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NASA Information Sheet 78-1 on UFOs

NASA / DoD FOIA reading room · 1978 · 7 pages · text from the file's own layer

NASA Information Sheet 78-1, prepared by the Public Services Branch at NASA Headquarters and dated February 1, 1978, answers public UFO inquiries sent to the White House and NASA. It quotes Administrator Robert Frosch's December 1977 letter, which declines to start UFO research but offers to analyze credible physical evidence. It also summarizes the Air Force's 1969 termination of Project Blue Book and the Condon Report, and discusses astronaut sightings and Jimmy Carter's 1969 sighting over Leary, Georgia.

  • p. 3 …of a report (often called t~e Condon Report) prepared by the University of Colorado and…
  • p. 5 …available: Scientific Studv of Unidentified Flving Objects. Condon ~epcrt study conducted by the University of Colorado…
Quoting from Dr. Frosch's December 21 letter: " ..• If some
new element of hard evidence is brought to our attention in the
future, it would be entirely-appropriate for a NASA laboratory to
analyze and report upon an otherwise unexplained organic or
inorganic sample: we stand ready to respond to any bona fide
physical evidence from credible sources. We intend to leave the
door clearly open for such a possibility.
"We have given considerable thought to the question of what
else the~United States might and should do in the area of UFO
research. There is an absence of tangible or physical evidence
available for thorough laboratory analysis. And, because of
the absence of such evidence, we have not been able to devise a
sound scientific procedure for investigating these phenomena.
To proceed on a research task without a sound disciplinary
framework and an exploratory technique in mind would be wasteful
and probably unproductive.
"I do not feel that we could mount a research effort with-
out a better starting point than we have been able to ide~tify
thus far. I would therefore propose that NASA take no steps to
establish research in this area or to convene a symposium on
this subject.
2

Cases discussed

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