Pentagon Sought Information on Brazil’s Operation Prato UFO Investigation, Documents Show - World news

Documents released by the Pentagon say a team linked to aerospace company BAASS traveled to northern Brazil in 2009 to investigate reports connected to the Brazilian Air Force’s Operation Prato. Researchers were instructed to keep the mission discreet.

The U.S. Department of Defense sought information about Operation Prato, a Brazilian Air Force investigation into unidentified flying object reports in Pará between 1977 and 1978, according to documents released by the Pentagon. In 2009, the department sent specialists to northern Brazil through aerospace company BAASS, or Bigelow Aerospace Advanced Space Studies.

Known locally as “chupa-chupa,” Operation Prato began in December 1977 and lasted four months. The newly released records say the U.S. researchers were told not to draw attention to their work and to carry out a “very discreet” mission.

The account appears in the seventh batch of documents, released on October 23. The stated aim was to locate existing contacts and interview as many witnesses as possible. BAASS ranked Operation Prato records as its highest-priority material.

The company’s findings included accounts from local researchers, civilian archives and Brazilian Air Force documents about the operation that had circulated online. BAASS collected 205 printed pages of leaked documents, more than 250 electronic pages and records covering over 3,000 cases investigated by the local Center for Ufological Research, or CPU.

The report also referred to the 1986 incident known as the “Night of the UFOs,” when Brazilian pilots reported seeing unusual objects. It described other sightings, including reports of objects emitting beams of light toward the ground. Some accounts said people had been burned by the intense lights.

Although Colares was the main focus, investigators gathered hundreds of reports from other parts of Brazil. Teams visited locations in Pará, Ceará, São Paulo and Brasília. BAASS recommended sending its own investigators to Colares to film the reported phenomena and interview residents, as well as examining the leaked Air Force documents more closely.

The documents provide no further information about whether work related to Operation Prato continued. The Pentagon is releasing the files in batches, and seven batches have been made public so far.

Sources: CNN Brasil.