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.123
VFA-11 and the Roosevelt Workups
Graves'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
Graves 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.46
Military Witness, Not Video Operator
Graves 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, 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
The 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
Americans for Safe Aerospace
After leaving active duty, Graves founded Americans for Safe Aerospace as a pilot-led UAP reporting and advocacy organization. In April 2023, ASA described itself as a nonprofit founded by Graves, a former Navy fighter pilot and engineer, to support pilots and aerospace professionals reporting UAP encounters and to seek more disclosure from public officials.9 At the July 2023 hearing, Graves said ASA had nearly 5,000 members and was working with more than 30 UAP witnesses; the current ASA homepage describes the group as a military pilot-led 501(c)(3) nonprofit providing a confidential UAP reporting channel, says it has more than 30,000 members, and lists Graves as founder, executive director, former Navy lieutenant, and F/A-18 pilot.410
Graves also moved the issue into professional aerospace channels. His AIAA UAP Integration Committee biography identifies him as founder and executive director of Americans for Safe Aerospace, says he previously worked on advanced military autonomy at BAE Systems FAST Labs, and lists him as the first chair of the AIAA Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena Integration Committee, whose stated goal is neutral, scientific work for safer aerospace operations.11
Public Impact and Network
Graves's public profile broadened with the May 16, 2021 60 Minutes segment, where CBS identified him as a former Navy lieutenant whose F/A-18F squadron began seeing UAP over restricted airspace southeast of Virginia Beach in 2014 after a radar update. In that interview, Graves told Bill Whitaker the pilots saw the objects every day for at least a couple of years, called the issue a security risk, and framed the possible explanations as secret U.S. technology, adversary systems, or something else.12
The July 26, 2023 House hearing put Graves in the same public witness panel as David Fravor and David Grusch. Graves's lane was pilot reporting, aerospace safety, stigma, and overclassification, while Fravor testified about the 2004 Nimitz Tic Tac case and Grusch testified about alleged hidden retrieval and reverse-engineering programs.16 Graves also hosts Merged, a podcast framed around UAP through the perspective of pilots, scientists, and innovators; the show's public description says it treats UAP as an engineering problem requiring a rational, science-first approach.13
Evidence Limits and Official Baselines
The public record identifies Graves by name, places the encounters in a named squadron context, describes claimed multi-sensor tracks, reports a near mid-air event, and documents Graves's statement that the squadron lacked a usable follow-on reporting mechanism. It does not include the full classified radar data, the full Gimbal sensor package, the W-72 safety report, or named public testimony from the pilot who nearly collided with the cube-inside-sphere object.4568
The 2021 ODNI preliminary assessment said many reports probably represented physical objects because a majority were registered across radar, infrared, electro-optical, weapon seekers, and visual observation, but it also said limited high-quality reporting prevented firm conclusions and that unusual flight characteristics could result from sensor errors, spoofing, or observer misperception.14 AARO's GoFast case-resolution paper later assessed the public GoFast video and concluded with high confidence that the object did not show anomalous or exceptional behavior; AARO also noted that the available data was only a compressed public video without the F/A-18's georeferenced position, heading, full atmospheric data, or complete original metadata.15
The broader AARO record does not identify Graves's Roosevelt sightings. AARO's 2024 historical report said no U.S. government investigation, academic-sponsored research, or official review panel had confirmed that any UAP sighting represented extraterrestrial technology, while also acknowledging unresolved cases and data limitations.16 AARO's fiscal year 2024 consolidated report said it received 757 reports in the covered period, resolved 118 during the period to prosaic objects, had many unresolved cases, and had discovered no evidence of extraterrestrial beings, activity, or technology.17