{"type":"people","slug":"ryan-graves","title":"Ryan Graves","url":"https://disclosdex.com/people/ryan-graves","description":"Former U.S. Navy F/A-18 pilot whose Roosevelt UAP reports became congressional safety testimony and pilot-reporting advocacy","date":"2023-07-26T00:00:00.000Z","tags":["Pilot"],"updated":"2026-05-18T12:13:32.000Z","disclosureRating":4,"connectionCount":8,"content":{"markdown":"Ryan Graves is an American former U.S. Navy lieutenant and F/A-18F pilot known for East Coast Navy training UAP encounters, congressional testimony, and aviation-safety advocacy. Congress introduced him at the July 26, 2023 House Oversight hearing as executive director of Americans for Safe Aerospace and a former Navy F-18 pilot with his own UAP experience; his congressional biography says he served for a decade, flew the F/A-18F, deployed for Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Inherent Resolve, and became the first active-duty pilot to speak publicly about regular UAP sightings.[^1][^2][^3]\n\n## VFA-11 and the Roosevelt Workups\n\nGraves's UAP encounters began in 2014, when he was stationed at Naval Air Station Oceana near Virginia Beach with Strike Fighter Squadron 11, the \"Red Rippers.\" In his House testimony, he said VFA-11 flew F/A-18F Super Hornets, upgraded its radar systems, began seeing unknown tracks, first treated them as possible software errors, and then correlated some tracks with infrared sensors and later visual identification.[^4] In a direct interview with Tim McMillan, Graves tied the same 2014 and 2015 activity to VFA-11 and the USS Theodore Roosevelt Carrier Strike Group during workups off Virginia and Florida; he also identified the upgraded radar as the AN/APG-79 AESA radar and described pilots using radar, FLIR, and occasional visual observation rather than relying on one instrument stream.[^5]\n\nGraves told Congress the sightings became common enough to enter regular preflight briefs. He described a pivotal Warning Area W-72 training incident about 10 miles east of Virginia Beach in which another F/A-18 pilot reported a dark gray or black cube inside a clear sphere at the entry point to the working area. In oral testimony, Graves said the lead aircraft came within about 50 feet of the object; in his written testimony, he said the squadron filed a safety report but received no official acknowledgement and had no further reporting mechanism.[^4][^6]\n\n## Military Witness, Not Video Operator\n\nGraves is a military pilot witness and later reporting advocate who says he personally saw advanced UAP on multiple sensor systems, but the W-72 cube-inside-sphere near miss was reported by the returning pilot rather than observed from Graves's own cockpit.[^6] During the [USS Roosevelt encounters](/events/2015-uss-roosevelt-encounters), Graves did not film the public Gimbal or GoFast clips; McMillan reported, based on his interview with Graves, that Graves was airborne during their recording and watched related objects on his own jet's avionics suite.[^5]\n\nThe Department of Defense later authorized release of the January 2015 Navy videos, said the videos were authentic Navy videos, and kept the observed aerial phenomena characterized as unidentified.[^7] At the House hearing, Graves said the released Gimbal ATFLIR clip showed one object rotating, while the pilots' audio referred to a fleet not visible in the public FLIR image; he attributed his knowledge of that fleet to radar data he reviewed on the situational-awareness page during the debrief.[^8]\n\n