Preliminary Assessment: Unidentified Aerial Phenomena
- Type: report
- Author: Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI)
- Date: 2021-06-25
- Credibility: primary (US government official report to Congress)
- URL: https://www.dni.gov/files/ODNI/documents/assessments/Prelimary-Assessment-UAP-20210625.pdf
Summary
The first official US government report on UAPs since Project Blue Book ended in 1969. Mandated by the Senate Intelligence Committee as part of the Intelligence Authorization Act for FY2021. Prepared by the UAPTF in coordination with ODNI, the Department of Defense, the FBI, and other agencies.
Key Findings
- Examined 144 UAP reports from US government sources, mostly US Navy personnel, from 2004 to 2021. Could only identify one with high confidence (a large deflating balloon). The remaining 143 were unexplained.
- 18 incidents featured “unusual flight characteristics”: objects “appeared to remain stationary in winds aloft, move against the wind, maneuver abruptly, or move at considerable speed, without discernible means of propulsion.”
- Some UAP “released radio frequency energy” detected and processed by US military aircraft.
- 11 documented near-miss incidents with pilot aircraft.
- Established five explanatory categories: airborne clutter, natural atmospheric phenomena, USG/industry developmental programs, foreign adversary systems, and “other.”
- Did not link any sighting to extraterrestrial life. Officials stated: “We have no clear indications that there is any nonterrestrial explanation for them, but we will go wherever the data takes us.”
- Found no standard reporting mechanism existed before the Navy created one in March 2019, meaning the data was incomplete by design.
Significance
The report’s significance lies not in what it concluded but in what it did not conclude. It could not explain 143 of 144 cases. It confirmed objects with unusual flight characteristics. It acknowledged 18 cases with flight behavior that does not match known technology. But it did not claim any of this was non-human. The gap between “we can’t explain it” and “it’s alien” is enormous, and the report did not bridge it.
The classified annex, according to a person who attended the briefing (speaking anonymously), contained “little information beyond what’s publicly available.”