Pentagon UFO Videos: Every Confirmed Military UAP Recording

The release of classified military videos showing unidentified aerial phenomena has fundamentally transformed the UFO debate. What was once dismissed as the province of unreliable witnesses and blurry photographs became, in a matter of years, a documented national security concern supported by infrared camera footage from some of the most advanced sensor platforms on Earth. These videos, captured by U.S. Navy and other military systems, show objects performing maneuvers that challenge our understanding of physics and aeronautics.

This guide provides a comprehensive account of every major military UAP video that has been officially released or confirmed, the circumstances of each recording, and what the footage reveals about the objects encountered.

FLIR1: The Tic Tac (November 2004)

The FLIR1 video is the oldest and arguably most significant of the Pentagon UAP recordings. Captured on November 14, 2004, by the Forward Looking Infrared camera of an F/A-18F Super Hornet operating from the USS Nimitz carrier strike group off the coast of San Diego, California, the video shows an oblong object—quickly dubbed the “Tic Tac” for its resemblance to the breath mint—tracked against the ocean background.

The encounter that produced this video is among the most thoroughly documented UAP cases in military history. For approximately two weeks prior to the filming, the USS Princeton, an Aegis-equipped guided missile cruiser, had been tracking anomalous radar returns from objects that appeared at eighty thousand feet, descended rapidly to the surface, and hovered near sea level before shooting back to altitude. The objects demonstrated speeds and accelerations that exceeded any known aircraft by orders of magnitude.

On November 14, Commander David Fravor and Lieutenant Commander Alex Dietrich, flying F/A-18 Super Hornets during a routine training exercise, were vectored to investigate the latest contact. What Fravor encountered was a white, oblong object approximately forty feet long hovering about fifty feet above the ocean surface. Below it, the ocean appeared disturbed, as though something large were just beneath the surface. The object had no wings, no visible engines, no exhaust plume, and no flight control surfaces. When Fravor attempted to close on the object, it mirrored his movements before accelerating away at a speed he described as incomprehensible—crossing his entire visual field in less than a second.

A second jet equipped with the FLIR pod subsequently detected and tracked the object, producing the FLIR1 video. The footage shows the object as a bright, glowing shape against the darker ocean, maintaining a stable hover before the tracking system loses lock. The object’s thermal signature was consistent with something radiating significant heat or energy, but its shape showed no conventional propulsion features.

Fravor has stated that the object demonstrated awareness of his classified combat air patrol coordinates—the rendezvous point he had been assigned—appearing at that exact location after departing the initial encounter area, a feat that would require either intercepting encrypted military communications or predicting his movement through some other means.

Gimbal (January 2015)

The Gimbal video, recorded in January 2015 off the east coast of the United States by the infrared camera of an F/A-18 Super Hornet, shows a dark, apparently rotating object moving against a strong headwind. The video’s most striking feature is the audio of the pilots reacting in real time, with exclamations of astonishment as they track the object.

“There’s a whole fleet of them,” one pilot says, indicating that additional objects were visible that the camera was not tracking. “Look at that thing! It’s rotating!”

The object appears to be disc or saucer-shaped, with no visible wings, tail, or propulsion system. It moves steadily against the wind without any of the flight characteristics expected of conventional aircraft. The apparent rotation has been debated: some analysts argue the rotation is an artifact of the camera gimbal mechanism (for which the video is named), while others contend the rotation is intrinsic to the object itself, noting that the surrounding background does not rotate in the same manner.

The Gimbal video was released publicly in December 2017 as part of the New York Times report on the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program. The Navy confirmed its authenticity in 2019, stating that the video depicted “unidentified aerial phenomena.”

GoFast (January 2015)

Recorded on the same deployment as the Gimbal video, GoFast shows a small, apparently spherical object racing over the ocean surface at considerable speed. The object has no visible wings or propulsion system. The infrared camera tracks it as the pilots express excitement and amazement.

Initial analysis suggested the object was traveling at extraordinary speed based on the apparent rate of motion against the ocean surface. However, subsequent detailed analysis by independent researchers, using the data visible on the heads-up display including altitude, slant range, and camera angle, calculated that the object’s actual speed was approximately thirty to forty knots—surprisingly slow. This slower speed created its own mystery: at that velocity, in the prevailing winds, the object should have been drifting with the air mass rather than maintaining a steady, purposeful trajectory. Whatever the object was, it appeared to be self-propelled despite lacking any visible means of doing so.

The Navy confirmed GoFast’s authenticity alongside the other two videos, and the Department of Defense officially released all three in April 2020, stating that the release was intended to “clear up any misconceptions by the public on whether or not the footage that has been circulating was real.”

USS Omaha Sphere (July 2019)

In July 2019, multiple ships of a Navy destroyer task group operating off the coast of San Diego encountered a series of unidentified objects over consecutive nights. The encounters were documented through radar, the Ship Nautical Or Otherwise Photographic Interpretation and Exploitation (SNOOPIE) team camera system, and night-vision equipment.

The most significant footage, leaked in 2021 and subsequently confirmed as authentic by the Pentagon, shows a spherical object observed through a night-vision-equipped camera aboard the USS Omaha. The object—dark, apparently spherical, and estimated to be six feet in diameter—flies steadily over the ocean before descending and disappearing beneath the water’s surface. Despite an extensive search by a submarine deployed to the area, no wreckage or debris was found on the ocean floor.

This transmedium capability—the ability to operate in both air and water—is one of the “five observables” that the Pentagon has identified as characteristics of the most anomalous UAP encounters. The footage from the USS Omaha is the clearest available documentation of this behavior.

Additional footage from the same series of encounters shows pyramid-shaped objects hovering above the destroyer USS Russell, captured through night-vision goggles. While some analysts have attributed the pyramidal appearance to bokeh effects caused by the camera’s aperture shape, the Navy confirmed the footage was taken by naval personnel and was part of ongoing UAP investigations.

The Jellyfish UAP (2018)

Among the most unusual UAP recordings is footage from Iraq in 2018 showing an object that has been described as resembling a jellyfish. The object, captured by a military surveillance system, appears to be a semi-translucent, amorphous form moving steadily through the air without any apparent propulsion mechanism. It moves against the wind and, according to reports, appears to descend into a body of water before emerging on the other side.

The Jellyfish UAP footage was brought to public attention by investigative journalist Jeremy Corbell in late 2023. While the Pentagon has not formally released this footage through official channels, it has been confirmed as genuine military imagery by multiple sources. The object’s unusual morphology—unlike any conventional aircraft, drone, or natural phenomenon—makes it one of the most perplexing recordings in the UAP catalog.

The Mosul Orb (2016)

Footage from Mosul, Iraq, captured in approximately 2016, shows a metallic, spherical object flying over a conflict zone. The object, estimated to be three to four feet in diameter, moves at considerable speed without any visible propulsion system, wings, or control surfaces. It appears reflective and metallic, consistent with descriptions of sphere-type UAP reported by military personnel in multiple theaters.

The Mosul Orb footage was presented during Congressional hearings as an example of the type of objects regularly encountered by military forces in operational environments. The Pentagon acknowledged that metallic spheres represent one of the most commonly reported UAP morphologies, documented across multiple geographic regions and by different branches of the military.

AARO director Sean Kirkpatrick showed the Mosul Orb footage during a 2023 briefing and described it as representative of a class of objects for which the office had no explanation. The spheres have been observed traveling at speeds between Mach 0.5 and Mach 2 without any detectable propulsion signature.

Additional Confirmed Footage

Beyond the headline recordings, several additional pieces of military UAP footage have entered the public domain through various channels:

Green Pyramid footage (2019): Night-vision video from the USS Russell showing apparent pyramid-shaped objects flashing above the ship. While debated, the footage was confirmed as genuine Navy material by Pentagon spokesperson Susan Gough.

Chilean Navy UFO video (2014): A nine-minute infrared video captured by a Chilean Navy helicopter showing a flying object that released hot material in flight. The footage was analyzed by Chile’s official UAP investigation committee (CEFAA) for two years before being released publicly. No conventional explanation was identified.

Aguadilla, Puerto Rico footage (2013): Thermal video from a U.S. Customs and Border Protection aircraft showing an object near Aguadilla airport that appeared to split into two separate objects and enter the ocean at high speed.

The Five Observables

Across the body of military UAP footage, a consistent set of performance characteristics has been identified. These have been termed the “five observables” and represent capabilities that exceed any known human technology:

Instantaneous acceleration: Objects that transition from hover to hypersonic speed with no observable transition period and no visible propulsion mechanism. The Tic Tac’s departure in the Nimitz encounter is the most dramatic documented example.

Hypersonic velocity without signatures: Movement at speeds exceeding Mach 5 without producing sonic booms, exhaust plumes, or thermal signatures consistent with conventional propulsion. Multiple radar tracks have documented these speeds.

Transmedium travel: The ability to operate seamlessly in air, water, and potentially space without any alteration in performance or observable change in propulsion mode. The USS Omaha sphere entering the water without debris or deceleration demonstrates this capability.

Low observability: Some UAP demonstrate selective visibility to different sensor systems, appearing on radar but not infrared, or visible to the naked eye but not to electronic sensors, suggesting active management of their electromagnetic signature.

Positive lift without flight surfaces: Stable, controlled flight without wings, rotors, or any visible aerodynamic surfaces. Nearly every recorded UAP demonstrates this characteristic.

The Sensor Data Beyond Video

While the released videos have captured public attention, they represent only the visible-light and infrared component of much richer datasets. Military encounters with UAP are typically recorded across multiple sensor systems simultaneously: radar (both shipboard and airborne), electronic warfare systems that detect electromagnetic emissions, satellite tracking, sonar (in transmedium cases), and the pilot’s own instruments.

The classified sensor data that accompanies the released videos is considered far more significant by analysts than the videos themselves. Radar tracks provide precise speed, altitude, and acceleration data. Electronic warfare systems can detect propulsion signatures or communication emissions. The integration of these data sources provides a three-dimensional, multi-phenomenological picture of the encounters that the videos alone cannot convey.

Much of this accompanying data remains classified, and its release has been a primary demand of Congressional investigators and UAP researchers. The 2026 disclosure process has raised hopes that more comprehensive sensor packages—not just the camera footage—will eventually be made available for independent analysis.

Impact on Policy and Investigation

The release of Pentagon UAP videos has had concrete policy consequences. The Navy established formal UAP reporting procedures in 2019, ending decades of stigma that discouraged pilots from reporting anomalous encounters. The creation of the UAP Task Force and subsequently AARO provided institutional structures for receiving, cataloging, and investigating reports. Congress mandated regular UAP briefings and included UAP-related provisions in successive National Defense Authorization Acts.

The videos also catalyzed scientific interest. Organizations like the Galileo Project at Harvard have cited the military footage as justification for serious scientific investigation of UAP. The Sol Foundation, a think tank focused on UAP policy, has brought together academics, former officials, and military personnel to analyze the implications of the footage and associated data.

Perhaps most significantly, the videos established a foundation of undeniable evidence that something anomalous is operating in military airspace. Whatever these objects are—foreign adversary technology, natural phenomena poorly understood, or something else entirely—they are real, they are documented, and they remain unexplained. That simple fact, supported by footage from the most advanced military sensors on the planet, has changed the conversation permanently.

Sources

• Wikipedia search: “Pentagon UFO Videos: Every Confirmed Military UAP Recording”
• CIA UFO/UAP Reading Room — Declassified CIA documents on UAP