Representational Image
(IANS)
From ancient to modern times, gazillions of unexplained aerial sightings and unidentified flying objects (UFOs) have time and again made the news. Numerous such observations have been dismissed due to poor footage or debunked as balloons to surveillance drones, but many also remain unsolved to date.
To get to the bottom of these mysteries, NASA formed an independent study team featuring 16 community experts across diverse areas to examine UFOs — formally renamed Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena (UAPs) — over a period of nine months.
And less than a year after commencing its research, the study panel convened its first public meeting on May 31, so as to hold final deliberations before it publishes a report later this year.
During the opening remarks of the meeting, the panel flagged the lack of data and its ‘fragmented’ nature to be the biggest hindrance in understanding UAPs.
Later in the session, the panel released a video of an unidentified ‘metallic spherical orb’ cruising somewhere over the Middle East, which was first seen in 2022. The clip, displayed below, has since gone viral on social media.
“This is a typical example of a thing we see most of…we see these all over the world. We see these making apparently interesting manoeuvres,” noted Dr Sean Kirkpatrick, Director of the Pentagon’s All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), while presenting the footage.
He also pointed out that it “demonstrated no enigmatic technical capabilities and was no threat to airborne safety”.
For now, this particular case rests in AARO’s unresolved active archives and is under investigation. Its resolution may have to wait until the Office can get better-resolved data on similar objects, Dr Sean added.
However, the research team has clarified that it has not found any conclusive evidence of the involvement of alien life forms yet.
“To make the claim that we’ve seen something that is evidence of non-human intelligence, it would require extraordinary evidence. And we have not seen that. I think that’s important to make clear,” said Astrophysicist David Spergel, chair of the study group.
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