The screen is black. Then the word “Enlarged” appears, and a spot comes into view near the top of the frame. It moves from left to right, gradually growing harder to distinguish from the background.
The video plays again, this time enlarged and slowed down. But in the version labeled as the original, the spot moves in a different direction. The video was edited before it was uploaded, yet there is no explanation for what it shows.
The Spot Returns, but Takes a Different Path
The video runs for less than a minute. At the beginning, the spot appears near the upper-left corner and crosses the frame. A black screen follows, listing the changes made: sharpening the image, enlarging it, tracking the spot’s movement, increasing its contrast with the background, and slowing the video down.
The video then plays again. This time, the spot is larger and moves more slowly. The changes make it easier to track, but they also alter the image’s appearance. They do not explain what caused the spot to move.
Then the Original Version Appears
A black screen announces that the next clip is the original video. The spot appears near the top of the frame, moves down and to the left, then turns right. Near the end of the clip, it again becomes difficult to distinguish from the background.
The same video now seems to show two different paths: in the first clip, the spot crosses the frame; in the original, it moves down, turns, and becomes hard to see. The difference is striking, but it is unclear whether the editing made the spot appear to move this way.
How Did the Video Come Under Review?
The video was uploaded in June 2024 to a closed computer network used for classified information. A U.S. office that investigates reports of anomalous phenomena included it in the material it reviewed, and the video was later released to the public.
The office estimates that the video was probably recorded with a heat-detecting sensor aboard a U.S. military aircraft operating in the Middle East in November 2020. The person who uploaded it gave it a title describing a ball in the skies over Afghanistan, between clouds. That was the uploader’s title, not an identification of what appears in the image.