In our work at Americans for Safe Aerospace, most stories remain in the 

shadows. They are told in ready rooms, in quiet conversations, in the kinds of spaces where trust is not a courtesy but a necessity. Occasionally, though, a witness steps forward who reminds us why these accounts matter, and why this issue has outgrown the old dismissals.

, Caison directed units in Afghanistan, Europe and stateside. He has led soldiers in combat, commanded intelligence detachments, and managed teams tasked with discerning signal from noise in some of the most complex security environments on earth. This spring, he completed one of the most competitive graduate programs in business. His career path – infantry officer, intelligence officer, combat veteran and elite business education – reads like a case study in discipline and civic-minded values.



That is what makes his UAP encounter so consequential.

In February 2022, near 

, Caison and four fellow intelligence professionals saw something extraordinary. The details of what they witnessed will soon become public. What matters is that men and women with his background – sober, analytical, allergic to superstition – are now saying publicly that they saw what they could not explain. And not just that they saw it, but that they tried to report it.

Caison did what any accountable officer would do: he documented it. The very next day, he wrote up a 

, complete with corroborating details from the other trained observers. And then he hit a wall

At first, there seemed to be no channel at all. The military had no visible process for service members who witnessed something anomalous. Later, Ryan Graves directed Caison to 

 - a document so well-hidden that one might fairly ask if concealment was the point.

When Caison finally submitted his report to 

, the federal office created to analyze these phenomena, he was not taken seriously. The replies were careless, unprofessional, and dismissive. What should have been treated as testimony regarding a 

 over a highly sensitive national security site was 

 as a nuisance. It was not an honest attempt to test extraordinary claims against ordinary explanations. It was an attempt to make the problem go away. There is a difference, and Caison perceived it clearly


That could have been the end of the story: another credible witness discouraged into silence, another report filed away in the waste bin of official neglect. But here, the path bent. In May 2023, 

Caison contacted Americans for Safe Aerospace

 and discussed his sighting with Ryan – a former Navy fighter pilot who had himself witnessed anomalous craft over the Atlantic – and with him, an organization built on a simple principle: take witnesses seriously


What began as cautious emails turned into something larger. Over time, trust was built – not through rhetoric, but through rigor. By August 2024, Ryan asked if Caison would take on the role of 

. Since then, Caison has helped process nearly 

 highly credible witnesses, many of them military aviators or intelligence professionals like himself.

The irony is sharp enough to sting. AARO, the office created to receive and analyze reports, treated him like a nuisance. ASA, a nonprofit started from scratch, treated him like a partner. One asked if he had mistaken a balloon for a UAP; the other handed him the keys to the reporting system.

There’s a larger point here. We often tell ourselves that institutions are neutral vessels: bureaucracies that will, with enough time, efficiency, and sunlight, correct themselves. But institutions do not correct themselves. They must be 

, pressed, and made to act. Left to drift, they sink into indifference.

Caison’s journey, from the combat zones of Afghanistan, to an unexplained encounter over Colorado, to MIT Sloan, and now to ASA – illustrates a truth that ought to unsettle us. The people who should have been listening were not. The people who did not have to listen, did.

And so the work of documentation, of discernment, of 

 with the seriousness they deserve, now falls to organizations like ASA. It is, in its way, the oldest story of democracy: when the official channels fail, civil society steps in.

Watch Caison tell his UAP experience story on NewsNation:



What is happening in our skies is no longer a matter of speculation. It is a matter of testimony, of 

aviation safety, and of national security

. The government office created to face this problem cannot manage even the dignity of a professional reply. The nonprofit founded by pilots has built the most trusted reporting system in the country.

The lesson is stark. When institutions falter, responsibility falls to those still willing to act. The time for mockery is over. The risks are real, the witnesses are credible, and the silence of the state has become its own kind of negligence.

What happened when a UAP was reported near Cheyenne Mountain?

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What happened when a UAP was reported near Cheyenne Mountain?