oceans,” said lead researcher Dr. Constantinos Charalambous from the Department of Electrical Engineering and Electronics at Imperial College London. “When these magmatic oceans cooled and crystallized, they left behind pieces of material with an excellent composition — and we believe that this is what we are now discovering in the depths of Mars.”

These early impacts and their aftermath scattered and mixed fragments of the planet’s early crust and mantle — and possibly debris from fallen objects — into the molten inner core. As Mars slowly cooled, these chemically diverse chunks became stuck in the slowly stirring mantle, like ingredients added to a Rocky Road chocolate chip cookie mix, and the stirring was too weak to completely mix everything together.

Unlike Earth, where tectonic plates constantly reshape the crust and mantle, Mars closed early under a fixed outer crust, preserving its inner core as a geological time capsule.

Listening to Mars

The evidence comes from seismic data recorded by NASA’s InSight lander, specifically from eight particularly clear Martian quakes, including two caused by two recent meteorite impacts that left craters 150 meters wide on the surface of Mars. 

InSight detects seismic waves passing through the mantle, and scientists were able to see that higher-frequency waves took longer to reach its sensors from the impact site. These signs of interference, they say, indicate that the interior of the planet is rough rather than smooth.

“These signals showed clear signs of interference as they traveled through Mars’s deep interior,” said Dr. Charalambous. “That’s consistent with a mantle full of structures of different compositional origins—leftovers from Mars’s early days.”

Differences between the geological structure of Mars and Earth

By comparison, the Earth’s crust is constantly shifting slowly and recycling material from the surface into the mantle of our planet — on tectonic plates such as the Cascadia subduction zone, where part of the plates forming the bottom of the Pacific Ocean are subducting beneath the North American continental plate.

The debris found in the mantle of Mars has a striking shape: several large fragments — up to 4 km wide — are surrounded by many smaller ones. Scientists have discovered that the so-called “fractal distribution” of debris in the mantle of Mars occurs when the energy of a catastrophic collision exceeds the strength of the object. In this case, the object breaks into several large fragments and a large number of smaller pieces, as, for example, when a meteorite falls on a planet.

This discovery may be significant for our understanding of how other rocky planets, such as Venus and Mercury, have evolved over billions of years. This new discovery of Mars’ preserved interior composition provides a rare opportunity to glimpse what may lie beneath the surface of immobile worlds.

• According to phys.org

• Posted in News, Science

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SpaceX has released high-resolution photos and videos taken in the Indian Ocean. They show the moment the Starship spacecraft splashed down.

Starship spacecraft splashdown in the Indian Ocean. Source: SpaceX

Starship was launched on August 27 from Starbase in Texas. Unlike previous tests, which ended in accidents, this time the super-heavy rocket performed at its best. The Super Heavy booster successfully completed its mission, then separated from the spacecraft and splashed down in the Gulf of Mexico/Gulf of America. During the descent, SpaceX conducted a series of tests with it, including an experiment to shut down one of the engines and replace it with a backup.

As for Starship, it was launched into a suborbital trajectory. During the flight, the spacecraft deployed eight full-scale Starlink satellite simulators. Despite some “glitches,” such as collisions between models and the gateway during unloading, this stage was completed successfully.

The decisive test for Starship was its entry into the atmosphere. SpaceX specialists deliberately removed a number of heat shield tiles from the most vulnerable parts of the spacecraft to test what damage it would sustain and whether it would be able to survive landing. In addition, in the 47th minute of flight, a mysterious explosion occurred in the engine compartment, damaging the Starship.

Despite all these problems, Starship showed remarkable resilience and managed to splashdown at the designated point, where the SpaceX buoy was located. The images it took show that passing through the atmosphere caused a change in the color of the spacecraft’s heat shield, which appeared to have “rusted.”

Starship spacecraft splashdown in the Indian Ocean. Source: SpaceX

The photographs also clearly show dark marks where Space engineers removed heat shield tiles and damage to the back skirt and flaps caused by the explosion. And what seems even more incredible is that, despite everything, the spacecraft was able to perform a rollover and landing maneuver that placed it approximately 3 meters from its target splashdown point.

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The Universe is challenging us once again. Interstellar object 3I/ATLAS, traveling through the galaxy, is currently passing through our Solar System and continues to surprise scientists. The new data only deepens the mystery of its origin, fueling scientific debate about whether we are dealing with a natural phenomenon or the creation of another civilization.

Interstellar object 3I/ATLAS through the “eyes” of Copilot artificial intelligence

Pure nickel in 3I/ATLAS

The latest research using the powerful Very Large Telescope has discovered another strange anomaly. In the gas trail surrounding 3I/ATLAS, scientists found pure nickel — without the usual iron impurities found in nature. This phenomenon is extremely unusual for comets, as these two elements are usually formed together during supernova explosions and travel through space together.

However, pure nickel is a familiar phenomenon in terrestrial metallurgy, where it is obtained through refining. Although there is a rare natural explanation involving nickel carbonyls, the artificial technological process seems much more plausible. This raises a key question: is this object a product of space manufacturing?

A chain of strange anomalies

The discovery of nickel is not the only thing that surprises scientists. Previously, the SPHEREx and Webb space observatories showed that the object’s gas trail consisted of 95% CO2 and only 5% water. For a normal comet, this is a paradoxical ratio.

Photograph of interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS taken by the Hubble Telescope. Source: NASA/astrafoxen

Furthermore, Hubble’s observations did not reveal a classic comet tail that would extend under the pressure of sunlight. This means that either the core of the object is incredibly massive — a million times larger than the previous interstellar visitor, 2I/Borisov. Or the surface of the interstellar traveler has unusual properties that prevent the formation of a tail. Its trajectory, perfectly aligned with the plane of the planets’ orbits, also raises suspicions that someone deliberately launched it into the inner part of our system. 

Crucial observations of the future

October 3, 2025, will be a decisive moment: 3I/ATLAS will pass 29 million km from the HiRISE camera aboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. This will enable us to obtain images with sufficient resolution to finally determine the size and shape of its nucleus with certainty, separating it from a possible dust coma. 

Nobel Prize winner David Gross suggested going even further and pointing radio telescopes at the object. The goal is to try to record any technological radio signals that may be coming from it. After a century of our own radio transmissions into space, we may finally have an answer.

On the edge of fiction and science

Some eagerly await confirmation of the object’s artificial origin, seeing it as an opportunity for humanity to unite for a common cause. Others hope that it is just a strange but perfectly natural comet, and that its properties are simply characteristic of an object from another star system. However, everyone agrees: 3I/ATLAS is already forcing us to take a fresh look at space and our place in it.

The discovery of such an object, regardless of its nature, gives us a sense of cosmic humility. It reminds us that we may not be the only intelligent beings in the Universe, and that our technologies, including artificial intelligence, may be only the first steps on a long path of development.

Earlier, we reported on how the mysterious glow of interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS was explained.

• According to avi-loeb.medium.com

• Posted in News, Science

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On July 1, 2025, the Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) station at Río Hurtado, Chile, detected something extraordinary: a fast-moving object flagged with the provisional designation A11pl3Z, later named 3I/ATLAS, also cataloged as C/2025 N1 (ATLAS). 

At first glance, it was classified as a comet. But almost immediately, astronomers realized that this visitor was anything but ordinary.  

3I/ATLAS imaged by the James Webb Space Telescope's NIRSpec on 6 August 2025. 

Why 3I/ATLAS is different. 

1. Interstellar Origins Like ʻOumuamua (1I/2017 U1) and Borisov (2I/2019 Q4) before it, 3I/ATLAS is only the third confirmed interstellar object to enter our solar system. Its steep hyperbolic orbit—with an eccentricity greater than 1.02—proves it is not gravitationally bound to the Sun. 
2. A Composition Unlike Any Comet Most comets are rich in water ice. Not 3I/ATLAS. Spectroscopic analysis from both the Hubble Space Telescope and James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) revealed it is dominated by carbon dioxide with one of the highest CO₂-to-water ratios ever measured. This makes it chemically alien compared to the comets that formed in our own solar system. 
3. A Tail That Breaks the Rules Comets typically sprout tails pointing away from the Sun, driven by sublimating ice. 3I/ATLAS, however, displays a dust plume angled toward the Sun—a tail in the “wrong” direction. This phenomenon has never been observed in a natural comet and suggests either unusual physics or engineered behavior. 
4. Perfectly Aligned Trajectory Instead of cutting randomly across the solar system, 3I/ATLAS travels almost exactly along the ecliptic plane, the flat orbital path where Earth, Mars, and most of the planets reside. Statistically, the odds of a random interstellar object aligning this precisely are less than 0.005%. 
5. Unexplained Acceleration Data from radar tracking and JWST confirm subtle but persistent non-gravitational acceleration. Normally, such changes are explained by outgassing jets. Yet Webb detects no coma, no jets, no thermal signature to explain the push. Instead, the acceleration resembles controlled propulsion, similar to how an ion engine expels dust or gas for thrust.  
6. Forward-Facing Glow: Instead of a tail behind it, 3I/ATLAS shines with a glow ahead of its motion, almost as if it were illuminating its path. 
7. Stabilized Rotation: Unlike natural tumbling comets, it appears to maintain attitude control, consistent with artificial stabilization. 
8. Speculations of nuclear propulsion: Harvard astrophysicist Avi Loeb, already known for his bold ʻOumuamua interpretations, has highlighted its non-gravitational acceleration and trajectory. He even speculated that 3I/ATLAS might be nuclear-powered technology, perhaps venting dust as thrust. 
9. 3I/ATLAS will not simply zip past and leave. Its calculated path takes it past several key planets:  Venus flyby – August 2025 

Mars encounter – September 2025 

Jupiter flyby – late 2026 

Tilted view of 3I/ATLAS's trajectory through the Solar System, with orbits and positions of planets shown. Such a sequence of planetary passes looks less like coincidence and more like a deliberate survey trajectory. 

Finally, on October 30, 2025, the object will reach perihelion, its closest approach to the Sun. Crucially, at that moment it will be hidden directly behind the Sun from Earth’s perspective, a perfect opportunity for a stealth maneuver if it is indeed under intelligent control. 

10. And the latest news on this object is that 3I/ATLAS shows signs of alien electroplating.  Astronomers using the Very Large Telescope (VLT) in Chile have detected something never before seen in a natural comet, a plume of pure nickel gas, laced with cyanide, but completely lacking iron. 

This is not how comets behave. In every known case, nickel and iron are paired together in space rocks, asteroids, and cosmic debris. The absence of iron in 3I/ATLAS makes it impossible to explain through natural processes. 

The nickel-cyanide combination looks eerily familiar to something we know from human technology: nickel-cyanide electroplating. This industrial process is used to coat and protect metals like iron, creating a corrosion-resistant shell. When heated, such a coating releases nickel vapor and cyanide gas, the exact chemical fingerprint astronomers now see venting from 3I/ATLAS. 

Renowned astrophysicist Avi Loeb has already highlighted this bizarre discovery, stressing that the nickel-only signature matches industrial alloy production rather than anything we’d expect from natural comet chemistry. 

Pure nickel without iron: impossible in natural comets. 

Nickel + cyanide plume: matches electroplated coatings. 

Artificial signature: hallmark of industrial processes. 

Putting it all together, so far: 

It is an interstellar visitor on a hyperbolic escape path. 

It has a carbon dioxide–dominated composition, nearly devoid of water. 

It has a dust plume points toward the Sun, breaking cometary rules. 

It has a trajectory which is perfectly aligned with the ecliptic plane. 

It shows mysterious acceleration without visible outgassing. 

It exhibits a forward glow, possible radio emissions, and signs of stabilization. 

It will perform planetary flybys. It probably has nuclear propulsion. 

It has an electroplated shell. 

Mainstream astronomers remain cautious, still labeling 3I/ATLAS as a comet, but with mounting evidence, we may be staring at the first tangible proof of alien technology crossing our solar system, a probe from another civilization on a reconnaissance mission, silently mapping habitable worlds before making contact.

 

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{ https://ufosightingshotspot.blogspot.com/ }

Navy Officer Says Underwater UFOs Are Legitimate Threats. The Evidence Is Hard to Ignore.

In mid-2014, during training flights off the coast of Virginia Beach, Virginia, F/A-18 pilot and U.S. Navy Lieutenant Ryan Graves began to notice something strange. The radar returns looked off—phantom blips moving with unfathomable speed and precision. At first he dismissed it as a glitch. But then the anomalies returned, recorded by the fighter jets’ sophisticated sensors. They would hover in place—and then dart away at supersonic speeds. They were recorded from the ocean’s surface to 40,000 feet.

“Sometimes stationary—0.0 Mach. Other times 250 to 350 knots . . .. Sometimes even supersonic—1.1 to 1.2 Mach. All altitudes. And always over the ocean,” Graves says.

After appearing only as glitches on the jets’ radar, the objects on one occasion finally came into view. Graves reported seeing a dark gray or black cube inside a clear sphere, between five and 15 feet in diameter, coming within 50 feet of their jets. “That was the turning point,” Graves says. “We started treating it as a safety issue.”

Over the next year, Graves’s squadron recorded sightings of unidentified objects almost daily. Sometimes the objects flew in loose formations. Other times they traveled alone. They had no exhaust, no visible propulsion, no wings. Sometimes the object would rotate in place; others vanished when approached. As it turned out, pilots stationed off the West Coast—on missions aboard the USS Nimitz, the USS Princeton, and other carriers—had been experiencing similar things for years.

Some of these craft—now classified as UAPs (unidentified anomalous phenomena)—appeared to be capable of transmedium travel, meaning they are able to move from air to sea without slowing, splashing, or emitting heat. They challenged every assumption held by aerospace engineers and radar operators.

Graves doesn’t claim to know what the objects were. But one thing was clear. “This wasn’t business as usual,” he says. “There was a serious issue at play. It wasn’t just one rogue object. It wasn’t just us on the East Coast. It wasn’t just my squadron. It was a pattern. This was global.”

Since at least the 1950s, military sources have reported strange objects plunging into the ocean—what they call USOs (unidentified submerged objects). These phenomena exhibit characteristics that conflict with our understanding of physics and maritime navigation. As radar and similar technologies have advanced, so have the number of sightings.

Today Graves is one of the most vocal advocates for UAP transparency. Now retired from the military, he’s the founder of Americans for Safe Aerospace, the largest UAP-focused pilot safety initiative in the world, and works with former Pentagon and naval officials to push for greater transparency. He doesn’t claim that these craft are alien, but he’s certain that they aren’t using known human tech. “Where that leaves us opens up options—extraterrestrial visitors, time travelers, breakaway civilizations . . . things that challenge the status quo and aren’t easily accepted at face value,” he says.

Rear Admiral Tim Gallaudet, PhD, an oceanographer, was one of the first to view footage from the UAP incidents in 2015 involving fighter jets attached to the USS Theodore Roosevelt, which at the time was conducting training exercises off the coast of Florida. Two videos captured by Navy fighter jets that were made public in 2020 show strange craft flying at incredible speeds with no visible means of propulsion, sometimes rotating in midair. “I knew then that what I saw was not our technology. We don’t test experimental aircraft in training ranges—it’s too dangerous—and I had access to everything classified. No nation has craft that can move like that,” he says.

Gallaudet, now retired from the Navy and currently the CEO of Ocean STL Consulting, is pushing for the U.S. government to treat these phenomena as a “national research priority.” Despite some public disclosures, many records remain classified, buried within defense contractor vaults or shielded by national security exemptions. If even part of what’s been reported is true, then the encounters off Virginia, California, and elsewhere could be the opening chapter in a much deeper mystery—one that spans oceans, navies, and continents.

This spring, Graves and Gallaudet briefed officials in Washington, D.C., on unidentified submerged objects. “We’re at a unique moment in history,” Graves says. “People have access to tools that can reveal things. The momentum is building.”

That momentum has already begun reshaping policy. In 2023, Congress passed the UAP Disclosure Act, legislation requiring federal agencies to collect, catalog, and disclose records related to recovered nonhuman craft and biologics. For the first time, U.S. law openly acknowledged the potential existence of off-world or nonhuman intelligence, and even hinted at craft retrieval and reverse engineering programs.

Those newly released records contain a trove of details on previously classified encounters with multiple transmedium UAPs. None definitively prove that otherworldly beings are hiding in or above our oceans, but they do raise questions that neither our military nor scientific experts can explain.

“The possibility that they exist underwater is very real,” Gallaudet says. “They could come from another galaxy, if they’ve conquered the engineering challenge of that,” he says. “Or why not—maybe they lived here for a long time, before we even evolved, and sought safety from the Earth’s atmospheric and geologic cataclysms by creating a habitat or place to live beneath the seafloor. . .. That’s one hypothesis.”

The following four incidents have provided investigators with the most compelling—and perplexing—evidence so far of transmedium encounters with what experts like Gallaudet believe could be nonhuman in origin.

In November 2004, several U.S. Navy pilots assigned to the USS Nimitz encountered a Tic Tac–shaped UAP darting and dashing over the Pacific. According to reports that followed, the object lacked visible control surfaces and heat signatures that would be typical of jet aircraft or rockets. It never made a sonic boom, although it appeared to be traveling faster than the speed of sound.

The incident began when the USS Princeton, a guided-missile cruiser escorting the Nimitz off the coast of San Diego, picked up strange radar contacts. The objects appeared at 80,000 feet, and then dropped to sea level in less than a second. F/A-18 Commander David Fravor and Lieutenant Commander Jim Slaight scrambled to intercept the object. Each man claims to have seen a smooth, white oblong object around 30 to 40 feet long, with no wings, no windows, no markings. It hung in the air just over the sea.

As Fravor circled downward, the object suddenly shot away, vanishing in seconds. “It just disappeared. Like a bullet out of a gun,” Fravor told Fox News.

The strike group dispatched a second flight. This time the object was captured on an infrared camera showing a white speck flying against the wind, rotating and maneuvering in ways no known aircraft can.

One of the most hotly debated encounters of an unidentified submerged object came in April 2013, when an infrared surveillance camera operated by U.S. Customs and Border Protection captured something extraordinary over Aguadilla, Puerto Rico. A small spherical object flew inland from the ocean, crossed the airport, and then returned to sea—where it maneuvered in ways that appeared to defy physics.

The three-minute video, published by the Scientific Coalition for UAP Studies, has become a key piece of evidence suggesting the possibility of transmedium travel. It shows the object entering the water without slowing down—no splash, no wake, no disruption. Seconds later it resurfaces, splits in two, and then submerges again. Any object passing between two mediums should generate drag or turbulence or, at the very least, a splash, according to the laws of hydrodynamics. But this one behaved as if those laws didn’t apply.

“It’s not that they break the laws,” Gallaudet says. “It’s that they demonstrate engineering capabilities we haven’t yet developed. We can’t build anything that can do that today.”

“I’ve spoken with the pilots who saw it,” he adds. “The near-instantaneous acceleration of that craft is something we just can’t engineer.”

A pilot of a U.S. Navy CH-53 Sea Stallion helicopter, like the one shown above, reportedly encounted a UAP while flying off the coast of Puerto Rico.

Caribbean Sea, Unspecified date

In the 1990s, a Navy CH-53 Sea Stallion pilot was flying off the coast of Puerto Rico when he saw something he couldn’t explain. His crew, on a routine mission to retrieve a BQM target drone that had previously been dropped into the ocean, had sent a diver into the water to connect the drone to the helicopter’s hoist system. But just before the helo was about to lift the 20-foot-long drone out of the sea, something pulled it violently downward. The pilot, whose name has not been disclosed, would later report that the object was a large, dark mass unlike any submarine or marine animal he’d ever seen.

After F/A-18 Commander David Fravor went public with the previous incident he witnessed flying off the USS Nimitz, he says the Sea Stallion pilot contacted him to relay the story. Fravor then shared details on Joe Rogan’s podcast in 2019.

“The helo drops a swimmer in the water, he hooks the whole thing up, and they fly back,” Fravor said. “The first time they were out and they were going to pick up a BQM, he’s sitting in the front—in the CH-53 you can see down by your feet—and as he’s looking down, they’re 50 feet above the water, he sees this kind of dark mass coming up from the depths.”

As the pilot picked up the BQM, he was apparently at a loss for words. “He’s looking at this thing going, ‘What the hell is that?’ And then it just goes back down underwater. Once they pull the kid and the BQM out of the water, this object descends back into the depths.”

It began as a blip. In July 2019, an infrared camera aboard the USS Omaha captured something that defied explanation: a spherical object moving swiftly over the Pacific before dropping into the ocean—again, no splash, no wake, no debris. The footage, later verified by Pentagon officials, stunned observers. The object didn’t resemble any known drone, missile, or aircraft. And its disappearance beneath the waves raised new questions about transmedium tech.

In the incident, the crew of the Omaha (which was also sailing off the San Diego coast) recorded a spherical UAP hovering just over the surface of the Pacific Ocean. The ship’s sensor that caught the object was the sophisticated AN/KAX-2—a stabilized sensor turret built for maritime environments that includes a digital video camera, night vision camera, and laser rangefinder.

The video shows a recording of the AN/KAX-2 screen and appears to have been taken with a night vision camera. The object seemingly moves, tracked by the sensor operator, and then hovers just above the ocean’s surface. Then the object disappears.

A pilot of a U.S. Navy CH-53 Sea Stallion helicopter, like the one shown above, reportedly encounted a UAP while flying off the coast of Puerto Rico.

An infrared sensor onboard a U.S. Customs and Border Protection aircraft captured footage of a UAP over Rafael Hernández Airport near Aguadilla, Puerto Rico.

“It looked nothing like any known aircraft,” Gallaudet says. “After I testified before Congress last year, a sailor who had been on the bridge of the Omaha contacted me. He said the object was just one of many—and that he’d witnessed a similar event aboard the USS Jackson in 2023.”

{ https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/ }

Bermuda Triangle mystery cracked as new 'splashing in bathtub' theory revealed

Dr Simon Boxall says rogue waves, not UFOs, cause Bermuda Triangle vanishings, with wild currents and storms in the Florida-Puerto Rico-Bermuda region swallowing ships and planes.

BY  Edward Easton

Oceanographer Dr Simon Boxall from the University of Southampton reckons he's blown the lid off the infamous region

(Image: Getty Images/Science Photo Library RF)

For years the Bermuda triangle has been a source of head scratching, with the high number of disappearances and disasters in the region a cause of bafflement for boffins and internet conspiracists alike. But now one Oceanographer claims to have solved the mystery.

Oceanographer Dr Simon Boxall from the University of Southampton reckons he's blown the lid off the infamous region, blaming colossal ‘rogue waves’ for swallowing ships and crews whole.

Nestled between Florida, Puerto Rico, and Bermuda, the Bermuda Triangle has spooked sailors and aviators for over a century.

Countless ships and planes have vanished without a trace, fuelling wild theories of UFOs and paranormal forces. But Dr Boxall insists science holds the answers.

“It’s not some Poseidon Adventure-style mystery,” he told the Daily Mail. “It’s rogue waves, massive walls of water, up to 100 feet tall, formed in perfect storm conditions.”

First identified in the 1990s, rogue waves are freak crests that can snap a ship in half.

“Imagine a supertanker, 400 meters long, caught between two waves, one propping up the bow, another the stern. The middle’s left hanging with no support,” Boxall explained. “The ship just breaks.”

These waves form when storms collide, their waves amplifying into towering 20- or 30-meter beasts. “It’s like splashing in a bathtub,” he said.

“Waves combine, and you get a massive ‘plop’ - a rogue wave. ”The Triangle’s deadly reputation isn’t just down to waves, though. Boxall points to stormy weather, human error, and inexperience as key culprits.

He debunked the 1945 disappearance of Navy bombers, a poster child for Triangle mysteries, as a case of a cocky commander misreading his position.

“Radio messages showed his students warning they were off course, but he ignored them,” Boxall said. “They weren’t experienced, despite the myths.”

Satellite tech now helps spot rogue waves, but Boxall stresses they don’t strike from calm seas. “No mariner would be out in those storms unless they were reckless,” he said.

While the public’s fascination with the Triangle fuels outlandish theories, most scientists dismiss it as a non-mystery. “There’s nothing there,” Boxall said, though he admits some enthusiasts reject his rational take. “People cling to myths, ignoring facts.”

{ https://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/ }