On December 1, 1948, a Kentucky Air National Guard pilot named Thomas Mantell was on a routine flight when he encountered an unidentified flying object (UFO) that would make him a part of UFO history. This incident is now known as the Mantell UFO Incident.

Mantell was flying an F-51 Mustang when he received a message from the tower that an object was spotted in the sky that was “about one-quarter the size of the full moon and of a white color.” Mantell was ordered to investigate the object, which was reported to be moving in a southward direction at a high rate of speed.

At first, Mantell thought the object was a weather balloon or some other type of aircraft. However, as he approached the object, he realized that it was not any type of aircraft that he had ever seen before. According to reports, Mantell described the object as being “metallic in appearance and of tremendous size.”

Mantell continued to pursue the object, climbing to an altitude of 22,500 feet. He reported that the object was moving at a high rate of speed and was still climbing. Mantell’s last transmission to the tower was that he was closing in on the object and that it was “directly ahead and above him.”

Moments later, Mantell’s plane crashed, killing him instantly. The official cause of the crash was listed as “pilot error.” The incident immediately became a subject of controversy and speculation among UFO enthusiasts and skeptics alike.

The incident was investigated by the United States Air Force, which later released a report stating that the object was most likely a weather balloon. However, many UFO enthusiasts have remained skeptical of this explanation, citing the speed and altitude of the object as being inconsistent with a weather balloon. They argue that the maneuverability and velocity observed during the sighting are beyond the capabilities of conventional weather balloons, which are generally slow-moving and unable to achieve high altitudes and rapid directional changes reported in the Mantell UFO Incident. Additionally, some witnesses described the object as being metallic and appearing to have a purposeful navigation system, further fueling speculation that it was not a simple weather device.

Despite the official explanation, the Mantell UFO Incident remains one of the most well-known and debated UFO sightings in history. The incident continues to capture the imagination of UFO enthusiasts and skeptics alike, and has become a part of UFO lore and legend. Researchers and investigators often revisit the Mantell case in documentaries, books, and articles, attempting to provide new insights or uncover additional evidence that may have been overlooked. The enduring interest in the Mantell UFO Incident also highlights the broader fascination with the possibility of extraterrestrial life and the quest to explain unidentified aerial phenomena. This continued intrigue ensures that the Mantell UFO Incident remains a topic of discussion and speculation for years to come.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mantell_UFO_incident

https://stmdailynews.com/category/stm-blog/blog/

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W. Joseph Campbell, American University School of Communication

An oracle erred badly. The most impressive results were turned in by a little-known company in Brazil. A nagging problem reemerged, and some media critics turned profane in their assessments.

So it went for pollsters in the 2024 presidential election. Their collective performance, while not stellar, was improved from that of four years earlier. Overall, polls signaled a close outcome in the race between former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris.

That is what the election produced: a modest win for Trump.

With votes still being counted in California and a few other states more than a week after Election Day, Trump had received 50.1% of the popular vote to Harris’ 48.1%, a difference of 2 points. That margin was closer than Joe Biden’s win by 4.5 points over Trump in 2020. It was closer than Hillary Clinton’s popular vote victory in 2016, closer than Barack Obama’s wins in 2008 and 2012.

There were, moreover, no errors among national pollsters quite as dramatic as CNN’s estimate in 2020 that Biden led Trump by 12 points.

This time, CNN’s final national poll said the race was deadlocked – an outcome anticipated by six other pollsters, according to data compiled by RealClearPolitics.

The most striking discrepancy this year was the Marist College poll, conducted for NPR and PBS. It estimated Harris held a 4-point lead nationally at campaign’s end.

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‘Oracle’ of Iowa’s big miss

In any event, a sense lingered among critics that the Trump-Harris election had resulted in yet another polling embarrassment, another entry in the catalog of survey failures in presidential elections, which is the topic of my latest book, “Lost in a Gallup.”

Comedian Jon Stewart gave harsh voice to such sentiments, saying of pollsters on his late-night program on election night, “I don’t ever want to fucking hear from you again. Ever. … You don’t know shit about shit, and I don’t care for you.”

Megyn Kelly, a former Fox News host, also denounced pollsters, declaring on her podcast the day after the election: “Polling is a lie. They don’t know anything.”

Two factors seemed to encourage such derision – a widely discussed survey of Iowa voters released the weekend before the election and Trump’s sweep of the seven states where the outcome turned.

The Iowa poll injected shock and surprise into the campaign’s endgame, reporting that Harris had taken a 3-point lead in the state over Trump. The result was likened to a “bombshell” and its implications seemed clear: If Harris had opened a lead in a state with Iowa’s partisan profile, her prospects of winning elsewhere seemed strong, especially in the Great Lakes swing states of Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania.

The survey was conducted for the Des Moines Register by J. Ann Selzer, a veteran Iowa-based pollster with an outstanding reputation in opinion research. In a commentary in The New York Times in mid-September, Republican pollster Kristen Soltis Anderson declared Selzer “the oracle of Iowa.” Rachel Maddow of MSNBC praised Selzer’s polls before the election for their “uncanny predictive accuracy.” Ratings released in June by data guru Nate Silver gave Selzer’s polls an A-plus grade.

But this time, Selzer’s poll missed dramatically.

Trump carried Iowa by 13 points, meaning the poll was off by 16 points – a stunning divergence for an accomplished pollster.

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“Even the mighty have been humbled” by Trump’s victory, the Times of London said of Selzer’s polling failure.

Selzer said afterward she will “be reviewing data from multiple sources with hopes of learning why that (discrepancy) happened.”

It is possible, other pollsters suggested, that Selzer’s reliance on telephone-based surveying contributed to the polling failure. “Phone polling alone … isn’t going to reach low-propensity voters or politically disengaged nonwhite men,” Tom Lubbock and James Johnson wrote in a commentary for The Wall Street Journal.

These days, few pollsters rely exclusively on the phone to conduct election surveys; many of them have opted for hybrid approaches that combine, for example, phone, text and online sampling techniques.

Surprise sweep of swing states

Trump’s sweep of the seven vigorously contested swing states surely contributed to perceptions that polls had misfired again.

According to RealClearPolitics, Harris held slender, end-of-campaign polling leads in Michigan and Wisconsin, while Trump was narrowly ahead in Arizona, Georgia, Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Nevada.

Trump won them all, an outcome no pollster anticipated – except for AtlasIntel of Sao Paulo, Brazil, a firm “about which little is known,” as The New Republic noted.

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AtlasIntel estimated Trump was ahead in all seven swing states by margins that hewed closely to the voting outcomes. In none of the swing states did AtlasIntel’s polling deviate from the final vote tally by more than 1.3 points, an impressive performance.

AtlasIntel did not respond to email requests I sent requesting information about its background and polling technique. The company describes itself as “a leading innovator in online polling” and says it uses “a proprietary methodology,” without revealing much about it.

Its founder and chief executive is Andrei Roman, who earned a doctorate in government at Harvard University. Roman took to X, formerly Twitter, in the election’s aftermath to post a chart that touted AtlasIntel as “the most accurate pollster of the US Presidential Election.”

It was a burst of pollster braggadocio reminiscent of a kind that has emerged periodically since the 1940s. That was when polling pioneer George Gallup placed two-page advertising spreads in the journalism trade publication “Editor & Publisher” to assert the accuracy of his polls in presidential elections.

Underestimating Trump’s support again

A significant question facing pollsters this year – their great known unknown – was whether modifications made to sampling techniques would allow them to avoid underestimating Trump’s support, as they had in 2016 and 2020.

Misjudging Trump’s backing is a nagging problem for pollsters. The results of the 2024 election indicate that the shortcoming persists. By margins ranging from 0.9 points to 2.7 points, polls overall understated Trump’s support in the seven swing states, for example.

Some polls misjudged Trump’s backing by even greater margins. CNN, for example, underestimated Trump’s vote by 4.3 points in North Carolina, by more than 6 points in Michigan and Wisconsin as well as Arizona.

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Results that misfire in the same direction suggest that adjustments to sampling methodologies were inadequate or ineffective for pollsters in seeking to reach Trump backers of all stripes.

W. Joseph Campbell, Professor Emeritus of Communication, American University School of Communication

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

STM Daily News is a vibrant news blog dedicated to sharing the brighter side of human experiences. Emphasizing positive, uplifting stories, the site focuses on delivering inspiring, informative, and well-researched content. With a commitment to accurate, fair, and responsible journalism, STM Daily News aims to foster a community of readers passionate about positive change and engaged in meaningful conversations. Join the movement and explore stories that celebrate the positive impacts shaping our world.

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In a remarkable turn of events, recently released documents have confirmed the recovery of debris from a UFO that was shot down by a U.S. F-16 fighter jet over Lake Huron on February 12, 2023. This incident marked the third notable UFO occurrence in North America within that month, following a high-profile engagement involving a Chinese surveillance balloon just days earlier.

The octagon-shaped object, which had strings dangling from it, raised eyebrows when U.S. military forces targeted it. The F-16 pilot fired at the unidentified flying object twice, successfully striking it with one missile before it plummeted into Canadian waters. The incident sparked immediate attention from both American and Canadian authorities.

According to a Freedom of Information request filed by CTVNews.ca, the wreckage was located on the shoreline of Lake Huron, yet this significant discovery went largely unreported to the public at the time. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), alongside the American and Canadian Coast Guard, initiated a brief search for the debris. However, they concluded their efforts prematurely, citing deteriorating weather conditions and a low likelihood of recovery as the main factors.

In March 2023, the RCMP managed to recover the UFO wreckage from its crash site. In communications obtained through the documents, a member of the RCMP informed a Canadian military general that the module was traced back to a company specializing in weather monitoring equipment, shedding light on the mysterious object.

The series of UFO incidents in February 2023 has piqued the interest of lawmakers and the public alike, especially in light of the U.S. military’s actions against the Chinese surveillance balloon. The House Committee on Oversight and Accountability has held multiple hearings on unidentified anomalous phenomena (UAPs), with the latest session occurring on November 13, 2023. Experts like Michael Gold, a former NASA leader and member of the independent UAP study team, emphasized the importance of courage in seeking the truth about such phenomena.

As the conversation surrounding UAPs continues to evolve, the recovery of debris from Lake Huron serves as a reminder of the ongoing mystery and intrigue that surrounds unidentified objects in our skies. The implications of these incidents extend beyond mere curiosity, potentially impacting national security and public perception of aerial phenomena. Stay tuned for further developments as authorities continue to unravel the truth behind these intriguing occurrences.

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https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/police-in-canada-collected-wreckage-after-object-shot-down-over-lake-huron-1.7110602

STM Daily News is a vibrant news blog dedicated to sharing the brighter side of human experiences. Emphasizing positive, uplifting stories, the site delivers inspiring, informative, and well-researched content. With a commitment to accurate, fair, and responsible journalism, STM Daily News aims to foster a community of readers passionate about positive change and engaged in meaningful conversations. Join the movement and explore stories that celebrate the positive impacts shaping our world.

https://stmdailynews.com/