Hacker News Reader

Comment by z7 | Hacker News Reader

How does one explain the eyewitness testimony of the 4 people involved?

>Fravor reported that he saw an object, white and oval, hovering above an ocean disturbance. He estimated that the object was about 40 feet (12 m) long.[7][4] Fravor and another pilot, Alex Dietrich, said in an interview that a total of four people (two pilots and two weapons systems officers in the back seats of the two airplanes) witnessed the object for about 5 minutes.[8] Fravor says that as he spiraled down to get closer to the object, the object ascended, mirroring the trajectory of his airplane, until the object disappeared.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pentagon_UFO_videos#Background

View on HN

The history of UFO sightings is nothing but eyewitness testimony, often from groups of people. If there weren't a video this wouldn't have escaped the tabloids.

Adding a video which is a textbook demonstration of gimbal+heat tracking behavior does not lend weight to their testimony.

EDIT: The testimony you quoted isn't even associated with "Gimbal", it's associated with the decade-earlier "FLIR" video.

But according to Fravor's report, the 2 planes were sent there by their ship because the radar at picked up something. So it means that if it is made up, it involves the 2 pilots and their 2 weapons specialist, plus an undetermined number of radar operators, and their chain of command in the USS Princeton who dispatched them.

So from my understanding, it was picked up by at least one type of sensor.

There is still a probability, there was an artifact on the radar, AND the crew then decided to make up a story, but, Alex Dietrich, the second pilot had just started a few weeks earlier, and it was her first real world mission. I don't think that typical people tries to do a prank on one of their first assignments, on the spot, more so with colleagues they don't know very well.

But it is still possible I guess, even if I have hard time what could be the motivation of everyone involved.

I am not a military person, but I would assume that "radar picked up something" is a pretty common reason for planes to be in the air. This time, there just happened also to be something on the lens of the FLIR camera.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com