The Gimbal encounter
On 20 January 2015, an F/A-18F Super Hornet attached to the USS Theodore Roosevelt Carrier Strike Group recorded a 35-second ATFLIR pod video off the U.S. east coast as the crew passed within sensor range of an oblong object rotating around its vertical axis against a 120-knot headwind. The clip — released publicly in 2017 by the New York Times, then formally declassified by the U.S. Department of Defense on 27 April 2020 alongside FLIR1 and GoFast — is the most-analysed piece of multi-sensor UAP footage in the modern record.
What the official record says
The DoD's 27 April 2020 statement reads, in part: "The U.S. Navy previously acknowledged that these videos circulated in the public domain since 2017 and 2018, and the Department of Defense has decided to release them in order to clear up any misconceptions by the public on whether or not the footage was real."
The Gimbal video itself shows the object — referred to in pilot audio as "a whole fleet of them, look on the SA" — rotating 90° clockwise around its short axis while remaining stationary in the air relative to the F/A-18F's flight vector. Pilot Lt. Cdr. Chad Underwood, who recorded the footage, has stated on the record that the rotation was "not consistent with any prevailing airframe physics" he had observed in a Super Hornet career.
Subsequent analyses by independent ATFLIR experts and by the UAP Task Force (UAPTF) in 2021 noted that the apparent rotation may be partially attributable to gimbal-axis tracking behaviour of the ATFLIR pod — hence the colloquial name. AARO's 2024 Historical Record Vol. I lists the event in its case index, with detailed sensor-physics analysis still ongoing.
Timeline
USS Theodore Roosevelt strike group begins reporting near-daily UAP encounters during East Coast training operations. Reports include "cubes inside translucent spheres" — referenced in the 2021 ODNI Preliminary Assessment.
F/A-18F Super Hornet records the Gimbal footage during routine training. Multiple objects tracked on the F/A-18's SA (Situational Awareness) display.
Footage circulates internally; reviewed by Navy commands and the OUSD(I&S) Directorate.
New York Times publishes Gimbal and FLIR1 alongside its AATIP exposé. DoD declines to comment on authenticity.
DoD officially declassifies the three videos: FLIR1, Gimbal, GoFast. Public confirmation that the footage is authentic.
ODNI Preliminary Assessment on UAP cites the Gimbal cluster as part of the 144-incident corpus.
AARO established under 10 U.S.C. § 1683 (NDAA FY 22). Gimbal-class incidents formally folded into its remit.
AARO Historical Record Vol. I publishes the case index; Gimbal flagged for continued sensor analysis.
Linked evidence in this archive
-
Gimbal — ATFLIR pod footage, 20 January 2015
F/A-18F AN/ASQ-228 ATFLIR pod recording. Declassified by the DoD on 27 April 2020 simultaneously with FLIR1 and GoFast.
-
Preliminary Assessment: Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (June 2021)
The first publicly released US intelligence assessment of UAP — 144 incidents 2004–2021. Gimbal cluster is part of the corpus.
-
Historical Record Report Vol. I — Case Index
AARO's 2024 historical record. Gimbal is indexed; full sensor analysis pending Vol. II.
Related AARO declassified footage
Why this case still matters
Gimbal sits at the intersection of multi-sensor capture (ATFLIR + SA + cockpit audio), fleet-scale observation (the F/A-18F crew refers to "a whole fleet of them" on radar), and formal U.S. government authentication. Together with FLIR1 and GoFast, it forms the canonical reference triplet for the modern American UAP record.
The remaining questions — apparent rotation against wind direction, apparent altitude hold, the presence of additional formation contacts on SA — are precisely the kind of multi-sensor signatures that AARO was created to resolve.
← Back to AARO Archive