Declassified correspondence held in NASA records shows that Carol Rosin, a former aerospace industry spokesperson, and her husband Jon Cypher delivered a copy of the French COMETA report — a privately commissioned study on UFOs and national defense implications — to a senior NASA official identified in the documents only as "Dan," during a visit to NASA headquarters in Washington, D.C., on or around May 1, 2001.
The Documents and Their Contents
The file, catalogued under NASA document number 255_413270 and bearing the title UFOs and Defense: What Should We Prepare For?, contains a cover letter dated April 30, 2001, a handwritten hotel note from Cypher, and a title page identifying the enclosed report as the COMETA study. The letter was sent from Ventura, California, to a recipient at NASA and confirmed an in-person meeting scheduled for that Friday at 3:30 p.m.
In the cover letter, Rosin identifies herself as a former spokesperson for rocket pioneer Wernher von Braun and founder of the Institute for Security and Cooperation in Outer Space, which she states she established in 1983 and had since closed. She describes the purpose of the visit as delivering a package related to what she characterizes as a path toward advancing the space program — one she says would cost NASA nothing.
"As you know, I was spokesperson for von Braun during the last years of his life. He had me commit to finding the path to open the doors to space ... with his full and unlimited vision. I think I've found a way to do it." — Carol Rosin, April 30, 2001 letter
A handwritten note on Renaissance Hotel letterhead, signed by Cypher and apparently left for the NASA official following the meeting, transmits the COMETA report directly. Cypher acknowledges a factual error in his initial characterization of the document's provenance.
"Dan — as promised, here is the French COMETA report. You will note the preface by your former counterpart and P.S. I missed it — it's a private — not government — report but the integrity and sober nature of the participants still, I think, recommends it to you." — Jon Cypher, handwritten note, date approximately May 2001
The COMETA Report and Its Significance
The COMETA report — formally titled UFOs and Defense: What Should We Prepare For? — was produced by the French association COMETA and published in a special issue of the magazine VSD. According to the title page included in the NASA file, the report details the results of a study conducted by the Institute of Higher Studies for National Defence, a French institution associated with senior military and intelligence professionals. Despite its institutional pedigree, the report was privately funded and not an official French government product — a distinction Cypher flags in his note after initially suggesting otherwise.
Cypher's note also directs the NASA official to specific sections of the document, citing radar analysis beginning at page 2162 and testimony from John Callahan — a former FAA Division Chief who has spoken publicly about a 1986 radar incident over Alaska — as well as accounts from Enrique Roudeck, described as an air traffic controller at Mexico City International Airport. The note instructs the official to "read the entire radar section" from that page onward.
Context and Caveats
The identity of the NASA official addressed as "Dan" is not confirmed in the available documents. The file does not include any response from NASA, nor any record of how the agency acted upon, filed, or assessed the materials provided. It is not possible to determine from these records whether the meeting resulted in any internal review, briefing, or institutional follow-up.
The document was retrieved from war.gov, a domain associated with U.S. government archival or defense records, though the provenance and declassification pathway have not been independently confirmed by UFOPress. Reliability of the source is assessed at a moderate level; the documents appear authentic on their face but have not been independently authenticated through a FOIA response or direct agency confirmation.
Rosin has been a recurring figure in UFO advocacy circles since the 1990s, including public testimony before the Disclosure Project in May 2001 — the same month these documents were produced. Her claims about von Braun's alleged warnings regarding the weaponization of space have circulated widely but remain unverified by independent sources. The COMETA report itself has been analyzed by researchers in France and the United States and is generally regarded as a serious, if inconclusive, contribution to the policy literature on UAP.
What the documents do establish, without inference, is that a formal attempt was made in the spring of 2001 to bring the COMETA report to the attention of at least one senior NASA official through a private, in-person channel — and that the individuals involved considered the report's defense and radar dimensions central to its relevance.