Science

NASA UFO Report: What the UAP Study Does and Doesn’t Say

Published

1 year ago

September 15, 2023

The role was created in response to the recommendations of a report that found the agency could do more to collect and interpret data on unidentified anomalous phenomena.

NASA said it had hired a director of research to study “unidentified anomalous phenomenon,” or U.A.P., after a report recommended the agency do more to investigate the topic. The agency did not share the director’s name.Win McNamee/Getty Images

Pledging a new, transparent, scientifically rigorous look at U.F.O.s, NASA on Thursday said it had appointed a director of research on the topic — and then kept the name of the director a secret for about seven hours.

The new position is part of NASA’s response to recommendations made by an independent study team that the agency had convened. The panel looked at how to better gather and study information about “unidentified anomalous phenomena,” or U.A.P. — the modern term for U.F.O.s.

The panel’s report, released on Thursday, did not attempt to provide a definitive answer to whether galaxy-trotting extraterrestrials are zipping through Earth’s skies. But it does propose a bigger role for NASA in tackling the question.

“NASA will do this transparently,” Bill Nelson, the NASA administrator, said during a news conference on Thursday morning at the agency’s headquarters in Washington, D.C., discussing the report.

During the news conference, Mr. Nelson first talked about NASA’s Perseverance rover on Mars, which is collecting rock samples that might contain hints of life that lived there several billion years ago. He then turned to the James Webb Space Telescope, which is studying planets around distant stars for clues that they may be habitable or even inhabited by life.

The U.A.P. work, he said, follows a similar yearning for learning about the possibilities of life elsewhere in the universe. “This is the first time that NASA has taken concrete action to seriously look into U.A.P.,” Mr. Nelson said.

Nicola Fox, the associate administrator for NASA’s science mission directorate, said the person serving as the new director of U.A.P. research had been in that role “for a while now,” but declined to identify him. ”We will not give his name out,” she said.

On Thursday evening, the agency identified the director as Mark McInerney in an updated news release. He previously served as NASA’s liaison with the Defense Department for U.A.P. issues. In the news release, NASA said he had also worked in various positions at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the National Hurricane Center.

In a post on X, the social network formerly known as Twitter, Dr. Fox wrote, “As we continue to digest the study team’s report and findings, please treat him with respect in this pivotal role to help us better scientifically understand U.A.P.”

NASA officials said that part of the reason for initially keeping Mr. McInerney’s identity secret was the harassment experienced during the period of the study by some of the 16 members of the independent panel, who included university professors, space industry officials and a science journalist.

“Some of them actually rose to actual threats,” said Daniel Evans, assistant deputy associate administrator for research in NASA’s science mission directorate. “And yes, that’s in part why we are not splashing the name of our new director out there, because science needs to be free.”

The federal government’s knowledge of U.A.P.s has recently been the subject of proposed federal legislation. In a House oversight subcommittee hearing in July, lawmakers quizzed a former intelligence official who claimed knowledge of a government cover-up of extraterrestrial technology.

U.A.P.s often turn out to be innocuous objects, like weather balloons. Most experts consider alien spacecraft to be an unlikely explanation for any of the events. But it is possible that some of what has been observed could be as-yet-undiscovered atmospheric phenomena or tests of advanced weapon systems.

“One of the main goals of what we’re trying to do here today is to move conjecture and conspiracy towards science and sanity,” Dr. Evans said. “And you do that with data.”

Several members of NASA's unidentified anomalous phenomena independent study team sit at a long table on a stage at NASA headquarters with a large screen behind them that reads "The US Department of Defense & the UAP Mission." — Sean Kirkpatrick, left, director of All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office at the Department of Defense, gave a presentation during a meeting of NASA’s unidentified anomalous phenomena independent study team in May.Joel Kowsky/NASA

The panel recommends that NASA use its Earth-observing instruments to collect environmental data coinciding with U.A.P. reports and enlist members of the public to send in a broader swath of observations, perhaps through a smartphone app.

“It always comes back to the data you feed into your analysis,” said David Spergel, an astrophysicist who is president of the Simons Foundation and served as the chair of the U.A.P. panel. “If you don’t have good data, you’re not going to learn things.”

Smartphones can take sharp images, note precise locations, magnetic fields and record sounds. “There’s a wealth of data that a cellphone takes,” Dr. Spergel said. “If you see something you don’t understand, collect data. We aggregate the data and we learn from it.”

Broader collection of data could also reduce the stigma and ridicule that many people fear if they talk about something they saw. “Stigma has limited reporting by pilots, both civilian and military,” Dr. Spergel said.

The panel also suggested using sophisticated computer algorithms, including artificial intelligence and machine learning, to look for subtle patterns in U.A.P. reports that may help identify the underlying phenomena.

Some of the questioning veered toward the odd and surreal. One journalist asked about the ufologist who on Tuesday displayed before Mexico’s Congress what he described as two corpses of aliens.

“Has NASA been in touch with the Mexican authorities about the rather sensational revelations earlier this week of two allegedly nonhuman corpses?” the journalist said. “And what, if any, importance do you attach to these discoveries?”

Dr. Spergel replied, “This is something that I know I’ve only seen on Twitter.”

He gave the analogy of the moon rocks that NASA collected during the Apollo moon landings 50 years ago, which are available for study to scientists around the world.

“If you have something strange, make samples available to the world scientific community and we’ll see what’s there,” Dr. Spergel said.

The U.A.P. study was announced in June last year by Thomas Zurbuchen, then the associate administrator of the science mission directorate.

Dr. Zurbuchen said examining U.F.O. reports could be “high-risk, high-impact kind of research,” possibly uncovering some entirely new scientific phenomenon, or possibly coming up with nothing new or interesting at all.

During a public hearing in May, the panel tried to explain some of the material that has fascinated the public. It used some (slightly tricky) high school geometry to explain how the object in one video taken by a Navy plane in 2015, known as “GOFAST,” was not moving quickly but at just 40 miles per hour by illustrating how the vantage point on an object could be a visual trick.

Source link

Science

The body of a Ugandan Olympic athlete who was set on fire by her partner is received by family

Published

3 days ago

September 13, 2024

Anne Joseph

NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — The body of Ugandan Olympic athlete Rebecca Cheptegei — who died after being set on fire by her partner in Kenya — was received Friday by family and anti-femicide crusaders, ahead of her burial a day later.

Cheptegei’s family met with dozens of activists Friday who had marched to the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital’s morgue in the western city of Eldoret while chanting anti-femicide slogans.

She is the fourth female athlete to have been killed by her partner in Kenya in yet another case of gender-based violence in recent years.

Viola Cheptoo, the founder of Tirop Angels – an organization that was formed in honor of athlete Agnes Tirop, who was stabbed to death in 2021, said stakeholders need to ensure this is the last death of an athlete due to gender-based violence.

“We are here to say that enough is enough, we are tired of burying our sisters due to GBV,” she said.

It was a somber mood at the morgue as athletes and family members viewed Cheptegei’s body which sustained 80% of burns after she was doused with gasoline by her partner Dickson Ndiema. Ndiema sustained 30% burns on his body and later succumbed.

Ndiema and Cheptegei were said to have quarreled over a piece of land that the athlete bought in Kenya, according to a report filed by the local chief.

Cheptegei competed in the women’s marathon at the Paris Olympics less than a month before the attack. She finished in 44th place.

Cheptegei’s father, Joseph, said that the body will make a brief stop at their home in the Endebess area before proceeding to Bukwo in eastern Uganda for a night vigil and burial on Saturday.

“We are in the final part of giving my daughter the last respect,” a visibly distraught Joseph said.

He told reporters last week that Ndiema was stalking and threatening Cheptegei and the family had informed police.

Kenya’s high rates of violence against women have prompted marches by ordinary citizens in towns and cities this year.

Four in 10 women or an estimated 41% of dating or married Kenyan women have experienced physical or sexual violence perpetrated by their current or most recent partner, according to the Kenya Demographic and Health Survey 2022.

Source link

News

The ancient jar smashed by a 4-year-old is back on display at an Israeli museum after repair

Published

4 days ago

September 11, 2024

Anne Joseph

TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — A rare Bronze-Era jar accidentally smashed by a 4-year-old visiting a museum was back on display Wednesday after restoration experts were able to carefully piece the artifact back together.

Last month, a family from northern Israel was visiting the museum when their youngest son tipped over the jar, which smashed into pieces.

Alex Geller, the boy’s father, said his son — the youngest of three — is exceptionally curious, and that the moment he heard the crash, “please let that not be my child” was the first thought that raced through his head.

The jar has been on display at the Hecht Museum in Haifa for 35 years. It was one of the only containers of its size and from that period still complete when it was discovered.

The Bronze Age jar is one of many artifacts exhibited out in the open, part of the Hecht Museum’s vision of letting visitors explore history without glass barriers, said Inbal Rivlin, the director of the museum, which is associated with Haifa University in northern Israel.

It was likely used to hold wine or oil, and dates back to between 2200 and 1500 B.C.

Rivlin and the museum decided to turn the moment, which captured international attention, into a teaching moment, inviting the Geller family back for a special visit and hands-on activity to illustrate the restoration process.

Rivlin added that the incident provided a welcome distraction from the ongoing war in Gaza. “Well, he’s just a kid. So I think that somehow it touches the heart of the people in Israel and around the world,“ said Rivlin.

Roee Shafir, a restoration expert at the museum, said the repairs would be fairly simple, as the pieces were from a single, complete jar. Archaeologists often face the more daunting task of sifting through piles of shards from multiple objects and trying to piece them together.

Experts used 3D technology, hi-resolution videos, and special glue to painstakingly reconstruct the large jar.

Less than two weeks after it broke, the jar went back on display at the museum. The gluing process left small hairline cracks, and a few pieces are missing, but the jar’s impressive size remains.

The only noticeable difference in the exhibit was a new sign reading “please don’t touch.”

Source link

News

B.C. sets up a panel on bear deaths, will review conservation officer training

Published

6 days ago

September 10, 2024

Anne Joseph

VICTORIA – The British Columbia government is partnering with a bear welfare group to reduce the number of bears being euthanized in the province.

Nicholas Scapillati, executive director of Grizzly Bear Foundation, said Monday that it comes after months-long discussions with the province on how to protect bears, with the goal to give the animals a “better and second chance at life in the wild.”

Scapillati said what’s exciting about the project is that the government is open to working with outside experts and the public.

“So, they’ll be working through Indigenous knowledge and scientific understanding, bringing in the latest techniques and training expertise from leading experts,” he said in an interview.

B.C. government data show conservation officers destroyed 603 black bears and 23 grizzly bears in 2023, while 154 black bears were killed by officers in the first six months of this year.

Scapillati said the group will publish a report with recommendations by next spring, while an independent oversight committee will be set up to review all bear encounters with conservation officers to provide advice to the government.

Environment Minister George Heyman said in a statement that they are looking for new ways to ensure conservation officers “have the trust of the communities they serve,” and the panel will make recommendations to enhance officer training and improve policies.

Lesley Fox, with the wildlife protection group The Fur-Bearers, said they’ve been calling for such a committee for decades.

“This move demonstrates the government is listening,” said Fox. “I suspect, because of the impending election, their listening skills are potentially a little sharper than they normally are.”

Fox said the partnership came from “a place of long frustration” as provincial conservation officers kill more than 500 black bears every year on average, and the public is “no longer tolerating this kind of approach.”

“I think that the conservation officer service and the B.C. government are aware they need to change, and certainly the public has been asking for it,” said Fox.

Fox said there’s a lot of optimism about the new partnership, but, as with any government, there will likely be a lot of red tape to get through.

“I think speed is going to be important, whether or not the committee has the ability to make change and make change relatively quickly without having to study an issue to death, ” said Fox.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 9, 2024.

Source link