Insects As Unidentified Flying Objects

UFOs have been the subject of investigations by various governments who have provided extensive records related to the subject. Many of the most involved government-sponsored investigations ended after agencies concluded that there was no benefit to continued investigation. These same negative conclusions also have been found in studies that were highly classified for many years, such as the UK's Flying Saucer Working Party, Project Condign, the U.S. CIA-sponsored Robertson Panel, the U.S. military investigation into the green fireballs from 1948 to 1951, and the Battelle Memorial Institute study for the USAF from 1952 to 1955 (Project Blue Book Special Report No. 14). Some public government reports have acknowledged the possibility of the physical reality of UFOs, but have stopped short of proposing extraterrestrial origins, though not dismissing the possibility entirely.

Two commercial pilots flying over the Arizona desert have claimed of seeing an unidentified flying object pass overhead, according to a radio broadcast released by the Federal Aviation Administration . The report avoids any scientific discussion of the possibility that the unexplained phenomena are extraterrestrial in origin, Loeb added, since this goes beyond the charter assigned to the government's task force. Rodeghier said his center wholeheartedly agrees with the recommendation for continued study with improvements in data collection and analysis. A new and unprecedented U.S. intelligence report offers no explanation for what it calls unidentified aerial phenomenon. The Condon Report was reviewed by a special committee of the National Academy of Sciences.

The three earliest known pilot UFO sightings, of 1,305 similar sightings catalogued by NARCAP, took place in 1916 and 1926. On January 31, 1916, a UK pilot near Rochford reported a row of lights, resembling lighted windows on a railway carriage, that rose and disappeared. In January 1926 a pilot reported six "flying manhole covers" between Wichita, Kansas, and Colorado Springs, Colorado. In late September 1926 an airmail pilot over Nevada said he had been forced to land by a huge, wingless, cylindrical object. On January 25, 1878, the Denison Daily News printed an article in which John Martin, a local farmer, had reported seeing a large, dark, circular object resembling a balloon flying "at wonderful speed". Martin, according to the newspaper account, said it appeared to be about the size of a saucer from his perspective, one of the first uses of the word "saucer" in association with a UFO.

In the Kecksburg UFO incident, Pennsylvania , residents reported seeing a bell-shaped object crash in the area. In the Rendlesham Forest incident of December 1980, U.S. military personnel witnessed UFOs near the air base at Woodbridge, Suffolk, over a period of three nights. On one night the deputy base commander, Colonel Charles I. Halt, and other personnel followed one or more UFOs that were moving in and above the forest for several hours. Col. Halt made an audio recording while this was happening and subsequently wrote an official memorandum summarizing the incident. After retirement from the military, he said he had deliberately downplayed the event (officially termed 'Unexplained Lights') to avoid damaging his career.

Governmental scrutiny of the UFO phenomenon was revived in the 21st century with the Advanced Aviation Threat Identification Program , a secret program run by the U.S. According to the DoD, AATIP operated from 2007 to 2012, at which point the program’s funding was diverted elsewhere. Air Force in 1966, which—under the leadership of physicist Edward U. Condon—was tasked with investigating 59 compelling but inexplicable sightings originally recorded during Project Blue Book. The results of the inquiry were included in a report called Scientific Study of Unidentified Flying Objects, less formally referred to as the Condon Report. UFOs first became a major subject of public interest after World War II, possibly sparked by the development of rocket technology.

An example is Halley's Comet, which was recorded first by Chinese astronomers in 240 BC and possibly as early as 467 BC. Such accounts in history often were treated as supernatural portents, angels, or other religious omens. Some current-day UFO researchers have noticed similarities between some religious symbols in medieval paintings and UFO reports though the canonical and symbolic character of such images is documented by art historians placing more conventional religious interpretations on such images. In December 2017, two videos emerged that showed Navy pilots encountering mysterious spherical objects that appeared, at first glance, to move through the air in ways that baffled experts. "The much-anticipated report from the UAP Task Force only disappoints those not familiar with the history of U.S. military engagement with the UFO phenomenon," said Mark Rodeghier, the scientific director of the Center for UFO Studies. He said that the report, as a whole, is a "stunning reversal of military attitudes about the subject."

The Air Force subsequently adopted that mechanism in November 2020, but it remains limited to USG reporting.” Indicating that the government never wanted to acknowledge UFOs. Loeb added that he would be delighted to lead a scientific project aimed at clearing up the nature of UAP. "I do not enjoy science fiction stories because the storylines often violate the laws of physics. But we should be open-minded to the possibility that science will one day reveal a reality that was previously considered as fiction."

© Ursatii/Shutterstock.comUnidentified flying objects are airborne objects—or optical phenomena that seem like airborne objects—that an onlooker is unable to identify. Another effect of the flying saucer type of UFO sightings has been Earth-made flying saucer craft in space fiction, for example the United Planets Cruiser C57D in Forbidden Planet , the Jupiter 2 in Lost in Space, and the saucer section of the USS Enterprise in Star Trek. UFOs are sometimes an element of conspiracy theories in which governments are allegedly intentionally "covering up" the existence of aliens by removing physical evidence of their presence or even collaborating with extraterrestrial beings. There are many versions of this story; some are exclusive, while others overlap with various other conspiracy theories.

It said materials recovered near Roswell were consistent with a crashed balloon, the military's long-standing explanation, and that no records indicated that there had been the recovery of alien bodies or extraterrestrial materials. After conspiracy the report's release, the Pentagon announced plans to "formalize" its UAP investigation mission currently handled by the task force. "Many unidentified objects from eyewitness testimonies may have mundane explanations, but we need better evidence to be sure," he said.

U.S. Senator Marco Rubio was instrumental in commissioning the report, ordered by Congress six months ago as part of broader intelligence legislation. The senior official said the findings did not provide any "clear indications" that the UAP are part of a foreign intelligence-collection program or a major technological advancement by a potential adversary. At this time, the possibility that any UAP are extraterrestrial is highly speculative, Loeb said. "Months before the UAP report was made public, my feeling was that it was an important development by itself, no matter what it might contain," Knapp said. "I am glad to see that the focus is on data collection, and I really like that there was no speculation about their nature," Kopparapu said.