This July 4, 1984 document made available by the British National Archives shows a letter from the Wigan Ariel Phenomena Investigation Team to the British Ministry of Defense. Britain's military has closed a hotline that took reports of unidentified flying objects, or UFOs, after determining that the money is better spent in Afghanistan. The Ministry of Defense says that the phone service and an associated e-mail address were taken offline earlier this week, and said Friday, Dec. 4, 2009 that 50 years of UFO sightings had not revealed any evidence of alien life or threats to the U.K. (AP Photo/British National Archives)






This May 25, 1992 document made available by the British National Archives shows a UFO sighting report. Britain's military has closed a hotline that took reports of unidentified flying objects, or UFOs, after determining that the money is better spent in Afghanistan. The Ministry of Defense says that the phone service and an associated e-mail address were taken offline earlier this week, and said Friday, Dec. 4, 2009 that 50 years of UFO sightings had not revealed any evidence of alien life or threats to the U.K. (AP Photo/British National Archives)

Hidden Territory On Mercury Revealed

December 05, 2009

The MESSENGER spacecraft's third flyby of the planet Mercury has given scientists, for the first time, an almost complete view of the planet's surface and revealed some dramatic changes in Mercury's comet-like tail.

"The new images remind us that Mercury continues to hold surprises," says Sean Solomon, principal investigator for the mission and director of the Department of Terrestrial Magnetism at the Carnegie Institution of Washington.

The probe flew by Mercury on Sept. 29th, executing a critical gravity assist maneuver designed to help MESSENGER enter Mercury-orbit in 2011. Despite shutting down temporarily because of a power system switchover during a solar eclipse, the spacecraft's cameras and instruments revealed 6 percent of the planet's surface never before seen at close range, including this picturesque region pocked by impact craters and molded by volcanic activity:




Monster Tsunamis On The Sun Are Real


December 05, 2009

Sometimes you really can believe your eyes. That's what NASA's STEREO (Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory) spacecraft are telling researchers about a controversial phenomenon on the sun known as the "solar tsunami."

Years ago, when solar physicists first witnessed a towering wave of hot plasma racing along the sun's surface, they doubted their senses. The scale of the thing was staggering. It rose up higher than Earth itself and rippled out from a central point in a circular pattern millions of kilometers in circumference. Skeptical observers suggested it might be a shadow of some kind—a trick of the eye—but surely not a real wave.

"Now we know," says Joe Gurman of the Solar Physics Lab at the Goddard Space Flight Center. "Solar tsunamis are real."

The twin STEREO spacecraft confirmed their reality in February 2009 when sunspot 11012 unexpectedly erupted. The blast hurled a billion-ton cloud of gas (a "CME") into space and sent a tsunami racing along the sun's surface. STEREO recorded the wave from two positions separated by 90o, giving researchers an unprecedented view of the event:





UFO Sighting By America West Airlines Flight 564

America West Airlines Flight 564 UFO sighting
At approximately 10:30 p.m. on May 25, 1995, Capt. Gene Tollefson and First Officer John J. Waller, piloting America West Airlines Flight 564 from Tampa, Florida, to Las Vegas, Nevada saw a huge dark wingless object with a row of bright white lights near
America West Airlines Flight 564 UFO Sighting

Tucumcari, New Mexico. The silhouette of this object was only visible when lit by nearby flashes of a thunderstorm. The pilots immediately contacted the Albuquerque FAA Air Route Traffic Control Center in an attempt to identify the object. The pilots describe the object to the control center as being over 400 ft long. The entire incident was recorded by the FAA.

Is this a massive Black triangle UFO or possibly one of the huge Black Stealth Blimps the USA government uses? In Area 51 there is a new gigantic hanger newly built. Some speculate that this type of craft is being hid there. Could this craft have uses for a false flag event? Something out of The V? A huge craft that would be used to darken a city sky to look like an extraterrestrial craft?

British Defense Ministry Closes UFO Department after More Than 50 Years

Rendlesham Forest Incident, 1980

http://www.allgov.com/ViewNews/British_Defense_Ministry_Closes_UFO_Department_after_More_Than_50_Years_91206

Sunday, December 06, 2009

After more than 50 years of investigations and finding no potential threats, the British government has decided to quietly shut down its UFO office. Officials with the Ministry of Defense, which housed the special investigative unit, felt there was no point in continuing to spend £50,000 (about $70,000) a year to delve into reports of UFOs appearing over the United Kingdom.

Since 1950 when the office was opened, British investigators looked into more than 12,000 reports, including 135 in 2008. Most sightings were explained as either natural or man-made phenomena, although approximately 600 over the years remained unexplained. Citizens will no longer be able to file accounts of new sightings now that the government hotline has been discontinued.
-Noel Brinkerhoff

MoD Department that Investigated UFO Sightings ‘Closed’ (by Andrew Hough, Telegraph)
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/ufo/6723067/MoD-department-that-investigated-UFO-sightings-closed.html

Highlights Guide (National Archives UK) (pdf)
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/documents/aug-2009-highlights-guide.pdf

Newly Released UFO Files from the UK Government (National Archives UK)
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/ufos/

Previously Released UFO Files (National Archives UK)
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/ufos/existing-files.htm

Sandtrapped Rover Makes a Big Discovery 12.02.2009

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2009/02dec_troy.htm?list1049613

Sandtrapped Rover Makes a Big Discovery
12.02.2009


December 2, 2009: Homer's Iliad tells the story of Troy, a city besieged by the Greeks in the Trojan War. Today, a lone robot sits besieged in the sands of Troy while engineers and scientists plot its escape.

Welcome to "Troy" – Mars style. NASA's robotic rover Spirit is bogged down on the Red Planet in a place the rover team named after the ancient city.

So why aren't scientists lamenting?

"The rover's spinning wheels have broken through a crust, and we've found something supremely interesting in the disturbed soil," says Ray Arvidson of the Washington University in St. Louis.

Spirit, like its twin rover Opportunity, has roamed the Red Planet for nearly 6 years. During that time, the rover has had some close calls and come out fighting from each. In fact, it's been driving backwards since one of its wheels jammed in 2006.


http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/mer/images/mer20091019.html

Spirit surveys its own predicament. The bright soil pictured left is loose, fluffy material churned by the rover's left-front wheel as Spirit, driving backwards, broke through a darker, crusty surface. At right is the least-embedded of the rover's six wheels.
From the beginning, the rovers' motto has been "follow the water." Both rovers have been searching Mars for minerals formed in the presence of H2O. Mars appears dry today, but minerals can provide clues that water was once there.

"It's been easy for Opportunity to find such minerals," explains Arvidson. "Opportunity landed in an ancient lake bed. Spirit has had to work much harder. Spirit landed in basaltic plains formed by lava flows chewed up by repeated meteoroid impacts. There's been little evidence of anything that was ever very wet."
But when Spirit reached an area of Mars called the "Columbia Hills," the whole complexion of the mission changed. "Spirit came across iron hydroxide, a mineral that forms in the presence of water. That alerted us to the change. We started coming across more and more rocks formed in the presence of water."

Then Spirit got stuck in a patch of loose soil on the edge of a small crater. Heavy sigh. Stuck again.

But wait!

"Spirit had to get stuck to make its next discovery," says Arvidson.

As the rover tried to break free, its wheels began to churn up the soil, uncovering sulfates underneath.

"Sulfates are minerals just beneath the surface that shout to us that they were formed in steam vents, since steam has sulfur in it. Steam is associated with hydrothermal activity – evidence of water-charged explosive volcanism. Such areas could have once supported life."

"And most amazingly, the boundary between the sulfate-rich soil and the soil with just the generic concentration of sulfates runs right down the middle of the stranded rover. Spirit is lodged on the edge of a crater -- sitting astride the boundary!"


Above: A topographic map of Spirit's surroundings at Troy. Spirit is straddling the edge of a small crater. Sulfate materials are located in the crater (from the middle of the rover and extending to the left). The topo map was generated from stereo images taken by Spirit's navigation camera when it was approaching the area in April 7, 2009.

"Also, the robot found that the top of the sulfate material is crusty. Ancient sulfates probably formed this crust as they were processed by variations in climate associated with changes in Mars' orbit over millions of years."

Here's what the scientists think: When a Martian pole faces the sun in Martian summer, it gets warmer at that pole and the water ice shifts to the equator. It even snows there! Warm dark soil under the snow causes the bottom layer of snow to melt. The water trickles into the sulfates, dissolving the water-soluble iron sulfates and forming a crust with the calcium sulfates remaining.

"By being stuck at Troy, Spirit has been able to teach us about the modern water cycle on Mars." Indeed, Spirit's saga at Troy has given scientists material evidence of past water on Mars on two time scales: ancient volcanic times, and cycles ongoing to the present day.

"We've sat here for more than 6 months. That's a long time to take measurements. We've learned a lot. Troy is a good place to be under siege, but we’re ready to leave."

Will Spirit break free to continue its incredible journey? Tune in to Science@NASA to find out if the escape plan works.

How not to report a UFO

* Nick Pope
* guardian.co.uk, Friday 4 December 2009 19.00 GMT
* Article history


British UFO sightings in the early 1990s. Photograph: guardian.co.uk

How not to report a UFO

With UFO sightings at record levels, the Ministry of Defence should not have closed its hotline. This is a sad day for science

On December 1 the Ministry of Defence terminated its UFO project. After over 50 years of investigating the phenomenon, the plug was pulled in a most unceremonious way.

The news was slipped out so as not to attract attention. An amendment was made to an existing document in the freedom of information section of the MoD website, entitled "How to report a UFO sighting". The announcement states: "In over fifty years, no UFO report has revealed any evidence of a potential threat to the United Kingdom." It goes on to say that the "MOD will no longer respond to reported UFO sightings or investigate them". When rumbled, the MoD press office implyied that the money saved (about £50,000 a year) would be spent on body armour in Afghanistan. I doubt it will be. As someone whose 21-year MoD career included a posting in a financial policy division, I suspect that's not how it works. Finance has played a part in this, I am sure. The defence budget is under huge pressure and the UFO project was doubtless an easy target for the Treasury and MoD financiers.

Between the 1950s and the present day, the MoD received around 12,000 UFO reports. While most were misidentifications of ordinary objects and phenomena, about 5% remained unexplained. These included instances where UFOs were seen by police officers and pilots, or tracked on radar.

Having worked on the UFO project from 1991 to 1994, I am very sorry to see the MoD disengage in this way. I believe that where evidence suggests that UK airspace has been penetrated by an unidentified object, this must automatically be of defence interest and should be investigated properly. Not because I believe Britain is vulnerable to an alien attack, but because "if it doesn't behave like a conventional aircraft, we're not interested" is a very dangerous mindset. Britain remains vulnerable to espionage and terrorist attack. What if the "UFO" turns out to be a prototype spyplane or drone? What if it's a hijacked aircraft with its transponder turned off? This is not the time to take our eye off the ball but this is precisely what has happened. Because of the baggage that the term "UFO" carries, the baby has been thrown out with the bathwater.

My only hope is that – away from the public gaze – sightings from pilots and uncorrelated targets tracked on radar will continue to be looked at, albeit outside of a formally constituted UFO project. But by cutting out the public, the MoD will only fuel conspiracy theories. UFO sightings are at record levels and public interest is at an all-time high. Whatever one's views about them, this is a sad day for science. One of the greatest mysteries of the modern era is now much less likely to be resolved.