State Department cable: 747 + 3 Americans witness 'enormous' bright light at 41,000 ft
A 1994 U.S. State Department diplomatic cable from Kazakhstan, declassified in PURSUE Release 01, records a Tajik Air 747 captain plus three U.S. citizens on board observing what the cable describes as a 'bright light of enormous intensity' at 41,000 feet over Kazakh airspace.
- Record type
- Official Statement
- Primary source
- linked
- Named witnesses
- 0
- Media
- 2
On January 27, 1994, the captain of a Tajik Air 747 in cruise over Kazakhstan, along with three U.S. citizens on board, reported observing a 'bright light of enormous intensity' at the aircraft's altitude of approximately 41,000 feet. The U.S. embassy in Almaty cabled the encounter to Washington four days later, on January 31, 1994.
What makes this cable notable in PURSUE Release 01 is the corroboration: multi-nationality observers, including U.S. private citizens whose identities the State Department vouched for, at commercial cruising altitude where conventional explanations (mirage, ground glint, low-altitude weather phenomena) are not available.
The cable was released alongside Cable 1 (Papua New Guinea, January 1985) — together the two cables form the publicly released diplomatic-channel portion of PURSUE Release 01.
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