The American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA), the largest technical society dedicated to the global aerospace profession, recently celebrated a virtual panel session dedicated to a subject which would have put any civilian pilot or aerospace technician at risk of ending their careers: UFOs.
The forum was dedicated in two main sections: the technical perspectives of UAPs, and the flight safety concerns raised by the phenomenon. Dr. Kevin Knuth was the second speaker on the first section, and the presentation he prepared along with Dr. Matthew Szydagis and David Mason* focused on the so-called ‘five observable’ characteristics of these objects; as proposed by Luis Elizondo when he was involved with the Pentagon’s secret UFO program (AATIP). These five observables are:
- Positive lift (their capacity to defeat gravity without wings or apparent propulsion)
- Sudden / instantaneous acceleration
- Hypersonic velocities without signatures (no sonic booms)
- ‘Transmedium’ travel (i.e., the capacity to effortlessly move in and out of the water)
- Low observability or ‘cloaking’ abilities
Knuth illustrated these five characteristics mainly with images extracted from the Aguadilla UFO video, which was recorded by a Coast Guard helicopter in 2013. But he also compared the ‘Gimbal’ Navy video** with a photograph obtained by former UFO contactee and dinosaur tracker Ray Stanford in Corpus Christi, Texas, in 1985. Stanford claimed there were multiple objects in the sky at the time of the sighting, and that it was observed by several witnesses.
Readers of The Grail will perhaps remember how in June of this year I wrote about a bit of a controversy raised during the Scientific Coalition of UAP Studies’ (SCU) virtual conference, when at the last minute Knuth declined to give his scheduled presentation. It was later revealed this decision was reached after a SCU member (Douglas Dean Johnson) alerted the SCU directors about Stanford’s controversial past. SCU spokesperson Richard Hoffman wrote the following in the conference webpage:
The Powerpoint slideshow titled “The Physical Observables of UAPs” that was briefly posted on the convention website was a draft; the document contains material that is not endorsed by Prof. Knuth or Prof Szydagis. or “contains material that does not represent the work or the views of Prof. Knuth or Prof. Szydagis”. As such, it was not vetted to SCU and a decision was made to remove the presentation in favor of a panel discussion as stated in my announcement. If you have downloaded this material, please be advised.
So, it seems as if despite the fact Stanford’s photo has yet to be ‘independently vetted’ by professional photographic experts –something Knuth was clear to point out to the rest of the AIAA panel attendants– he and his colleagues still find this piece of evidence compelling enough as to warrant further attention. Not to mention showing it during a very serious international forum on aviation safety –instead of your typical UFO conference along with enlarged craniums, and discussions on all the ‘galactic races’ currently visiting out planet– as an example of a possible “plasma sheath” surrounding a unidentified flying object; which might explain how UFOs are able to fly at such fantastic speeds without causing sonic booms or suffering considerable atmospheric drag.
Knuth’s decision has already begun to raise criticism from certain sectors of Ufology (not just Mr. Johnson) who think Ray Stanford is nothing but a charlatan and paying attention to whatever evidence he claims to have is not only a waste of time, but also a risk to the feeble legitimization obtained by the topic in the last few years. Of course, some of these critics are also the same who think the Aguadilla UFO video can be easily explained as a pelican; so I guess it goes to show there is just no way to please everybody when it comes to this field.
“Science progresses without Stigma.” This was one of the points in the presentation of Dr. Ravi Kopparapu, a planetary scientist who was also a panelist in the AIAA’s forum. One of the points all the AIAA panelists unanimously coincided is the need for more data, and since the US government is clearly not moving forward to giving access to their classified records to the scientific community –hence why some of them are now getting ready to gather data by themselves– there will be no choice but to look for some of those answers in places our predecessors might have frowned upon while raising their noses in contempt –such as old esoteric texts or even the dusty drawers of UFO contactees.
Perhaps Ray Stanford is just a charismatic conman who keeps managing to fool people with his old UFO photos (even people with credentials as impressive as Dr. Knuth’s). Or perhaps Ray, despite his shady past (and in concordance with the self-negating nature of the phenomenon) did manage to film something truly anomalous –there is also a third possibility, I think, and that is Ray inadvertently recording secret military tests with high-powered lasers and plasma technology, which were conveniently covered under the veil of flying saucers.
Whatever the case, the time has come to independently corroborate his material before the films degrade beyond recognition, or ‘mysteriously disappear’ once Stanford passes away –as it is often the case with such UFO evidence…
(*): Knuth and Szydagis are both members of SCU, whereas David Mason is an engineer associated with Knuth under UAPx.
(**): Former Navy Lieutenant Ryan Graves, who was involved with the UFO sightings from which the ‘Gimbal’ video was obtained, was another of the AIAA panelists.
Many thanks to NARCAP for providing a link to a video with the entire forum.
NOTE: A previous version of this article erroneously stated Knuth’s scheduled presentation for the SCU virtual conference in June was the same one he ended up delivering before the AIAA UAP panel. But not only were the Power Point slideshow titled differently — “The Physical Observables of UAPs” for SCU and “The Flight Characteristics and Physics of UAP” for AIAA– but also sources who had access to Knuth’s Power Point submission to SCU confirmed that presentation was longer, and contained more material shared by Ray Stanford.
