The 2021 UAP Report: 144 Sightings, One Balloon Explained
What this means
Primary records exist: an original document, a published text, an official file or a dated report. We link to them. This level says the record exists and what it says, not that every claim in it is true.
A 2021 US intelligence report reviewed 144 military UAP reports and could explain just one: a large, deflating balloon.
The 2021 UAP report is a nine-page intelligence assessment released June 25, 2021. It reviewed 144 military reports from 2004 to 2021, explained only one, a deflating balloon, and concluded UAP clearly pose a flight safety issue.
In 2020 the Senate Intelligence Committee, in Senate Report 116-233 accompanying the intelligence authorization bill for fiscal year 2021, asked the Director of National Intelligence and the Secretary of Defense for a UAP report within 180 days. The result was a nine-page unclassified "Preliminary Assessment: Unidentified Aerial Phenomena," released on June 25, 2021. The Navy-led Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force played a central role in compiling it.
The assessment covered 144 reports from US government sources, all from between 2004 and 2021. Only one was identified with high confidence: "we identified the object as a large, deflating balloon." The report proposed five categories of possible explanation: airborne clutter, natural atmospheric phenomena, US government or industry developmental programs, foreign adversary systems, and "other." That left 143 reports that could not be explained with the data available.
The most discussed passage reads: "In 18 incidents, described in 21 reports, observers reported unusual UAP movement patterns or flight characteristics." It goes on: "Some UAP appeared to remain stationary in winds aloft, move against the wind, maneuver abruptly, or move at considerable speed, without discernable means of propulsion." The report also counted 11 documented near misses between pilots and UAP. In a small number of cases, it said, military aircraft systems picked up radio frequency energy linked to sightings.
The report's firmest conclusion concerned safety, not origins: "UAP clearly pose a safety of flight issue and may pose a challenge to U.S. national security." The words "extraterrestrial" and "alien" do not appear in it. Senator Marco Rubio called it "just a first step," and Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks then ordered formal reporting procedures across the military.
An official US intelligence report stated that some objects "appeared to remain stationary in winds aloft, move against the wind, maneuver abruptly, or move at considerable speed, without discernable means of propulsion."
The report stresses that its data were limited and uneven. It lists airborne clutter, weather effects, secret programs and foreign systems as likely explanations. As skeptic Mick West put it, "a lack of data does not mean aliens are the likely answer."
