Skywatcher

Skywatcher is a private UAP research venture unveiled in January 2025 through NewsNation's specials with Ross Coulthart. It claims a team of former military and intelligence professionals capable of detecting, filming, and, most controversially, attracting UAP through proprietary methods including "psionic" human operators.

The venture launched around Jake Barber's public emergence as a self-described crash-retrieval participant, with former UAP Task Force director Jay Stratton as chief investigator and a roster described as drawn from special operations and intelligence backgrounds, plus scientific advisors.

Skywatcher released short clips it said showed unidentified objects appearing during field operations, described a program of instrumented expeditions with multi-sensor kits, and stated goals of collecting public-grade evidence and even guiding an object to a controlled landing. Through 2025 it promised imminent data releases, papers, and demonstrations. By 2026 the public promises remained largely unfulfilled: the organization's output slowed to near silence, tracked closely and critically by the research community, and its status is unclear.

Barber (public face), Stratton (chief investigator), and associates including figures from the Task Force era; Coulthart as the media conduit rather than a member.

Uncertain as of September 2026. No published dataset, peer-reviewed output, or verifiable demonstration has appeared; nor has a formal wind-down announcement.

Skeptics regard Skywatcher as the era's cautionary tale in real time: extraordinary institutional pedigrees attached to unfalsifiable summoning claims, launched through television, sustained by promissory notes. Sympathetic observers counsel patience, citing claimed data-security and funding constraints. The venture's fate matters beyond itself: it tests whether the whistleblower era's credibility survives contact with deliverables, a question MWN's own search traffic shows readers are asking.