unidentified aerial phenomenon

unidentified aerial phenomenon (plural unidentified aerial phenomena)

1. (aviation) Synonym of unidentified flying object (“UFO”)
   • 2016, “Only Weirdos See UFOs”, in Jason McClellan, →ISBN:

     An Introduction to the Public's Misperception of Unidentified Aerial Phenomena and Extraterrestrial Life.

   • 2017, Rafi Letzter, Scientific American, "The Truth about Those "Alien Alloys" in The New York Times UFO Story", ISSN 0036-​8733

     The company [involved in the DOD research] modified buildings in Las Vegas for the storage of metal alloys and other materials that program contractors said had been recovered from unidentified aerial phenomena.

   • 2018, Sarah Scoles, Wired, "What Is Up With Those Pentagon UFO Videos?", ISSN 1059-1028

     The article describes a federally funded program that investigated reports of unidentified aerial phenomena (UAPs, the take-me-seriously acronym that includes UFOs). And within the story, the Times embedded videos of two such UAPs.

   • 2019, Kayla Epstein, The Washington Post, "Those UFO videos are real, the Navy says, but please stop saying ‘UFO’"

     The Navy designates the objects contained in these videos as unidentified aerial phenomena.

   • 2020, Rob Long, The National Review, "The Great Coronavirus Non-Freakout", ISSN 0028-0038

     So for the first time, video showing unidentified aerial phenomena was confirmed as just that, weird objects flying around the sky at a speed and in a trajectory that no known technology allows, and it was on television and cable news for a day, and then everyone just went back to talking about what Trump tweeted to the guy on CNN.

   • 2020, PRNewswire, Baker City Herald, "To the Stars Academy of Arts & Science Acknowledges the Pentagon's Official Release of Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Video Footage"

     Pentagon officially released three videos of Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (UAP).

• UAP (abbreviation)
• unexplained aerial phenomenon

• aerial phenomenon
• phenomenon

• UAP (abbreviation)