PURSUE Release 04: Space Shuttle Columbia and the 1948 Document the Air Force Kept Secret

The fourth PURSUE release arrived on July 10, 2026, and it contains the oldest UAP video ever published by the U.S. government — and the oldest formal military analytical document yet released under PURSUE.

It also contains three photographs from Space Shuttle Columbia.

STS-80: What the Shuttle Crew Saw in 1996

Space Shuttle Columbia launched on November 19, 1996 on the STS-80 mission. The crew of five included Story Musgrave, then 61, on his sixth and final spaceflight. The mission lasted 17 days and 15 hours — the longest shuttle flight at the time.

Three photographs from that mission are now in the public PURSUE archive. Each shows an unidentified object in low-Earth orbit. NASA-UAP-D030, D031, and D032 are distinct images, suggesting multiple observations or a single object documented across several frames or orbital passes.

STS-80 is not a mission without prior public attention. Musgrave made remarks over the years about what he observed during his final flight. NASA footage from the mission was previously circulated by UAP researchers. What changes now is the classification status: these are not leaked or scraped frame grabs. They are formally declassified U.S. government records, released under a presidential transparency directive, designated unresolved.

Three photographs. One mission. Official acknowledgment that the objects remain unexplained.

1996 Also Produced a Western U.S. Dual-Object Video

The same year — 1996 — produced a second PURSUE case in Release 04. DOW-UAP-PR113 is infrared footage from the Western United States showing two distinct areas of contrast with visible heads-up display (HUD) elements from the sensor aircraft's cockpit. HUD elements in the frame confirm this was captured from a military aircraft targeting system.

Two objects. Military sensor platform. Western U.S. airspace. 1996. Both unresolved.

PR113 is now the oldest video case in the PURSUE program. That a dual-object infrared observation from a military platform in 1996 remained classified for nearly thirty years — and is released designated unresolved — is a data point worth sitting with.

The 1949 Nuclear Thread Continues

Release 04 adds a third document to the pattern of UAP observations near U.S. nuclear infrastructure.

DOE-UAP-D004 is a transmittal letter from the United States Atomic Energy Commission — the predecessor to the Department of Energy — dated March 22, 1949. It concerns a conference on aerial phenomena held at Los Alamos, New Mexico.

Los Alamos is where the atomic bomb was designed. In 1949, it was the primary U.S. nuclear weapons design laboratory. The Atomic Energy Commission convened a formal conference on aerial phenomena there — at the same location, in the same year, as the Army's Flying Saucer Study (released in Release 03) and the FBI's 1949 correspondence referral (also Release 03) were being generated.

A transmittal letter accompanies another document. The conference itself — its agenda, its attendees, its conclusions — is not yet in the public record.

DOW-UAP-D094, also in Release 04, is a 1949 Army document containing an analysis of flying object incidents in the United States. One visible page shows a hand-drawn sketch of a cylindrical object labeled "Fig. 8." Multiple numbered figures implies a substantial case catalog. This is a companion to the 1949 Army Flying Saucer Study from Release 03. The Army was running a more comprehensive analytical program on UAP in 1949 than the public record previously showed.

Project Sign: The Report That Was Supposed to Stay Hidden

DOW-UAP-D097 is a 1948 Project Sign Progress Report — stamped confidential, containing a photograph of a large delta-winged aircraft prototype.

Project Sign was the U.S. Air Force's first formal UAP investigation program, established December 30, 1947. It is the program that produced the "Estimate of the Situation" — an internal report that reportedly concluded some UFOs might be of extraterrestrial origin. General Hoyt Vandenberg, then Air Force Chief of Staff, reportedly rejected the conclusion and ordered the document destroyed. Copies are believed to exist.

A 1948 progress report from Project Sign is now in the public record. The delta-winged aircraft photograph is consistent with how these investigations worked — known experimental platforms were documented as comparison baselines to rule out domestic explanations for sighting reports. That the document was still classified 78 years after it was written suggests it contained more than routine administrative content.

The Indo-Pacific in 2025

Two new video cases complete Release 04. PR104 shows an infrared contact in the Yellow Sea in 2025 — a six-pointed star-like signature. PR105 shows an infrared contact against a cloud background in the East China Sea, also 2025.

The Yellow Sea is bordered by China, North Korea, and South Korea. The East China Sea is bordered by China, Japan, and Taiwan. Both are theaters of sustained U.S. military presence and contested territorial claims.

Two unresolved infrared cases from 2025 in some of the most politically sensitive waters on Earth. Both officially designated unresolved.

What Release 04 Tells Us

Four releases into PURSUE, the program has now produced documents spanning 1948 to 2025. The pattern across releases is not a random selection. Nuclear facilities appear in three of four releases. NASA mission records appear in three of four releases. The earliest classified military analytical documents on UAP — Project Sign, the 1949 Army studies, the AEC conference — are being systematically surfaced.

The STS-80 photographs are the clearest signal yet that the PURSUE program is not constrained to unresolved sensor data. These are formally declassified photographs from a named NASA mission with a documented crew. They are in the public record, designated unresolved.

The objects remain unexplained. The archive continues to grow.