Are there ufos

There has been a spike in UFO sightings across the nation. With the recent release of a US intelligence UFO report, are there just more people looking up in the sky or is it something else?

The US government and military confirmed investigations and sightings of UFOs bringing this phenomenon back into the mainstream media. Earlier this year the DoD's inspector general launched an investigation into how the unidentified aerial phenomena were being monitored by the military.

A Florida resident recently caught 2 orbs on his home security camera. The video shows lights moving rapidly across the frame. Further examination of the video to see if there was a logical explanation such as drones, satellites or birds, was inconclusive. Although no earth-shattering revelations emerged, the existence of a government report on a much-ridiculed issue shows how UFOs have beamed out of the realm of purely science fiction pop culture and into the world of US national security.

The Pentagon established the Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force last August to look into observations of unknown flying aircrafts. The group's job was to "detect, analyse and catalogue" these events, as well as to "gain insight" into the "nature and origins" of UFOs, the Pentagon said. A classified version of its report was provided to lawmakers earlier this month. Public pressure on the US to release what it knows about aliens has been building for decades as civilian groups of so-called ufologists argue that evidence of their existence has been suppressed by the government.

The Pentagon has been quietly gathering data since as part of the military's little-known Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program. Money for the programme came at the request of Nevada Senator Harry Reid, a Democrat who represented the region that encompasses Area 51 - the military site where conspiracy theorists believe remains collected from an alien crash in the town of Roswell have been studied since Former top officials and even US presidents have recently weighed in on whether the truth truly is out there.

Hillary Clinton's campaign manager John Podesta, long a follower of UFO theories, promised during her campaign that she would release classified government reports on aliens if she were elected. In an interview last year, then-President Donald Trump said he would not disclose - even to his family - what he had learned about aliens. And you know, they did a little bit of research and the answer was no. And so, you know, I think that people still take seriously trying to investigate and figure out what that is.

The effort to release what is known about UFOs has also found followers in Congress - both Republican and Democrat - who argue that the report will end the stigma that may prevent troops from telling a superior officer about an unexplainable encounter.

Other US military and intelligence officials have detailed the odd sightings, with some of the more credible reports coming from pilots who have personally observed UFOs near military weapons and training facilities from within their cockpits.

In March, Mr Trump's former director of national intelligence John Ratcliffe - who previously oversaw all 18 US intelligence agencies - summarised the phenomena, telling Fox News: "Frankly, there are a lot more sightings than have been made public. In a CBS News 60 Minutes episode last month, two former Navy pilots discussed seeing an object in the Pacific Ocean that appeared to mirror their movements. UFO means unidentified flying object. Nothing more, nothing less. Instead, UFOs have been taboo for academic scientists to investigate, and so unexplained reports have not received the scrutiny they deserve.

One reason is that most scientists think there is less to most reports than meets the eye , and the few who have dug deeply have mostly debunked the phenomenon. Over half of sightings can be attributed to meteors, fireballs and the planet Venus.

Another reason for the scientific hesitance is that UFOs have been co-opted by popular culture. They are part of a landscape of conspiracy theories that includes accounts of abduction by aliens and crop circles. Scientists worry about their professional reputations, and the association of UFOs with these supernatural stories causes most researchers to avoid the topic.

But some scientists have looked. In , Edward U. Sturrock also surveyed professional astronomers and found that nearly half thought UFOs were worthy of scientific study, with higher interest among younger and more well-informed astronomers. And while UFO research has employed some of the tools of the scientific method , it has not had the core of skeptical, evidence-based reasoning that demarcates science from pseudoscience. A search of 90, recent and current grants awarded by the National Science Foundation finds none addressing UFOs or related phenomena.

While the scientific community has almost entirely avoided engaging with UFOs, a much more mainstream search for intelligent aliens and their technology has been going on for decades. The search is motivated by the fact that astronomers have, to date, discovered over 4, planets orbiting other stars. Astronomers estimate that there are million habitable worlds in the Milky Way galaxy alone, and each one is a potential opportunity for life to develop and for intelligence and technology to emerge.

Indeed, most astronomers think it very unlikely that humans are the only or the first advanced civilization. This confidence has fueled an active search for extraterrestrial intelligence, known as SETI.

It has been unsuccessful so far. It was starved of federal funding for decades and recently has gotten most of its support from private sources. In this context, the Pentagon report is welcome. The report draws few concrete conclusions about UFOs and avoids any reference to aliens or extraterrestrial spacecraft. However, it notes the importance of destigmatizing UFOs so that more pilots report what they see. It also sets a goal of moving from anecdotal observations to standardized and scientific data collection.

Time will tell if this is enough to draw scientists into the effort, but the transparency to publish the report at all reverses a long history of secrecy surrounding U. Meanwhile, the truth is still out there. Receive news, sky-event information, observing tips, and more from Astronomy's weekly email newsletter. View our Privacy Policy.