USS Forrestal Mediterranean Fleet Encounter 1964

On July 19, 1964, USS Forrestal (CVA-59) airwing crews operating in the Mediterranean Sea as part of the US Sixth Fleet encountered a metallic disc-shaped craft at 12,000 feet. The disc performed maneuvering patterns that brought it into proximity with multiple aircraft in the airwing. Sixth Fleet radar systems tracked the contact independently of the aircrews. The encounter was handled through Sixth Fleet command channels and classified by Mediterranean theater intelligence. The USS Forrestal case represents the Mediterranean dimension of a documented pattern in which US Navy carrier strike groups across all major oceanic fleet areas — Atlantic, Pacific, Indian Ocean, and Mediterranean — were filing UAP encounter reports throughout the 1960s. The consistency of these reports across geographically separated fleet areas during the same decade has been noted by researchers as significant.