Congressional Testimony — House Committee on Oversight & Accountability

Under Oath: What a Rear Admiral Told Congress About UAP

On November 13, 2024, Dr. Tim Gallaudet testified before two House subcommittees under penalty of federal law. Here is what the record shows.

When a witness appears before the United States Congress and signs the Truth in Testimony disclosure form, they do so under the explicit terms of 18 U.S.C. § 1001. Knowingly providing material false information to a congressional committee is a federal crime. The legal exposure is real and the penalties are severe. This is the context in which Dr. Tim Gallaudet — Rear Admiral, U.S. Navy (ret.), former Acting Undersecretary of Commerce, and former Acting Administrator of NOAA — testified on November 13, 2024, before the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability.

What follows is a summary of the factual record as documented in his written testimony, his signed congressional bio, and the Truth in Testimony form submitted to the committee. No claims are made that exceed the primary source record.

Who Is Tim Gallaudet

According to his official congressional biography, submitted as part of the hearing record, Gallaudet served as the Acting Undersecretary and Assistant Secretary of Commerce, Acting and Deputy Administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and as Oceanographer of the Navy. He holds a bachelor's degree from the U.S. Naval Academy and master's and doctoral degrees from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. He is a recipient of the U.S. Coast Guard Distinguished Public Service Award and a fellow of The Explorer's Club.

He testified as a private citizen and non-governmental witness, representing himself rather than any organization.

January 2015: An Email on the Navy's Secure Network

In his written testimony, Gallaudet described an incident that occurred in January 2015 while he was serving as Commander of the Naval Meteorology and Oceanography Command. His personnel were participating in a pre-deployment exercise involving the USS Theodore Roosevelt Carrier Strike Group off the U.S. East Coast, overseen by United States Fleet Forces Command.

During the exercise, he received an email on the Navy's secure network from the operations officer of Fleet Forces Command. The email was addressed to all subordinate commanders. The subject line read, in capital letters: URGENT SAFETY OF FLIGHT ISSUE. The text stated, in words to the effect: "If any of you know what these are, tell me ASAP. We are having multiple near-midair collisions, and if we do not resolve it soon, we will have to shut down the exercise."

Attached to the email was footage now publicly known as the "Go Fast" video, captured by the forward-looking infrared sensor of a Navy F/A-18 aircraft participating in the exercise. The video was subsequently declassified and authenticated by the U.S. Navy.

Gallaudet testified that, because Department of Defense policy requires rigorous deconfliction of classified technology demonstrations from live exercises, he was confident the objects in the footage were not classified technology being tested.

The Email Disappears

According to his written testimony, the email disappeared from his account and those of the other recipients the following day, without explanation. The Commander of Fleet Forces and his operations officer never discussed the incident again, including during weekly meetings specifically designed to address issues affecting the ongoing exercise.

Gallaudet testified that he concluded the UAP information must have been classified within a special access program managed by an intelligence agency — a compartmented program that even senior officials, including himself, were not read into.

An Encounter With AARO

In his written testimony, Gallaudet stated that earlier in 2024, during a meeting with the then-acting director of the All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) and his senior staff, he was subjected to what he described as an hours-long influence operation. He testified that the operation attempted to convince him of the validity of AARO's historical records report — which he characterized as severely flawed — to question well-documented UAP reports including the USS Nimitz encounter, and to disparage former government officials who had spoken publicly about U.S. government UAP programs.

Gallaudet testified: "If AARO is attempting to repeat the illegal and unethical DoD disinformation efforts involving UAP in the past, Congress should be gravely concerned."

What He Asked Congress to Do

Gallaudet made three formal recommendations to Congress in his written testimony. First, he called for the establishment of proper oversight of the Executive Branch's management of UAP programs, information, and materials — including inviting AARO's director to explain the alleged inaccuracies in its historical records report. Second, he called for passage of the UAP Records Review Board provisions of the UAP Disclosure Act, which passed the Senate in 2023 but were stripped in conference and omitted again from the 2025 defense authorization bill. Third, he called for a whole-of-government approach to UAP policy, research, and disclosure.

He also informed the committee that former DoD official Christopher Mellon had contacted him regarding satellite imagery of UAP from 2017 that had still not been shared with Congress.

The Signatories

Submitted as part of the hearing record was a letter dated November 12, 2024, addressed to Members of Congress and organized by the UAP Disclosure Fund. The letter called for passage of the UAP Disclosure Act's review board provisions. Among its signatories, all identified by name and institutional affiliation:

The letter carried no anonymous signatories. Each signatory identified themselves by name, title, and institutional affiliation on a document entered into the congressional record.

The Cultural Moment

The Gallaudet hearing took place against a shifting public backdrop. On March 13, 2026, filmmaker Steven Spielberg told the SXSW audience in Austin, Texas, that his interest in making his new film Disclosure Day was reinvigorated by a 2017 New York Times article about Navy pilots encountering unexplained aerial phenomena, and by congressional subcommittee hearings in 2022 and 2023 where military officials testified under oath. The Hollywood Reporter and the Los Angeles Times both covered his remarks. "I don't know any more than any of you do," Spielberg told the audience, "but I have a very strong, sticky suspicion that we are not alone here on Earth right now."

The observation is relevant not as evidence, but as context: the cultural conversation about UAP disclosure is now being shaped in part by what witnesses like Gallaudet said under oath before Congress, not only by films and documentaries.

What Is Not Established

The following claims fall outside the scope of this article's primary source record and are not established here:

Source Note

All factual claims in this article are drawn directly from documents filed with the U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Accountability for the hearing titled "Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena: Exposing the Truth," held November 13, 2024. These documents carry the official HHRG-118-GO12 prefix and are part of the public congressional record. The Spielberg remarks are sourced from The Hollywood Reporter and the Los Angeles Times, both published March 13–15, 2026. This archive draws no conclusions about the nature or origin of the phenomena described.