Wednesday, May 22, 2013

Mystery UFO Filmed Over Ipswich | VIDEO



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Mystery UFO Filmed Over Ipswich 5-18-13

By x-small

      A GREEN UFO that lit up the night sky over Ipswich has the man who saw it and experts in the field baffled.

"I've never seen anything like it before," UFO Research Queensland president Sheryl Gottschall said.

Booval's Arthur Sollitt took a video recording of the bizarre object and after replaying the video many times he is still none the wiser.

"As far as I am concerned it is an unidentified flying object, but whether it is earth-made or something from outer space... you just wouldn't know," he said. . . .

UFO Photos Snapped By Local Woman Over Santee, California | VIDEO


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Local Woman Snapped Photos of UFO Over Santee, California 5-22-13

By Janet Kwak
www.10news.com
5-22-13

      SANTEE, Calif. - 10News went looking for answers after a local woman snapped photos of an unidentified object flying over Santee.

Ellen Henry told 10News her camera stopped working after snapping photos at a historical barn.

Henry said she is convinced that whatever she saw hovering over Santee's Edgmoore Barn is not from this world. She did not want to show her face on camera because she said she was still spooked by what she captured.

"I was like what was it doing there," said Henry. "Why was it there? What was it doing? And I said, the next time I come here, the barn will be beamed up." . . .

Details of Alleged Photographic Evidence Re Roswell UFO Crash Leaked To The Public!


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RAAF Captures Flying Saucer


Aztec is (really) Roswell


By RRRGroup
5-20-13

      A recent discovery of material, thought to be linked to the Roswell incident, seems, indeed, to be so.

While the provenance of that material is being sought, evidence that it derives from the 1947 Roswell area is circumstantially solid.

Here’s the scenario, as we understand it…..

A group of geologists, working in an area north of Roswell, stumbled upon an Army mop-up of what appeared to be an accident.

An accident is inferred by the “evidence” gathered and extant – currently provided to news media and research facilities for their evaluation.

One of the geologists, despite being warned along with his colleagues, not to obtain any information from the accident site, did snap, surreptitiously, some photos of what the group had inadvertently come across.

The geologists were also cautioned not to discuss what they had seen.

The evidence remained hidden until, by happenstance, it was recovered during a legal matter, and subsequently proffered to members of Kevin Randle’s Dream team.

Following the scrutiny the evidence has been subject to, one finds that the “evidence” supports elements of the Aztec crashed-saucer story, recounted by Frank Scully in his 1950 book, Behind the Flying Saucers.

The geologist whose wife had squirreled away the evidence was a working intimate of Silas Newton, one of the Scully informants, who was, along with Leo Gebauer, ultimately discredited by machinations of the U.S. government and the U.S. Air Force.

To keep her husband from the Newton/GeBauer fate, the geologist’s wife kept his Roswell evidence hidden until its recent find after her death.

But how does Aztec become connected to Roswell?

While the Aztec story began, allegedly, at a lecture by an “unidentified” scientist at the University of Denver in March 1950, Frank Scully became privy to details of the Roswell crash, via Silas Newton and Leo GeBauer who had obtained information about the Roswell incident from intimates in the government with whom they worked in their oil companies and related research.

Scully, initially, was not given the location of the supposed saucer crash but received the location from Silas Newton who was told by Dr, Gee (Leo GeBauer) that the crashed saucer was near Aztec.

Passing on the Roswell information to Scully caused anxieties of an extreme kind to the government when its agencies found out that Scully had been given suppressed information about what happened near Roswell in 1947, but relocated to Aztec in 1948, to prevent the Roswell crash from becoming “unsecret.”

The government arranged for GeBauer and Newton to corrupt the information they had already provided to Scully.

Aztec had experienced a strange episode in 1948, one similar in scope to the Roswell incident but not well supported as Roswell had been.

Roswell had experienced a true saucer crash, with a recovery of bodies, while Aztec’s saucer and bodies were not clearly defined and its supporting evidence was evanescent.

The Air Force decided to mix, using GeBauer and Newton, the Roswell “facts” with the Aztec “non-facts.”

Should Scully’s book become grist for a national awareness that flying saucers were, indeed, craft of extraterrestrial visitors -- which it did – the content could be debunked easily, full of rumored information rather than actual information which was what Roswell had produced.

Roswell’s information was suppressed by all the hither-dither that has become the bulk of the Roswell myth.

Scully’s book was prepared to reopen the Roswell story so Scully’s venue was shifted to Aztec, where the information was iffy, at best.

The ploy did not work initially, and Scully’s book became a headliner.

The Air Force then had to rid the Scully oeuvre of its essential informants: GeBaurer and Newton, credible men at the time and well-connected.

A case of fraud was concocted against Scully’s confidants, and promoted by an expose in a book by San Francisco reporter, J.P. Cahn.

Newton and GeBauer were convicted of fraud, and Scully’s story was dismissed as a tale conceived to perpetuate the fraud.

Aztec was and is tainted by that fraud conviction and Roswell was not opened to new scrutiny as its renewal was stifled by its being wrapped into the Aztec story, and disguised thereby.

The story and evidence of alien bodies derives from Roswell and ended up in Aztec per Scully: Page 26 ff. (in the Popular Library paperback, 1951)

Metal remnants (debris) was intrinsic to Roswell but was inserted into the bogus Aztec scenario per Scully: pages 40/159 (in the Popular Library paperback, 1951)

Scully was, indeed, duped but not by Silas Newton and Leo GeBauer alone, but rather by a brilliant disinformation contrivance of the U.S. Air Force.

Yes, Scully was proffered material documenting a flying saucer crash, but that material pertained to Rowell.

Yes, his wife did see photos of unearthly bodies, but those photos came from the Roswell incident and will factor into the new Roswell probe.

Yes, something did happen near Aztec in 1948, but that something was prosaic and mundane by Roswell standards.

Aztec is a cover story, nothing more.

It’s Roswell where the “action” really took place, and the new evidence, when revealed, will bear that out.

Read Behind the Flying Saucers to really see what happened near Roswell in July 1947.

Monday, May 20, 2013

UFOs Interfering with US Missiles; Former Capt. Bob Salas Opened The Flood Gates on This Aspect of the UFO Phenomenon

Former Capt. Bob Salas


Robert Salas and Me


Kevin Randle     By Kevin Randle
A Different Perspective
5-19-13

     While in Roswell a couple of years ago, I shared, briefly, a table with Robert Salas of Malmstrom missile fame. He was a little more serious about selling his book than I was in selling mine and at one point he snapped at me for joking with the UFO museum patrons. I hadn’t spoken to him since that time in Roswell. I mention this for the context it will provide for some later comments here.

At the recent Citizen Hearing I saw him again. At the Sunday evening dinner for those who were participating in some fashion… that is, the former members of Congress, the witnesses which included researchers, and those volunteers who helped Steve Bassett to organize the Hearing, I made my way up front to speak with Bassett. On my way back I passed the table where Salas sat. He looked up at me and I said, “You can say, ‘hello,’” which, of course he did.

The next day, we ended up on the bus arranged to transport everyone from the hotel to the National Press Club and back. We were the only two on it, and we spoke again, briefly. I asked him a couple of questions about what had happened at Oscar Flight in 1967.

I have said it before and I’ll say it again. If Salas was alone in his claims, then we could reject them simply because you’d expect others to have had similar experiences. Of course, there was a series of UFO sightings near Belt, Montana on the day that Salas claimed the UFO caused the missiles of Oscar Flight to “go off-line.” And, there were the documented events of Echo Flight which had happened just days before when all ten of their missiles did the same thing. In other words, Salas was not alone, and the other man in the capsule with him at the time, Fred Meiwald, confirmed the event.

There was a minor discrepancy. Salas said all the missiles had gone off line but his boss, Meiwald said only four or five. In the original information, Salas, according to what he said to me, “Split the different and I said eight.” He now has said all ten were involved.

Swearing in of the Missileers at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., May 2013

Meiwald, interviewed by others including Robert Hastings for UFOs and Nukes, confirmed what Salas had said. The missiles had gone off-line, in essence failed. Combined with the documentation about Echo Flight, the words of Salas took on added weight. In fact, Salas appeared in Washington, D.C. with two other officers who had been assigned to missile flights at other military bases who had experiences with UFOs. In other words, there are a number of reports of this sort and contrary to what the Condon Committee said this was a matter of national security.

I suppose I could point out here that all said they had been required, at the time, to sign nondisclosure agreements. They wouldn’t reveal what they knew and would not talk to others at their bases about this. It was a way to keep the information from spreading among the missile crews.

At any rate, we chatted on the short ride from the National Press Club to the hotel. Salas gave me a little more information and a slight preview of what he would say the next afternoon in front of the committee. I was there to watch, listened to Salas as he reported what he had seen, heard and done, and then listened to two other officers say some of the same things. UFOs had penetrated the missile sites and shut down the missile guidance systems. If an outside source could do that, it was a matter of national security. At the time, if the Soviets had been able to do that, they could have rendered our entire strategic missile system useless. They could shut it down from outside the system and prevent retaliation. But, of course, they didn’t have that capability, but in the 1960s and the 1970s, nobody knew that for certain.

It was sometime Thursday afternoon that I bumped into Salas again. It was just after several men from around the world had told of their experiences with UFOs and their governments attitudes about UFOs had testified. Salas came up to me and wondered if I could help him sell some of his books… It was a joke, related to what we had our spat about in Roswell. For those interested, his book is Faded Giant written with Jim Klotz is available at Amazon and probably other on line bookstores.

The real point here is that Salas opened the floodgates on this one aspect of the UFO phenomenon. He was among the first to talk about UFOs interfering with US missiles. Others, such as those who testified with him, and Jim Penniston and John Burroughs who had testified that morning, suggest that UFOs have interfered with our atomic weapons (which, I must point out here might not be a bad thing but that slides off into the realm of political opinion and not relevant here). All of that made for compelling testimony (and now we can hear that Rendlesham was a lighthouse and rabbit holes), and even if it was not alien in nature, national security was involved. Someone, or something, had caused the trouble at the missile sites.

Say what you will about Salas, he is not stand alone… and for me, he seems to have mellowed a little bit as well. Such is the world in which we travel.

Citizen Hearing on Disclosure:
Remarkable Revelations Undercut By Distressing Disinformation


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Citizen Hearing on Disclosure

By Robert Hastings
www.ufohastings.com
5-18-12

     Although I was repeatedly invited—pestered, actually—by Stephen Bassett to participate in the hearing, I chose not to lend my name and credible research to the event. Over the past 40 years I have interviewed more than 140 U.S. military veterans, regarding their involvement in UFO incidents at nuclear weapons sites. Seven of those individuals participated in my September 27, 2010 "UFOs and Nukes" press conference in Washington D.C., which CNN streamed live:


Even though I decided not to be a part of Bassett's recent affair, the co-sponsor of my press conference, former U.S. Air Force Captain Robert Salas, became involved, asking three other USAF veterans to join him. Each of them—Captain Bruce Fenstermacher, Captain David Schindele, and Technical Sergeant David Scott—had independently approached me over the past three years and revealed their nukes-related UFO experiences.

Salas believed that the hearing would provide valuable public exposure for those incidents, and his own, which involved the mysterious shutdown of 10 widely-separated nuclear missiles at Malmstrom Air Force Base's Oscar Flight, on March 24, 1967, just as a glowing red, disc-shaped UFO was observed hovering over the central launch control facility.

Moments before the four men began to testify about those encounters at ICBM sites, Stephen Bassett took the microphone and said that their impending statements would be "the most important" revelations during the five-day event, which included some 40 witnesses. Quite a statement. Sitting next to the vets was researcher Richard Dolan, I guess as a substitute for me, sort of.

So why did I decline to participate? As I noted in an open email, circulated shortly after the event:
All,

As I told a friend, when he asked me to assess the Citizen Hearing before it happened, "Nothing is black or white. Some good will come from it, however, I suspect that the negatives will outweigh the positives and I am concerned that the ex-USAF missileers who've decided to participate will end up being unfairly associated with the less-than-credible witnesses."

Well, given that former U.S. Senator Mike Gravel (D-Alaska) took the Air Force veterans seriously and went so far as to say that their statements were the "smoking gun" that confirmed that there was/is a government cover-up on UFOs, I would say that I was correct about the good part.

Also, serious researchers were in evidence, including Peter Davenport and Kevin Randle, to name two. And credible whistleblowers, such as retired FAA administrator John Callahan.

But as I watched the hearings, all five days, it became clear that I was also correct about the bad part. Bassett has never vetted his witnesses, refuses to do so, probably doesn't even know how, and it frequently showed. So, it's not surprising that there was more than a little BS, wishful thinking, and unwitting participation in hoaxes and disinformation ops.

Welcome to the Wonderful World of Ufology.

However, given how rare it is for a high-level government type to say something affirming about UFOs and the cover-up of same—even though Sen. Gravel left Washington in 1981—I decided to issue this press release.

It has already received some useful attention. The debunkers will say that I am posting it just to sell books. That's what they always fall back on, since the information I have collected over the years from military veterans is credible, documented, and hard to refute.

Robert
Over the past few days, various recipients of that email have asked me to elaborate on one or two points, so I am doing so here. In particular, there is curiosity regarding my remark about some ufologists having been duped by hoaxers and government disinformation agents. The remainder of this article and, importantly, the links that follow it, will address this topic:

Decades ago, no later than 1990, overwhelming evidence emerged which confirmed the fraudulent nature of the so-called MJ-12 documents. No matter how many times certain researchers—who should know better—suggest or outright claim that they are legitimate, one glaring fact remains: Not a single "document" has a verifiable provenance, confirming its origin within the U.S. government network of departments and agencies.

On the contrary, exhaustive work done by Barry Greenwood, Dr. Kevin Randle, Jan Aldrich, Brad Sparks, the late Bob Todd, and myself—as well as others—makes clear the bogus origin(s) of the alleged documents. Whether they were created by still-unidentified hoaxers, or now-exposed disinformation agents working for the Air Force Office of Special Investigations—or a combination of the two—remains in dispute. However, the forensic and anecdotal data are damning.

Except, of course, to those who have a vested interest in the documents being for-real, either due to their own insupportable biases, their lack of understanding about the basic requirements for document-verification, or the general gullibility they have displayed with distressing and seemingly oblivious abandon over the past several years.

Because MJ-12 reared its ugly head again at the Citizen Hearing, I felt this article would be timely. Despite claims by Linda Moulton Howe regarding the so-called "SOM 1-01 field manual" being genuine, and the embarrassing video of "the dying CIA agent" who discussed his supposed knowledge of MJ-12 for Howe and Richard Dolan, there is every indication that the "manual" is fraudulent, and it is a virtual certainty that the testimony of the "agent" is equally bogus.

Links to my most recent article on MJ-12, and updates, published in 2009, have been inserted at the end of this one. I also recommend reading these articles by Bob Todd and Barry Greenwood in the now-defunct newsletter Just Cause:
greenwoodufoarchive.com/Just_Cause_Greenwood/1990_03_n23.pdf

greenwoodufoarchive.com/Just_Cause_Greenwood/1989_09_n21.pdf
Also check out these very relevant blog posts by Dr. Kevin Randle:
Del Rio UFO Crash and MJ-12

MJ-12 is DEAD
In conclusion, while I am gratified that the collective testimony of the ex-USAF nuclear missile launch officers and ex-missile guard at the Citizen Hearing was well-received by the former members of congress and the media, it remains problematic that a forum used for such authentic, important revelations was also a conduit for the kind of water-muddying nonsense offered up by others.

If Steve Bassett views himself as some valiant leader in the fight for governmental honesty on the UFO topic—and he certainly does—it should be noted that others see him as a thoroughly reckless, narcissistic, self-aggrandizer whose credo is "The end justifies the means".

That type of thinking has derailed legitimate revolutions throughout human history and the fact that Bassett remains oblivious to this makes him all the more an impediment to the process of true, meaningful Disclosure.

One of the links below, a radio interview, lays bare his view on vetting witnesses, which is to say he won't. Consequently, as in the past, future Bassett events will undoubtedly be a confused jumble of credible, valuable information mixed up with wholly unsubstantiated, over-the-top claims paraded as tantalizing glimpses of The Real, Inside Story of UFOs.

No wonder the skeptics scoff. Surely the public deserves better.

Important Links:

“Operation Bird Droppings”


“OBD Update 1”

“OBD Update 2”

This interview makes clear Bassett’s unwillingness to “separate the wheat from the chaff” by vetting his witnesses. (Scroll down To player; begin at 1:14:40)

Sunday, May 19, 2013

Bigelow Aerospace Director Responds to UFO Queries (Video)

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Mike Gold - Director of Operations for Bigelow Aerospace

By Alejandro Rojas
www.openminds.tv
5-18-13

     YouTuber Shepherd Johnson got an impromptu interview with the Director of Operations for Bigelow Aerospace, Mike Gold. He was attempting to get information on the FAA’s UFO reports, which are forwarded to a division within Bigelow Aerospace.

Gold looked a bit hesitant and embarrassed when he was first approached and asked about Bigelow Aerospace Advanced Space Studies (BAASS), a controversial department in Bigelow Aerospace. Gold replied that he was not a part of that division, “so I can’t really talk about BAAS.”

Shepard then asked about the FAA being instructed to forward UFO reports to BAASS. Gold laughed, and said, “Here we go!”

Gold then came back with a surprising response, “I personally find the subject matter very interesting.” Gold continued, saying that he looked to the work of Kepler, and the discoveries of exoplanets, which leads him to conclude, “I think the galaxy is most likely teeming with life. As a matter of fact that is what science is teaching us.’

Johnson interrupted, pressing Gold for information on UFO reports . . ..

Friday, May 17, 2013

Dr. Eric W. Davis, of NASA's Breakthrough Physics Propulsion Project, Discussed UFOs During Lecture | VIDEO


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Dr. Eric W. Davis

By J. Maynard Gelinas
The UFO Chronicles
5-15-13

     Dr. Eric W. Davis, formerly a contract research physicist at NASA's Breakthrough Propulsion Project, which ran from 1996 through to 2002, gave a lecture in 2010 where he responded to the question of UFOs as they pertain to potential physics for traversable wormholes, warp drives, and anti-gravity. Sponsored by the Society for Scientific Exploration, the lecture was about a then recently published book, Frontiers of Propulsion Science, regarding discoveries from the NASA project. After the lecture, during a question and answer session, one questioner asked whether, "...properties of UFOs had guided the thinking and research of that initiative." In responding to the question, Dr. Davis said, "Secretly yes and overtly no."

In giving a reason for the secrecy, he stated that, "UFOs don't have credibility with mainstream academic researchers," and that, "...policy makers and decision-makers in charge of funding and programatics ... don't want to hear the topic of UFOs. So, for the purpose of doing this officially, [we didn't bring in UFOs], but we did consider it under the table."

Dr. Davis was a technical consultant to the NASA project. He obtained a PhD in Astrophysics from the University of Arizona in 1991, was a co-founder of a joint NASA-JSC's Advanced Deep Space Transport Technology Assessment group studying advanced propulsion physics, and has authored several papers on zero-point vacuum physics for propulsion as well as the potential of traversable wormholes.

Delving further into the subject, Dr. Davis noted that some members had, "...looked at all the physical events and physical descriptions [of UFO data] provided by researchers such as [Jacques Vallee, George Hathaway, and the unnamed questioner]." He described two events that took place at the NIDS Utah Ranch of, "...one scientist and one researcher seeing a wormhole, what looked like a wormhole, with a creature crawling through." In the second event, "...the ranch owners had seen an opening in the sky in broad daylight with a triangular craft that came through it." Dr. Davis then compared these observations with known wormhole physics. "...that's an example of data that indicates a wormhole involved. Geometry tells you what a wormhole looks like when it intersects our space. It appears as [an intensely bright] point of light and then, as the intersection gets larger and larger, it opens up and you begin to see the hole." At that point, he noted, objects could traverse the wormhole.

NIDS Ranch refers to the National Institute for the Discovery of Science, more colloquially known as Skinwalker Ranch. A property situated near Ballard, Utah, it's known for historical UFO, cattle mutilation, and other paranormal legends. Reclusive billionaire Robert Bigelow bought it in 1996 as part of an effort to fund a long-term study of these claimed phenomena.

Discussing the matter of UFOs and warp drives, Dr. Davis stated that, "We haven't seen performances that adhere to the warp drive because ... basically it's just between stars and we don't see UFOs warping anywhere. We see then doing ninety-degree turns and rapid motions. They disappear and reappear. That is undetermined yet."

He finally commented on the matter of anti-gravity, "...we have anti-gravity in Einstein's General Theory of Relativity. ... There are aspects of anti-gravity, the properties of negative vacuum energy, that would create a repulsive force that allows something to levitate up. And UFOs do exhibit that."

In explaining how, he referred to Dr. Hal Puthoff's Polarized Vacuum Model where, "...instead of space-time [in traditional Relativity], you envision space-time as a polarized vacuum of a quantum zero point fluctuations. And, if you exert a field on that medium, the fluctuations are polarized, [and] that creates a space-time bending effect similar to warp drive and wormholes. We see that in aspects of what's predicted."

The Breakthrough Propulsion Project was disbanded at NASA in 2002 due to funding shortfalls. Dr. Davis is now a research physicist at the Institute for Advanced Studies-Austin, and is CEO of the company Warp Drive Metrics. He’s published scholarly and speculative literature on such matters quantum teleportation, traversable wormholes, and advanced propulsion physics. He is currently scheduled to speak at the 2013 MUFON (Mutual UFO Network) symposium on the topic of warp drives and wormhole research.


FULL TRANSCRIPT FOLLOWS:

Audience Question: Is there any thought to using the known properties of UFOs as a guide to your thinking and research?

Dr. Eric W. Davis: The answer is yes and no. Secretly, yes and overtly no. Because the mainstream academics don’t like the topic of UFOs and they really don’t have any credibility with them, especially with policy-makers and decision-makers in charge of funding and programatics. They don’t want to hear the topics of UFOs. So, for the purpose of doing this officially [we didn’t bring in UFOs], but we did consider it under the table.

And yes, there is a subset of us who have looked at UFO data. And we’ve looked at all the physical events and physical descriptions that have been provided by investigators from Jacques Vallee to yourself, and whatnot, and George Hathaway and so forth. And we’ve been able to use that data as input to give us an idea, and that data does drive the concepts that we did derive later on [when we did] the book and went into the original NASA program. Like warp drives and wormholes. For example, at the NIDS Utah Ranch, where I used to work for Bob Bigelow for six years, we had the experience of one scientist and one investigator seeing a wormhole – what looked like a wormhole – with a creature crawling through, and then the ranch owners had seen an opening in the sky in broad daylight with a triangular craft that came through it. Well, that’s an example of data that indicates there’s a wormhole involved. I mean, geometry tells you what a wormhole looks like when it intersects our space. It appears as a very bright – intensely bright – point of light and then, as the intersection gets larger and larger, it opens up and you begin to see the hole. And, things would be going in and out of it. So, that’s an example of two datasets that we verified at the NIDS Utah Ranch that match what I know as a physicist what a wormhole would do.

Warp drives. We haven’t seen UFOs do performances that adhere to the warp drive, because the warp drive… basically it’s just between stars and we don’t see UFOs warping anywhere or warping around. We see them doing ninety degree turns and rapid motions; they disappear and reappear. That is undetermined yet. I would think that wormhole is a big possibility still. I’m trying to think of anything else. I would think that anti-gravity – we have anti-gravity in Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity and I cover that in my chapter in the book; one of my three chapters. There are aspects of anti-gravity, the properties of negative vacuum energy that would create a repulsive force that allows something to levitate up. And UFOs do exhibit that. So there’s Hal Putthoff’s Polarized Vacuum Model. It’s a different form of Relativity where instead of a space-time you envision space-time as a polarized vacuum of a quantum zero point fluctuations. And, if you exert a field on that medium, the fluctuations are polarized, that creates a space-time bending effect similar to warp drive and wormholes. So, we see that. We see that in aspects of what’s predicted.

Thursday, May 16, 2013

UFO FOIA Requesters Make Our Government More Transparent

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FOIA

How UFO believers make our government more transparent

By Dana Liebelson
theweek.com
5-16-13

      "Every major military agency receives an enormous amount of requests about UFOs."

There is a group of people in America that may be more committed to prying documents from the government than just about anyone else: People who believe that Unidentified Flying Objects are real.

UFO believers have been dutifully trying to prove the existence of alien lifeforms for decades, largely by submitting countless Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests. These requests are so exhaustive, they've actually spawned new laws for how government decides to give up its other (more mundane) secrets.

"There are individuals who file FOIA requests every single time a new report of a UFO comes in, asking all the relevant agencies to look for mentions of a triangular object" says Kel McClanahan, an attorney specializing in national security and privacy law. "Every major military agency receives an enormous amount of requests about UFOs."

One of those FOIA requesters is 32-year-old John Greenewald Jr., a television producer and writer in North Hollywood, Calif. He says he's filed hundreds of FOIA requests about UFOs. He filed his first request when he was 15, and received a four-page document detailing the 1976 Tehran UFO encounter that read "like an X-Files episode." After that, he says he "was hooked," and has since amassed more than 700,000 pages of government documents, most of which he's posted online.

He's not the only one. Larry Bryant, who spent decades writing for U.S. Army publications, claims that he has "filed more UFO-related lawsuits in federal court than has anyone else in the entire universe."

It's not unusual for a UFO FOIA case to make it to court. In a 1981 case, Ground Saucer Watch v. CIA, William Spaulding, head of a small UFO group, alleged that the CIA was hiding information about the "Robertson panel," a government intelligence advisory committee that met in 1953 to investigate a spate of UFO sightings. The group filed a FOIA lawsuit, which forced the CIA to conduct a search of all UFO-related documents — even if it was a piece of paper stuck under a secretary's desk. . . .

NASA's Planet-Hunting Kepler Telescope is Broken | VIDEO


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Kepler Telescope



Kepler Space Telescope's Planet-Hunting Days May Be Numbered, NASA Announces

By ALICIA CHANG
The Huffington Post
5-15-13

      LOS ANGELES — NASA's planet-hunting Kepler telescope is broken, potentially jeopardizing the search for other worlds where life could exist outside our solar system.

If engineers can't find a fix, the failure could mean an end to the $600 million mission's search, although the space agency wasn't ready to call it quits Wednesday. The telescope has discovered scores of planets but only two so far are the best candidates for habitable planets.

"I wouldn't call Kepler down-and-out just yet," said NASA sciences chief John Grunsfeld.

NASA said the spacecraft lost the second of four wheels that control its orientation in space. With only two working wheels left, it can't point at stars with the same precision.

In orbit around the sun, 40 million miles from Earth, Kepler is too far away to send astronauts on a repair mission like the way Grunsfeld and others fixed a mirror on the Hubble Space Telescope. Over the next several weeks, engineers on the ground will try to restart Kepler's faulty wheel or find a workaround. The telescope could be used for other purposes even if it can no longer track down planets. . . .

Scientists Agree (Again): Climate Change Is Happening


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Scientists Agree (Again): Climate Change Is Happening

By Tom Zeller Jr.
www.huffingtonpost.com
5-16-13

      Public opinion on the topic of climate change is notoriously fickle, changing -- quite literally sometimes -- with the weather. The latest bit of evidence on this: Yale's April 2013 climate change survey, which found, among other things, that Americans' conviction that global warming is happening had dropped by seven points, to 63 percent, over the preceding six months. The decline, the authors surmised, was most likely due to "the cold winter of 2012-13 and an unusually cold March just before the survey was conducted."

A far smaller percentage -- 49 percent -- understood that human activities are contributing to the problem.

People and surveys being what they are, these numbers tend to jump around a bit from year to year. At the same time, 49 percent is nearly half the country, so it wouldn't be excessively cheerful (would it?) to note that half of the American public is more or less in harmony with basic science -- at least as it relates to climate change. Given that roughly the same number of Americans flatly reject evolution, the climate numbers represent a comparative bounty of enlightenment.

That's not something you hear very often when it comes to surveys of Americans. Delving deeper into the textbooks, for instance, another recent study showed that less than half of population was clear on whether atoms are smaller than electrons, or whether lasers work by focusing sound waves. In this light (ahem), the larger consensus on global warming is notable. (Answers on atoms and lasers appear at the end of this column.)

But a far more troubling metric from Yale's latest poll suggests that only 42 percent of Americans believe that most scientists think global warming is happening. A full 33 percent of respondents are convinced that there remains "widespread disagreement" among scientists on this question. This is a problem -- both because it is so at odds with reality, and because it likely helps prevent more Americans from recognizing and accepting some pretty straightforward scientific realities.

It is this reason that prompted a team of researchers to painstakingly comb through the abstracts of more than 12,000 scientific articles published between 1991 and 2011 to determine just how much scientific agreement exists on the subject of climate change, and humanity's role in driving it. . . .




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