Experts make the case for UFOs and UAPs during congressional hearing : NPR

Journalist Michael Shellenberger, founder of the Public news outlet, displays redacted reports during a hearing on Capitol Hill Wednesday as he stresses the need for more transparency over UAP investigations.

House Oversight Committee/Screenshot by NPR

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House Oversight Committee/Screenshot by NPR

Is intelligent alien life darting around in space — and even in the skies above us here on Earth? Has the U.S. government been covering up unexplained phenomena, and using secret extraterrestrial discoveries to boost its own technology?

Those are among the questions members of Congress discussed Wednesday in a joint hearing by subcommittees of the House Oversight Committee. Its title: “Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena: Exposing the Truth.”

Four experts testified in the public hearing. You can watch the proceeding here.

The Pentagon issued a report in March saying that it has found no evidence of extraterrestrial spacecraft.

Extraordinary moments unfolded in a similar hearing last year, most notably when retired Maj. David Grusch, formerly part of the Pentagon’s UAP Task Force, alleged that the U.S. government has recovered nonhuman “biologics” from crash sites and has long operated a secret reverse-engineering program to glean advances from recovered vessels.

Grusch isn’t among the witnesses for the 2024 hearing. Instead, those testifying include:

Tim Gallaudet, retired rear admiral, U.S. Navy; CEO of Ocean STL Consulting, LLC

“Confirmation that UAPs are interacting with humanity came for me in January 2015,” Gallaudet said in his written testimony.

He describes being part of a pre-deployment naval exercise off the U.S. East Coast that culminated in the famous “Go Fast” video, in which a Navy F/A-18 jet’s sensors recorded “an unidentified object exhibiting flight and structural characteristics unlike anything in our arsenal.”

He was among a group of commanders involved in the exercise who received an email containing the video, which was sent by the operations officer of Fleet Forces Command, Gallaudet said.

“The very next day, the email disappeared from my account and those of the other recipients without explanation,” he said.

Luis Elizondo, author and former Department of Defense official

Elizondo’s testimony is brief and sure to raise scrutiny, alleging that a secretive arms race is playing out on the global stage.

“Let me be clear: UAP are real,” he writes. “Advanced technologies not made by our Government — or any other government — are monitoring sensitive military installations around the globe. Furthermore, the U.S. is in possession of UAP technologies, as are some of our adversaries.”

Elizondo is a former intelligence officer who later “managed a highly sensitive Special Access Program on behalf of the White House and the National Security Council,” according to his official bio.

“By 2012, [Elizondo] was the senior ranking person of the DOD’s Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program, a secretive Pentagon unit that studied unidentified anomalous phenomena,” his bio states, adding that he resigned in 2017.

Michael Gold, former NASA associate administrator of space policy and partnerships; member of NASA UAP Independent Study Team

Gold’s testimony stresses the need for government agencies and academics to “overcome the pernicious stigma that continues to impede scientific dialogue and open discussions” about unexplained phenomena.

“As the saying goes, the truth is out there,” Gold said, “we just need to be bold enough and brave enough to face it.”

Michael Shellenberger, founder of Public, a news outlet on the Substack platform

Shellenberger’s testimony runs to some 214 pages, including a lengthy timeline of UAP reports from 1947 to 2023.

Shellenberger presses the White House and Congress to act, calling for the adoption of UAP transparency legislation and cutting funds for any related programs that aren’t disclosed to lawmakers.

“UAP transparency is bi-partisan and critical to our national security,” his written testimony states.

Reports of UFOs and UAPs are now more centralized

In 1977, President Carter asked NASA to look into resuming UFO investigations, but the agency and the Air Force believed “nothing would be gained by further investigation.”

But in recent years, there have been increased efforts to compile and centralize the reporting of unexplained phenomena.

In July 2022, the U.S. government established the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office, or AARO, to standardize reporting methods and data collection. It collects UAP reports from the military and from the Federal Aviation Administration including sightings reported by civilian pilots to air traffic control. The agency doesn’t offer a way for the general public to file a UAP report. It does accept “reports from current or former U.S. Government employees, service members, or contractor personnel with direct knowledge of U.S. Government programs or activities related to UAP dating back to 1945.”

The agency adds that potential filers should not submit “any information that is potentially CLASSIFIED, or unclassified information that is not publicly releasable (e.g. subject to export control regulations).”

Many historical records are also available

Because of intense public interest, a number of records related to UFO studies are available online, including a “case files” folder related to UAPs on the U.S. Navy’s website. The FBI also has an online “vault” of records, covering the period from 1947 to 1954.

As for the famous Project Blue Book run by the U.S. Air Force from 1947 through 1969, documents related to the project are now kept by the National Archives, which holds 37 cubic feet of case files, along with at least 5 other cubic feet of records.

The bulk of the Blue Book investigations into 12,618 reported sightings were resolved, or explained, — but 701 remained “Unidentified,” the Air Force has said. The service said that none of the incidents constituted a security threat or indicated abilities beyond modern science. It added, “There was no evidence indicating that sightings categorized as ‘unidentified’ were extraterrestrial vehicles.”