US DNI report: "Preliminary Assessment: Unidentified Aerial Phenomena"

[Laird]

I was just sent a copy of this report, dated 25 June 2021, and which can be downloaded from this page, but I haven't yet read it.

Roughly speaking, it says more data is needed.

[Laird]

Yep, now that I've read the report, I think that that's a fair four-word rough summary ("more data is needed"). A couple of other points I thought worth noting from it are:

First:

Of over 144 reports in total (the exact number doesn't seem to be given), the report's authors "were able to identify one reported UAP with high confidence. In that case, we identified the object as a large, deflating balloon. The others remain unexplained." That's over 144, officially recognised (by the US government) inexplicable UAP observations.

Second:

And a Handful of UAP Appear to Demonstrate Advanced Technology

In 18 incidents, described in 21 reports, observers reported unusual UAP movement patterns or
flight characteristics.

That seems to be a cautious endorsement of the idea of craft capable of movement that known human-manufactured craft are not.

I think often, the interest is not necessarily in the conclusions or statistics, but in the narrative of individual reports.

UFO report: US finds no explanation for sightings

One pilot described it as a "little white Tic-Tac-looking object", referring to the white oblong mints.

"And that's exactly what it looked like, except it was travelling very fast and very erratically and we couldn't anticipate which way it was going to turn or how it was manoeuvring the way that it was, or the propulsion system," witness and former Navy pilot Alex Dietrich told BBC News.

"It didn't have any apparent smoke trail or propulsion. It didn't have any apparent flight control surfaces to manoeuvre in the way that it was manoeuvring."

There is some open-endedness about the possible explanations, foreign adversaries such as Russia and China as examples. Though some of these phenomena (not included in this assessment) date back to years ago, when known man-made technology was less advanced, which tends to weigh against that. Though it should not be discounted.

Howard Hughes (theunexplained.tv) brief podcast on the report:

Special - Washington UFO Report

direct mp3 link: https://cdn.theunexplained.tv/media/spec...729656.mp3