UFO's Confirmed (Part 1)

I’ve seen UFO’s.

As an aerospace engineer and amateur astronomer, what would I know? Not much, it turns out.

But before we get to that, most of you have probably seen the news this week that the Pentagon has released confirmed footage of UFO’s. Therefore, aliens. Right? If you haven’t seen it you can read more here in the New York Times:

The Pentagon Released U.F.O. Videos. Don't Hold Your Breath for a Breakthrough.

On Monday, the Department of Defense formally released three Navy videos that contain "unidentified aerial phenomena." Enthusiasts were encouraged, though there was nothing new. At least, these three videos are. What the videos show? The government isn't so sure there.

What do both of these claims have in common? They both need a lot of unpacking.

Let’s start with my personal account. Most recently, on a commercial flight over the Pacific Northwest (the home of some notorious UFO sightings), I looked out over the darkness and saw an aircraft just off the left wing of the airliner, following at the same speed. I looked around for more clues.

I couldn’t make out any details, just the sheer brilliance of the white light. I could barely see stars behind it in the sky, though a few were faintly visible. My engineering training has taught me to look for subtle clues, and I’d like to believe it’s made me less susceptible to sensory illusions. I rule out any astronomical objects, as it’s simply too bright and moving too fast.

Then I noticed the giveaway. After about five minutes it was still perfectly in the same position off the wing. And I hadn’t seen it move into position either, it was just there when I opened the visor on the window. Now that I was slightly more adjusted to the dark, I could make out a few more stars behind it. Then it dawned on me. 

This was Venus. How could I have made such a miscalculation? I’ve been cautioning people about jumping to conclusions about their first-hand observations for over a decade, had I really fallen in the same trap? Absolutely.

From that high an altitude (about 30,000 ft), the air is much less dense, and most of the pollution and weather is below, meaning much less atmospheric disturbance. The ever-so-slight twinkle of stars is almost completely invisible through the much thinner air, and Venus appeared so much brighter than I remembered seeing it on the ground that I was convinced it could only be an aircraft. And because it’s so far away, it doesn’t appear to change position from the plane’s moving perspective, creating a compelling impression that it’s following.

But I can truthfully say that for those few minutes, I was observing an ‘unidentified flying object’. UFO doesn’t automatically mean aliens, it’s an admission that we don’t know. Our ground-based sensory adaptations are great for spotting predators on the plains and recognizing friendly faces in a tribe, but they are so heavily reliant on visual context that it’s easy to convince yourself a star is drifting if you just stare at it long enough. There’s a host of other visual illusions that we are uniquely susceptible to as a result of our physiology and psychology.

For today, we’ll leave on that thought. What about the Pentagon’s UFO release? Check back for part two tomorrow!

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