Coast to Coast - Dr. Abraham Loeb, MADAR and Chain of Evidence

 

I recently spent an hour talking with Dr. Abraham Loeb, he of alien artifact fame. I learned that the idea the artifact originated from Vega was something of a misnomer. He said there was no way to determine its point of origin.

He suggested that it had been around the Solar System for as much as 10,000 years, which explains its relatively slow speed and that he believed there were other such

Dr. Loeb

objects out there. This seemed strange to me, especially since we had only just found this one. The problem was that it was so small and it didn’t reflect the light very well so that it was difficult to see. Our optics, meaning telescopes here and not political discourse, had gotten better. He thought that we might find others and should be prepared for that. We should know what to look for and what to do.

He was hinting that searching for radio signals, or broadcasting signals as a way of contacting an alien race was not the best way to do it. He thought that sending out probes, thousands of probes, was a better way of conducting the search. The real problem, no matter how you conducted the search, might be a search for a civilization that no longer existed. How long does a civilization last? You can listen to our conversation here:

https://www.spreaker.com/episode/43152043

Eventually, I asked him a question that I think we should ask all scientists. In this case it was what would he like to see as evidence that UFOs are visiting the Earth (I have asked this of both skeptics and scientists and probably should put all those answers into a single posting). He suggested building the case without human observers. He wanted raw data collected by instruments that could be taken into the lab analyzed at length. He wanted data that would not be biased by the observers’ belief structure. Data gathered by instruments had no bias.

I thought, immediately of the MADAR Network. It was designed to alert someone to the possible presence of a UFO. You’d have both the data collected by the instruments including time, location, direction to the UFO, but you might also have witnesses to the events and frankly it seemed that some human observation would be necessary.

Such is the case on August 19, last year. At 9:47, p.m. a man, was taking his trash out to the curb. While doing this he noticed a pair of odd flashing lights in the night sky, traveling west to east in a straight trajectory at a slow but constant speed. The event lasted a little more than a minute before the lights disappeared behind the trees.

At the same time, the MADAR detector at a nearby node, recorded the sudden surge in the magnetic field and provided some of that raw data that Dr. Loeb wanted.

Here was a case that provided an independent observer and the detection of something anomalous at the same time. This got me to thinking about chains of evidence, and by using the MADAR Network, that it would be possible to create four chains of evidence.

First, would be the collection of the information by the MADAR Node. This is using instrumentality that did not rely on human observation. The only human involvement would be to distribute the data to those who wanted to conduct the analysis.

If the Node operator could get outside in time to see the UFO, it would be a second chain of evidence, which is the dreaded human observation. That information would give us a description of the UFO, or provide the identity of the object that tripped the data collection. To me, this was an important part of the process and I still don’t see how it would hurt the analysis of the data if there were human observers involved. I will note here that the MADAR data is cross referenced to sighting reports made to a number of websites including the National UFO Reporting Center, so that a connection has been made in some of the MADAR cases.

If the witness took pictures, then we have a third chain of evidence. The photographs, although taken by a human would be recorded by the camera and those images could be independently studied. If the MADAR Node operator had set up a network of interested people around his Node, and if there was time, he could alert them, collecting additional observations. This could be coordinated in advance and with the cell phone technology available could be accomplished rapidly. This too has bee attempted, though as I understand it, on a limited basis.

Providing additional cameras taking more pictures would enhance the credibility of the sighting and while they wouldn’t be, strictly, independent, their photographs would provide more information. With the data collected from those taking the photographs and by examining all the pictures, a great deal of data could be recovered. And if the witnesses had the chance to move to the right or left, then stereoscopic photographs could be created. I have suggested for a long time that anyone photographing a UFO attempt to get pictures from a different perspective so that the stereoscopic pictures could be created.

Finally, if coordinated earlier, there might be the possibly of using local radars. Here I was thinking that contacts with the local airfield and TV stations with radar might provide another aspect of recording data. In the case of the Japan Airlines flight 1628, there was complete radar data available that allowed an independent analysis. If the object was tracked, then there was a fourth chain of evidence. This too, has been attempted, though, again as I understand it, has not yielded any results.

Fran Ridge

If all that was properly collected and recorded, then a very strong case could be made. We could even leave out the human observations. It would meet the criterion suggested by Dr. Loeb and might advance our cause.

Fran Ridge, who runs the NICAP website, is also one of those deeply involved in the MADAR program. Although I was unaware of the extent of the MADAR Network, it seems that others had some of the same thoughts that I did before I had them. Fran provided a number of links about MADAR, about the sightings, and about how the network is structured. Some of the steps I thought necessary to upgrade the system had already been taken. These are some of the links to all that important information:

http://www.nicap.org/match/papers/21-MAVERIC.htm

http://www.nicap.org/match/papers/

http://www.nicap.org/match/correlations/

http://www.nicap.org/ncp/ncp-ridge6.htm

http://www.nicap.org/match/papers/31-UAP&the-KU-band-MUJversion.htm

In the course of the next few weeks, I’ll be taking a more in depth look at the MADAR project. This has real potential and is something that could lead to Disclosure.