Welcome to this edition of The Intelligence Brief… This week, a U.S. Air Force C-17 Globemaster bound for Antarctica was forced to return to New Zealand after its crew received a warning of a “potentially hazardous” space-related activity reportedly involving a planned Russian missile launch. In our analysis, we’ll be looking at 1) how a Russian air traffic management warning prompted New Zealand authorities to issue a NOTAM affecting international airspace, 2) why the alert caused the Antarctic-bound U.S. military flight to reverse course, 3) the lingering uncertainty over whether the reported Russian missile launch ever actually occurred, and 4) why some analysts suspect the mysterious warning may represent another example of Russia’s broader campaign of information operations and “hybrid warfare” against the West.

Quote of the Week

“The plane turned around on the advice of New Zealand authorities who indicated that there was a space-related hazard enroute.”

– U.S. Pacific Command Statement

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“Space Hazard” Near Antarctica Forces U.S. Military Flight to Turn Back

This week, an alarming story from the southernmost continent made headlines, as it was reported that a United States Air Force C-17 Globemaster aircraft on its way to Antarctica required an unexpected change of course after its crew was warned of a “potentially hazardous” space activity occurring in the area.

Within just hours of departing from Christchurch, New Zealand, at approximately 9 a.m. on Tuesday, the American military aircraft was forced to turn around following the release of a Notice to Airmen (NOTAM) issued by New Zealand’s Civil Aviation Authority (CAA).

Early reports offered few details, indicating only that an unspecified “space hazard” had been what prompted the NOTAM, inevitably prompting speculation about what might have caused the unusual turn events.

So what do we currently know about the space-related mystery near Antarctica this week that caused a U.S. military aircraft to change its course?

Incident En Route to Antarctica

Departing Christchurch under the call sign ICE28, the American C-17 Globemaster was on its way to Antarctica’s famous McMurdo Station. A logistics hub operated by the U.S. via the National Science Foundation, the station supports as many as 1,200 residents at the height of Antarctica’s busy summer science season—a number that shrinks back to around 200 workers who weather the colder Antarctic months.

The aircraft had only been traveling for three hours when a NOTAM came to its crew’s attention, prompting the Antarctic-bound aircraft to return to New Zealand. Early reports indicated that some kind of potential “hazard” had been identified; it was soon revealed that knowledge of this had reportedly been conveyed to CAA officials by the Russian State Air Traffic Management (ATM) Corporation.

A Russian Missile Launch?

Little else was known at that time, and on Wednesday, the New Zealand Herald reported that the country’s Foreign Minister, Winston Peters, had reached out to Moscow for more information after it was learned that Russian officials had reportedly planned to launch a missile in the area.

Officials with New Zealand’s CAA later confirmed that the Russian State ATM Corporation had alerted them about a “planned missile launch and associated potential hazard to international airspace,” specifically impacting New Zealand’s Oceanic Flight Information Region, an area of international waters over the South Pacific Ocean, Southern Ocean, and Tasman Sea covering as much as 29 million square kilometers, which is managed by Airways New Zealand.

Responding to the alert, the CAA issued a NOTAM for the area, which did not restrict all flights through the area, but which reportedly advised pilots to “make their decisions based on the information available,” according to a CAA statement issued this week.

Russian Weapon, or “Hybrid Warfare”?

To date, there is little evidence that any real weapons test ever even occurred. According to The Diplomat, there were reportedly never any Russian ships or aircraft confirmed around the time of the alleged launch. By contrast, a significant Russian presence was visible in the region earlier this year during a long-range ballistic missile launch conducted by China.

“So it appears that Russia’s warning is a dummy warning of a dummy missile,” Anne-Marie Brady wrote of the incident at The Diplomat, further characterizing the situation as a likely “information operation” evincing Moscow’s ongoing hybrid warfare efforts.

Similar incidents have been occurring for several years now. In December 2024, Andrea Kendall-Taylor with the Center for a New American Security characterized such events as part of a broader “hybrid war” Moscow has been continually waging against the West.

“While individually all these acts seem not to be important, when you bring them all together, they’re part of Russia’s hybrid war against the West,” Kendall-Taylor said.

As of Thursday, it remains unclear whether the alleged Russian missile launch ever really occurred, or if the incident that interrupted a U.S. Air Force aircraft’s annual flight to Antarctica was simply a false alarm prompted by a Russian “warning”—one that may yet prove to have been part of a broader issue the West has encountered with Moscow in recent years.

That concludes this week’s installment of The Intelligence Brief. You can read past editions of our newsletter at our website, or if you found this installment online, don’t forget to subscribe and get future email editions from us here. Also, if you have a tip or other information you’d like to send along directly to me, you can email me at micah [@] thedebrief [dot] org, or reach me on X: @MicahHanks.

Here are the top stories we’re covering right now…

New subsurface scans of Turkey’s controversial Durupınar Formation—a 157-meter (515-foot) geological feature long promoted by some researchers as the possible remains of Noah’s Ark—have reportedly identified subsurface anomalies that may challenge past assessments of the controversial site.

The findings, revealed in a press release and not yet detailed in research that has undergone peer-review, do not conclusively establish that the formation is artificial. However, according to researchers with Bakhtar Research and Engineering, LLC, and Noah’s Ark Scans, their preliminary data reveal newly identified features that warrant further investigation.

Durupınar Formation Scanned with Radar Developed for the U.S. Air Force

Scientists and religious scholars have long debated the historical basis of biblical narratives. However, the 1959 identification of the boat-shaped Durupınar Formation near Turkey’s Mount Ararat added a new dimension to the longstanding search for archaeological evidence associated with Noah’s Ark. Some researchers have argued that the formation’s dimensions and location resemble descriptions associated with the biblical vessel, while skeptics and geologists have generally maintained that the feature is a natural geological formation.

In a press release announcing the new analysis, the researchers said the survey marked the first use of BakhtarRadar at the controversial Durupınar site. The system was developed by project leader Dr. Khosrow Bakhtar, who, according to the release, has spent four decades developing detection technologies for organizations including the U.S. Air Force, Navy, Defense Threat Reduction Agency, and NORAD-USNORTHCOM. The team says the BakhtarRadar system used during the survey originated as a specialized subsurface imaging technology called EarthRadar, developed for the U.S. Air Force.

Joined by Noah’s Ark Scans founder Andrew Jones, Bakhtar conducted scans across the formation that the team says produced high-resolution, three-dimensional volumetric imagery of its subsurface features.

Before conducting the survey, the researchers outlined three primary objectives: determining whether the formation is a “single homogeneous mass of natural stone,” investigating whether it contains internal structures, and identifying the location of the underlying bedrock. The team also sought to determine whether that bedrock extends continuously beneath the surrounding valley.

“That is precisely the challenge at Durupınar,” the team’s statement explains, “separating layers, structures and discontinuities in difficult conditions and building a 3-D picture of what lies underneath.”

Not a Simple Homogeneous Mass of Rock?

Earlier investigations, including a 2019 ground-penetrating radar survey, reportedly identified several unusual subsurface features within the formation. These included voids, linear and angular features, and patterns that investigators interpreted as “possible corridors and chamber-like spaces.”

Unlike the equipment used in that earlier survey, the team said BakhtarRadar was deployed to “interrogate those same targets with a fundamentally different radar approach.” According to the researchers, the system also allowed them to examine the “deeper geological framework beneath the site” and attempt to trace the bedrock surface below and around the formation.

After completing scans across the Durupınar Formation, the team reported several preliminary observations from the data analyzed so far. Most notably, the researchers said the scans “do not show the formation as a simple, homogeneous mass of rock.”

Instead, Bakhtar and Jones reported what they described as “strong subsurface anomalies and layering” beneath the boat-shaped formation. They also said their analysis of the deeper data processed to date revealed “no clear boundary” beneath the formation. According to the team, this was unexpected because “the radar is looking well below where a shallow rock core would be expected to appear.”

The researchers also highlighted a subsurface anomaly extending approximately 250 feet through the central portion of the formation, which they have interpreted as resembling a “tunnel or hallway.” However, the feature has not been physically excavated or otherwise confirmed to represent an artificial structure.

The team cautioned that these observations were preliminary, and “remain subject to full processing and interpretation.” However, they also claim that their new findings “strike directly at the geological objection that has been raised against the site for years,” which argues that the Durupınar formation “is nothing more than a natural pile of rock or mud draped over shallow bedrock.”

“We are not trying to end this debate with a press release,” Jones said. “We believe this is Noah’s Ark, but the way to demonstrate that is to keep testing it.”

Even Some Creationists Remain Skeptical

For now, though, all the team has presented is the press release Jones mentions—none of the findings have been detailed in a formal study or undergone peer review. Additionally, critics have previously raised questions about how some of the team’s geophysical findings have been interpreted, particularly given that some members of the project, like Jones, have already publicly expressed their belief that the formation represents Noah’s Ark, and that others include self-ascribed Christian activists, according to the team’s website.

Even some prominent young-Earth creationists have expressed doubts about the team and its findings in the past. Such critics include Ken Ham, the founder, CEO, and former president of the Christian apologetics organization Answers in Genesis, who took issue with Noah’s Ark Scans’ founder, Andrew Jones, in a blog post last June.

“By his own admission, Andrew Jones of Noah’s Ark Scans, a committed leader of this latest ‘push’ to promote this site as the remains of Noah’s ark, was convinced of what this site likely was before viewing the results of these geophysical surveys,” Ham wrote on his blog last year, noting that geophysical data discussed by Jones had been “couched in terms of scan features being ‘decks’ as well as a claimed ‘corridor’ or ‘tunnel’ down the middle of the structure.”

“None of these reports objectively assess the raw geophysical data by canvassing other interpretations,” Ham argued.

It is worth noting that the Noah’s Ark Scans team concedes their failure to identify a bedrock boundary in the scan data processed so far, although noting that this “does not by itself prove bedrock is absent.” The group also concedes that radar anomalies alone “do not prove an archaeological origin.” Instead, they said more analysis and research will be needed to settle the argument about the controversial site’s true nature.

“Now we need to finish the processing, choose the best core locations, and put physical samples in the hands of the scientists,” Jones said in the recent press release. “That is where this becomes truly exciting.”

Preliminary Report ‘In the Coming Weeks’

The researchers said that the purpose of the ongoing effort is to find physical evidence that can “withstand scrutiny” and distinguish their interpretation of the site “from a purely natural geological explanation.”

The team says it expects to release a preliminary report “in the coming weeks,” after which its findings “will be integrated with the existing geophysical surveys” to help the team prioritize targeted core-drilling locations and “guide the next phase of the Durupınar investigation.”

Whether the group will produce evidence capable of persuading geologists and archaeologists—let alone critics of the project who themselves believe in the biblical flood—remains to be seen. Until physical evidence conclusively demonstrates otherwise, however, the Durupınar Formation is best described according to the prevailing geological interpretation: as a naturally formed geological feature rather than the remains of an archaeological structure.

Christopher Plain is a Science Fiction and Fantasy novelist and has spent the last six years as Associate News Editor and Head Science Writer at The Debrief. Follow and connect with him on X, learn about his books at plainfiction.com, or email him at christopher@thedebrief.org.