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☆ US government tracking more than 650 potential UFO cases, Pentagon says
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-19 | by ( Jeremy Herb | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

CNN —The US government is tracking more than 650 potential cases of so-called “unidentified aerial phenomenon,” commonly known as UFOs, according to the director of the office created last year to focus on the sightings. He played video from two of cases that had been declassified, one that had been resolved and the other unresolved. Kirkpatrick explained that this case was unresolved because there was no other evidence beyond the video. He said that in a small number of cases, he has concerns the episodes could be evidence of potential technological advancements. Those cases, he said, are handed off to the intelligence community to investigate further.

☆ Flash of light above Kyiv sparks buzz about falling satellite, aliens
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-19 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

April 19 (Reuters) - The night sky above wartime Kyiv was lit up by a flash of light on Wednesday, social media channels said, prompting speculation that a crashing satellite or even aliens might be responsible. Four short video clips posted to a Telegram channel by journalist and blogger Anatolii Sharii showed the sky suddenly illuminated by a bright light. The Kyiv city military administration, citing what it called preliminary information, said it was a crashing NASA satellite. The Ukrainian air force, responsible for trying to down missiles and drones fired by Russia, said a satellite or a meteorite could be responsible. "Please do not use official air force symbols to create memes for the enemy to enjoy!"

☆ Fact Check-Digital simulation footage of a UFO flying over Alaska shared online as authentic
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-28 | by ( Reuters Fact Check | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

Video of a UFO approaching a fighter jet over Alaska is a digital simulation. According to a Reuters report, a U.S. F-22 fighter jet did shoot down an unidentified object flying over Alaska on Feb. 10 (here). The video, however, does not depict the shootdown or the UFO approaching the fighter jet. The pilot can be heard saying “looks like something ah, some kind of object” at the beginning of the clip, as the fighter jet encounters the UFO. Footage of a UFO approaching a fighter jet over Alaska is a flight simulation.

☆ Fact Check-Debunked video of UFO over Eau Claire, Wisconsin resurfaces
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-14 | by ( Reuters Fact Check | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

A video showing a triangular, metallic object gliding through the sky has been previously identified as computer generated and Reuters found no evidence that it shows an unidentified flying object over Eau Claire, Wisconsin, as claimed on social media. Posts in March 2023 describing the clip as an authentic recording of an object flying over Wisconsin are viewable (here) and (here). However, portions of this video have been making appearances online for years, for example, an iteration of the clip posted in March 2016 to DailyMotion.com can be found (here) . Chad Hoyord, deputy chief of the Eau Claire Police, told Reuters via email that his department was “not aware of any reports of this nature in the City of Eau Claire.” Reuters did not find any verifiable evidence of recent UFO sightings in Eau Claire, Wisconsin either. There is no evidence to support claims that this video depicts an object flying over the city of Eau Claire, Wisconsin.

☆ From pigeon-mounted cameras to dragonfly drones, here's how aerial surveillance has evolved to spy on people over the past 200 years
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-12 | by ( James Pasley | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +1 min

A Chinese spy balloon in the US is the latest in a long history of governments spying on each other from the sky. Aerial surveillance dates back to the French Revolution to UFO rumors to the Cuban Missile Crisis. It's gone from hot air balloons to CIA gadgets to sophisticated live-streaming drones. Loading Something is loading. Here's how surveillance from the sky has developed over the years.

☆ Fact Check-Video does not show UFO sighting in Afghanistan, was likely created with CGI
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-02 | by ( Reuters Fact Check | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

A video shared on social media does not show an unidentified flying object over Afghanistan, contrary to claims on Facebook. It was seemingly created by artists specialized in computer-generated imagery (CGI). One user commenting on the subreddit said the clip was originally shared by a YouTube channel called “Section 51” (bit.ly/3JdVuLn), managed by CGI artists. The video was seemingly created by CGI artists and does not show a real UFO sighting in Afghanistan. Read more about our work to fact-check social media posts here .

☆ 5 times scientists thought they'd maybe discovered signs of extraterrestrial life but sadly didn't
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-23 | by ( Morgan Mcfall-Johnsen | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

Extraterrestrial life could exist, but mysterious objects in the sky aren't evidence of aliens. Scientists have thought they were close to discovering alien life a few times — none of it via UFOs. As the US discovered a flurry of UFOs — officially called "unidentified anomalous phenomena," or UAPs — in early February, Google searches for "extraterrestrial life" and "are aliens real" spiked. There have been incidents in the past where some researchers thought they'd come close to discovering signs of alien life — or even extraterrestrial intelligence — but none were UFOs. They dubbed the first interstellar object 'Oumuamua, which is a Hawaiian term meaning "a messenger from afar arriving first."

☆ Fact Check-Video shows rocket launch in South Korea, not a UFO in Poland
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-22 | by ( Reuters Fact Check | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

A video of a rocket launch in South Korea from December 2022 has been miscaptioned by social media users in posts claiming that it shows a UFO in Poland. One post (here) includes a caption that reads, “The air force shoots down a UFO in Poland. A Google search for the words “South Korea UFO” (bit.ly/3Ivw0Zq) reveals many news reports of a rocket launch in South Korea causing a UFO scare among residents who had no knowledge of it. The caption reads, “The light trail is seen in Goyang, South Korea, Friday, Dec. 30, 2022. The video shows a rocket launch in South Korea that happened in December 2022.

☆ The UFO shoot-downs show the hardest part of discovering alien life may be announcing it. Here's how NASA might break the news.
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-18 | by ( Morgan Mcfall-Johnsen | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +9 min

Extraterrestrial life likely wouldn't show up as flying objects, but finding it could cause similar chaos. An illustration of the CoLD scale for determining confidence in a detection of alien life. The president or other countries could be involved in announcing extraterrestrial life existsPresident Joe Biden speaks at Delaware State University. Anna Moneymaker/Getty ImagesAnnouncing the existence of alien life would be an "administration-level" affair, Glaze said, referring to the US presidency. Needless to say, any discovery of alien life would likely lead to chaos — at least in public discourse.

☆ Fact Check-Video showing thick dark clouds predates February 2023 train derailment in Ohio
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-17 | by ( Reuters Fact Check | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

A video which has been circulating online since at least November 2022 has been shared to falsely claim it shows the aftermath of the Norfolk Southern Railroad-operated train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, on Feb. 3, 2023. This is Ohio's Chernobyl,” states a tweet sharing a video of a dark, ominous cloud (here). The TikTok user did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. Reuters found the spot the video was most likely filmed from on Google Street View (bit.ly/3XIrU4h). The video does not show the sky over Ohio following the Feb. 3 train derailment, it dates to at least November 2022.

☆ ‘UFO’: A Military Term Abducted by Fans of Aliens
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-17 | by ( Ben Zimmer | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Linguist and lexicographer Ben Zimmer analyzes the origins of words in the news. Read previous columns here. The U.S. military recently dispatched fighter jets over North American airspace to shoot down three...well, what exactly?

☆ Joe Biden’s Unexplained UFO Silence
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-16 | by ( Daniel Henninger | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

A half week after the U.S. government used fighter jets firing Sidewinder missiles to shoot down three “objects” over North America—an event with no precedent—and more than a week after the destruction of a large Chinese spy balloon, it’s obvious the Biden White House isn’t going to tell the American people what this is all about. On Tuesday, the White House’s national-security spokesman, John Kirby said the Alaska, Yukon and Lake Huron shootdowns really were about protecting civilian air traffic, notwithstanding that nothing like this fantastic statistical anomaly has happened in the days since.

☆ Fact Check-Star Wars promotional video shared online as footage of a downed UFO
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-15 | by ( Reuters Fact Check | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

A Star Wars promotional video created in 2014 by the German media company Sky Deutschland is being shared online with the false claim that it shows a downed UFO in Alaska in February 2023. Later in the clip, individuals dressed as stormtroopers, soldiers in the U.S. film franchise Star Wars, can be seen as the car heads towards the remains of the aircraft. A reverse image search of the video led to an article by CNET about this video published in 2014 (here). The YouTube title similarly links the clip to the Star Wars franchise. The clip shows a Star Wars-themed promotional video created in 2014.

☆ Fact Check-Video shows a Goodyear blimp, not a UFO or alien spacecraft
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-15 | by ( Reuters Fact Check | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

A video of a Goodyear blimp flying over New Jersey in 2020 is being shared online as if it is recent footage of a UFO. A tweet sharing the video said: “UFO BREAKING: REAL ALIEN SPACECRAFT CAPTURED ON HIGHWAY” (here). CBS 8 San Diego aired a closer view of the Goodyear blimp at the time, acknowledging that residents confused the blimp for a UFO (here). In 2018, an alleged UFO sighting turned out to be a Goodyear blimp covering a NASCAR race, according to news reports at the time (here) and (here). The object in the video is a Goodyear blimp in New Jersey in 2020, not a recent UFO sighting.

☆ Fact Check-Video said to show UFO hitting the moon is CGI
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-14 | by ( Reuters Fact Check | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

A video allegedly showing a UFO hitting the moon was created by a 3D artist, but users online are sharing the video as if it really showed an object near the moon. Now a UFO hitting the moon #ufotwitter Now something is landing on the moon” (here). A search for the clip shared online leads to a video by the same user, @Aleksey__n, on YouTube from May 18, 2021 (here). Users online have repeatedly shared videos created by the 3D artist as if they were real (here). The clip shared online originates from a 3D artist who routinely shares videos created by using CGI.

☆ Chinese Spy Balloons and the UFO Obfuscation
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-14 | by ( Holman W. Jenkins | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Not many things with significant mass are drifting around tens of thousands of feet up. An unidentified object may be the size of a “small car,” as one pilot report passed along by the Pentagon claims, but it’s not a car. It may look “cylindrical,” as another states, but steel drums aren’t floating in the thin air at 20,000 feet. If it doesn’t have an engine and wings, it’s a balloon, thousands of which have no military purpose. The White House, so far, has been sure only that the objects weren’t alien spacecraft.

China widened its dispute with the United States on Monday, claiming that U.S. high-altitude balloons had flown over its airspace without permission more than 10 times since the beginning of 2022. Washington called that a surveillance balloon, while China has insisted it was a weather-monitoring craft blown badly off course. A White House spokeswoman denied it, and accused China of violating the sovereignty of the United States and more than 40 other countries across five continents with surveillance balloons linked to its military. "It has repeatedly and wrongly claimed the surveillance balloon it sent over the United States was a weather balloon and to this day has failed to offer any credible explanations for its intrusion into our airspace and the airspace of others." Reuters GraphicsThe three objects were flying at altitudes that could have posed a risk to air traffic, officials have said.

☆ 3 suspicious objects have been downed across North America this week. Officials have no idea where 2 of the UAP came from and the pilots who shot them down can't agree on what they even look like.
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-12 | by ( Katherine Tangalakis-Lippert | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +10 min

US fighter aircraft shot down an object threatening airspace over Alaska yesterday. On Saturday, another unknown object, described as "cylindrical," was shot down over Canada. Here is what we know about the object shot down on Friday. The object shot down on Saturday was spotted in the Northern Canadian territory of Yukon. It is unclear if the object shot down off the Alaskan coast was of similar size or shape.

☆ Teams are searching for Yukon UFO debris, Trudeau says
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-12 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

[1/2] Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau speaks to media before discussing healthcare with Provincial and Territorial premiers in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, February 7, 2023. REUTERS/Blair GableOTTAWA/WASHINGTON, Feb 12 (Reuters) - Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Sunday that investigators are hunting for wreckage of the mysterious flying object shot down by a U.S. fighter jet over Yukon territory the day before. "Recovery teams are on the ground, looking to find and analyze the object," Trudeau told reporters before departing for a previously scheduled fund-raising event in Yukon. Schumer said American officials were "focused like a laser" on figuring out what the objects were and what if any threat they posed. "They do appear somewhat trigger-happy," Turner told CNN on Sunday.

"We don't know who owns this object," said White House spokesperson John Kirby, adding that it was unclear where it began its flight. President Joe Biden ordered the shootdown, which was announced from the White House. Some lawmakers criticized the president for not shooting down the Chinese balloon sooner. The object was shot down off the coast of northeastern Alaska over frozen U.S. territorial waters near the Canadian border. UNMANNED VESSEL[1/4] White House National Security Council Strategic Communications Coordinator John Kirby takes questions during the daily press briefing at the White House in Washington, U.S. February 10, 2023.

☆ A Balloon Pops D.C.’s Myth Bubble
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-07 | by ( Holman W. Jenkins | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

For those who couldn’t figure out why I devoted four columns to the Pentagon UFO debate, this is why. It became clear that, whether from serendipity or design, national security agencies were using UFOs to hide something they didn’t want us to see. That something, it has slowly dribbled out since last May, was Chinese surveillance in U.S. airspace. Suspected Chinese drones have been a sometimes daily presence in U.S. military training sites going back perhaps a decade or more. We learn now of multiple balloon incursions too.

☆ The 3 Chinese spy balloons spotted during the Trump administration were initially classified as UFOs
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-07 | by ( Katherine Tangalakis-Lippert | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

A Chinese spy balloon seen floating over the United States was shot down on Saturday. Three spy balloons were seen during the Trump administration and were initially classified as UFOs. Trump, however, denies the balloons ever existedIn a Sunday interview with Fox News, Trump said the Biden administration lied about Chinese balloons being seen during his term because "they look so bad." It is unclear if the spy balloons seen during the Trump administration were shot down, as limited details about the incidents were only made public this week. Balloon surveillance has been utilized as far back as the 1800s, according to Al Jazeera, and was popularized during the first World War.

☆ 3 spy aircraft that were also 'weather balloons'
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-04 | by ( Blake Stilwell | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

China has said that it is a weather balloon that has gone off-course. It wouldn't be the first time that a spy balloon has been described as a weather balloon. China is probably just taking a page out of the US government 1960s-era cover-up playbook that we'll call: The ol' "Weather Balloon Dodge." Thomson ReutersThere's a reason the Department of Defense believes China's weather balloon is actually a reconnaissance balloon: The DoD is developing reconnaissance balloons of its own. If any of the massive balloons get forced down, they'd just be another weather balloon, which the National Weather Service still uses.

☆ Spy balloon witness thought it might have been a star or UFO
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-03 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

Feb 3 (Reuters) - Chase Doak was getting ready to leave work when he spotted what he thought might have been a star or even a UFO. It turned out to be a spy balloon floating high over the United States and his images have been seen around the world. The Pentagon reported on Thursday that a spy balloon it suspected is Chinese had been flying over the country for a couple of days. But it was just a run-of-the mill Chinese spy balloon!" China has itself often complained about surveillance by the United States, including its deployment of ships or planes near Chinese military exercises.

☆ Fact Check-Clip of planes pursuing flying spheroid was created by visual effects artist
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-30 | by ( Reuters Fact Check | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

A clip of a spheroid flying at speed through the air with what appears to be military planes in pursuit was created by a visual effects artist. The Twitter account under the handle @ufoofinterest that debunks UFO hoaxes or fakes online addressed the clip and identified the person who created the video (here). The account pointed out that the video was shared by visual effects artist Brandon Piskorik, who posted the video to his Instagram and Facebook on Jan 10 (here), (here). Piskorik routinely shares CGI clips via his profile, and describes himself as a filmmaker, photographer and visual effects artist (www.instagram.com/bpiskorik/). The video was created by a visual effects artist.

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