NASA needs more evidence to solve mystery of UFOs over US

Washington, May 31 (EFE).- NASA needs more and better data to be able to understand what “unidentified flying objects” are, given that UFOs are allegedly being spotted more frequently than in the past over US territory, a team from the US space agency that is studying the phenomenon concluded on Tuesday.

At the first public symposium of experts making up the NASA group tasked with analyzing UFOs, the group said that at present there is not enough high-quality information on them to determine what they are.

Noting that some scientists have faced online harassment for their work on “unidentified anomalous phenomena” (UAPs), NASA science program director Nicola Fox said that “Harassment only leads to further stigmatization of the UAP field, significantly hindering the scientific process and discouraging others (from studying) this important subject matter.”

Fox said that the data that the experts have been studying are not classified and come from “civilian government institutions,” the private sector and “other sources.”

The context in which the UAPs are seen also contributes to the fact that the information often cannot be used, said Fox, mainly because there are objects or phenomena that can imitate or eclipse the UAPs completely, such as military aerial equipment.

UAPs are defined as sightings “that cannot be identified as aircraft or known natural phenomena from a scientific perspective.”

Weather or “ionospheric” phenomena such as the northern lights can also complicate the data, she added.

Thus, David Spergel, the head of the team investigating the unexplained phenomena, said that the origin of the UAPs remains unclear and the team fears that many events of this type are “not being reported.”

However, Spergel, an astrophysicist, added that, even with better data, there is “no guarantee” that every sighting will be able to be explained.

The UAP study group was created in June 2022 with the aim of making progress in terms of scientifically understanding the phenomena.

The US Department of Defense, meanwhile, also created a department last year to analyze and gather data on encounters with UFOs or phenomena of this kind.

According to a Pentagon report published in January, the number of sightings of UAPs or UFOs has been increasing since 2021.

EFE aaca/pem/bp