Dark Circle Over Western US, Military Sensor, 2025

Brief

The FBI submitted a single still image to AARO capturing a UAP event in the western United States in late 2025. The image was derived from a U.S. military system but was redacted prior to submission, and no accompanying mission report was provided. The monochrome, grainy frame shows a small, dark, circular object in the center-right quadrant of a crosshair reticle against an indistinct background. The embedded timestamp is unreliable because the capturing system's date and time were not properly configured.

Metadata

Agency

FBI

Release

5/8/26

Incident

Late 2025

Location

Western United States

Type

PDF • .pdf

Length

1 pages

Tags

circular object, dark, monochrome still image, crosshair reticle, military imaging system, western United States, 2025, redacted, no mission report

Key points

• The FBI submitted the image to AARO after the originating military system's imagery was altered with redactions; no mission report was included.
• The operator could not positively identify the UAP.
• The image timestamp is acknowledged as incorrect — the system's date/time was not properly set, eliminating metadata as a corroboration tool.
• The object presents as a small, dark, circular shape located in the center-right quadrant of the frame, adjacent to a central crosshair reticle.
• The release carries an explicit disclaimer: the narrative description reflects no analytical judgment, investigative conclusion, or factual determination about the event's validity or nature.

Most interesting

• The image originates from a U.S. military platform yet was submitted to AARO by the FBI — an unusual inter-agency chain of custody that suggests the military did not self-report.
• A crosshair reticle centered in the frame is consistent with a targeting or surveillance optic, implying the object was observed during an active military operation or patrol.
• With the embedded timestamp known to be wrong and no mission report filed, every contextual data point — altitude, speed, bearing, engagement geometry — is absent from the record.
• The object's circular shape and dark signature against a monochrome background are consistent with several prosaic explanations (balloon, drone), but no determination of any kind was made.
• AARO received the image without the original, unredacted version — meaning even the government's own resolution office is working from a degraded copy.