Page 48 - The 'X' Chronicles Newspaper - September 2021

48 Don’t Assume UFOs Are Alien Spaceships

UFOs Are Real, But Don't

Assume They're Alien
Spaceships

Aliens shouldn't be the default
explanation for weird stuff in the

sky.

By Mike Wall

UFOs are very real, as we have recently seen —
but that doesn't mean E.T. has been violating our
airspace.

"UFO" refers to any flying object an observer
cannot readily identify. And pilots with the U.S.
Navy saw fast-moving UFOs repeatedly off the
East Coast throughout 2014 and 2015, in one
case apparently nearly colliding with one of the
mysterious objects, The New York Times
reported earlier this week.

Those incidents were reported to the Pentagon's
Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification
Program (AATIP), whose existence the Times
and Politico revealed in December 2017.
(Interestingly, those 2017 stories cited Pentagon
officials as saying that AATIP had been shut
Such reasoning is bolstered by the current telescope, for example, suggest that at least 20%
down in 2012.)
tendency of UFOs to manifest as blobs or blurs percent of the galaxy's 200 billion or so stars
on the displays of advanced instruments rather likely harbor a rocky planet in the "habitable
The Navy pilots said some UFOs reached
than as crisply defined objects in cellphone zone," that just-right range of distances where
hypersonic speeds without any detectable
photos. liquid surface water could exist.
exhaust plumes, suggesting the possible
involvement of super-advanced propulsion
"The sightings always recede to the edge of what So, while the odds may be long that any UFO
technology. Still, Defense Department officials
technology allows you to do," Shostak said. witnessed to date was an extraterrestrial craft,
aren't invoking intelligent aliens as an
"The aliens are kind of keeping pace with it's far from crazy to suspect that intelligent
explanation, according to this week's Times
technology." aliens are out there somewhere (or at least were
story — and they're right to be measured in this
out there somewhere, at some point during the
respect, scientists say.
Common sense also argues against jumping to Milky Way's 13-billion-year history). That's why
the E.T. conclusion. If these UFOs are indeed people like Shostak keep listening for signals
here are multiple possible prosaic explanations
alien spacecraft, what exactly are they doing? from the sky. []
for the Navy pilots' observations, said Seth
Why were they sent here, across the vast gulfs of
Shostak, a senior astronomer at the SETI
space and time?
(Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence)
Institute in Mountain View, California.
"If the aliens are here, you gotta say they're the
best houseguests ever, because they never do
He pointed out, for example, that the sightings
anything," Shostak said. "They just buzz around.
occurred off the coast, as did a similar 2004
They don't address climate change; they don't
observation unveiled in conjunction with the
steal our molybdenum."
December 2017 stories. (That previous sighting
occurred near San Diego).
But such skepticism should not be taken as a
dismissal of the E.T. possibility, Shostak
Coastal regions are where you might expect to
stressed.
find a rival nation's advanced reconnaissance
craft, Shostak said, because incursions over the
"It's not trivial to say what these things are," he
continental United States would be more
said. And Shostak applauded a newly enacted
obvious and easily detected.
classified Navy policy, as reported by the Times,
instructing pilots on how to report UFOs (which
He also noted that, according to the recent Times
the military, and many other people, now call
story, the Navy pilots began spotting the UFOs
"unexplained aerial phenomena," likely in an
after their jets' radar system was upgraded. That
attempt to dodge the tinfoil-hat stigma
detail suggests the sightings might stem from
associated with the term "UFO.")
some sort of software bug or instrument issue,
he said.
"That's a good policy," he said. "Let them do it."

"As anybody who uses Microsoft products
After all, we've learned over the past decade or
knows, whenever you upgrade any technical
so that our Milky Way galaxy is home to huge
product, there are always problems," Shostak
numbers of potentially habitable worlds.
said.
Observations by NASA's Kepler space