UFO hearing - live: Sightings are ‘frequent and continuing’, Navy tells Congress
There have been 144 encounters of mysterious craft between 2004 and 2021
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Your support makes all the difference.A House Intelligence subcommittee will today hold a hearing about unidentified flying objects and the possibility that we have encounted alien life.
The hearing on “unidentified aerial phenomena” will be broadcast on the House Intelligence’s YouTube page at 9:00am ET (2:00pm GMT).
Testimony is expected from many high-ranking intelligence and defence officials. It follows a report on UAPs last year which found that there were 144 encounters between 2004 and 2021.
Although the report said that the evidence was “largely inconclusive”, it stated the most of the phenomena reported “do represent physical objects” and that the United States currently lack data to indicate any UAP are part of a foreign collection program or indicative of a major technological advancement by a potential adversary.”
The proceedings will be chaired by Representative Andre Carson, who said that people needed to be informed about the events.
“Congress hasn’t held a public hearing on unidentified aerial phenomena (UFO’s) in over 50 years”, he tweeted. “Americans need to know more about these unexplained occurrences.
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff has also said that “there’s much to learn about unidentified aerial phenomena” and that “the American people deserve full transparency.”
It adds: “UAP clearly pose a safety of flight issue and may pose a challenge to US national security. Safety concerns primarily centre on aviators contending with an increasingly cluttered air domain. UAP would also represent a national security challenge if they are foreign adversary collection platforms or provide evidence a potential adversary has developed either a breakthrough or disruptive technology.”
Senior US officials briefing reporters anonymously about the report pointed out many of the UAP cases included in the report had been detailed by US naval aviators who told of craft showing impossible-to-explain speeds and manoeuvrability.
A total of 143 UFO sightings since 2004 cannot be explained, the US intelligence report stated last year.
The report, by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), said that of that total, there were 21 reports of unknown phenomena related to eighteen reported events, that were beyond the known technological capabilities of America.
It also underscores a rapid and remarkable shift in the official view of UFOs, or “unidentified aerial phenomenon” (UAP), and the people who report them.
Once dismissed as the confused or misguided beliefs of conspiracy theorists, the issue has taken on a far more solid position in public discourse, mainly because so many of those reporting the sightings were members of the military. Indeed, the US Navy worked with the ODNI as part of a taskforce to probe UAP.
“This report provides an overview for policymakers of the challenges associated with characterising the potential threat posed by UAP while also providing a means to develop relevant processes, policies, technologies, and training for the US military and other US Government (USG) personnel if and when they encounter UAP, so as to enhance the Intelligence community’s ability to understand the threat,” says the report.
After this public hearing, Congress will hold a closed, classified hearing on the activity of the Pentagon group
The group, called the Airborne Object Identification and Management Synchronization Group (AOIMSG) aims to uncover explanations for the sightings.
What the hearing will reveal isn’t clear, but pertinent questions include whether UAPs could be satellites, belong to foreign governments or be purposeful fakes.
US representatives will question Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence and Security Ronald Moultrie and Deputy Director of Naval Intelligence Scott Bray on UAPs.
Are UFOs being mistaken for something else?
However, there is a concern that some of the strangest incidents are being conflated with reports about human activities such as drones and space debris.
“They’re like, you know, five things out of 5,000, we weren’t sure what they were,” said an anonymous intelligence official at the Department of Defence. He claimed that that his superiors want to treat all UAPs as “all air trash” and that the department is not addressing “the whole tapestry of the multi-tech problem that we have.”
The official added: “They really dragged their feet on this. I don’t think they have taken it very seriously.”
“There has to be something to hold people accountable but also give them a chance to come out clean for a period of time,” the official also said, and added that there are people with knowledge of the UAPs that are yet to contribute.
“These people exist and they are protecting very interesting information,” the official said.
According to Politico, there is a ‘tug of war’ among factions that will make it challenging to reveal information about UFOs.
“Without forcing peoples’ hand, it is going to be very difficult to uncover legacy ventures and programs that we know about based on oral interviews we dug up,” said a Defense Department official. “There has to be a forcing mechanism.”
Watch the hearing live
The hearing will be played on the House Intelligence’s YouTube channel. The livestream - when it starts in four hours - can be watched below.
Pentagon officials to talk about UFOs
Hello, and welcome to The Independent’s liveblog on the US House subcommittee on “unidentified aerial phenomena”
Following this hearing, Congress will hold another, classified hearing.
This will focus on the activity of the Pentagon group — known as the Airborne Object Identification and Management Synchronization Group (AOIMSG) — which aims to provide explanations for the sightings.
It is likely that questions will include whether UAPs could be satellites, craft that are developed by international governments, or be purposeful fakes.
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