USSR: MEDIA REPORT MULTITUDE OF UFO SIGHTINGS

This Foreign Press Note, dated 22 November 1989, details the growing trend of UFO-related media coverage within the Soviet Union. According to the report, Soviet newspapers and journals began publishing an increasing number of articles regarding unidentified aerial phenomena. In response to this public interest, a permanent research center was established in Moscow to investigate these sightings. The document highlights an interview with P. Prokopenko, the director of a laboratory for the study of anomalous phenomena, who confirmed the center's role in conducting research and providing lectures on the subject. A significant portion of the report focuses on a specific incident from July 1988, involving a flying sphere that crashed on Hill 611 near the village of Dalnegorsk in Primorskiy Kray. This event remained under investigation at the time of the report. Scientists from the Siberian Division of the USSR Academy of Sciences were tasked with analyzing debris recovered from the site, which included a 'fine mesh,' 'small spherical objects,' and 'pieces of glass.' Scientist A. Makeyev reported the presence of various elements, including gold, silver, nickel, alpha-titanium, molybdenum, and beryllium compounds. While one physicist from Tomsk hypothesized that the object was a 'plasmoid' formed by the interaction of geophysical force fields, other researchers expressed skepticism, noting that the concentration of metals found at the site would imply atmospheric metal levels 4,000 times higher than current levels.