Chilean officials have officially released video of what they call an Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon, or a UAP, captured in 2014 by two officers in the Chilean Navy flying an Airbus Cougar AS-532 helicopter equipped with an infrared high-definition FLIR camera.

According the report submitted by an unnamed captain within the Chilean Navy, the helicopter was on patrol in the “coastal sector between the port of San Antonio and Quinteros” on November 11, 2014, when the FLIR camera operator spotted an unknown object flying at a consistent speed similar to that of their helicopter.  They were traveling at approximately one hundred and fifty two miles per hour at an altitude of 4,500 feet with “perfect horizontal visibility.”

The official Chilean government statement continues:

“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 arranged 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.  On two occasions, the object seemed to throw a trail of some element that could not be specified.”

The flying object was observed and tracked over a span of approximately forty miles, at different points hovering in the clouds and occasionally releasing what appeared to be some sort of gas as it moved along.  Puzzlingly, the gas releases were not consistent with a means of propulsion, based on the direction the craft was moving in at the time.

The formal report, released by The Committee for the Study of Anomalous Aerial Phenomena, a branch of the Chilean government tasked with analyzing such claims, included testimonials from both the pilot and the camera’s technician.  The pilot described the craft as visible to the naked eye and a “flat, elongated structure with two thermal spotlights like discharges that did not coincide with the axel of motion.” The FLIR camera technician described it as “white with a semi-oval shape on the horizontal axis.”

After about eight minutes of filming the craft, the technician noted that it released a burst of hot material, a puzzling development that it would repeat moments later.

“In two instances it discharged some type of gas or liquid with a high thermal track or signal,” the technician testified in his statement.  In the video, the plumes of hot material can be seen trailing behind the craft as it continues moving.

The video has been analyzed by Chile’s Committee for the Study of Anomalous Aerial Phenomena, or CEFAA, for the past two years, but they have made no progress in identifying the craft or explaining away its strange behavior.  Nearby air traffic controllers were interviewed and said they were not able to identify any aircraft in the area that fit the pilot or camera operator’s description on radar.  The pilot also confirmed that the helicopter’s on-board radar was unable to detect the craft they tracked visually.

Eight meetings have been held by the Chilean Navy and CEFAA wherein experts from the scientific community were asked to aid in identifying the strange craft seen in the video, including noted Astrophysicist Luis Barrera.  Ultimately, no consensus could be made regarding the craft in question.

CEFAA’s General, Ricardo Bermudez, offered an official statement regarding the video when releasing the footage, and their findings, to the public.

“We do not know what it was, but we do know what it was not,” General Bermudez said.  “This has been one of the most important cases in my career as director of CEFAA because our Committee was at its best. The CEFAA is well-regarded partly because there is full participation from the scientists of the academic world, the armed forces through their representatives, and the aeronautic personnel from the DGAC, including its Director. I am extremely pleased as well with the conclusion reached which is logical and unpretentious.”

Skeptics have reason to question the video however, as the results were released to UFO blogs and less-than-reputable news sources, rather than being published in a peer-reviewed scientific journal.  The original video has also not been released for independent analysis, prompting some to suggest that it may not withstand the rigors of a third-party investigation.

If the footage, and CEFAA’s analysis of it, is to be believed, this could be the best evidence to date of aliens visiting our planet, or more likely, an as-yet unidentified stealth aircraft in use in Chilean air space.  Now that the video has been released to the public, believers are applauding Chile’s transparency while those with a more critical eye are working to develop a more plausible explanation for the images captured on the FLIR camera.

One thing is for certain, until a reasonable explanation can be fielded by skeptics, this video will continue to ignite debate within the UFO research and scientific communities.

You can watch a short excerpt from the video here.

Image courtesy of CEFAA