Bigelow's expectation of a UFO announcement (1998)
From the UAP Encyclopedia, the open encyclopedia of UFO and UAP history · 🗓️ Event
Contents 7
| Date | 11 January 1998 |
|---|---|
| Topics | Remote viewing & psi (topic) |
| People | Robert Bigelow, Jacques Vallée |
| Testimony | Shellenberger testimony, p. 131 |
| Year | 1998 in UFO history |
| Timeline | 1998 on the UAP Timeline |
| Sources | 5 |
According to Jacques Vallée's journals, on 11 January 1998 businessman Robert Bigelow called him with an inner certainty that a dramatic development, either a spectacular display by the phenomenon or a striking government announcement, would happen "soon".[1]
The call
Bigelow called to brief Vallée on part of a meeting of the National Institute for Discovery Science (NIDS) science board he had missed. Bigelow proposed to sponsor two studies on how society would react to announcements of a major asteroid impact and of UFOs being extraterrestrial craft, asking what the "consciousness aspects" would be in each case.[1]
"The Day After"
The idea had run through NIDS meetings for two years. In August 1996 Bigelow asked what would happen if the government announced alien intrusions and whether people would bother to go to work the next day. In January 1997 futurist John Petersen presented "day after" scenarios, and Vallée noted that Petersen was also certain an announcement was imminent. By March 1997 Bigelow was funding Petersen's scenarios through NIDS.[1]
Outcome
No announcement followed. In 1999 NIDS commissioned a Roper poll of 1,971 Americans on how people would react to proof of extraterrestrial visitors, and a survey of religious bodies.[1]
People and topics
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- Robert Bigelow — Businessman who founded NIDS and Bigelow Aerospace and ran the AAWSAP contract.
- Jacques Vallée — Computer scientist and astronomer, author of the Forbidden Science journals and a central figure in UFO research.
- Unidentified anomalous phenomena — The U.S. government's current term for unidentified objects in the air, in space and underwater.
- NIDS — Robert Bigelow's research institute (1995–2004) that studied UFOs and other anomalies.
- Unidentified flying object — An object in the sky that can't be identified; the older term for UAP.
- Skinwalker Ranch — A Utah ranch known for reports of strange events, studied by NIDS and AAWSAP.
- Bigelow Aerospace — Robert Bigelow's space habitat company.
- AAWSAP — The Defense Intelligence Agency's UAP research program of 2008–2010, carried out by Bigelow Aerospace Advanced Space Studies.
On the Timeline
- James Cox antigravity classification (1998) (January 1998) — An antigravity newsletter proposes seven possible types of antigravity devices.
- University of South Carolina gravity generator (1 March 1998) — University of South Carolina scientists say they are developing a 'gravity generator'.
See every 1998 event on the UAP Timeline →
References
- Keith Basterfield, "NIDS and the 'Day After' scenarios", UFOs – scientific research (Dec 2019) · ufos-scientificresearch.blogspot.com · archived copy
- Forbidden Science — the journals of Jacques Vallée (Anomaly Archives) · anomalyarchives.org · archived copy
- Forbidden Science series — Anomalist Books · anomalistbooks.com · archived copy
- Review of Forbidden Science 6 — SFCrowsnest · sfcrowsnest.info · archived copy
- Forbidden Science Dispatches — Tanner Boyle (journal summaries) · tannerfboyle.substack.com · archived copy
Further reading
- AATIP / AAWSAP — Wikipedia · en.wikipedia.org · archived copy
- Robert Bigelow — Wikipedia · en.wikipedia.org · archived copy
- Jacques Vallée — Wikipedia · en.wikipedia.org · archived copy
This page was last edited on 29 October 2026. Articles are written in our own words from the sources listed under References; disputed claims are attributed to the people who made them.
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