USO Case Book: Unidentified Submerged Objects Throughout History

Overview

This video is a global historical survey of Unidentified Submerged Object (USO) sightings, intended as a companion and sequel to UAP Gerb's earlier video on USOs. The central argument is that credible USO reports are not a modern American curiosity but a persistent, multi-century, globally distributed phenomenon documented across militaries, merchant navies, scientific institutions, and civilian witnesses. UAP Gerb examines cases from Project Blue Book, Soviet naval records, Australian government files, and pre-twentieth-century maritime logs to demonstrate that objects displaying transmedium behavior — entering and exiting water at speed, hovering slightly above ocean surfaces, submerging without disturbing the water — have been recorded consistently regardless of era or nation.

A secondary argument concerns the suppression of USO data. The 1952 OPNAV 3820 directive restricted Navy UFO sightings to circulation only among the Air Force Technical Intelligence Center, USAF Intelligence, and the Director of Naval Intelligence, which UAP Gerb argues directly explains the thinness of officially documented USO cases. Of the more than 13,000 sightings collected by Project Blue Book between 1949 and 1969, only 258 involved ships, and only 13 of those met the program's own merit standards for UFO reporting. The video also references JANAP 146C as a parallel restriction on inter-service UFO reporting. Both directives are characterized as institutionally responsible for ensuring that meaningful USO data did not accumulate in the public record.

The video covers four geographic and documental domains: Project Blue Book ship sightings, Soviet naval and scientific records (drawn primarily from Paul Stonehill and Philip Mantle's Russia's USO Secrets and Jacques Vallée's UFO Chronicles of the Soviet Union), Australian government files and civilian reports, and a special category of recurring historical phenomena called the Maritime Light Wheel — rotating spoke-like luminous structures observed by multiple independent crews across the Eastern Hemisphere from 1873 through at least 1910. UAP Gerb concludes by arguing that the consistency of USO characteristics across these diverse sources — especially the recurrence of Tic Tac or cigar-shaped objects hovering above or submerging into the ocean without affecting the water's surface — supports treating the oceans as a primary operational environment for the UAP phenomenon.

Project Blue Book Ship Sightings

Of 258 ship-based UAP reports in Project Blue Book, 155 occurred in the Pacific and 104 in the Atlantic, a distribution UAP Gerb notes as suggesting a Pacific hotspot rather than isolated incidents. Four cases are examined in detail, with particular emphasis on the inadequacy of Blue Book's official explanations.

The MV Marala North Atlantic Sighting on August 4, 1950 is described as UAP Gerb's favorite case in the video. The ship master, chief mate, and third mate of the MV Marala observed an ovular, cylindrically shaped object — described as half an egg cut lengthwise — approach from the southwest at between 25 and 500 mph, hover no more than 100 feet above the sea surface, and pass within 1,000 feet of the vessel. All three witnesses described a rotary and wobbling motion; the object's surface was variously described as shiny aluminum or metallic white. The encounter lasted approximately one minute. Blue Book classified this case as unidentified — one of the few maritime cases to receive that designation.

On November 7, 1959, three witnesses aboard the SS City of Alako, traveling from Yokohama to Los Angeles just north of the Hawaiian Islands, observed a bright object streak across the water from four miles north of the ship, emit three flashes, and submerge. Blue Book classified the case as a meteor. The low pursuit angle and extended trajectory across the water surface are argued as incompatible with that explanation; the three flashes before submersion are noted as a detail that recurs in Australian sightings discussed later in the video. See SS City of Alako Hawaiian Islands Sighting.

On June 25, 1960, near Ascension Island, an operation range vessel (code-named Whiskey) was recovering the data cassette from Missile Test 1802 via a small boat when witnesses — including an RCA photographer, divers from the recovery crew, and the pilot and co-pilot of the recovery plane — observed a steady white or yellowish light appear approximately 100 yards from the cassette, apparently from under the surface. No waves broke over the light; the event lasted ten seconds. Blue Book attributed the sighting to a flare, but the investigation established that no planes or vessels released a flare at the location. See Ascension Island USO Sighting.

The SS Morgantown Victory Sighting occurred on January 11, 1966, approximately 1,000 miles southeast of Tokyo. The third mate, helmsman, and bow lookout observed a cigar-shaped object with an orange-yellow glow and a dimmer dorsal glow, estimated at 200–250 feet long and 35–40 feet wide, approach the ship's starboard side from the horizon. The object turned 180 degrees to avoid the vessel, hovered for 30 seconds, crossed the bow, changed direction again, and entered the sea — a sequence lasting three minutes. Blue Book attributed the sighting to the decay of the Cosmos 33 satellite, an explanation incompatible with the object's hovering and controlled directional changes.

Soviet USO Records

UAP Gerb draws on Russia's USO Secrets by Paul Stonehill and Philip Mantle, and on Jacques Vallée's UFO Chronicles of the Soviet Union, while acknowledging that Soviet cases lack the documentary accessibility of Blue Book files.

On October 7, 1977, the Soviet submarine repair ship Vulga was navigating the Barents Sea when its radar detected an unknown object approaching from roughly 60 miles away. Captain Tanton arrived on the bridge to observe nine bright discs moving in from the northeast, which circled the vessel for 18 minutes. Ship communications malfunctioned during the encounter — a pattern comparable to the 1976 Tehran UFO incident — and returned to normal after the discs departed. In response, Fleet Admiral Nikolai Smirnov issued a directive mandating that Soviet hydrographic, scientific research, and reconnaissance ships report UFO sightings, authorized by naval officer and UFO researcher Vladimir Azhazha and signed by Naval Deputy Chief of Staff P. Noitov. See Soviet Submarine Repair Ship Vulga Sighting.

In August 1970, a group of Soviet hydrologists conducting research from a motorboat on Kamchatka Lake on the Kamchatka Peninsula witnessed a large dome of water erupt approximately one kilometer away, from which rose a gray-colored oval object estimated at 40 to 60 meters in length that hovered at roughly 100 meters altitude while the motorboat engine stalled. The object then accelerated rapidly away, after which engine function was restored. The engine interference is noted as consistent with the electromagnetic effects discussed by Kevin Knuth at the Sol Foundation. See Kamchatka Lake USO Sighting (1970).

On June 15, 1977, the Soviet ship Nooget, navigating the Gulf of Guayaquil off Ecuador, observed a white luminescent sphere rise from the water directly ahead, fly around the ship, hover 20 meters above the vessel, fly higher, zigzag, and dive back into the water. This account is sourced from the manuscripts and books of Felix Zigel, described as one of Russia's most respected UFO researchers. See Soviet Ship Nooget USO Sighting.

Australian Government and Civilian Sightings

Australia's officially declassified UFO files provide more documentary access than Soviet records. The Royal Australian Air Force's first officially logged unusual aerial sighting occurred on January 23, 1964, and describes lights observed at sea near Groote Island, Western Australia, that caused compasses to malfunction — a shadow at the center of the lights rotated clockwise, causing them to pulsate. Australian intelligence produced a formal report on magnetic disturbance from this sighting, and Lieutenant Commander AF Perry of Australian intelligence hypothesized that similar sightings might represent experiments by oil search teams, though UAP Gerb notes this explanation is inconsistent with the character of the observations.

A 1967 incident documented in Australian government files records staff from the Department of Works and local civilians observing lights emerge from the sea, rise to great height, curve, and return to the ocean — accompanied by three distinct flashes on return, paralleling the SS City of Alako case from eight years earlier. Australian intelligence tracked this category of sighting in a manner comparable to American and Soviet programs.

The Port Augusta USO Sighting in 1947 involved Frederick Walter and Emma Flav observing five gray oblong objects rise from the sea and move northwest to southeast; two railroad workers independently described five white or light pink egg-shaped objects with a quivering motion on emergence — a detail compared to the gyrating, wobbling motion of the MV Marala object.

The Frasier Island USO Sighting, reported in the July–August 1966 issue of Flying Saucer Review, involved private pilot C Adams and television cameraman Les Hendy, who observed four or five objects approximately three miles east of Frasier Island from an aircraft: two dark cigar-shaped objects up to 100 feet long, accompanied by three smaller objects, standing still in the water. As the aircraft closed to within two miles, the objects submerged without disturbing the surface — a characteristic connected to the HMNZS Southland case discussed by Kevin Knuth at the Sol Foundation.

Maritime Light Wheel Phenomenon

The Maritime Light Wheel is a recurring category of USO observation documented primarily across the Eastern Hemisphere from the 1870s through the early twentieth century. The phenomenon is characterized by large rotating wheel-like structures with radial spokes of bright or milky white light, observed either below the water surface or hovering above it — in some cases both within a single encounter. UAP Gerb presents the maritime light wheel as potentially a transmedium craft, while acknowledging a competing natural explanation involving bioluminescent algae interacting with pressure waves — a hypothesis noted as lacking scientific consensus. The phenomenon is also discussed in a 2006 Russian USO documentary recommended in the video.

The earliest documented case is the Ship Adhy Maritime Light Wheel Sighting on March 27, 1873. Captain Lebman, voyaging from Lebanon to Singapore on the ship Adhy, observed a blinding milky white light beneath the waves approximately two ship-lengths from the vessel, emitting waves of light "like flakes of snow when driven over the rocks by a strong wind." The light followed the ship at four to five knots for roughly half an hour. Lebman stated he had never encountered anything similar in his 26 years of maritime experience. The case is documented in the National Library of Australia, reported in the 1873 newspaper The Argus.

The Persian Gulf USO Flap spans 1879 to 1901 and involves three distinct light wheel encounters. On May 15, 1879, JE Pringle of the HMS Vulture reported "luminous waves or pulsations in the water moving at great speed" passing under the ship, and observed two objects described as revolving wheels with illuminated spokes — the two wheels rotating in equal and opposite directions, with spokes approximately 25 feet long. In May 1880, the captain and crew of the British India Company steamer Patna observed two enormous luminous wheels appear on each side of the ship near 11:30 p.m., with spokes of 200 to 300 yards in length, each wheel approximately 500 to 600 yards in diameter and containing about 16 spokes. On April 4, 1901, Captain Hosan of the SS Kila encountered revolving shafts of light on the sea surface rotating at approximately 60 mph that appeared suddenly and faded over 15 minutes.

Two additional light wheel cases are documented outside the Persian Gulf. On January 5, 1880, Commander Ari Harris of the SS Shahian observed a milky white circle in the sky off the Malabar Coast of India resembling a nebula, with waves of light, on a clear night with no moon. On June 10, 1909, Captain Gabe of the SS Bintang, sailing through the Strait of Malacca, observed a vast revolving wheel of light under the water with "long arms issuing from a center," so large only half of it was visible at once, disappearing when its center was directly under the vessel. The case was published in Scientific American issue 1065, sourced from the nautical meteorological annual of the Danish Meteorological Institute. In 1910, in the South China Sea, Captain Brier of the Dutch steamship Valentin and his first and second mates and first engineer observed what appeared to be a horizontal wheel hovering rapidly above the water surface.

Key Claims

• Of the 13,000+ UFO sightings in Project Blue Book, only 258 involved ships, 13 met merit standards, and a small subset of those describe USOs or transmedium objects; the 1952 OPNAV 3820 directive directly suppressed naval USO reporting.
• The MV Marala case (August 4, 1950) is one of the very few ship-based Blue Book cases classified as "unidentified."
• The Blue Book explanation for the SS City of Alako case (meteor) does not account for the object's low pursuit angle across the water and extended trajectory.
• The Ascension Island case (June 25, 1960) was classified as a flare by Blue Book despite confirmed absence of any flare release by any aircraft or vessel at the location.
• The Cosmos 33 satellite decay explanation for the SS Morgantown Victory (January 11, 1966) cannot account for hovering and controlled directional changes.
• Soviet Fleet Admiral Nikolai Smirnov issued a mandatory UFO reporting directive for hydrographic and reconnaissance ships following the 1977 Vulga incident — a Soviet functional equivalent of OPNAV 3820.
• The 1970 Kamchatka Lake USO case involved engine interference consistent with the electromagnetic effects seen in other UAP encounters.
• Australian government files describe objects with three distinct flashes on returning to sea — a detail matching the SS City of Alako case decades earlier.
• The Frasier Island objects submerged without disturbing the water surface, consistent with the HMNZS Southland case discussed by Kevin Knuth.
• The maritime light wheel phenomenon is documented in the Persian Gulf, the Indian Ocean, the South China Sea, and the Strait of Malacca across a period from 1873 to 1910; the two wheels observed by JE Pringle rotated in equal and opposite directions.
• No documented cases of ball lightning exiting the sea are known, undermining that explanation for USO fireball events.
• The bioluminescent algae pressure wave hypothesis for maritime light wheels lacks scientific consensus.
• George Knapp allegedly smuggled UFO files out of Russia that may contain USO-relevant data.
• Pacific Ocean ship-based sightings in Blue Book (155) outnumbered Atlantic sightings (104), suggesting a Pacific hotspot.

Sources

• YouTube — UAP Gerb
• Russia's USO Secrets — Paul Stonehill and Philip Mantle
• UFO Chronicles of the Soviet Union — Jacques Vallée
• Flying Saucer Review, July–August 1966–67
• Scientific American, issue 1065
• Nautical Meteorological Annual — Danish Meteorological Institute
• National Library of Australia — The Argus, 1873

Related Pages

• People: Luis Elizondo, Kevin Knuth, George Knapp, Paul Stonehill, Philip Mantle, Felix Zigel, Fleet Admiral Nikolai Smirnov, Vladimir Azhazha, JE Pringle, Captain Lebman, Captain Gabe, Captain Brier, Captain Hosan, Ari Harris, RF Moore, Frederick Walter, Emma Flav, C Adams, Les Hendy, AF Perry
• Organizations: Project Blue Book, Project Sign, Project Grudge, OPNAV 3820, JANAP 146C, US Hydrographic Bureau, British Admiralty, British India Company, Danish Meteorological Institute, RCA, Sol Foundation
• Locations: North Atlantic Ocean, Pacific Ocean, Ascension Island, Persian Gulf, Kamchatka Peninsula, Cape Race, Newfoundland, Malabar Coast, India, Strait of Malacca, South China Sea, Hawaiian Islands, Port Augusta, South Australia, Frasier Island, Australia
• Concepts: Unidentified Submerged Object (USO), Trans-Medium Vehicle, Maritime Light Wheel, Maritime UFO and USO Research, Ball lightning, Bioluminescent algae pressure wave hypothesis
• Events: MV Marala North Atlantic Sighting, SS City of Alako Hawaiian Islands Sighting, Ascension Island USO Sighting, SS Morgantown Victory Sighting, Persian Gulf USO Flap, Ship Adhy Maritime Light Wheel Sighting, Port Augusta USO Sighting, Frasier Island USO Sighting, SS Siberian USO Encounter, Fort Salisbury USO Sighting, SS Patna Light Wheel Sighting, SS Kila Light Shaft Sighting, SS Bintang Light Wheel Sighting, Dutch Steamship Valentin Hovering Object Sighting, SS Shahian Circular Object Sighting, Soviet Submarine Repair Ship Vulga Sighting, Kamchatka Lake USO Sighting (1970), Soviet Ship Nooget USO Sighting
• Operations: Missile Test 1802 Data Recovery