Iranian Air Force jets scramble over Tehran and report instrument failures

No footage exists. The primary record is a US Defense Intelligence Agency document written days afterwards, drawing on Iranian Air Force accounts. It describes two F-4 Phantoms scrambled in sequence, each reporting the loss of instrumentation and communications as it closed on a bright object, with function returning as the aircraft turned away. The document records that the object was visible to observers on the ground and was tracked on airborne radar.

General Yousefi, the deputy commander who ordered the intercepts, is named in the report as having looked at the object himself before scrambling the second aircraft. Lieutenant Parviz Jafari, who flew the second F-4, later described the encounter publicly and stated his weapons and communications went dead as he attempted to engage. The pilot of the first aircraft reported the same pattern of failure. The report attributes these accounts to the aircrew rather than asserting them.

The DIA document was declassified and is held in US government archives, which is why the case rests on an official record rather than recollection alone. The report's evaluation section rated the reporting as high quality. No government has offered an identification of the object. Astronomical explanations have been proposed by later analysts, chiefly a bright planet combined with a meteor and equipment faults, but no official body has adopted one.

The object was never identified. The aircraft were not examined afterwards in any record that has been released, so whether the reported instrument failures had a technical cause is unknown. Iranian records of the night have not been made public. The account of both aircraft failing in the same way rests on the crews' statements as relayed in the report.