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◆ CASE FILEThe facts, corroborated

The Aguadilla Thermal Video

On the night of 25 April 2013 the infrared camera on a US Customs and Border Protection aircraft filmed a small object over Rafael Hernández Airport in Puerto Rico that seemed to plunge into the sea and come out again split in two. In 2024 AARO, the Pentagon's UAP office, published a case resolution assessing with moderate confidence that the objects were sky lanterns. This is the record of what was filmed and how it has been read, not a verdict on what flew.

◆ THE SHORT VERSION

  • The Aguadilla Thermal Video is a reported UAP case in Rafael Hernández Airport, Aguadilla, Puerto Rico, Puerto Rico, 25 April 2013.
  • An analysis by the Scientific Coalition for UAP Studies says the object filmed by a US Customs and Border Protection thermal camera over Aguadilla, Puerto Rico, in April 2013 entered the Atlantic without slowing, moved underwater at close to 100 mph and came back out split in two.
  • The Scientific Coalition for UAP Studies concluded that no known technology could match the Aguadilla object, a verdict that belongs to that group's analysis.
  • The Aguadilla footage was shot by the crew of a CBP DHC-8 near Rafael Hernández Airport at about 9.20pm on 25 April 2013.
  • In 2024 AARO, the Pentagon's UAP office, published a case resolution assessing with moderate confidence that the Aguadilla objects were sky lanterns.
  • Sceptics Mick West and Rubén Lianza argue the Aguadilla object was two Chinese wedding lanterns tied together and released from beach hotels, with parallax making them seem to enter the sea.
  • For this case Fractured Realities holds 3 distinct sources and 3 distinct claimants on its resolved list.
  • The archive grades it L3 · MULTI-SOURCE — multiple independent sources attest to it.

Counts are resolved totals of what sources say, computed 2026-10-03; the reported details above are claims in the record, not findings. A record of reports, not a verdict on what happened.

EVENT DATE
25 April 2013
LOCATION
Rafael Hernández Airport, Aguadilla, Puerto Rico · Puerto Rico
COORDS
18.49°N 67.13°W
INDEPENDENCE
L3 · MULTI-SOURCE
SOURCES
3 distinct
CLAIMANTS
3
STATUS
Multi-source testimony
NUMBERS COMPUTED 2026-10-03 · RESOLVED COUNTS, NOT A VERDICT
VIEW ON ATLAS →

The object kept going after it hit the water. That is the claim the archive's tellings return to. In an analysis by the Scientific Coalition for UAP Studies (SCU) the object on the thermal footage flew at between 40 and 120 mph and entered the Atlantic without slowing. It moved underwater at close to 100 mph and then came back out and divided into two. The SCU concluded that no known technology could match it. The footage was shot by the crew of a Customs and Border Protection DHC-8 near Rafael Hernández Airport at Aguadilla at about 9.20pm on 25 April 2013.

What is on the record

The archive lists three claimants, but they are the same CBP aircrew under three labels. The file is one crew and one video. The archive holds three tellings on two channels and two pieces of journalism that mention the case. The tellings do not carry the date. The public record fixes it at 25 April 2013.

The official finding is not the SCU's. In 2024 AARO published a case resolution assessing with moderate confidence that the objects were sky lanterns. Sceptics including Mick West and Rubén Lianza had argued the same thing: two Chinese wedding lanterns tied together and released from beach hotels. In that reading the plunge into the sea is parallax. A lantern drifting well above the water lines up with the waves behind it as the aircraft moves and only seems to enter them. One of the archive's own tellings sides with AARO and Lianza. The verdict of "no known technology" in the other two belongs to the SCU. It is one group's analysis.

Why it sits where it does

The case sits at L3, the tier for several independent claimants describing one event. Here those claimants are a single crew, so the grade overstates the sourcing. The video is government footage but the archive does not hold it as an authenticated file. On one side sit a thermal video and a private analysis that found it inexplicable. On the other is an official resolution that found lanterns, and that is the government's answer. Whether every frame of the footage fits it is not resolved here.

◆ CORROBORATION
✓3 independent video sources across 2 channels
✓3 resolved claimants
◆ SOURCES

Everything this file draws on, in the open — reports, not reality. Check us.

Watch — the tellings

Each plays the source video — right here, cued to the exact moment this case is covered.

Documents & published sources

Government records, papers and journalism the archive links to this case.

VIDEO EVIDENCETRANSMEDIUM2013PUERTO RICO

CASE FILES STATE THE RECORD AS OUR ARCHIVE HOLDS IT — FACTS, NOT OPINION. REPORTS, NOT REALITY.

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The Aguadilla Thermal Video — Case File · Fractured Realities