Case · C-061

Bariloche 1995: flight AR 674 and the light during the blackout

San Carlos de Bariloche, Río Negro · Argentina · Jul 31, 1995

In flight Mixed witness types

What happened

On the evening of July 31, 1995, with Bariloche and its airport in darkness because of a power outage, the crew of the Boeing 727 of Aerolíneas Argentinas flight 674, commanded by Jorge Polanco, reported an object with three lights, a red one in the center, which came alongside on approach, forcing them to break off the landing; lights were also seen by the crew of a Gendarmería Nacional Piper Cheyenne and by ground personnel. Considered for more than twenty years by many researchers to be Argentina's most solid case, it was re-examined by the CEFAe, which in 2018 declared it solved by comparing a Gendarmería pilot's drawing with the reconstruction made by the operator of a searchlight. In 2020 the government declassified the file at the request of a civilian group and in 2026 the case was cited in documents released by the Pentagon.

Proposed explanation

According to the CEFAe of the Argentine Air Force (2018), which completed the investigation begun in 1995 by the researcher Heriberto Janosch, the positions attributed to the object by a Gendarmería pilot coincide with the directions in which a private individual aimed a powerful searchlight at the cloud base, powered by its own generator while the city was dark; as early as 1995 the Air Force had indicated this possibility. No documented challenges to the analysis are on record, although in 2026 part of the press presented the case again as unexplained without mentioning it.

Official investigation

Gendarmería Nacional (report of August 2, 1995); Fuerza Aérea Argentina – CEFAe (2018 report); governmental declassification of the file (2020)

Words of the document

el reflejo en la base nubosa del haz de un proyector

Official documents

1. Informe CEFAe 2018 – Testimonios clave en el caso «Bariloche» (31/Jul/1995) · Fuerza Aérea Argentina – CEFAe · 2018

Sources

1. ANBariloche, September 18, 2020: the government declassifies the documents on the Bariloche sighting (press)
2. Buenos Aires Times, May 2026: the Bariloche case cited in the UFO files released by the Pentagon (press)
3. Inexplicata (from Clarín, April 26, 2011): Captain Polanco remembers the Bariloche UFO (press, pro-disclosure)
4. Noticias NQN, May 9, 2026: the Bariloche case reappears in the UFO files declassified by the United States (press)

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