Safe Aerospace Podcast

Latest Episodes:

Phantom NJ Swarms: Uncovering 13,000 UAP Police Records with AI | John Malaska x Ryan Graves Jul 28, 2026

Show notes

What really happened during the 2024 New Jersey drone wave?

Ryan Graves sits down with AI researcher John Malaska, whose own unexplained thermal-camera sighting led him to investigate the incidents through public records. After contacting municipalities across New Jersey, John assembled approximately 13,000 records—including police reports, dispatch logs, emails, body-camera transcripts, drone telemetry, and government intelligence reports—and used AI to identify patterns within the data.

Our conversation examines reports of possible electromagnetic interference, unidentified radar returns near airports, activity around reservoirs and other critical infrastructure, the difficulties faced by local police, and the gap between official assurances and what responding agencies documented.

Whether these objects were drones, misidentified aircraft, UAP, or a combination of all three, the records reveal a serious weakness in America’s ability to understand and protect its increasingly congested low-altitude airspace.

Learn more, become a member, and support our work at: safeaerospace.org.

"The Size of a 737": Marine Fighter Pilot Benjamin Read on His UAP Near-Miss Over Houston Jul 14, 2026

Show notes

A veteran Marine F-18 Hornet pilot, a commercial airliner climbing out of Houston, and an object "the size of a 737" hovering motionless between cloud layers — with air traffic control confirming an uncorrelated target that had been "popping on and off the scope all day." In this episode of the Safe Aerospace Podcast, former Navy F/A-18F pilot Ryan Graves talks with Benjamin Read, an 18-year Marine Corps aviator turned commercial airline captain, about the encounter that turned a lifelong skeptic into an advocate for pilot reporting.

Reed describes a night departure out of Houston in May 2021: during a level-off, the controller called out unidentified traffic that neither pilot expected to see. What they found was a wingless, mercury-like, oblong object — a "Tic Tac" — holding perfectly still on their flight path. Reed rolled the aircraft to avoid it. At an estimated 500 feet, the object accelerated perpendicular to their wing line faster than anything he'd seen in two decades of military and civilian flying. The captain's photo captured nothing.

Before the encounter, Read's story is remarkable on its own: enlisted helicopter mechanic to Hornet pilot, a G-induced spinal injury during a gun run for the Thai Royal Family, a FAC tour in Iraq recovering fallen Americans with Task Force Personnel Recovery, and a stint as a general's aide that convinced him every strange light in the sky had a classified explanation. This episode is about what happens when that worldview meets something it can't explain — and why he chose to report it to ASA rather than stay silent.

In this episode:

From enlisted avionics tech to single-seat Hornet pilot in Japan
The back injury that nearly ended his career — and the 90-day recovery that saved it
Why a former general's aide assumed all UAP were classified U.S. programs
The Houston encounter: ATC's uncorrelated radar target, the 500-foot pass, the instant acceleration
"Don't lie": the cockpit conversation about what to tell ATC
Why pilots self-censor, and why reported cases may represent 1% of encounters
Nightly unexplained lights on West Coast routes — and how cockpit culture is changing
Reed's message to fellow pilots: "Don't be a coward"

About the guest: Benjamin Read served 18 years in the U.S. Marine Corps, flying the F/A-18 Hornet from Japan and Afghanistan, serving as a forward air controller in Iraq, and instructing in the T-6 Texan before becoming a commercial airline captain.

About the show: The Safe Aerospace Podcast is produced by Americans for Safe Aerospace (ASA), the nonprofit founded by Ryan Graves dedicated to aviation safety, airspace transparency, and rigorous scientific investigation of UAP. Read pilot reports and support our work at https://www.safeaerospace.org

Ben will join ASA members for a live AMA one week after this episode airs — become a member at safeaerospace.org to submit your questions.

Inside the Radar Room: 26-Year Air Traffic Controller Jason Judy on UAP Sightings, Filtered Radar Data & the Chinese Balloon Jul 10, 2026

Show notes

What do air traffic controllers actually see on their scopes when pilots report unidentified aerial phenomena? In the premiere episode of the Safe Aerospace Podcast, former U.S. Navy F/A-18F pilot Ryan Graves sits down with Jason Judy, a 26-year FAA air traffic controller turned corporate pilot, for a rare inside look at how UAP appear — and disappear — inside America's air traffic control system.

Jason pulls back the curtain on what controllers discuss off-frequency: near misses with falling NASA balloon payloads, nightly UAP reports during 2021–2023 that had watch desk managers saying "they're back," an American Airlines crew tracked by an object bouncing off their wing nearly all the way to Salt Lake, and the radar playback of the 2023 Chinese balloon incident — including data suggesting an object accelerated from a 28-knot drift to over 1,200 knots in roughly a minute.

The conversation also digs into the systemic issues ASA works on every day: why primary radar returns are filtered out above 23,000 feet, why raw radar data is erased after just 45 days, how stigma keeps pilots and controllers from filing reports, and what happened to the thousands of aviation UAP reports that vanished into classified archives.

In this episode:

How ATC radar actually works: primary vs. secondary returns and ADS-B
Why controllers never see most UAP — the 23,000 ft filtering problem
The 45-day data destruction window and the case for preserving raw radar
UAP reports "almost every night" on mid shifts, 2021–2023
The Chinese balloon radar playback and a 1,252-knot acceleration analysis
Stigma, reporting culture, and where early-2000s UFO reports actually went

About the guest: Jason Judy spent 26 years as an FAA air traffic controller, beginning at Fort Worth Center in 1997, before retiring in 2023 to fly corporate aviation.

About the show: The Safe Aerospace Podcast is produced by Americans for Safe Aerospace (ASA), the nonprofit founded by Ryan Graves dedicated to aviation safety, airspace transparency, and rigorous scientific investigation of UAP. Learn more, read pilot reports, and support our work at https://www.safeaerospace.org

Jason will be joining ASA members for a live AMA after this episode airs, become a member at safeaerospace.org to submit your questions.

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