NICAP: Renowned UFO Research Site Turns 18!

By Fran Ridge NICAP 12-16-15

     It's hard to believe that on this day we celebrate the NICAP site's 18th anniversary! In 1997 I envisioned a web site with links to all the best UFO web sites at that time, along with some NICAP trivia, and data on casework. It was called "NICAP Interlink". Right after that simple beginning, and then being authorized to expand on the idea, I added the original UFO chronologies and began work on case directories. The chronos were skimpy. They had few cases from the Project Blue Book files and ended at 1963.

In the fall of 2005 I began a major update of Richard Hall's NICAP UFO Sighting Chronologies. In nothing short of a crash program we produced qualitative and quantitative sighting summaries for the most important years in UFO history: 1947-1952. In December of 2005 we had posted a massive updated chrono on 1952. This included documentation but was basically a major update on sightings. By the end of 2006 we had drastically updated (with links to detailed key cases) incidents from pre-1947 to 1969. That total group emcompassed the Air Force Project Blue Book years and the BB files. In January 2007 we established the goal to update the remaining chronos at a rate of one year per month, beginning with 1970. In July of that year we were able to add hundreds of foo-fighter sightings to the WWII period with the help of Keith Chester. The plan was to have all the chronos up and updated by March 15, 2010. We were able to accomplish that goal several months early.

If you are looking for anything important (sightings or events or dated documents), these chronos are the definitive source.

http://www.nicap.org/chrono.htm

An amazing way to find anything these days is by Googling. Use the code-word "nicap" in your search, and bingo. I misplaced an important document that was "lost" by putting it in the wrong site folder. Google found it instantly and I fixed the problem right away.

In 2009 we began the second major project, the new RADCAT, which is the re-issue and processing of all the radar cases in the Blue Book files and elsewhere. Later we started another major project, AVCAT (Aviation Catalog), to update directories on old cases and I created AVCAT dirs for new ones regarding sightings of UFOs from aircraft.

My A-Team, consisting of 31 top-notch researchers, my Nuclear Connection Project group, and the Current Encounter List, all worked together in this major effort to locate and document significant UFO cases. This summer I took a much-needed break and worked on two major projects, one still confidential; the other, some intensified Lunascan Project work. And every day continuing work on the MADAR Project since the system was put back in operation in February of 2014. After the summer hiatus we went over the 1947 through 1950 chronos with a fine tooth comb to make sure we were not simply linking to external site pages and Blue Book documents that might later go down. PDF files were made and they are now housed forever and securely on the NICAP site.

Earlier this year we had a major crisis and lost a computer, the workhorse for all our work. This had happened a few years prior as well, and each time our work stopped in its tracks and for weeks we were down, but not out. This time I/we learned a major lesson. We are still under siege and being spammed at an unbelievable rate, hundreds of emails every day. But some wonderful soul who wishes to remain anonymous donated a new computer and I bought two used ones, and now we have three computers running, all backed up by external hard drives. Whoever is spamming us is sending these emails out every day, and all three pcs get them, but we are still operating.

Financial support for our work comes in the form of donations and purchases from the NICAP Store. NICAP caps and coffee mugs were a great way, an only way, to provide promotion and funding. Unfortunately we are now out of both. But sometime in 2016 I hope to start a fundraiser to get these back in stock.

Join with us as we begin a new and exciting year.

The National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena (NICAP) was formed in 1956 and flourished through about 1970, and, as an organization with field investigators and consultants, declined gradually thereafter. For a more detailed story about NICAP please checkpapers/hall-IUR1994, Richard Hall. What we have today, many years later, is the existence of the NICAP web site, a tremendous repository of the evidence collected by NICAP and other sources to continue the goal of public information.

There have been millions of UFO sightings, but bona fide UFOs are more rare. We have more than 215,000 sightings on computer (UFOCAT, Donald A. Johnson). In addition we have massive evidence in the form of 11 different Categories

• Category 11 - 3,000-plus sightings from aircraft by Dr. Richard Haines and over 240 cases listed on the NICAP site with the AVCAT Project. To see the actual breakdown by month see:

http://www.nicap.org/avcat_brief.htm

• Category 10 - Over 200 cases involving a nuclear connection, several radiation injury cases, plus incidents from Robert Hastings files.

• Category 9 - With the RADCAT Project we have produced over 460 radar case directories along with supporting documents from the Blue Book files. To see the actual breakdown and cases filed, see this doc report

http://www.nicap.org/radcat_brief.htm

• About 1600 U.S. Air Force Project Blue Book UNKNOWNS (Brad Sparks).

• Category 8 - Photographic Evidence. 11,821 cases (as of Dec 15,2014) by Vicente-Juan Ballester Olmos.

• Category 7 - Humanoid Cases (hundreds) and Abduction Reports

• Category 6 - Over 5600 Physical Trace cases documented, 4104 involving UFO visual sightings (CUFOS).

• Category 5 - Medical Cases. Being compiled

• Category 4 - Over a hundred cases of UFO sightings involving animal reactions on the NICAP site alone by Joan Woodward.

• Category 3 - E-M Effects. Over 500 cases associated with UFO sightings (CUFOS) and 185 E-M cases documented involving UFOs near aircraft (Dr. Richard Haines). 250 listed on the NICAP site. 144 compass needle cases listed by Eric Herr.

• Category 2 - Hundreds, if not thousands, of excellent close encounters by credible observers whose testimony in court would be taken at face value

• Category 1 - Probably millions of reports of nighttime objects (Nocturnal Lights) or daylight objects seen at a distance.

The NICAP site is the number one source of the best evidence and covers material from the dawn of the UFO age, over a half century ago. If you would like to participate in email discussions on CURRENT ENCOUNTERS or file information, please email me at: franridge@nicap.org

Francis Ridge
NICAP Site Coordinator
(812) 838-3120
franridge@nicap.org

Mailing address:
618 Davis Drive
Mt. Vernon, IN 47620

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See Also:

12th Year Anniversary for the NICAP Web Site

UFOs, the AISS, and Air Force Interest After Blue Book

Blast From The Past - October 23, 1956: NICAP is Borne

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