Senator Marco Rubio has warned that UFOs pose a serious threat to national security and can no longer be laughed off by lawmakers. As anti...
Senator Marco Rubio has warned that UFOs pose a serious threat to national security and can no longer be laughed off by lawmakers.
As anticipation builds about the release of a Department of Defense report into unidentified aerial phenomena sightings by military personnel next month, Rubio told 60 Minutes the threat needed to be taken seriously.
'Some of my colleagues are very interested in this topic and some kinda, you know, giggle when you bring it up. But I don't think we can allow the stigma to keep us from having an answer to a very fundamental question.'
Rubio said the possibility that drones or aircraft from a rival military power - or from another civilization - were entering US airspace without permission should be getting more attention and resources.
'I want us to take it seriously and have a process to take it seriously,' Rubio told 60 Minutes.
'I want us to have a process to analyze the data every time it comes in. That there be a place where this is cataloged and constantly analyzed, until we get some answers.'
'Maybe it has a very simple answer. Maybe it doesn't.'
In December, while he was acting head of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Rubio called for Pentagon reports into the unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP) to be declassified.
The result of his enquiries is that the Pentagon's Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force has until June to report its findings to Congress.
Marco Rubio says many lawmakers in Congress 'giggle' when the optic of UFOs comes up, but that the national security threat needed to be taken seriously
Luis Elizondo, the former head of the the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program, says incredibly sophisticated and as-yet unidentified flying objects have been detected
A whistleblower who ran the Pentagon's top-secret UFO program has warned the soon-to-be-released report on unidentified aerial phenomena could reveal the greatest US intelligence failings since 9/11.
Luis Elizondo headed the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program, a $22 million program set up by then-Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to investigate UFOs, from 2007 to 2012.
Like Rubio, Elizondo is privy to classified material that hasn't yet been made public and says the threat is very real.
'Imagine a technology that can do 6-to-700 g-forces, that can fly at 13,000 miles an hour, that can evade radar and that can fly through air and water and possibly space,' he told 60 Minutes.
'And oh, by the way, has no obvious signs of propulsion, no wings, no control surfaces and yet still can defy the natural effects of Earth's gravity. That's precisely what we're seeing.'
Meanwhile, a new leaked video shows US Naval personnel having a close encounter with a UFO - this time a spherical object that makes a controlled descent into the ocean.
The object was filmed by a camera aboard the USS Omaha as it sailed off the coast of San Diego in July 2019.
Two unidentified crew members could be heard exclaiming: 'Wow, it splashed,' after the ball made a controlled flight over the ocean, then splashed into the sea and disappeared underwater.
They filmed the object making a controlled flight above the water for an extended period of time before it finally entered the ocean. Investigative filmmaker Jeremy Corbell shared the footage on Friday with Mystery Wire.
It was released the same day that a US Navy pilot told of how he and his colleagues saw UFOs off the Virginia coast so regularly they grew used to the ultra-capable aircrafts' presence.
Still images from a newly released video show a spherical object diving into the Pacific Ocean off the coast of California
A map shows the region where fighter jets encountered the UFOs off the coast of Virginia
Former Navy Lieutenant Ryan Graves, who regularly witnessed UFOs in restricted airspace, called them a threat to national security
Former Navy Lieutenant Ryan Graves - who refers to UFOs as unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP) - called them a threat to national security in an interview with aired on 60 Minutes on Sunday.
He and his colleagues spotted the objects hundreds of times in protected air space between 2015 and 2017, and also recorded an encounter off the coast of Jacksonville, Florida, during the same time period.
The 60 Minutes report comes as the government is expected to release a report in June on UFO sightings after unclassified videos of them were leaked to The New York Times in 2017.
Respected former government officials have conceded that the sightings are credible, and that the UFOs' origins remains unknown.
John Ratcliffe, the former director of national intelligence, told Fox News that these are not just eyewitness accounts - they're videos and measurements taken after 'multiple sensors that are picking up these things.'
'When we talk about sightings, we are talking about objects that have been seen by Navy or Air Force pilots, or have been picked up by satellite imagery, that frankly engage in actions that are difficult to explain, movements that are hard to replicate, that we don't have the technology for, or traveling at speeds that exceed the sound barrier without a sonic boom,' he said.
John Ratcliffe, the former director of national intelligence, told Fox News that these are not just eyewitness accounts - they're videos and measurements taken after 'multiple sensors that are picking up these things'
USS Omaha in 2019 in restricted waters off the coast of southern California (leaked May 2021)
The USS Omaha filmed a round object making a controlled flight above the water for an extended period of time before it finally entered the ocean. Investigative filmmaker Jeremy Corbell shared the footage on Friday with Mystery Wire.
Still images from that video were first released in April as the Pentagon confirmed that a set of images and videos showing unidentified flying objects buzzing over Navy warships off the coast of California in 2019 'were taken' by branch personnel.
Staff could be heard exclaiming excitedly as the object made a controlled, gradual descent into the Pacific Ocean, before disappearing with a splash.
No explanation for the spherical object has been given.
The USS Omaha filmed a round object making a controlled flight above the water for an extended period of time before it finally entered the ocean
One of the images appears to be a pyramid-shaped object while others were thought to be drones or balloons; however, the Navy has listed them as unknowns.
In a statement, a Pentagon spokesperson told Mystery Wire: 'I can confirm that the referenced photos and videos were taken by Navy personnel. The UAPTF has included these incidents in their ongoing examinations.'
The confirmation came a week after Admiral Michael Gilday, the chief of naval operations, admitted that he has no idea where the swarm of mysterious Tic Tac-shaped drones that menaced four US destroyers in July 2019 originated.
Gilday led an investigation into the incident in which a group of what some have called unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) chased the destroyers for up to 100 nautical miles off the coast of California.
The Independence Class littoral combat ship USS Omaha (LCS 12) transits the Pacific Ocean
F/A-18E Super Hornets assigned to the Tomcatters of Strike Fighter Squadron (VFA) 31 returned to their home base at Naval Air Station (NAS) Oceana in Virginia Beach
Flight logs revealed as many as six mystery aircraft swarmed the warships close to a sensitive training area at the Channel Islands at speeds of up to 40mph and with a greater maneuverability than US military drones.
When asked directly if the Navy had confirmed the identity of the drones at a media event, Gilday responded: 'No, we have not.'
The Drive revealed in February that US Navy warships stationed off the coast of Los Angeles had encountered swarms of mysterious drones, which pursued them at high speed in low visibility.
The outlet obtained ship logbooks and internal emails from the Navy under the Freedom of Information Act, and eyewitness descriptions from the staff on board, to establish the UAVs had a far greater aeronautical capability than any previously known drones.
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