POLICE OFFICERS SPOT UFO; RAPID REACTION FORCE ALERTED

On June 25, 1996, at approximately 0030 hours, two Lithuanian police officers, Jaunius Pozera and Laimis Kraujalis, were patrolling the Vilnius-Medininkai road near the village of Nemezis when they encountered an unidentified flying object. The officers reported observing a spherical object hovering at an altitude of 20 to 30 meters above the ground. The object was described as 'shining' and exhibited a 'pulsing' behavior, characterized by alternating shrinking and expanding. The witnesses also reported hearing a sound described as an 'electric or electronic crackle.' As the officers approached the object, it moved away, rose higher, and departed rapidly in the direction of Vilnius. The sighting lasted for approximately thirty minutes. Following the report, the ARAS rapid reaction force and personnel from the Civil Defense Department arrived at the scene. These teams conducted an investigation, which included measuring background radiation and recording the area for unusual sounds. While the sniffer dogs deployed to the scene did not detect anything suspicious, investigators noted that the tall grass in a 10-meter radius around the location where the object had hovered was flattened. Police Commissioner Valentinas Juchnevicius publicly defended the credibility of the officers involved, stating in a radio interview that both men were 'psychologically healthy, normal people' and not prone to 'crankiness.' As of the date of the report, Lithuanian scientists had not yet provided an official opinion regarding the nature of the object.