Office of the Secretary of Defense: 25_Sky_View_Final_Draft

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traffic and with military activity suggest that people are seeing things that are human made, in
some unexpected way. As a good example, a hot air balloon seen from a far enough distance can
look unexplainable, especially if it is seen by someone who has not seen one before. Drones,
which we did not test specifically for here, can seem to fly erratically in areas where people
aren’t used to seeing things moving in the sky. It is unlikely that events, such as ball lightning,
seismic based lights, insects, or other natural occurrences are responsible for more than a small
portion of these sightings, as they are rare events themselves. We had initially expected cloud
cover to be credibly related to sightings, as clouds can cause light to scatter and by doing so,
obscure reflective or illuminated things that are moving within or above them, and create
patterns that some might consider unexplained. However, that was not the case.
While these results provide an initial assessment of factors linked to the sightings of
unidentified or unexplained phenomenon, they also generate further questions. We find credible
relationships with these factors and there are now spatial patterns that are require further
investigation. Why, for example, are the rates of sightings low in California, when they are high
in many of the surrounding states? Why do the rates of sightings fluctuate across time? Some of
our future research will include temporal considerations (e.g., variation over time) to hopefully
address some of these questions. We further note that our covariates represent average
conditions, and while these clearly explain much of the first-order pattern in sightings, additional
factors may be identified by considering individual events.
We wonder how many sightings can be explained by sociocultural factors. For example,
are there spikes of sightings after Hollywood attention is given to movies or TV shows on aliens?
Are some cultures more likely to see UAPs, because of their belief systems? Have some U.S.
regions/places been given more attention to historical UAP observations (e.g., New Mexico)?
There is no question that geography and “place” influence people’s belief systems and behavior.
In some places, the expectation of what you are supposed to see, may influence what you
actually see. In a process termed motivated perception, people may bias their perceptions to
arrive at expected conclusions that meet their goals or offer rewards (Kunda, 1990; Leong et al.,
2019). If your goal is to see a UAP, you may very well see one given the opportunity.
Many of the reports used here, given our results, may very well be explained by human
based air traffic. We do not test natural phenomena, as discussed here, e.g., ball lightning. Many
of those cases would be impossible to test for, as those occurrences are very rare and even more
rarely recorded. One potential solution to estimate this would be to use weather data that
identifies thunderstorms or other similar event activity. However, it could be the minority of
sightings that take place during weather events given their spatial and temporal distribution.
We approach this problem with caution, because of both the complexity of the topic and
the sensitivity of available data. The U.S. Government position is that “UAP clearly pose a safety
of flight issue and may pose a challenge to U.S. national security” (Office of the Director of
National Intelligence, 2021, p. 3). For national security issues, uncertainties and unknowns are
never good. It is the job of intelligence efforts to minimize the unknowns. Regardless of what
people are seeing, and whether they are military pilots, civilian pilots, or general bystanders,Page determined to be Unclassified
Reviewed by Chief of Staff, AARO
IAW FY24 NDAA, Section 1841 (a)(1)(C)
Date: 02/06/2025