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In June, the space agency announced that it had commissioned a team to investigate UFOs, or more recently renamed Unidentified Air Phenomena (UAPs). At the time, NASA officials said the independent study, which would begin in the fall, would cost less than $100,000 and take about nine months from start to finish.
Autumn has come, and with it the date of the start of the study – in any case, about the same. The team will begin work on Monday (October 24), NASA officials said in an update (opens in a new tab) today (October 21).
This study does not claim to be the final word on UFOs. It will review previously collected UAP sightings (unclassified sightings only, excluding sensitive military data) with a focus on how they can be better organized and analyzed in the future to learn more about the mysterious skyscape.
“Exploring the unknown in space and the atmosphere is at the heart of our work at NASA,” Thomas Zurbuchen, Associate Administrator of the Science Mission Directorate (SMD) at NASA Headquarters, said in today’s update.
“Understanding the data we have about unexplained phenomena in the air is critical to helping us draw scientific conclusions about what is happening in our skies,” he added. “Data is the language of scientists to explain unexplained things.”
We already know that the research team will be led by the Simons Foundation chairman, astrophysicist David Spergel, and the NASA official coordinating the work is Daniel Evans, Assistant Associate Administrator for Research at SMD.
But today’s update revealed the whole team. There will be 16 researchers from various fields including astronomy, oceanography, computer science and journalism. There was even a former NASA astronaut in the group.
Above is a shortened version of the miniature creature featured in today’s NASA update. You can read the full version in this post (opens in a new tab).
“NASA brings together the world’s leading scientists, data and AI scientists, [and] aerospace security experts, each with a specific mandate, to tell us how to apply the full science and data focus to UAP,” Evans said. in the same statement.
NASA officials said the results of the study will be made public by the end of the study in mid-2023.
Mike Wall is the author of Out There (opens in new tab) (Grand Central Publishing, 2018; illustrated by Carl Tate) about the search for extraterrestrial life. Follow him on Twitter @michaeldwall (opens in a new tab). Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom (opens in a new tab) or Facebook (opens in a new tab).
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Michael Wall is a senior space writer at Space.com (opens in new tab) who joined the team in 2010. He mainly covers exoplanets, spaceflight and military space, but is known for his forays into bits of space art. His book Out There, about the search for extraterrestrial life, was published on November 13, 2018. Before becoming a science writer, Michael worked as a herpetologist and wildlife biologist. He has a Ph.D. BSc in Evolutionary Biology from the University of Sydney, Australia, BSc from the University of Arizona, and a Graduate Diploma in Science Writing from the University of California, Santa Cruz. To find out what his latest projects are, you can follow Michael on Twitter.
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