{"type":"documents","slug":"2026-pursue-release-03-034-dow-uap-d083-narrative-statement-5-western-united-states-event-2023","title":"DOW-UAP-D083, Narrative Statement 5, Western United States Event, 2023","url":"https://disclosdex.com/documents/2026-pursue-release-03-034-dow-uap-d083-narrative-statement-5-western-united-states-event-2023","description":"First-hand narrative from Witness 5, a U.S. federal law enforcement special agent who observed UAP over two days in October 2023 in the western United States.","date":"2023-10-01T00:00:00.000Z","tags":["Testimony"],"updated":"2026-06-12T00:00:00.000Z","disclosureRating":6,"connectionCount":0,"content":{"markdown":"DOW-UAP-D083 is a Department of War memorandum presenting the first-hand narrative of Witness 5, one of several U.S. federal law enforcement special agents who reported observing unidentified anomalous phenomena (UAP) over two days in October 2023 in the western United States. Released in PURSUE Release 03 on June 12, 2026, the document was issued by the Office of the Under Secretary of War for Intelligence and Security on 02 June 2026 and submitted to the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) in response to requests for free-form witness accounts.[^1][^2]\n\n<PDF src=\"https://www.war.gov/medialink/ufo/061226/release_03/documents/DoW-UAP-D083_Narrative-5_Western-US-Event.pdf\" />\n\n## Provenance and Chain of Custody\n\nThe memorandum is unclassified and bears VIRIN 260508-D-D0360-1052, with a reference date of 08 May 2026. It was issued under the signature of Jon T. Kosloski, Director of AARO. Witness 5 is identified as a U.S. federal law enforcement special agent. Throughout the released version, specific names, precise locations, geographic coordinates, vehicle license plates, and certain dates are redacted. The document preserves the witness's contemporaneous account without editorial interpretation or proposed explanations, and the phenomena described remain unresolved and unidentified within the official record.[^3]\n\n## Document Structure\n\nThe account is organized as a numbered, log-style narrative arranged chronologically across two discrete observation periods. The first day's observations occurred in the evening hours of a day in October 2023; the second day's sightings and subsequent ground investigation took place in the early morning hours of the following day, approximately seventeen hours later. The narrative records specific times, directional bearings, estimated distances, weather and lighting conditions, and descriptions of instrumental observations made with Night Vision Goggles (NVGs) and thermal binoculars.\n\n## Day One: Evening Observations\n\nWitness 5 and a fellow special agent (SA, name redacted) departed toward an unnamed location around 1630 hours. Heading south, they encountered two males in a sedan who claimed to be photographing the area. The agents also noted a trailer and a white minivan parked along the roadside. Turning onto an unpaved road posted with signs prohibiting sleeping in vehicles, they observed a trailer, a white Jeep Wrangler, and an old red Volkswagen van parked nearby. Witness 5 noted what appeared to be a screen visible inside the trailer.\n\nAt 1858 hours, with the sun setting but ambient light still sufficient, the witness noticed a large orange light ahead and slightly to the right. Upon closer inspection, the orange light appeared to be positioned on something unidentifiable, \"hovering with zero resistance or movement, suspended just over a distinctive peak in the ridge line.\" The light persisted for less than or about one minute -- longer than a brief flash, but substantially shorter than sustained visibility. Using Google Maps on a subsequent day, the agents retrospectively determined that the orange light was located at coordinates that are redacted in the released version.\n\nUnable to proceed further by vehicle, the agents continued on foot around 1910 hours. At 1918 hours, while hiking west and facing north and slightly west, Witness 5 observed a large red orb at a further distance. Two smaller red orbs released simultaneously from the larger one and moved west. One smaller orb moved horizontally at a steady speed; the other moved upward at a possible slight angle, appearing fainter than the horizontal-moving orb. The larger orb remained stationary throughout. All lights on every orb were extinguished within approximately ten seconds. Concurrent with or shortly after the lights disappeared, the witness observed a white flash of light in the western sky.\n\nAt 1937 hours, continuing the westward hike, the agents observed the large red orb again, now positioned to their left. This manifestation also lasted approximately ten seconds. A similar white flash of light appeared in the sky, this time more toward the southwest.\n\nApproximately three miles from where they parked, the agents established a camera position to attempt photographic documentation should the phenomena reappear. They maintained intermittent radio contact with other teams in the field. They later discovered that while they could hear other teams communicating, their own transmissions could not be heard in return. The other teams departed around 2330 hours, at which point Witness 5 and the SA began packing their equipment.\n\n## Day Two: Early Morning Sightings and Ground Investigation\n\nThe agents reached their vehicle around 0130 hours. After driving down the mountain and becoming temporarily disoriented in the wildlife area, they reached a highway at approximately 0330 hours and a gate location at 0415 hours.\n\nAround 0430 hours, while driving near a lake en route to a base location, Witness 5 noticed two lights approximately two to three feet above the ground surface on the far side of the road, positioned directly over the pavement. One light was white and square in appearance; the other was round and red, positioned diagonally to the left above the white light. The witness initially considered whether the lights might indicate a night-time cyclist.\n\nAs an oncoming vehicle approached from the opposite direction, the red and white light pair began drifting off the pavement into sand at the roadside. Witness 5 pointed the anomalous behavior out to the SA. The lights made it difficult to discern what might be displaying them, and they appeared to be oriented directly toward the agents' vehicle. The agents slowed to approximately 100 feet in front of the light pair.\n\nAs the agents' vehicle slowed and the oncoming vehicle approached, the light pair hovered \"with zero resistance or change in height over bushes to the right,\" moving at approximately 15-20 mph. The pair stopped as the agents' vehicle stopped. Witness 5 deployed Night Vision Goggles for closer observation. Through the NVGs, the witness observed the light pair for a split second before the lights extinguished. In their place, the NVGs revealed \"a very thin line remain, maybe 4 ft wide, horizontal to the earth.\" This thin line moved at the same speed before the witness lost track of it; it appeared to move upward in height while maintaining its horizontal orientation.\n\nThe SA notified a named location of the activity. Personnel on duty committed to investigating. A named individual (redacted) volunteered to return to the sighting location. Three agents then searched, maneuvering their vehicle to illuminate the area with headlights and observing through NVGs and thermal binoculars. Several cold spots were identified but proved upon examination to be redacted items.\n\nAround 0530 hours, while using NVGs, the SA announced \"I see it!\" and referenced a cobweb. Witness 5 then noticed a cobweb nearby. A second cobweb was observed moving upward -- an observation the witness noted as inconsistent with natural wind patterns or gravitational behavior.\n\nAt that point, Witness 5 observed what the memorandum describes as \"not perfectly outlined, but faint lights in a perfect formation that moved together.\" While the SA watched through NVGs, Witness 5 observed the formation with the naked eye. The formation appeared to move upward and slightly side to side, \"giving the perception of trying to evade being noticed, or blend into the stars\" as it ascended to more than twenty feet in the air. When the witness focused on a bright reference light in the distance, their eyes adjusted and they lost the formation. Upon readjusting a few seconds later, they observed \"the exact formation of faint lights again but at the opposite angle and at the same height and location.\" The formation then became progressively fainter and ceased to be visible. The agents continued maneuvering and shining lights but could not identify anything tangible.\n\nThe agents noted a parked truck near the location around 0345 hours, which they marked for future investigation. Tire tracks from this truck led back to the road and location where the red and white light pair was observed at approximately 0430 hours.\n\n## Ground Investigation in Daylight\n\nAfter resting from 0700 to 1030 hours, Witness 5 returned to the 0430 sighting location with the other agents for a systematic daylight search. They identified odd scrapes in the ground surrounding a particular plant. While the pattern was initially considered potentially consistent with wind damage, the witness observed that \"it was not windy the night before and the dirt movement looked very sharp and very fresh.\" The cuts in the dirt were symmetrical and round in configuration but \"did not always make a full circle.\" The witness noted that at other times this same plant did not have similar markings, and the pattern was assessed as distinct from the plant's baseline state.\n\n## What The Record Supports\n\nDOW-UAP-D083 preserves a detailed, chronologically structured account from a trained federal law enforcement observer, filed within AARO's official case management process. The record documents multiple distinct visual phenomena across two observation periods in October 2023, using both unaided vision and instruments including Night Vision Goggles and thermal binoculars.\n\nThe document does not provide identified explanations for any of the phenomena described. The orange hovering light, the stationary red orb with simultaneously released smaller orbs, the two-light pair that was briefly visible through NVGs as a thin horizontal line, and the faint coherent formation with apparent evasive movement all remain unresolved and unidentified within the official record.\n\nThe presence of civilian vehicles, an unidentified parked truck with tire tracks leading to the 0430 sighting location, and an inability to corroborate radio transmissions in real time are noted details the document records without resolution. Ground evidence -- symmetrical, fresh scrapes around a plant -- is described as anomalous by the witness but is not formally analyzed or attributed in the memorandum.\n\nWhat this record supports is the existence of an official statement, submitted to AARO and formalized by the Office of the Under Secretary of War, documenting multiple unexplained aerial and ground-level observations by U.S. federal law enforcement personnel in the western United States in October 2023.\n\n## References\n\n[^1]: [Department of War PURSUE page](https://www.war.gov/UFO/#release)\n\n[^2]: [Department of War PURSUE data file (uap-data.csv)](https://www.war.gov/Portals/1/Interactive/2026/UFO/uap-data.csv)\n\n[^3]: [DOW-UAP-D083, Narrative Statement 5, Western United States Event, 2023 remote release asset](https://www.war.gov/medialink/ufo/061226/release_03/documents/DoW-UAP-D083_Narrative-5_Western-US-Event.pdf)","readingTime":"9 min read"},"relatedRecords":[],"citation":{"canonicalUrl":"https://disclosdex.com/documents/2026-pursue-release-03-034-dow-uap-d083-narrative-statement-5-western-united-states-event-2023","title":"DOW-UAP-D083, Narrative Statement 5, Western United States Event, 2023","publisher":"Disclosdex","retrievedFrom":"https://disclosdex.com/api/v1/documents/2026-pursue-release-03-034-dow-uap-d083-narrative-statement-5-western-united-states-event-2023","license":"CC-BY-4.0"}}