Documents / FOIA release
This Central Intelligence Agency document, dated 3 January 1953, records the comments and suggestions of the Scientific Advisory Panel on Unidentified Flying Objects, which met 14 to 17 January 1953. The panel reviewed case histories including Tremonton, Great Falls, Washington and Haneda and concluded that it found no evidence of a direct threat to national security or of extraterrestrial origin. It rejected the Navy's analysis of the Tremonton film and recommended an educational program of training and debunking, supported by ATIC.
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action would benefit a training and educational program (see below). The writings of Charles Fort were referenced to show that "strange things in the sky" had been recorded for hundreds of years. It appeared obvious that there was no single explanation for a majority of the things seen. ## On Lack of Danger. The Panel concluded unanimously that there was no evidence of a direct threat to national security in the objects sighted. Instances of "Foo Fighters" were cited. These were unexplained phenomena sighted by aircraft pilots during World War II in both European and Far East theaters of operation wherein "balls of light" would fly near or with the aircraft and maneuver rapidly. They were believed to be electrostatic (similar to St. Elmo's fire) or electromagnetic phenomena or possibly light reflections from ice crystals in the air, but their exact cause or nature was never defined. If the term "flying saucers" had been popular in 1943-1945, these objects would have been so labeled. ## Air Force Reporting System. It was the Panel's opinion that some of the Air Force concern over UFO's (notwithstanding Air Defense Command anxiety over fast radar tracks) was probably caused by public pressure. The result today is that the Air Force
FOIA release, from the cia-readingroom collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. The text was read from the page images by GLM-OCR; expect the odd misread word. 22 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.