Soviet cosmonauts conceal truth about UFOs

The UFO phenomenon never existed in the former USSR, at least in the official records. There were numerous stories about unidentified flying objects which could be heard from susceptible individuals, but Soviet cosmonauts never said anything on the subject, although they had a lot to share.




Former Soviet cosmonaut Vladimir Kovalenok appeared at a press conference devoted to unusual and anomalous phenomena in space. He said that he had witnessed something inexplicable during his work on board the Salyut orbital station. The cosmonaut said that he once saw a strange object on Earth’s orbit. He asked his partner, Viktor Savinykh, to fetch a camera. While Savinykh was trying to find the camera, the object exploded in front of Kovalenok’s eyes. The object split into two parts and had something like a bridge connecting those parts. The dumbbell-like object disappeared before the other cosmonaut was ready to photograph it. A strong radioactive emission was registered on Earth soon after the explosion of the mysterious object.

Kovalenok said that many of his colleagues had witnessed something unusual on a number of occasions, but they decided not to bring those issues to the public attention.

Pilot Pavel Popovich was on a flight from Washington to Moscow in 1978. The plane was flying at the height of about 10,000 meters, when he noticed a triangular luminescent object flying on the same trajectory with his aircraft. The speed of the triangle was higher than that of the plane – more than 1,700 km/h, whereas the jetliner was flying at 1,100 km/h.

Cosmonauts Gennady Strekalov and Gennady Manakov saw a bright spherical object appearing in the cloudless sky above Newfoundland in 1990. The sphere disappeared without a trace ten seconds later.

In 1991, Musa Manarov was observing the module with the new crew nearing the Mir Space Station, filming the process on video camera. He suddenly saw an antenna-like object separating from the module. He informed the cosmonauts inside the module that something had undocked from them. Nevertheless, it never became possible to identify the object, although it was filmed on camera.

It goes without saying that cosmonauts informed their governing bodies of all those and many other strange incidents. All of the stories were most likely documented and subsequently classified.

Cosmonauts may often witness other inexplicable events happening in space, Vladimir Kovalenok said. A tape recorder switched on by itself and started playing the crew’s favorite film on the orbit once, Kovalenok said.

Psychologists often warn cosmonauts prior to their space missions that they may experience a phenomenon known as the altered state of consciousness. A Russian cosmonaut said in 1994 that he and his partner had numerous visions when they were working on board the Mir station for six months. It seemed to them that they were turning into weird creatures – animals and even humanoids of extraterrestrial origin.

KGB agents were making records of UFO observations in special Blue Folder

Files comprising the famous Blue Folder have been declassified a while ago. The prominent Soviet cosmonaut Pavel Popovich got the folder from the KGB in 1991. These days Mr. Popovich holds the position of honorary president of the Academy of Informational and Applied Ufology. The folder contains numerous descriptions of UFO flights and reports on some (mostly failed) attempts taken by the military in order to catch the aliens.




In 1968, 13 leading aircraft designers and engineers of a brand-new aircraft section of the Soviet Committee on Space Technology and Exploration forwarded a letter to the Soviet Prime Minister Alexei Kosygin. Actually, it was a request to set up a special organization for the study of UFOs. A reply to the letter was signed by Academician Shchukin. It is an amazing document per se:

“A number of competent organizations of the Presidium of the USSR Academy of Sciences in cooperation with the Chief Directorate of Meteorological Service, Defense Ministry and a few other agencies considered the issue of nature of the so-called flying objects. The organizations involved in the study of the atmosphere and space have been instructed to register and do research on any cases of UFOs for identification purposes. The USSR Academy of Sciences is charged with general monitoring of the phenomena, and therefore a special organization for the study of UFOs is not required.”

“It was a real breakthrough,” says Vladimir Azhazha, president of the above academy and keeper of the Blue Folder. “The authorities not only acknowledged the existence of UFOs for the first time, they also showed their great interest in the issue,” adds he.

“We got hold of the Blue Folder only in 1991,” says Mr. Azhazha. “Pavel Popovich was given the folder after requesting reports on the cases of UFOs. I received the folder from Popovich, it was a 124-page compilation of reports about the encounters with UFOs. The reports filed by authorities, military units COs and eyewitnesses. It took us a long time to get rid of some doubts before making the folder public,” says he.

Mr. Popovich saw an UFO only once while flying in a passenger plane from Washington to Moscow. According to him, the object looked like a shining triangle that popped up out of nowhere, for awhile it flew near the plane at about 1,000 km per hour before vanishing without a trace.

Despite the cover letter that effectively denied any special program by the KGB for monitoring the UFO activities, the contents of the folder indicated the opposite. It is quite obvious that the Soviet secret police launched thoughtful investigations in several cases e.g. an anomaly observed near the village of Burkhala of the Magadan region on October 21, 1989. The report on the incident says: “The eyewitnesses claim to have watched a red shining sphere circulating above the village for half an hour.” The northern lights are reported to have shone extremely brightly all night long following the incident.

The flying disks vanished in thin air after the explosion

KGB agents looked high and low trying to figure out what happened at the airport of the city of Mineralnye Vody on December 15, 1987. According to the airport dispatchers, at 23.15 the flight No 65798 reported an incoming “object resembling an aircraft with its headlights on.” The radars showed no aircraft whatsoever. Three minutes later the UFO was gone as reported by the flight No 65789.

The crew of another plane also observed the UFO flying in that area. The clock read approximately 23.20. According to crewmembers, the UFO left a fiery trail in the air. The crews of the both planes reported that the UFO had disappeared after the flash resembling an explosion. A villager reported a burning plane flying over his village at 23.30. The eyewitness said the plane then disappeared. The eyewitness found no wreckage or other evidence of a plane crash.

No manholes found in the “Martian” spacecraft

From time to time the military made attempts to deal with UFOs independently. In August 1987, servicemen of an antiaircraft unit based on the Tiksi Peninsula tried to “get to know better” an unidentified flying object that appeared on a radar screen. The report from Colonel Lobanov, a duty officer of the military unit No 45038, said: “An unidentified target detected by the radar station of the commandant’s office of the antiaircraft unit at 05.45 Moscow time.” The target moved at a speed varying from 0 to 400 km per hour. At 06.55 a helicopter MI-8 took off for a closer examination of the object. Suddenly, the object became invisible. Another aircraft, the AN-12 was flying in the vicinity at the time. At 3600 m the crew reported an emerald cloud with a few traces of purple and dark spots visible in the middle. Two inverse trails were reported behind the cloud.

An incident occurred in the Leningrad Military Region in early August of 1987. Five officers were dispatched to the northern part of Karelia to accompany an object of unknown origin that had been located near the city of Vyborg. The object was said to be 14 m long, 4 meters wide and 2.5 m high. The military failed to open the “extraterrestrial can.” Eventually, the object disappeared from the hangar late September.

On July 28, 1989, the arrival of an UFO spread panic among the personnel of a military unit stationed in the vicinity of Kapustin Yar, in the Astrakhan region. Corporal Valery Voloshin was on duty in the communications center at the time. He filed the first report on the case.

Researchers believe the Blue Folder is an invaluable source of information. According to Mr. Azhazha, all reports and evidence on record indicate that intelligent life forms control the objects that mean no harm to human beings. At least no case of an attack by UFO against man was found in the folder