New Zealand
Nine volumes of declassified UFO sighting reports released by the New Zealand Defence Force in 2010. The files span 1952 to 2009 and contain reports filed by members of the public, police officers, and military personnel. Documents are scanned originals across roughly 2,000 pages.
Volumes
Dates
Volume
Dates
Volume
Dates
Volume
Dates
Volumes
Dates
About This Collection
New Zealand released its complete UFO files in December 2010, joining the wave of government disclosures that followed the United Kingdom's MOD release and France's GEIPAN programme. The NZDF compiled all records into nine volumes and made them available through Archives New Zealand.
The files are organised across several record series. AIR 39/3/3, the largest, contains the main body of sighting reports filed through official channels from 1952 onwards. A supplementary series (AIR 39/3/3A) ran parallel during the late 1970s and early 1980s, a period of heightened reporting that coincided with the Kaikoura lights incident. Separate series cover Air Staff briefings, RNZAF operational reports, and the final years of reporting through 2009.
The Kaikoura lights of 21 December 1978 remain the most prominent case in the collection. An Argosy cargo aircraft crew observed unidentified lights tracked simultaneously on Wellington Air Traffic Control radar. A film crew aboard a follow-up flight on 30 December captured footage that was broadcast internationally. The NZDF files contain the official reporting and investigation records from both events.
All nine volumes are image-only PDF scans of the original documents. The archive plans to build page-scan viewers for these files, making the content browsable without downloading full PDFs.
On the night of 21 December 1978, the crew of a Safe Air Argosy freighter reported unusual lights over the Kaikoura coast while Wellington radar tracked unidentified returns in the same area. When an Australian television crew flew the same route nine days later with a camera rolling, they filmed bright objects that matched concurrent radar contacts. The footage aired worldwide and prompted official inquiries from both the RNZAF and the New Zealand Civil Aviation Authority.
