LAS VEGAS (KLAS) — Thursday marks 20 years since what could be the most consequential UFO encounter of all time—the “tic tac” incident. The case helped reignite public interest in the UFO mystery and directly led to ongoing inquiries by members of Congress into the phenomena. However, few know that the groundbreaking investigation has origins in Las Vegas.
Pentagon officials did their best to downplay the incident, and the US Navy didn’t bother to investigate, but the “tic tac” incident did lead to a significant investigation, even if the public wasn’t made aware until years later.
Over two weeks in November 2004, the ships and planes of the USS Nimitz Carrier Strike Group detected brief glimpses of unknown objects dozens of times off of the Southern California coast. Aviators aboard two separate F-18s encountered a strange craft with astounding capabilities. 19 years later, one of those Navy Top Gun pilots told his story at a public hearing before Congress.
“The ‘tic tac’ object that we engaged in November 2004 was far superior to anything that we had at the time, have today, or are looking to develop in the next 10-plus years,” said David Fravor, the commander of the “Black Aces” Strike Fighter Squadron 41.
Fravor went on to say that no investigation was initiated by the US Navy or any other entity in 2004. It was as if the incident never occurred. However, four years later, in Las Vegas, Dr. Colm Kelleher heard the “tic tac” story from an applicant to Bigelow Aerospace Advanced Space Studies (BAASS,) a subsidiary of Bigelow Aerospace.
BAASS was created by Las Vegas tycoon Robert Bigelow and was conducting an ambitious but hush-hush investigation of UFOs for the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA.) That program was dubbed the Advanced Aerospace Weapon Systems Applications Program or the clunky acronym AAWSAP. Its first task was looking into the “tic tac” incident.
Bits and pieces of the “tic tac” incident had appeared in public forums, drawing little notice. However, the New York Times published a front-page story about the “tic tac” in 2017, leading to several closed-door briefings on Capitol Hill and eventually public hearings. At nearly every opportunity, Pentagon officials have tried to downplay the “tic tac” or hint there might be prosaic explanations, often mirroring claims made on social media by loud but unqualified debunkers.
“There’s a lot of cleanup to do when people say it’s birds,” said Jay Stratton, former director of the UAP Task Force. “You know the rest of the story but can’t tell the rest of the story.”
Stratton, a highly-regarded intelligence official, alongside his colleague Dr. James Lacatski, helped convince the DIA to launch AAWSAP. He conducted the first investigations into the “tic tac” case and contacted Fravor.
“I talked to him when he was doing it. We talked on the phone extensively,” Fravor said. “He did a pretty good job. He actually did a lot of research.”
According to Dr. Sean Kirkpatrick, head of UFO investigation AARO, or the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office, the “tic tac” case is still considered to be an ‘unknown,’ if only because there is no data saved from the 2004 incident to analyze. However, Kirkpatrick omitted a highly detailed 18-page analysis of the “tic tac” and its extraordinary capabilities, penned by Stratton.
The report is loaded with facts about the “tic tac,” referred to in the report as an anomalous aerial vehicle (AAV.) Stratton interviewed the aviator witnesses and spoke with radar and sensor operators who said “tic tac” objects were detected many times, dropping from 60,000 feet to ocean level in a matter of seconds. They reportedly traveled at 30 to 60 times the speed of sound without producing sonic booms. Pilots saw the object with their own eyes and on their instruments, infrared sensors which recorded the now-famous video.
Multiple other sensors confirmed the encounters, including AN/SPY, a system capable of tracking a golf ball 100 miles away, and the E-2 Hawkeye early warning aircraft that flew above the USS Nimitz Carrier Strike Group.
Just before his exit from AARO, Dr. Kirkpatrick said the “tic tac” was possibly a Central Intelligence Agency balloon or another secret military project being tested. However, the AAWSAP report directly contradicts his guesses, with a key finding from the report indicating that the AAV was not something that belonged to the U.S. or any other nation. It was so advanced that it rendered U.S. capabilities ineffective and showed velocities far greater than anything known to exist. Additionally, it could turn itself invisible, both to radar and the human eye. Essentially, it was undetectable and unchallenged.
Stratton personally ruled out that the “tic tac” was secret U.S. technology being tested, while Fravor said what he saw was not a balloon.
Congress is holding a new UFO hearing on Wednesday, one day before the anniversary of the incident. The secretive DIA program based in Las Vegas eventually compiled a more detailed report about the “tic tac.” It was never released.
