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Unidentified Flying Object, UFO

A UFO or unidentified flying object in the original, literal sense is any airborne object or optical phenomenon, detected visually or by radar, whose nature is not readily known. Interest in these objects stems from arguments that some of them display anomalous characteristiscs, especially the continued speculation that some of them may be the products of extraterrestrial intelligence.

Perhaps the best scientifically accepted definition of a UFO was provided by the late astronomer Dr. J. Allen Hynek: "A UFO is the reported perception of an object or light seen in the sky or upon the land the appearance, trajectory, and general dynamic and luminescent behaviour of which do not suggest a logical, conventional explanation and which is not only mystifying to the original percipients but remains unidentified after close scrutiny of all available evidence by persons who are technically capable of making a common sense identification, if one is possible."

History of UFO

Ancient Accounts

Unusual aerial phenomena have been reported throughout history. Some of these strange apparitions may have been astronomical phenomena such as comets or bright meteors, or atmospheric optical phenomena such as parhelia. Examples of these reports include:

• During the reign of the Pharaoh Thutmose III around 1450 BC, there is a description of multiple "circles of fire" brighter than the sun and about 5 meters in size that appeared over multiple days. They finally disappeared after ascending higher in the sky.
• The army of Alexander the Great in 329 BC, as they were crossing a river into India, saw "two silver shields" in the sky that dove repeatedly on their military columns causing panic. In 322 BC when Alexander was besieging Tyre in Phoenicia, another "flying shield" moving in triangular formation with smaller "shields" approached. Supposedly the larger object shot beams of light at the city shattering its walls and other defenses. Alexander's army quickly took advantage of the situation and seized the city. The objects then departed.
• The Roman author Julius Obsequens writes that in 99 BC, "in Tarquinia towards sunset, a round object, like a globe, a round or circular shield, took its path in the sky from west to east."
• On September 24, 1235, General Yoritsume and his army observed unidentified globes of light flying in erratic patterns in the night sky near Kyoto, Japan. The general's advisers told him not to worry, it was merely the wind causing the stars to sway.
• On April 14, 1561 the skies over Nuremberg, Germany were reportedly filled with a multitude of objects seemingly engaged in an aerial battle. Small spheres and discs were said to emerge from large cylinders.

These sightings were usually treated as supernatural portents, angels, and other religious omens. Some contemporary investigators believe them to be the ancient equivalent of modern UFO reports.

First Modern Reports

Before the terms "flying saucer" and "UFO" were coined, there were a number of reports of strange, unidentified aerial phenomena. These reports date from the mid-nineteenth to early twentieth century. They include:

• On January 25, 1878, The Denison Daily News wrote that local farmer John Martin had reported seeing a large, dark, circular flying object resembling a balloon flying "at wonderful speed."
• On November 17, 1882, astronomer E. W. Maunder of the Greenwich Royal Observatory described in the Observatory Reports "a strange celestial visitor" that was "disc-shaped," "torpedo-shaped," or "spindle-shaped." It was said to be very different in characteristics from a meteor fireball. Years later, Maunder wrote it looked exactly like the new Zeppelin dirigibles. The strange object was also seen by several other European astronomers.
• On February 28, 1904, there was a sighting by three crew members on the USS Supply 300 miles west of San Francisco, reported by Lt. Frank Schofield, later to become Commander-in-Chief of the Pacific Fleet. Schofield wrote of three bright red egg-shaped and circular objects flying in echelon formation that approached beneath the cloud layer, then changed course and "soared" above the clouds, departing directly away from the earth after 2 to 3 minutes. The largest had an apparent size of about six suns.
• The so-called Fátima incident or "The Miracle of the Sun," witnessed by tens of thousands in Fátima, Portugal on October 13, 1917, is believed by some researchers to actually be a UFO event.
• In both the European and Japanese aerial theatres during World War II, "Foo-fighters" (balls of light and other shapes that followed aircraft) were reported by both Allied and Axis pilots.
• On February 25, 1942, an unidentified craft was detected over the California region. The craft stayed aloft despite taking at least 20 minutes worth of flak from ground batteries. The incident later became known as the Battle of Los Angeles, or the West coast air raid.
• In 1946, there were over 2000 reports of unidentified aircraft in the Scandinavian nations, along with isolated reports from France, Portugal, Italy and Greece, then referred to as "Russian hail," and later as "ghost rockets," because it was thought that these mysterious objects were Russian tests of captured German V1 or V2 rockets. This was subsequently shown not to be the case, and the phenomenon remains unexplained. Over 200 were tracked on radar and deemed to be "real physical objects" by the Swedish military. A significant fraction of the remainder were thought to be misperceptions of natural phenomena, such as meteors.

Modern UFO Era

The post World War II UFO phase in the United States began with a reported sighting by American businessman Kenneth Arnold on June 24, 1947 while flying his private plane near Mount Rainier, Washington. He reported seeing nine brilliantly bright objects flying across the face of Rainier towards nearby Mount Adams at "an incredible speed", which he calculated at at least 1200 miles per hour by timing their travel between Rainier and Adams. His sighting subsequently received significant media and public attention. Arnold would later say they "flew like a saucer would if you skipped it across the water" and also said they were "flat like a pie pan", "shaped like saucers," and "half-moon shaped, oval in front and convex in the rear. ...they looked like a big flat disk." (One, however, he would describe later as being almost crescent-shaped.) Arnold's reported descriptions caught the media's and the public's fancy and gave rise to the terms flying saucer and flying disk.

Arnold's sighting was followed in the next few weeks by several thousand other reported sightings, mostly in the U.S., but in other countries as well. Perhaps the most significant of these was a United Airlines crew sighting of nine more disc-like objects over Idaho on the evening of July 4. This sighting was even more widely reported than Arnold's and lent considerable credence to Arnold's report. For the next few days most American newspapers were filled with front-page stories of the new "flying saucers" or "flying discs." Starting with official debunkery that began the night of July 8 with the Roswell UFO incident, reports rapidly tapered off, ending the first big U.S. UFO wave.

Starting July 9, Army Air Force intelligence, in cooperation with the FBI, secretly began a formal investigation into the best sightings, which included Arnold's and the United crew's. The FBI was told that intelligence was using "all of its scientists" to determine whether or not "such a phenomenon could, in fact, occur." Furthermore, the research was "being conducted with the thought that the flying objects might be a celestial phenomenon," or that "they might be a foreign body mechanically devised and controlled." (Maccabee, 5) Three weeks later they concluded that, "This 'flying saucer' situation is not all imaginary or seeing too much in some natural phenomenon. Something is really flying around." A further review by the intelligence and technical divisions of the Air Materiel Command at Wright Field reached the same conclusion, that "the phenomenon is something real and not visionary or fictitious," that there were objects in the shape of a disc, metallic in appearance, and as big as man-made aircraft. They were characterized by "extreme rates of climb [and] maneuverability," general lack of noise, absence of trail, occasional formation flying, and "evasive" behavior "when sighted or contacted by friendly aircraft and radar," suggesting either manual, automatic, or remote control. It was thus recommended in late September 1947 that an official Air Force investigation be set up to investigate the phenomenon. This led to the creation of the Air Force's Project Sign at the end of 1947, which became Project Grudge at the end of 1948, and then Project Blue Book in 1952. Blue Book closed down in 1970, ending the official Air Force UFO investigations.

Use of "UFO" instead of "flying saucer" was first suggested in 1952 by Capt. Edward J. Ruppelt, the first director of Project Blue Book, who felt that "flying saucer" did not reflect the diversity of the sightings. Ruppelt suggested that "UFO" should be pronounced as a word - "you-foe". However it is generally pronounced by forming each letter: "U.F.O." His term was quickly adopted by the Air Force, which also briefly used "UFOB" circa 1954. (See next paragraph.) Ruppelt recounted his experiences with Project Blue Book in his memoir, The Report on Unidentified Flying Objects (1956), also the first book to use the term.

Air Force Regulation 200-2, issued in 1954, defined an Unidentified Flying Object (UFOB) as "any airborne object which by performance, aerodynamic characteristics, or unusual features, does not conform to any presently known aircraft or missile type, or which cannot be positively identified as a familiar object." The regulation also said UFOBs were to be investigated as a "possible threat to the security of the United States" and "to determine technical aspects involved." Furthermore, Air Force personnel were directed not to discuss unexplained cases with the press.

Web Links about UFO

The UFO Research of Jerry Cohe
Thirty five years of in-depth, accurate UFO research performed by someone who saw one hover near his home in 1967.

The Disclosure Project
A nonprofit research project working to fully disclose the facts about UFOs, extraterrestrial intelligence, and classified advanced energy and propulsion systems.

National UFO Reporting Center
Comprehensive and up to date UFO information source. Provided by America's foremost UFO Reporting Agency in continuous operation since 1974

Mutual UFO Network
The world's largest civilian UFO scientific reseach organization.

Alien-UFOs.com
Award winning UFOs / UFO website with UFO photographs, Roswell, Area51, alien abductions, crop circles, conspiracy theories, UFO links and a UFO forum.

UFO Watch
UFO Sightings, Abductions, Sighting Reports, Abduction Reports, and more...

The Bible UFO Connection
Collection of the hundreds of references in the Bible to flying vehicles, close encounters, futuristic weaponry, and advanced technological character of the race of supreme beings known as the Elohiym.

Center for UFO Studies
An international group of scientists, academics, investigators, and volunteers dedicated to the continuing examination and analysis of the UFO phenomenon.

UFO Skeptic
An information site on the UFO phenomenon by and for professional scientists.

San Diego UFO Information Homepage
It's represented organizations reject UFO cults and the practice of religious suicide.

Bill Chalkers The Oz FIles
About the Australian Government and Military UFO files with official documents and original photos and drawings of encounters with UFO's and Beings.

Kentucky Mutual UFO Network
An international scientific organization composed of people seriously interested in studying and researching the phenomenon known as unidentified flying objects (UFOs) by combining their mutual talents, areas of expertise and invest-igative efforts.

International Center for Abduction Research
An organization devoted to the dissemination of trustworthy information about UFO abductions.

UFO Paranormal search engine
The largest Paranormal and UFO Search directory and forum. Report UFO or Paranormal sighting in the forum and get help from others.

UFOINFO: The Home of UFO Roundup
Regular news from UFO Roundup, Filer's Files, AUFORN, Oz Files, UFO News UK and UFO + PSI Magazine. The bulletins are archived on the site for research purposes. There is also information on UFO Organizations, Magazines, Newsletters, Conferences, Lecturers, UFO Books, UFO Museums, Space and Astronomy News and much more.

UFO Online research
The ultimate source for UFO sigthings, documents, pictures, research works and much more, from Italy and elsewhere in the world. The serious face of ufology.

UFO Evidence
One of the Internet's largest sources of quality research and information on the UFO phenomenon, with over 1,700 articles, documents and resources.

The Disclosure Project
Nonprofit research project working to fully disclose the facts about UFOs, extraterrestrial intelligence, and classified advanced energy and propulsion systems.

UFO & Bible
In the Bible there are both encounters with Godly angels doing His will, and encounters with rebellious angels who seek to lead mankind astray and undermine God's credibility.

UFO News Today
UFOs and Related Phenomena.

Orion Homepage
An Academic and Investigative UFO Organization.

PROJECT 1947
World-wide effort to document the origins of the modern UFO phenomenon. Research for the project has yielded many early-era UFO reports via the FOIA, newspaper articles and contemporary accounts.

COME SAIL AWAY : UFO Phenomenon and The Bible
Whether you're a Bible reader, a Bible scholar or a Bible burner, you won't be able to resist turning the page. And in a matter of hours, you will believe...

BUFORA Ltd
Nationwide network of around three hundred people, who have a dedicated, non-cultist interest in understanding the wide-ranging extent of the UFO enigma.

UFO Digest
Provides video proof of UFOs, using streaming video.Also huge photo galleries of UFOs, stories and articles about alien abduction and sightings.

Obiwan's UFO-Free Paranormal
Ghosts, Hauntings, and Other Strange Phenomena.