Incident: 5 August 2026, San Felipe, Chile. SEFAA case 2280, reported 2 September; resolved 15 September and released 8 October 2026. Identification: Venus.
The initial description concerned a white, circular-looking light apparently suspended to the west. Two people were reported to have watched it for about fifteen minutes. It seemed both large and nearby, but those impressions were not accompanied by a measured distance.
The photographs
The four-page investigation examines two iPhone 13 photographs. Metadata for the illustrated frame give 18:48:07 on 5 August, a 1/9-second exposure and a 4032 × 3024 image. The enquiry georeferenced the viewpoint and compared its direction with the evening sky.
A bright unresolved point in a photograph can look physically rounded without revealing a body’s dimensions. The useful evidence here was the combination of a dated image, a reconstructed viewing direction and the astronomical position of a conspicuous source.
The sky and traffic comparisons
SEFAA placed Venus at an azimuth around 296 degrees and an apparent elevation around 35 degrees. The report’s geographical figure shows the corresponding direction from San Felipe. This was consistent with the recorded light and the general western view described by the witnesses.
An Airbus A320 operating LXP389 from Calama towards Santiago also appeared in the traffic review. The agency rejected that aircraft as the photographed point because its position and crossing geometry did not match. An aircraft appearing somewhere in the wider sky at the relevant time was not sufficient grounds to identify it as the object.
The assessment
SEFAA classified the file as resolved, with Venus as the explanation. The witnesses’ sense that the light was close does not supply a competing measured range; it remains an important part of why the sight was reported in the first place.
UKPX reviewed the full report and its sky-and-landscape comparison figures, without independently calculating an ephemeris or examining the original image files. The 8 October release is a later publication stage. This case remains dated to the August evening established in the camera record.
Location and source record
Approximate San Felipe town-centre reference, not the private observation point or the position of Venus. Coordinates follow the checked geographical reference.
UKPX reference added 6 November 2026. Incident year: 2026. UKPX reviewed the linked source account. Any additional review limits are described above. Browse Historical Cases · More UFO / UAP / USO references.