Robert Bigelow is an American billionaire entrepreneur best known within UAP research circles for funding private investigations into unidentified aerial phenomena and the paranormal, and for serving as the prime government contractor for the Pentagon’s classified UAP research effort in the late 2000s. He made his fortune through a hotel chain called Budget Suites of America.1 Based in Las Vegas, he channelled substantial personal wealth into scientific enquiry at the fringes of mainstream research, creating institutional structures specifically to pursue these interests.
In 1995, Bigelow self-funded the creation of the National Institute for Discovery Science (NIDS), a privately financed research organisation dedicated to studying UAP and paranormal phenomena.2 The following year, in 1996, he purchased Skinwalker Ranch in Utah for $200,000, providing NIDS with a dedicated field site.3 In 1998, he founded Bigelow Aerospace, a space technology company based in Nevada Las Vegas.4 Bigelow invited Apollo 14 astronaut Edgar Mitchell to serve on the NIDS advisory board,5 and the institute conducted investigations into UAP and paranormal activity throughout the 1990s.6 NIDS documents record investigations from August 1997 into suspected UAP-related cattle mutilations in Utah, Nevada, and New Mexico.7 George Knapp and Colm Kelleher co-authored the 2005 book Hunt for the Skinwalker, which covered NIDS’s work at the ranch.8 At some point, Federal Aviation Administration manuals specifically advised civilian pilots to report UAPs to Bigelow rather than to the FAA.9
Bigelow’s involvement with US government UAP research deepened around 2007. Senator Harry Reid has stated that his own interest in UFOs originated with Bigelow, and that in 2007 Bigelow told him a Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) official had approached Bigelow wishing to visit his Utah ranch where he conducted research.10 Bigelow subsequently sent Reid a letter from a senior DIA physicist who had visited Skinwalker Ranch and been convinced the phenomenon warranted investigation.11 In August 2008, the DIA issued an invitation to tender for the Advanced Aerospace Weapon System Applications Program (AAWSAP) contract; Bigelow was the sole bidder and secured US$10 million in funding for the first year with a five-year option.12
Most of the funding for the Pentagon Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program (AATIP) UFO Program, 2007–2017 went to Bigelow’s companies.13 The bulk passed to Bigelow Aerospace Advanced Space Studies (BAASS), which served as the prime contractor for AAWSAP,14,15 hiring subcontractors and soliciting research on behalf of the programme. Bigelow also spent considerable personal funds supplementing the government contract.16 Douglas Kurth, the first pilot witness to the Tic Tac Sighting in November 2004, was hired by Bigelow in December 2007 as a programme manager for the BAASS investigation team.17 Under Bigelow’s direction, Bigelow Aerospace modified buildings in Las Vegas for the storage of metal alloys and other materials that Luis Elizondo and programme contractors stated had been recovered from unidentified aerial phenomena.18 Elizondo also records that Bigelow attended the Roslyn Virginia Hotel Dinner, describing him as a billionaire hotelier, developer, and aerospace magnate.
As of 2017, Bigelow was also working with NASA to develop expandable spacecraft for human use in space.19 In May 2017, appearing on CBS’s 60 Minutes, Bigelow stated that he was “absolutely convinced” that extraterrestrial life exists and that UFOs have visited Earth.20 He has also claimed to have spent more as an individual on the UAP subject than anyone else in the United States.21 In the context of the AATIP programme, Bigelow stated publicly that the US was “the most backward country in the world on this issue,” contrasting it with China, Russia, and several European and South American nations that he described as more open to official investigation.22