Beneath the Surface: We May Learn More about UAP by Looking in the Ocean

Brief

Gallaudet's Sol Foundation white paper contends that UAP research has almost entirely overlooked the ocean despite a documented record of transmedium incidents: the 2004 Tic Tac case, the 2019 USS Omaha observation, and the 2013 Aguadilla thermal-imaging analysis in which the Scientific Coalition of UAP Studies found an object traveling 40–120 mph in air and 95 mph underwater with no significant deceleration at the air-sea interface, splitting into two parts before re-entering the water. He grounds this in stark oceanographic baselines: fewer than 25% of the seabed has been mapped to modern standards and only 5% of ocean volume has been explored, meaning anomalous sonar contacts are systematically underdetected and routinely deleted as noise under standard research protocols. The paper calls for executive and legislative action directing NOAA, NASA, and the Naval Oceanographic Office to prioritize transmedium UAP and USOs in national ocean research programs, including the 2025 NDAA and the National Oceanographic Partnerships Program reauthorization.

Metadata

Category

Search

Venue

Sol Foundation

Type

White paper

Year

2023

Authors

Timothy Gallaudet

Access

Open access

Length

995.4 K

Programs

Sol Foundation, Galileo Project, All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), Americans for Safe Aerospace, Scientific Coalition of UAP Studies (SCU), National Oceanographic Partnerships Program, New Paradigm Institute, NOAA Okeanos Explorer Program

Instruments

FLIR thermal imaging (US Customs and Border Protection DHC-8 aircraft), hull-mounted sonar (USS Maury), ROV high-resolution video camera (NOAA Okeanos Explorer), F/A-18F Super Hornet sensor suite

Data sources

NOAA oceanographic survey data, MUFON Case Management System, National UFO Reporting Center (NUFORC), AARO/ODNI 2023 UAP Annual Report, SCU Aguadilla Case Analysis

Tags

UAP-maritime, USO, transmedium, UAP-policy, ocean-security, maritime-domain-awareness

Key points

• Less than 25% of the seabed has been mapped to modern standards; only 5% of ocean volume has been explored, more is known about the surfaces of the Moon and Mars than Earth's own seafloor.p.5
• Aguadilla 2013 thermal-imaging analysis by the Scientific Coalition of UAP Studies: object flew 40–120 mph in air, reached 95 mph underwater, traversed the air-sea interface with no significant deceleration, and appeared to split into two parts before re-entering the Atlantic Ocean.p.9
• USS Maury (1946) sonar tracked an object that accelerated and vanished into the deep after multiple mapping passes; Gallaudet argues that standard research-vessel protocol, deleting anomalous returns as noise, means such contacts are routinely discarded, making systematic USO detection nearly impossible.p.12
• NOAA ship Okeanos Explorer (2022) ROV documented unexplained centimeter-scale holes in seafloor sediment at approximately 2,540 meters depth; the principal investigator published a peer-reviewed paper concluding the find pointed to significant knowledge gaps in the deep ocean.p.12
• USS San Francisco (2005) and USS Connecticut (2021) both struck uncharted seamounts near Guam; fewer than 0.1% of the estimated 100,000-plus seamounts taller than 1,000 meters have been mapped and explored.p.13
• Approximately 95% of global communications are transmitted through roughly 500 undersea fiber-optic cables; Russia has probed Atlantic cables and China has sabotaged cables running to Taiwan, compounding the maritime security case for improved undersea awareness.p.14
• AARO/ODNI 2023 report logged 274 UAP observations by DOD personnel between August 2022 and April 2023, while attributing most to ordinary phenomena and characterizing the pattern as a 'restricted airspace reporting bias'.p.7
• Richard Dolan's forthcoming compilation documents over 600 USO cases from 1711 to 2023, drawn from MUFON's Case Management System, the National UFO Reporting Center, and prior regional studies.p.9

Verbatim

• “When has ignorance ever been a good national security strategy?”

  p.15

Most interesting

• The Aguadilla 2013 object appeared to split into two separate parts mid-flight before re-entering the Atlantic, a behavior the SCU analysis concluded cannot be attributed to any known aircraft, vessel, or projectile.
• Gallaudet personally witnessed the bioluminescent 'pinwheel' phenomenon in the Strait of Hormuz that early ufologists had catalogued as a USO encounter, and identified it as turbulence-driven bioluminescence from tidal circulation, which he uses as an explicit caution against premature attribution.
• When NOAA scientists posted about the mysterious 2,540-meter seafloor holes on social media and solicited public hypotheses, the top community response was 'aliens.'
• Gallaudet notes that only one nuclear ballistic missile submarine interaction with a potential USO has come to his attention, but flags that the strict secrecy of the SSBN program makes additional incidents plausibly concealed.
• Standard oceanographic research-vessel protocol, deleting anomalous sonar returns as noise during high sea states, means a contact like the USS Maury's 1946 accelerating object would almost certainly be discarded by a modern scientific crew, not investigated.
• Ivan Sanderson's Invisible Residents appears to be the first book dedicated entirely to USOs, and the Lorenzen book UFOs over the Americas may contain the first modern chapter-length treatment of underwater UAP cases.