Here is the article that you can download and read for free: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/394040040_Aligned_multiple-transient_events_in_the_First_Palomar_Sky_Survey
Here is one reddit thread about it:
https://old.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1mavwlj/beatriz_villarroels_paper_just_dropped_the_one/
Here is an article written about the scientific paper (read below):
https://www.abovethenormnews.com/2025/07/28/pre-satellite-era-ufo-evidence/
https://www.reddit.com/r/UFOs/comments/1miqlow/today_on_reality_check_with_ross_coulthart_dr/
Scientists Discover Mysterious Aligned Objects in Earth’s Orbit Decades Before First Satellite - By David Freeman (July 28, 2025)
Scientists have made a discovery that could fundamentally alter what we know about objects orbiting Earth. A team of 15 international researchers led by Swedish astronomer Dr. Beatriz Villarroel has found evidence of mysterious artificial objects in Earth’s orbit that existed decades before humanity launched its first satellite.
The findings come from analysis of 298,165 short-lived transient events captured in photographic plates from the First Palomar Sky Survey, taken between 1949 and 1957. These aligned, multiple-transient events appeared in the sky before any human-made satellites existed. Sputnik 1, the first artificial satellite, wasn’t launched until October 4, 1957 – yet these mysterious objects were photographically documented years earlier.
Dr. Villarroel, working from the Nordic Institute for Theoretical Physics in Stockholm, leads the Vanishing & Appearing Sources during a Century of Observations (VASCO) project. Her team has systematically examined historical astronomical data, comparing sky surveys from the 1950s with modern observations to identify objects that have appeared, disappeared, or changed in ways that defy conventional astrophysical explanations.
This latest research builds on a series of discoveries that began with an extraordinary event on April 12, 1950. Nine star-like objects simultaneously appeared and vanished within a 10 arcminute region during a single 50-minute photographic exposure at Palomar Observatory. These nine transients were absent from images taken just 30 minutes earlier and completely missing from all subsequent observations, including modern deep-sky surveys that reach magnitudes far fainter than the original plates.
The April 1950 event prompted more systematic searches. The VASCO project has cataloged many thousands of unknown transients visible only within single plate exposures, representing phenomena that last mere minutes compared to the decades-long time scales of conventional variable stars.
The new aligned transient discovery represents a major advancement in the research. Unlike isolated cases of multiple simultaneous transients, these events show clear geometric patterns – point-like objects arranged along narrow bands across the sky. The most significant candidate exhibits a 3.9-sigma statistical significance, meaning the probability of such an alignment occurring by chance is approximately 0.01 percent.
The research team’s own language reveals their bewilderment at what they’ve found. As they state in their paper, “no known astrophysical or instrumental explanations fully account for these events.” This admission from accomplished astronomers leaves the door wide open for more extraordinary possibilities.
Research has documented multiple connections to one of the most documented aerial anomaly cases in history: the 1952 Washington D.C. UFO flap.
On July 19, 1952, the team discovered a bright triple transient that vanished within 50 minutes. This date coincides exactly with the first weekend of the Washington UFO events, when air traffic controllers at Washington National Airport spotted seven slow-moving objects on radar screens far from any known flight paths. The objects moved at speeds exceeding 7,000 mph and were witnessed by multiple radar operators, pilots, and ground observers.
Candidate 5 from the aligned transients study (the most statistically significant case with nearly 4-sigma confidence) occurred on July 27, 1952. This date falls on the second weekend of the Washington UFO wave, when President Harry Truman himself demanded answers about the mysterious objects appearing over the nation’s capital.
Also, a forthcoming paper from members of the VASCO team, previewed in this research, reveals even more startling numbers: transients were reportedly 45% more likely to occur within one day of nuclear weapons testing. For every additional UAP report filed on a given date, the number of transients increased by 8.5%.
These correlations suggest a connection between the transient phenomena and significant human activities, particularly nuclear testing and reported aerial anomalies. The statistical relationships are too strong to be explained by coincidence alone.
The strongest evidence for the artificial nature of these objects comes from what scientists call the “Earth shadow test.” When the team analyzed the broader sample of 106,339 transients from the northern hemisphere, they made a remarkable discovery – these mysterious objects exhibit a profound avoidance of Earth’s shadow.
At an altitude of 42,164 kilometers (geosynchronous orbit), transients were found to be 3.5 times less likely to appear in Earth’s umbra than statistical probability would predict. This 22-sigma statistical significance provides overwhelming evidence that these objects require sunlight to be visible, consistent with the hypothesis that they represent reflections from highly reflective artificial surfaces.
The shadow test provides what the researchers call “a crucial empirical lever to distinguish between physical reflections and random defects.” Even the research team states that plate defects “have no plausible reason to avoid the Earth’s shadow,” and that the results “strongly disfavors the plate defect hypothesis.” This forces the conversation toward a more unconventional source.
At 80,000 kilometers altitude, the deficit is even more pronounced, with a 12.7-sigma statistical significance. The consistency of this effect across different altitudes strengthens the case for reflective objects in high Earth orbits.
The research team examined every potential conventional explanation with scientific precision. Atmospheric phenomena would appear as streaks during the 50-minute exposures due to telescope tracking, but these objects appear as perfect point sources. Objects in low Earth orbit would likely leave trails as they moved across the field of view during the long exposures.
Gravitational lensing events would be exceedingly rare and unlikely to produce multiple aligned sources. The researchers calculated that the probability of finding even one such event in their dataset would be vanishingly small. Optical ghosts typically appear extended or irregular, not as perfect point sources matching stellar profiles.
Photographic plate defects cannot explain the shadow avoidance behavior. Emulsion flaws would occur randomly across the plates with no preference for illuminated versus shadowed regions. The team verified their candidates using both Digitized Sky Survey and SuperCOSMOS images (independent digitizations of the same physical plates) to eliminate scanning artifacts.
Computer modeling using the Blender graphics engine demonstrates that rotating objects with reflective surfaces could produce the observed glinting patterns. Five different geometric models (including spheres, polyhedra, cones, double pyramids, and structures with reflective panels) all showed capability to generate multiple aligned flashes when tumbling or precessing in geosynchronous orbit.
The surface density of these detectable objects has been estimated at 9.5×10^-6 per square kilometer at geosynchronous altitude. This suggests a substantial population of artificial constructs in Earth’s vicinity. The detection rate of aligned transients reaches approximately 0.27 events per hour per square degree of sky coverage.
The discoveries in the Palomar plates are stunning on their own, but the story takes a darker turn when viewed in historical context. Our research shows that during this same period of high strangeness, Donald Menzel, a prominent UFO skeptic and director of the Harvard Observatory, allegedly destroyed portions of Harvard’s photographic plate collection in 1952 and stopped the observatory’s sky surveys in 1953. This “Menzel gap” lasted fifteen years until his retirement. The timing coincides with the peak period of transient detections, raising questions about what other evidence might have been lost.
Dr. Villarroel’s methods offer a repeatable way to detect similar phenomena in other historical astronomical datasets. The research demonstrates that answers to fundamental questions about non-human technology may already exist within our scientific archives, waiting to be properly analyzed with modern techniques.
The aligned transient finding builds on the initial nine simultaneous objects found in 1950. Each new finding builds upon previous work, creating a comprehensive picture of unexplained aerial activity during the pre-satellite era. The consistency of these discoveries across multiple years and different photographic plates strengthens the case for a genuine phenomenon rather than instrumental artifacts or contamination.
The VASCO project has altered how scientists search for extraterrestrial intelligence. Rather than listening for radio signals from distant star systems, this research examines our immediate orbital environment for signs of technology that may have been monitoring Earth for decades or longer. The use of pre-satellite era photographs provides a unique window into a time when only non-human objects could have been present in these orbital regions.
The team’s findings have attracted attention from multiple scientific disciplines. The statistical correlations with historical events, combined with the shadow-avoidance behavior, point toward artificial objects operating in Earth’s vicinity during the 1950s. While the researchers maintain scientific caution in their language, referring to “technosignatures” and “non-terrestrial artifacts,” the data increasingly supports the hypothesis that these transients represent technology of non-human origin.
Upcoming research will examine other historical sky surveys and develop artificial intelligence methods to filter genuine transients from plate defects. The team estimates that the aligned candidates represent only a small fraction of the total population of reflective objects in Earth orbit. The shadow test suggests that hundreds of thousands of single, non-aligned transients in the VASCO catalog may also represent artificial objects.
This work has opened up archaeological astronomy: using historical data to search for evidence of advanced technology. As more pre-satellite era photographs are digitized and analyzed, the full scope of non-human activity in Earth’s vicinity may finally be understood. The evidence suggests that we have not been alone, and that our planet has been under observation far longer than previously imagined.
Source Paper:
Villarroel, B., Solano, E., Guergouri, H., Streblyanska, A., Bruehl, S., Andruk, V. M., Mattsson, L., Bär, R. E., Mimouni, J., Geier, S., Gupta, A. C., Okororie, V., Laggoune, K., Shultz, M. E., & Freitas Jr., R. A. (2025). Aligned, multiple-transient events in the First Palomar Sky Survey. Preprint. ResearchGate. https://doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.17502.14402
