The USS Nimitz Encounter
UnsolvedSummary
In November 2004 two Navy fighter crews, sent to check radar tracks off southern California, reported a white, wingless object over the sea. An infrared video from the same day was published in 2017 and released by the Pentagon in 2020; no official body has identified the object.
The case rests on the testimony of experienced aircrew, one of whom has repeated it under oath, and on a radar record that has never been made public. The one piece of evidence anyone can examine, a short infrared video, was recorded later that day by another crew. It is not a recording of the encounter.
What is documented
The strike group. In November 2004 the Nimitz carrier strike group was training about 100 miles south-west of San Diego, according to the 2021 60 Minutes report. Its escort, the cruiser USS Princeton, carried the Navy's Aegis SPY-1 radar.
The radar tracks. In a sworn statement to Congress in 2023, Commander David Fravor said the Princeton's crew had been observing objects on the Aegis system for the previous two weeks, "descending from above 80,000ft and coming rapidly down to 20,000ft." 60 Minutes put the period at a week and described the objects as descending 80,000 feet "in less than a second." The accounts differ, and the radar recordings have not been published.
The encounter. Fravor was the commanding officer of Strike Fighter Squadron 41, the Black Aces. On 14 November 2004 he and a second F/A-18F, flown by Lieutenant Alex Dietrich, were sent to the Princeton's contact while Dietrich's aircraft "stayed in High cover." On an otherwise calm sea they saw an area of churning white water, which 60 Minutes described as the size of a Boeing 737. Above it, Fravor said, was "a small white Tic Tac shaped object" with "No Rotors, No Rotor wash, or any visible flight control surfaces like wings." 60 Minutes reported his estimate that it was about the size of his own F/A-18F. As he descended towards it, he said, it rose, mirroring his path, and then "it rapidly accelerated and disappeared right in front of our aircraft." The pilots said four aircrew, two in each jet, watched it for about five minutes.
The CAP point. The air controller then told Fravor that the object had reappeared on the Princeton's radar at the squadron's CAP point, a holding position "roughly 40 miles South of the ship." Fravor has said this meant it had covered 60 miles "in a very short period of time (less than a minute)." That figure comes from the controller's relay of the radar picture, and the radar data behind it have not been released.
Dietrich's account. Speaking publicly for the first time in 2021, Dietrich said she had at first tried to categorise the object as "maybe a helicopter or maybe a drone." She also said that if she had seen it alone, "I don't know that I would have come back and said anything."
The video. Later that day, by Fravor's account, a crew from his squadron preparing to launch recorded an object with the aircraft's infrared targeting camera, producing what he calls "the now famous approximately 90 second video." It is known as FLIR1. 60 Minutes described the crew as having briefly locked on to the object before it moved off. The video does not show the encounter Fravor and Dietrich describe.
Publication. On 16 December 2017 the New York Times reported on the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program, a Pentagon effort that had received $22 million between 2007 and 2012, and published the video together with the pilots' account of the 2004 encounter.
Official acknowledgement. In September 2019 the Navy confirmed that the videos were genuine and described the objects in them as unidentified aerial phenomena. On 27 April 2020 the Department of Defense formally released FLIR1 with two videos recorded in 2015, known as Gimbal and GoFast.
The 2021 assessment. The Office of the Director of National Intelligence's Preliminary Assessment of 25 June 2021 reviewed 144 reports from US government sources between 2004 and 2021 and identified one with high confidence, as a large, deflating balloon. It said most reported phenomena "probably do represent physical objects", that 18 incidents described in 21 reports involved unusual movement, and that these "could be the result of sensor errors, spoofing, or observer misperception and require additional rigorous analysis."
The 2023 hearing. On 26 July 2023 Fravor testified under oath before a House Oversight subcommittee. He described what he saw as "far superior to anything that we had at the time, have today, or are looking to develop in the next 10+ years."
AARO. The Pentagon's All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office was set up in July 2022. Its historical review of March 2024 found no evidence that any US government investigation had confirmed that any sighting represented extraterrestrial technology. The registry has found no AARO assessment of this case up to September 2026. Coverage of the Pentagon's rolling release of UFO files, begun on 8 May 2026, did not report new material on it.
Leading explanations
Unidentified (the Navy's and the Department of Defense's position since 2019 and 2020; unchanged). This is a statement about the government's knowledge, not about the object. The Navy has not said what it thinks the object was, and has not released the data that would let anyone else decide.
Sensor error, spoofing or misperception (possibilities named in general terms by ODNI in 2021; untested for this case). Each would need the radar logs, the full sensor recordings or both to test. None is public. Misperception would have to account for two crews seeing the same thing at once, and radar error would have to coincide with the white water and the visual sighting.
A classified US or foreign aircraft or drone (raised in general terms by ODNI and by members of Congress; no evidence published for this case). ODNI lists both "USG or U.S. industry developmental programs" and "foreign adversary systems" as categories. No programme or system has been identified with this event.
Technology beyond any known capability (Fravor's view; unsupported by published data). It rests on the performance figures: the descent, the disappearance and the reappearance 60 miles away in under a minute. Those figures come from crew recollection and the controller's relay, not from data anyone outside the Navy has examined.
What the popular version gets wrong
"The video shows the Tic Tac outmanoeuvring the jets." The video was recorded later that day by a different crew. It does not show the white water, the descent or the disappearance the pilots describe. What it shows is a small infrared shape that the camera holds briefly and then loses.
"The Pentagon confirmed it was a UFO." It confirmed that the videos were genuine and that it had not identified what they showed. Unidentified means unidentified. AARO's 2024 historical review found no evidence that any government investigation had ever confirmed extraterrestrial technology.
"Radar proved it dropped 80,000 feet in under a second." No radar data have been published. The figures come from crew accounts, and the accounts differ: 60 Minutes reported a descent of 80,000 feet in less than a second, while Fravor's sworn statement describes objects coming rapidly down from above 80,000 feet to 20,000.
"It flew 60 miles in under a minute." That is what the controller told Fravor the radar showed. It may be true. It is a relay of a radar picture that has never been released, not a measurement anyone can check.
Current status
Unsolved. Two experienced crews saw something they could not identify, and nothing published since has identified it. Fravor has given his account under oath, and Dietrich's public account agrees with it on the essentials. The documentary record is thin: a short video recorded later by another crew, and descriptions of radar tracks whose data have not been released.
The Department of Defense's position since 2020 is that the object is unidentified. AARO has published no assessment of the case as far as the registry can find. What would change the finding is the release of the Princeton's radar recordings, the full sensor data from the aircraft, or an identification of any US or foreign system operating in the area that day.
Sources
- Fravor, D. (2023). Statement for the Record. House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, Subcommittee on National Security, the Border, and Foreign Affairs, hearing "Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena: Implications on National Security, Public Safety, and Government Transparency", 26 July 2023.
- CBS News (2021). "UFOs regularly spotted in restricted U.S. airspace, report on the phenomena due next month." 60 Minutes, 16 May 2021. Interviews with Fravor and Dietrich.
- Cooper, H., Blumenthal, R., and Kean, L. (2017). "Glowing Auras and 'Black Money': The Pentagon's Mysterious U.F.O. Program." The New York Times, 16 December 2017.
- Cooper, H., Blumenthal, R., and Kean, L. (2017). "2 Navy Airmen and an Object That 'Accelerated Like Nothing I've Ever Seen'." The New York Times, 16 December 2017.
- United States Department of Defense (2020). "Statement by the Department of Defense on the Release of Historical Navy Videos." 27 April 2020.
- Office of the Director of National Intelligence (2021). Preliminary Assessment: Unidentified Aerial Phenomena. 25 June 2021.
- All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (2024). Report on the Historical Record of U.S. Government Involvement with Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena (UAP), Volume I. Department of Defense, released 8 March 2024.
- Martinez, L., and Beynon, S. (2026). "Pentagon releases declassified UFO files from various federal agencies." ABC News, 8 May 2026.
Last reviewed: September 2026. Records are provisional. Where the evidence changes, the entry changes. Found an error? Tell us.