[RoosterRedux]

Before the usual points are made about the vast distance between stars and jokes about extraterrestrials;-), let me mention that the takeaways from this article are that:

1. The majority of the Super Hornet squadrons equipped with AN/APG-79 Active Electronically Scanned Array at the time (off of Virginia) were encountering these craft AND so were the new E-2D Hawkeyes (with their AN/APY-9 radar suite).

2. "Notices To Airman (NOTAMs) were posted regarding the dangers potentially posed by unknown aerial vehicles flying in the same military operating areas that aircraft from NAS Oceana frequented for training. This action was taken by the base's command leadership as they couldn't figure out how else to address the bizarre issue and its perceived threat to their aircrews' safety."

   "Freedom Of Information Act (FOIA) requests have been filed for copies of these NOTAMs, as well as documents regarding how the decision to file the NOTAMs was made at the command level."

3. "[A]dditional visual encounters occurred beyond the one near miss with the Super Hornet and the 'cube inside and orb' object. Our source tells us that there were many more, and yes, they all resulted in the exact same description of the object."

4. "Congress is taking a high-interest in the subject as of late, with multiple hearings being held with key lawmakers and the military's top witnesses."

[RoosterRedux]

Notice how these articles from this “defense blog” are all timed/published to provide a reminder that the History Channel show “Unidentified” is aired on Friday nights (tonight).

[Tallguy]

I wonder about that visual description. I mean what were they doing? Flying formation with it? Matching it’s speed and rate of turn. If this thing is as described, it would be damned hard to get a visual on unless they flew formation with it — which, BTW, seems to contradict the “we almost had a mid-air with it”. That seems to suggest a high closure rate.

Maybe there’s an answer to all this, I don’t know. Without the visuals I’d say that this is a radar glitch with the new ASEA sets on the Super Hornets. Or possibly this is an artifact of the new combat systems piecing together a piece of airspace from multiple airborne radar perspectives? What are the F-35’s seeing?

[Hulka]

Flew the F-15E with APG-70.

Routinely would scroll the radar to max elevation and lock on to something, 180 miles “up” and moving over 3,500 knots.

If a LANTIRN pod was on the jet, we would slave the pod to the radar lock.

Most times it was a ghost lock, but sometimes would see visually through the pod that the lock was onto something, couldn’t make it out but it was there.

Perhaps a low orbit satellite, perhaps a classic UFO. Who knows but was interesting.

[momincombatboots]

I was following along and then you said congress. Congress needs to focus on the border.. they are just using this as an excuse. How convenient.
Military tech clearly has limitations.. they can’t even get warships through shipping lanes.
Think about the generation of pilots we have now... they have been shooting aliens in video games, maybe a little obama cocaine in college.
Stop wasting time on fantasies and get back to work congress.
I know they want to deep fake folks onto believing this absudity.. and i know why.

[_Jim]

re: “The majority of the Super Hornet squadrons equipped with AN/APG-79 Active Electronically Scanned Array at the time (off of Virginia) were encountering these craft AND so were the new E-2D Hawkeyes (with their AN/APY-9 radar suite).”

Sounds like they were hitting ‘hard’ targets; BIG difference in wavelength from the UHF (400 MHz ~80 cm) band the E-2D uses and the F/A-18 X-band (10 GHz 3 cm) RADARs ...

[JimRed]

The good news: no hostile intent has been apparent.