Pentagon Says UFO Described by Rep. Gaetz Was Likely a ‘Balloon’

The congressman says the Pentagon’s report on object, which he described as beyond ‘any human capability,’ is ‘incomplete.’

Images of the alleged UFO/UAP seen near Eglin Air Force Base in Florida on Jan. 26, 2023. Courtesy of the Pentagon's All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office.

A UFO described by Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) at a July 2023 congressional hearing was probably a “large form-factor balloon,” according to an April 24 report from the Pentagon’s All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office.

The document on the UFO, or “UAP” (unidentified anomalous phenomena), that was seen and photographed by a military pilot near Eglin Air Force Base in Florida on Jan. 26, 2023, comes a month after the Pentagon released a historical report disputing the idea that some UFOs are unexplainable or of “non-human” origin.

Several lawmakers, including Mr. Gaetz and Rep. Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.), are pushing back against the Pentagon while calling for more transparency.

“The image was of something that I am not able to attach to any human capability, either from the United States or from any of our adversaries,” Mr. Gaetz said.

The congressman described the object at a “UFO Whistleblower” congressional hearing where former Air Force intelligence officer David Grusch alleged that the U.S. government has UFO crash-retrieval programs going back to the 1930s and is hiding non-human biological specimens. The Pentagon has denied these claims and said there is no evidence of any UFO crash-retrieval programs or samples of alien “biologics.”

Mr. Gaetz testified that he, Mr. Burchett, and Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) asked to see the evidence and radar signature and to meet the flight crew. Military officials initially refused to let the three lawmakers meet the crew or look at the flight data, Mr. Gaetz said, but later allowed them to meet the pilot and look at the radar signature and photos.

The pilot described the object as one of four “craft” that were in a diamond formation while he and his crew were flying a test mission over the Gulf of Mexico. When the pilot approached the “diamond formation,” he was only able to take a photo of one object, which Mr. Gaetz described as a “large floating orb.”

Upon approaching the object, the pilot said his radar system went down, his FLIR—or thermal vision system—malfunctioned, forcing him to take the photo with the jet’s electro-optical/infrared sensor. The Pentagon said the jet’s video recording equipment was “inoperable prior to and during the aircraft’s flight.”

The pilot said the object was gray with a “paneled surface and orange-red coloring at the center,” roughly 12 feet in diameter, and slow-moving or stationary. It was rounded on the bottom half and rounded on the top in a “three-dimensional cone shape,” similar to an “Apollo spacecraft.”

The object looked like it had a “heat signature” emanating from its bottom, according to the pilot, who described the heat as “blurry air.” He also observed what looked like a “vertically oriented engine” along the side that was almost the full height of the object. However, the Pentagon said these details are not visible in the two still images taken by the jet’s infrared sensor and said no additional data is available to corroborate the alleged engine description.

The object finally descended into the cloud deck after the radar malfunction, according to the pilot.

The Pentagon’s Explanation

In the case resolution report, the Pentagon said the radar malfunction was due to a tripped circuit breaker that had experienced the same problem during three previous flights.

While technicians could not “conclusively diagnose the cause of the fault for this incident,” the Pentagon is confident it was “coincidental” and not caused or affected by the object in the images.

Because “no anomalous flight characteristics, behaviors, or capabilities were confirmed,” the Pentagon concluded with “moderate confidence” that the object was mostly likely a “lighter-than-air object,” such as a weather balloon, a large mylar balloon, or an outdoor lighting balloon.

The Pentagon said the magnified infrared image displays characteristics of large commercial helium balloons, particularly ones used at outdoor events, construction sites, and movie sets.

The Pentagon says this commercial balloon lighting system most closely matches the alleged UFO/UAP seen near Eglin Air Force Base in Florida on Jan. 26, 2023. Courtesy of the Pentagon's All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office.

The pilot’s reported radar malfunction calls back to an alleged UFO the Iranian military saw over Tehran in 1976. A September 1976 document from the Department of Defense explains the incident, describing the craft as a “bird-like object” with “flashing strobe lights” seen by multiple eyewitnesses.

When an Iranian F-4 jet approached the UFO, the pilot “lost all instrumentation and communications (UHF and intercom).” When he turned away from the object and headed back toward the base, the F-4 immediately regained its communication and control systems.

However, the pilot who spotted the UFO near Eglin Air Force Base lost his radar for the remainder of the flight. He did not regain control after breaking away from the object like the Iranian pilot.

Pentagon Report ‘Incomplete’

Mr. Gaetz was not satisfied with the Pentagon’s explanation for the sighting.

“This report by the AARO is incomplete and does not reflect all of the information that I was shown,” he said in a statement to The Epoch Times. The lawmaker urged the government to release all of the incident data, including radar signatures not seen in the report.

In its UFO historical analysis, the Pentagon largely dismissed the idea that some UFOs are unexplainable after seven years of multiple government insiders detailing their work in various UFO research programs, including the one at the Defense Intelligence Agency from 2008 until 2012.

“Although many [UFO] reports remain unsolved or unidentified, AARO assesses that if more and better quality data were available, most of these cases also could be identified and resolved as ordinary objects or phenomena.

“Sensors and visual observations are imperfect; the vast majority of cases lack actionable data or the data available is limited or of poor quality,” the Pentagon wrote.

FOIA expert and researcher on the U.S. federal government John Greenewald Jr. Courtesy of John Greenewald Jr.

However, some aren’t satisfied with the Pentagon’s conclusions.

Researcher John Greenewald Jr., who runs the massive government document archive called the Black Vault, told The Epoch Times that before 2017, the Pentagon insisted that its UFO interest ended in 1969.

He said this “lie” is “easily provable with their own evidence,” including the Pentagon report on the 1976 Iran incident, which it delivered to the White House, CIA, NSA, and other government offices that same year.

Additionally, the Pentagon, in its historical report, says the infamous 1947 Roswell sighting was of a crashed military balloon and that the alleged “alien bodies” some witnesses saw were test dummies carried by high-altitude balloons for scientific research.

However, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office, which created the Roswell audit, test dummies were not invented until 1949.

Mr. Burchett is also worried the Pentagon isn’t being entirely truthful about UFOs. He told The Epoch Times in February that he’s concerned about the taxpayer money spent researching UFOs since the 1940s.

“To me, it’s not little green men and flying saucers; it’s millions and millions of dollars that we spent … it’s about transparency,” he said.

The Epoch Times has reached out to the Pentagon for comment.