5-OBSERVABLES GAP REPORT
Gimbal Incident (ATFLIR, 2015) — 5-Observables Gap Analysis
The released 36-second ATFLIR clip preserves a sensor track of the object plus pilot voice commentary, but omits the observer-side and atmospheric data classes required to evaluate the Pentagon 5 observables. The clip is sufficient to establish that something appeared on a calibrated military sensor; it is insufficient to evaluate propulsion, acceleration, or velocity claims.
Scoreboard
This release supports evaluation of 0 of 5 observables in the Pentagon framework.
Per-observable analysis
Sudden / instantaneous acceleration
Cannot evaluate- Required to evaluate
- Calibrated linear acceleration of the object derived from observer position, range-rate, and a per-frame bearing reference.
- Released data
- ATFLIR sensor angular position is preserved (azimuth + elevation rate). Observer aircraft GPS track in machine-readable form, range-rate to target, and atmospheric refractive index are not included in the release.
- AeriTrax live capture would have provided
- For a ground witness in the same scene, AeriTrax records a per-frame sensor stream at ~50 Hz with magnetometer-derived bearing plus accelerometer angular rate, enabling frame-to-frame angular velocity computation against a calibrated reference and supporting parallax-vs-actual-motion separation.
Hypersonic velocity without signature
Cannot evaluate- Required to evaluate
- Synchronized ambient audio at the observer plus an independent observer-velocity estimate.
- Released data
- Audio in the release is intra-cockpit pilot commentary, not external ambient. No external microphone track is preserved.
- AeriTrax live capture would have provided
- Device microphone recording correlated with capture timestamps, enabling absence-of-acoustic-signature claims to rest on recorded negative evidence rather than absence-of-evidence inference.
Low observability
Partial data- Required to evaluate
- Continuous frame coverage at known fps plus a per-capture sensor-blink and gap log.
- Released data
- The 36-second clip is continuous at the ATFLIR's standard frame rate. There is no per-frame sensor-blink ledger that would distinguish 'object lost lock' from 'object stopped reflecting in IR.'
- AeriTrax live capture would have provided
- Per-capture frame-timestamp ledger that distinguishes sensor failure from subject disappearance, plus the visible-spectrum AR-overlay subject track.
Trans-medium travel
Cannot evaluate- Required to evaluate
- Pre-event and post-event imaging of water or atmospheric-layer transition zones in the object's track.
- Released data
- The ATFLIR field of view is air-only throughout the 36-second clip. No water surface or cloud-layer transition is captured.
- AeriTrax live capture would have provided
- Pre-burst water-presence classification via on-device coastline polygons; AR-overlay timeline anchors that flag when the subject crosses a known atmospheric-layer altitude based on the local sounding.
Positive lift / propulsion without surface
Cannot evaluate- Required to evaluate
- Thermal-IR signature delta over time plus acoustic data sufficient to evaluate propulsion-method consistency.
- Released data
- ATFLIR IR is preserved but only the object's bulk-track signature, not the per-component thermal evolution required to evaluate exhaust-plume or surface-heating claims. No acoustic data.
- AeriTrax live capture would have provided
- Thermal-context flags via the AR-overlay's sensor stream and acoustic capture from the burst-window microphone — both inputs needed to either support or rule out propulsion-method inferences.
What the release contains
The Gimbal clip is 36 seconds of ATFLIR (Advanced Targeting Forward Looking Infrared) video from a US Navy F/A-18F Super Hornet, recorded during the January 2015 USS Theodore Roosevelt operating period off the Atlantic coast. Sensor-track markings are visible: range, azimuth, elevation rate, sensor mode. Audio is intra-cockpit pilot commentary.
The Department of Defense authenticated the clip in April 2020, after it had circulated since the December 2017 To The Stars Academy release. As of the most recent AARO catalog update, Gimbal is one of the three “official” DoD-authenticated US Navy UAP clips alongside FLIR1 (Tic Tac) and GoFast.
What the release does not contain
The release format is the sensor feed plus audio. It is not the full mission data:
- Observer aircraft track. No machine-readable GPS-stamped path of the F/A-18 itself during the 36 seconds. Without this, the apparent rotation of the object cannot be cleanly decomposed into observer-induced parallax versus actual subject motion.
- Range-rate and bearing-rate. The ATFLIR overlay shows azimuth and elevation rate but the underlying range/range-rate signals are not in the published clip.
- Atmospheric data. No sounding (temperature, pressure, humidity by altitude) for the local airspace at the time of recording. Acceleration claims through a layered atmosphere depend on it.
- External audio. Ambient audio outside the cockpit was not captured; the audio track is intra-cockpit voice only.
- Companion sensor data. Whether the F/A-18’s radar was holding a return on the same object, and at what range-rate, is not part of the public release.
What an AeriTrax live capture at a ground witness would have added
AeriTrax is a ground-observer capture instrument; it would not have flown alongside the F/A-18. The relevant question is what a credible ground witness in the same scene would have recorded.
The gap report above answers per observable. In aggregate: AeriTrax would have produced a parallel data trace — bearing-stamped sensor stream, ambient audio, frame-timestamp ledger, calibration state, GPS-fix accuracy, ADS-B traffic correlation, satellite-pass cross- reference — anchored to a signed manifest. A ground witness would not have produced a thermal-IR sensor track, but the rest of the elimination chain (ADS-B / ephemeris / Remote ID / weather context) applied to the same window would have either matched the object to a conventional source or surfaced the residual that the ATFLIR feed alone cannot.
The release is sufficient to establish that the F/A-18’s ATFLIR recorded something. It is not sufficient to evaluate the Pentagon-framework observables on its own.