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FBI Photo B6

Open Sky release file PDF: FBI Photo B6

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

FBI Photo B6

Evidence media

Derived page render from the official FBI Photo B6 PDF

Derived page render from the official PDF. The page contains the redacted monochrome still image with a central reticle/crosshair and lower-left timestamp 12/31/99 18:10:00; no separate narrative text is visible outside the image.

Embedded image raster extracted from the official FBI Photo B6 PDF

Embedded image raster extracted from the official PDF. The raster preserves the top and side redaction blocks, the reticle scale, the unreliable displayed timestamp, a faint dark unresolved feature near the upper reticle area, and a smaller dark speck below/right of center.

Investigation reading

This Release 01 item is a one-page FBI still-image PDF. The release record says the FBI submitted a report to AARO consisting of a still image derived from a U.S. military system in 2025. It also says the original imagery was altered with redactions before submission, no accompanying mission report was provided, and the operator reported being unable to positively identify the object. The verified release record ties this item to CSV row 132, incident window Late 2025, and incident location Western United States.

The PDF itself contains only the redacted image frame. There is no visible narrative paragraph, mission-report page, map, sensor table, video frame sequence, operator log, or caption outside the image. Frontier OCR for the PDF page contains only the timestamp text visible in the lower-left corner: 12/31/99 18:10:00.

What the file appears to contain

The visible source is a grainy monochrome frame with a white central reticle/crosshair. The reticle has a horizontal and vertical scale with short tick marks; the horizontal scale shows labels such as 15, 10, and 5 on both sides of center. A large black redaction band spans the upper frame, with additional black rectangular redaction blocks around the left, right, and lower portions of the image. Those blocks are release/source alterations or overlays, not scene content.

The lower-left timestamp reads 12/31/99 18:10:00. The release description states that the date in the image is incorrect because the system date/time had not been set, so the visible timestamp should not be treated as the actual incident date.

The official description says the monochrome image shows a dark structured object with an appendage on its left side just at the top of the reticle, plus a second smaller dark circular object below the reticle in the bottom-right quadrant. Visual inspection of the extracted 1280 x 960 image supports the general placement described by the release text, but the quality is limited: near the upper portion of the vertical reticle there is a faint, irregular dark feature that can appear to have a short appendage-like extension, while below and right of the reticle there is a more compact small dark dot or dash. Both features are low-resolution marks in a noisy, redacted still image. This draft does not infer identity, range, altitude, speed, or motion from them.

Source custody and provenance

  • Official/source URL: https://www.war.gov/medialink/ufo/release_1/fbi-photo-b6.pdf
  • Open Sky release-file copy: war-gov-fbi-photo-b6-b279eac8
  • Agency: FBI
  • Release: WAR.GOV / PURSUE Release 01
  • Current release CSV row: 132
  • Current release record incident window/location: Late 2025, Western United States
  • File type and size reviewed: one-page PDF, 608,164 bytes
  • SHA-256: 09444e6501f05a4030120db174a1841e891814464fd7ce6f325178d3c09cdf1a
  • PDF structure observed: encrypted/copy-disabled PDF, one page, one embedded RGB image at 1280 x 960
  • OCR coverage: one OCR page with only 12/31/99 18:10:00

At review time, direct official-server HEAD and browser-like byte-range requests returned 403 Forbidden; the Open Sky release-file copy was therefore checked against the release inventory hash and size. One provenance cleanup item is visible in graph text: a derived manifest-description chunk can surface Related CSV rows: 135, while the verified release record and release inventory for this PDF use row 132. Row 135 is surfaced nearby as an FBI Photo B-series record and should be treated as an indexing/custody cleanup lead, not as evidence that the B6 image belongs to that row.

Graph context

The graph has two exact official records for this item: the WAR.GOV release-record document for FBI Photo B6 and the PDF-asset document for the canonical file URL. Current semantic extraction attached to the asset reports 22 extracted claims, 14 entity mentions, 4 sensor/platform events, and 0 table rows. The claim categories are mostly provenance and release-text facts: FBI/AARO references, the still-image source type, the military-system wording, Late 2025 / Western United States release metadata, the operator's inability to positively identify the object, and the release caveat that the description should not be read as an analytical determination.

The four sensor/platform events should be read as navigation cues from source language such as still image and military system. They are not independent radar returns, telemetry, a raw instrument track, or a released mission-report sensor table. The graph also surfaces related FBI Photo B-series records, including B3 and B9; those are useful comparison targets for sequence/custody review, but they do not by themselves establish a shared event, object, or identification. No candidate crosslinks are attached for this item in the current context.

Leads to check

  • Establish the actual collection date/time from source metadata outside the visible 12/31/99 18:10:00 clock, since the release says the system time was not set.
  • Locate any unavailable mission report, operator notes, platform/sensor metadata, field-of-view/range information, unredacted frame, adjacent frames, or original video sequence.
  • Compare the official thumbnail, extracted image raster, and adjacent FBI Photo B-series items for shared cropping, redaction style, timestamp sequence, or repeated background/noise patterns.
  • Run ordinary image-quality and prosaic checks before escalation: sensor blemish, dust/debris, compression/noise, redaction artifact, distant aircraft, bird, balloon, terrain contrast, or other optical effects.
  • Clean up the row-number tension between verified B6 row 132 and the derived manifest text that can surface row 135.

Lead check notes

  • Blocked — The displayed 12/31/99 18:10:00 timestamp was visible in the PDF image and OCR, but the release text says the system date/time was not set. A true collection date/time still needs source metadata outside this PDF.
  • Blocked — The current release-file PDF exposes only the redacted still-image page. It does not provide a mission report, operator notes, platform/sensor metadata, unredacted frame, adjacent frames, or original video sequence.
  • Partial — The official PDF page render and the extracted 1280 x 960 raster were checked. Available graph context surfaces nearby FBI Photo B-series records, including B3 and B9, but those records are only comparison/custody leads until page-level sequence and cropping are reviewed directly.
  • Needs external source — Ordinary image-quality and prosaic checks require missing collection geometry or less-redacted source imagery; this page should not infer sensor blemish, dust/debris, aircraft, bird, balloon, terrain contrast, or optical effects from the public still alone.
  • Partial — Release metadata and the verified source file tie B6 to row 132; a separate manifest-description reference can surface row 135, which remains an indexing/provenance cleanup lead rather than an event-level fact.

Limits

This page is an investigation draft, not a finding. The released source is a single redacted still-image PDF. It does not include the original mission report, platform identity, sensor model, collection geometry, range, altitude, speed, weather, operator log, adjacent frames, unredacted imagery, or original video. The visible marks are small and low-resolution, and the redactions remove important surrounding context.

The visible 12/31/99 timestamp is not reliable as an incident date because the release text says the system date/time was not set. The release-record Late 2025 / Western United States fields are stronger custody metadata than the embedded timestamp, but they still do not supply a precise time, location, or environmental context.

Deep investigation — graph + web reconnaissance

Source reread

The verified release-file copy remains a one-page encrypted/copy-disabled PDF, 608,164 bytes, SHA-256 09444e6501f05a4030120db174a1841e891814464fd7ce6f325178d3c09cdf1a. pdfinfo reads title/subject B6 FBI Photo, one 640 x 480 pt page, and pdfimages reports one 1280 x 960 RGB embedded image. The OCR layer contains only 12/31/99 18:10:00, matching the visible lower-left timestamp and adding no mission narrative.

A fresh byte-range check of the official WAR.GOV PDF URL returned a currently served one-page PDF variant with %PDF-1.7 magic, Content-Range: bytes 0-15/124905, SHA-256 c70c7334e7b8f38701fc9951e356cc702c194caaeae12f6e5a41c1bf0c2463e9, and the same visible B6 still when rendered: the top redaction band, side/lower redaction blocks, central reticle, displayed 12/31/99 18:10:00 timestamp, faint upper-reticle dark mark, and smaller lower-right dark speck all remain visually consistent. That size/hash difference is a custody/versioning note, not a new event record.

Graph connections checked

Read-only graph checks found the exact B6 PDF asset document plus the Release 01 row record for FBI Photo B6. The semantic layer currently attaches 22 machine-extracted claims, 14 entity mentions, and 4 sensor/platform events to the B6 asset; those records are marked machine_extracted_needs_human_review / not_a_finding. The useful graph facts are provenance facts: FBI/AARO source wording, still-image source type, Late 2025 / Western United States release metadata, the missing accompanying mission report, and the operator's reported inability to identify the object.

The sensor/platform graph entries are navigation cues from release language such as still image and military system; they are not independent radar, telemetry, or raw track evidence. Exact-URL/hash matching also exposes manifest drift in nearby B-series records: the row-132 B6 release record can carry stale fbi-photo-b3.pdf file fields, while a row-135 FBI Photo B9 record can carry the B6 final URL/body hash. Those are row/indexing cleanup leads. They should not be treated as proof that B3, B6, and B9 show the same object or the same event. No candidate crosslinks were attached in the exact B6 context checked here.

External provenance and official-source checks

Official WAR.GOV access was mixed: direct HEAD requests to the PDF and thumbnail returned 403, while browser-style range GET requests returned the PDF and thumbnail magic bytes. The official landing page and both checked CSV URLs also returned 403 from this environment, so the verified release-file copy, graph source record, and release inventory remain the stable custody anchors.

The Internet Archive availability endpoint showed an exact official-PDF snapshot available at timestamp 20260516081500; the CDX listing endpoint was unavailable during this check. DVIDS exact-title search returned an empty 202 response, and AARO/Defense.gov exact-title searches returned access-denied responses. Because the official CSV row has blank DVIDS/video pairing fields and the PDF contains no mission report or video, these web checks are provenance leads only, not corroboration or resolution.

Prosaic checks, limits, and follow-up leads

The strongest prosaic lane remains image/source-quality analysis before any escalation: redaction/copying artifacts, raster compression, display noise, sensor blemish, dust/debris, distant aircraft, bird, balloon, terrain/background contrast, or other optical effects. The public source does not provide the true collection date/time, platform, sensor model, field of view, range, altitude, look angle, weather, airspace traffic, adjacent frames, unredacted image, or original video, so astronomy/weather/launch/satellite correlation is blocked rather than negative.

Follow-up should prioritize the missing mission report or operator notes, original/adjacent frames, unredacted imagery, platform/sensor metadata, and a row-level reconciliation of B3/B6/B9 manifest drift. Until those are released or located, the visible marks should remain described as small unresolved features in a noisy redacted still image.

Audit note

This section uses the source page, OCR text, rendered/extracted image evidence, read-only graph context, and official/archive web probes. It adds provenance and prosaic-check context only; it does not create a finding, hypothesis, or resolution decision.

Sources