In 1992, Dr. Gregory Rogers, then chief of aerospace medicine at the 45th Space Wing, Patrick Air Force Base, Cape Canaveral, was shown a live closed-circuit television feed of a pearly white, saucer-shaped craft approximately 20 feet across, sitting in what appeared to be a hangar or clean room. The craft had no rivets, seams, or windows, bore US Air Force markings and an Air Force flight insignia, and was marked with black rectangles presumably for motion tracking. It levitated silently, rotated 360 degrees clockwise and then counterclockwise, moved smoothly in all directions, and at one point tilted to a 45-degree angle of attack without any visible means of propulsion. The major who showed Rogers the feed said, when asked why the Air Force would build such a design, “We got it from them.” Rogers was a highly credentialed flight surgeon who had served as senior flight surgeon for the astronaut rescue and recovery team at Kennedy Space Center, overseeing shuttle launch and landing safety operations. His account is one of the most detailed firsthand descriptions of a craft in US government possession and adds significant corroboration to claims made by David Grusch and others about secret reverse-engineering programs.
Rogers’ background and credentials
Rogers served as chief of aerospace medicine at the 45th Space Wing, overseeing medical operations at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Patrick Air Force Base, and the Eastern Space and Missile Center.
He was the senior flight surgeon for the astronaut rescue and recovery team at Kennedy Space Center, riding in rescue helicopters for every shuttle launch and landing.
He made practical safety improvements, including switching astronauts’ red chem lights to green ones so rescue crews could spot downed astronauts at night from miles away, and forcing NASA to adopt high-visibility yellow flight suits instead of blue ones that would be invisible in the ocean.
He also deployed with AFTAC (Air Force Technical Application Center) for search and rescue missions in the South Atlantic and South America.
The 1992 sighting in detail
In April or May 1992, Rogers was touring various facilities at Cape Canaveral with an EG&G escort as part of his oversight duties. EG&G was the prime contractor managing operations at the Cape.
After leaving one building, Rogers was approached by a major he did not personally recognize (though the major knew Rogers as the flight surgeon). The major said, “I’ve got something to show you even you have never seen.”
The major took Rogers into an office, locked the door, closed all the blinds, and pulled up a live CCTV feed on his computer console. The feed had no classification markings, location data, or timestamps.
On the screen, Rogers saw a pearly white saucer-shaped craft, roughly 20 feet in diameter, shaped like a modified egg, sitting on the floor of what appeared to be a hangar or test facility. Two engineer-types in lab coats and three people in Tyvek suits were visible in the frame.
The craft had black rectangles painted along its horizontal beam at the 12:30–2:30, 3:30–5:30, 6:30–8:30, and 9:30–11:30 positions, and vertical rectangles at the 3:00, 6:00, and 9:00 positions, apparently for tracking motion.
At the 12:00 position, Rogers could barely make out markings. When the craft rotated, he clearly read “US Air Force” and saw an Air Force flight insignia above it.
The craft lifted off the floor silently and effortlessly, rotated 360 degrees clockwise, paused, then rotated 360 degrees counterclockwise back to its starting orientation. It then moved left, right, forward, and backward with extreme smoothness.
Electromagnetic discharges, like small static sparks, were visible and audible across the surface of the vehicle, seemingly random and not concentrated in any direction that would explain the motion.
Three umbilical lines ran from a pole at the top of the craft, suggesting external power or control inputs, which Rogers interpreted as evidence that the craft was a prototype or test bed that had not yet achieved internal power and control.
The craft then tilted to a 45-degree angle of attack and held that position without moving forward, something Rogers said no known aircraft (helicopters, F-16s, or otherwise) could do.
A knock on the door interrupted the viewing. The major panicked, shut off the console, and told Rogers, “Don’t tell anyone I showed you this.” A lieutenant colonel and two captains entered. The major claimed he had been showing Rogers a skin lesion. Rogers went along with the cover story and left.
Rogers’ interpretation of what he saw
Rogers believes the craft was a prototype owned by a defense contractor, not part of the US Air Force inventory, comparing it to Lockheed’s “Have Blue” prototype that preceded the F-117.
He suspects the contractor was likely Lockheed, Northrop, or a consortium, but could not confirm this.
When he asked the major why the Air Force would build such a design, the major replied, “We got it from them,” which Rogers understood to mean the craft was of non-human origin.
Rogers does not believe the electromagnetic discharges were the propulsion mechanism. He believes the craft was using a force he was unfamiliar with, and the discharges were a byproduct.
He does not believe the craft was a hoax or psyop, noting the randomness of the encounter and the fact that he had never been to that building before and never returned.
EG&G’s role and significance
EG&G was the prime contractor at Cape Canaveral, managing facilities, security, and operations for all other contractors (Lockheed, Martin Marietta, Boeing, Raytheon, etc.).
EG&G has deep ties to the US nuclear program, having been founded by MIT scientist Harold “Doc” Edgerton, a close associate of Vannevar Bush. EG&G was the prime contractor for the Atomic Energy Commission, ran the Nevada Test Site, and managed operations at Area 51 (Groom Lake) in the 1960s, handling personnel screening, security badges, and commuter flights.
EG&G crews filmed nuclear tests, including high-altitude detonations where UFOs were frequently observed and called “tagalongs” by personnel.
Bob Lazar claimed EG&G handled his background checks and transportation to S-4 near Area 51.
In 2001, a former Lockheed and CIA contractor claimed EG&G scientists were organizing UFO reverse-engineering work in private labs in Utah.
In 2023, George Knapp reported that a senior EG&G manager, Alfred O’Donnell, told him EG&G had recovered a flying saucer in New Mexico with a live humanoid being inside.
Rogers’ EG&G escort on the day of the sighting may have been part of the chain of events that led to the encounter, though Rogers could not confirm this.
Why Rogers stayed silent for decades
Rogers chose not to report the sighting because the video feed had no classification markings, and reporting it would have required accusing the major and potentially a lieutenant colonel of wrongdoing without proof.
He feared that if he reported it and the feed could not be found, his story would make him look like an idiot and destroy his career.
He noted that in 1992, no one reported UFOs regardless of what they saw, and that pilots and astronauts he knew had also witnessed things they never reported.
Why Rogers came forward
Rogers retired from the Department of Defense on April 30, 2024.
The 2017 New York Times article revealing the Pentagon’s UAP videos and pilot testimony was a turning point for him, as he recognized from the pilots’ voices that they were seeing something extraordinary.
David Grusch’s 2023 congressional testimony was the decisive catalyst. Grusch testified under oath that the US has a craft retrieval program and reverse-engineered non-human craft, but noted that no one who had personally seen such craft had come forward publicly. Rogers decided he could provide that firsthand corroboration.
Rogers has since given interviews to Josh Boswell (Daily Mail), Ty Roberts (International UFO Bureau and Total Disclosure), Chris Leto (Leto Files), and Jesse Michaels (American Alchemy).
He has written a book titled We Got It From Them, which includes his UFO testimony alongside other stories from his military career.
PTSD and the human cost of service
Rogers has PTSD stemming from his years as a flight surgeon, including a traumatic incident in which he recovered the body of a pilot friend who died in an aircraft mishap. He collected body parts across 130 yards, and a medic later told him part of the pilot’s brain was on his boot. He had placed it in a pot-belly stove without conscious awareness, losing more than four hours to a catatonic state.
He also described survivor’s guilt from working on a close friend he could not save, and from the cumulative weight of treating combat casualties.
Rogers chose to disclose his PTSD preemptively, knowing that whistleblowers often have their medical records leaked to discredit them, as happened to David Grusch.
He emphasized that PTSD has been documented since ancient times, including among Spartan warriors, and that it should not be a source of shame.
Faith, science, and the universe
Rogers is a person of faith who sees no conflict between science and belief in God. He argues that the universe is not random and that phenomena like chirality (the exclusive use of right-handed glucose in biological systems) point to design.
He draws parallels between biblical passages and modern physics, such as the cosmic microwave background matching the description of light on the first day of creation in Genesis, and time dilation in relativity matching the biblical statement that “with God a thousand years is as a day.”
He is skeptical of mainstream cosmological models, noting that the James Webb Space Telescope has discovered early galaxies that challenge the Big Bang timeline, and that concepts like dark matter and cosmic inflation are placeholder ideas that may be overturned.
He argues that if a civilization were even 1,000 or 10,000 years more advanced than us, their technology would appear indistinguishable to us as magic, and that our current physics is far too primitive to understand the propulsion system of the craft he saw.
Disclosure and the path forward
Rogers believes the debate over whether UAP are real is over and that the real question is what humanity will do with this knowledge.
He argues that bureaucratic inertia is the main obstacle to disclosure, and that those who control the programs will determine the pace and extent of what is released.
He sees his testimony as supporting David Grusch’s claims and adding to the growing body of evidence that the US government has recovered and is reverse-engineering non-human craft.
He also sees similarities between his sighting and Bob Lazar’s descriptions of craft at S-4, particularly the smooth, pearly white, saucer-like shape.
