USS-NIMITZ-TIC-TAC · CASE
USS Nimitz Tic-Tac
CREDIBLE WITNESS ENCOUNTER VOICE · NAR / SCI / INV
AN/SPY-1 detected anomalous tracks descending from 28,000 m to 6,000 m. F/A-18F crews subsequently visually acquired a 12 m oblong object.
VOICE · NARRATIVE
Commander Dave Fravor took off from the Nimitz on a clear November morning, the Pacific empty under him for two hundred miles in every direction.
The radar operator voice came over the headset, calm in the way pilots are calm when something is very wrong. There was a contact at 80,000 feet. Then it was at 28,000. Then it was at 50.
Fravor saw the object first as a disturbance in the water, an oblong of churn the size of a 737. Above it, the size of his own jet, a white tic-tac. No wings. No exhaust. No insignia.