Government and military
The Pentagon UAP offices: AATIP, the UAP Task Force, AOIMSG and AARO, with their reports. 109 events, newest first.
Media11 Jul 2020
History began the second season of Unidentified: Inside America's UFO Investigation. Former Pentagon official Luis Elizondo and former defense official Chris Mellon examined military and civilian sightings and argued the objects warrant serious government study.
Photo: Max Moszkowicz, CC BY 3.0
Military28 Apr 2020
Asked about the Pentagon release of Navy UFO videos, Japanese Defense Minister Taro Kono said no SDF pilot had met a UFO and that he did not really believe in them, but that encounter procedures would be set and Japan would seek the US analysis.
Photo: Prime Minister's Official Residence, CC BY 4.0
Government27 Apr 2020
The Defense Department authorized the release of three Navy infrared videos, FLIR1, Gimbal and GoFast, that had already circulated publicly. It said the objects in them remain unidentified.
Photo: United States Navy, Public domain
Whistleblowers2020
Former Pentagon official Luis Elizondo and former intelligence official Christopher Mellon, who joined Tom DeLonge's To The Stars Academy in 2017, left the company at the end of 2020. They later said the firm's science mission was losing out to entertainment.
Photo: Max Moszkowicz, CC BY 3.0
Government19 Jun 2019
Senate Intelligence vice chairman Mark Warner and two other senators received a classified Pentagon briefing on Navy pilot encounters with unidentified aircraft. His office said unexplained interference with naval pilots was a safety concern; the Navy confirmed the briefing but gave no details.
Photo: U.S. Senator Mark Warner, Public domain
Whistleblowers1 Jun 2019
Pentagon spokesperson Christopher Sherwood told The Intercept that Luis Elizondo had no responsibilities for AATIP while in his intelligence office. Days later spokesperson Susan Gough said he had no assigned AATIP role, starting a long dispute with Elizondo, who says he ran the program.
Photo: Txint445444, CC BY-SA 4.0
Media31 May 2019
History premiered a six-part series following Luis Elizondo, Tom DeLonge's To The Stars Academy and former Pentagon official Chris Mellon. It featured Navy pilot David Fravor describing his 2004 encounter and other accounts tied to the Navy cases.
Photo: Max Moszkowicz, CC BY 3.0
Whistleblowers2019
In sworn 2023 testimony, former intelligence officer David Grusch said that as a National Reconnaissance Office reservist he was a member of the UAP Task Force from 2019 to 2021. He said this work was the basis for his later claims, which the Pentagon disputes.
Photo: U.S. House Subcommittee on National Security, the Border, and Foreign Affairs, Public domain
GovernmentFeb 2018
Answering a written question from lower-house lawmaker Seiji Osaka, the cabinet said it had never confirmed UFOs thought to come from beyond Earth and had made no special study of how to respond if one entered Japanese airspace. The question also cited the U.S. Pentagon's UFO program.
Photo: Cabinet Public Relations Office, Cabinet Secretariat of Japan, CC BY 4.0
Military18 Dec 2017
Two days after the New York Times revealed AATIP, retired Navy Cmdr. David Fravor told ABC News about chasing a wingless, roughly 40-foot white object off California in 2004, saying he thought it 'was not from this world.' He later repeated his account under oath to Congress in 2023.
Photo: U.S. House Committee On Oversight and Accountability, Public domain
Media16 Dec 2017
The New York Times reported that the Pentagon had run a little-known Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program, funded with about $22 million from 2008 to 2011. The story ran with two Navy videos and said Luis Elizondo had led the program.
Photo: United States Navy, Public domain
WhistleblowersOct 2017
Luis Elizondo, who said he ran the Pentagon's Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program, left the Defense Department in October 2017, citing a lack of support for the work, and joined Tom DeLonge's To The Stars Academy.
Photo: Max Moszkowicz, CC BY 3.0
Military7 Nov 2015
On the evening of Nov. 7, 2015, a bright, spreading light was seen and filmed from California to Nevada and Arizona, prompting UFO speculation online. The Navy and Pentagon said it was a scheduled, unarmed Trident II (D5) test missile fired from the submarine USS Kentucky off the coast.
Photo: U.S. Navy, Public domain
Sightings10 Aug 2015
A volunteer group, the Scientific Coalition for UAP Studies, released an analysis of the 2013 Aguadilla infrared video arguing a wind-borne object could not explain it. In 2025 AARO assessed with moderate confidence that the objects were sky lanterns.
Photo: Miguelpr91 at English Wikipedia, Public domain
Sightings25 Apr 2013
An infrared camera on a U.S. Customs and Border Protection aircraft over Rafael Hernandez Airport filmed objects that seemed to race and enter the sea. Private analysts argued it was anomalous; in 2025 AARO said the objects likely were two sky lanterns drifting with the wind over land.
Photo: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:Erniefr&action=edit, Public domain
Government2012
Dedicated funding for the program began in 2008 and ended in 2012, the Pentagon said in 2017, because other priorities merited the money. A later Pentagon statement said DIA found the contractor's reports of limited value; people who worked on it say UAP study continued informally.
Photo: MSGT KEN HAMMOND, Public domain
Government2011
Interviewees told AARO that KONA BLUE was a DHS compartment for retrieved non-human material. AARO found it was a 2011 proposed special access program, pushed by people from DIA's AAWSAP/AATIP, that DHS's deputy secretary disapproved; it never got funding or material.
Photo: U.S. Coast Guard, Public domain
Sightings8 Nov 2010
A KCBS news helicopter filmed a billowing trail rising over the Pacific northwest of Catalina Island that many viewers took for a missile launch. The Pentagon first called it unexplained, then said it was most likely an airplane contrail distorted by camera angle and the setting sun.
Skinwalker Ranch11 Mar 2010
A Defense Intelligence Reference Document, Anomalous Acute and Subacute Field Effects on Human Biological Tissues, produced under DIA's AAWSAP program, studied burns and neurological effects reported after close encounters and proposed electromagnetic fields as a cause. DIA later released it.
Photo: Antony-22, CC BY-SA 4.0
Government24 Jun 2009
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid wrote to Deputy Defense Secretary William Lynn asking for a restricted special access program for parts of the DIA aerospace study he called AATIP, citing sensitive findings. A November 2009 DIA review found no justification for the protection.
Photo: United States Congress, Public domain
GovernmentSep 2008
The Defense Intelligence Agency contracted Bigelow Aerospace Advanced Space Studies of Las Vegas for the Advanced Aerospace Weapon System Applications Program, officially a study of future aerospace threats. It produced dozens of technical papers; funding of about $22 million ended in 2012.
Photo: Bill Ingalls, Public domain
Skinwalker Ranch18 Aug 2008
The Defense Intelligence Agency publicly posted a small-business request for proposals for the Advanced Aerospace Weapon System Applications Program, seeking studies of possible breakthrough aerospace technologies. The contract that followed went to Bigelow's BAASS.
Photo: Antony-22, CC BY-SA 4.0
Skinwalker Ranch2007
Former Senate leader Harry Reid later said he asked Ted Stevens and Daniel Inouye, who ran the defense appropriations subcommittee, to fund a study of aerial phenomena. He said they agreed to unpublicized money in the defense bill, and that the Pentagon put the study out to bid, which Bigelow won.
Photo: Office of United States Senator Ted Stevens (R- Alaska), Public domain
MilitaryNov 2004
Navy F/A-18F crews from the USS Nimitz strike group, cued by the cruiser USS Princeton's radar, reported intercepting a smooth white object they could not identify. Another crew recorded the infrared video the Pentagon later released as FLIR1.
Photo: United States Navy, Public domain
WhistleblowersAug 2000
Mercury astronaut Gordon Cooper's memoir Leap of Faith, written with Bruce Henderson, says that in 1957 at Edwards AFB camera crew filmed a saucer-shaped craft landing, and that the film was sent to the Pentagon on orders and never heard of again. No official record of it has been confirmed.
Photo: NASA, Public domain
