Russian USO Sightings

Russian USO Sightings

Date: 1960s to present

Location: At Sea

V.V. Krapiva, a researcher and writer who resides in Odessa, Ukraine, years ago had attended numerous lectures presented by veteran officers of Soviet nuclear powered submarines. They had served in the Soviet North, aboard secret naval installations and bases. The lectures sometimes veered off from the planned presentations, and many spellbinding tales were told as a result. For instance, episodes when Soviet sonar-operators (military hydroacoustics technicians) were hearing strange targets present at great depths. Soviet Navy submarines were actually being chased by other submarines.

Mysterious Object Pursues

An interesting observation of a UFO was recorded by a crew of a Soviet nuclear submarine in 1965. This case is on file in the Colonel Kolchin archives. All those who had observed the UFO were ordered to report the details and provide drawings to the Special Department (i.e., Naval Intelligence).

The submarine was to rendezvous with a ship in the Atlantic Ocean. They arrived at the meeting place an hour and a half before the time of the rendezvous, and the captain allowed the crew to come to the outside deck. No ships were in the area, and the sky was starry and cloudless.

Then the watchman observed a cigar-shaped object moving noiselessly through the sky. Although the submarine was in international waters at the time, the Soviets assumed the unidentified object was American, and decided to dive immediately. But their onboard radar did not record anything, and the captain decided to stay put, above-water. Suddenly three rays shot out from the UFO, and the Soviet submariners noticed something very unusual about the object.

The UFO had no gondolas, and no horizontal or vertical rudders. The object was about 740' long, and Soviet submariners were not familiar with such dirigibles, for those used by American Air Force were much smaller.

Then something strange took place, the UFO slowly descended to the surface of the ocean, its searchlights still on, about half a mile from the submarine, and dove underwater. The submarine’s sonar had registered a strange and very intensive hissing sound, as the UFO submerged, but the sound was of a very short duration.

Reports from Kuzovkin

A well-known Soviet UFO researcher and author A.S. Kuzovkin had been engaged in UFO research ever since he observed one such object in 1964. He was a physicist and researched ecology of anomalous phenomena for Vokrug Sveta, a very popular Soviet magazine. Kuzovkin mentioned in his writings that while visiting Sevastopol, a port city in Ukraine, he met with local marine scientists who had descended into the depths of the Black Sea in deep-water bathyscaphes. They observed, among other things, an object that resembled a wheel as large as a ten-story building, standing vertically underwater. The scientists saw and later described to Kuzovkin the “wheel” that would remain immobile for a while, and then move into a horizontal position, rotate, and depart.

Another well-known Russian researcher of the paranormal, author Aleksandr Petukhov, mentioned an incident from 1951.

It took place in the territorial waters of the USSR. A Soviet submarine encountered a strange underwater object of gigantic size.It did not react to the submarine communication to identify itself, and continued an unhurried movement towards the nation’s shores. The captain of the submarine ordered depth charges to be dropped into the site where USO was located. The unidentified object did not react to the attack, and continued its course, at the same speed. After a while it unexpectedly and abruptly ascended to the surface of the sea. At the depth of 50 meters, it stopped its ascent, changed the course, and departed.

Yargora Sighting

In July of 1978, there was a UFO sighting in the Mediterranean. The captain of the Soviet motor ship Yargora immediately sent a radiogram about it to the Soviet Academy of Sciences. The coordinates of the sighting were 37 degrees northern latitude and 3 degrees 40 minutes of eastern longitude. The time was between 7:30 a.m. - 8:40 a.m. The object observed by Soviet seamen was shaped like a flattened-out sphere; its color that of a white pearl. There were three protruding constructions in the bottom portion of the UFO; they resembled antennae. The object moved from east to west. No reply to the radiogram ever came from the Academy. This sighting was mentioned in the 2001 article written by Valentin Psalomschikov, and published in NLO magazine. An unnamed Russian source mentioned that Yargora’s Captain Cherepanov sent a telegram from the ship to Moscow, Soviet Academy of Sciences, regarding the sighting.

On December 26, 2002, the Russian newspaper Zhizn published an article about Soviet observations of UFOs. The chairman of the Anomalous Phenomena Commission of the Russian Geographical Society in Saint Petersburg made a presentation at the society’s monthly meeting. The society, founded in 1980, had studied tens of thousands of cases UFO sightings, and had reached the conclusion that UFOs are real.

The chairman at the time, Yevgeny Litvinov, recalled that his experience with the UFOs had begun when he was a Soviet Navy officer and did not take seriously any published UFO-related information. Then came the winter of 1979-80, and several incidents had rocked the Northern Fleet, forcing the Soviet general staff to take UFOs seriously. UFOs had visited a Soviet submarine base at the Western Dvina every week during a six-month period.

The craft were shaped like disks, and hovered over the armaments’ (mines, torpedoes, and nuclear weapons) preparation sites. The UFOs also flew above the top secret Soviet military town. While the military personnel below freely observed the “flying saucers,” the anti-aircraft radars did not register anything. Captain Beregovoy, head of the Naval Intelligence for the Northern Fleet, ordered that photographs of the UFOs be taken, but to no avail; the film turned out to be accidentally exposed each time.

The Soviets were busy trying to find out the nature of UFOs flying over their heads. Initially they suspected NATO, but then it was explained to them that potential adversaries do not possess such technology. To prevent panic, those in command told their military personnel that the UFOs above were actually Soviet-made craft, and that tests were underway. Of course, high-ranking officers knew better, and felt terrified by the uncertainty.

Rather serious incidents took place during that winter. The crew of a Soviet Project 671 submarine (“Victor” class sub, per NATO classification) encountered a UFO. The sub’s commander was Aleksey Korzhev. The sub was coming to the base; sometimes it surfaced, sometimes it would descend to 200 meters. They wanted to be undetected by spy satellites. Then they received a report that up and straight ahead was an airplane. The commander was surprised, for the weather was absolutely not conducive for aircraft flights. But fifty meters from the sub a silvery disc was hovering, slowly moving with the sub, staying a bit ahead of it. The crew looked at it, feeling mesmerized. Then the UFO emitted a ray of light, and this pillar of bright white light did not immediately reach the surface of the water, but contrary to the laws of physics, it slowly descended. Korzhev immediately ordered a change of the ship’s course. The disc slowly ascended and disappeared in the clouds. Litvinov said that the Soviets speculated that the UFO wanted to scan the submarine that actually happened to carry new weapons aboard.

Soroka’s Report

Mikhail Soroka, a paranormal phenomena researcher from Kiyiv, Ukraine, also described the same incident in more detail in an interview he gave to FAKTY newspaper (December 2007). Soroka mentioned fascinating details of the USO encounter when a nuclear submarine was accompanying a surface vessel. The submarine surfaced, and a large object appeared in the sky. Its shape was that of mushroom with its cap turned down. Its bottom part shone white light; the part above shone yellow light; the next part shone reddish light; and the uppermost part shone bright red light. The object not only approached the ships, but also directed toward one of them a ray from its searchlight. Then the object unexpectedly disappeared. He also mentioned that Soviet Navy’s intelligence believed that UFOs generally appeared over military vessels and coastal installations.

Later, when Litvinov was with the special commission of the Soviet Navy’s main staff, he was able to read dozens of UFO reports that came from the intelligence channels. One report described a UFO landing in Motovsky Bay in the Barents Sea. Years later, a leakage of liquid radioactive waste from a spent fuel storage facility took place in the Motovsky Bay and Litsa Fjord.

Zapadnaya Litsa is the largest and most important Russian naval base for nuclear-powered submarines. The base is located on the Litsa Fjord at the westernmost point of the Kola Peninsula, about 45 kilometers from the Norwegian border. The Litsa Fjord heads into the Kola Peninsula interior from the Motovsky Fjord, just across from the southeastern coast of the Rybachky Peninsula.

Few people in the West know exactly what was going on there during the Soviet rule. No radar station in the vicinity registered the UFOs. Soviet experts assumed that an ionized cloud enveloped the UFOs.

Another incident, mentioned by Litvinov to Zhizn, comes from the archives of the Russia’s Geographic Society. It took place in the Mediterranean, in November 1976. Soviet diesel submarine Project 641 (“Foxtrot”, per NATO classification), navigated through the Gibraltar, and surfaced. It was at 2:00 am, and the sea was absolutely still. The captain, the watch officer, and signalman came to the submarine deck to verify the vessel’s coordinates.

Suddenly they noticed a radiant silvery sphere to the left, over the horizon. The sphere ascended rapidly, and suddenly they saw right in front of the sub, on the water, a radiant map of the Mediterranean. It appeared at precisely the moment when the navigator was to determine the sub’s location measuring the position of stars. The impression was that someone aboard the sphere read the Russia navigator’s thoughts. Moreover, the radiant map also indicated the sub’s position. The sphere flew away, and the map disappeared.

Causes Investigated

Yevgeny Litvinov revealed in the interview that he is convinced that UFOs exist. But he puts aside his convictions when he is asked to determine the veracity of reports.

He has developed a complex method for systematic selection (as is done by intelligence officers). His scale of credible authenticity is based on 350 criteria.

Litvinov has concluded that out of all data, about 70 percent result from technogenic reasons; natural phenomena, or mystification. But the other 30 percent are real observations of UFOs. There are too many of them to simply wave them away. His database contains 10,000 observations and incidents. Litvinov stated that most often UFOs are observed over military installations, areas of ecological disasters, and geological faults.

In the 1970s, reports issued by Admiral V.A. Domislovsky, chief of the Pacific Fleet’s intelligence department, described an unknown, gigantic cylindrical object sighted by Soviet Navy in faraway regions of Pacific Ocean. The object was 800-900 meters long. When it hovered over the ocean, smaller objects exited from one of its ends (like bees from a beehive) and descended into the waters. Some time later they reentered the gigantic UFO. After the smaller objects entered, the UFO would fly away and disappear over the horizon. This information was revealed in Vladimir Ajaja’s interviews to Russian media.

Too Fast for Comfort

According to MosNews.com (July 16, 2009), former Rear Admiral and nuclear submarine commander Yury Beketov was quoted describing events that occurred in the Bermuda Triangle. “We repeatedly observed that the instruments detected the movements of material objects at unimaginable speed, around 250 m.p.h.

“It’s hard to reach that speed on the surface — only in the air [is it readily possible]… The beings that created those material objects significantly exceed us in development.”

Russian Naval intelligence expert and Captain First Rank Igor Barklay noted that the unidentified objects were most often spotted in deep water near where military forces are concentrated off the Bahamas, Bermuda, Puerto Rico, and the east coast of the United States.

The February issue of the remarkable Belarus newspaper Sekretniye Issledovaniya (Issue 3{212}), contained an article written by Valeriya Peresilkina. Titled Zagadki glubin (Secrets of the depths), it lists cases of USOs observed by the Russian Navy in various seas of our planet.

The author mentions Captain First Rank (retired) Yuri Vinogradov who had served in the Soviet Navy from 1975 to 2000. A top expert in his field, he had been involved in a number of submarine search and recovery operations; a veteran of high-risk units, and a participant in four long-range missions. He had been to the Devil’s Sea; also know as the Dragon Triangle it is located between Japan, Guam, and northern Philippines. Some call this area the Pacific Bermuda Triangle.

In the 1980s, Vinogradov had participated in the search and rescue operations of the Soviet Pacific Fleet (submarines and surface vessels had been involved). Twice he and other officers had observed, on the sonar screen, a USO that had moved at great speed, and disappeared in the depths.

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