Skinwalker Ranch owner weighs in on Pentagon UAP file release
May 9, 2026, 7:50 AM
The owner of Utah's Skinwalker Ranch said he was pleasantly surprised this week after the U.S. Department of War released the first set of declassified videos and files on Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena, or UAP. (Screengrab from Pentagon website)
(Screengrab from Pentagon website)
SALT LAKE CITY — In a long-awaited move, the Pentagon on Friday made public the first set of declassified videos and files on Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena.
From unidentified objects captured on video moving at fast speeds while suddenly changing directions, to mysterious lights, to the accounts of pilots and famed astronauts like Buzz Aldrin, the files were rolled out on a U.S. Department of War website.
“The Department of War is in lockstep with President Trump to bring unprecedented transparency regarding our government’s understanding of Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena,” read a statement on the site from Secretary of War Pete Hegseth. “These files, hidden behind classifications, have long fueled justified speculation – and it’s time the American people see it for themselves. This release of declassified documents demonstrates the Trump Administration’s earnest commitment to unprecedented transparency.”
The release brought favorable reaction from one of Utah’s foremost stakeholders on the UAP issue.
“I am pleasantly surprised and believe it’s a step in the right direction,” said Brandon Fugal, owner of Skinwalker Ranch in Uintah County.
Fugal said there was a measure of validation in the government’s move to release the files.
“We know even at Skinwalker Ranch in Utah, which was the center of gravity for a Pentagon-funded, black budget program studying these phenomena, that there has been military interest,” Fugal said. “We’ve even documented surveillance of our experiments and a lot of the sightings that we’ve been able to capture on camera with our advanced instrumentation.”
The ranch has long been considered a UAP and paranormal hotspot, and it has been the location of an ongoing reality television series on History Channel. Fugal said the seventh season in the series was scheduled to begin on May 19.
“I mean, we’re going to be presenting data and photographic evidence that is in alignment with what is being released by the government today,” Fugal said.
KSL’s own investigation of the ranch in 2020 at Fugal’s invite ended in the documentation of additional unexplained phenomena, including the video capture of an apparent, unidentified flying object.
“I went from being a skeptic—a total skeptic—not believing that there was anything unusual going on,” Fugal said in an interview with KSL on Friday evening. “I believed at the time of purchasing the ranch in Utah that there was a natural, prosaic explanation for what had been reported, and of course (I) moved from being a skeptic to not just a believer, but an ‘experiencer.’”
Fugal said what surprised him most about the files wasn’t necessarily what was in them, but that the government released them at all after what he described as “decades of disinformation.”
“There has been a very active campaign to discredit pilots and others involved with these types of events,” Fugal said.
With the pivot toward disclosure, Fugal believed the world was inching closer to learning what was responsible for all the phenomena at his ranch and with the sightings reported and recorded around the planet.
“I think this is historic,” Fugal said. “There is more than meets the eye to what is going on in our airspace, in our world, and I think we are just barely scratching the surface of understanding the nature of it.”
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