USS Nimitz strike group reports the 'Tic Tac' encounter

Aircrews from the USS Nimitz Carrier Strike Group report repeated radar contacts and a daylight visual encounter with a small, white, smooth, Tic Tac–shaped object during a training exercise in the Pacific. One of three Pentagon videos later released by the Department of Defense (FLIR1) documents a portion of the event.

What we know

Record type: Sighting
Primary source: linked
Named witnesses: 1
Media: —

Beginning on 10 November 2004, the SPY-1 radar aboard the cruiser USS Princeton, attached to the USS Nimitz Carrier Strike Group, began tracking a series of unidentified targets descending from approximately 80,000 feet to near sea level. On 14 November 2004, two F/A-18F Super Hornets from Strike Fighter Squadron 41 (the 'Black Aces') were vectored to investigate. The flight lead, Cmdr. David Fravor, and his wingman, Lt. Cmdr. James Slaight, reported a daylight visual encounter with a small, white, smooth, Tic Tac–shaped object hovering above an area of disturbed water.

Later that day, an F/A-18F flown by Lt. Cmdr. Chad Underwood obtained gun-camera footage of an apparently similar object using the AN/ASQ-228 Advanced Targeting Forward-Looking Infrared (ATFLIR) pod. That footage, later designated 'FLIR1,' was officially released by the Department of Defense on 27 April 2020. The Nimitz encounter is the most-documented modern U.S. military UAP case.

Primary source

Institutional

U.S. Navy / Department of Defense

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