At about 1:17 a.m. on February 19, 2025, a small group of Anoka Police Department employees was holding an after-action briefing in a Domino’s parking lot up the road from the station when they noticed a multicolored, flashing object hovering low in the western sky. According to FBI records released through the National Archives in May 2026, at least three of them watched it for about 90 minutes, moving to a municipal parking ramp for a better view.

One officer filmed it with an iPhone held up to binoculars. Witnesses estimated it was somewhere between an SUV and a school bus in size. One compared it to six hula hoops ringed with lights. The FBI notes put it at 10,000 to 30,000 feet and possibly 50 miles away, and one witness said it moved in three bursts toward the Monticello nuclear plant. A colleague who drove toward it reached Elk River and found it was still far to the west.

The report reached the FBI through Americans for Safe Aerospace, a group led by former Navy pilot Ryan Graves, who called the case very hard to explain. The file also mentions an officer’s sighting two days earlier and another over the Anoka Ice Arena in 2022.

The FBI drew no conclusion. Skeptics online point out that a bright star or planet low on the horizon flickers through many colors, especially through a zoomed phone camera, and seems to hang in place for hours.