This day in UFO history: Japan Air Lines Flight 1628

A routine Japan Airlines cargo flight ended unexpectedly. The aircraft was carrying a load of French wine from Paris to Tokyo.

Captain Kenju Terauchi, co-pilot Yoshio Tsukuba, and flight engineer Takanori Tamefuji headed the crew for the JAL cargo flight.

The cargo flight left Paris on November 16, 1986. It traveled to Reykjavik, Iceland, before crossing Greenland and eventually reaching Canada.

After crossing into Alaska at around 5:09 pm local time, Anchorage Air Traffic control instructed the plane to follow its flight path.

At around 5:11 pm, Captain Terauchi was about 200 feet below the ground when he saw the lights, which he initially thought were American fighter jets. However, a few minutes later, he realized that the lights were moving at the same speed as his plane.

The crew members were monitoring the lights for around seven minutes before they suddenly stopped working. Suddenly, two spaceships appeared in front of the cargo plane. The lights illuminated the cockpit and warmed the captain’s face.

He initially thought the objects were the lights that appeared below him. The two moving objects continued to move in the same direction for several minutes.

After around seven minutes, the two objects started to move in a side-by-side manner. Captain Terauchi noted that the lights looked like flames coming from exhaust ports. Flight engineer Yoshio Tsukuba said the lights looked like Christmas lights with a salmon-colored tint.

Although he didn’t have a good view of the lights, flight engineer Tsukuba noted that the objects were different from the town lights in the area.

Captain Terauchi then asked Tskububa to take a picture of the objects. However, due to his lack of experience with cameras, he was unable to take a proper picture. The objects then flew off and disappeared.