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.
“Sightings”16 pages
'0. Approved For Re.se 2001/08/07: CIA-RDP81R00560R.00030027-0 k. Hand "jitter 11 frequencies (obtainable from early part of Tremonton film) were not removed from the plots of the "single pass plots" at the end of the film. The Panel believed strongly that the data available on this sighting was sufficient for positive identification if further data is obtained by photographing polyethylane "pillow" balloons released near the site under similar weather conditions, checking bird flight and relfection characteristics with competent ornithologists and calculating apparent "G" fo\-ces acting upon objects from their apparent tracks. It \vas concluded that the results of such tests would prob- ably lead to creditable explanations of value in an educational or training program. However, the Panel noted that the cost in technical manpovrer effort required to follm·r up and explain every one of the thousand or more reports received through channels each year (1 1 900 in 1952) could not be justified. It was felt that there ~<rill allvays be sightsings, for -.;.;hich complete data is lacking, that can only be explained with disproportionate effort and with a long time delay, if at all. The long delay in explaining a sighting tends to eliminate any intelligence value. The educational or training program should have as a major purpose the elimination of popular feeling that every sighting, no matter how poor the data, must be explained in detail• Attention should be directed to the requirement among scientists that a new phenomena, to be accepted, must be completely and convincingly docun1ented• In other words, the burden of proof is on the sig~r, not the explainer. ~~~~"!''--~-llwi~.-i'Ji""e';-:-.n:lr"-E' -~.r ~~;~~!ton Approved For Release 2001/08/07 :t~A-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.