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FBI Photo B4

Open Sky release file copy of the official PDF

Release 01#war-gov#pursue#release-01#official-source#evidence#fbi#still-image#pdf

FBI Photo B4

Evidence media

Derived official PDF page render: FBI Photo B4

Derived page render from the official one-page PDF. The render shows a grayscale still with a central reticle, heavy black redactions, and the visible lower-left timestamp 12/31/99 18:12:16; the release description says the image date is incorrect because the system date/time had not been set. A small dark unresolved mark is visible above and to the right of the reticle center, but the released page does not support identification, distance, speed, or motion.

Extracted embedded raster from FBI Photo B4 PDF

Extracted main image object from the same PDF. It preserves the reticle and redaction layout at 1280 x 960; it is source-media context, not a separate unredacted frame.

Investigation reading

FBI Photo B4 is a one-page Release 01 PDF containing a single monochrome still image. The release record says the FBI submitted the image to AARO as a UAP report from a U.S. military system in 2025, with redactions applied before submission. The same release text says no accompanying mission report was provided, the operator reported being unable to positively identify the UAP, and the visible 12/31/99 date in the image is incorrect because the system date/time was not set.

This draft treats the file as a still-image evidence item only. It does not make a finding about what the visible feature is. The source supports a narrow public reading: a redacted, noisy sensor-style frame was released; the manifest calls out a small dark feature; the released PDF does not provide the mission report, platform logs, range, motion history, or unredacted display fields needed for identification.

What the file appears to contain

The verified release-file copy is a 593,683-byte PDF with one page. PDF inspection shows one embedded RGB image at 1280 x 960; the page render is a gray, noisy frame with a central white reticle. The horizontal reticle has tick marks and visible numeric labels such as 15, 10, 5, 5, 10, and 15; a vertical scale intersects it at center. Multiple solid black rectangular redaction bars cover the upper edge, side display areas, and lower display areas. No redacted text is readable.

The only visible OCR-level text preserved for the page is the timestamp 12/31/99 18:12:16 in the lower-left corner. Because the release description itself says the system date/time was not set, that timestamp should be treated as a frame display artifact, not as the incident date.

Visual inspection of the extracted image shows one small dark unresolved mark above and to the right of the reticle center. It is only a tiny speck or short dash against a grainy gray background. A few other faint specks are visible elsewhere, but they are not resolved enough to describe as objects. The release manifest describes a small dark circular object in the center-right quadrant and an indistinct, possibly natural landscape in the background. In the image itself, the lower portion is darker and low-contrast, but the scene is too degraded and redacted to confidently identify terrain, structures, horizon, size, distance, motion, or shape beyond the small dark unresolved feature.

Source custody and provenance

The official WAR.GOV media URL currently rejects direct HEAD and byte-range fetches with 403, so this review relies on the verified Open Sky release-file copy and the matching SHA-256 hash. The record-level metadata gives the incident window as Late 2025 and location as Western United States, while the asset inventory entry itself leaves incident date/location fields blank. That mismatch should remain visible as a provenance cleanup lead rather than being silently normalized.

Graph context

The graph contains both the release-record document for FBI Photo B4 and the PDF asset document. The PDF asset has 22 extracted claim records, 14 entity mentions, 4 sensor-event records, and 0 table rows. Those sensor-event records are generated from source phrases such as still image and military system; they should be read as pointers to the type of released material, not as independent multi-sensor corroboration.

The graph also preserves the Frontier OCR chunk with the timestamp 12/31/99 18:12:16 and release-manifest text summarizing the FBI/AARO submission, redaction, absence of an accompanying mission report, operator inability to identify the feature, and the warning that the displayed date is incorrect. Related graph neighbors include other FBI Photo B-series records such as B7 and B23. For this page, those links are navigation context only; there are no candidate crosslinks that establish a shared incident or conclusion.

One graph chunk from a manifest-revision source surfaces Related CSV rows: 133, while the current asset inventory and exact release record identify row 130 for B4. That row-number tension should be checked during release-manifest reconciliation.

Leads to check

  • Locate the unredacted original frame or source video, if it exists, to determine what information the black bars conceal.
  • Reconcile the row-number inconsistency between the current row 130 and a manifest-revision chunk that mentions row 133.
  • Confirm the corrected incident date/time behind the visible 12/31/99 18:12:16 display timestamp.
  • Compare adjacent FBI Photo B-series stills for repeated redaction layout, reticle geometry, timestamps, and whether the same system generated the frame.
  • Look for any mission report, sensor log, platform metadata, or operator note that could establish motion, range, altitude, line of sight, or environmental context.
  • Treat image noise, compression, scan artifacts, display overlays, and redaction artifacts as ordinary checks before any escalation.

Lead check notes

  • Checked — The Open Sky release-file copy matches the current Release 01 asset inventory: one-page PDF, 593,683 bytes, SHA-256 d5dd840f008b10fcd88bcab731f07b56fb614aa16048ced9672c9b40a9c9bc69, and official row 130.
  • Checked — PDF inspection reports one embedded RGB image at 1280 x 960 and zero embedded file attachments. The derived page render and extracted main raster now appear in the evidence media section.
  • Partial — The page render, extracted raster, and OCR preserve the visible timestamp 12/31/99 18:12:16, but the release description says the image date is incorrect because the system date/time was not set. The exact incident time remains missing from the released file.
  • Partial — Current asset inventory and exact release-record context identify row 130; an older FBI Western U.S. photo-set record surfaces row 133 for the same B4 asset. That remains a provenance-cleanup issue before row sequence is used for B-series comparisons.
  • Blocked — Direct checks against the official PDF URL and likely thumbnail URL currently return 403 Forbidden, and the current linked corpus does not expose a less-redacted frame, adjacent frames/video, mission report, source logs, platform/sensor geometry, or the underlying FBI/AARO submission package.
  • Needs external source — Image-noise, compression, display-overlay, redaction-artifact, sensor-blemish, aircraft, bird, balloon, terrain, weather, illumination, range, line-of-sight, and motion checks require unredacted imagery, adjacent frames, exact time/location, collection geometry, or environmental records.

Deep investigation — graph + web reconnaissance

Source reread and media check

The source file re-check confirms the same narrow evidentiary posture: a 593,683-byte, one-page PDF with SHA-256 d5dd840f008b10fcd88bcab731f07b56fb614aa16048ced9672c9b40a9c9bc69. PDF inspection identifies a copy-restricted PDF with one embedded RGB image at 1280 x 960; direct text extraction produces no useful text beyond a form-feed, while Frontier OCR preserves only 12/31/99 18:12:16.

Visual review of the page render and extracted embedded raster confirms a grayscale, noisy frame with a central white reticle, scale ticks, several solid black redaction bars, and the visible lower-left timestamp. A small dark unresolved speck or short dash is visible above and slightly right of the reticle center, but the frame also contains scattered noise and compression-like speckling. The released image alone does not support identifying the mark, deciding whether it is airborne, or estimating size, distance, altitude, velocity, or trajectory.

The release description is the controlling source text: the FBI submitted the item to AARO as a still image derived from a U.S. military system in 2025; the original imagery was altered with redactions before submission; no accompanying mission report was provided; the operator reported being unable to positively identify the UAP; and the displayed date is incorrect because the system date/time was not set. Those statements remain source claims, not analytical conclusions.

Read-only graph context

Read-only graph review finds two stable exact records for this page: the current Release 01 record at official CSV row 130, with incident window Late 2025 and location Western United States, and the PDF asset record at the exact official media URL with the verified hash and byte size above. The asset is connected to three text chunks: the linked-asset manifest description, a later manifest-description chunk that still says Related CSV rows: 133, and the one-line Frontier OCR chunk with the visible timestamp.

The semantic layer contains 22 machine-extracted claims, 14 entity mentions, and 4 sensor-event records for this asset. The extracted claims mainly repeat source metadata: FBI, AARO, FBI Photo B4, Late 2025 / 2025, Western United States, still image, military system, the operator's inability to identify the UAP, and the release-description warning not to treat the narrative as an analytical judgment. The sensor-event records are machine-extracted still image and military system cues marked machine_extracted_needs_human_review / not_a_finding; they are useful provenance pointers, not independent multi-sensor corroboration.

Direct graph neighbors include the current B4 release record, a secondary UFO-USA GitHub markdown conversion, and nearby B-series navigation records such as FBI Photo B7/B23. No CANDIDATE_CROSSLINK record was returned for B4. The row 130 versus manifest-revision row 133 tension is therefore a provenance-cleanup lead, not evidence that B4 and B7/B23 are the same incident.

External provenance and official-source checks

Official web probes during this check left custody mostly where it was: the WAR.GOV PDF URL and the current uap-release001.csv URL both returned 403, so the verified Open Sky release-file copy and exact SHA-256 remain the usable official-primary custody anchors. Internet Archive availability for the exact PDF URL returned 429 Too Many Requests during this run, so archive confirmation should be retried later rather than treated as absent.

DVIDS search for the exact title returned a web-application-firewall challenge with no body; AARO and Defense.gov search probes returned 403. A secondary GitHub conversion in DenisSergeevitch/UFO-USA at commit 49f78498f323bcba625fd96b7283cbe5779349d6 is reachable and mirrors the title, incident window/location, and the visible reticle/timestamp description, but it is a derivative community conversion generated on 2026-05-08, not a canonical source.

Prosaic checks and unresolved questions

Because the public packet gives only a broad Late 2025 / Western United States context and no exact time, platform, look direction, sensor mode, range, sequence, or unredacted display fields, astronomy, weather, aircraft, balloon, drone, satellite, and launch correlation cannot yet be performed at case quality. The first practical prosaic lane is image/media forensics: sensor noise, compression, screen/display artifacts, dust/specks, redaction edges, reticle overlay behavior, and whether adjacent frames show the mark consistently.

The priority follow-up is to obtain the unredacted original imagery or source video, the missing mission report or operator note, corrected system time, platform/sensor metadata, and environmental context. Adjacent FBI B-series stills should be compared for repeated reticle geometry, redaction layout, timestamps, and recurring specks only after each source file is reviewed on its own. Until then, this page remains a source-reviewed evidence note with an unresolved visible mark, not a finding.

Audit note

This section was added from the verified source file, OCR, page render, extracted embedded raster, read-only graph queries, and bounded official/secondary web reconnaissance. No graph writes were performed and no finding, hypothesis, or resolution decision is asserted.

Limits

This page is not a finding. The released file is one still image inside a PDF, not a full mission packet. Redactions remove display metadata. The timestamp visible in the frame is explicitly unreliable. No accompanying mission report was provided in this release item. The image does not show enough detail to identify the small dark feature, determine whether it is airborne, estimate distance or size, or separate a physical object from possible image/sensor artifacts.

Sources

  • WAR.GOV/PURSUE Release 01 official media file: https://www.war.gov/medialink/ufo/release_1/fbi-photo-b4.pdf
  • Open Sky release-file endpoint: /api/explore/war-gov/release-file/war-gov-fbi-photo-b4-672ae7ea
  • Release 01 CSV/inventory record for official row 130, FBI Photo B4
  • Verified source-file hash: d5dd840f008b10fcd88bcab731f07b56fb614aa16048ced9672c9b40a9c9bc69
  • Rendered PDF page and extracted embedded image reviewed for this draft; no resolution or identification is asserted.