Go Fast UAP

On January 21, 2015, pilots from Strike Fighter Squadron 11 (VFA-11) aboard the USS Theodore Roosevelt recorded a 34-second video of a white, oval-shaped object moving at high speed over the Atlantic Ocean off the U.S. East Coast. The footage was captured by an F/A-18F Super Hornet equipped with an AN/ASQ-228 ATFLIR (Advanced Targeting Forward-Looking Infrared) pod. The video remained largely unknown until 2018, when The New York Times and To The Stars Academy released it publicly. The Department of Defense officially released the video on April 27, 2020, alongside two other Navy cockpit videos, sparking renewed public interest in unidentified aerial phenomena.

What did the pilots observe?

The recorded object appeared to skim just above the ocean surface at high speed. Radar systems aboard the carrier and aircraft detected multiple contacts during the operational period from summer 2014 through March 2015, suggesting a pattern of encounters rather than a single event. However, specific range data for the Go Fast object remains unavailable for public analysis, making it difficult to determine the object's actual size and speed from the video alone.

Who witnessed and investigated it?

Lieutenant Ryan Graves, a VFA-11 pilot, became the most vocal public figure associated with the Roosevelt encounters, though he did not pilot the jet that recorded Go Fast. Graves later founded Americans for Safe Aerospace to encourage pilots to report UAP without fear of stigma. The Pentagon's All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) conducted an official analysis released on February 6, 2025.

What did the Pentagon conclude?

AARO assessed the object's altitude at approximately 13,000 feet, not near the ocean surface as the video initially suggested. The analysis estimated the object's speed between 5 mph and 92 mph depending on wind conditions. AARO concluded the object was "moving with the wind" and displayed no indications of propulsion or maneuverability inconsistent with atmospheric phenomena. Wind data from the time and location showed approximately 69 mph winds from the west at 13,000 feet.

What explains the high-speed appearance?

AARO attributed the object's apparent high speed to motion parallax, an optical effect where a stationary or slow-moving object appears to move rapidly when viewed from a fast-moving platform, such as a jet traveling at high speed. This effect can create the illusion of extreme velocity without the object actually moving fast.

What remains unclear?

AARO's analysis relied on a compressed version of the video due to loss of the original file and metadata, limiting the precision of the assessment. Broader radar and sensor data from the USS Theodore Roosevelt remain unavailable for independent verification. Some analysts contend that AARO's methodology lacks transparency and that the full dataset needed to evaluate the encounters has not been publicly disclosed.