FBI-UAP-D001

Unresolved

The object over Cheyenne Mountain (Colorado, 2022)

Five service members at Fort Carson see a white, motionless, silent object over Cheyenne Mountain that suddenly disappears. The only official explanation, light reflected off snow, has low confidence, and the witnesses agree on neither the time, the sky nor the shape.

Date: Feb 2022
Location: Fort Carson, Colorado Springs, Colorado; the object, over the saddle of Cheyenne MountainCheyenne Mountain, about 6 miles west of the witnesses according to the intelligence analysis.See the area on the globe →
Platform: From the ground · five Army service members at Fort Carson, with the naked eye [1 · p. 1][3 · p. 3]
Sensor: Human eye · none of them had a phone; there are no photos or video [1 · p. 2]
Official status: Unresolved · AARO keeps it unresolved as of June 2026. An intelligence partner proposes, with low confidence, sunlight reflected off snow lighting low clouds [5][3 · p. 3]

01 Sensor readout

There is no recording: none of the five had a phone, and by the time they decided to fetch one the object was gone. Everything rests on their accounts, collected two and three years later. [1 · p. 2]

02 Images from the file

Only images from the records themselves: official pages, charts and photos, and drawings the witnesses handed in. Artist's recreations and AI-generated images are not shown, even when the catalogue includes them.

The FBI's digital recreation (FBI-UAP-D003) is not shown: it is an artistic photomontage based on an account, not an image of the event. The witnesses' own drawings and the initial sketch draft have not been released. [4][1 · p. 2][2 · p. 2]

03 Timeline

Feb 15, 2022
Five service members leave their building at Fort Carson and see a white object, still over the saddle of Cheyenne Mountain, making no sound. They watch it for 30 seconds to 5 minutes, depending on who tells it; then it disappears. The time varies by document: 09:35, 11:25 or between 13:00 and 14:00. [3 · p. 3][2 · p. 2][1 · p. 1–2]
2023
The service members report the event to AARO. [5]
Jul 2024
The FBI interviews one of them in New York, now out of the Army, to produce a sketch of the object: an opalescent “potato” with “scales” moving in waves. [2 · p. 1–2]
Mar 2025
The FBI interviews another witness by video call: a matte white “bean” with polygonal ridges. The witness says AARO made contact in 2024 but no one had interviewed them. [1 · p. 1–2]
Jun 12, 2026
PURSUE releases the four documents and the intelligence analysis: possible light reflected off snow, with low confidence. AARO keeps it unresolved. [5][3 · p. 3]

04 Hypotheses

Status as stated by the official sources cited. The archive takes no side.

Compatible
Sunlight reflected off snow lighting low clouds
The intelligence partner's proposal, with low confidence: at 09:45 the sun, in the southeast, would reflect off the mountain snow and light low clouds; a slight shift of clouds or sun would explain the disappearance. The witnesses say there were no clouds and give later times. [3 · p. 3–4]
Ruled out
Aircraft or balloon
The analysis found no aircraft or balloons active in the area. The witnesses had already considered a blimp or a weather balloon and dismissed it because the object did not move for minutes. [3 · p. 4][1 · p. 2]
Ruled out
Adversary capability
The analysis states that no anomalous data were recorded and the event does not represent an unknown adversary capability. [3 · p. 3]

05 Testimony

“He specifically stated that the object “cloaked” in the space of time it took to turn a head and there was no shadow.”

Former Army intelligence officer, per the FBI · Sketch interview, July 2024 [2 · p. 2]

06 Editor's reading

The editor's opinion, not an official finding. It rests on the records cited and changes if they do.

Conventional explanation likely
Open
Anomalous

Five witnesses at once, service members, who each drew the object separately and agreed: it is more than an isolated sighting. [1 · p. 2]
The only official explanation comes with low confidence and depends on there being clouds and on it being morning. By our calculation, at 09:45 the sun was behind anyone looking at the mountain; at the times the witnesses give, it was to the south or southwest, and they insist there were no clouds. [3 · p. 3][2 · p. 2][1 · p. 1]
But the accounts, collected two and three years later, differ on almost everything checkable: time, shape, appearance, duration and how it vanished. With no photos or data, what they saw cannot be reconstructed. [1 · p. 1–2][2 · p. 2]
Neither is the explanation fully convincing nor is there anything measurable pointing elsewhere: it stays open. [5]

— Isaac Chaves, editor · Reading of Oct 7, 2026

07 Discrepancies between sources

The time: 09:35 according to the intelligence analysis; around 11:25 according to one witness; between 13:00 and 14:00 according to another. The reflected-light hypothesis depends on it being morning. [3 · p. 3][2 · p. 2][1 · p. 1]
The sky: the witnesses describe it as clear, cloudless; the weather reports the analysis cites indicate it was partly to mostly cloudy. [1 · p. 1][2 · p. 2][3 · p. 3]
The shape: a matte white, non-metallic “bean” with polygonal ridges, the size of a pool cue at arm's length; an opalescent, translucent “potato” with moving “scales”; an angular potato the size of a large jet. [1 · p. 1–2][2 · p. 2][3 · p. 3]
The disappearance: when they all looked away to fetch a phone; in the time it takes to turn a head; or while they kept watching it, according to the analysis. The duration ranges from 30 seconds to 5 minutes. [1 · p. 2][2 · p. 2][3 · p. 3]
The sun: the analysis puts it at azimuth 125° at 09:45; our calculation gives about 138° (the altitude, about 28°, agrees). [3 · p. 3]

08 The case in PURSUE

How PURSUE publishes this case: its official description and every record, with links to the files. Reproduced as is, catalogue errors included.

Official description

This document is a Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) FD-302, a form the FBI uses to record interviews. This FD-302 contains a summary of an interview with a U.S. military service member in March 2025 regarding a February 2022 incident potentially involving unidentified anomalous phenomena (UAP). The individual described the phenomenon as being “bean shaped,” “matte white” or “off-white” in color, with a surface covered in “intersecting lines or ridges which formed an abstract polygon pattern.” The individual described the phenomenon as “motionless” and that “no sound could be heard coming from it.” FBI Note: AARO has since been in contact with the interviewee to conduct subsequent interviews to inform its analysis of this incident.

Catalogue records · 1

FBI-UAP-D001 · Document · FBI · Jun 12, 2026
FD-302, Unresolved UAP Report, Colorado Springs, 2022
February, 2022 · Colorado Springs, Colorado, U.S.
File on war.gov ↗

09 Sources

[1]
Record · U.S. Department of War · PURSUE (FBI) · Jun 12, 2026
FBI-UAP-D001 · FD-302, Unresolved UAP Report, Colorado Springs, 2022
Summary of the FBI interview with one of the five service members (March 2025, by video call; 2 pp.): a matte white bean-shaped object, motionless for 3–5 minutes over Cheyenne Mountain.
Checked on Oct 7, 2026 · Open the original ↗
[2]
Record · U.S. Department of War · PURSUE (FBI) · Jun 12, 2026
FBI-UAP-D002 · FD-1057, Unresolved UAP Report, Colorado Springs, 2022
Forensic sketch interview with a former Army intelligence officer (New York, July 2024; 2 pp.): an opalescent potato-shaped object with moving “scales” that suddenly “cloaked”.
Checked on Oct 7, 2026 · Open the original ↗
[3]
Record · U.S. Department of War · PURSUE (Intelligence Community partner of AARO) · Jun 12, 2026
ICA-UAP-D001 · Analysis: Colorado Springs UAP Incident, 2022
Analysis by an AARO Intelligence Community partner (4 pp.): the object was “possibly” sunlight reflected off snow lighting low clouds, with low confidence. Places the event on 2022-02-15 at 09:35.
Checked on Oct 7, 2026 · Open the original ↗
[4]
Record · U.S. Department of War · PURSUE (FBI) · Jun 12, 2026
FBI-UAP-D003 · Digital Rendering, Unresolved UAP Report, Colorado Springs, 2022
FBI artistic recreation based on the D002 account: a photomontage of the mountain with the object. It is not evidence and is not reproduced here.
Checked on Oct 7, 2026 · Open the original ↗
[5]
Record · U.S. Department of War
Presidential Unsealing and Reporting System for UAP Encounters (PURSUE)
Department of War program, supported by ODNI, that releases declassified records of unresolved UAP cases from several agencies in tranches. None of the three Navy videos is in it.
Checked on Oct 4, 2026 · Open the original ↗

May contain errors by the AI and the editor · always check the official source. · Privacy