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This FAA file, released through The Black Vault, collects correspondence and memos about the Japan Air Lines flight 1628 UFO report over Alaska on November 17, 1986. It includes Philip J. Klass's 1987 Skeptical Inquirer article, which attributes the sighting to Jupiter, Mars and moonlit ice clouds, and FAA Alaskan Region public affairs memos on the premature release of investigation material. It also contains Richard F. Haines's request for the case file and Paul Steucke's reply explaining the radar returns as uncorrelated targets.
2 promptly reported that his radar showed only the JAL airliner. 4. The flight crew's description of the white-amber lights first seen slightly to the left (south) shortly after sunset as the JAL 747 crossed into northeastern Alaska, and the single UFO, further to the left, reported as the aircraft approached Fair- banks, indicate that they looked significantly different. The initial UFO was observed for roughly 10 minutes while the second was in view for about 30 minutes. 5. The recently released FAA data confirm's CSICOP's earlier report on the incident which first revealed that two'other aircraft (United Airlines flight #69, and a .USAF C-130) that were in the area, searched for a UFO as they passed near ·the JAL airliner. The United flight, headed north from Anchorage to Fairbanks while JAL was headed south to Anchorage on a parallel airway, passed within several miles of JAL. Shortly before the two airliners passed, the JAL pilot--looking to the southeast--reported that the UFO was "just ahead of United," but the United crew saw not~ing. At the time, the JAL pilot was looking in the direction of a very bright planet Jupiter, then low on the horizon. The United crew would not have noticed Jupiter because it was to their far right while they were looking ahead and to their left for something near the JAL 747. A short time later the US~C-130, heading west, passed to the south of JAL and also failed to see any bright light. The C-130 . crew would not have seen Jupiter, which was far to its left because they were looking at JAL to their right. 6. The initial "UFO(s)" of Nov. 17 were described by the pilot as resembling the exhaust of jet/rocket engines, and he later described and sketched a giant UFO shaped like a walnut. But when the FAA later showed the pilot's sketches to the copilot, he responded: "I don't see anything like this." All he reported seeing were "like landing lights" of an aircraft. 7. Based on the pilot's report at the time of the Nov. 17 incident, confirmed by flight crew interviews, it is evident that there were thin, spotty clouds at about or slightly below the JAL flight altitude of 31,000 ft.--at roughly the same altitude as that reported for the UFO. On Nov. 17 the moon was almost full and at the time of the initial sighting and almost directly behind the 747, low in the sky •• This suggests that the amber-white lights observed by the crew were caused by bright moonlight reflecting off spotty clouds of ice crystals. (Village light reflecting off such clouds on Jan. 11 prompted Capt. Terauchi to report UFOs, and his Jan. 11 description resembled that of Nov. 17.) 8. If overflew this the hypothesis region of is correct, when the JAL airliner spotty clouds, the initial UFO would
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