Next week, NASA's Planetary Defense Coordination Office (PDCO), FEMA and other U.S. agencies will play out their strategies for a fictional — but ultimately realistic — scenario of an asteroid on a collision course with Earth.
Why it matters: The world’s first collision experiment with an asteroid took place earlier this month, when Japan sent a bomb down to the surface of Asteroid Ryugu. Axios found in 2018 that Americans rank monitoring Earth's climate and detecting asteroids and other objects that could hit the planet as top priorities for NASA.
Almost 2 months after President Trump formalized the creation of the Space Force, the U.S. Navy announced there has been an increase in reports of UFO sightings, reports Politico.
Why it matters: While the Navy isn't saying aliens are out there, it is concerned about the increasing number of reports alleging highly advanced aircraft flying near sensitive military facilities and in military-controlled ranges, per Politico. These reports have been happening consistently since 2014, Luis Elizondo, a former senior intelligence officer, told the Washington Post. Elizondo explained that new Navy guidelines formalized the reporting process, allowing for data-driven analysis of the reports. He called it "the single greatest decision the Navy has made in decades," per the Post.
