Ross Coulthart

Ross Coulthart is an Australia-based international investigative journalist, author and filmmaker with over 35 years in broadcast television public affairs and newspaper journalism. He is currently the senior special investigations correspondent for the NEWS NATION cable TV news network based out of Chicago, USA, where he presents the hugely popular show REALITY CHECK.

Since 2017 much of Ross’ investigative work has focussed on the phenomenon of Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena (UAPs) aka UFOs, a subject long stigmatized and ridiculed but now acknowledged officially by the US Government to be an authentic scientific mystery worthy of serious investigation.

His bestselling book IN PLAIN SIGHT: An Investigation into UFOs & Impossible Science broke a long-held taboo on mainstream media engagement with the UFO topic. It has been widely acknowledged for its objective and thorough appraisal of the overwhelming evidence that anomalous apparently intelligently controlled highly technologically advanced objects, perhaps craft, have been verified by even official US military investigations over many decades.

In June 2023, Ross’ exclusive television interview with former senior intelligence officer David Grusch revealed Grusch’s investigations with the Pentagon’s UAP Task Force had uncovered a secret US Government and private aerospace UAP craft retrieval and reverse engineering program, knowledge of which has been improperly withheld from Congressional oversight.

Central to Grusch’s allegations, verified by the then Inspector General of the Intelligence Community as ‘urgent and credible’, is the extraordinary claim that the US has long had physical possession of alien (non-human intelligence) technology and alien bodies (biologics). As confronting as such allegations may sound, in the face of continuing US Government denials of any alien engagement with our planet, Ross has developed his own sources inside the so-called ‘Legacy UAP retrieval program’ who have confirmed Grusch’s allegations. Senior members of Congress have also backed Grusch’s allegations by pushing UAP disclosure legislation on The Hill requiring the Pentagon to
disclose what it knows.

Most recently, Ross broke the exclusive story of former intelligence community insider Jake Barber, revealing his first-hand role in the retrieval of non-human craft in a program run on a secret Government range and through a private aerospace corporation. The program, backed by Barber’s colleagues Don Paul Bales and Fred Baker, also revealed the creation of the SKYWATCHER project – the first ever privately funded initiative to attempt the recovery of a non-human craft. This show also revealed the existence of the US military’s so-called psionics program, in which people trained to use alleged psychic abilities engage mentally with non-human technology.

Ross is one of the only international mainstream media reporters with a solid background in long-form investigative journalism willing to seriously engage with the UAP topic. He continues his hugely popular investigative journalism with News Nation and on his own online show NEED TO KNOW, which he co-hosts with his friend and fellow author/producer Bryce Zabel, a senior Hollywood screenwriter.

He has previously worked as chief investigative reporter for Australia’s prestigious 60
Minutes public affairs program, a sister show to CBS 60 Minutes, and some of his
investigations have been aired on the US show, notably his exclusive international
expose of a huge weakness in mobile telephony that allows all mobile phones to be
hacked.

He has worked as an investigative journalist in TV and newspapers, including Australia’s Sydney Morning Herald & Australian newspapers. He worked for many years as a reporter/host for Australia’s Australian Broadcasting Corporation flagship show Four Corners, The Nine Network’s Sunday show and 60 Minutes, and the Seven Network’s Sunday Night investigative public affairs show.

He has written six best-selling books, including In Plain Sight: An Investigation into UFOs & Impossible Science (HarperCollins 2021). A passionate historian, one of his three histories of the first World War, Charles Bean, won the 2015 Australian Prime Minister’s Literary Award for Australian History. His two-book First World War historical investigations The Lost Diggers and The Lost Tommies tell the story of his discovery of a hitherto hidden collection of priceless photographs of allied soldiers from that conflict, taken behind the frontlines during the WW1 battles of the Somme Valley.

Ross’ investigations into outlaw motorcycle gang biker organized crime Dead Man Running and Above The Law became international best-sellers for revealing the extent of biker gang international organis

zed crime rackets in drug trafficking and money laundering. He has also reported extensively from the frontlines of Iraq, Afghanistan, East Timor and other international conflicts as a correspondent for major networks.

Trained as a lawyer, Ross is married and has two adult daughters. He lives in the Southern Highlands south of Sydney in Australia’s NSW.

Need-to-Know With Coulthart and Zabel

The Need-to-Know podcast deals with the now acknowledged reality of Unidentified Aerial Phenomena or UAP. Its hosts are award-winning broadcasters and investigative journalists Ross Coulthart and Bryce Zabel. Every episode, they look at what’s happened in the UAP/UFO world. Coulthart and Zabel discuss their current investigations, give each other advice, and seek to answer the big questions: who are they and what do they want?