The Pentagon's PURSUE programme posted 72 more declassified files on June 12, 2026, revealing that FBI agents traced five years of unexplained orb sightings to a single northeastern U.S. property, while the AARO director found 40% of phenomena cases remain unresolved.
The U.S. Pentagon released a third tranche of declassified UAP files on June 12, 2026, adding 72 new records to the public archive at war.gov/ufo. The most operationally significant new detail, according to NBC News, is that the FBI has now determined that five years of still-unexplained orb sightings can be traced to a single location in the northeastern United States.
The release, the third under the PURSUE programme (Presidential Unsealing and Reporting System for UAP Encounters), also includes a new internal AARO assessment reporting that 40% of cases on record remain without a reasonable explanation, and a July 2008 CIA report that was routed to the White House Situation Room.
According to CBS News, the 72 files originate from six federal agencies: 29 from the FBI, 18 from the CIA, 12 from the Department of Defense, 11 from NASA, and two from other government bodies. The release also includes six videos depicting orb-like objects, 10 images, and multiple audio recordings - among them more than two hours of Apollo 16 mission debriefs recorded in 1972, and a 1962 recorded conversation between astronaut Gordon Cooper and journalist Walter Cronkite.
War.gov/ufo has now recorded over 1.7 billion page views since the PURSUE site launched on May 8, 2026.
A new AARO assessment dated June 5, 2026 - signed by AARO Director Dr. Jon Kosloski - was released as part of the third batch. The document states that 40% of reported UAP phenomena on file “lack a reasonable explanation and remain unresolved,” according to CBS News. It also describes a reported encounter in which an orange “mother” orb was observed launching smaller red orbs.
Kosloski’s office has been consistent across all three PURSUE tranches: no released material constitutes evidence of extraterrestrial origin or non-human technology. That position is restated in the June 5 assessment.
The most specific new finding in the third batch concerns a pattern of orb sightings that FBI investigators have linked to a single residential property in the northeastern United States, according to NBC News. The Bureau’s determination is based on at least five years of reported encounters at or near the site.
Two FBI agents visited the location in November 2024 and, per the released documents, witnessed the phenomenon directly. The property’s resident had independently set up trail cameras and environmental sensors. The sensor data showed spikes in gamma radiation that correlated with the times the objects appeared, along with anomalous effects on electronics and GPS readings at the site.
The case has roots in an October 2023 event referred to in reporting as “Orbs Over the Pond,” during which five federal law enforcement special agents separately observed unexplained orbs. CBS News reported that one agent recalled turning to his partner, who exclaimed: “Are you seeing this?” The FBI produced digital renderings of those sightings, which are included in the newly released files.
The origin of the orbs - whether conventional, foreign, or of genuinely unknown character - remains undetermined, and no official assessment in the released documents offers a conclusion.
The third batch is not limited to domestic sightings. A July 2008 CIA report describes a disc-shaped object with rotating lights hovering above Harare International Airport in Zimbabwe. According to the released document, cited by NBC News, the report was transmitted directly to the White House Situation Room and distributed across the intelligence community. Observers at the time could not determine whether the object was “a reconnaissance device of a foreign government” or something else; the disc, they noted, had “a series of rotating lights on the underside of the airframe.”
The Apollo 16 audio, per CP24, includes a passage in which a speaker makes an off-handed comment referencing an “alien starbase” while discussing experimental data. The surrounding context of the remark is not elaborated in available documentation.
The PURSUE programme continues to release files on a rolling basis. The Department of War has indicated further tranches will be published every few weeks as additional records are reviewed and declassified. Two prior releases - on May 8 and May 22, 2026 - produced a combined 384 records, including radar data, pilot accounts, infrared video, and decades of internal memos. ABC News reported that the 72 files in the third batch span from the 1940s to the present.
Analysts who have followed the programme closely note a consistent pattern: the files document that investigators took these phenomena seriously, that significant proportions of cases remained unresolved, and that no official assessment - from any of the three tranches - claims extraterrestrial explanation. The gamma radiation readings, the single-site FBI concentration, and the 40% unresolved figure are the kind of anomalies that will draw continued scientific and investigative attention, even as official conclusions remain appropriately cautious.
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