Documents / Report
This declassified CIA document, released through The Black Vault, reports on the meetings of the Scientific Advisory Panel on Unidentified Flying Objects, which the Office of Scientific Intelligence convened on January 14 to 18, 1953. It includes a history of the sessions and the panel's informal comments, and it appends the formal report signed by H. P. Robertson and others. The panel found no evidence of a direct threat to national security. It recommended stripping UFOs of their special status and starting a public education program.
“G. A.”9 pages
Approved For Re.se 2001/08/07: CIA-RDP81R00560R~00030027-0 ··•"""'$liiit:tl~~~'1~~,,.,,"""'"">:50 'E'""e""rf'" ,. '"· ·">If<· ~&:~).~ 1000 man-hours of professional and sub-professional time in the preparation of graph plots of individual frames of the film, show- ing apparent and relative motion of objects and variation in their light intensity. It was the opinion of the P.I.L. representatives that the objects sighted were not birds, balloons or aircraft, were nnot reflections because there 1ras no blinking while passing through 60° of arc" and were, therefore, 11self-luminous". Plots of motion and variation in light intensity of the objects were displayed, While the Panel Members were impressed by the evident enthusiasm, industry and extent of effort of the P.I.L. team, they could not accept the conclusions reached. Some of the reasons for this were as follows: • a. A semi-spherical object can readily produce a reflection of sunlight without ''blinking" through 60° of arc travel. b. Although no data was available on the ttalbedo" of birds or polyethylene ballons in bright sunlight, the apparent motions, sizes and brightnesses of the objects vrere considered strongly to suggest birds, particularly after the Panel viewed a short film sho\nng high reflectivity of seagulls in bright sunlight. c. P.I.L. description of the objects sighted as "circular, bluish-white" in color would be expected in cases of spectacular reflections of sunlight from convex surfaces where the brilliance of the reflection would obscure other portions of the object. ~~.!lW'~fllli:!-<t~ -"D"""'·l5't-"C"' "l'f',..l!i "'"''!"~~~..,.,.~ .. .-~~..~~~.~~~·~·~1\ "'' .. ·. •.• - Approved For Release 2001/08/07 :-efA--RDP81R00560R000100030027-0
Report, cited by the archive. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is under it. 29 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.