DOW-UAP-PR096, "HH11 03 July 2018 UAPs"

Investigation reading

This Release 02 item is an official Department of War / AARO video record from manifest row 156, published in the 5/22/26 WAR.GOV/PURSUE release and mirrored through DVIDS video ID 1007726. The public title is preserved as source/catalog language: "HH11 03 July 2018 UAPs". The title's UAPs wording, the HH11 string, and the plural framing are not treated here as independent Open Sky findings about object identity, object count, platform identity, event significance, or the nature of the visible contrast areas.

The official release description says eight U.S. House members requested access to 51 potentially UAP-related records allegedly held by the Department of War and the Intelligence Community. AARO identified responsive materials held on a classified network and warns that many of these materials lack a substantiated chain of custody. For this row, AARO assesses that the public video is likely derived from an infrared sensor aboard a U.S. military platform operating within the United States Central Command area of responsibility in 2018, and says a user uploaded the video to a classified network in July 2020.

The source-provided video description lists a duration of 00:01:19. It breaks the public clip into these windows: 00:00 to 00:12, No Content; 00:13 to 00:21, two areas of contrast enter the lower right side of the screen and exit the bottom of the screen; 00:13 to 00:29, the sensor pans to track the two areas of contrast and centers them generally within the field of view; 00:30 to 00:47, the sensor zooms in, one area of contrast is no longer visible at this magnification, and the remaining area appears as three distinct areas of contrast in a generally straight line; 00:47 to 00:58, the distance between the rightmost area and the center/left areas appears to increase while the center and left areas remain at a roughly fixed distance from one another; and 00:59 to 01:19, other areas of contrast enter the field of view from the top of the screen. The same source text is explicitly informational only and should not be read as an analytical judgment, investigative conclusion, or factual determination about the described event's validity, nature, or significance.

The DVIDS page resolves to a canonical page for video 1007726 and lists date taken 07.03.2018, date posted 05.22.2026 07:30, category B-Roll, video ID 1007726, VIRIN 180704-D-D0360-9472, filename DOD_111719807, length 00:01:19, and location (UNDISCLOSED LOCATION). The manifest gives incident location CENTCOM; DVIDS gives (UNDISCLOSED LOCATION). Those are provenance fields to preserve, not enough by themselves to derive coordinates, platform position, line of sight, or sensor geometry. The title/date-taken fields point to 3 July 2018, while the VIRIN begins with 180704; that one-day catalog tension should be reconciled before any precise timing analysis.

What the released item appears to contain

The downloaded direct MP4 is a 1280×720 monochrome / infrared-style sensor-display clip. Sampled frames show fixed black rectangular masks or display/redaction blocks near the upper frame and along the frame edges, plus border-like side panels. The visible image field is grainy and low-contrast, with broad brightness gradients and mottled texture. The black blocks, borders, reticle/marker-like points, timestamp/contact-sheet labels, and any display overlays are presentation features and should not be confused with natural scene content.

The source-labeled 00:00 to 00:12 No Content interval is not a blank screen in the public MP4. Contact-sheet samples still show the sensor-display layout, masking blocks, gray texture, gradients, and small specks or marker-like points. Here No Content is preserved as source catalog language, not as an Open Sky claim that the video contains no pixels, no sensor output, or no display texture.

In the source-described 00:13 to 00:29 entry/track window, cropped sampled frames show faint localized contrast features and patches against the grainy field while the visible scene appears to pan or reframe. The release description says two areas of contrast enter from the lower right and are tracked near center. The still samples support only cautious wording: contrast areas or patches are visible in the sensor display and appear to be kept near the central field during the sequence. They do not establish object identity, range, speed, altitude, heading, sensor polarity, or cause.

In the 00:30 to 00:58 zoom window, sampled frames show zoom/framing changes and small bright or dark contrast spots in a noisy field. Some samples give a weak impression of a three-spot, roughly linear grouping, consistent with the source description's three distinct areas of contrast language, but the grouping is faint and ambiguous in still samples. It could be affected by sensor zoom, pan, display masking, compression, noise, scene texture, or contrast/processing changes. The safe public reading is that the source describes multiple contrast areas and the public MP4 shows low-contrast spots/features that require full-resolution frame-by-frame review before count, motion, or identity claims.

In the source-described 00:59 to 01:19 late window, sampled frames show darker diffuse material or tonal patches appearing or extending from the upper/top portion of the frame, partly near or under the fixed top mask. The top mask and low contrast limit interpretation. The visible region is not sharply bounded enough in these derived stills to identify as an object, plume, cloud, artifact, or background feature.

The MP4 includes an AAC stereo audio stream, but a full decoded audio check returned zero signal in this source review (RMS 0.0, mean absolute sample 0.0, max absolute sample 0.0, and zero nonzero sample values). No transcript or audible content is quoted here. The contact sheets below are derived review aids from the downloaded official MP4; they are not independent evidence and should not be used to infer cause, identity, count, speed, range, altitude, platform, or event significance.

Source asset review

The individual official DVIDS/CloudFront MP4 was downloaded and inspected directly; the full Release 02 video ZIP was not used as a substitute. The direct media response returned 200, content-type: binary/octet-stream, accept-ranges: bytes, content-length: 73000480, last-modified: Fri, 22 May 2026 11:30:37 GMT, and ETag "62823515b644bb98c90980c076779993-9". A byte-range probe returned 206 with content-range: bytes 0-15/73000480; the first 16 bytes were MP4/M4V header bytes 0000001c667479704d34562000000001.

The Release 02 remote video-ZIP central directory lists video_2605_DOD_111719807_DOD_111719807.mp4 as 72,994,733 bytes with CRC32 e43c019a, stored uncompressed. Those ZIP-entry values do not match the downloaded direct DVIDS MP4 size (73,000,480 bytes) or CRC32 (af49b978); the direct file is 5,747 bytes larger than the ZIP entry. This is a source-custody lead, not evidence of tampering by itself. The public page should preserve both facts until the direct DVIDS file and Release 02 ZIP copy can be compared byte-for-byte.

Source custody and provenance

Primary public provenance for this page is the official WAR.GOV/PURSUE Release 02 landing page, the Release 02 manifest row, and the DVIDS page for video 1007726. The public DVIDS page resolves to https://www.dvidshub.net/video/1007726/dow-uap-pr096-hh11-03-july-2018-uaps and exposes the direct media asset at https://d34w7g4gy10iej.cloudfront.net/video/2605/DOD_111719807/DOD_111719807.mp4.

The custody posture is intentionally bounded. The public release says many responsive materials lack a substantiated chain of custody. This row says the video was uploaded to a classified network in July 2020 and is likely derived from an infrared sensor aboard a U.S. military platform operating within the CENTCOM area of responsibility in 2018. DVIDS adds a 07.03.2018 date taken, (UNDISCLOSED LOCATION) location, VIRIN 180704-D-D0360-9472, and filename DOD_111719807. Those fields are useful public catalog facts, but they do not provide original sensor metadata, platform identity, coordinates, range, altitude, precise time of day, or continuous chain-of-custody documentation. This page preserves the official manifest/DVIDS provenance and downloaded-source inspection facts without converting the title, visible contrast, or AARO summary into an Open Sky finding.

Graph context

No exact Release 02 graph record was returned for this slug, title, or DVIDS ID during this run's read-only graph context check. That is not a source-access problem; it means this page is currently anchored to official manifest/DVIDS provenance while graph ingest for Release 02 catches up. Future title-related or dataset-wide graph hits should be treated as leads until their provenance links resolve back to this exact official asset.

Leads to check

• Reconcile the direct DVIDS MP4 (73,000,480 bytes, CRC32 af49b978) against the Release 02 video-ZIP entry (72,994,733 bytes, CRC32 e43c019a) before treating the two public delivery paths as byte-identical.
• Reconcile the title and DVIDS date-taken field (03 July 2018) with VIRIN 180704-D-D0360-9472, whose date prefix appears to point to 2018-07-04.
• Review the 00:13 to 00:29 entry/track sequence in continuous full-resolution playback to separate true scene motion from sensor panning, stabilization, display overlays, masking, compression, and contrast/processing effects.
• Review the 00:30 to 00:58 zoom window frame by frame before counting or naming separate contrast areas. The source body uses cautious area(s) of contrast language; this page does not elevate those areas into object identities or performance claims.
• Review the 00:59 to 01:19 upper-frame sequence with the original-resolution file and display-overlay knowledge, because the large top mask obstructs the region where later contrast areas appear to enter.
• Identify the original sensor type, display polarity, reticle/overlay meaning, masking/redaction behavior, platform position, line of sight, range, precise time, and any companion mission, operator, or intelligence notes.
• Run prosaic context checks before escalation: ordinary aircraft, drones, birds, balloons, debris, clouds/haze, glint/reflection, atmospheric effects, sensor gain or contrast processing, platform parallax, compression/display artifacts, redaction artifacts, CENTCOM activity around 3 July 2018, weather, satellite/launch/reentry context, and any available military or civilian incident logs.

Limits

This is a compressed public MP4 derived from a classified-network upload, and the release-level source warning says many responsive materials lack a substantiated chain of custody. The public record does not provide the original file hash, original sensor metadata, platform identity, precise time of day, line of sight, range, altitude, coordinates, independent radar or optical tracks, air/maritime traffic correlation, weather correlation, or original witness/operator notes on this page. The source-described areas of contrast remain unresolved from this asset alone. This page is a source-review draft and not a finding.

Sources

• WAR.GOV/PURSUE Release 02 landing page: https://www.war.gov/UFO/
• DVIDS video page: https://www.dvidshub.net/video/1007726
• DVIDS canonical video page: https://www.dvidshub.net/video/1007726/dow-uap-pr096-hh11-03-july-2018-uaps
• DVIDS direct media asset: https://d34w7g4gy10iej.cloudfront.net/video/2605/DOD_111719807/DOD_111719807.mp4
• Release 02 document bundle: https://www.war.gov/medialink/ufo/052226/release_02/release_02_document_bundle.zip
• Release 02 video bundle: https://d34w7g4gy10iej.cloudfront.net/uap052226.zip
• Official Release 02 manifest row 156, DOW-UAP-PR096, "HH11 03 July 2018 UAPs", release date 5/22/26, agency Department of War, kind VID.