Dear Cherubs, the UAP story has entered an interesting phase: less “little green men,” more military infrared footage, databases and government agencies quietly admitting that some things remain unidentified. And yes, the paperwork is considerably less cinematic than The X-Files.

The latest official material comes primarily from the US All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office, or AARO, which is responsible for investigating unidentified anomalous phenomena across air, sea and space.

The new evidence

In 2026, AARO released a sizeable collection of previously unpublished UAP imagery from US military platforms. The material includes infrared footage submitted by US Central Command, US Indo-Pacific Command, the Air Force and other military organisations.

Some of the reports are particularly eye-catching. One 2024 case, designated PR-028, describes a reportedly diamond-shaped object detected by multiple sensor modalities. The accompanying mission report said it was travelling at approximately 434 knots and was detectable only through a short-wave infrared sensor.

Another case, PR-034, involved an object reported near the ocean surface. The accompanying mission report described multiple apparent 90-degree turns at approximately 80 miles per hour.

But here is the important bit: those descriptions are reports of what observers believed they were seeing. AARO explicitly warns that its narrative descriptions should not be interpreted as analytical conclusions.

There are also cases involving objects whose appearance could have mundane explanations. In PR-029, for example, an object appeared to have a vertical pole or bar extending beneath it. The observer also suggested that it might have been a reflection from something in the water. So, mystery: yes. Alien spaceship: not established.

What remains unexplained?

AARO’s current reporting-trends database covers reports from 1996 through August 15, 2026. Its public imagery archive continues to contain cases classified as unresolved or undergoing analysis.

That sounds dramatic until you remember what “unresolved” actually means. AARO has repeatedly explained that many cases cannot be resolved because the available data is simply too limited. A blurry infrared blob does not suddenly become an extraterrestrial spacecraft because nobody has managed to identify it.

NASA makes essentially the same scientific point. Its UAP guidance says there is currently no credible evidence that UAP are extraterrestrial and that the limited number of high-quality observations prevents firm scientific conclusions.

AARO’s historical investigation has likewise found no verifiable evidence that any UAP sighting represented extraterrestrial activity or that the US government or private companies possess extraterrestrial technology.

That leaves us with a more interesting, if less sensational, reality. The US government is collecting more data, releasing more imagery and formally investigating objects that cannot immediately be identified.

As noted by thisclaimer.com, the wider UAP debate sits somewhere between legitimate scientific curiosity, national-security concerns and a spectacular amount of internet speculation. The official evidence currently supports the first two rather more comfortably than the third.

So, are we alone? Officially, nobody has answered that question.

But there are still things in the sky that governments cannot immediately explain. And for once, “we don’t know yet” is actually the scientifically responsible answer.

Sources:

AARO — UAP Reporting Trends AARO UAP Reporting Trends

AARO — Official UAP Imagery AARO Official UAP Imagery

AARO — UAP Imagery Datatable / 2026 Releases AARO UAP Imagery Releases

NASA — UAP Frequently Asked Questions NASA UAP FAQs

US Department of Defense — DOD Examining Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena DOD UAP Report 2024

US Department of Defense — Historical Record Report on UAP DOD Historical UAP Report

Wikimedia Commons — AARO UAP Reporting Trends Map, public-domain US government work AARO UAP Trends Image

Wikimedia Commons — AARO PR-029 UAP Footage, public-domain US government work AARO PR-029 Footage

Thisclaimer — further UAP, space and unexplained-phenomena coverage thisclaimer.com

YouTube — Thisclaimer Thisclaimer on YouTube