In those same decades, most UFO sightings were made in the daytime and frequently at close range, when shapes and surface features could be distinguished, thus making positive identification of normal sights easier and the descriptions of unusual sights more detailed. When all normal explanations had been eliminated, the witnesses could concentrate on those aspects of the experience which were most abnormal.
Don BerlinerFor more than 50 years, men and women around the world have reported sights in the sky that are strange to their experience and understanding. Inasmuch as many of these sights appeared to be solid objects having impressive performance, they have become known as Unidentified Flying Objects (UFOs) or, colloquially, flying saucers. Their positive identification is one of the major public scientific challenges of the era, with a significant number of these sights so far defying all reasonable efforts at classification.
Don BerlinerIf every UFO report could be convincingly credited to some conventional astronomical or atmospheric phenomenon, there would be no UFO mystery. It is precisely because so many UFO reports cannot logically be blamed on stars, planets, satellites, airplanes, balloons, etc., that a UFO mystery has existed since at least the mid-1940s.
Don BerlinerPatterns of these UFOs appearance and behavior suggest a limited range of sizes and shapes of unidentified craft, despite the often-desperate efforts on the part of the American and other governments to discount them as nothing more substantial than mistakes made by naïve individuals. Their performance, observed repeatedly by expert witnesses, remains as far off the scale today as it was in the 1940s.
Don BerlinerHundreds of thousands of UFO sightings have been made by persons in all walks of life, in all parts of the world. Tens of thousands of UFO reports have been made to governmental and private agencies in the past 55 years. Thousands of these reports have withstood careful scrutiny and appear to represent real objects having a novel nature.
Don Berliner