NASA will study UFOs, aims to shed light on ‘the unknown’

Despite the 'reputational risk' NASA is committed to furthering the scientific understanding of UFOs with a study that is expected to span nine months.

NASA is setting up an independent research team to study UFOs in the interest of “both national security and air safety,” the agency said Thursday in a press release.

Through this study, NASA said it hopes to push forward our scientific understanding of UFOs.

UFOs — or unexplained aerial phenomena (UAPs) as they’re now called — have long captured the imaginations of the public through sci-fi movies and urban legends. But recently, governments and agencies have started to seriously investigate the phenomena.

Last month, the U.S. held its first public hearing on the topic in over 50 years after a report found that U.S. military pilots had encountered over 144 UAPs since 2004. Navy officials announced during the hearing that, actually, that number had risen to 400 encounters.

NASA is not directly collaborating with the military or U.S. government on its investigation but will be gathering and analyzing non-classified government data.

In fact, data collection will be the first order of business for the study team, which will be led by astrophysicist David Spergel, former chair of Princeton University’s astrophysics department.

“Given the paucity of observations, our first task is simply to gather the most robust set of data that we can,” Spergel said. “We will be identifying what data — from civilians, government, non-profits, companies — exists, what else we should try to collect, and how to best analyze it.”

NASA expects the study to take about nine months and will begin in the fall. Experts in aeronautics, data analytics, and other relevant scientists will be tapped to advise the team.