“The American people expect and deserve their leaders in government and intelligence to seriously evaluate and respond to any potential national security risks — especially those we do not fully understand,” lawmaker André Carson (D-Indiana), who will oversee the hearing, said in a statement last week. “Since coming to Congress, I’ve been focused on the issue of unidentified aerial phenomena as both a national security threat and an interest of great importance to the American public.”

Congress holding UFO hearing today: How to watch live (and what to expect)

By Leonard David published about 20 hours ago

The U.S. Congress will hold a public hearing today (May 17) on reports of unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP) skirting through our skies, and you can watch the proceedings live.

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Last year, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence submitted to Congress a preliminary report regarding UAP that relayed the progress the Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force has made in understanding the mysterious phenomena. (In the past few years, the term UAP has substituted for the more familiar “unidentified flying object,” or UFO.)

That helped lay the foundation for tomorrow’s hearing on UAP, which will be held under the House Intelligence Committee’s Counterterrorism, Counterintelligence, and Counterproliferation Subcommittee. The two-hour hearing starts at 9 a.m. EDT (1300 GMT); you can watch it live here at Space.com or directly via the House intelligence committee.

Today’s event comes five months after a National Defense Authorization Act required the military to establish a permanent office to gather and look into the UAP issue. That document also called for an annual report and semiannual briefings for Congress.

Related: 2022 could be a turning point in the study of UFOs

Top-tier witnesses

“The American people expect and deserve their leaders in government and intelligence to seriously evaluate and respond to any potential national security risks — especially those we do not fully understand,” lawmaker André Carson (D-Indiana), who will oversee the hearing, said in a statement last week. “Since coming to Congress, I’ve been focused on the issue of unidentified aerial phenomena as both a national security threat and an interest of great importance to the American public.”

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The hearing will feature two top-tier witnesses: Ronald Moultrie, the Pentagon’s top intelligence official, and Scott Bray, Deputy Director of Naval Intelligence.

That new office to look into UAP — the Airborne Object Identification and Management Synchronization Group (AOIMSG) — was created within Moultrie’s office. Bray’s involvement makes sense, given that Navy pilots, among others, have made high-profile UAP sightings over the past two decades.

It’s Carson’s intent that the hearing “will give the American people an opportunity to learn what there is to know about these incidents.”

Space.com reached out to several leading UAP/UFO investigators about their expectations and views about what may take place at the hearing.

“I’m generally in a ‘wait and see’ mode with respect to the hearings. It’s great that any type of hearing on UFOs/UAPs is being held, but two hours will barely be enough to scratch the surface,” said Mark Rodeghier, the scientific director of the Center for UFO Studies.

Rodeghier said his main concern is simply whether the two officials testifying will be adequately briefed on the ongoing work of the newly formed AOIMSG. “Especially efforts by whoever is staffing and running that organization to gather data from a diverse range of government sources,” he told Space.com.

“I don’t expect any findings at this stage,” Rodeghier said, “but I would be pleased to learn about the progress being made in setting up a robust, science-based effort to investigate UFOs.”

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That effort should focus on just what these aerial phenomena could be, Rodeghier said. For example, are they most likely unknown drones zipping around Navy vessels? Or might they be something more exotic, perhaps vehicles that could be tracked by sensor systems that cover space?