Next Tuesday, a House subcommittee will hold the first open congressional hearing on unidentified aerial vehicles in more than half a century. Two top defense officials will testify. Via the New York Times:

The hearing comes after the release last June of a report requested by Congress on “unidentified aerial phenomena.” The nine-page “Preliminary Assessment” from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence focused on 144 incidents dating back to 2004 and was able to explain only one.

The report declined to draw inferences, saying that the available reporting was “largely inconclusive” and noting that limited and inconsistent data created a challenge in evaluating the phenomena. But it said most of the phenomena reported “do represent physical objects.”

The assessment concluded that the objects were not secret U.S. technology and that “we currently lack data to indicate any UAP are part of a foreign collection program or indicative of a major technological advancement by a potential adversary.”

There have been no open Congressional hearings on U.F.O.s since the Air Force closed Project Blue Book in early 1970.

Rep. André Carson (D-IN), chairman of the House Intelligence Committee’s subcommittee on counterterrorism, counterintelligence, and counterproliferation, is holding the hearing.

“This hearing is about examining steps that the Pentagon can take to reduce the stigma surrounding reporting by military pilots, and by civilian pilots,” he said.