Chile.Iquique · the dawn 'aircraft' photographed by LXP380

At 06:34 local time on Friday 9 August 2019, 10:34 UTC, the crew of LATAM flight LXP380, an Airbus A321 on a Santiago–Arica flight plan, called Iquique approach control by radio. The aircraft was heading north on airway UQ802, near the DADGI waypoint, at 32,000 feet and about 20 nautical miles west of Diego Aracena airport. The transcript published by SEFAA, the section of Chile's Directorate General of Civil Aviation that studies anomalous aerial phenomena, records the query: 'At 3 o'clock from our position we have, uh… an aircraft apparently. We estimate about 20 miles. Do you have it on your display?' Control asked for confirmation and the pilot repeated: 'It seems to be an aircraft. It would be… apparently some 20 or 30 miles from our position. We estimate the same altitude.' The controller answered that the nearest traffic was at 5 o'clock, ninety miles away. 'I'm taking a photo of it, to send to you later.' The tower logbook recorded the query and that the Air Force Air Operations Centre was informed. The pilot gave no path, behaviour or speed.

SEFAA studied a 12.6-second video, 848 by 480 pixels, and three photographs, two of them copies of the same image. All of it arrived over WhatsApp, which removed much of the pixel data and, in the photos, the camera parameters; even so, the office pressed on because it was an aviation case. According to the metadata, the video was created at 11:15 UTC, and the report says this is one hour and fourteen minutes after the logbook time, although the difference from 10:34 is 41 minutes; since the files went through WhatsApp, which the report itself says altered them, that creation time is probably when the file was sent rather than when it was shot. In the photo it reproduces, above the dark silhouette of the hills and below bands of reddish and orange cloud, a small dark elongated shape stands against the brightest strip of the dawn. The report says that 'the image analyst considered what was studied to be a cloud'; in her detailed opinion she described it as a rectangular-looking object with one rounded end, and added that she 'leaned towards thinking' it could be a cloud whose shape changed with the light and the breeze.

The office reviewed transponder traffic: at the time of filming the only aircraft to the east was LAN864, some 214 miles away in Bolivian airspace, about 396 kilometres, beyond what the images could show. There were no institutional air operations in the sector, a primary-radar search found nothing and a commercial flight approaching from the south, asked by control, saw nothing. The astronomy adviser ruled out an astronomical origin. The Iquique weather report gave visibility of more than 10 kilometres, overcast at around 3,500 feet and a light southwesterly wind. A meteorologist from the Chilean Meteorological Directorate reported that, having seen the background and the videos, a field of high cloud associated with a jet stream could be observed, consistent with the satellite imagery of the moment, and that, in view of this, he ruled out the presence of any kind of meteorological phenomenon or radiosonde balloon. To illustrate how a lone cloud changes within minutes, the report adds its own photographs of isolated clouds over Santiago and Lagunillas taken in February and March 2026. Its conclusion, of 11 May 2026, almost seven years later, is that what was reported had the characteristics of a cloud whose outline and size evolved, conspicuous because of the lighting and because it lay between the aircraft and the mountains and clouds lit by the dawn glow, and that the aircraft that later followed the route did not see it, very possibly because it had broken up. It classified the case as 'Resolved'.

Unlike many crew reports, here there are images, and that is why the case could be closed with more than a generic hypothesis. The pilot thought he saw an aircraft at his own altitude; the secondary radar, the primary-radar search, transponder traffic and another aircraft that passed through the area found none. What the photo and video show is a small, elongated dark patch silhouetted against the brightest part of the sky. A check of our own, not the report's, fits the explanation: at 10:34 UTC, off Iquique, the Sun was some 8 or 9° below the horizon, to the east-northeast, that is, roughly at 3 o'clock for an aircraft heading north. The object lay in the same direction as the dawn, and against the light a dark, compact cloud looks very much like the silhouette of a distant aircraft.

The report also has weak points. The image quality is poor, and the identification as a cloud rests on the analyst's judgement, which the report summarises as having 'considered what was studied to be a cloud' and which she herself phrased as 'leaning towards thinking' it was a cloud, together with the traffic and radar analysis and the meteorologist's opinion; there is no measurement of the object. The time of the video does not match that of the report, and the report itself gets the difference wrong: the metadata give 41 minutes, not one hour and fourteen, and that time is probably when it was sent over WhatsApp. The nearest traffic is given as 90 miles on the radio and 214 in the later analysis. The clouds used for comparison are over Santiago and nearly seven years later. And the file holds no account from the pilot beyond the radio call.

Even with those reservations, nothing in the file points to an aircraft: there was no return on any radar, no military operation in the sector, and the pilot reported no path.