JAL Flight 1628 UFO Case, Pictures, Video

JAL Flight 1628 UFO Incident, Radar Confirmation, Military Confirmation, FAA Confirmation

Captain Kenji Terauchi showing how his plane had to maneuver 

to avoid the UFO and a sketch he later made

On November 17, 1986, a Japanese crew of a JAL (Japan Airlines) cargo jumbo freighter aircraft witnessed three unidentified objects while flying over Alaska, USA. The Boeing 747 cargo plane cargo plane was on a routine flight from Paris to Tokyo cruising at 966 km/h (600MPH) at an altitude of 10 600 m (35,000 ft).

The plane was heading towards Anchorage, Alaska to re-fuel when at 17:11 Captain Kenji Terauchi reported seeing three large objects 610 m (2000 ft) below, describing the largest as resembling a shelled walnut. Captain Terauchi further described the largest craft as twice the size of an aircraft carrier, after several minutes observing the objects the crew noticed the objects matched the same speed as freighter aircraft. The two smaller objects veered 305 m (1000 ft) in front of the craft so much so that the captain said he could feel the warmth of their glows. Military radar picked up the two objects trailing the JAL flight and the FAA requested military intervention which Captain Terauchi declined due to his knowledge of the Thomas Mantell Case, the military did not take any action however the objects stopped trailing JAL 1628 and the airline arrived safely in Anchorage at 18:20.

Captain Terauchi cited in the official FAA report that the object was a UFO. However, for reasons unknown, the FAA did not pursue the case in depth

The US Air Force KC 135 jet flying from Anchorage to Fairbanks saw the same object in January 1987 flying from Anchorage to Fairbanks, saying that the object was 12 m (40 ft) from his aircraft. The object then disappeared out of sight.

Captain Terauchi lost his flying status for reporting the incident to the public, but 15 years later, the story was corroborated by John Callahan, retired Division Chief of the Accidents and Investigations Branch of the FAA. According to Callahan (see video below), his boss FAA administrator Admiral Donald D. Engen briefed members of President Reagan's Scientific Study Team, the FBI and the CIA in Washington, D.C. We know the details today because Callahan attended the secret meeting and saved all audio and video evidence of the event.

Captain Terauchi cited in the official FAA report that the object was a UFO. In December 1986, Terauchi gave an interview to a Kyodo News journalists. JAL soon grounded him for talking to the press, and moved him to a desk job. He was only reinstated as a pilot years afterwards, and retired eventually in north Kanto, Japan.

Kyodo News contacted Paul Steucke, the FAA public information officer in Anchorage on December 24, and received confirmation of the incident, followed by UPI on the 29th. The FAA's Alaskan Region consulted John Callahan, the FAA Division Chief of the Accidents and Investigations branch, as they wanted to know what to tell the media about the UFO.At the time John Calahan was unaware of any such incident, considering it a likely early flight of a stealth bomber, then in development. He asked the Alaskan Region to forward the relevant data to their technical center in Atlantic City, New Jersey, where he and his superior played back the radar data and tied it in with the voice tapes by videotaping the concurrent playbacks.

A day later at FAA headquarters they briefed Vice Admiral Donald D. Engen, who watched the whole video of over half an hour, and asked them not to talk to anybody until they were given the OK, and to prepare an encompassing presentation of the data for a group of government officials the next day.The meeting was attended by representatives of the FBI, CIA and President Reagan’s Scientific Study Team, among others. 

Upon completion of the presentation, all present were told that the incident was secret and that their meeting "never took place". According to Callahan, the officials considered the data to represent the first instance of recorded radar data on a UFO, and they took possession of all the presented data.John Callahan however managed to retain the original video, the pilot's report and the FAA's first report in his office. The forgotten target print-outs of the computer data were also rediscovered, from which all targets can be reproduced that were in the sky at the time.

After a three month investigation, the FAA formally released their results at a press conference held on March 5, 1987. Here Paul Steucke retracted earlier FAA suggestions that their controllers confirmed a UFO, and ascribed it to a "split radar image" which appeared with unfortunate timing. He clarified that "the FAA [did] not have enough material to confirm that something was there", and though they were "accepting the descriptions by the crew" they were "unable to support what they saw". 

JAL Flight 1628 remains one of the best documented and most credible UFO cases of record.