The Nimitz Encounter 2004: The Tic Tac UAP Incident

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On November 14, 2004, during a routine training exercise off the coast of Southern California, Commander David Fravor and Lieutenant Commander Alex Dietrich encountered an unidentified aerial phenomenon that did not match any known aircraft. What they saw, and what the ships’ radar systems tracked for two weeks before and after that day, has become the most thoroughly documented UAP case in modern American military history. The object had no wings, no exhaust, no visible markings, and maneuvers that, according to the pilots, exceeded the performance of their brand-new F/A-18F Super Hornets. The Pentagon has confirmed the video is real. The incident has never been explained.

TL;DR: On November 14, 2004, Commander David Fravor and two other Navy F/A-18F Super Hornet pilots from the USS Nimitz carrier strike group intercepted a smooth, white, wingless UAP approximately 40 feet long hovering over churning whitewater in the Pacific Ocean, about 100 miles southwest of San Diego. The object, which witnesses described as shaped like a Tic Tac candy, appeared to mirror the pilots’ movements before accelerating out of sight. Radar operators on the USS Princeton tracked the object reappearing 60 miles away in under a minute. The encounter was recorded on infrared video by a second pair of jets launched later that day. The Pentagon declassified the video, known as FLIR1, in April 2020, along with two other Navy UAP recordings. Commander Fravor, the lead pilot, testified about the incident under oath before Congress in July 2023. Skeptics have argued the infrared video shows a distant commercial aircraft. The incident has never been officially explained. Sources linked below.

Timeline

November 10, 2004 Radar operators aboard the USS Princeton, a Ticonderoga-class guided missile cruiser part of the Nimitz carrier strike group, begin tracking unidentified aerial contacts on the ship’s AN/SPY-1B Aegis radar system approximately 100 miles southwest of San Diego. The objects appear at high altitude, descend rapidly, and hover or loiter in the operating area over multiple days, according to Popular Mechanics.

November 14, 2004, approximately 2 p.m. Commander David Fravor, commanding officer of VF-41 “Black Aces” squadron, and Lieutenant Commander Alex Dietrich, each flying an F/A-18F Super Hornet with a weapons systems officer in the back seat, are diverted from a training exercise by the USS Princeton to investigate a radar contact at a new set of coordinates, according to History.

November 14, 2004 Fravor and Dietrich observe an area of roiling whitewater on the ocean surface, described as roughly the size of a Boeing 737. Above the water, they see a smooth, white, oblong object with no wings, no exhaust, and no visible markings, approximately 40 feet long. Fravor later describes it as looking like a “Tic Tac,” according to 60 Minutes.

November 14, 2004 Fravor begins a descending spiral toward the object. The object appears to mirror his movements, ascending to meet him. When the two are nearly at the same altitude, the object accelerates rapidly and disappears. Radar operators on the USS Princeton reacquire the contact more than 60 miles away in approximately one minute, according to Coffee or Die.

November 14, 2004, later A second pair of F/A-18Fs is launched to investigate. Commander Chad Underwood, the weapons systems officer who recorded the encounter, locks onto the object using the jet’s forward-looking infrared (FLIR) targeting camera. The resulting video, later designated FLIR1, shows an oblong object moving against a cold sky. Underwood later tells investigators the object exhibited unusual acceleration, according to Wikipedia.

2007 The FLIR1 video is leaked online through unknown channels. The footage circulates in UFO research communities but receives little mainstream attention.

December 16, 2017 The New York Times publishes a front-page story revealing the existence of the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program (AATIP), a secret Pentagon program that investigated UAP encounters. The article publishes two videos, including FLIR1 from the 2004 Nimitz encounter, according to the New York Times.

April 27, 2020 The Pentagon officially declassifies three Navy videos, including FLIR1 (November 2004), GIMBAL (January 2015), and GO FAST (January 2015). Pentagon spokesperson Sue Gough states the release is intended to “clear up any misconceptions by the public on whether or not the footage that has been circulating was real,” according to the Department of Defense.

May 16, 2021 Commander Fravor and Lieutenant Commander Dietrich appear on CBS 60 Minutes, providing their first joint televised account of the encounter. Fravor describes seeing “this little white Tic Tac-looking object” moving above the whitewater. Dietrich describes the object having “no predictable movement” and “no predictable trajectory,” according to CBS News.

July 26, 2023 Fravor testifies under oath before the U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Accountability about the Nimitz encounter, alongside fellow former fighter pilot Ryan Graves and former intelligence officer David Grusch. Fravor states the incident was never formally investigated and that the object traveled 60 miles in under a minute, according to his written statement.

The 2004 Encounter

The Nimitz encounter did not begin on November 14. According to multiple witnesses, the USS Princeton had been tracking anomalous radar contacts for approximately four days before Fravor and Dietrich were sent to investigate. Kevin Day, a senior operations specialist and radar operator aboard the Princeton, has described tracking groups of contacts appearing at roughly 80,000 feet, descending rapidly to near sea level, and hovering. The movements did not match any known aircraft or natural phenomenon, according to New Space Economy.

The AN/SPY-1B radar system on the Princeton was one of the most advanced surface radar systems in the world at the time. Day has said the contacts were cross-checked repeatedly and appeared genuine, not the result of equipment malfunction. Gary Voorhis, an electronics technician on the Princeton, has confirmed observing unusual radar returns and later seeing a distant white object through binoculars darting around over the water, according to The Black Vault.

When Fravor and Dietrich arrived at the coordinates provided by the Princeton, they saw two things: an area of disturbed water on the ocean surface, and an object hovering above it. Fravor has consistently described the object as smooth, white, approximately 40 feet long, with no wings, no control surfaces, no exhaust, and no visible means of propulsion. Dietrich has confirmed this description.

Fravor decided to investigate by spiraling down toward the object. As he descended, the object appeared to begin ascending toward him, mirroring his movements in what Fravor described as a “40-mile-an-hour hourglass” pattern. When the two were nearly at the same altitude, the object accelerated instantaneously and vanished. Seconds later, the Princeton reacquired the contact on radar more than 60 miles away, according to 8 News Now.

A second pair of jets, including Commander Chad Underwood, was launched to track the object using the aircraft’s FLIR targeting camera. Underwood recorded approximately 90 seconds of footage showing an oblong object against the sky. The object appeared to rotate on the FLIR display, though Underwood was unable to obtain a radar lock. The video, later known as FLIR1, became one of the most widely viewed UAP recordings in history.

The Witnesses

The Nimitz encounter is notable for the number and credibility of its witnesses. At least four pilots directly observed the object from their aircraft: Fravor, Dietrich, and their respective weapons systems officers. On the Princeton, multiple radar operators and technicians tracked the contacts, including Senior Chief Kevin Day, Petty Officer Gary Voorhis, Petty Officer Jason Turner, Petty Officer P.J. Hughes, and Petty Officer Ryan Weigelt, according to Popular Mechanics.

Fravor retired from the Navy in 2006 as a commander after a career that included Top Gun training and command of the VF-41 Black Aces squadron. He has described the encounter as unlike anything he experienced in his military career, according to CBS News.

Dietrich, who was initially reluctant to speak publicly, has said she decided to come forward because she felt a duty to taxpayers who funded the military mission she was performing. “I was in a taxpayer-funded aircraft, doing my job as a military officer. Citizens have questions,” she told 60 Minutes in 2021, according to The Independent.

At a February 2025 conference reported by Popular Mechanics, several of the Princeton crew members spoke publicly about the incident for the first time. Day said only the four pilots involved ever personally saw the object, that no one was asked to sign non-disclosure agreements, and that “men in suits” never appeared on the ships. Multiple crew members described unusual activity after the encounter, including the removal of radar data and equipment by unknown individuals who arrived by helicopter.

The Video

The FLIR1 video is approximately 90 seconds long and shows an oblong thermal image against a cold sky. The footage was recorded by Commander Chad Underwood using the ATFLIR (Advanced Targeting Forward Looking Infrared) system on his F/A-18F. The object appears to accelerate and rotate during the recording.

The video first leaked online in 2007, reportedly through an anonymous upload to a UFO forum. It circulated in niche communities for a decade before the New York Times published it alongside the December 16, 2017 story about the Pentagon’s AATIP program. In 2020, the Pentagon officially declassified the footage, along with two other Navy UAP videos from 2015 known as GIMBAL and GO FAST.

Worth noting: the FLIR1 video was recorded after Fravor and Dietrich had returned to the Nimitz. The video does not show the dramatic visual encounter Fravor describes. It was recorded by a different crew, in a different jet, at a different time. The video and the eyewitness account are separate pieces of evidence from the same event, according to Popular Mechanics.

Commander David Fravor describes the Nimitz encounter in detail on the Lex Fridman Podcast.

The Pentagon’s Response

The Pentagon’s handling of the Nimitz encounter has been inconsistent. The incident was never formally investigated by the military after it occurred. No debriefing of the witnesses was conducted beyond a brief post-flight discussion. Fravor has testified that no follow-up investigation was ordered, according to NewsNation.

The creation of AATIP in 2007, funded through a $22 million allocation inserted into the Defense Appropriations Act by then-Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, was partially motivated by cases like the Nimitz encounter. Luis Elizondo, the military intelligence officer who ran AATIP, later resigned from the Pentagon in 2017 and publicly criticized the department for not taking UAP encounters seriously enough, according to 8 News Now.

The Pentagon’s April 2020 declassification statement noted that the videos “do not reveal any sensitive capabilities or systems, and does not impinge on any subsequent investigations of military air space incursions by unidentified aerial phenomena.” The statement confirmed the videos were authentic but did not address what the objects were, according to defense.gov.

Opposing Perspectives on the Nimitz Encounter

The Nimitz encounter has been the subject of significant skeptical analysis. The most detailed alternative explanation comes from Mick West, a science writer and former video game developer who runs the skeptical analysis website Metabunk.

West has argued that the FLIR1 video most likely shows a distant commercial aircraft, not an exotic object. He points out that the object in the video displays a typical jet engine thermal signature and does not exhibit the extraordinary acceleration described by Fravor. West has noted that the video was recorded well after Fravor’s visual encounter and may show an entirely different object. He has also suggested that radar anomalies could have been caused by system malfunctions or electronic interference, according to Metabunk.

Other proposed explanations include advanced U.S. military drone tests, radar spoofing technology designed to deceive enemy systems, and classified reconnaissance programs. History.com has noted that some analysts have suggested the objects were advanced reconnaissance drones and that the churning whitewater was caused by a submarine, according to History.

These explanations address the FLIR1 video but do not fully account for the visual sighting by Fravor and Dietrich, the radar tracking over multiple days, or the object’s apparent ability to reappear 60 miles away in under a minute. Fravor has publicly challenged West’s analysis, stating that what he saw with his own eyes was not a distant aircraft.

Dietrich has been more measured, saying she cannot rule out a conventional explanation and acknowledging the limits of what she observed from her cockpit. She has emphasized that she is not claiming the object was extraterrestrial, only that it did not match any aircraft or phenomenon she recognized.

The Nimitz encounter remains one of the few UAP cases where multiple independent sensor systems, radar, infrared video, and direct visual observation, recorded the same event. No official explanation has been offered by the U.S. government.

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