What is the Tic Tac UFO from the USS Nimitz?
“The Tic Tac UFO refers to a November 2004 multi-day Navy radar and visual encounter near the USS Nimitz strike group, in which F/A-18 pilots observed a 40-foot white object resembling a Tic Tac that demonstrated extreme acceleration and trans-medium capability.”
The Tic Tac UFO is the most-cited modern U.S. military UAP encounter. Over multiple days in November 2004 off the coast of Baja California, the USS Nimitz Carrier Strike Group's E-2C Hawkeye radar and the USS Princeton's SPY-1 radar repeatedly tracked anomalous objects descending from approximately 80,000 feet to sea level in seconds. On 14 November 2004, F/A-18F pilot Commander David Fravor was vectored to investigate and visually observed a smooth, white, 40-foot object "shaped like a Tic Tac" hovering above a churning patch of ocean, then accelerating beyond the F/A-18's tracking capability. The encounter was captured on FLIR1 ATFLIR sensor video, declassified in 2017. AARO has reviewed the case multiple times and as of 2026 it remains classified as anomalous; not formally resolved.