The Pentagon's All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) has moved to issue a sole-source contract to the National Unidentified Flying Object Historic Records Center (NUFOHRC), a New Mexico-based nonprofit that holds what a Defense Department source described as the world's largest private collection of UAP-related historical records. Details of the planned commercial data subscription were first disclosed in a Defense Department contracting notice reported by DefenseScoop on September 2, 2026. The subscription would grant AARO digital access to NUFOHRC's proprietary data, metadata, and analytical products, with particular emphasis on materials predating 1990.
The move represents AARO's latest step to fulfill congressional mandates requiring a comprehensive review of U.S. government UAP involvement dating back to 1945, as directed by the fiscal year 2023 National Defense Authorization Act. NUFOHRC, founded and led by UAP historian David Marler, holds hundreds of thousands of unique case files — including the complete archives of early civilian scientific UFO research groups and personal files of Dr. J. Allen Hynek, who worked on the Air Force's Project Blue Book. The proposed contract structure includes a one-year base period with four one-year option periods; the total estimated cost was not disclosed.
A New Hampshire teenager and two Exeter, New Hampshire, police officers report a large, silent, brightly lit object hovering at low altitude over a residential field. The Air Force initially attributes the sighting to a high-altitude refueling mission, then revises the case to 'unidentified.'
Eleven members of an extended family in rural Kentucky report being besieged through the night by small, silver-coated humanoid figures. The Hopkinsville Police, Kentucky State Police, and U.S. Air Force investigate.
Three-volume Air Force Office of Special Investigations dossier (Box 7) containing 233 incident summary reports from 1955. Released by the Department of War as part of PURSUE Release 01.
PURSUE Release 03 publishes the CIA's 1952-1953 Scientific Advisory Panel on Unidentified Flying Objects — the Robertson Panel — in less-redacted form, with the Department of War's own transmission copy to the Secretary of Defense. The panel found no direct physical threat but warned that public fascination could clog intelligence channels and that a 'morbid national psychology' could be exploited by adversaries — and recommended an official policy of 'debunking' to 'strip the UFO subject of its mystery.'
Across two consecutive weekends, multiple radar installations and visual observers track unidentified objects above the restricted airspace surrounding the U.S. Capitol and White House. The Air Force convenes its largest press conference since World War II to address the events.
Kentucky Air National Guard pilot Capt. Thomas Mantell is killed when his P-51 Mustang crashes during the pursuit of a large, slow-moving object reported above Godman Field. The Air Force eventually attributes the object to a Skyhook research balloon.
Civilian pilot Kenneth Arnold reports nine crescent-shaped objects flying in formation near Mount Rainier at speeds he estimates at more than 1,200 mph. His description gives rise to the term 'flying saucer' and is widely treated as the start of the modern UFO era.