USSR’s own X-Files also collected eye-witness reports of humanoid figures tied to unexplained lights in the sky
Daniel Smith Interim Head of Operations – Content Hub & GAU
12:27, 11 Feb 2026
The UFO remained in the sky for more than an hour before vanishing
A ‘jellyfish’ UFO crowned by shifting coloured lights hovered above a Russian city for an hour before disappearing in the 1980s.
The strange case is among a newly shared bundle of Soviet-era documents that lift the lid on how officials in the former USSR quietly recorded and assessed strange objects in the sky- even as they publicly dismissed visiting alien craft as Western nonsense.
The material, translated into English and published by journalist George Knapp, spans around 70 pages and pulls together reports from the 1970s and 1980s.
According to Knapp, the archive was removed from Russia in the early 1990s and has only now been made widely accessible, offering the public a rare window into how Soviet institutions catalogued what they called ‘Abnormal Atmospheric Phenomena’.
One of the most striking entries is dated February 13, 1989, and describes a large aerial object over Nalchik, in southern Russia. Witnesses reported a ‘jellyfish’-like form that they said remained in the sky for more than an hour before vanishing from view.
Other accounts include a young man reporting luminous streaks across the sky followed by a brush with humanoid figures, reports IBT.
Investigators note the claims and details but stop short of declaring what, if anything, the witness encountered. A separate 1979 incident in Kazakhstan describes campers who said they saw tall, dark figures near a wooded area. Again, recollections were consistent – but there was no physical evidence to pin anything down.
The files reference sightings logged by civilians, soldiers, and technical specialists, as well as the procedures for taking testimony, filing reports, and weighing possible explanations.
While the documents don’t offer hard proof of anything extraterrestrial, they do show an organised effort to track cases that didn’t fit neatly into known boxes.
Jellyfish-like UFO seen above a Soviet city in the 1980s
Many entries propose Earth-bound explanations like atmospheric effects, sensor quirks or even experimental aircraft. Some files consider whether certain sightings might have involved foreign technology – a live concern in the Cold War years – or simply rare natural phenomena.
One of the most infamous cases of a Russian UFO was in 1993, when state media reported the military had downed an extraterrestrial craft in Siberia using a surface-to-air missile.
This supposedly led to an encounter with five humanoid entities who emerged from the wreckage. These beings reportedly merged into a singular, glowing sphere that emitted a catastrophic burst of light, instantly transforming 23 nearby soldiers into stone pillars.
The soldiers were turned into stone pillars, accoording to reports
The report suggests that only two witnesses survived the event, while the resulting limestone remains and wreckage were transported to a clandestine research facility near Moscow.
US intelligence officials at the time noted that if these accounts were authentic, they represented a highly dangerous threat from advanced alien technology.