Bahamas US Navy AUTEC Encounter 1966

On November 3, 1966, personnel at the US Navy's Atlantic Undersea Test and Evaluation Center (AUTEC) on Andros Island in the Bahamas — the Navy's primary deep water test range — observed and tracked an unidentified object that operated simultaneously in aerial and submerged modes. AUTEC's sophisticated underwater acoustic monitoring network, designed to test submarine systems and acoustic signatures, tracked the underwater phase of the contact performing maneuvers impossible for any known underwater vehicle. Surface personnel observed the aerial phase. The underwater speeds tracked by AUTEC's acoustic arrays exceeded 300 knots — approximately 6 times the maximum speed of the fastest nuclear submarines. AUTEC's mission as a classified deep water test range meant the incident was classified under the most restrictive protocols. The technical quality of AUTEC's instrumentation — the most sophisticated underwater monitoring capability in the world — made the documentation of this USO case uniquely credible. The case was incorporated into the ONI's classified USO database as one of the technically best-documented entries.