Archive / search
Official reports, hearing transcripts, case files and releases: the paper behind the cases. 2,872 documents, 2,610 mirrored with their text, 53,529 pages indexed, so a search reads inside them and lands on the page.
New in the library The PURSUE files The Department of War's UAP release, mirrored in full: the videos, recordings and images, each beside its case file.Documents30 records
This Department of Defense biography of Timothy A. Phillips comes from the Office of the Secretary of Defense. It says he took up the duties of Deputy Director of the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) in October 2023 and is listed as Acting Director. The text describes him as a Senior National Intelligence Service executive with over 40 years of government service and a retired Marine Corps lieutenant colonel, and it lists his education. AARO released the page in full in February 2025.
This backgrounder from the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) sets out the office's mission, its vision and how it is organized. It was released in full on 3/20/2025 under case number 330UAP000015. The paper defines UAP, explains why they matter for national security, and describes AARO's four functional groups, its partners and how it tells UAP apart from known objects. It says testimony from over two dozen individuals has produced no verifiable evidence of programs to reverse-engineer extraterrestrial materials.
This AARO information paper, dated May 2024 and released in full in February 2025, explains how forced perspective and parallax can lead observers to misjudge the size, speed and direction of UAP. Using examples such as the Leaning Tower of Pisa, a featureless sphere and an airborne sensor passing over a river, it shows how moving observers can see stationary objects appear to move quickly. It concludes that single-observer reports remain valuable, and that observers should still estimate range, size and speed.
This is a case resolution from the Department of Defense's All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), dated 8 May 2023 and released in full in 2025. It covers three infrared videos recorded by theater UAV operators over the Middle East and the Mediterranean Sea in 2022 and 2023, in which objects appeared to leave atmospheric wakes. AARO concludes that each wake was a sensor artifact. One object matched a military aircraft and another was identified as an Airbus A380. The remaining objects were judged prosaic.
This case resolution from the Department of Defense's All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) is dated 14 October 2023. It covers a report from a military pilot on 26 January 2023 in the Eglin Air Force Base training range off Florida. The pilot tracked four objects on radar and photographed one of them, which appeared as a rounded cone at 16,000 feet. With moderate confidence, AARO concluded the object was very likely a lighter-than-air object such as a commercial lighting balloon. It found the aircraft's radar failure was coincidental.
This is a case resolution from the Department of Defense's All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), dated 17 March 2023, for the "Southeast Asia Triangles" case. Satellite imagery from 30 August 2017 showed six dark triangles in formation, and they were flagged as possibly anomalous and a possible risk to navigation. AARO's intelligence and science and technology partners compared the image with other imagery. They concluded that the objects were almost certainly static, cone-shaped fishing nets floating on the ocean, each about 11m by 7m.
This is the Fiscal Year 2023 Consolidated Annual Report on Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena from the Department of Defense and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, dated October 2023. It covers 291 UAP reports that the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) received between 31 August 2022 and 30 April 2023, bringing its total to 801. It found no adverse health effects and no reports attributed to foreign activity. It concludes that most UAP will likely resolve to ordinary phenomena once better data is collected.
This is a case resolution from the Department of Defense's All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), dated 8 May 2023, about a 2021 report from military airspace in the Western United States. Military personnel saw five equidistant infrared lights flying at a fairly constant pace and thought they might be an incursion into restricted airspace. AARO and its partners concluded the objects were almost certainly commercial aircraft on established air routes up to 300 nautical miles from the sensor. The page was cleared as unclassified and released in full in February 2025.
This is a public information trifold about the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), issued by the Department of Defense and updated in October 2024. It was reviewed and released in full as unclassified on March 3, 2025. The trifold describes AARO's mission and vision and gives its definition of UAP. It lists objects commonly reported as UAP, such as airborne clutter, aircraft, drones, satellites, space launches and celestial objects. It also explains how military personnel, civilian pilots and people with knowledge of government UAP programs can file reports.
This is a stenographic transcript of an April 19, 2023 hearing of the Senate Armed Services Subcommittee on Emerging Threats and Capabilities, chaired by Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, on the mission and budget of the All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office. AARO released it in full in 2025. Director Sean Kirkpatrick testified that AARO has found no credible evidence of extraterrestrial activity and that most reports resolve into mundane objects. He also presented trend data and two declassified MQ-9 videos, one of which was resolved as a commuter aircraft.
This unclassified briefing from the All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office was given by Deputy Director Tim Phillips to the Defense Space, Geospatial and Intelligence Leadership Conference and was released on 2/6/2025. It defines UAP and notes that most reports lack enough data, while most that can be assessed resolve to mundane objects. It says a 2018 Mt. Etna object was likely a balloon. It also describes controlled tests at Camp Grafton, North Dakota, a Space UAP Tiger Team, and Starlink flaring as a cause of reported orbs.
This information paper from the Department of Defense's All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) is dated December 2024 and was released in full in February 2025. It explains how sunlight reflecting off Starlink and other low Earth orbit satellites produces bright flares and satellite trains that observers can mistake for UAP. It gives step-by-step methods for predicting flare windows from the ground and from aircraft. It concludes that lights reported by an airline pilot near Gallup, New Mexico, in October 2022 were very likely satellite flares.
These unclassified display slides from the Department of Defense's All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) are dated 2023, carry the name of Director Seán Kirkpatrick, and were reviewed for release in March 2025. They define unidentified anomalous phenomena and summarize how the FY23 NDAA expanded AARO's authorities. They also lay out AARO's mission, its operations, analysis, science and strategic communications functions, reporting trends from 1996 to 2023, and the office's goals and priorities for 2023.
This is a draft paper dated March 1, 2023, by Abraham (Avi) Loeb of Harvard's Galileo Project and Sean M. Kirkpatrick of the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO). AARO released it in full in February 2025. The paper derives physics-based limits on how highly maneuverable UAP could be interpreted. It argues that supersonic objects would produce fireballs, ionization and radar signatures. It concludes that when these signatures are missing, the distance and velocity estimates from single-site sensors may be inaccurate.
This is a 2023 briefing for the Senate Armed Services Committee from the Department of Defense's All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office, presented by Director Seán Kirkpatrick. It was released in full in 2025. It covers UAP reporting trends from 1996 to 2023, typical characteristics such as round shapes 1 to 4 meters across, and two MQ-9 cases. A 2022 Middle East spherical object remains unresolved. A 2023 South Asia object with an apparent wake was likely a commercial airliner plus a video-compression artifact.
This unclassified briefing from the Department of Defense's All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) is dated February 2024 and was reviewed for release in 2025. It defines unidentified anomalous phenomena and sets out AARO's mission and vision. It also describes its operations, science and technology, analysis and strategic communications functions. It reports that only a very small percentage of UAP reports show anomalous signatures and that missing data leaves many cases unresolved. It also presents three example cases, including two resolved as commercial airliners with camera artifacts.
This is a Department of Defense trifold brochure from the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO). It is dated 2023 and was reviewed for release in March 2025. It sets out AARO's mission, vision and functions and defines UAP as anomalous detections that cannot yet be attributed to known actors. It asks current and former government personnel with direct knowledge of UAP programs to report them for AARO's congressionally directed Historical Record Report. It also explains how military personnel and civilian pilots should report sightings.
This is Volume I of the Historical Record Report from the Department of Defense's All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), dated February 2024 and released in full in February 2025. It reviews US government UAP investigations since 1945, from Project SIGN and Blue Book through the Condon Report, AATIP and the UAP Task Force. AARO found no evidence that any sighting involved extraterrestrial technology or that anyone reverse-engineered alien craft. It says the claims come largely from circular reporting, and it names KONA BLUE as a proposed program that was never approved.
This release pairs two 2023 authorization memos. The first is a Department of Defense Special Access Program Central Office memorandum for record dated March 8, 2023, and the second is a matching ODNI Controlled Access Programs Central Office memo, CAPCO-23-003. Under Section 1673 of the FY2023 NDAA, both allow people bound by nondisclosure agreements to give UAP-related information to the All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office. Those disclosures must happen in appropriate secure spaces, and the people making them must keep protecting classified information.
This is the Department of Defense All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office's Fiscal Year 2024 Consolidated Annual Report on Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena, covering reports from May 1, 2023 to June 1, 2024 and released in full in February 2025. AARO received 757 reports, and every case it resolved turned out to be a prosaic object such as a balloon, bird, drone or satellite. It found no evidence of extraterrestrial activity and no reported health effects. The report also covers drone flights near nuclear facilities and the release of its Historical Record Report.
This All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) case resolution from the U.S. Department of Defense is dated February 2025. It covers the "Go Fast" FLIR video, which a U.S. Navy F/A-18F recorded off Florida in January 2015. AARO found the object was at about 13,000 feet and moving between 5 and 92 mph once wind is accounted for. It assesses with high confidence that the object showed no anomalous performance and attributes the apparent high speed to motion parallax. A technical appendix explains the calculations.
These slides from the Department of Defense's All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) accompanied testimony by Director Dr. Jon Kosloski to the Senate Armed Services Subcommittee on Emerging Threats and Capabilities. They were reviewed and released in full in February 2025. They chart UAP reporting trends from 1996 to 2024, showing that most closed cases were resolved as balloons. They also present analyses finding that the 2013 Puerto Rico object, the 2015 GO FAST video and the 2018 Mt. Etna object showed no anomalous flight characteristics.
This is a case resolution report from the Department of Defense's All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), dated 20 March 2025. It covers infrared video taken on April 26, 2013 by a U.S. Customs and Border Protection aircraft over Rafael Hernandez Airport near Aguadilla, Puerto Rico. AARO found with high confidence that the video shows two objects drifting at wind speed over land, not one object splitting or entering the ocean. It assessed with moderate confidence that they were sky lanterns.
This is an unclassified slide presentation to NASA by Seán Kirkpatrick, Director of the Department of Defense's All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), released in full in February 2025. It covers UAP reporting trends from 1996 to 2023, typical reported characteristics such as round orbs 1 to 4 meters across, and two example cases: an unresolved 2022 Middle East orb seen by an MQ-9, and a Western US P-3 sighting judged likely commercial airliners. It closes with recommendations for NASA research and data review.
This 2023 synopsis from the All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) in the Office of the Secretary of Defense covers Oak Ridge National Laboratory's analysis of a layered magnesium-zinc specimen with bismuth and lead bands. The specimen is claimed to come from a UAP crash around 1947 and to act as a terahertz waveguide. Microscopy, spectroscopy and isotope analysis found that its magnesium and lead signatures are terrestrial and that its impure, layered bismuth could not have worked as a waveguide.
This July 2024 supplement from the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) was released in full on 02/06/2025. It adds historical context to Oak Ridge National Laboratory's analysis of a magnesium alloy specimen that has been publicly alleged to come from a crashed extraterrestrial vehicle in 1947. AARO agrees with ORNL that the specimen's magnesium and lead isotopes show a terrestrial origin. It also agrees that the specimen cannot work as a terahertz waveguide. AARO assesses that it is likely a product of mid-20th century research on magnesium alloys.
This is a 2023 slide briefing from the All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), presented by Director Seán Kirkpatrick for the Department of Defense and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, titled "The Defense Department's UAP Mission & Civil Aviation." It defines UAP and sets out AARO's mission, vision and lines of effort. It calls for educating aviators, destigmatizing UAP reporting and building civil reporting channels, and it lists the observation details analysts need. The slides were reviewed and released in full in February 2025.
This is a briefing chart from the All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) under the Office of the Secretary of Defense. It summarizes UAP reporting trends from 1996 to November 20, 2023. It lists the characteristics UAP reports typically share: round objects 1 to 4 meters across, white, silver or translucent in color, seen at 10,000 to 30,000 feet, stationary up to Mach 2, with no thermal exhaust detected. It also covers intermittent X-band radar returns and radio signals in the 1 to 3 GHz and 8 to 12 GHz bands. AARO released the chart in full on February 6, 2025.
This is a 2023 draft research paper by Richard M. Medina and Simon Brewer of the University of Utah and Sean M. Kirkpatrick of the Department of Defense, prepared for journal submission and released in full by AARO in 2025. It analyzes 98,724 NUFORC public sighting reports from 2001 to 2020 by county with a Bayesian model. It finds that more light pollution and tree canopy mean fewer sightings, while more air traffic and military area mean more. Cloud cover showed no relationship.
This is a statement for the record by Dr. Jon Kosloski, Director of the Department of Defense's All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), to the Senate Armed Services Subcommittee on Emerging Threats and Capabilities, dated November 19, 2024, and released in full in 2025. He says AARO holds over 1,600 UAP reports, most of which resolve to birds, balloons or unmanned systems. He adds that AARO has found no verifiable evidence of extraterrestrial beings, activity or technology, and he sets partnerships, transparency and scaling up as the office's priorities.