Documents / Report
This is the final report of the Scientific Study of Unidentified Flying Objects, conducted by the University of Colorado under Air Force contract F44620-67-C-0035, with Edward U. Condon as scientific director and Daniel S. Gillmor as editor. It was submitted to the National Academy of Sciences on 15 November 1968 for review. The report includes field studies, photographic and radar analyses, case studies, historical chapters and appendices such as the Robertson Panel report and the Twining letter.
enough about the actuRl atmospheric conditions to make allowance fOl
effects of this kind and, if they happen to be p~onounced, can tc led
to make erroneous decisions. Another point is that, although the
antenna sends out most of its energy in a singlc narrow beam, small
amounts of energy go out in several other directions, known as side-
lobes, 50 that a large or a nearby object in the direction of a side-
lobe can give rise to a received signal that is indistinguishable from
a small or distant object in the direction of the main beam.
The overall radar system is a rather complicated set of electronic
equipment which can malfunction in various ways giving rise to internal-
iy generated signals which the operator will tcnd to regard as reflec-
tions nlade by outside obstacles Nhich are in reality not there.
USlInlly the returned radar signals arc displayed on the scrC~Il of
a cathode ray tul)e and observed visually by the operator. On this
account, subjective judgments of the operat'Jr enter into the final
determi nat i on of what is seen, hall l +. is ir.te, , 'cted and how j t is
reported. The data obtained from rnJur c;ystcms are thus not a~
co~pletely objective as is often assumed. In some few instances suiJ-
jectiveness is somewhat l~Juced by the fact that the cathode ray screen
is photographed" but even when this is done ther~ is ;:l subjective
element introduced at the stage \"h01'C !l iluman observer has to interpret
the photograph of the radur screen.
Radar operators do ~cport unidentified targets frem time to time
and so there exists u category of UFO cases ill which the unidentified
flyirg ohject \\'a~; scen on a radar screen. [II a few cases there is a
close corn'latio'l hetwecn all unknown thing in the sky seen visually
and something also di"'p]ayed \)\1 radar.
IlowC'vl'r ill viC'\\' of t:1l' m"lly difficulties ass'lciat.;c! with unarJl-
biguo\ls intcrj1J'C'tati\)1\ of all blobs of light e1l1 a radar :-:crccn it docs
not {OIll)'" dil'l\ctly alld easily that th..' -ntlar rep0J'ts support or "prove"
that UFOs eXist HS moving vch;clcs :H:8tte'11ng the radio pUlses as would
a metallic object. TLe CollJ~'ado project l'llga!o1ed the scrvi -udal' r'C'IHlI·ts support or "prove"
that UFOs eXl~t as moving vl'h:clcSH:L!ttf~'lin~ the' I'adio pulses as would
a metal] i c obJect. The Colo;'ado project ('llg:ql('U the ~:crv l"es of the
57 Report, from the classic collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is under it. 1497 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.