Pentagon solves 1 UFO mystery but still probing cases of "large orange orb," "large metallic cylinder"
The Pentagon office investigating UFOs, or what the government calls unidentified anomalous phenomena, resolved one of its most prominent cases — nicknamed "GOFAST" — its director told Congress in a hearing on Tuesday. (It's the last one listed on the office's website here).
The GOFAST video was made public in 2017 and shows what appears to be an object flying at a high speed just above water, but Dr. Jon Kosloski, the director of the All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office, told Congress the object depicted is not actually too unusual.
"Through a very careful geospatial intelligence analysis and using trigonometry, we assess with high confidence that the object is not actually close to the water, but is rather closer to 13,000 feet," Kosloski said.
Kosloski did not identify the object, but he said that a "trick of the eye" called parallax made the object appear anomalous — or out of the ordinary — when it was not. He said a detailed report on parallax will be available on the All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office website.
The "GOFAST" video was recorded by a fighter jet from the USS Theodore Roosevelt off the East coast of the U.S. and made public in 2017.
Former F/A-18 pilot Ryan Graves, who has spoken with CBS' "60 Minutes" about UAP sightings and later founded Americans for Safe Aerospace, told NBC News Now in an interview after the hearing that the Pentagon should continue to investigate the GOFAST case.
"I would argue that some of these cases aren't quote unquote debunked or no longer of interest, specifically the GOFAST video itself was never really interesting because it was going fast," Graves said. "The pilots certainly didn't say that, nor did they name the video. If anything, the Pentagon simply debunked their own naming for that video."
Graves also said there were more objects in the air at the time than the one depicted in the GOFAST video. The Pentagon is still investigating another video nicknamed GIMBAL that was taken around the time of the GOFAST video.
After providing examples to Congress of two other resolved cases the Defense Department calls "The Puerto Rico Objects" and "Mt. Etna," Kosloski described cases his office is still actively investigating, notably, an "orange orb" and "a metallic cylinder."
These cases are likely part of the 21 cases that the recently released annual unidentified aerial phenomena report said contain enough information and data for the office to actively investigate.
One case was reported by a law enforcement officer "out West" who observed "a large orange orb floating several hundred feet above the ground," according to Kosloski.
As the officer approached where he thought the orb would be, he saw "a blacker than black object" that was about the size of a Prius. When he reached a distance of 40-60 meters away from the object, it tilted 45 degrees and shot up vertically, traveling faster than any drone he had seen before.
Just as it left his field of view, it emitted bright red and blue lights that lit up the inside of his vehicle "as brightly as if someone had set off fireworks just outside of his vehicle," Kosloski told Congress.
Another case was reported from the southeastern part of the United States after two cars driven by government contractors left a facility around 9 a.m. and saw "a large metallic cylinder about the size of a commercial airplane."
After they observed it for 15-20 seconds, it disappeared.
"Obviously an object that large and stationary — unless it's a blimp — is unusual but then disappearing, we can't explain how that would happen," Kosloski said.