Congress held its first public hearing on unidentified flying objects in decades on Tuesday, centering on investigations about reported military encounters with unexplained objects.
By the numbers: A database tracking unidentified object sightings has grown to roughly 400 reports. Sightings "are frequent and are continuing," witnesses said. ...
The hearing follows a U.S. government report on unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP)
- The report concluded that UAP could pose a threat to national security but found no evidence of aliens from the incidents.
- The last hearing on UFOs was in 1966, when then-Republican House Majority Leader Gerald Ford held two hearings regarding reported sightings in Michigan and other parts of the country earlier that year.
- One now-resolved unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP) video captured by the Navy was explained as lens aberrations and the aperture shape of the night vision goggles used to record the footage.
- Deputy Director of Naval Intelligence Scott Bray played another video of a military flyby with a UAP that has yet to be explained.
Resolved reports fall into five explanatory categories
- Airborne clutter
- Natural atmospheric phenomena
- U.S. government or U.S. industry developmental programs
- Foreign adversary systems
- "Other," which serves as "a holding bin of difficult cases and for the possibility of surprise and potential scientific discovery," Bray said.
There have been 11 near misses between unknown objects and U.S. military assets
- U.S. service members have recorded no collisions or direct communications with UAP, Bray said.
- They also have not found wreckage material "that isn't consistent with being of terrestrial