UFOs

What's a UFO?

Since man first started looking up into the skies he saw things he couldn't explain. For the last fifty years or so these things have taken on the label "UFOs." Originally an abbreviation for the Air Force term "Unidentified Flying Object", it has become a synonym to most people for "Alien Spaceship." For the Air Force, though, it is simply a term to refer to something in the skies that the observer can see but not recognize. Usually the explanation is less extraordinary than a flying saucer manned by visitors from other worlds. Often a weather balloon or natural phenomenon is the cause. However, there are cases on record where no good common explanation was ever found.

A History of Strange Things in the Sky

Some claim that UFOs have been visiting the earth since ancient times. Author Erich von Daniken sees evidence of these ancient astronauts in the records our ancestors left. He sites art that includes flying beings, stories of visitors from the sky and archaeological oddities as proof. While evidence that would convince most scientists is lacking, certainly the idea that we were visited by extra-terrestrial beings in the past has it appeal and Von Daniken was able to write several successful, if somewhat inaccurate books, on the subject.

Certainly there are stories about men seeing things in the sky since ancient times. A sailor aboard Columbus's ship ,the Santa Maria, saw a glittering thing in the distance. At the end of the 19th century America experienced a flap of "airship" sightings across the nation. During World War II pilots spotted strange lights in the sky that neither seemed to be friendly or enemy craft and nicknamed them "foo fighters." The modern history of UFOs, though, perhaps begins in 1947 with an Idaho businessman and pilot named Kenneth Arnold. While flying near Mount Rainier, Washington, Arnold spotted a formation of nine silvery, disc shaped objects flying in and out of the mountains of the Cascade Range. He estimated their speed at some 1,200 miles per hour, more than twice as fast as any known aircraft of that day. He described the disc's movements to a reporter as "like pie plates skipping over the water." In his story the next day the reporter coined the term "flying saucers" and the label stuck. Sightings like Arnolds, and more fantastic stories including actual contact with occupants of the saucers, and rumors that the U.S. government had salvaged a crashed alien spaceship, and that U.S. plane had been shot down by a UFO, flourished in the late 1940's. In response the U.S. government created a group to investigate these reports. Operating under several names, the most well known being "Project Blue Book", the Air Force continued to investigate UFO reports for some twenty years. Project Blue Book hired Dr. J Allen Hynek, an astronomer at Ohio State University, as a consultant to the project. While a skeptic himself he became disillusioned with Project Blue Book, which had never been staffed with more that two or three people and given a low priority, saying it was nothing more than a "public-relations effort designed to debunk the whole thing." While not believing that UFOs where actually alien spaceships, Hynek did come to believe that there was indeed a real phenomenon at work warranting scientific investigation.

Hynek continued to work gathering information about UFO sightings without the help of the United States Air Force. He, with other interested UFO researchers, formed the Center for UFO Studies at Evanston, Illinois. Hynek and his colleagues have been responsible for organizing UFO reports into a classification system based on criteria like the distance of the sighting and the time of day.

Hynek's group broke down sightings into two major categories: Closer than 500 feet and further than 500 feet. These majors groups were then broken down into nocturnal visual observations (the majority of reports), daytime visual, and radar visual (where the object is observed both by eye and on radar).

Three Kinds of Encounters

The Center for UFO Studies also categorizes contacts with UFO's based on the amount of interaction with the witnesses as "Close Encounters" of the first, second, or third kind. Encounters of the first kind are usually reports of objects in the sky or unexplained lights. The famous Hudson Valley UFO sightings fall into this catogory. Encounters of the second kind are marked by the UFO having some kind of tangible effect on the Earth environment, such as burn marks or radioactivity. Close encounters of the third kind include reports of interaction been the witnesses and the crew of the alien spaceship.

There are also a group of reports that can be termed " alien abductions". These are stories of people who claim they were actually forced aboard a UFO by the occupants. Typically the subjects are examined by the aliens, then released. While these reports are rare when compared to the number of close encounters of the first or second kind, many people from different walks of life have reported this strange experience.

Identified Flying Objects

The wide majority of UFO reports, perhaps 80%, are simple cases of mistaken identity. Natural Identified Flying Objects (IFOs), some as common as planets like Venus and Jupiter, or as unusual as the electrical glow of Saint Elmo's Fire, may fool casual, and often even expert, observers.

Almost any man-made object that flies has also been mistaken for a UFO at one time or another. Kites, balloons and aircraft can all seem unfamiliar when seen at strange angles and in poor lighting. Experimental, or secret military aircraft may also account for a few sightings. Power lines, displaying an effect similar to the natural occuring Saint Elmo's Fire, are undoubtedly the source of a few UFO reports given how ofen UFOs are seen near high voltage transmission lines.

Hoaxes

A small portion of UFO reports are fraudulent. Either the person reporting the sighting has filed a false report, or someone has purposefully used some special effect to fool the witness into thinking he has seen something he hasn't. A UFO hoax, in general, is not illegal, so there is little to restrain someone from using one for a practical joke. Occasionally a charlatan attempts to use a hoax for profit, though more often it seems that the perpetrator is looking to feel important or gain recognition. Hoaxes can be difficult to spot and many only come to light when the hoaxer confesses his story.

UFO in Entertainment

The image most people form of UFOs, flying saucers and alien abductions is through entertainment media like books, movies and television. There is no doubt that what people see and hear in entertainment affects their perception of what they expect to see when dealing with UFO's. It is reported, though disputed, that after the success of the movieClose Encounters of the Third Kind,in 1977, UFO reports surged.

Entertainment certainly seems to affect the way we view aliens themselves. Movies have portrayed extra-terrestrial visitors as evil human eating monsters in Species to gentle kind creatures in ET.

If They are Out There, Where?

If we do assume there is intelligent life in places other than Earth, where might they be? Though scientists last century thought the planet Mars might be a good candidate, and some even thought they detected a huge canal system stretching across the planet, recent probes sent to Mars have failed to detect even bacteria-like creatures, let alone a civilization capable of producing a flying saucer. With the rest of the planets in our solar system seemingly too hot or cold, the best hope for intelligent life seems to be across the void of interstellar space in other parts of our galaxy.

In an attempt to detect intelligent life beyond our solar system researchers have conducted a number of SETI programs trying to use radio waves to detect the existence of other civilizations. So far no SETI program has been successful in finding intelligent life, but there are millions of stars in our galaxy alone that might have planets that could harbor life and carefully looking at each one of them will take a long time.

Is there intelligent life on other planets? Have they visited us on Earth? Are some UFOs alien spaceships? Or are there other explanations for saucers in the sky? Nobody has final proof one way or another. We need to keep open eyes and open minds.