NASA Going "Full Force"on UFO Research

Given the changing landscape around UFOs or, as the government calls them, Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (UAP), NASA will soon get in on the action. The space agency is gearing up to launch an extensive study into the unknown flying vessels; in fact, one official even says NASA is going "full force" on the research.

"We're going full force" NASA assistant deputy associate administrator Daniel Evans said in a town hall meeting this week (via Space.com). "This is really important to us, and we're placing a high priority on it."

According to Evans, NASA's panel will included 15 to 17 people, which will be made up of "some of the world's leading scientists, data practitioners, artificial intelligence practitioners, aerospace safety experts, all with a specific charge, which is to tell us how to apply the full focus of science and data to UAP."

The study was first announced in June, when NASA announced it planned to research the safety of UAP. The study is expected to parse through existing data and come up with procedures on recording future sightings.

"NASA believes that the tools of scientific discovery are powerful and apply here also," Thomas Zurbuchen, the associate administrator for science at NASA Headquarters in Washington said at the time. "We have access to a broad range of observations of Earth from space – and that is the lifeblood of scientific inquiry. We have the tools and team who can help us improve our understanding of the unknown. That's the very definition of what science is. That's what we do."

During the town hall last Wednesday, Evans said he thinks the study can be done by October should things go well.

"NASA really is uniquely positioned to address UAP, because we know how to use the tools of science and data to discern what might be happening out there in the skies," Evans added. "And, to be frank, no other agency is trusted as much by the public as us."

Cover photo by EVA MARIE UZCATEGUI/AFP via Getty Images