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- Latin America· 2014civilian claim
On November 11, 2014, two Chilean Navy officers in an Airbus Cougar AS-532 helicopter filmed an unidentified object for nine minutes using a Wescam MX-15 HD infrared camera west of Santiago. The object was invisible to the naked eye and emitted two separate thermal plumes. Neither on-board radar nor two ground radar stations detected it. CEFAA's two-year investigation concluded unanimously: cause unknown.
- Latin America· 2013civilian claim
In April 2013, four technicians at the remote Collahuasi copper mine in Chile's Atacama highlands, at over 14,000 feet elevation, observed a brilliant disc-shaped object approach slowly, hover for more than an hour, then depart eastward. One technician photographed it with a Samsung S860 camera. CEFAA's subsequent analysis ruled out meteorological phenomena, aircraft, weather balloons, and drones.
- Latin America· 2013foreign government record
On October 23, 2013, the Peruvian Air Force (Fuerza Aérea del Perú) relaunched its Department of Investigation of Anomalous Aerial Phenomena under the new acronym DIFAA, after the original OIFAA office created in 2001 had gone dormant for several years. The department's mandate was framed by its leadership as grounded in the Peruvian Constitution's assignment of sovereign aerospace responsibility to the FAP.
- Latin America· 2011civilian claim
In May 2011, Argentina's Air Force officially launched the Commission for the Investigation of Aerospace Phenomena (CEFAe), headquartered at FAA headquarters in Buenos Aires. Its first public report, released in 2015, analyzed multiple documented cases from Argentine airspace. Argentina thereby joined Chile, Uruguay, Peru, and Brazil as Latin American nations with active, institutionalized military UFO investigation bodies.
- Latin America· 2010civilian claim
At an air show over El Bosque Air Force Base in Santiago on November 5, 2010, an object moving too fast to be seen by spectators or pilots passed near three separate jet formations. Halcones, F-5s, and F-16s. Seven video recordings from different angles captured it. CEFAA photogrammetric analysis by Air Force and Army technicians estimated its velocity at 4,000 to 6,000 miles per hour.
- Latin America· 2009civilian claim
In 2009, Brazil became the first country to institutionalize ongoing military UFO disclosure, releasing over 2,200 pages of formerly classified documents to the Arquivo Nacional and issuing Ordinance 551/GC3 requiring all armed forces branches to forward UAP reports to the national archive annually. The files span 1952 to 2015 and include radar data, photographs, and pilot reports from the FAB's SIOANI investigation system.
- Latin America· 2004civilian claim
On March 5, 2004, a Mexican Air Force C-26A Merlin conducting drug surveillance over Campeche state detected 11 objects on its FLIR infrared camera that were entirely invisible to the naked eye. Three of the objects also registered on radar. The Secretary of National Defense officially released the footage and crew reports to the media, calling the objects unidentified.
- Latin America· 1997civilian claim
In 1997, twenty years after commanding Operação Prato, Captain Uyrangê Hollanda gave a filmed interview to Brazilian UFO researchers Ademar Gevaerd and Marco Petit, stating that his team had directly observed the objects, photographed them close-up, and believed them to be intelligently controlled. He described the classification order and his own growing conviction that the phenomenon was real. Three months later he was found dead.
- Latin America· 1996civilian claim
On January 20, 1996, three young women in Varginha, Minas Gerais, encountered a crouching creature with red eyes and a large domed head in a vacant lot. Within hours, military police and firefighters moved through the city; multiple witnesses reported seeing beings transported under military guard to local hospitals. Military police officer Marco Eli Chereze died twenty-six days later under disputed circumstances.
- Latin America· 1995civilian claim
On the night of July 31, 1995, Aerolíneas Argentinas captain Jorge Polanco and his crew, approaching Bariloche Airport with 102 passengers aboard flight 674, observed a luminous disc-shaped object flying parallel to the aircraft for approximately 17 minutes. When the object appeared, all airport runway lights and surrounding city power failed simultaneously. Control tower instruments behaved erratically throughout.
- Latin America· 1991civilian claim
During the July 11, 1991 total solar eclipse over Mexico City, at least 17 independent video recordings captured a stationary, silvery disc-shaped object hovering in daylight while millions watched the eclipse from rooftops and streets. Journalist Guillermo Arreguin's footage was broadcast on national television, triggering a wave of additional witness submissions.
- Latin America· 1986civilian claim
On the night of May 19, 1986, Brazilian Air Defense radar tracked 21 unidentified objects moving at estimated Mach 15 across São Paulo, Goiás, Rio de Janeiro, and Minas Gerais. Two F-5Es and three Mirage IIIs were scrambled; pilots reported objects surrounding their aircraft before vanishing. Four days later the Minister of the Air Force held an unprecedented public press conference confirming the events.
- Latin America· 1980civilian claim
On April 11, 1980, Lieutenant Óscar Santa María Huertas was ordered by his commander to intercept and shoot down an unidentified object hovering at 1,800 feet over La Joya Air Force Base in Arequipa. He fired 64 rounds from his Sukhoi-22 in four passes; the object appeared to absorb or deflect the rounds, then shadowed his aircraft to 63,000 feet before departing. Approximately 1,800 base personnel witnessed the chase.
- Latin America· 1977civilian claim
Between August and December 1977, the Brazilian Air Force secretly deployed a six-man team to Colares, Pará, after hundreds of fishing-community residents reported beam-emitting lights that left radiation-like burns and puncture wounds. Captain Uyrangê Hollanda's Operação Prato produced more than 500 photographs and 16 hours of film, then was immediately classified.
- Latin America· 1975civilian claim
On September 25, 1975, a Uruguayan Air Force FH-227 flight from Asunción to Montevideo at 14,000 feet encountered a yellowish luminous object that matched the aircraft's speed and altitude for an extended period after the pilot activated his landing light and received an immediate reaction from the unknown object. Uruguay's CRIDOVNI, established by presidential decree in 1979, formally investigated.
- Latin America· 1971civilian claim
On September 4, 1971, a National Geographic Institute of Costa Rica aerial survey aircraft photographed a sharp, metallic disc over Lago Cote at 10,000 feet while the automatic mapping camera cycled every 13 seconds. The object appeared in one frame only. Analysts Dr. Richard Haines and Dr. Jacques Vallée examined the original negative and concluded the image was not a double exposure or fabrication.
- Latin America· 1958civilian claim
On January 16, 1958, at least 47 crew members and civilian researchers aboard the Brazilian Navy ship Almirante Saldanha watched a Saturn-shaped object circle Trindade Island. Civilian photographer Almiro Barauna captured four frames with his Rolleiflex before the object reversed course and departed. President Kubitschek personally authorized release of the prints to the press.
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