PURSUE Release 03: The FBI's Files Are Now Part of the Public Record
The third release under the PURSUE directive arrived on June 12, 2026 — and it introduces a type of document that has not appeared in any prior PURSUE tranche: FBI field investigation records.
Releases 01 and 02 drew from military sensor data, CIA intelligence cables, ODNI narratives, and archival documents from NASA and the Department of Energy. Release 03 adds the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Seven of the ten files in this release originate from the FBI — five documentary records and two videos. That shift deserves more attention than the individual cases it contains.
The Colorado Springs Cluster
Three of the Release 03 documents are linked: an FBI FD-1057 interview transcript used to develop a witness sketch, a digital rendering of the observed phenomenon over a mountain landscape, and a formal Intelligence Community Assessment.
The location is Colorado Springs, Colorado. The year is 2022.
Colorado Springs is not a randomly selected city. It hosts NORAD and USNORTHCOM headquarters at Peterson Space Force Base, the U.S. Air Force Academy, Fort Carson, and Schriever Space Force Base — among the highest concentrations of sensitive defense and space command infrastructure in the continental United States. An unresolved UAP incident in that airspace warranted an FBI field investigation, a rendered reconstruction, and, notably, a formal Intelligence Community Assessment.
An ICA — Intelligence Community Assessment — is a product of the broader U.S. intelligence community, synthesizing analysis from multiple agencies on a specific issue of national security concern. The 2017 assessment on Russian election interference was an ICA. The government now confirms that a 2022 UAP incident in Colorado Springs generated the same category of document.
ICA-UAP-D001 is the first publicly released ICA on a specific UAP event in U.S. history.
The incident remains unresolved.
The Northeastern Orb Series
Four additional files document orb sightings in the Northeastern United States across 2024, 2025, and 2026 — a timeline that overlaps directly with what became one of the most widely covered unexplained aerial phenomena stories of the past decade.
In late 2024, credible reports of unexplained drone-like objects and luminous orbs over New Jersey, New York, and adjacent states triggered congressional inquiries, FAA airspace reviews, and public statements from multiple federal agencies — none of which produced an official explanation. The footage and field reports in Release 03 confirm the FBI was actively investigating those sightings, and the results remain unresolved.
PR003 shows an orb over a body of water (2024). PR004 shows two lights above a treeline (2025). FD-302-67 and FD-302-71 are formal FBI witness interview summaries from 2026, both redacted. These are not casual observations or civilian smartphone recordings placed into a database. These are formal investigative products — the FBI conducted interviews, documented them in the standard form used for federal investigations, and those interviews produced no resolution.
The 1949 Parallel
Release 03 also surfaces two documents from 1949: the U.S. Army's Flying Saucer Study and an FBI correspondence referral stamped with a Department of Justice file cover.
Their presence alongside the 2022 Colorado Springs and 2026 Northeastern orb records creates an inadvertent through-line. In 1947, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover agreed to cooperate with the Air Force on flying saucer reports. In 1949, both the Army and FBI were generating classified internal documentation on the same phenomena. In 2022 and 2025–2026, the FBI is running formal field investigations with witness interviews and formal documentary reports. The institutional thread is unbroken.
The CIA Zimbabwe Cable
CIA-UAP-017 is an intelligence cable involving routing information labeled "Zimbabwe" and describing placement on high alert due to perceived aggressive foreign posturing. Zimbabwe achieved independence in April 1980, which places this cable in the early 1980s at the earliest. The intersection of UAP activity and Cold War-era misattribution to foreign military action is a scenario the ODNI's 2021 preliminary assessment identified as a potential risk. This document appears to be an instance of that risk in the historical record.
What Release 03 Establishes
Release 01 introduced sensor data from military platforms. Release 02 introduced the intelligence community — CIA records, ODNI narratives, NASA mission data, Department of Energy facility reports. Release 03 introduces the FBI's investigative apparatus — field interviews, formal case documentation, and now a formal ICA.
The PURSUE program has now drawn from the military, the intelligence community, civilian space and energy agencies, and federal law enforcement. The pattern of institutions contributing records is no longer narrow.
The Colorado Springs ICA and the multi-year Northeastern orb investigation are the two cases in Release 03 that will drive the most sustained analysis. Both remain officially unresolved. Both now have public documentary records that establish they were investigated at the highest levels of the U.S. government.
Release 04 has not yet been announced.