The Nimitz Incident — November 2004
In November 2004, Carrier Strike Group 11 conducted training exercises off the coast of San Diego, California. The cruiser USS Princeton, equipped with an advanced AN/SPY-1B radar system, begins to detect anomalous objects at very high altitudes — between 24,000 and 28,000 meters — which make rapid descents to 8,000 meters before rising or disappearing from the screens.
These detections are repeated over several days. On November 14, 2004, two F/A-18F Super Hornets from VFA-41 (Black Aces Squadron) were sent for interception. On board: the commander David Fravor and Lieutenant Commander Jim Slaight, and their teammates from the second aircraft.
What David Fravor described under oath
During his testimony before the House of Representatives on July 26, 2023, and in his previous public statements, David Fravor described the object he visually observed:
- Oblong shape, white, approximately 12 to 14 meters long.
- Without visible wings, without identifiable thermal propulsion signature.
- Flight behavior: mirrored movement in front of your F/A-18, as if responding to its presence.
- After a brief interaction, the object suddenly accelerates and disappears within a few seconds towards the radar rendezvous point, located 100 km away.
“In my twenty-two year career in the Navy, I have seen a lot. What I saw that day had no explanation in my technical frame of reference. »
— Cdr David Fravor, hearing before the House of Representatives, July 26, 2023
What is verified, what is not
✓ Documented points
- David Fravor's presence in the Navy, his rank, his squadron (VFA-41) — verifiable in military archives.
- Radar detections from the USS Princeton over several days preceding the incident.
- FLIR1 video, filmed during a later interception the same day by another crew.
- Fravor's testimonies in media from 2017 and under oath in 2023.
⚠ What is not established
- The origin of the object: no declassified piece has concluded that it is extraterrestrial technology or alien terrestrial technology.
- The actual speed of the object when it disappeared — raw radar data from the USS Princeton is not fully public.
- Whether other sensors recorded the object during Fravor's visual observation.
Sources used
- Hearing before the House of Representatives — July 26, 2023. National Security Oversight Subcommittee. Sworn testimony of David Fravor. Public transcript.
- New York Times — December 16, 2017. Fravor's first public description of the incident.
- Pentagon — FLIR1 confirmation — April 27, 2020. Official authentication of the video associated with the incident.
- AARO — aaro.mil. aaro.mil
- Department of War — WAR.GOV/UFO. The Nimitz file appears in the PURSUE corpus. war.gov/ufo
UFO VIDEO Rule: A sworn testimony from a credible military officer is a serious source. It is not, in itself, proof of the origin of the phenomenon. The Nimitz incident remains one of the best-documented cases in the UAP corpus — unsolved.
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