The 16-member panel commissioned by NASA to study what the U.S. government now calls unidentified anomalous phenomena (UAP), widely known as UFOs, said that it needed more and better-quality information to explain the hundreds of mysterious objects that have been reported in the skies over the years.
NASA said the focus of the first public session at the agency’s headquarters in Washington, DC, was to hold “final deliberations” before the highly anticipated report on UAP is released by the end of July.
“The presence of UAPs undoubtedly raises concerns about the safety of our skies, and it’s our responsibility again, working together, to investigate whether those anomalies, those phenomena pose any risks to airspace safety,” Dan Evans of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate said during a media briefing.
NOW: An audio-only media briefing following today's public discussion on unidentified anomalous phenomena, or UAPs. https://t.co/y4gMK6n1M9
— NASA (@NASA) May 31, 2023
800 UFO sightings in 27 years
The team of scientists has looked into nearly 800 sightings of mysterious flying objects in the skies. Sean Kirkpatrick, director of the Pentagon’s newly formed All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), told the meeting that the U.S. Defense Department is examining more than 800 cases from the past 27 years but only 2 to 5% of those incidents could be described as “anomalous” or inexplicable.
The NASA study is separate from a recently established investigation based in the Pentagon, which focuses on sightings reported in recent years by military aviators and analyzed by U.S. defense and intelligence officials.
Is there possibility of intelligent alien life?
Both NASA and defense-intelligence officials have emphasized that while the possibility of intelligent alien life has not been dismissed, no evidence has been found to support the idea that UFO sightings originate from extraterrestrial sources.
While NASA has previously stated that there is no evidence to suggest that UAPs, U.S. Navy pilots have reported mysterious objects with astonishing speeds. From the summer of 2014 to March 2015, unusual objects, were observed almost daily in the skies over the East Coast. Lt. Ryan Graves,F/A-18 Super Hornet pilot, and other Navy pilots reported that these objects had no visible engines or infrared exhaust plumes, but that they could reach 30,000 feet and hypersonic speeds.
However, the panel members were emphatic that they had seen no convincing evidence of extraterrestrial activity in any sightings to date. “There is no conclusive evidence suggesting an extraterrestrial origin for UAPs,” said Nadia Drake, a panel member, and called for “more good data from the scientific community” to study the phenomena.
Better data needed
NASA panel members highlighted the main challenge as the lack of scientifically reliable methods to document the sightings of objects that defy the bounds of known technologies and laws of nature. One reason is that that the current equipment, such as cameras, radars and other sensors, are not specifically designed to accurately study these unusual phenomena.
“If I were to summarize in one line what I feel we’ve learned, it’s we need high-quality data,” said David Spergel, the panel’s chairman and an astrophysicist. “The current existing data and eyewitness reports alone are insufficient to provide conclusive evidence about the nature and origin of every UAP event.”
The 16-member panel was formed in October 2022 to “lay the groundwork for future study on the nature of UAPs for NASA and other organizations.”
