Dit is ons nieuw hondje Kira, een kruising van een waterhond en een Podenko. Ze is sinds 7 februari 2024 bij ons en druk bezig ons hart te veroveren. Het is een lief, aanhankelijk hondje, dat zich op een week snel aan ons heeft aangepast. Ze is heel vinnig en nieuwsgierig, een heel ander hondje dan Noleke.
This is our new dog Kira, a cross between a water dog and a Podenko. She has been with us since February 7, 2024 and is busy winning our hearts. She is a sweet, affectionate dog who quickly adapted to us within a week. She is very quick and curious, a very different dog than Noleke.
DEAR VISITOR,
MY BLOG EXISTS ALREADY 12 YEARS AND 10 MONTHS.
ON 06/04/2024 MORE THAN 1.951.050
VISITORS FROM 134 DIFFERENT NATIONS ALREADY FOUND THEIR WAY TO MY BLOG.
THAT IS AN AVERAGE OF 400GUESTS PER DAY.
THANK YOU FOR VISITING MY BLOG AND HOPE YOU ENJOY EACH TIME.
The purpose of this blog is the creation of an open, international, independent and free forum, where every UFO-researcher can publish the results of his/her research. The languagues, used for this blog, are Dutch, English and French.You can find the articles of a collegue by selecting his category. Each author stays resposable for the continue of his articles. As blogmaster I have the right to refuse an addition or an article, when it attacks other collegues or UFO-groupes.
Druk op onderstaande knop om te reageren in mijn forum
Zoeken in blog
Deze blog is opgedragen aan mijn overleden echtgenote Lucienne.
In 2012 verloor ze haar moedige strijd tegen kanker!
In 2011 startte ik deze blog, omdat ik niet mocht stoppen met mijn UFO-onderzoek.
BEDANKT!!!
Een interessant adres?
UFO'S of UAP'S, ASTRONOMIE, RUIMTEVAART, ARCHEOLOGIE, OUDHEIDKUNDE, SF-SNUFJES EN ANDERE ESOTERISCHE WETENSCHAPPEN - DE ALLERLAATSTE NIEUWTJES
UFO's of UAP'S in België en de rest van de wereld In België had je vooral BUFON of het Belgisch UFO-Netwerk, dat zich met UFO's bezighoudt. BEZOEK DUS ZEKER VOOR ALLE OBJECTIEVE INFORMATIE , enkel nog beschikbaar via Facebook en deze blog.
Verder heb je ook het Belgisch-Ufo-meldpunt en Caelestia, die prachtig, doch ZEER kritisch werk leveren, ja soms zelfs héél sceptisch...
Voor Nederland kan je de mooie site www.ufowijzer.nl bezoeken van Paul Harmans. Een mooie site met veel informatie en artikels.
MUFON of het Mutual UFO Network Inc is een Amerikaanse UFO-vereniging met afdelingen in alle USA-staten en diverse landen.
MUFON's mission is the analytical and scientific investigation of the UFO- Phenomenon for the benefit of humanity...
Je kan ook hun site bekijken onder www.mufon.com.
Ze geven een maandelijks tijdschrift uit, namelijk The MUFON UFO-Journal.
Since 02/01/2020 is Pieter ex-president (=voorzitter) of BUFON, but also ex-National Director MUFON / Flanders and the Netherlands. We work together with the French MUFON Reseau MUFON/EUROP.
ER IS EEN NIEUWE GROEPERING DIE ZICH BUFON NOEMT, MAAR DIE HEBBEN NIETS MET ONZE GROEP TE MAKEN. DEZE COLLEGA'S GEBRUIKEN DE NAAM BUFON VOOR HUN SITE... Ik wens hen veel succes met de verdere uitbouw van hun groep. Zij kunnen de naam BUFON wel geregistreerd hebben, maar het rijke verleden van BUFON kunnen ze niet wegnemen...
07-10-2023
Area 51: Some of the Strangest Tales and Mysteries From Aliens to Marilyn Monroe
Area 51: Some of the Strangest Tales and Mysteries From Aliens to Marilyn Monroe
Nick Redfern
Area 51: we've all heard about it. But, what about some of the craziest stories that have come out of it? Let's have a look at some of them. Here they are, in their top weirdness and in no particular order: there can be very few people on the planet who have not heard of its infamous name. Many will be familiar with the extraordinary claims of what, allegedly, goes on there. It’s a place that is saturated in secrecy, cloaked in conspiracy theories, and, according to many, it is home to Uncle Sam’s very own, highly classified, prized collection of secret aircraft, dead aliens, crashed UFOs, and extraterrestrial technology. Highly fortified, and guarded by personnel who have the right to use “deadly force” to protect its many and varied secrets, it is, of course, Area 51. For years, there were rumors of a top secret installation deep in the Nevada desert. Incredibly, outside of the world of officialdom and the people who lived in the area, hardly anyone had heard of the place until the latter part of the 1980s. That was when a controversial character named Bob Lazar came out of the shadows and revealed a startling story. According to Lazar, in late 1988 he worked briefly at a facility on Area 51 called S-4. That work reportedly revolved around the study of a number of acquired alien spacecraft. Yes, the U.S. Government has a secret storage area for vehicles from other worlds. Maybe even from other galaxies. At least, if you buy into the stories of Lazar.
(Nick Redfern) The most secret military facility on the planet
It’s hardly a surprise that when the Lazar story hit the headlines the media quickly latched onto it, as did the UFO research community, many of whom saw Lazar’s revelations as the breakthrough they had waited for, patiently, and for so long. Maybe it was just such an amazing breakthrough, but, on the other hand, perhaps it wasn’t. We’ll come to that thorny issue later. Regardless of whether or not people bought into Lazar’s revelations, the fact is that the genie’s bottle – so to speak – was, thanks to his disclosures, now open and ready to be mined. As a result, Area 51 appeared in various episodes of The X-Files, in a block-buster movie of 1996, Independence Day, and in numerous other sci-fi-driven shows, as well as on almost endless numbers of television documentaries. Although, from the government’s perspective, it’s barely acknowledged to exist, Area 51 is known worldwide. In a very strange fashion, it has become part of our pop-culture. And that is unlikely to ever change, such is the allure of the tales coming out of the base. But how and why did one top secret government facility achieve such notoriety? Let’s see…
Area 51, the Nevada Test and Training Range, aliens, JFK and the death of Marilyn Monroe: are they all connected? It’s a hugely charged saga that dates back to the mid-1990s and which is clearly not going to go away anytime soon. The vast majority of the story is reliant on a controversial document of questionable origins and of equally questionable authenticity. Allegedly, it’s a CIA document dated August 3, 1962 and which deals with Marilyn Monroe’s supposed knowledge of Roswell and UFO-themed conspiracies. And matters relative to what is referred to as a “secret base.” Now, where might that be…? What is particularly interesting about the “Monroe document” is not so much what it says, but what it specifically doesn’t say. Despite what many researchers have said, there is not even a single reference in the document to aliens, extraterrestrials, flying saucers, or UFOs. Not a single one. In fact, the wording could actually push the whole thing down a very different paths you will soon see. But, first, let’s see how and under what circumstances the controversial one-page document surfaced.
It all began in 1995, at a Los Angeles-based press conference. It was a press conference held by a man named Milo Speriglio. He was a man with a deep interest in the circumstances surrounding Marilyn’s death. Speriglio was so interested in her final day in August 1962 that he wrote three books on the issues of her life and her still-controversial death. They were Crypt 33, The Marilyn Conspiracy, and Marilyn Monroe: Murder Cover-Up. Until 1995, Speriglio had not made any kind of connection between the Hollywood uber-babe and UFOs. So, what was it that prompted Speriglio to head off into new and highly inflammatory territory? It was a revelation from a man named Timothy Cooper. Today, many people within Ufology might not recognize that name. But, from the early-to-late 1990s, Cooper – of Big Bear Lake, California – was a well-known figure in Ufology. He was also a controversial figure, too. Most of the controversy stemmed from the fact that Cooper claimed to have received a wealth of old, sensational, leaked documents from retired figures in the intelligence community – almost all of them on crashed UFOs, Roswell, dead aliens, and the notorious Majestic 12 group. Rather notably, the initial batch came to Cooper from a source in…Nevada.
(Nick Redfern) Who really knows the truth?
There’s no doubt that the documents existed (and still exist). There are literally hundreds of pages. The big question is: are they the real deal? When the papers were made available, there were those researchers who believed that the documents were one hundred percent real. Some investigators, though, considered them to be government disinformation. And others were firmly of the opinion that Cooper had created them himself, perhaps for fame, notoriety or money. Possibly, all three. The controversy raged on for a while, but finally imploded upon itself with barely a sigh. The Marilyn document was one of those which Cooper claimed to have received from one of his various sources, or as we might justifiably call them: “ufological Snowdens.” Now, onto somthing else weird and connected to Area 51.
Now, to a matter concerning NASA and which provoked a whirlwind of controversy in 1974. It all revolves around three astronauts and NASA’s almost legendary craft, Skylab. NASA states: “Skylab was hailed as a ‘bold concept’ by Rocco Petrone, who served as director of launch operations at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida before becoming director of the agency’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., during 1973 and 1974. The program demanded innovation and ingenuity, said Petrone in Skylab, Our First Space Station, a NASA report published in 1977. ‘Experience and knowledge gained from earlier space programs provided a solid foundation on which to build, but the Skylab Program was truly making new pathways in the sky.’ The project began as the Apollo Applications Program in 1968 with an objective to develop science-based human space missions using hardware originally developed for the effort to land astronauts on the moon. Skylab orbited the Earth from 1973 to 1979.”
It was on April 19, 1974 that trouble started brewing. It was on that day that the then-Director of the CIA, William Colby, received a communication from one of his colleagues, an unknown figure who wanted to discuss a certain “issue.” Colby was told that: “The issue arises from the fact that the recent Skylab mission inadvertently photographed” Area 51. Colby was additionally informed that: “There were specific instructions not to do this.” Dwayne A. Day, of The Space Review, and who personally broke the story in 2006, said: “In other words, the CIA considered no other spot on Earth to be as sensitive as Groom Lake, and the astronauts had just taken a picture of it.” Uh-oh. Not good. Those astronauts who had caused all of the problems were Edward Gibson, Gerald Carr and William Pogue. Both Pogue and Carr had military backgrounds and Gibson had a doctorate in engineering physics. Day says of their actions: “Why the Skylab astronauts disobeyed their orders and took the photo is unknown, as are what it depicted.”
Director Colby’s informant told him: “This photo has been going through an interagency reviewing process aimed at a decision on how it should be handled. There is no agreement DoD elements (USAF, NRO, JCS, ISA) all believe it should be withheld from public release. NASA, and to a large degree State, has taken the position that it should be released – that is, allowed into the Sioux National Repository and let nature take its course.” Colby was also advised that: “There are some complicated precedents which, in fairness, should be reviewed before a final decision.” There was, Colby was told, “a question of whether anything photographed in the United States can be classified if the platform is unclassified; such complex issues in the UN concerning United States policies toward imagery from space” and “the question of whether the photograph can be withheld without leaking.”
In terms of the outcome, Dwayne A. Day said: “Nothing more is known of this Skylab incident than the fact that the photograph was not released. NASA and the State Department clearly lost the argument. But the opponents of releasing it preserved national security, as they defined it.” None of this explains, exactly, why the NASA astronauts deliberately went against protocol and photographed Area 51. Were they, perhaps, aware of the strange rumors surrounding the base and, as a result, decided to get a photo of the legendary installation? It’s very hard to come to another, viable conclusion. Although the story of Area 51 didn’t really take off big time until 1989 – which was when Bob Lazar entered the scene in controversial and eyebrows-raising fashion – there were significant indications as far back as 1984 that something very weird and deeply conspiratorial was going down out in the heart of the Nevada Desert. We know this, thanks to a now-declassified U.S. Government document of 1987 on what are referred to in its pages as “military land withdrawals. The title: Hearings Before the Subcommittee on Interior and Insular Affairs, House of Representatives, Ninety-Ninth Congress, Second Session.
On March 11, 1986, beginning at 9:45 a.m., in room B-352, Rayburn House Office Building, the Honorable John F. Seiberling made a notable statement on the U.S. Air Force’s plans to prevent American citizens from accessing massive slabs of land that, legally, the Air Force had no right to claim as their own. That land, of course, was – as the government saw things – way too close to Area 51 for comfort. But, before we get to that, let’s take a look at a certain controversy that was going down in 1984. It provides us with a timeline that led directly to the events of March 11, 1986. In his 1991 book, Alien Liaison, British ufologist Timothy Good wrote: “In early 1984 the U.S. Air Force illegally seized 89,000 acres of public land, known as the Groom Range, in order to further restrict access to Area 51. The decision to control access was made after the consultation with local Bureau of Land Management officials and after USAF Headquarters had conferred with the Air Force Secretariat.”
As a result of this controversial land-grabbing operation, in August 1984 a hearing was held to specifically address this issue. It was held in the U.S. House of Representatives. The debate was between the Honorable John Rittenhouse – who was there to represent the interests of the Air Force – and the Chairman, the Honorable John F. Seiberling. The debate went as follows: Seiberling: “Is it true that Air Force has already acted to restrict public use of the Groom Range area?”
(Nick Redfern) Marilyn Monroe and Area 51: a strange connection
Rittenhouse: “Yes, sir, it is true. We have asserted the right to control the surface access and egress to the extent of requesting people not to go in and out. We have people posted to the roads and at certain times we do not. We ask their cooperation.”
Seiberling: “Under what legal authority was that done; that right asserted?”
Rittenhouse: “As far as I know, sir, there is none; except decisions were made at a much, much higher level than mine that that be done.”
Seiberling: “There is no higher level than the laws of the United States.”
Rittenhouse: “No, sir, I understand, and we can describe that further if you would like, sir.”
Seiberling: “I would like.”
Rittenhouse: “In closed briefing.”
Seiberling: “Why would that have to be in a closed briefing?”
Rittenhouse: “I can’t discuss it, sir.”
Area 51's secrecy was in danger of being lost.
One of the most controversial of all of Lazar’s claims is that he read a series of highly-classified documents on various aspects of the UFO phenomenon. One of those documents, Lazar maintained, told a strange and almost sinister story of a violent confrontation between security personnel at Area 51 and a group of aliens that were in residence and working at S-4, alongside a scientific team. It was a confrontation that reportedly resulted in more than a few deaths. Far more than a few. To his credit, Lazar has admitted that he cannot say for sure that the briefing papers he read were the real thing. He has acknowledged that they may have been disinformation, designed to swamp him with both real and bogus material. Why might the project leaders at Area 51 do such a thing? Simple: if there were concerns that lazar might blow the whistle on what he knew (which, as history has shown, he did, in 1989), mixing up the truth with a more than liberal amount of lies might have an adverse effect on his credibility. It should be noted that’s exactly what happened. That said, and although he cannot say for sure that the documentation was the real deal, he does recall the contents of the material, in relation to this fire-fight situation.
According to Lazar, the deadly confrontation occurred at some point in 1979, in the S-4 facility. Lazar said: “I believe the altercation came about in 1979, or sometime like that. And I don’t remember exactly how it was started, but it had something to do with the security personnel. The aliens were in a separate room. I think it had something to do with the bullets [the security guards] were carrying, and somehow they were trying to be told that they couldn’t enter the area with the bullets, possibly because it was hazardous – the bullets could explode, through some field or whatever.” Lazar continued that despite the warning, one of the security guards did indeed enter the room with the bullets – something which resulted in a violent and lethal response from the aliens. Lazar recalled that the papers he read described how the security personnel were all quickly killed by “head wounds.” The same fate befell a group of scientists on the program, too. Timothy Good, who interviewed Lazar at the height of the controversy surrounding his claims, said: “The incident is said to have led to the termination of an alien liaison at the Nevada Test Site.”
There is a particularly important aspect to the controversy surrounding Bob Lazar that many researchers are either completely unaware of or have overlooked – possibly not realizing the importance of that certain aspect. It’s the distinct possibility that while working out at S-4 Lazar may have had his mind tampered with. We’re talking about ways and means to blur reality, to have the targeted individual – in this case Lazar – see and experience something that may not actually be part of what passes for reality. Timothy Good made a notable statement on this issue. Good stated that Lazar told him, “Security was formidable, and various methods of intimidation (including the possible use of drugs and hypnosis [italics mine]) were used to ensure that those who worked at the base kept their mouths shut.”
Renowned ufologist, Dr. Jacques Vallee, noted something that was almost certainly connected to the drugs / hypnosis issue. Vallee, speaking on KLAS-TV’s show, UFOs: The Best Evidence, said he asked Lazar “if he felt that his memory might have been tampered with.” There was a good reason for that question to have been asked. Lazar has admitted that on a couple of occasions, all he could remember was being flown out to S-4…and flying back. And that’s all. His mind had been wiped clean of around two days’ worth of memories. And he never, ever got those missing days back. In light of that, we have to seriously wonder if Lazar genuinely recalled his experiences as he remembered them, but that what he remembered wasn’t real. It may well have been part of an ingenious plan to have Lazar become the ultimate patsy in a plot to convince someone – maybe the Russians – that the U.S. Government has UFOs and alien technology in its secret arsenals. In that sense, the entirety of Lazar’s story needs to be addressed very carefully. Not because he was a liar. But, because his memories cannot be trusted. Of course, though, that’s not down to him. It’s all down to whoever it was who messed with his mind.
One of the lesser known aspects of the Bob Lazar controversy is that which suggests he just might have seen an alien entity at Area 51 – a live one, no less. The story gets very little publicity, but it’s fascinating in the extreme. The issue of aliens – alive, dead or both at Area 51 -first surfaced from Lazar in early 1989. When asked about that specific matter by George Knapp, Lazar quickly shot down the question in an awkward fashion and changed the subject. Later, though, in what was a private, rather than public, interview, Lazar opened up a bit more. What he had to say was brief but amazing – if true, of course. According to Lazar, “I walked down the hallway at one time I was working down there, and there were these doors – the doors that go to the hangar are smaller than the doors in the corridors and have a 9-inch or 12-inch square window with little wires running through it, just about head level. And as I was walking by, I just glanced in and I noticed – at a quick glance – there were two guys in white lab coats, facing me towards the door.”
Lazar then got to the heart of the matter: the two men were looking down at a small, humanoid figure with long arms, seemingly talking to it. Although Lazar only saw the entity for a second or so, he was in no doubt about what it appeared to be. I say “appeared” because Lazar himself wondered if this was some kind of set-up. He said of this possibility: “Maybe they stuck a doll in front of these guys and made me walk by it and look at it, just to see what my reaction would be.” Such a thing is not at all impossible, as the following brief, but notable, comment from Lazar makes clear: “They play so many mind games there [italics mine].” While enthusiastic UFO researchers may dearly want to believe that living aliens are at Area 51, Lazar’s carefully worded statement suggests we should exercise restraint on this issue – at least until, or if, further vindication comes along. It’s important too to note that there is an intriguing precedent to this – a very similar tale of fabricated aliens, as we will imminently see. George Knapp made a thought-provoking statement in 1993 which may have a bearing on the issue of how the government might be using the UFO issue as a cover for something else, such as a dummy for an alien, we might suggest. Knapp said: “Again and again, I have heard self-appointed Groom Lake experts conclude, without any reservations, that the Groom Lake aerial ballet is disinformation, pure theater, a show designed to distract attention away from earthly black projects, or as some sort of exercise in mass psychology.”
It’s a fact that most people who have studied the claims of Bob Lazar focus their attentions on what he had to say about the UFOs allegedly held at S-4, as well as his statements concerning Element 115. There is one issue which doesn’t get the attention that it really should. It’s a part of Lazar’s story which takes things down a path that is filled with disturbing revelations involving the afterlife. One of the many briefing papers that Lazar said he read at S-4 stated that the aliens refer to us, the human race, as what we would call “Containers.” But, containers of what? Well, that’s where things get really controversial. Lazar told KLAS-TV’s George Knapp “religion was created so we have some rules and regulations for the sole purpose of not damaging the containers.”
There followed an awkward conversation which saw Knapp pressing for answers, and Lazar almost squirming because of the nightmarish nature of the story. That’s hardly surprising, because the claimed big secret is that the aliens have an interest in the human soul. Worse, though, they allegedly use the human soul in a way that the U.S. Government doesn’t fully understand. Or, that the government does know, but does not know how to tell the world the awful truth. One of the theories is truly terrifying: that the aliens “feed” on the human soul, on our life-force. In this scenario, the earth is a farm and we are the cattle. On our deaths our souls are reaped and the life-energy sustains the aliens. Far out? Definitely. But, Lazar stands by what he read in those briefing papers. The soul angle has led some UFO researchers to believe that the aliens are actually nothing of the sort. Rather, the theory is that they are high-tech demons; it’s an issue we will come to shortly.
George Knapp was not the only person who Bob Lazar spoke to on this issue of containers. Michael Lindemann is the author of a 1995 book, UFOs and the Alien Presence. He also questioned Lazar on this controversy-dominated aspect of the story of Lazar and Area 51. Lazar added a bit more to the story, when speaking with Lindemann, as the latter acknowledged in his book. He noted that Lazar said the containers were “extremely, extremely unique,” that they were “very difficult to find,” and that the biggest secret of all revolved around our souls. No wonder that the people in the know at Area 51 didn’t know how to tell the rest of the world the story they were forced to sit on – out of fear of worldwide anarchy breaking out, if it was revealed that religion was a creation of ancient extraterrestrials who devour our souls.
As we have seen, there is one thing – more than any other – that sets Area 51 apart from just about every other military or government facility in the United States: it’s the sheer extent of the government’s determination to make sure that absolutely nothing gets out of Area 51 and no-one gets in. Of course, and particularly so in today’s climate of uncertainty and threats of nuclear attacks, everyone needs to be vigilant. And that includes everyone who works at Area 51, too. They are, when all is said and done, just like us, regular people with lives and families. The big difference, though, is that they know the reasons for so much secrecy and we don’t. It would be hard – in fact, impossible – to find a military installation in the United States that protects its secrets to a greater degree than Area 51. People have been forced to leave their homes and their land – solely due to U.S. Government concerns and worries that those same people just might see something they shouldn’t see. The outrageous story of the Sheahan is a perfect example. Those who stray too close to portions of the Nevada desert that the staff of Area 51 would prefer to keep under wraps risk large fines, imprisonment and even death, and all in the name of national security.
Aircraft are banned from flying close to or over Area 51. They can even be shot down out of the sky, if circumstances dictate and warrant such drastic action. When, in 1974, NASA’s astronauts on-board Skylab took an aerial phot of the base, all hell broke loose in the defense- and intelligence-based communities of the United States. The CIA and the Department of Defense quickly got involved. Major concerns were expressed about how on Earth (or, in this case, off it) such a thing could have happened. Secret files were created, most of which have never publicly surfaced. Motion-detector equipment peppers the landscape. Cameras are everywhere. Guards patrol the local roads for any perceived suspicious characters. Night-vision technology ensures that no-one can penetrate the base in the early hours of the morning.
The government practically refuses to acknowledge not just the existence of Area 51, but even its name. That same government refused to offer help on the 1996 movie Independence Day, and all because a substantial portion of the movie revolved around Area 51 and the 1947 incident at Roswell, New Mexico. All of the above is astonishing. No facility in the United States comes even close to the level of secrecy and paranoia that surrounds Area 51. Which brings up an important question: is all of this overwhelming secrecy just in place to protect next-generation after next-generation of aircraft? Or, are the rumors and the whispers true? You know the ones, of course: the claims that are deeply hidden at Area 51 are the remains of the Roswell wreckage, recovered flying saucers, and alien corpses. Maybe, even living aliens are at the base, too.
Three Enigmatic Lights Spotted in Earth’s Orbit by Astronauts!
Three Enigmatic Lights Spotted in Earth’s Orbit by Astronauts!
Article: The Enigma of Space: UFO Sightings or Astral Phenomena?
From the vast emptiness of space, mysteries emerge. Stories of unidentified flying objects have long intrigued the masses, stirring up questions about extraterrestrial life and the unknown. As advancements in technology bring us closer to the stars, they also offer more enigmatic findings.
During a routine survey to ensure the safety of Atlantis’ heat shield, astronauts reported seeing three flashing lights in Earth’s orbit. Was it a sign of extraterrestrial life visiting our planet? This sighting, though brief, captivated NASA scientists and enthusiasts of UFO sightings alike.
However, a closer examination suggested that the lights might be incidental objects that broke free accidentally from the shuttle. The concern was justified when, a day later, NASA found evidence that Atlantis had been hit by a micrometeorite. While the triangular formation of the lights witnessed by the crew remained an unsolved puzzle, NASA’s swift caution ensured the shuttle’s safe return.
Atlantis had always been a beacon of hope and a symbol of human achievement in space exploration. The unexpected incident only reinforced the importance of its impeccable performance.
Space Oddities: Beyond Triangular Lights
Triangular patterns aren’t the only peculiar symbols reported in space. Astronomer Jim Scotty of Kit Peek Observatory in Arizona, upon hearing of an unconventional comet, set his sights on the skies. Using his 1.8-meter telescope, he glimpsed something out of the ordinary – an object that looked eerily distinct from any known comet.
Further investigation revealed a hazy image that seemed to have a probe-like extension. This caught NASA’s attention, leading them to deploy their most powerful observational tool – the Hubble Space Telescope.
The images relayed were nothing short of astonishing. A giant ‘X’ shape loomed in space, an anomaly that had scientists stepping back in awe. This X-structure, which spanned over 1,500 miles, was unlike anything manufactured on Earth and was unlike any recognized natural phenomena. Theories abounded, with some speculating a collision between two asteroids, while others mused on the possibility of an unknown space construction.
Despite the abundance of advanced equipment and seasoned experts, the universe continues to retain its mysteries. As Astronomer JJ Cavalars aptly puts it, “There’s more that we don’t know than we do know.”
Whether UFO sightings, mysterious space formations, or the enigmatic ‘X’ in the sky, the universe constantly reminds us of its vastness and the multitude of secrets it holds. While some questions might find answers in time, others might remain in the beautiful realm of the unknown.
Should Britain be taking UFOs more seriously? As NASA sets up a taskforce to study possible extraterrestrial visitors in the US, experts say it's time for the UK to follow suit in the interests of 'national security'
Should Britain be taking UFOs more seriously? As NASA sets up a taskforce to study possible extraterrestrial visitors in the US, experts say it's time for the UK to follow suit in the interests of 'national security'
Experts have accused UK Government of failing to take UFOs seriously enough
Ministry of Defence closed its UFO desk in 2009 and nothing has ever replaced it
Britain should follow America's lead and create its own UFOtaskforce to investigate potential extraterrestrial sightings, experts have said.
They accused the UK Government of failing to take the issue seriously enough and warned that it could have serious implications for the country's defence capabilities.
Nick Pope, who investigated UFOs for the British military in the 1990s before the unit was disbanded, said it was 'outrageous' that ministers are not taking 'meaningful action' to probe unidentified anomalous phenomena (UAPs) — more commonly known as unidentified flying objects.
The Ministry of Defence (MoD) needs to restart UAP investigations, a task force of some sort needs to be set up, and the Defence Committee needs to start holding the MoD to account on UAP, as the Armed Services Committees are doing in the US Congress, in both the Senate and the House,' he told MailOnline.
Mr Pope accused defence officials of 'falling back on a lazy, closed-minded "it can't be, so it isn't" mindset', meaning potential foreign threats to UK shores could be missed.
Is anyone out there? Britain should follow America's lead and create its own UFO taskforce to investigate potential extraterrestrial sightings, experts have said
Alien hunter: The inaugural boss of NASA's newly-created UFO research division has been named as former meteorologist and liaison to the Pentagon Mark McInerney
The MoD closed its UFO desk in 2009 and nothing has ever replaced it.
Prior to this, it carried out what at the time was a highly-secretive and extensive UFO investigation of more than 10,000 possible sightings over several decades — many of which were by military personnel.
Known as the Project Condign report, it concluded that 80 per cent of the sightings were easily explained, 19 per cent were secret military craft and just 1 per cent were mysterious in origin.
However, the MoD accepted that there are always going to be UAP and that those which are unexplained are likely an 'an unknown kind of plasma' and not of concern.
'The MoD has consistently stated that no UFO/UAP sighting has ever shown a threat to the UK, therefore they are of no defence significance and as a result the MoD is not interested,' said Philip Mantle, the former director of investigations at the British UFO Research Association.
He told MailOnline that for this reason it would be 'pointless' to set up a UFO taskforce.
'The MoD are not interested and science in general usually gives the subject a wide berth,' Mr Mantle added.
'One thing that is clear, however, is that the UFO phenomenon, whatever it may be, does not recognise any international borders, therefore any such study surely must be international in scope rather than national.'
The space agency's independent panel of experts stressed that there was 'no reason to conclude' that any were extraterrestrial in origin, but warned that mysterious flying objects were a 'self-evident' threat to American airspace.
Mr Pope said that if the US was worried about this then Britain, as an NATO ally, should be too.
In the US, NASA last week released its highly-anticipated report into more than 800 potential alien sightings over a period of three decades. NASA chief Bill Nelson (pictured) announced that a new director for UFO research would help implement the panel's recommendations
The newly-formed UFO research division will continue studying UAPs, even though the space agency yesterday ruled out that aliens were to blame for some 800 such sightings over almost three decades. Above, a weather balloon careens through the air following its release from the Cape Canaveral weather station in Florida. NASA's panel included this image in their report as an example of the striking, highly unusual objects that actually have a terrestrial explanation
He added: 'The UK can make a significant contribution to the wider search for the truth about UAP, by leveraging its world class intelligence community imagery analysis resources and capabilities.
'The bottom line is that we need action.
'Just as lawmakers in the US – Republicans and Democrats alike – are taking up this issue, UK Parliamentarians should start asking the MoD some hard questions, not accept boilerplate responses, and ensure that meaningful action is taken by setting up a task force modeled on the Pentagon's All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office.'
A petition has also been set up calling for the UK to set up an investigatory office on UFOs/UAPs but has so far attracted just 1,500 signatures since May.
It requires 10,000 for the Government to respond to it and 100,000 to be considered for debate in Parliament.
Interesting: Earlier this year the Department of Defense released a document disclosing the 'world's UFO hotspots'. It includes a map showing where the most sightings of unidentified objects have been recorded, based on reports between 1996 and 2023
The petition states that the office 'would be primarily to research and investigate reports of UFOs (unidentified flying objects) and UAPs (unidentified anomalous phenomena) over the United Kingdom and also assist and support witnesses.'
Even though they poured cold water on the extraterrestrial hypothesis, NASA's experts did not deny the possibility of a 'potential unknown alien technology operating in Earth's atmosphere'.
Their 33-page report called for NASA to utilise its technological might to continue studying UFOs because many cases remain unsolved — and researchers still have no idea what some of these sightings are.
But that could finally change following the official release of information from the Pentagon about the mysterious aerial phenomena.
The new Department of Defense document reveals characteristics of the typical UFO, including the colour and the shape, velocity, and flight level
Based on clues from reported sightings, the typical UFO has a round shape, usually described as spherical or an orb, with a white or silver colour, often translucent.
It also has a size of between 3 and 13 feet (1 to 4 metres) and usually travels through the air at a height just below commercial passenger planes.
Het is een van de raadselachtigste massa-extincties die de Aarde heeft gekend: hoe konden die grote en machtige dinosaurussen 66 miljoen jaar geleden in één klap worden weggevaagd? En niet alleen de dino’s, driekwart van het leven op Aarde verdween. Was het een meteorietinslag of toch een vulkaanuitbarsting, die op dramatische wijze een einde maakte aan het Krijt?
Onderzoekers besloten zich er eens niet zelf mee te bemoeien, maar een computer het werk te laten opknappen. En dat leidde tot een verrassende uitkomst: niet de asteroïde, maar de uitbarsting van de Deccan Traps zou het leven op Aarde fataal zijn geworden. Rond de overgang van het Krijt naar het Tertiair barstte het westen van India open over een oppervlakte van 500.000 vierkante kilometer. De vulkaanuitbarstingen hielden een miljoen jaar aan, waardoor er enorme hoeveelheden CO2 in de lucht belandden en de Aarde snel opwarmde. Het gebied van de Deccan Traps bestaat uit een laag van 2 kilometer dikke gestolde basalten.
Vulkaan versus meteoriet Volgens de laatste theorie vormden deze vulkaanuitbarstingen de voorzet, waarna de meteoriet de genadeklap was. Het puin en stof in de lucht na de inslag blokkeerde het zonlicht waardoor het zo’n tien jaar lang koud en donker werd op Aarde, wat tot de uitsterving van een groot aantal soorten kan hebben geleid. Maar zeker weten doen we het niet.
Dus misschien kan een computermodel uitsluitsel bieden. “In plaats van te zeggen: ‘laten we de vulkanen de schuld geven en uitleggen waarom’ of ‘laten we de asteroïde de schuld geven en uitleggen waarom’, was het doel om zo min mogelijk menselijke input of vooroordelen te hebben”, zegt rekenkundig geoloog Alexander Cox van het Amerikaanse Dartmouth College.
Boringen in de diepzee Het idee was om bij het bewijs te beginnen, want dat is er: bij boringen in diepzeesedimenten zijn geologische resten gevonden die wijzen op dodelijke hoeveelheden gas in de atmosfeer en in de oceanen, met name CO2 en zwaveldioxide. Maar die gassen kunnen net zo goed afkomstig zijn van de vulkaanuitbarstingen als van de meteorietinslag, aangezien daardoor rotsen zijn verbrand op het oppervlak van de Aarde, redeneren de onderzoekers.
Speciaal wiskundig model Om te ontrafelen hoe groot de bijdrage was van beide rampen, hebben ze een specifiek statistisch model gebruikt: de Markov-keten Monte Carlo-methode (voor de liefhebbers). Deze methode berekent systematisch de kans op verschillende emissiescenario’s van de diverse bronnen. De oplossing ontstaat, doordat de resultaten van de simulaties steeds dichterbij de geologische observaties komen. Wat de bevindingen extra sterk maakt, is dat de onderzoekers maar liefst 128 verschillende processors parallel simulaties lieten draaien. “Alle processoren vergeleken daarna hoe ze het deden aan het eind van elke simulatie, zoals klasgenoten hun antwoorden vergelijken”, aldus Cox. Zo konden berekeningen die normaal wel een jaar duren in een paar dagen worden uitgevoerd.
Foraminiferen De gegevens waren afkomstig uit drie kernen die gedrild zijn in diepzeesedimenten, allemaal daterend van 67 tot 65 miljoen jaar geleden. In die sedimenten zijn foraminiferen gevonden, micro-organismen waarvan de schaal verschillende isotopen van koolstof en zuurstof bevat. Dit kun je zien als een afspiegeling van de chemische samenstelling van de oceaan in die periode. Daarom kun je het gebruiken als een proxy om bijvoorbeeld de temperatuur in die tijd af te leiden of hoeveel diertjes er in de oceanen leefden en hoeveel koolstof er heen en weer ging tussen de atmosfeer, de oceaan en het land.
En de computersimulaties leverden iets interessants op: de hoeveelheid gas die in de atmosfeer werd gespuwd door de vulkanen was genoeg voor de temperatuurverandering en koolstofcyclus, zoals die is af te leiden uit de foraminiferen in de drilkernen. En de asteroïde, die de enorme Chicxulub-krater vormde in wat nu Mexico is, produceerde waarschijnlijk niet zo’n enorme piek in koolstof- of zwaveldioxide als gedacht, blijkt verder uit de analyse.
Niet overtuigd Maar veel wetenschappers zijn nog niet helemaal overtuigd dat deze computerberekening nu voor eens en voor altijd het antwoord is op een vraag die onderzoekers al decennia bezighoudt. “Het is een elegante manier om dit probleem op te lossen”, reageert geochemicus Sierra Petersen van de University of Michigan. “Een model op deze manier gebruiken, geeft de vrijheid om tot een consensus te komen, waarbij rekening is gehouden met vele data. Maar, zoals met elk model, hangt de output af van de input.” Volgens Petersen zijn foraminiferen niet de ideale proxy om vroegere temperaturen uit af te leiden. De zuurstofisotopenratio’s kunnen niet alleen door temperatuur veranderen maar ook door de samenstelling van het zeewater. Verschillende temperatuur-proxy’s leiden waarschijnlijk tot verschillende patronen van vrijkomend gas, zoals die worden gereproduceerd door de modellen, legt Petersen verder uit.
Ook heeft ze kritiek op de conclusie uit de studie. “Het is nogal een stap om te stellen dat deze studie aantoont dat de meteorietinslag de extinctie niet heeft veroorzaakt. Ik denk dat enkel wordt aangetoond dat er bij de inslag niet zoveel gas vrijkwam.” Maar de asteroïde kan nog steeds op een andere manier een dodelijke impact hebben gehad. Zo kwamen er grote wolken van roet en stof in de lucht. Eerder onderzoek stelde dat daardoor het zonlicht dat de Aarde bereikte mogelijk met wel 20 procent afnam, waardoor het steenkoud werd en vele dieren en planten stierven.
Toch een stapje dichterbij Hoewel deze studie dus een interessante toevoeging is in het debat over het einde van het dinotijdperk biedt hij wederom geen uitsluitsel in de discussie ‘vulkaanuitbarsting versus meteorietinslag’, maar misschien is het wel weer een puntje erbij voor de vulkaantheorie.
Grote opwinding onder wetenschappers als in 2017 voor de kust van Antarctica een monsterachtige ijsberg het levenslicht ziet. De ijsberg dobbert jarenlang rond en vindt uiteindelijk pas in 2020 zijn Waterloo. En nu blijkt ook die ondergang van de machtige ijsberg behoorlijk opwindend te zijn (geweest).
Want in een nieuw onderzoek – verschenen in het blad Geophysical Research Letters – schrijven wetenschappers dat de ijsberg – terwijl deze ten onder ging – een enorme impact had op zijn directe omgeving. Zo blijkt de ijsberg er eigenhandig voor gezorgd te hebben dat de oppervlaktetemperatuur van de Zuidelijke Oceaan lokaal met maar liefst 4,5 graad afnam. En ook het zoutgehalte liep door toedoen van de smeltende ijsberg met meer dan 60 procent terug. Het zijn grote veranderingen; groter dan alle andere veranderingen die wetenschappers ooit in reactie op een smeltende ijsberg hebben waargenomen.
Als een riviermonding in open zee “De A68-ijsberg was één van de grootste en best bestudeerde ijsbergen ooit,” vertelt onderzoeker Roseanne Smith. “Toen deze uiteen begon te vallen, was het een beetje alsof er een enorme riviermonding in de open oceaan was geïnstalleerd die koud, zoet water in de bovenste laag van de oceaan pompte.”
Over A68 De ijsberg waar het onderzoek van Smith en collega’s om draait, ontstond in 2017, toen een enorm stuk ijs van de Larsen C-ijsplaat voor de kust van Antarctica, afbrak. In eerste instantie was de resulterende ijsberg ongeveer net zo groot als de provincie Gelderland. Naarmate de tijd verstreek, braken er echter steeds meer stukken ijs van de ijsberg af. En in 2020 was deze nog ongeveer zo groot als Luxemburg. Rond diezelfde tijd had A68 – al dobberend – ook al een flinke afstand afgelegd en stevende deze af op het nagenoeg onbewoonde eiland Zuid-Georgië. En daar begint de ijsberg in datzelfde jaar uiteen te vallen en – al smeltend – enorme hoeveelheden koud, zoet water in een relatief klein deel van de oceaan te brengen. Wetenschappers zitten er bovenop; met behulp van satellieten observeren ze de smeltende ijsberg en hoe deze de bovenste centimeters van de Zuidelijke Oceaan lokaal beïnvloedt. Het resulteert in de ontdekking van ongeëvenaarde, lokale afwijkingen in de temperatuur en het zoutgehalte van de oceaan, zo is in het blad Geophysical Research Letters te lezen.
De reis van A68, van Antarctica naar Zuid-Georgië. Afbeelding: ESA.
Fytoplankton Het roept natuurlijk de vraag op in hoeverre die veranderingen ook de bewoners van die wateren hebben geraakt. Dat is op dit moment lastig te zeggen, vertelt Smith aan Scientias.nl. “A68 heeft waarschijnlijk de grootste directe invloed gehad op de onderste regionen van de voedselketen, oftewel op microalgen of fytoplankton – die aan het oppervlak van de oceaan leven. Elke soort is aan specifieke omstandigheden – waaronder een bepaalde watertemperatuur en een bepaald zoutgehalte – aangepast. Dus een verandering in die omstandigheden – zoals ontstaat wanneer een enorme ijsberg koud, zoet water in de nabijheid dumpt – is waarschijnlijk van invloed op een breed scala aan verschillende fytoplanktonsoorten in dit gebied.” Als je het zo bekijkt, lijkt de smeltende ijsberg dus slecht nieuws voor fytoplankton – en mogelijk ook de organismen hogerop in de voedselketen die voor hun overleving (grotendeels) van fytoplankton afhankelijk zijn.
Complex verhaal Maar het is een stuk gecompliceerder dan dat, vertelt Smith. Want zo’n smeltende ijsberg kan fytoplankton inderdaad het leven zuur maken door de temperatuur en het zoutgehalte van hun oude vertrouwde oceaan tijdelijk te veranderen. Maar tegelijkertijd kan de ijsberg de groei van (andere) fytoplanktonsoorten ook weer bevorderen. “Het smeltwater van de ijsberg is rijk aan opgelost ijzer en ijzer is iets wat de Zuidelijke Oceaan door de bank genomen mist. Dus ijsbergen kunnen de oceaan als het ware ‘bemesten’.” En zo de groei van fytoplankton stimuleren. “Dus als we kijken naar de gigantische ijsberg A68 en het smelten en ineenstorten daarvan voor de kust van Zuid-Georgië, in de zomer van 2020/2021, was die gebeurtenis dan goed nieuws voor algen? Dat is lastig te zeggen. Er groeit van nature namelijk ‘s zomers al veel fytoplankton in de wateren rond Zuid-Georgië. Voor nu wijzen satellietdata er echter voorzichtig op dat het fytoplankton in sommige gebieden toenam en in andere iets afnam.”
Tegelijkertijd kan op dit moment ook niet worden uitgesloten dat de smeltende ijsberg de omringende oceaan niet alleen op ijzer, maar ook op fytoplankton getrakteerd heeft. “Het is mogelijk dat de ijsberg zelf ook fytoplanktonsoorten herbergde die normaliter niet zo noordelijk voorkomen,” vertelt Smith. “Die soorten kunnen tijdens het smelten van de ijsberg zijn ontsnapt en in de wateren rond Zuid-Georgië zijn gaan groeien, omdat ze het wel prettig vinden in dat koude, zoete smeltwater dat rond hen vrijkwam.” Het is iets wat onderzoekers in eerdere studies naar andere (kleinere) smeltende ijsbergen wel hebben zien gebeuren. Maar of ook A68 fytoplankton meevoerde, is nog niet bewezen. “We hebben simpelweg te weinig bewijs om nu te zeggen dat dat het geval is. Ook kunnen we nog niet zeggen of het netto effect van de ijsberg op het ecosysteem van Zuid-Georgië nu positief of negatief was. Daar worden de komende maanden en jaren nog wel studies over gepubliceerd,” verwacht Smith. “Want er zijn in die tijd (dat de ijsberg smolt, red.) veel watermonsters verzameld en die worden nu nog onderzocht.” Wordt vervolgd dus.
Enorme afstand Wat we ondertussen wél zeker weten, is dat de impact van de ijsberg ook verder reikte dan de directe omgeving van Zuid-Georgië. Het koude, zoete smeltwater werd namelijk door stromingen in oostelijke richting van het eiland weggevoerd. En niet zo’n klein eindje ook. “Wat mij het meest heeft verrast, was de enorme afstand waarover de smeltwaterpluim van A68 verspreid werd,” vertelt Smith. “Voor A68 hadden we al vastgesteld dat temperatuurdalingen en veranderingen in het zoutgehalte van het water aan het oppervlak van de oceaan zelfs op tientallen kilometers afstand van de rand van de ijsberg nog gedetecteerd konden worden. Dat komt doordat het smeltwater door lokale stromingen wordt weggevoerd. Maar in het geval van A68 was het echt een heel ander verhaal: de pluim bestaande uit koel, zoet smeltwater werd over een enorme afstand weggevoerd. Op een gegeven moment was deze pluim zelfs meer dan 1000 kilometer lang! Dat is ongeveer de afstand tussen Parijs en Wenen!”
Heldenrol voor satellieten De enige reden dat onderzoekers überhaupt in staat waren om de enorme afstand waarover het smeltwater verspreid werd, vast te stellen, is dat ze gebruik maakten van satellietdata. “In de meeste eerdere studies naar smeltwaterpluimen van ijsbergen werd gebruik gemaakt van sensoren op schepen of boeien, maar je zou heel veel schepen en heel veel tijd (en dus ook heel veel geld) nodig hebben om op die manier de omvang van de smeltwaterpluim van A68 te meten. Alleen dankzij satellietdata is het ons gelukt om de volledige lengte en distributie ervan over een periode van meerdere maanden vast te stellen.”
Dat het smeltwater zo ver werd weggevoerd, betekent ook dat de impact die het smeltwater eventueel op fytoplankton nabij Zuid-Georgië had, in ieder geval tijdelijk was. “Het is onwaarschijnlijk dat de impact van het smeltwater na de winter van 2021 nog door de fytoplankton gevoeld werd,” stelt Smith. “De ijsberg was in april 2021 (oftewel tijdens de herfst op het zuidelijk halfrond, red.) volledig weggesmolten en het resterende koude, zoete smeltwater was toen door stromingen al bij Zuid-Georgië weggevoerd. Tegen het aanbreken van de lente was alles rond Zuid-Georgië waarschijnlijk weer als vanouds.”
Groeven in de zeebodem Is er dan anno 2023 niets meer dat ons herinnert aan het ontstaan en de ondergang van de machtige ijsberg A68? Zeker wel! “Daarvoor moeten we echter onder het ruwe, stormachtige oppervlak van de oceaan duiken, richting de bodem rond Zuid-Georgië,” vertelt Smith. “Het is gebruikelijk dat grote ijsbergen over de bodem van de zeebodem schuren als ze door relatief ondiep kustwater bewegen.” Het resulteert in blijvende groeven in de zeebodem. Ook beïnvloedt het alles wat op die zeebodem leeft. “Als ijsbergen over de zeebodem schuren, bulldozeren ze het fragiele ecosysteem op die zeebodem en dat kan erin resulteren dat meer dan 98 procent van de lokale dieren en planten sterft. Het kan vervolgens ook lang (in de orde van jaren) duren voor dat ecosysteem weer hersteld is.” Zuid-Georgië heeft al veel ijsbergen door haar kustwateren zien reizen, dus de zeebodem herbergt heel wat groeven die daarvan blijvend getuigen. “Van A68 wordt vermoed dat deze de zeebodem ten zuiden van Zuid-Georgië half december heeft geraakt,” vertelt Smith. En daarmee is het leven op de zeebodem mogelijk zodanig aangetast dat het wel even duurt voor het zich weer hersteld heeft. En de zeebodem zelf is in dat scenario sowieso voorgoed enkele groeven rijker.
Het onderzoek naar de impact die monsterachtige ijsbergen op de lokale oceaan en ecosystemen hebben, is belangrijk. Want de verwachting is dat we in de nabije toekomst veel meer van deze grote ijsbergen zullen zien ontstaan. “Klimaatmodellen laten zien dat een verdere opwarming van de atmosfeer en oceaan door broeikasgassen de stabiliteit van de vele ijsplaten rond Antarctica aantast. Als die ijsplaten uiteenvallen, kunnen ze in korte tijd veel grote ijsbergen in de Zuidelijke Oceaan loslaten,” legt Smith uit. “Meer ijsbergen betekent ook dat meer met ijzer verrijkt zoetwater de Zuidelijke Oceaan bereikt. En dat resulteert in een afnemend zoutgehalte en meer stratificatie in de bovenste delen van de oceaan, oftewel: die bovenste lagen gaan zich moeilijker mengen met diepere waterlagen.” Dat laatste heeft alles te maken met het feit dat zoet water een geringere dichtheid heeft dan zout water en dus minder makkelijk zinkt. “Het kan verschillende effecten hebben,” gaat Smith verder. Zo zorgt de stratificatie van het water ervoor dat oppervlaktewater moeilijker naar grote diepte zinkt. “En dat is belangrijk, omdat het zinken van dat oppervlaktewater helpt bij de opslag van koolstof en warmte in de diepere delen van de oceaan.” Daarnaast kan het smeltwater ook van invloed zijn op de aangroei van zee-ijs, zo verwachten de onderzoekers. “En dat is belangrijk, omdat zee-ijs helpt om de energie van de zon te reflecteren en minder zee-ijs betekent dus dat er meer zonne-energie (en dus warmte) wordt geabsorbeerd (en vice versa).” En ten slotte kunnen ijsbergen dus ook nog eens op verschillende manieren hun stempel drukken op lokale ecosystemen. “Welk van deze effecten het meest dominant zal zijn, is lastig te zeggen,” erkent Smith. “Maar als de frequentie waarmee grote ijsbergen ontstaan, substantieel toeneemt, kan het zijn dat de tijdelijke invloeden die elke individuele ijsberg heeft, zich gaan opstapelen en resulteren in grotere, langer aanhoudende en meer wijdverspreide veranderingen in de Zuidelijke Oceaan, met gevolgen voor zee-ijs, de groei van fytoplankton en het zinken van oppervlaktewater.”
The melting of the supergiant iceberg A-68 had a huge impact on the ocean around South Georgia, in sub-Antarctica,_Povl Abrahamsen, BAS
Mysterious light appears in the images pulled from the depths of the universe using the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). And now, it finally has an explanation.
JWST, the next-generation observatory from NASA, the European Space Agency, and the Canadian Space Agency, is able to view infrared light like never before. Infrared reveals visible light that has been stretched by the universe as it expands and which has poured out from the farthest reaches of space across billions of light-years. Once this light reaches Earth, astronomers can see the cosmos as it once was.
They haven't seen anything like JWST’s images before, which first went public in July 2022. But, they had good guesses about what they’d find.
There are more than 20,000 galaxies in this field, observed by the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope view when it looked between the Pisces and Andromeda constellations.
However, one particular characteristic of the ancient galaxies appearing before them left many stumped. Although astronomers know very little about Cosmic Dawn, the 100 million years to 1 billion years after the Big Bang, when the universe sprouted its first stars and galaxies, they did not expect to see galaxies shining as bright as they see in the telescopic images. Rohan Naidu, a NASA Hubble Fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, even toldQuanta Magazine that the galaxies were “stupidly bright.”
WHY ARE THE ANCIENT GALAXIES SO BRIGHT?
Their luminosities were so shocking that some physicists questioned the standard model of cosmology, which describes how the universe has evolved since the Big Bang.
The issue is that, usually, bright galaxies mean big galaxies. “But because these galaxies formed at cosmic dawn, not enough time has passed since the Big Bang,” Claude-André Faucher-Giguère, associate professor of physics and astronomy at Northwestern University in Illinois and an author of a new paper, says in a statement describing the study. “How could these massive galaxies assemble so quickly?”
A research team led by Guochao Sun, a postdoctoral fellow at Northwestern, found an explanation: bursts of formation. They published their findings on Tuesday in the journal Astrophysical Journal Letters.
“If star formation happens in bursts, it will emit flashes of light. That is why we see several very bright galaxies,” Sun said in a Northwestern University statement describing the study.
The young galaxies, which the statement called “too bright, too massive, and too mature to have formed so soon after the Big Bang,” may just plain and simply be bursting with new stars.
Unlike modern galaxies, which form stars at a steady rate, the early galaxies seed a process known as bursty star formation. “So-called bursty star formation occurs when stars form in an alternating pattern — many stars at once, followed by millions of years of very few new stars and then many stars again,” according to the statement.
Now that the JWST imagery begins to make more sense, astronomers can use its sensitive instruments to investigate other cosmic mysteries.
Geoscientists Discover Massive Undersea Water Reservoir Off New Zealand’s Coast
Geoscientists Discover Massive Undersea Water Reservoir Off New Zealand’s Coast
Revealed by 3D seismic imaging, the newly-discovered water reservoir lies 3.2 km (2 miles) under the ocean floor off the coast of New Zealand, where it may be dampening a major earthquake fault that faces the country’s North Island. The fault is known for producing slow-motion earthquakes, called slow slip events. These can release pent-up tectonic pressure harmlessly over days and weeks.
3D seismic imaging and ocean drilling at the Hikurangi margin reveal a widespread and previously unknown fluid reservoir within the extensively hydrated (up to 47 vol % water) volcanic upper crust of the subducting Hikurangi Plateau large igneous province.
Image credit: Gase et al., doi: 10.1126/sciadv.adh0150.
“Many slow slip earthquakes are thought to be linked to buried water,” said Dr. Andrew Gase, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Texas.
“However, until now there was no direct geologic evidence to suggest such a large water reservoir existed at this particular New Zealand fault.”
“We can’t yet see deep enough to know exactly the effect on the fault, but we can see that the amount of water that’s going down here is actually much higher than normal.”
The site where Dr. Gase and colleagues found the water is part of a vast volcanic province that formed when a plume of lava the size of the United States breached the Earth’s surface in the Pacific Ocean 125 million years ago.
The event was one of the Earth’s largest known volcanic eruptions and rumbled on for several million years.
The study authors used seismic scans to build a 3D picture of the ancient volcanic plateau in which they saw thick, layered sediments surrounding buried volcanoes.
They ran lab experiments on drill core samples of the volcanic rock and found that water made up nearly half of its volume.
The seismic image of the Hikurangi Plateau reveals details about the Earth’s interior and what it’s made of. The blue-green layer under the yellow line shows water buried within rocks
Image credit: Gase et al., doi: 10.1126/sciadv.adh0150.
“Normal ocean crust, once it gets to be about 7 or 10 million years old should contain much less water,” Dr. Gase said.
“The ocean crust in the seismic scans was ten times as old, but it had remained much wetter.”
“The shallow seas where the eruptions took place eroded some of the volcanoes into a porous, broken-up rock that stored water like an aquifer as it was buried. Over time, the rock and rock fragments transformed into clay, locking in even more water.”
The finding is important because scientists think that underground water pressure may be a key ingredient in creating conditions that release tectonic stress via slow slip earthquakes.
This usually happens when water-rich sediments are buried with the fault, trapping the water underground. However, the New Zealand fault contains little of this typical ocean sediment.
Instead, the researchers think the ancient volcanoes and the transformed rocks — now clays — are carrying large volumes of water down as they’re swallowed by the fault.
“The findings suggest that other earthquake faults around the globe could be in similar situations,” said Professor Demian Saffer, a researcher at the University of Texas.
“It’s a really clear illustration of the correlation between fluids and the style of tectonic fault movement — including earthquake behavior.”
“This is something that we’ve hypothesized from lab experiments, and is predicted by some computer simulations, but there are very few clear field experiments to test this at the scale of a tectonic plate.”
The study appears in the journal Science Advances.
Andrew C. Gase et al. 2023. Subducting volcaniclastic-rich upper crust supplies fluids for shallow megathrust and slow slip. Science Advances 9 (33); doi: 10.1126/sciadv.adh0150
Researchers Find Two Extraterrestrial Minerals in El Ali Meteorite
Researchers Find Two Extraterrestrial Minerals in El Ali Meteorite
The El Ali meteorite, a 15.2-ton iron meteorite found in 2020 near the tiny town of El Ali in Somalia, contains at least two new minerals: elaliite and elkinstantonite.
This sample of the El Ali meteorite contains two new minerals: elaliite and elkinstantonite.
Image credit: Nick Gessler / Duke University.
“Whenever you find a new mineral, it means that the actual geological conditions, the chemistry of the rock, was different than what’s been found before,” said University of Alberta’s Professor Chris Herd.
“That’s what makes this exciting: in this particular meteorite you have two officially described minerals that are new to science.”
The two minerals, elaliite and elkinstantonite, came from a 70-g slice that was sent to the University of Alberta for classification, and there already appears to be a potential third mineral under consideration.
“If researchers were to obtain more samples from the massive meteorite, there’s a chance that even more might be found,” Professor Herd said.
Professor Herd and his colleagues from the University of Alberta, the University of California, Los Angeles and Caltech classified the El Ali as an ‘Iron, IAB complex’ meteorite, one of over 350 in that particular category.
“The very first day University of Alberta’s Dr. Andrew Locock did some analyses, he said, ‘You’ve got at least two new minerals in there.’ That was phenomenal. Most of the time it takes a lot more work than that to say there’s a new mineral,” Professor Herd said.
“The rapid identification was possible because the two minerals had been synthetically created before, so he was able to match the composition of the newly discovered natural minerals with their human-made counterparts.”
The scientists are continuing to examine the new minerals to determine what they can tell us about the conditions in the meteorite when it formed.
“That’s my expertise — how you tease out the geologic processes and the geologic history of the asteroid this rock was once part of,” Professor Herd said.
“I never thought I’d be involved in describing brand new minerals just by virtue of working on a meteorite.”
“Any new mineral discoveries could possibly yield exciting new uses down the line,” he said.
“Whenever there’s a new material that’s known, material scientists are interested too because of the potential uses in a wide range of things in society.”
“While the future of the El Ali meteorite remains uncertain, we’ve received news that it appears to have been moved to China in search of a potential buyer.”
“It remains to be seen whether additional samples will be available for scientific purposes.”
This day in History, Pilot encounters giant pyramid-shaped UFO over Pelotas, Brazil, Oct 5, 1996, UFO Sighting News.
This day in History, Pilot encounters giant pyramid-shaped UFO over Pelotas, Brazil, Oct 5, 1996, UFO Sighting News.
Perhaps the most impressive UFO story told during the recent Brazilian World UFO Forum was that of Haraldo Westendorf, who made news headlines a year ago when he allegedly flew his private plane within a few dozen meters of an enormous unidentified flying object.
Westendorf is 40 years old, a father of three children and a successful businessman. He is also an avid private pilot rated for acrobatic flying.
The following account is based directly on his one-hour presentation at the Brazilian UFO conference, which included several detailed illustrations. Westendorf says he took off in his single-engine Piper Apache [correction: the plane was actually an Embraer EMB-712, the Brazilian version of the Piper Cherokee Archer II] from the city of Pelotas near the southernmost tip of Brazil on the morning of November 5, 1996. It was to be a routine recreational flight of the kind he takes for fun whenever time allows. On this occasion, he had been in the air only about 12 minutes and was flying at an altitude of 5,000 feet over a large lake some five miles southeast of Pelotas when he saw ahead of him an enormous aerial object. The time was about 10:30 a.m. He radioed the Pelotas tower to learn if they could see the object from the ground.
They confirmed that the object was visible to them and asked him for a close-range report. Westendorf then decided to fly as close as he could. Westendorf emphasizes that he did not believe in UFOs and says this accounts for his initial willingness to fly close to the object. He didn't know he might be in danger. When he got close to the object, he realized that in his twenty years of piloting experience he had never seen or heard of anything like it. Since he had done stunt training in the United States and had also flown in France, he had become acquainted with some very advanced and exotic aircraft.
But he knew that this was not an airplane. Westendorf showed several detailed color drawings of the object, with his own plane drawn to scale alongside it. He describes the object as a faceted cone, flat on the bottom with a rounded point on top. On each of the eight or ten sloping side panels were three large bulges, like triangle-shaped bay windows on the side of a house -- but they did not look like windows. The entire surface was brown in color. The structure was about 70 meters (225 feet) high and about 100 meters (325 feet) in diameter, big enough to fill nearly an entire soccer field if landed. His own plane, less than 6 meters wide, was tiny by comparison. Westendorf says he spent about 12 to 14 minutes in close proximity to the object, trying to see as much as he could. Although the Pelotas air tower does not have radar, he believes the airport radar at Curitiba (nearly 450 nautical miles northeast of his position) tracked the whole encounter. However, officials at Curitiba deny this (see below). The object was spinning around slowly and moving southeast toward the nearby seacoast at a speed of about 60 nautical miles per hour. Westendorf managed to fly entirely around the base of the object three times. At one point, he says, his wingtip came within about 40 meters of the object. After his third lap around the object, Westendorf noticed that the rounded top seemed to disappear, leaving what looked like an open hole at the top. Then he saw, emerging from inside the object, a classic flying saucer. It rose sideways, its long axis vertical until it cleared the top of the larger object, then tipped down to assume its normal orientation and departed at tremendous speed. Westendorf said that this saucer was about 10 meters in diameter, or nearly twice as wide as his own plane, and he thinks it flew away at more than Mach 10. The saucer showed no indication of noticing Westendorf's presence nearby. As soon as the saucer disappeared, Westendorf decided to try to fly over the top of the object. Brazilian media later reported that he wanted to fly his plane into the interior of the object, but he says he never even considered that. He only hoped for a peek through the opening. To get more altitude, he flew his plane several hundred meters away from the object, turned around and began a steep climb. He noticed that the object was now rotating much faster. Then he saw brilliant beams of red light shoot from the top of the object toward the sky. He quickly abandoned his plan to fly over the top. Then, to his amazement, the object rose straight up at tremendous speed. For the first time, Westendorf was scared, because he believed the object's rapid acceleration might produce a shock wave of turbulence that could overwhelm his own plane.
As a trained pilot, he knew that air traffic controllers recommend staying at least three minutes behind a large aircraft to avoid such turbulence. He estimated that the unidentified object probably weighed at least three times as much as a 747 jumbo jet, so its shock wave should be huge -- and he was only a few hundred meters away. He quickly began emergency procedures in case his plane went into a spin or a stall. But to his surprise, he did not encounter any turbulence.
Former Sheriff Recounts Cigar-Shaped UFO Encounter Near Rattlesnake Butte
Former Sheriff Recounts Cigar-Shaped UFO Encounter Near Rattlesnake Butte
In the vast world of UFO sightings, stories range from mildly interesting to downright unbelievable. The Pearson Case, as it came to be known, is a captivating tale that comes from a place of authenticity and has managed to stay largely under the radar.
Early one morning, near the mysterious backdrop of Rattlesnake Butte, a family’s regular morning routine took an unexpected turn. The mother, as was her habit, prepared coffee and stood by the kitchen window. The view she usually admired, the one of Rattlesnake Butte situated some distance away, held a different spectacle that day. Hovering close to the Butte was a colossal cigar-shaped mothership. It remained steady in a subtle depression on the landscape, and smaller saucer-like crafts flew around it, entering and exiting the mothership’s belly.
Awakened by the spectacle, the husband joined the watch. The couple observed this bewildering scene for approximately half an hour. They eventually decided to alert a retired sheriff, who, intrigued by the vague call, rushed to the scene. Although the ship had left by the time he arrived, he did get a comprehensive account from the couple. They provided explicit details and labeled it as a “cigar-shaped Mothership,” with the smaller crafts entering and exiting it.
What lends credibility to this account is the nature of the eyewitnesses. These were simple farm folk with no apparent reason to fabricate such a tale. The sheriff, who interviewed them, felt confident in their honesty, emphasizing the depth and authenticity of their account. The sighting remains a unique and unforgettable memory for those involved, echoing the sentiment, “I wish you’d come back. That’d be quite a view.”
While UFO sightings are not uncommon, cases like these – grounded in genuine human experiences and witnessed by reliable individuals – make for truly fascinating tales. With the Pearson Case, we are reminded that sometimes, the most unbelievable stories are the ones that ring true.
The new method is being hailed as the "holy grail of astrobiology."
The robotic arm of NASA's Perseverance rover is visible in this image used by the AI4Mars project. Users outline and identify different rock and landscape features to help train an artificial intelligence algorithm that will help improve the capabilities of Mars rovers.
(Image credit: NASA)
Can machines sniff out the presence of life on other planets? Well, to some extent, they already are.
Sensors onboard spacecraft exploring other worlds have the capability to detect molecules indicative of alien life. Yet, organic molecules that hint at intriguing biological processes are known to degrade over time, making their presence difficult for current technology to spot.
But now, a newly developed method based on artificial intelligence (AI) is capable of detecting subtle differences in molecular patterns that indicate biological signals — even in samples hundreds of millions of years old. Better yet, the mechanism offers results with 90% accuracy, according to new research.
In the future, this AI system could be embedded in smarter sensors on robotic space explorers, including landers and rovers on the moon and Mars, as well as within spacecraft circling potentially habitable worlds like Enceladus and Europa.
"We began with the idea that the chemistry of life differs fundamentally from that of the inanimate world; that there are 'chemical rules of life' that influence the diversity and distribution of biomolecules," Robert Hazen, a scientist at the Carnegie Institution for Science in Washington D.C. and co-author of the new study, said in a statement. "If we could deduce those rules, we can use them to guide our efforts to model life's origins or to detect subtle signs of life on other worlds."
The new method relies on the premise that chemical processes that govern the formation and functioning of biomolecules differ fundamentally from those in abiotic molecules, in that biomolecules (like amino acids) hold on to information about the chemical processes that made them. This is likely to hold true for alien life, too, according to the new study.
On any world, life may produce and use higher quantities of a select few compounds to function on a daily basis. This would differentiate them from abiotic systems — and it is these differences that can be spotted and quantified with AI, the researchers said in the statement.
The team first trained the machine learning algorithm with 134 samples, of which 59 were biotic and 75 were abiotic. Next, to validate the algorithm, the data was randomly split into a training set and a test set. The AI method successfully identified biotic samples from living things like shells, teeth, bones, rice, human hair as well as from ancient life preserved in certain fossilized fragments made of things like coal, oil and amber.
The tool also identified abiotic samples including chemicals like amino acids that were created in a lab as well as carbon-rich meteorites, according to the new study.
Almost immediately, the new AI method can be used to study the 3.5 billion-year-old rocks in the Pilbara region in Western Australia, where the world's oldest fossils are thought to exist. First found in 1993, these rocks were thought to be fossilized remains of microbes akin to cyanobacteria, which were the first living organisms to produce oxygen on Earth.
If confirmed, the bacteria's presence so early in Earth's history would mean the planet was friendly towards thriving life much earlier than previously thought. However, those findings have remained controversial, as research repeatedly pointed out that the evidence can also be due to pure geological processes having nothing to do with ancient life. Perhaps AI holds the answer.
This research is described in a paper published Monday (Sept. 25) in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
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The UFO event over Chicago’s O’Hare Airport in 2006 is one of the most intriguing UFO sightings in recent history. Despite being unremarkable as far as UFO sightings go, the reaction of the airline and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) was anything but ordinary, suggesting some type of cover-up between the implicated authorities.
On November 7, 2006, United Airlines Flight 446 was preparing to depart from O’Hare International to North Carolina when a dozen of airline employees, including mechanics and pilots, spotted a gray and metallic saucer-like object hovering above Gate C17 of the United terminal. The object remained there for several minutes before flying off into the clouds at an unnatural speed. This event was captured in official FAA audio recordings, with a United controller and a colleague discussing the sighting.
The disc was estimated to be at least 22 feet in diameter and hovered around 1,500 feet off the ground, below a heavy cloud cover at 1,900 feet. One grounded pilot announced his sightings over the radio, alerting a taxi mechanic and several other pilots to the presence of the object. At least two grounded pilots were able to lean out of their cockpit windows and see the object in great detail.
The story of the O’Hare UFO incident went almost completely unnoticed until the Chicago Tribune published an article on December 31, 2006, nearly two months after the incident. The story became the highest-hitting article in the website’s history, and other news outlets picked up the story as well.
Jon Hilkevitch, a transportation reporter with the Chicago Tribune, started interviewing the witnesses. Initially, both the FAA and United Airlines denied any knowledge of the event but were forced to admit that this was a lie when an audio tape was leaked to the press that captured a United Airlines radio conversation on the date of the event.
The FAA supervisor identified as “Sue” was asking several controllers at O’Hare if they had seen a flying disc over gate C-17. They initially laughed off the question, but she called back 15 minutes later to confirm that several pilots had seen the disc and that one had captured a photograph of it. Unfortunately, this alleged photograph has never s
The tape also recorded the control tower operators warning outgoing planes of the UFO and advising them to be cautious. Even in the wake of the tape, United Airlines and the FAA continued to brush off the incident. The airline prohibited any employees from discussing the incident with the media.
However, after the Chicago Tribune article compelled them to address the situation, a spokesperson from the FAA claimed that the alleged disc was nothing but the reflection of airport lights off the low cloud cover. However, this explanation was unconvincing, as the sighting occurred in daylight, before any of the airport’s lights were turned on.
Despite the assertions of several credible witnesses, the airline and the FAA declined to investigate the matter further and wrote it off as a rare weather phenomenon known as a fallstreak or “hole-punch cloud.” However, Mark Rodeghier, the director for the Center for UFO Studies Scientific Director, did not accept this explanation and stated:
“It’s an unknown object over O’Hare, and it’s seen by official personnel and does United or the FAA take it seriously? Of course not, they have zero interest because UFOs can’t exist. But how can you not worry about something hovering over an airport after 9/11? It doesn’t make sense.”
This explanation did not stand up to reason too, as journalist Leslie Kean soon discovered. Hole-punched clouds form, when ice crystals from higher clouds fall down through a lower cloud shelf, punch a hole in it, and evaporate in the warm air below, only forming in below-freezing temperatures. The air at the altitude of the sighting on the day in question was 53 degrees Fahrenheit, which was above freezing.
Despite the FAA’s lack of interest in the O’Hare UFO incident, an independent investigation group called NARC conducted their own research. The team of former NASA scientists, pilots, meteorologists, and aerospace engineers, among others, prepared a 154-page report that confirmed the presence of a physical object over O’Hare. The report stated that the object’s maneuvers could not be explained by conventional means and advised the FAA to launch their own investigation. However, to this day, the FAA has not acted upon this recommendation. (Source)
Joe Abegg, Captain at United, says “The employees that I talked to about the sighting accepted it as real.”
“There have been documented cases where safety appears to have been implicated, and more and more we are coming to the point of view that we are dealing with an intelligent phenomenon. We must be proactive before an aircraft goes down,” said Richard Haines, a former chief of the Space Human Factors Office at NASA’s Ames Research Center.
The reaction of the airline and the FAA in the aftermath of the incident suggests some type of cover-up between the implicated authorities. The airline prohibited its employees from sharing the details of the incident, and the FAA provided unconvincing explanations for the UFO sighting, such as the reflection of airport lights off low cloud cover or a misidentified weather phenomenon. These explanations were quickly debunked by journalists and independent investigators.
Jon Hilkevitch emphasized how unusual it is for the FAA to ignore such a significant UFO sighting. The FAA has launched investigations for far less extraordinary incidents, such as spilled coffee pots and airport aisles. This lack of interest in the O’Hare UFO incident raises questions about the extent of government involvement in hiding the truth about UFOs from the public.
The taxi mechanic described Chicago’s O’Hare UFO as follows:
“The craft appeared to be hovering right below the ceiling of the cloud cover (about 700 or 800 feet). The cloud ceiling that day was 1900 feet. The top of the craft was clearly outlined as a very dark gray material, but the bottom and the edges of the craft were hazy like when you see the mirage-like surface of the road on a hot day.
The other interesting observation was that after the craft accelerated straight up (observed by other witnesses), there was a hole punched in the clouds. The hole in the clouds was about the same size as the unidentified craft. It looked like a cookie cutter hole stamped out of dough ‘very similar in size’ to the craft. The hole stayed for a little while and then dissipated into the overcast clouds. The sighting lasted about 20 minutes from the time of the first radio call to the time when the mechanic and witness parked the Boeing 777 that he was taxiing across the airport.”
Reddit user Buddy_Felcher describes what he saw during the 2006 O’Hare Airport UFO sighting:
“I was working at American Airlines as a ramp service clerk at O’Hare when that thing came. I saw it, and only one other coworker saw it as well. And nobody believed me even after other airline workers said they saw it too. Until I heard other people saw it everyone had me convinced I was crazy…
Have you ever seen the movie flight of the navigator? That’s what it sort of looked like but also kind of like it was a chrome bubble of air or like the way invisible people in movies look when it’s raining on them. I only saw the latter part of it being there, the guy I worked with said it was solid grey at first and then changed to what I saw.” (Source)
A nameless mesa in a strange Martian landscape once stood at the center of a swirl of alien conspiracy theories.
In a low-resolution snapshot from NASA’s Viking 1 spacecraft, taken in 1976, the brightly lit ridges and darkly shadowed dips in the terrain atop the mesa formed a weirdly compelling optical illusion: a grim, black-eyed face staring back at us from Mars. Conspiracy theorists insisted the mesa must have been the work of alien sculptors. But it turns out that if you see the mesa in more detail and in different lighting, the stark contrasts of light and shadow that originally formed the face completely disappear.
But the “face on Mars” is a great example of the same phenomenon that may once have inspired early humans to draw some of the first art on cave walls here on Earth.
Spot the face! (That’s a hilarious joke, because an imaging error caused this photo to be spotted with little black specks.)
NASA
FACE? OFF.
The SETI Institute recently shared a blast from the past: an image from NASA’s Mars Global Surveyor satellite, which snapped an image of the famous “Mars face,” revealing a discouraging lack of alien megaliths or slumbering giants.
In the original image, from Viking 1, with a low resolution of about 164 feet per pixel, the mesa shows up in stark patterns of light and shadow, creating the illusion of dark eyes in a pale face – one that looks unsettlingly like a death mask.
But seen in more detail at 6.6 feet per pixel, and with the Sun shining down from a different angle in the Martian sky, the facial features came into focus as weathered ridges of rock. If you know what you’re looking for, you can still trace the outline of the illusion on the top of the mesa and think to yourself, “Okay, I see how that weird dip in the ground looks like an eye in the right lighting,” but it’s also easy to tell the face isn’t really there.
This is the same mesa from the Viking 1 image, shown in much higher resolution (and with the sunlight coming from the lower left instead of the upper left). The face vanishes!
NASA
Nobody carved this two-mile-long mesa into the shape of a very spooky face. It’s just an example of a very ancient quirk of the human mind called pareidola. The phrase refers to our tendency to see faces and other familiar shapes in random patterns, like clouds, rock formations, or the stars in the night sky.
A recent study, published last week in the Cambridge Archaeological Journal, suggested that paraidolia may have provided some of the inspiration for humanity’s first artworks on cave walls. Archaeologist Izzy Wisher and her colleagues found that more than half the Paleolithic images drawn on cave walls in northern Spain — some dating back 40,000 years — included natural features of the cave wall in the shapes they depicted. A curved section of rock, viewed in a flickering firelight at just the right angle, might look like a bison’s back, and that image might have inspired an ancient person to draw the rest of the animal, for example.
“However, whilst our study showed that pareidolia did have some influence on the cave artists, this was not always the case, giving us a fascinating insight into the work of these early painters,” says Wisher in a recent statement. “It seems to us that their art may have been part of a ‘creative conversation’ with the cave walls, where they both took inspiration from what they saw in the cracks and shapes of the cave wall but also used their own creativity.”
There’s still another famous face on Mars: a smiley face traced by mountain ranges in Galle Crater (not to be confused with Gale Crater, home of NASA’s Curiosity Rover) and made famous in The Watchmen. That one is really there, but the iconic smiley face is a great example of pareidolia in its own right, since the mind is managing to make a face out of two dots and a curved line.
And if you’re still wondering how we connected The Watchmen, ancient cave art, and an optical illusion on Mars, the word you may be looking for is apophenia.
The candle experiment would likely be impossible on the International Space Station, which has strict rules regarding flammable materials and open flames.
China's Shenzhou 16 astronauts conducted an eye-raising experiment in space involving open flames aboard the Tiangong space station.
Astronauts Gui Haichao and Zhu Yangzhu lit a candle during a live lecture broadcast from China's Tiangong space station on Sept. 21 to demonstrate how flames burn in microgravity. Strikingly, the flames appear nearly spherical, rather than the teardrop-shaped flames we're familiar with back on Earth.
Lit candles on Earth produce flames shaped through buoyancy-driven convection, with hot air rising and cold air descending. That combustion convection current is weak in the microgravity environment of low Earth orbit, however. This means flames diffuse in all directions, resulting in spherical fireballs.
Astronauts Gui Haichao and Zhu Yangzhu light a candle aboard the Tiangong Space Station during a live lecture on Sept. 21, 2023. (Image credit: CCTV)
The livestreamed lecture was the fourth so-called "Tiangong classroom" hosted on China's space station. The astronauts interacted with students in five classrooms across China, demonstrating a number of microgravity phenomena. As with previous classrooms, the astronauts demonstrated that many physical processes behave differently than they do on Earth.
However the candle experiment — in which Gui strikes a match to produce an open flame to light the candle — would likely be met by surprise by International Space Station participants, who have strict rules regarding flammable materials and open flames.
Strict fire safety measures aboard the ISS are in part a response to a significant fire on the Russian space station Mir in in 1997.
Combustion in microgravity has been the subject of numerous experiments on the ISS, but usually using a specially-designed combustion integrated rack, keeping fire isolated and contained.
Tiangong also has its Combustion Experiment Rack (CER) for serious research in this area.
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Magnetic Fusion Plasma Engines Could Carry us Across the Solar System and Into Interstellar Space
A new study offers a new means of propulsion that could revolutionize space travel - the Magnetic Fusion Plasma Drive (MFPD). Credit: Created with Imagine
Magnetic Fusion Plasma Engines Could Carry us Across the Solar System and Into Interstellar Space
Missions to the Moon, missions to Mars, robotic explorers to the outer Solar System, a mission to the nearest star, and maybe even a spacecraft to catch up to interstellar objects passing through our system. If you think this sounds like a description of the coming age of space exploration, then you’d be correct! At this moment, there are multiple plans and proposals for missions that will send astronauts and/or probes to all of these destinations to conduct some of the most lucrative scientific research ever performed. Naturally, these mission profiles raise all kinds of challenges, not the least of which is propulsion.
Simply put, humanity is reaching the limits of what conventional (chemical) propulsion can do. To send missions to Mars and other deep space destinations, advanced propulsion technologies are required that offer high acceleration (delta-v), specific impulse (Isp), and fuel efficiency. In a recent paper, Leiden Professor Florian Neukart proposes how future missions could rely on a novel propulsion concept known as the Magnetic Fusion Plasma Drive (MFPD). This device combines aspects of different propulsion methods to create a system that offers high energy density and fuel efficiency significantly greater than conventional methods.
Florian Neukart is an Assistant Professor with the Leiden Institute of Advanced Computer Science (LIACS) at Leiden University and a Board Member of the Swiss quantum technology developer Terra Quantum AG. The preprint of his paper recently appeared online and is being reviewed for publication in Elsevier. According to Neukart, technologies that can surmount conventional chemical propulsion (CCP) are paramount in the present era of space exploration. In particular, these technologies must offer greater energy efficiency, thrust, and capability for long-duration missions.
What will it take before human beings can travel to the nearest star system within their own lifetimes? Credit: Shigemi Numazawa/ Project Daedalus
This is especially true for missions to Mars and other locations beyond the Earth-Moon system, which pose serious risks to astronaut health, safety, and well-being. Even when Earth and Mars are at their closest every 26 months (a Mars Opposition), it can take up to 9 months to make a one-way transit to the planet. Combined with surface operations that could last up to a year and the nine-month return trip, missions to Mars could last up to 900 days! During this time, astronauts will be exposed to elevated levels of cosmic and solar radiation, not to mention the toll of long periods spent in microgravity will have on their bodies.
Hence, NASA and other space agencies are actively investigating alternate means of propulsion. As noted in a previous article, “How Long Would It Take To Travel To The Nearest Star?“, these concepts are also considered potential means for achieving interstellar travel for decades. They include fuel-efficient concepts like electric or ion propulsion, which utilize electromagnetic fields to ionize inert propellant (like xenon gas) and accelerate it through nozzles to generate thrust. However, these concepts generally produce low thrust and must rely on heavy power sources (solar arrays or nuclear reactors) to generate more.
Solar Sails are another option, which can generate continuous acceleration while requiring no propellant (thereby saving on mass). However, missions equipped with this technology are limited in terms of thrust and must operate closer to the Sun. A twist on the idea is to employ Gigawatt-energy (GWe) laser arrays to accelerate spacecraft equipped with sails to relativistic speeds (a fraction of the speed of light). However, this concept requires expensive infrastructure and tremendous amounts of power in order to be feasible.
Another popular concept is nuclear thermal propulsion (NTP), which NASA and DARPA are currently developing in the form of the Demonstration Rocket for Agile Cislunar Operations (DRACO). This method relies on a nuclear reactor to heat propellant (like liquid hydrogen), causing it to expand through nozzles to generate thrust. The benefits of NTP include very high energy density and significant acceleration, but it also comes with numerous technical and safety challenges involving the handling and launching of nuclear materials.
There are also propulsion concepts that harness fusion reactions, like Deuterium-Tritium (D-T) and Deuterium-Hydrogen three (D-He3) reactions, something that theoretical scientists have been working with for decades. These methods offer the potential for high thrust and extremely high specific impulse but also present technical challenges, not the least of which are related to handling the necessary fuel and achieving sustained and controlled fusion reactions. There are also more exotic concepts, like antimatter propulsion and the Alcubierre Warp Drive, but none of these will be available in the foreseeable future.
A spacecraft powered by a positron reactor would resemble this artist’s concept of the Mars Reference Mission spacecraft. Credit: NASA
And there’s Neukart’s proposal, which combines elements of fusion propulsion, ionic propulsion, and other concepts. As he explained to Universe Today via email:
“The MFPD is a propulsion system for space exploration, utilizing controlled nuclear fusion reactions as a primary energy source for both thrust and potential electric power generation. The system is predicated on harnessing the immense energy output from fusion reactions, typically involving isotopes of hydrogen or helium, to produce a high-velocity exhaust of particles, thereby generating thrust according to Newton’s third law.
“The plasma from the fusion reactions is confined and manipulated using magnetic fields, ensuring controlled energy release and directionality. Simultaneously, the MFPD concept envisages the possibility of converting part of the fusion energy into electrical power to sustain onboard systems and possibly the reaction control system of the spacecraft.”
To develop this concept, Nuekart began with deuterium-tritium (D-T) fusion reactions since it is one of the most researched and understood reactions and offers a clear and familiar basis for elaborating the core principles and mechanics of MFPD. Furthermore, Neukart added, D-T reactions have relatively low ignition temperatures and a higher cross-section than other concepts, making it a good “starting point.” Therefore, they provide a useful benchmark for measuring and comparing the performance of this theoretical propulsion system.
However, the ultimate goal of MFPD is to harness aneutronic fusion (p-B11), where very little of the energy released by the reactions is carried by neutrons. Aneutronic reactions, in contrast, release energy in the form of charged particles (typically protons or alpha particles), thereby significantly reducing the level of neutron radiation produced. The advantages of this system are immediately apparent, combining high specific impulse and immense energy density and providing both thrust and power from a single energy source. Other benefits, said Neukert, include the following:
High Specific Impulse: The MFPD can provide a high-specific impulse, delivering substantial velocity change (delta-v) to the spacecraft, facilitating missions to distant celestial bodies.
Energy-Dense Fuel: Fusion fuel, like isotopes of hydrogen, is incredibly energy-dense, potentially enabling extended missions without needing vast amounts of propellant.
Lower Mass Fractions: The spacecraft might be designed with lower mass fractions dedicated to fuel storage, affording more mass allocation for scientific instruments or additional technologies.
Dual Utility:The MFPD is not just a propulsion system; it is also envisioned to provide electrical power for the spacecraft’s systems and instruments, which is crucial for long-duration missions.
Adaptability:The potential to adjust the thrust and specific impulse, offering versatility for different mission phases, such as acceleration, cruising, and deceleration.
Reduced Travel Time: The potential for higher continuous thrust may significantly reduce transit times to distant destinations, mitigating risks related to cosmic radiation exposure and onboard resource management.
Radiation Shielding: Although challenging, the inherent magnetic and physical structures might be engineered to provide some level of radiation shielding for the spacecraft and crew, utilizing the plasma and magnetic fields.
Independence from Solar Proximity:Unlike solar sails or solar electric propulsion, the MFPD does not depend on proximity to the Sun; thus, it is viable for missions into the outer solar system and beyond.
Minimized Risk of Nuclear Contamination: Compared to nuclear-thermal or fission-electric concepts, the MFPD could be designed to minimize the risk of radioactive contamination, given that fusion, in general, requires less radioactive material and potentially allows for safer reactor shutdown.
Artist’s concept of a Bimodal Nuclear Thermal Rocket in Low Earth Orbit.
Credit: NASA
As to the implications this system could have for space exploration, Nuekart emphasized the ability to traverse vast cosmic distances in reduced timeframes, expanding mission profiles (fast transits to other planets in the Solar System and interstellar missions), mitigating the risks of long-duration space missions (exposure to radiation and microgravity), revolutionizing spacecraft design by providing propulsion and electrical power simultaneously, and enhancing human exploration capabilities.
Beyond that, he also foresees the potential for technological spin-offs in materials science, plasma physics, and energy production that could have applications here on Earth. The development of this system could also foster international collaborations, bringing experts and resources from multiple fields together to realize common exploratory objectives.
Of course, no next-generation technology proposal would be complete without some caveats and addendums. For instance, said Nuekart, the main challenge for MFPD propulsion lies in achieving and maintaining stable fusion relations in space. On Earth, researchers have made considerable progress with magnetic confinement (MCF) and inertial confinement fusion (ICF). The former involves Tokamok reactors using magnetic fields to confine fusion in the form of plasma, while the latter relies on lasers to compress and heat tablets of D-T fuel.
However, similar experiments have not been conducted in space, leading to questions about how the system will handle heat caused by reactions, the resulting radiation, and the structural implications for spacecraft. Nevertheless, the ball is already rolling on nuclear tests in space (the aforementioned DRACO demonstrator). Given the benefits of fusion propulsion, it’s not likely to remain on the drawing board for long. Ultimately, says Nuekart, the research into MFPD aims to establish a pathway that will lead to interplanetary and (someday) Interstellar exploration:
“While the journey to realize the MFPD concept will undeniably be layered with challenges and scientific hurdles, the potential payoff is monumental. Achieving reliable, effective, and efficient fusion propulsion could redefine the boundaries of achievable goals, propelling humanity into a new era of exploration, discovery, and understanding of the cosmos. The hope is that the research seeds curiosity, innovation, and determination among scientists, engineers, and explorers across the globe, charting the course toward our future among the stars.”
The large mound structures that dominate one of the lobes of the Kuiper belt object Arrokoth are similar enough to suggest a common origin. Credit: Southwest Research Institute.
When New Horizons flew past Arrokoth in 2019, it revealed close-up images of this enigmatic Kuiper Belt Object for the first time. Astronomers are still studying all the data sent home by the spacecraft, trying to understand this two-lobed object, which looks like a red, flattened snowman.
Scientists have now identified 12 mounds on Arrokoth’s larger lobe, which are roughly the same size – about 5-kilometers long – as well as the same shape, color, and reflectivity. The scientists think their similar look is because they all formed the same way, where icy material slowly accumulated on the surface of Arrokoth.
A new study published in the Planetary Science Journal suggests that these mound-shaped “building blocks” could help researchers better understand how planetesimals form. These insights will be beneficial when the Lucy spacecraft arrives in Jupiter’s Trojan Belt.
“Similarities including in sizes and other properties of Arrokoth’s mound structures suggest new insights into its formation,” said Alan Stern, the Principal Investigator of the New Horizons mission, presenting the findings this week at the American Astronomical Society’s 55th Annual Division for Planetary Sciences (DPS) meeting in San Antonio. “If the mounds are indeed representative of the building blocks of ancient planetesimals like Arrokoth, then planetesimal formation models will need to explain the preferred size for these building blocks.”
This composite image of Arrokoth was compiled from data obtained by NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft as it flew by the object on Jan. 1, 2019. The image combines enhanced color data (close to what the human eye would see) with detailed high-resolution panchromatic pictures. Credits: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute//Roman Tkachenko
Arrokoth is one of the thousands of small icy bodies in the Kuiper Belt, a massive population of objects that are essentially leftover material from the formation of the Solar System. Much like the Main Asteroid Belt, the Kuiper Belt is also home to several larger bodies, such as Pluto and Charon. Since the turn of the millennium, many more have been discovered, like Eris, Haumea, Makemake, 2007 OR10, Quaoar, and others.
Arrokoth — which had an original designation of (486958) 2014 MU69 — is the most distant and most primitive object ever explored by a spacecraft. It was discovered in 2014 by NASA’s New Horizons science team, using the Hubble Space Telescope.
New Horizons flew by Arrokoth on Jan. 1, 2019, snapping pictures showing the strangely shaped object. It wasn’t until well after the flyby that scientists realized the two lobes on Arrokoth were not round, but flattened like a pancake.
Graphic of Arrokoth’s true shape. Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute
“It’s amazing to see this object so well preserved that its shape directly reveals these details of its assembly from a set of building blocks all very similar to one another,” said Lowell Observatory’s Dr. Will Grundy, co-investigator of the New Horizons mission, in a Southwest Research Institute press release. “Arrokoth almost looks like a raspberry, made of little sub-units.”
Arrokoth measures about 22 miles (35 kilometers) long. It is about 12 miles (20 kilometers) wide, by 6 miles (10 kilometers) thick. Most of the mounds were identified on Arrokoth’s larger lobe, Wenu, but three more mounds were tentatively identified on the object’s smaller lobe, Weeyo.
A three-dimensional model created from images taken by the New Horizons spacecraft shows that the larger lobe is flatter and has dimensions of approximately 14 × 12 × 4 miles (22 × 20 × 7 kilometers). The smaller lobe is more rounded and is approximately 9 × 9 × 6 miles (14 × 14 × 10 kilometers) in its dimensions.
Observations of the Kuiper Belt object Arrokoth suggest it formed from an assembly of similarly sized objects, brought together at low speeds in a local area undergoing gravitational collapse. These findings support the streaming instability model of planetesimal formation and are described in a new study led by Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) Planetary Scientist and Associate Vice President Dr. Alan Stern. Credit: Courtesy of New Horizons/NASA/JHUAPL/SwRI/James Tuttle Keane
Scientists say the shape of Arrokoth indicates that its two lobes most likely formed separately and gently merged within a cloud of particles early in the history of our solar system. It is thought that Arrokoth is primordial — existing since the beginning of the solar system. The two lobes are similar in color, adding evidence to this interpretation.
Arrokoth means means ““sky” in the Powhatan/Algonquian language.
Scientists think there is a good chance that some of the flyby targets for NASA’s Lucy mission to Jupiter’s Trojan asteroids and ESA’s comet interceptor will be other pristine planetesimals, which could contribute to the understanding of accretion of planetesimals elsewhere in the ancient solar system, and whether they differ from processes New Horizons found in the Kuiper Belt.
“It will be important to search for mound-like structures on the planetesimals these missions observe to see how common this phenomenon is, as a further guide to planetesimal formation theories,” Stern said.
Found this in a Lunar orbiter 3 mission photo, had to share it. It looks like a subteraining advanced alien culture does exist on Earths moon. In this photo there is some huge structures within the depths to he craters. It's no wonder why NASA can't go back to the moon, the aliens wont let them! Scott C. Waring
Maryland could be a UFO hotspot, as nearly 2,000 sightings of bizarre objects in the sky have been reported since the mid-1990s.
Residents of the eighth-smallest state have reported a 'flat bottom black triangle' with green lights, 'a classic flying saucer,' and an oval-shaped craft that 'stayed stationary for about a minute and a half.'
Reports of the phenomenon have been collected in a database that shows that the first recorded sighting in Maryland dates back to May 15, 1946 — but wasn't reported until June 2017.
More modern sightings, like the glowing 'orbs' witnessed above Ocean City this past April, now get reported to the database within a matter of days.
'My daughter and I looked up and saw 'four orbs' moving in a circular motion, then come back to the middle, then spread back out,' the witness from Ocean City, who works in the defense sector, wrote to the UFO database.
This map, compiled in February 2023, reveals the number of UFO sightings in each US state
For decades, the official policy of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has been that commercial pilots and other civilians should not bother reporting unexplained aerial phenomena (UAP) or craft (UFOs) to the federal agency.
Per the FAA's 'Aeronautical Information Manual,' anyone who sees something strange in the sky should report their sightings to the volunteers at the National UFO Reporting Center (NUFORC) instead.
'If concern is expressed that life or property might be endangered,' the FAA manual's guidance on UFO sightings continues, 'report the activity to the local law enforcement department.'
One White House official, former Clinton chief of staff and current Biden 'clean energy' czar John Podesta, likened the FAA's official stance to 'illogical directives' and 'discrimination.'
And, as of this summer, NASA's UAP advisory panel now recommends that the civilian air agency should admit the public's UFO and UAP sightings into its own Aviation Safety Reporting System.
'It's heartening to me that so many people are coming forward now,' Davenport told CBS News.
'We're getting significantly more reports than just six months or a year ago,' he said. 'There are UFO reports coming from probably most cities in the country.'
California is reported to have the most UFO sightings out of any state in the US, with more than 15,000 claims.
And the state has seen more than 200 objects this year alone.
Maryland has witnessed 1,923 UFO incidents, as logged by 1,818 reports maintained by this civilian UFO database.
Below are some of Maryland's most compelling cases from the past year.
UFO sightings in Baltimore and Brunswick, Maryland captured on camera
Multiple electric blue lights, several in a tight triangular formation, hovered over a backyard in Baltimore on August 5, 2023, according to one crisply recorded UFO report to NUFORC
August 5, 2023 - Baltimore, Maryland
Multiple electric blue lights, several in a tight triangular formation, hovered over a backyard in Baltimore, according to one crisply recorded UFO report to NUFORC.
'We were outback celebrating and I notice some bright lights in the sky,' the witness wrote along with their submission of the video.
'I started recording because I didn't think they were stars like most people thought,' the witness said. 'I usually look at the sky at night and never saw those before, plus they were moving slowly across the sky.'
While the witness described seeing 'at least 10 lights' during the sighting, at most eight or nine are seen during the 30-second video.
Although the lights do twinkle in the distance like stars, no other stars are visible in the night sky — and, by the video's end, the lights can be seen moving slowly in unison 'across the sky' just as the witness describes.
July 4, 2023 - Brunswick, Maryland
During a clear night of Independence Day fireworks, multiple witnesses at an apartment complex in Brunswick noticed a pair of blinking lights that appeared connected to one another, hovering around their local fireworks show.
'What is that? Oh, my gosh! What is that?' one confused witness video-recording the event can be heard asking as the reportedly 'quick moving lights in synchronization' glides across the sky, leaving 'no sound or trails.'
'Happened during fireworks but very easy to tell it's not fireworks, nor a plane or helicopters in formation,' said the witness who submitted his report and cell phone video to NUFORC.
'The objects also seemed fairly close, as in not extremely high,' the witness added, 'but the objects still seemed smaller than crafts known of.'
'The flight pattern was so consistent between the two lights that I truly don't believe it's drones being flown as the line between the two was absolutely perfect and did not change at all during flight.'
A child witness, who can be heard in the video, guesses that the mystery lights might be 'a firework,' but the adults remain unsure.
For about a minute near Jackson Station Road on March 19, 2023, one driver reported seeing a 'flat-bottom black triangle shape flying low to the ground with a low wooshing sound'
March 19, 2023 - Perryville, MD
For about a minute near Jackson Station Road, one driver reported seeing a 'flat-bottom black triangle shape flying low to the ground with a low wooshing sound.'
'I stopped my car and rolled down the window and heard a low wooshing sound coming from it,' the witness told NUFORC in their written report.
The UFO, which they referred to as 'the shape,' was then reportedly 'flying low to the ground and moving really slow.'
The witness further described the UFO as appearing 'black in color' with a green light on 'each point' of its triangular shape.
'I got one blurry picture,' the witness reported, 'when a car pulled up behind me and I had to keep driving.'
On November 7, 2022, one Maryland witness saw what they described as 'a classic flying saucer, with a black marking in the 'front'' moving very slowly above their parents' house in Rockville, north of Washington DC. The witness said it was slow 'compared to [...] an aircraft'
November 7, 2022 - Rockville, MD, USA
One Maryland witness saw what they described as 'a classic flying saucer, with a black marking in the 'front'' moving very slowly above their parents' house in Rockville just north of Washington DC.
'Saw this weird flying saucer-looking thing, took some photos,' the witness wrote into NUFORC.
'I was looking at the evening sky and saw a strange looking object with no trail,' their account continues, noting that the UFO 'seemed to be relatively low' in the sky and was moving 'very slowly (compared to, for example, an aircraft).'
In the throwback to the mid-20th Century's UFO sightings, the object, they report, 'looks like a classic flying saucer, with a black marking in the 'front' (what was visible).'
Then, just like a classic UFO, it apparently zipped off: 'It seemed to disappear after I filmed and photographed it for 30 seconds,' the witness wrote.
Although Davenport has been working for NUFORC since 1994, the group's director has few predictions for what the recent resurgence in interest might lead to.
'I don't know what the future has in store for us,' Davenport said.
'But I am encouraged that more people are coming forward and the government recognizes the UFO phenomenon [as] something worthy of their attention.'
In the unending expanse of the cosmos, Earth holds secrets that have perplexed and fascinated humans for centuries. As we race towards the future, pushing the boundaries of what is scientifically possible, we find intriguing clues from our ancient past suggesting that we may not be alone in the universe.
One of the most riveting stories from history dates back to 1946, with the expedition called Operation High Jump led by the renowned Admiral Richard Byrd. This mission, considered the largest Antarctic expedition at that time, has been mired in mystery. Whispers of an aerial battle involving advanced flying craft and encounters with extraterrestrial beings suggest an incredible and almost unbelievable narrative. Adding more intrigue to the tale, a 2018 satellite image captured what appeared to be a contrail stretching from the North to the South Pole. The sheer speed necessary to leave such a trail hints at technology far beyond our current capabilities.
This is not the only tale that nudges us to reconsider our understanding of human history. The Antikythera mechanism, an ancient mechanical computer found in the Aegean Sea, dates back to 200 BC. This device, which was used to predict astronomical events, stands as a testament to the advanced technological capabilities of ancient civilizations. It was so advanced that it’s likened to finding a jet plane in King Tut’s tomb! Such anomalies make one wonder: was the knowledge of our ancestors influenced or even given by extraterrestrial beings?
Jumping from the ancient to the ultra-modern, science is on the brink of creating wonders with nanotechnology. Imagine microscopic robots, a mere 244 atoms across, swimming through our bloodstream, repairing damaged tissues, healing wounds at unprecedented speeds, and perhaps even reversing the aging process. Such advancements are not confined to the realms of science fiction anymore. The field is advancing so rapidly that it promises not just longer life but perhaps a reversal of the aging process in the foreseeable future.
Could it be that these modern scientific marvels echo knowledge passed down from celestial visitors? The merging of our ancient past and a promising future raises exciting questions. Are we, as a species, evolving to resemble our potential extraterrestrial ancestors? The universe holds its secrets close, but with each discovery, we inch closer to understanding our place in this vast cosmos.
Wetenschappers van de National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) hebben onlangs bekendgemaakt dat ze het einde naderen van hun zoektocht naar het proberen voorkomen dat een asteroïde over 159 jaar op de aarde botst.
Volgens deskundigen zou de asteroïde 'Bennu' op 24 september 2182 de aarde kunnen treffen. Deze cataclysmische gebeurtenis heeft een kans van 1 op 2.700 om de aarde te raken, maar specialisten nemen geen enkel risico en maken zich dan ook zorgen over deze kleine kans. Zozeer zelfs dat NASA zeven jaar geleden een ruimtevaartuig naar Bennu lanceerde om gegevens te verzamelen die zouden kunnen helpen bij het afwenden van de ramp, als en wanneer deze zich voordoet.
Ruimterots komt elke 6 jaar in buurt van onze planeet
Volgens NASA werd de asteroïde in 1999 geïdentificeerd en reist hij ongeveer elke zes jaar in de buurt van de aarde. De ruimterots is naar schatting even groot als het Empire State Building en heeft de kracht van 22 atoombommen. Tijdens de Touch-and-Go (TAG)-monsterverzamelingsoperatie daalde NASA's 'OSIRIS-Rex-ruimtevaartuig' in 2020 af op het oppervlak van asteroïde Bennu en haalde rotsachtig materiaal op van een monsterlocatie genaamd 'Nightingale'.
Bennu, een oeroud overblijfsel van ons zonnestelsel, bestaat volgens wetenschappers al ruim 4,5 miljard jaar. Het raakte voor het eerst bekend als '1999 RQ36'. Nadat een kind uit de derde klas, Michael Puzio, een wedstrijd had gewonnen om de asteroïde een naam te geven, werd deze in 2013 omgedoopt tot Bennu.
Hoe wil NASA botsing tussen aarde en asteroïde voorkomen?
“We bevinden ons nu in de laatste etappe van deze zeven jaar durende reis, en het voelt heel erg als de laatste paar kilometer van een marathon, met een samenloop van emoties zoals trots en vreugde die naast elkaar bestaan met een vastberaden focus om de race goed te voltooien,” citeerde Telegraph Rich Burns, projectmanager voor OSIRIS-REx bij NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. De asteroïdemonsters van de OSIRIS-REx-missie arriveerden eind september op aarde en worden nu intensief geanalyseerd.
De bevindingen van de missie kunnen niet alleen de wereld redden van een catastrofale botsing, maar kunnen ook informatie onthullen over de oorsprong van het leven op aarde. De missie doet denken aan de film Armageddon uit 1998 van Bruce Willis. In de film voorkomt Willis dat een asteroïde ter grootte van Texas in botsing komt met de aarde door erop te landen en deze met een atoombom in tweeën te breken. Maar ook 'Don't look up' uit 2021 lijkt heel erg op deze gebeurtenis.
(Skwadra by Tagtik/Source: News18 - Telegraph/Illustration picture: Pixabay)
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Over mijzelf
Ik ben Pieter, en gebruik soms ook wel de schuilnaam Peter2011.
Ik ben een man en woon in Linter (België) en mijn beroep is Ik ben op rust..
Ik ben geboren op 18/10/1950 en ben nu dus 73 jaar jong.
Mijn hobby's zijn: Ufologie en andere esoterische onderwerpen.
Op deze blog vind je onder artikels, werk van mezelf. Mijn dank gaat ook naar André, Ingrid, Oliver, Paul, Vincent, Georges Filer en MUFON voor de bijdragen voor de verschillende categorieën...
Veel leesplezier en geef je mening over deze blog.
![On November 7, 2022, one Maryland witness saw what they described as 'a classic flying saucer, with a black marking in the 'front'' moving very slowly above their parents' house in Rockville, north of Washington DC. The witness said it was slow 'compared to [...] an aircraft'](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2023/10/04/22/76179353-12594651-image-a-33_1696455460650.jpg)
