Russian Cosmonauts and Their Sightings of UFOs and
Other Strange Phenomena
by Paul Stonehill
SIGHTINGS IN THE LOW EARTH ORBIT
Soviet, and later, Russian cosmonauts have observed
interesting , unusual, and often inexplicable phenomena while in space. Some of
them have talked about their experiences, although doing so is not encouraged
by their space program. A cosmonaut is a person trained by a human spaceflight program to command, pilot, or serve as a crew member of
a spacecraft; cosmonauts are professional space travelers.
Cosmonaut Vladimir Lyakhov once remarked about a very
unusual phenomenon he observed from his spaceship looking down on Earth: two
gigantic waves ascended from the waters of the Indian Ocean, and crashed onto
each other. The mass of water resulting from the crash seemed to be a giant
mountain that had vanished in an instant (published in Tekhnika-Molodezhi, Issue
3, 1980). Cosmonaut Vladimir Kovalyonok reported a very similar water
pillar of over 100 kilometers in height in the Timor Sea near Australia (NLO
magazine, 10/11, 1996). In an article published in Tekhnika-Molodezhi (Issue
3) back in 1979, cosmonaut and scientist Yevgeny Khrunov, remarked
that UFOs cannot be denied, as thousands of people have observed them.
Properties of unidentified objects simply astound the imagination. He was
outspoken in another interview, a year later. It was in the pre-perestroika times,
and Khrunov could not speak freely. Cosmonaut Aleksei Gubarev went a step further:
he admitted that he believed in aliens. Interestingly enough, he mentioned the
information that the Americans had at their disposal, information that
confirmed his belief (Tekhnika-Molodezhi, Issue 1, 1980).
Cosmonaut Valery Rozhdestvensky, a cosmonaut who does not believe in the
presence of extraterrestrial civilization anywhere in the close vicinity to us,
at the same time revealed knowledge about secret rumors or information that
those outside of special circles (the Soviet space program and their military)
could not know. In the article in Tekhnika-Molodezhi (Issue
10, 1980) he stated that he did not believe that a “small green
man” actually knocked on the porthole of a Soyuz spaceship.
