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.
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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 Ontdek de Fascinerende Wereld van UFO's en UAP's: Jouw Bron voor Onthullende Informatie!
Ben jij ook gefascineerd door het onbekende? Wil je meer weten over UFO's en UAP's, niet alleen in België, maar over de hele wereld? Dan ben je op de juiste plek!
België: Het Kloppend Hart van UFO-onderzoek
In België is BUFON (Belgisch UFO-Netwerk) dé autoriteit op het gebied van UFO-onderzoek. Voor betrouwbare en objectieve informatie over deze intrigerende fenomenen, bezoek je zeker onze Facebook-pagina en deze blog. Maar dat is nog niet alles! Ontdek ook het Belgisch UFO-meldpunt en Caelestia, twee organisaties die diepgaand onderzoek verrichten, al zijn ze soms kritisch of sceptisch.
Nederland: Een Schat aan Informatie
Voor onze Nederlandse buren is er de schitterende website www.ufowijzer.nl, beheerd door Paul Harmans. Deze site biedt een schat aan informatie en artikelen die je niet wilt missen!
Internationaal: MUFON - De Wereldwijde Autoriteit
Neem ook een kijkje bij MUFON (Mutual UFO Network Inc.), een gerenommeerde Amerikaanse UFO-vereniging met afdelingen in de VS en wereldwijd. MUFON is toegewijd aan de wetenschappelijke en analytische studie van het UFO-fenomeen, en hun maandelijkse tijdschrift, The MUFON UFO-Journal, is een must-read voor elke UFO-enthousiasteling. Bezoek hun website op www.mufon.com voor meer informatie.
Samenwerking en Toekomstvisie
Sinds 1 februari 2020 is Pieter niet alleen ex-president van BUFON, maar ook de voormalige nationale directeur van MUFON in Vlaanderen en Nederland. Dit creëert een sterke samenwerking met de Franse MUFON Reseau MUFON/EUROP, wat ons in staat stelt om nog meer waardevolle inzichten te delen.
Let op: Nepprofielen en Nieuwe Groeperingen
Pas op voor een nieuwe groepering die zich ook BUFON noemt, maar geen enkele connectie heeft met onze gevestigde organisatie. Hoewel zij de naam geregistreerd hebben, kunnen ze het rijke verleden en de expertise van onze groep niet evenaren. We wensen hen veel succes, maar we blijven de autoriteit in UFO-onderzoek!
Blijf Op De Hoogte!
Wil jij de laatste nieuwtjes over UFO's, ruimtevaart, archeologie, en meer? Volg ons dan en duik samen met ons in de fascinerende wereld van het onbekende! Sluit je aan bij de gemeenschap van nieuwsgierige geesten die net als jij verlangen naar antwoorden en avonturen in de sterren!
Heb je vragen of wil je meer weten? Aarzel dan niet om contact met ons op te nemen! Samen ontrafelen we het mysterie van de lucht en daarbuiten.
07-04-2017
Two UFO sightings in North Bay last year
Two UFO sightings in North Bay last year
The most popular shape of UFO reported in 2016 was a simple point source of light
by: Jeff Turl
The Canadian UFO Survey is out for 2016 and North Bay reported two UFO sightings and Parry Sound one.
The first was on June 18, around 9:30 a.m. when five lights were seen travelling on a path. There was no wind. Two sightings were reported.
The report does not give exact locations.
The second report was on September 25, 2 p.m. A black triangular object with lights around it and making abrupt turns was seen.
The Parry Sound sighting was in the early morning hours of March 3 when two circular crafts were signalling to each other.
UFO sightings are still being reported at a near- record level, according to the survey.
In 2016, 1,131 UFO reports were officially filed in Canada, the fifth year in a row above 1,000 cases but down slightly from 1,267 UFO sightings reported in 2015.
Last year most UFO reports were recorded during the summer with June, July and August having a combined 37.7 per cent of all cases.
Most sighting reports were simple lights in the sky, known as Nocturnal Lights (54.9 per cent), and Close Encounters comprised less than one per cent of the total.
The most popular shape of UFO reported in 2016 was a simple point source of light.
Other shapes reported were Triangle, Ball, Cigar and Fireball.
The classic “flying saucer” was only reported 48 times or 5 per cent in 2016.
While the vast majority of cases reported to UFO groups and official agencies are of low Strangeness, some rather odd incidents are reported each year, the report states.
"Close Encounter cases are definitely in the minority, but some of these cases are extremely close indeed," it said.
A witness in Cornwall, P.E.I. reported that a thin, six-foot-tall, long fingered, white alien in a black suit appeared in his bedroom. The witness spoke to the alien, which then left by walking through a wall.
In One report from Quebec simply stated 'They contacted me.'
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69 Years Ago A UFO Crashed In Aztec, Arizona In 1948, And Was Covered Up, Video, UFO Sighting News.
69 Years Ago A UFO Crashed In Aztec, Arizona In 1948, And Was Covered Up, Video, UFO Sighting News.
Date of crash: 1948 Location of crash: Aztec, Arizona, USA Its important to look back at the past UFO sightings, but especially at the UFO crashes that took place in history. Here is an in depth look at this crash, and how the evidence was overwhelming. Alien bodies and craft were found, and the public of course was kept in the dark. Scott C. Waring Report states: Source: (Credit: aztecufo.com) [go to original source] THE AZTEC RECOVERY 1948 It was the columnist Frank Scully who first alerted the world to sensational stories of recovered flying saucers and little men in his best-selling book Behind the Flying Saucers published in 1950. Scully claimed that up to that time there had been four such recoveries, one of which was alleged to have taken place around Aztec, New Mexico, when sixteen humanoid bodies were recovered together with their undamaged craft. According to Scully's informants, the disk that landed near Aztec was 99.99 feet in diameter, its exterior made of a light metal resembling aluminum but so durable that no amount of heat (up to 10,000 degrees was applied) or diamond-tipped drill had the slightest effect. The disk apparently incorporated large rings of metal which revolved around a central, stabilized cabin, using an unfamiliar gear ratio. There were no rivets, bolts, screws or signs of welding. Investigators were eventually able to gain entry. Scully was told, because of a fracture in one of the portholes, which they enlarged, revealing a knob inside the cabin which when pushed (with a pole) caused a hidden door to open. Sixteen small humanoids, ranging in height from 36 to 42 inches, were supposedly found dead inside the cabin, their bodies charred to a dark brown color. Scully was told that the craft landed undamaged, having landed under its own guidance. The craft was eventually dismantled, the investigators having discovered that it was manufactured in segments which fitted in grooves and were pinned together around the base. The complete cabin section, measuring 18 feet in diameter was lifted out of the base of the saucer, around which was a gear that fitted a gear on the cabin. These segments, together with the bodies, were then transported to Wright Field (Wright Patterson AFB). Some of the bodies were later dissected and examined by the Air Force, and were found to be similar in all respects to human beings, with the exception of their teeth, which were perfect. New Supportive Evidence? According to important information published by William Steinman in 1987 there is a large grain of truth in the Aztec story, and he has managed to acquire some astonishing supportive evidence. Like Scully, he is unwilling to divulge his sources, which inevitably lays him open to charges of fabrication. Steinman discovered that the Aztec disk came to earth on 25 March 1948, having been detected by three separate radar units in the southwest, one of which was said to have disrupted the craft's control mechanism. The area of impact was calculated by triangulation and this information was immediately relayed to Air Defense Command and Gen. George C. Marshall, then Secretary of State, who allegedly contacted the MJ-12 group as well as the Interplanetary Phenomenon Unit (IPU) of the Army Counterintelligence Directorate. The IPU operated out of Camp Hale, Colorado, at this time, Steinman claims, and its main function was to collect and deliver disabled or crashed disks to certain specified secret locations. The craft was recovered within hours by the IPU scout team about 12 miles northeast of Aztec. General Marshall ordered Air Defense Command to go off alert status, and the radar units were advised that there had been a false alarm. Marshall then gave orders to the commander of the IPU to organize a recovery team and contacted Dr. Vannevar Bush - the. head of MJ-12 to gather together a team of scientists to accompany the IPU to the crash site. Steinman has named these scientists as follows: Dr., Lloyd Berkner, Dr. Detlev Bronk, Dr. Carl A. Heiland, Dr. Jerome Hunsaker, Dr. John von Neumann, Dr. Robert J. Oppenheimer, Dr. Merle A. Tuve, Dr. Horace B. van Vandenberg. Four of these scientists, it will be noted, were members of the original MJ-12 panel set up in September 1947. Dr. Carl A. Heiland was a geophysicist and magnetic sciences expert who was the head of the Colorado School of Mines, and according to Steinman leaked details of the recovery to one of Scully's sources, Leo GeBauer. Dr. Horace B. van Vandenberg was an inorganic chemist associated with the University of Colorado. Dr. Merle A. Tuve worked for the Office of Scientific Research and Development during World War II, and is chiefly remembered as a geophysicist for his techniques of radio wave propagation of the upper atmosphere. Dr. Robert J. Oppenheimer distinguished himself primarily as leader of the Los Alamos atomic bomb project , commanding the allegiance of the world's top physicists. He was the Director of the Institute of Advanced Studies at Princeton from 1947 and became Chairman of the General Advisory Committee of the Atomic Energy Commission. Dr. John von Neumann, the famous Hungarian born mathematician, became a consultant on the atomic bomb (Manhatten Project) in 1943. His main area of expertise lay in the design and development of computers. The scientists, according to Steinman, were told by Dr. Bush to assemble at Durango Airfield, Colorado, 35 miles to the north of Aztec, with the minimum delay. All those involved in the recovery were sworn to an above top secret oath. The IPU convoy used a route to the site that avoided main roads, and on arrival road blocks were set up at strategic points within two miles of the recovery area. The owner of a ranch and his family were allegedly held incommunicado and told never to discuss the matter (cf. the Roswell incident). Equipment hauling trucks were camouflaged to look like oil drilling rigs during the operation. Inside the Craft A team of scientists arrived at the site a little later than the IPU team and began dissecting the disk. According to Steinman, they entered the craft one by one, entry having been gained via a fractured porthole as described in Scully's account. The portholes themselves looked metallic and only appeared translucent on close inspection. Inside the craft they found two humanoids, about two feet in height, slumped over an instrument panel charred deep brown. Another 12 bodies lay sprawled on the floor in chamber within the cabin, making a total of 14 bodies (not 16 as Scully had been told). An instrument panel supposedly had several pushbuttons and levers with hieroglyphic-type symbols, as well as symbols illuminated on small display screens. Bush and von Neumann discovered that the control panel had drawers which rolled out, but no wiring could be detected. A book composed of parchment-like leaves with the texture of plastic also contained the strange hieroglyphs - similar to Sanskrit, Oppenheimer thought. This was given to General Marshall, who then passed it on to two leading cryptological experts for analysis, William F. Friedman and Lambros C. Callihamos (who both later led distinguished careers in the National Security Agency). Dr. Bronk, a physiologist and biophysicist, examined the bodies and asked Bush to get hold of cryogenic equipment with which to preserve them. Cryogenics specialist Dr. Paul A. Scherer, a colleague of Bush's, was contacted and advised Bush to obtain some dry ice. Meanwhile, another small group of scientists and military personnel examined the craft and were eventually able to dismantle it when several interlocking key devices were found which opened up seams at specific points. Three days later the segments were loaded onto three trucks, together with the bodies, and transported with a tarpaulin marked "Explosives". The convoy headed at night by the least conspicuous and often most laborious route to the restricted Naval Auxiliary Airfield Complex at Los Alamos, arriving one week later. Here they remained for over a year, Steinman claims, before being transported to another base. The Bodies Dr. Paul A. Scherer eventually obtained special preservation containers for the least damaged bodies, Steinman relates. One of the companies which supplied equipment was the Air Research Corporation, of which Scherer was Director of Research and Development; it supplied the liquid nitrogen pump, circulation system and refrigeration units. Other specimens were given a complete autopsy, by a team headed by Dr. Bronk, of biophysicists, histochemists and pathologists. The results were put in a report, part of which, Steinman claims, appeared in the "Air Force Project Sign (Grudge) Report No. 13" which has never been released. According to the report, the bodies were described as averaging 42 inches in length. The facial features strongly resembled "mongoloid Orientals" in appearance, with disproportionately large heads, large "slant" eyes, small noses and mouths. The average weight was about 40 pounds. The torsos were very small and thin, with very thin necks. The arms were long and slender, reaching the knees, with hands containing long and slender fingers with webbing between them. There was no digestive or gastrointestinal tract, no alimentary or intestinal canal, and no rectal point. No reproductive organs were apparent. Instead of blood there was a colorless liquid with no red cells which smelled similar to ozone. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Further Evidence Veteran researcher Leonard Stringfield, a former Air Force intelligence officer who is the world's leading specialist on what he calls "Retrievals of the Third Kind," shares my misgivings about some of the material in Steinman's book, but we are both impressed with his extensive research into the Aztec case. Stringfield has uncovered further evidence himself. Captain V. A. Postlethwait, who was on detached service with Army G-2 (Intelligence) in 1948, told Stringfield that he was cleared to see a top secret cable describing the crash of a saucer-shaped craft 100 feet in diameter and 30 feet high, with one porthole broken, causing suffocation to the five occupants - who had turned blue as a result. The bodies were about four feet tall with relatively large heads, Postlethwait recollects. The metallic skin of the saucer was too tough to penetrate, although as thin as newspaper. The incident was said to have occurred near White Sands, New Mexico. Aside from a few discrepancies there are some significant parallels with the Aztec case. Postlethwait revealed to Stringfield, for example, that private property was purchased to facilitate transporting the craft. Leonard Stringfield has also spoken with Dr. Robert Spencer Carr, a retired University of South Florida professor who claims to have testimonial evidence from five sources, including a nurse and a high-ranking Air Force officer who participated in the recovery of a crashed UFO and occupants in 1948 - presumed to be the one at Aztec (although there was another alleged recovery that year, just across the Mexican border near Laredo, Texas). In 1982 Stringfield asked Carr to disclose the name of his principal source, "on the premise that our ages give us little time tolerance in our search for truth." "When Professor Carr named his source," says Stringfield, "I sat back dumbfounded. I knew his name well in research, and recalled some of his comments on UFOs while he served as an Air Force officer. . . . "Please, Len," pleaded Carr, "keep the name to yourself; please spare me any trouble as long as I live . . . My key witness participated in the 1948 retrieval and saw alien bodies on location." According to Bill Steinman, two of Carr's sources were aeronautical engineers who provided important information regarding the saucer's construction and propulsion. A source now named is Arthur Bray (not to be confused with the Canadian researcher), a security guard involved with the recovery project. Carr also interviewed a woman whose father was present during the recovery. Information pertaining to the flying saucers must be suppressed, he told his daughter. "If news of this vehicle's water-driven engine got out to the whole scientific community, that would be the end of the oil industry." The comment is of course pure hearsay, but if there is any truth in it a further possible reason for the cover-up is brought to light. At the still fenced-off crash site on a plateau twelve miles northeast of Aztec, Bill Steinman has uncovered charred and scraped-off rocks of various sizes as well as some metal bracing struts that might possibly have been used for supporting the craft. On one of his visits to the area he was shadowed by two unmarked helicopters. As for George Bowra's claim that no one in Aztec, could recall the incident, Steinman has traced at least four people who knew where the crash site was located, one of whom, "V.A.," recalls that sometime between 1948 and 1950 a huge disk-shaped flying object with a dome on top skimmed about 100 feet above the ground not far from him. The witness pointed out to Steinman a cliff jutting above the Animas River. "That thing, or flying saucer, tried hard to clear that cliff, but it hit the very corner up there, shooting sparks and rocks in every direction," he claims. "Finally, it made a right-angle turn in midair and headed straight north in the direction of the alleged crash site at Hart Canyon. That's the last I saw of it. I ran into the house and called the military in Albuquerque. I never heard from them about it." Steinman first became interested in UFOs in 1981 when he read Frank Scully's book, and has since devoted much of his time and resources on the Aztec case and the other recoveries associated with Scully's claims, often in the face of discouraging odds. Steinman's job in quality assurance and analysis in the aerospace industry has aided him in probing the complex and intricate leads that he has pursued. Writing in the foreword to Steinman's book, UFO Crash at Aztec, Leonard Stringfield explains how, like many others, he was led to believe the Scully story was a hoax, his disbelief long being conditioned by a succession of ufologists who for years claimed that Scully "was duped by a scheming Silas Newton and his cohort, Leo Gebauer." But now, thanks to Bill Steinman's painstaking research (as well as some of his own leads), he has been obliged to reevaluate the evidence.
California Man Films UFO, Gets Family To Come Out And Watch (Bad Language), Video, UFO Sighting News.
California Man Films UFO, Gets Family To Come Out And Watch (Bad Language), Video, UFO Sighting News.
Date of sighting: March 15, 2017 Location of sighting: California, USA Source: MUFON #82604 This is an awesome video posted by Isaac Wilee (click to subscribe to him) of Youtube. The video shows a triangle craft that may be the new evolution of the TR3B, but it certainly isn't the old one, because the TR3B has one small light (for balance hovering) on each corner (white lights) and a larger light orb at its center (propulsion). Awesome video. Scott C. Waring Eyewitness states:
"I pulled onto my street heading home and I noticed 3 bright lights in the sky. 2 red and one white flashing very fast. I recorded it for a few seconds from my car, until the video went out of focus, then pulled into my driveway and went inside to tell people to come look. My brother in law came outside and seen it as well. I started to record again and as I did it changed its white light to red and began pulsating slowly with the other 2 lights now turned off. It then flickered its lights and changed the red pulsating light back to white, continued to pulsate, and then went back to flashing again for the remainder of the time I watched. It eventually vanished."
UFO Fan Disappears Without A Trace – Leaving Coded Writings In His Room VIDEO!
UFO Fan Disappears Without A Trace – Leaving Coded Writings In His Room VIDEO
The mysterious disappearance of a UFO enthusiast in Brazil causes speculations of alien abductions. Bruno Borges left behind a locked room full of coded writings and bizarre photos of extra-terrestrials. The internet is convinced that Borges has been either nabbed by the Men in Black or aliens after he suddenly disappeared without telling his family.
Avideo inside the room of Borges shows notebooks with cryptic writings on the covers and symbols apparently associated with pentagrams.
Bruno’s relatives said that he did not reveal details of what he was working, but hinted that he was into writing a series of books, which, according to Bruno, would change humanity in a good way.
The family had not yet received substantial information on what has happened, according to Father Athors Borges, who also said that they tried to call him on his mobile phone, but it was off.
The family said that this is the first time Bruno disappears without a trace. Athors stated that his son did not take anything and he was leaving their home the last time they saw him.
This interesting footage of triangle UFO sighting was recorded over Barrie in Ontario Canada on 27th February 2017.
Witness report:
I pulled onto my street heading home and I noticed 3 bright lights in the sky; 2 red and one white flashing very fast. I recorded it for a few seconds from my car, until the video went out of focus, then pulled into my driveway and went inside to tell people to come look. My brother-in-law came outside and saw it as well. I started to record again and as I did it changed its white light to red and began pulsating slowly with the other 2 lights now turned off. It then flickered its lights and changed the red pulsating light back to white, continued to pulsate, and then went back to flashing again for the remainder of the time I watched. It eventually vanished from view.
This past weekend I spoke at the annual Edinburg, Texas “Out Of This World” conference. The subject: mysterious deaths in the field of Ufology. During the course of the gig, one of the attendees asked – given the various books I have written – if I had a large database of material on UFO-themed cases, witness reports, and so on. Well, yes, I do. So, I figured that today I would share with you one of those reports. It demonstrates the undeniably bizarre nature of certain aspects of the UFO phenomenon. It also reveals how the subject has been manipulated for very strange purposes.
On September 2, 2014, I had an interesting chat with a retired employee of the U.S. Air Force. I’ll call him “Harry Palmer.” He contacted me to share a deeply odd story – and specifically after reading my 2011 book, The Real Men in Black. Palmer’s exposure to the UFO phenomenon occurred below Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Dayton, Ohio. The base in question is a highly secure military installation. It has a reputation for (allegedly) being the home of a number of well-preserved – and some not so well-preserved – corpses of dead aliens, presumably recovered from more than a few UFO crashes. Many UFO skeptics ignore or write-off such claims. Harry Palmer told me he knew better.
It was a winter’s night in 1988 when Palmer (27 at the time) was ordered to report to one particular building on the base that he had never previously been in, one which was connected to a certain weapons-storage area. On doing so, he was met by three very pale-skinned men dressed in dark suits. They directed him to a door which, when opened, revealed a large elevator on the other side. Silently, the black-clad trio motioned Palmer into the elevator. He quickly realized he was descending – and to a fairly deep degree. He was then ushered into a corridor which had a large vault-like door at its end.
One of the three men opened it, and in a strange high-pitched voice, ordered Palmer into the vault. The same man pointed at a large container – perhaps nine feet in length and five feet in width – and told Palmer to take a look inside. He did as he was told and was shocked – to the point of feeling nauseous and clammy – by the sight of a badly-damaged body of what he, Palmer, could only guess was an extraterrestrial. The head was large, the eyes were huge and black, and the severed and small torso was skinny.
Dead aliens
In seconds, Palmer was forcibly taken from the room, taken to yet another room, and then ordered to sign a document which effectively said that if he ever spoke of what he saw he would be prosecuted to the full extent of the law for violating U.S. national security regulations. After signing the document, a worried Palmer was taken back up to the surface and left there to make his way back to his regular place of work.
Clearly, this affair makes absolutely no sense at all – unless someone was playing weird mind-games with Palmer, which I think was probably the case, as I will soon reveal. It’s a fact that UFOs had zero bearing on Palmer’s work at Wright-Patterson. So, why expose him to something so astonishing that, in all probability, he would one day share the story with people – like his family and, in 2014, me?
My view on all this is that Palmer was shown the body (or, far more likely, an expertly-created model) to determine his loyalty. It may have been intended all along for him to see “it.” If Palmer kept quiet about what he saw, he was a good military man and someone considered trustworthy. If he told his family of what he had seen, he was, maybe, a potential security risk and needed to be watched carefully. And if he ran to a Soviet handler, it was jail-time. But, the important thing to remember is that no real secret would ever have been compromised: it was all a ruse and a test of loyalty.
On this thought-provoking matter/theory, Palmer told me he was assigned to a particularly sensitive non-UFO project (a description of which he did not expand on) just five days before seeing the body in the container. With that latter, notable issue in my mind, I strongly suspect that the body seen by Palmer was not real. The whole thing was a staged event. It was designed to see how – and to what extent – Palmer could be trusted.
If true, this saga may very well help to explain some of the highly controversial stories concerning military personnel who have reportedly been exposed to alleged alien bodies in underground rooms (such as the many “Hangar 18” legends attached to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base), and under “convenient” and unlikely circumstances that many skeptical researchers think are just too good to be true. They probably are too good to be true. But not for the reasons that the skeptics think. This case also suggests that intelligence agents might, at times, mimic the actions and creepy appearances of the MIB – which is a story for another day.
When an extraterrestrial dies on Earth and can’t be taken back to the home planet, where do the mourning ETs bury their friend? Would you believe … Ohio? A UFO was spotted…
Well, with Men in Black 3 finally among us, I figured that now would be the time to share with you a very weird story of definitive MIB proportions, which was brought to…
The dark night of Saturday, September 11, 1976 was the decidedly ill-fated evening upon which the Orchard Beach, Maine, USA home of a certain Dr. Herbert Hopkins was darkened by a nightmarish MIB….
At 10:49pm Western Australian time on February 2 this year, cosmic gamma rays hit the Nasa satellite, Swift, orbiting the Earth. Within seconds of the detection, an alert was automatically sent to the University of WA's Zadko Telescope. It swung into robotic action, taking images of the sky location in the constellation Ophiuchus.
What emerged from the blackness, where nothing was seen before, was a rapidly brightening "optical transient", which is something visible in the sky for a brief period of time.
The event, named GRB170202, was a very energetic gamma ray burst (GRB). After less than a minute, the gamma rays switched off, and the GRB appeared as a brightening and then fading optical beacon.
The Zadko Telescope recorded the entire evolution of the optical outburst. During its biggest outburst, GRB170202 was equivalent in brightness to millions of stars shining together from the same location.
About 9 hours 42 mins after the GRB, the Very Large Telescope in Chile acquired the spectrum of the light from the optical afterglow.
This enabled a distance to the burst to be measured: about 12 billion light years. The universe has expanded to four times the size it was then, 12 billion years ago, the time it took the light to reach Earth.
GRB170202 was so far away, even its host galaxy was not visible, just darkness. Because the GRB was a transient, never to be seen again, it is like turning on a light in a dark room (the host galaxy) and trying to record the detail in the room before the light goes out.
Mystery of gamma ray burst
The flash of gamma radiation and subsequent optical transient is the telltale signature of a black hole birth from the cataclysmic collapse of a star. Such events are rare and require some special circumstances, including a very massive star up to tens of solar masses (the mass of our Sun) rotating rapidly with a strong magnetic field.
These ingredients are crucial to launch two jets that punch through the collapsing star to produce the gamma ray burst (see animation). The closest analogue (and better understood transient) to a GRB is a supernova explosion from a collapsing star. In fact, some relatively nearby GRBs reveal evidence of an energetic supernova linked to the event.
Simulations show that most collapsing stars don't have enough energy to produce a GRB jet, a so-called "failure to launch" scenario. Both observation and theory show that GRBs are extremely rare when compared to the occurrence of supernovae.
View photos
fast radio burst
The stars that produce GRBs are born and die within some tens to hundreds of thousands of years, unlike our Sun which has been around for billions of years. This is because very massive stars exhaust their fuel very quickly, and undergo violent gravitational collapse leading to a black hole, on the timescale of seconds.
A plethora of rogue black holes
The rates of black hole formation throughout the universe can be inferred from the GRB rate. Based on the observed GRB rate, there must be thousands of black hole births occurring each day throughout the entire universe.
So what is the fate of these cosmic monsters? Most will be lurking in their host galaxies, occasionally devouring stars and planets.
Others will be in a gravitational death dance with other black holes until they merge into a single black hole with a burst of gravitational waves (GWs), such as the first discovery of such an event by the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO).
At the frontier of understanding black hole formation is the search for a special kind of GRB that marks the merger (collision) of two neutron stars. So called "short GRBs" are flashes of gamma radiation that last less than a second and could be the "smoking gun" for neutron star mergers.
View photos
black hole
Importantly, merging neutron stars should be detected from their gravitational radiation by LIGO. Hence, a coincident detection in gamma rays, optical and gravitational waves is a real possibility.
This would be a monumental discovery allowing unprecedented insight into the physics of black hole formation. The revolution is like listening to the radio on a 1920s receiver and then watching a modern high definition surround sound movie.
Future challenges
Given the above rate of thousands of black holes created per day, it seems that coincident detection of GRBs and gravitational waves is a no brainer.
But in reality we must take into account the limited sensitivity of all the telescopes (and detectors). This reduces the potential observation rate to some tens per year. This is high enough to inspire a global scramble to search for the first coincident gravitational wave sources with electromagnetic counterparts.
The task is extremely difficult because the gravitational wave observatories cannot pinpoint the location of the source very well. To counter this, a strategy of searching for coincident gravitational wave and electromagnetic detections in time may be the best bet.
The newly funded ARC Centre of Excellence OzGrav mission is to understand the extreme physics of black holes.
One of the goals is to search for optical, radio and high energy counterparts coincident with gravitational waves from black hole creation. Australia is poised to play a significant role in this new era of "multi-messenger astronomy".
David Coward, Associate professor, University of Western Australia
This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.
Iron Man-Style Exosuit Turns Inventor into Real-Life Superhero
Iron Man-Style Exosuit Turns Inventor into Real-Life Superhero
By Tereza Pultarova, Live Science Contributor
The so-called Daedalus suit is a jet engine-powered exosuit developed by amateur inventor Richard Browning.
Credit: Gravity
Residents of the quiet town of Salisbury, in the south of England, had no clue until last week that their neighbor, a 38-year-old oil trader named Richard Browning, is a real-life Iron Man in the making.
The amateur inventor had been secretly building a jet engine-powered exoskeleton suit, and he recently unveiled how the futuristic ensemble enables him to hover in the air like a superhero.
Despite the noisiness of the technology, which consists of three sets of miniature jet engines attached to the arms and the back, Browning managed to keep the work completely under wraps. For 18 months, he had been experimenting in his garage, trying to figure out the optimal number and position of the jet engines toallow him to fly with a minimal amount of equipment. [Humanoid Robots to Flying Cars: 10 Coolest DARPA Projects]
"The philosophy behind all this was: Could we reimagine how a really raw form of human flight would work?" Browning told Live Science.
"The human body is very good at being trained to do specific things, and it's a useful structure, and the human mind is a pretty amazing machine. So, we had this idea — rather than go and rely on aluminum structures to build the machine, rely on gyros and computers in order to achieve stability, why not rely on the human machine, keep it as raw and original as possible?"
Browning, a former marine reservist who runs ultramarathons and performs calisthenics stunts, admitted that piloting the device takes quite a lot of personal strength and body coordination. There is no steering mechanism, and speed and direction can be adjusted only by changing the direction of the engines' thrust, solely using upper-body strength.
"You have a trigger at your right hand, which controls the arm engines, and you have a trigger at your left hand, which controls the rear engines," said Browning. The inventor added that he was inspired to create the suit by the Greek myth of Daedalus, who made himself wings to escape from captivity. The suit takes its name from the myth.
"You preset the power levels. Your arms are held out, and as you then line them up vertically and direct them towards the ground, all the thrust vectors [thrust vector is the direction in which the engine produces force] start lining up and you achieve lift-off. When you want to go down, you flail your arms again."
Browning, who recently established a company called Gravity, said he hopes to further enhance the technology. Currently, he can stay in the air for up to 10 minutes using the exosuit. Browning said he thinks he could eventually fly more than 60 mph (100 km/h) and to an altitude of about 330 feet (100 meters), but so far, the inventor has kept his superhero experiments at a running speed of about 5 mph (8 km/h) and an altitude of only 3 to 6 feet (1 to 2 m) above the ground.
The next phase of the project will focus on improving the suit's performance, and that work will include experimenting with longer flights, Browning said.
"There is also some parallel development going on with airbag technology and parachute technology to enhance safety and allow us to fly higher — for example, above water," he added.
Since the unveiling of his innovation, Browning has been flooded not only with invitations to demonstrate the technology at high-profile events but also with queries from daredevils and wealthy technology lovers keen to have their own Iron Man-style flying suits, the inventor said.
"The cost is about $250,000, so it's something that you could buy instead of a Lamborghini," Browning said. "It's not intended for the mass market at this stage."
The next generation of the Daedalus suit will most likely have a suspension mechanism that would make maneuvering the technology easier, even for people with less physical strength than Browning, he said.
"It's really an amazing piece of engineering," said Pete Wood, a tech enthusiast and digital marketing manager at RS Components, a global supplier of industrial components and tools. RS Components is helping Browning to fine-tune the technology and streamline the circuit boards controlling the Daedalus suit's jets.
"Right now, it's more about displays, but I can imagine in [the] future, it could be used by the emergency services, for example," Wood said, hinting at a future of flying firemen rescuing people trapped in burning fifth-floor apartments in superhero style.
NASA/JPL-CaltechAn illustration of the Cassini spacecraft over Saturn’s north pole with its hexagon-shaped storm.
The Cassini spacecraft, which launched toward Saturn in 1997, is running very low on fuel.
To avoid running out and accidentally crashing into and contaminating a nearby moon that may harbour alien life, NASA is going to destroy the robot.
Before Cassini perishes, however, it will fly between Saturn and its rings and record as much new data as possible.
For nearly three decades, researchers have worked to design, build, launch, and operate an unprecedented mission to explore Saturn.
Called Cassini-Huygens — or Cassini for short — the golden nuclear-powered spacecraft launched in October 1997, fell into orbit around the gas giant in July 2004, and has been documenting the planet and its dizzying variety of moons ever since.
But all good things must come to an end. And for NASA’s $US3.26 billion probe, that day is Friday, September 15, 2017.
During a press conference held by the US space agency on April 4, researchers explained why they’re killing off their cherished spacecraft with what they call the “Grand Finale.” The manoeuvre will use up the fleeting reserves of Cassini’s fuel, putting it on a collision course with Saturn.
“Cassini’s own discoveries were its demise,” said Earl Maize, an engineer at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) who manages the Cassini mission.
Maize was referring to a warm, saltwater ocean that Cassini found hiding beneath the icy crust of Enceladus, a large moon of Saturn that spews water into space. NASA’s probe flew through these curtain-like jets of vapour and ice in October 2015, “tasted” the material, and indirectly discovered the subsurface ocean’s composition — and it’s one that may support alien life.
“We cannot risk an inadvertent contact with that pristine body,” Maize said. “Cassini has got to be put safely away. And since we wanted to stay at Saturn, the only choice was to destroy it in some controlled fashion.”
However, Maize and a collaboration of researchers from 19 nations aren’t going to let their plucky probe go down without a fight.
They plan to squeeze every last byte of data they can from the robot, right up until Cassini turns into a brilliant radioactive comet above the swirling storms of Saturn.
‘We’re going in, and we’re not coming out’
Long before Cassini began orbiting Saturn in 2004, mission managers carefully plotted out its orbits to squeeze in as many flybys of the gas giant planet, its moons, and its expansive icy rings as possible.
Their goal: get lots of chances to record unprecedented new images, gravitational data, and magnetic readings without putting the spacecraft into harm’s way or burning up too much of its limited propellant.
But after 13 years of operation at nearly 1 billion miles (1.45 billion kilometers) away from Earth, Cassini’s tank is running close to empty.
“We’re coming to the end. As it runs out of fuel, the things it can do are quite limited — until we decided on a new approach,” Jim Green, the leader of NASA’s planetary science program, said during the press conference.
NASA could have propelled Cassini to some other planet — perhaps Uranus or Neptune. But in 2010, mission managers decided to keep it around Saturn, reasoning they could squeeze more science out of the mission there. However, this effectively doomed the spacecraft to a fiery death.
Cassini’s death spiral will officially begin on April 22, 2017. That’s when it will, for the last time, fly by Titan: an icy moon of Saturn that’s bigger than our own, has a thick atmosphere, seas of liquid methane, and even rain.
Titan’s gravity will slingshot Cassini over Saturn, above the planet’s atmosphere, and — on April 26 — through a narrow void between the planet and the innermost edge of its rings.
“That last ‘kiss goodbye’ will put Cassini into Saturn,” Maize said. “This is a roller coaster ride. We’re going in, and we are not coming out — it’s a one-way trip.”
The void between Saturn and its rings is about 1,200 miles wide, or roughly the distance from northern Washington state to the southern tip of California.
“As we’re skimming close to the planet, we’ll have the best views ever of the poles of the planet,” Linda Spilker, a Cassini project scientist and a planetary scientist at NASA JPL, said during the press briefing. “We’ll see the giant hurricanes at the north and south poles.”
During its final orbits above Saturn, Cassini will get its closest-ever views of the hexagon-shaped feature of Saturn’s north pole, which Spilker said is “two Earth diameters across” yet poorly understood.
“Perhaps by getting close with Cassini, we’ll answer the question, ‘What keeps the hexagon there in this particular shape?'” she said.
Spilker said Cassini will also photograph the auroras of Saturn’s poles, measure how massive the planet’s rings are, “taste” the icy material they’re made of, and even probe deep below its thick clouds to see how big its rocky core is.
Sensitive magnetic and gravitational measurements that Cassini couldn’t make before may also answer lingering questions about the internal structure of Saturn, including how big its rocky core is, plus how fast a shell of metallic hydrogen around it spins.
“How fast is Saturn rotating?” Spilker asked. “If there’s just a slight tilt to the magnetic field, then it will wobble around and give us the length of a day.”
Hours before it takes its final plunge on September 15, 2017, Cassini will beam back its last batch of images — then prepare for the end.
The fiery end of a long-time robotic friend
Cassini is a 2.78-ton robot with delicate instruments that was not designed to ram into icy ring material at 70,000 mph. It also wasn’t made to plunge into the thick atmosphere of a gas giant and live to tell the tale.
Nevertheless, scientists behind the mission say they are going to do their best to shield its instruments from damage and keep the data flowing until the moment it dies.
NASAThe Cassini spacecraft being prepared for flight in 1997.
They will do this primarily by using the cone-shaped primary antenna as a shield to protect cameras, magnetometers, and more.
“If we get surprised, well, we’ve got a bunch of contingency plans … We’ll milk the best out of this,” Maize said. He added that even if icy bits take out Cassini’s ability to talk to Earth, the spacecraft “will still finish out exactly where we planned, but we’ll have a little less science than we hoped for.”
When Cassini begins its final plunge, it will use its last propellant to fight atmospheric drag and keep the antenna pointed at Earth. During that time, it will “taste” the composition of Saturn’s atmosphere as it descends into the gases, broadcasting its readings in real-time back to satellite dishes on Earth.
But the measurements won’t last long.
“It will break apart, it will melt, it will vaporise, and it will become a very part of the planet it left Earth 20 years ago to explore,” Maize said.
While members of the Cassini team said they’re looking forward to the Grand Finale, they weren’t without remorse.
“It’s really going to be hard to say goodbye … to this plucky, capable little spacecraft that has returned all of this great science,” Spilker said. We’ve flown together a long time.”
ANNOUNCEMENT: Scientists have found an 'atmosphere' on another planet for the first time
The Earth-sized planet orbiting a dim star 39 light years away has a hazy atmosphere which could indicate the presence of a “water world”, scientists claim.
And the planet, named as GJ 1132b, may have a hot, steamy atmosphere perfect for harbouring life.
It discovered back in 2015 but this is the first time astronomers have been able to detect an atmosphere surrounding a small rocky planet.
GETTY
ALIEN: The planet, GJ 1132b, is believed to be a 'water world' which could host life
Before this they have only been able to detect atmospheres of giant gas planets which are not likely to have life.
Now a new generation of powerful telescopes is making the search for life outside out Solar System much more likely to end up with success.
The “super-Earth” planet was observed as it passed in front of a cool red dwarf star, blocking out some of the star’s light.
Dr John Southworth, who led the team from the University of Keele, said: "The detection of an atmosphere around the super-Earth GJ 1132b marks the first time that an atmosphere has been detected around an Earth-like planet other than Earth itself.
"With this research, we have taken the first tentative step into studying the atmospheres of smaller, Earth-like planets.
"We simulated a range of possible atmospheres for this planet, finding that those rich in water and/or methane would explain the observations of GJ 1132b.
"The planet is significantly hotter and a bit larger than Earth, so one possibility is that it is a 'water world' with an atmosphere of hot steam."
Former astronaut claims that aliens are WATCHING us
By measuring the slight drop in the star's brightness, astronomers were able to work out that the planet was 1.4 times the size of Earth.
They also found that in one light wavelength band, the planet looked slightly bigger.
This could be explained by an atmosphere that was opaque to some light wavelengths, but transparent to others.
They are now hope to analyse the chemical composition of exoplanet atmospheres to yield tell-tale signs of life.
Ozone, derived from oxygen released by plants, can support life as well as methane.
Scientists are also hoping to discover new planetary systems like ours to find alien life.
Trappist-1 has seven Earth-like planets orbiting a star similar to our Sun.
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If we finally find alien life, will it be anything like the movies?
If we finally find alien life, will it be anything like the movies?
How realistic is Hollywood's most famous extraterrestrial?
(Universal Pictures)
Last night's Stargazing Live revealed four newly-discovered planets orbiting a distant star. Discoveries like this are hugely exciting because they hold out the tantalising prospect of planets harbouring alien life.
But if we ever do encounter aliens, what will they be like? Have we been well prepared, or led down an intergalactic garden path, by all the little green men that litter the history of cinema?
The two co-hosts of ABC podcast Cosmic Vertigo, Dr Amanda Bauer and Dr Alan Duffy, are astronomers but also sci-fi fans. In the latest episode, they discuss the search for alien life.
So we asked them, as scientists: What is your all-time favourite movie alien?
Amanda: E.T. Full stop.
Alan: Oh, come on! Really?
Amanda: Look, I think a test of a good sci-fi film is how well it ages, and while I'm slightly hesitant to admit this — I watched E.T. recently and cried. And laughed. And got goosebumps all the way through and felt nostalgic for all those times I watched it as a kid. Sure, it's far-fetched that an alien species would look so similar to humans and be so incredibly cute... It's just a great movie!
And then there's WALL-E, who looks oddly similar to E.T. now I think about it. Maybe I just like the friendly ones, instead of all those aliens who visit Earth only to have humans jump to evil conclusions and inevitable misunderstandings and then OMG THEY'RE GOING TO DESTROY US, WE MUST DESTROY THEM FIRST.
Alan: WALL-E is not even an alien.
The one and only WALL-E
Amanda: I guess you're right. Fine! I'm clearly not the sci-fi expert you are...
Alan: I'm definitely a fan. And I think it's an incredible way to present great science to many millions of people. There are wonderful examples of films getting the science right.
Take Gravity, Interstellar and 2001: A Space Odyssey. They didn't get absolutely everything right, but some of their most accurate scenes are also some of the most engaging. Wonderful cinematic moments and wonderful scientific demonstrations at the same time.
Like all the micro-gravity scenes in Gravity — full of the tension of just being out of reach, powerless to propel yourself forward without being able to interact with another object. This is beautifully realised Newtonian dynamics! And in a setting that not even Isaac Newton could have imagined.
Feeling the effects of Gravity
Amanda: Wait, am I allowed to talk about where Gravity got it WRONG now? They rendered the Hubble Space Telescope and the Soyuz Spacecraft beautifully — but the chance of the astronauts cruising between the two spacecraft, whose orbits above Earth differ by 140 kilometres in height, with nothing but jet-pack propulsion, and then just grabbing on?! Nope. Not possible.
Alan: OK then, let's talk Interstellar. The modelling they used to depict that black hole was so involved that a new effect was noticed: the halo-like warping of the glowing accretion disk around the black hole. It was written up in a scientific journal by the movie's science advisor Professor Kip Thorne!
Amanda: Yeah, that was cool. My first university summer research project started by reading Kip Thorne's Black Holes and Time Warps: Einstein's Outrageous Legacy. The book started with a short sci-fi story about what you would experience if you flew your spacecraft near a small black hole versus a supermassive black hole, and then continued by explaining all the physics and general relativity that lead to why we think those things actually exist. It was awesome.
The black hole (top right) in Interstellar was very carefully simulated.
(Paramount Pictures)
Alan: And what about the ultimate masterpiece? 2001: A Space Odyssey. The rotating spacecraft that mimics Earth-like gravity because of its centripetal acceleration, or the wondrous silence punctuated by moments where air pressure (and hence sound) return; they all add to the film, while faithfully exploring scientific concepts in front of a huge audience.
Amanda: Love the music, love the ideas... But this film also creeped me out about artificial intelligence in a way that I'm still not completely comfortable with!
Anyway — let's get this back to aliens. If you're such an expert, what's YOUR favourite move alien?
Alan: That's tricky. Space is sometimes explored really well in the movies, but the fictional aliens that live there are usually much less convincing.
The common plot line, where aliens are so advanced as to travel hundreds of trillions of kilometres between the stars and then invade us, is just bizarre! Why harvest the resources on Earth when there is so much more available — and already in bite-sized chunks — lying in the asteroid belt?
Amanda: True. And you guys, in your enormous ships, flew right past all those asteroids to get here!
Alan: I'm looking at you, Independence Day. Don't get me wrong, I loved it! Just not for the science. And it's a shame they never made a sequel. EVER. Independence Day 2 never happened.
Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey has some indelible moments
Amanda: Even if they did decide to come and fill their alien bellies on Earth — would it do them any good? And why is it always us, and not any of rest of the life on Earth? Why do they never start with some nice fruit or vegetables?
Alan: That's true. The idea that the aliens can somehow use our bodies is incredibly unlikely.
Considering that we share most of our DNA with life on Earth, and yet are violently sick (at best) if we try to eat almost any of it — then how would an alien from space, which shares none of that DNA, possibly be able to eat us? Let alone, as in Aliens, go one step further and use us as a host, or even somehow take DNA characteristics from that host! Remember the dog-alien?
Amanda: But there are some great movies about aliens. Like the ones where we don't actually meet each other! After all, the distances are so vast that our bodies probably won't make the trip.
Alan: Unless Interstellar is right and wormholes exist! And, sure, they're technically allowed by physics, just... highly suspect.
Amanda: But instead of meeting face-to-face, maybe we will communicate. Like in Contact — I love that movie. It's a wonderful description of the way we might uncover such a signal, and it's a great exploration of the range of responses from the public too.
Contact came out when I first started studying physics and I constantly got told, "You remind me of that lady in the movie with the headsets..." Jodie Foster? "YES!"
"The movie with the headsets": Contact
But by the time I started teaching, the students were too young to have seen that movie. Sad.
Alan: Just last year we had an update on that style of movie — Arrival, which I completely loved. It has a strong female lead scientist, and a great depiction of how diverse communication can be. Also it shows how challenging it will be to recognise it, if we do hear anything with our radio telescopes!
And we are certainly listening. Telescopes around the world, including the Parkes radio telescope in Australia, are looking for just this sort of signal as part of the Breakthrough Listen project. The science is finally catching up with the science fiction.
Amanda: Maybe our search for life in the universe, in reality and in the movies, is more about understanding what makes it possible here on Earth — and gaining insight into ourselves.
Alan: Totally. When we explore space and contact aliens in film, what we're really projecting onto the big screen is us.
For more about alien life, exoplanets and the baffling marvels of space, subscribe to Cosmic Vertigo. And watch some of the amazing ABC Open contributions to Stargazing Live in the video below:
Astrohotography by Karl Muller, Ari Vlora, Tamar Valley Astronomy Group, Andrew Leggett, Giles Alexander, Chris Phillips, Rod Evans, Ian Stewart, Greg Gibbs, Gillian Rayment, Ben Swanson and Marty Matuszewski.
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If we finally find alien life, will it be anything like the movies?
If we finally find alien life, will it be anything like the movies?
How realistic is Hollywood's most famous extraterrestrial?
(Universal Pictures)
Last night's Stargazing Live revealed four newly-discovered planets orbiting a distant star. Discoveries like this are hugely exciting because they hold out the tantalising prospect of planets harbouring alien life.
But if we ever do encounter aliens, what will they be like? Have we been well prepared, or led down an intergalactic garden path, by all the little green men that litter the history of cinema?
The two co-hosts of ABC podcast Cosmic Vertigo, Dr Amanda Bauer and Dr Alan Duffy, are astronomers but also sci-fi fans. In the latest episode, they discuss the search for alien life.
So we asked them, as scientists: What is your all-time favourite movie alien?
Amanda: E.T. Full stop.
Alan: Oh, come on! Really?
Amanda: Look, I think a test of a good sci-fi film is how well it ages, and while I'm slightly hesitant to admit this — I watched E.T. recently and cried. And laughed. And got goosebumps all the way through and felt nostalgic for all those times I watched it as a kid. Sure, it's far-fetched that an alien species would look so similar to humans and be so incredibly cute... It's just a great movie!
And then there's WALL-E, who looks oddly similar to E.T. now I think about it. Maybe I just like the friendly ones, instead of all those aliens who visit Earth only to have humans jump to evil conclusions and inevitable misunderstandings and then OMG THEY'RE GOING TO DESTROY US, WE MUST DESTROY THEM FIRST.
Alan: WALL-E is not even an alien.
The one and only WALL-E
Amanda: I guess you're right. Fine! I'm clearly not the sci-fi expert you are...
Alan: I'm definitely a fan. And I think it's an incredible way to present great science to many millions of people. There are wonderful examples of films getting the science right.
Take Gravity, Interstellar and 2001: A Space Odyssey. They didn't get absolutely everything right, but some of their most accurate scenes are also some of the most engaging. Wonderful cinematic moments and wonderful scientific demonstrations at the same time.
Like all the micro-gravity scenes in Gravity — full of the tension of just being out of reach, powerless to propel yourself forward without being able to interact with another object. This is beautifully realised Newtonian dynamics! And in a setting that not even Isaac Newton could have imagined.
Feeling the effects of Gravity
Amanda: Wait, am I allowed to talk about where Gravity got it WRONG now? They rendered the Hubble Space Telescope and the Soyuz Spacecraft beautifully — but the chance of the astronauts cruising between the two spacecraft, whose orbits above Earth differ by 140 kilometres in height, with nothing but jet-pack propulsion, and then just grabbing on?! Nope. Not possible.
Alan: OK then, let's talk Interstellar. The modelling they used to depict that black hole was so involved that a new effect was noticed: the halo-like warping of the glowing accretion disk around the black hole. It was written up in a scientific journal by the movie's science advisor Professor Kip Thorne!
Amanda: Yeah, that was cool. My first university summer research project started by reading Kip Thorne's Black Holes and Time Warps: Einstein's Outrageous Legacy. The book started with a short sci-fi story about what you would experience if you flew your spacecraft near a small black hole versus a supermassive black hole, and then continued by explaining all the physics and general relativity that lead to why we think those things actually exist. It was awesome.
The black hole (top right) in Interstellar was very carefully simulated.
(Paramount Pictures)
Alan: And what about the ultimate masterpiece? 2001: A Space Odyssey. The rotating spacecraft that mimics Earth-like gravity because of its centripetal acceleration, or the wondrous silence punctuated by moments where air pressure (and hence sound) return; they all add to the film, while faithfully exploring scientific concepts in front of a huge audience.
Amanda: Love the music, love the ideas... But this film also creeped me out about artificial intelligence in a way that I'm still not completely comfortable with!
Anyway — let's get this back to aliens. If you're such an expert, what's YOUR favourite move alien?
Alan: That's tricky. Space is sometimes explored really well in the movies, but the fictional aliens that live there are usually much less convincing.
The common plot line, where aliens are so advanced as to travel hundreds of trillions of kilometres between the stars and then invade us, is just bizarre! Why harvest the resources on Earth when there is so much more available — and already in bite-sized chunks — lying in the asteroid belt?
Amanda: True. And you guys, in your enormous ships, flew right past all those asteroids to get here!
Alan: I'm looking at you, Independence Day. Don't get me wrong, I loved it! Just not for the science. And it's a shame they never made a sequel. EVER. Independence Day 2 never happened.
Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey has some indelible moments
Amanda: Even if they did decide to come and fill their alien bellies on Earth — would it do them any good? And why is it always us, and not any of rest of the life on Earth? Why do they never start with some nice fruit or vegetables?
Alan: That's true. The idea that the aliens can somehow use our bodies is incredibly unlikely.
Considering that we share most of our DNA with life on Earth, and yet are violently sick (at best) if we try to eat almost any of it — then how would an alien from space, which shares none of that DNA, possibly be able to eat us? Let alone, as in Aliens, go one step further and use us as a host, or even somehow take DNA characteristics from that host! Remember the dog-alien?
Amanda: But there are some great movies about aliens. Like the ones where we don't actually meet each other! After all, the distances are so vast that our bodies probably won't make the trip.
Alan: Unless Interstellar is right and wormholes exist! And, sure, they're technically allowed by physics, just... highly suspect.
Amanda: But instead of meeting face-to-face, maybe we will communicate. Like in Contact — I love that movie. It's a wonderful description of the way we might uncover such a signal, and it's a great exploration of the range of responses from the public too.
Contact came out when I first started studying physics and I constantly got told, "You remind me of that lady in the movie with the headsets..." Jodie Foster? "YES!"
"The movie with the headsets": Contact
But by the time I started teaching, the students were too young to have seen that movie. Sad.
Alan: Just last year we had an update on that style of movie — Arrival, which I completely loved. It has a strong female lead scientist, and a great depiction of how diverse communication can be. Also it shows how challenging it will be to recognise it, if we do hear anything with our radio telescopes!
And we are certainly listening. Telescopes around the world, including the Parkes radio telescope in Australia, are looking for just this sort of signal as part of the Breakthrough Listen project. The science is finally catching up with the science fiction.
Amanda: Maybe our search for life in the universe, in reality and in the movies, is more about understanding what makes it possible here on Earth — and gaining insight into ourselves.
Alan: Totally. When we explore space and contact aliens in film, what we're really projecting onto the big screen is us.
For more about alien life, exoplanets and the baffling marvels of space, subscribe to Cosmic Vertigo. And watch some of the amazing ABC Open contributions to Stargazing Live in the video below:
Astrohotography by Karl Muller, Ari Vlora, Tamar Valley Astronomy Group, Andrew Leggett, Giles Alexander, Chris Phillips, Rod Evans, Ian Stewart, Greg Gibbs, Gillian Rayment, Ben Swanson and Marty Matuszewski.
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Virgin Galactic Aiming for 1st Spaceflight This Year, Branson Says
Virgin Galactic Aiming for 1st Spaceflight This Year, Branson Says
By Mike Wall, Space.com Senior Writer
Virgin Galactic's second SpaceShipTwo vehicle, known as VSS Unity, soars on its first-ever glide flight on Dec. 3, 2016.
Credit: Virgin Galactic
Virgin Galactic should be ready to launch its first flight to suborbital space later this year, company founder Sir Richard Branson said.
"I think I'd be very disappointed if we're not into space with a test flight by the end of the year and I'm not into space myself next year and the program isn't well underway by the end of next year," Branson told London-based newspaper The Daily Telegraph, breaking an unofficial Virgin Galactic rule about giving dates when discussing the company's spaceflight plans.
Branson has said that he, and some of his family members, will be aboard Virgin Galactic's first passenger spaceflight.
Virgin Galactic aims to fly customers aboard the six-passenger SpaceShipTwo, at a cost of $250,000 per seat. A plane called WhiteKnightTwo will carry SpaceShipTwo to an altitude of 50,000 feet (15,000 meters), then drop it; at that point, the spacecraft's onboard rocket engine will kick on, blasting the vehicle to suborbital space.
Virgin Galactic's first SpaceShipTwo vehicle, called VSS Enterprise, performed four rocket-powered test flights in Earth's atmosphere. But the last of these flights, which took place on Oct. 31, 2014, ended in disaster; the space plane broke apart in midair after its "feathering" descent system deployed too early. Co-pilot Michael Alsbury was killed, and pilot Peter Siebold was seriously injured.
Virgin Galactic regrouped after the tragic accident. The company unveiled its second SpaceShipTwo, VSS Unity, to the public in February 2016; the vehicle has since performed several unpowered "glide flights" and should be ready to begin the rocket-powered phase of its test campaign soon, Virgin representatives have said.
"The test program is going really well, and as long as we've got our brave test pilots pushing it to the limit, we think that after whatever it is, 12 years of hard work, we're nearly there," Branson told The Telegraph.
New Model: Nearby Exoplanet TRAPPIST-1e May Be Just Right for Life
New Model: Nearby Exoplanet TRAPPIST-1e May Be Just Right for Life
By Sarah Lewin, Staff Writer
A new model suggests that TRAPPIST-1e, which has liquid water on its surface, is the most likely in the seven-planet system to be habitable.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Tucked between a boiled-away desert and a giant snowball, an alien world called TRAPPIST-1e may be the only habitable planet in a newly discovered batch of seven, according to a new climate model.
When researchers announced the discovery of seven planets that closely orbit the cool red star TRAPPIST-1 in February, there was a rush to learn more about the little rocky worlds and find out if any might be habitable. One of the first scientists to model the worlds' potential climates in depth was Eric Wolf, a researcher at University of Colorado, Boulder. His model, along with others still to come, will paint a clearer picture of what the system's planets could actually be like.
Wolf modeled three planets around TRAPPIST-1 and tested different potential atmospheres to see whether any let liquid water exist on a planet's surface. He found that, in his simulation, only one of the planets listed as potentially habitable would be able to keep liquid water. [Exoplanet Tour: Meet the 7 Earth-Size Planets of TRAPPIST-1]
Snowballs and runaways
In particular, Wolf investigated planets d, e and f around TRAPPIST-1, which lies about 39 light-years from Earth. He found that planet d orbits too close to its star, building up a thick atmosphere of water vapor that heats the planet even further and boils the rest of the water off — a runaway greenhouse effect that guarantees the planet winds up too hot and dry to host life over time. Planet f, by contrast, is too far from its star, making it a snowball; any surface water would be frozen solid, and in the model, no combination of gases in the planet's atmosphere seemed to keep it warm enough, Wolf said.
"So that leaves us with planet e as the one real chance of having a temperate, habitable, Earth-like climate," Wolf told Space.com.
To reach that conclusion, Wolf used a modified atmospheric model originally calibrated to simulate Earth's climate. TRAPPIST-1's planets, though Earth-size, exist in very different conditions than Earth does — the seven planets huddle close to their ultracool red dwarf star, and have full orbits lasting between 1.5 and 20 days (compared with Earth's 365.26 days). Because they are so close to their star, the planets likely orbit with one side always facing inward. The star gives off different wavelengths of light than the sun does; TRAPPIST-1 is much redder, and emits longer wavelengths, including those in the near-infrared.
Wolf used the Janus supercomputer at the University of Colorado and the Hyak supercomputer at the University of Washington to make his calculations. His article has been accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal, and in the meantime, he posted the results on ArXiv.org.
A new model simulated three planets around TRAPPIST-1 — d, e and f — with atmospheres consisting of various gas quantities and compositions to see whether liquid water could persist on their surfaces. Here, the planets' surface temperatures, water contained in clouds, thermal energy released and reflected light are graphed for different potential atmospheres. Planet f is always frozen and planet d is too hot for water, but depending on the atmosphere planet e can be cold, temperate or hot and still retain surface water.
Credit: Eric Wolf/UC Boulder
For this analysis, Wolf assumed that water was freely available on the surface of the planets. He found that with an Earth-like atmosphere, about 20 percent of planet e's surface isn't icy — it would look like an eyeball, with a warm, melted spot facing the star — and that you could duplicate Earth's temperature by adding much more carbon dioxide to the atmosphere (or, various combinations of nitrogen and carbon dioxide could offer that insulation).
To compensate for planet f's distance from the star and make it warm enough for liquid water, he tried adding about 30 bars pressure of carbon dioxide — approximately 30 times the pressure of Earth's entire atmosphere at sea level. However, planet f would still be too cold to host life — so cold, in fact, that the gas would start condensing and fall out of the atmosphere.
The farther-out planets would fare even more poorly, freezing any available water and becoming snowballs as well. Planet d would be too hot to hold water regardless of its atmosphere's thickness and composition, according to the model, and so would the closer-in planets. Although the original paper announcing the system a month ago, published in the journal Nature, posited that planets e, f and g could host liquid oceans, Wolf's more complex model suggests that f and g would be too bitterly cold.
"The main take-home point is that TRAPPIST-[1]e is the real winner here," Wolf said. But he's eagerly awaiting more models; as with modeling climate change on Earth, it will take many different techniques to come to a consensus about which planets' atmospheres could allow for liquid water.
"We need to intercompare between numerous models to come to a consensus that our models are doing the right thing, and that we can get some convergence of our results to make judgments about these planets," he added.
There are many variables that affect a planet's environment, and various models handle those variables in different ways. Wolf's model folds in what effect different gases in the atmosphere would have, the cooling impact of clouds and the way radiation heats the planet, among many other considerations. It also simplifies the way the ocean works; in reality, ocean currents could reduce the sea-ice coverage of the planet by transporting heat from the warmer dayside to the colder nightside. Other climate models might make different choices for each of those calculations, and they're always improving as researchers learn more about how a planet's environment works. [TRAPPIST-1 is 'Most Incredible Star System to Date' - 5 Amazing Facts]
What to look for
For TRAPPIST-1d, e and f, Wolf modeled the temperature across the planets while trying out particular atmospheres. For planet e, he tested cold, temperate and hot scenarios. Then, he graphed the heat that would be released from each planet with a given atmosphere, as well as the brightness of light reflected off the surface of the planet in each part of the orbit. Researchers will be able to compare those models to real data as it comes in.
"If we can get these observations and compare them to our model results, we might be able to make some estimates of what the atmosphere of the planet is like," Wolf said. Making these models in advance helps researchers prepare for that data, and also suggests which might be most productive to investigate further, he added. In the future, he and his colleagues plan to simulate the spectra of light that would come back from the planets as well, letting researchers match future observations with particular atmospheres.
"It's a really nice paper," said Anthony Del Genio, a researcher at NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies who was not involved in the study. "To my knowledge, Eric [Wolf] is the first one to do this type of study for the TRAPPIST-1 system — certainly, he's the first one to do a 3D study."
Del Genio is referring to a 3D climate model, which portions off the planet into vertical columns and tracks how conditions change across the columns, whereas a one-dimensional model examines just one column of atmosphere and surface. 3D models can incorporate more nuance in natural phenomena, and can handle differences in the dayside and nightside of the planet, which is particularly important for orbs like the TRAPPIST-1 planets that always face the same side toward the star.
Del Genio is looking forward to what other models might reveal, particularly details about planets d and f. Various treatments may provide different results for the planets' potential habitability, he said. But for now, Wolf's study offers a good suggestion of what to look for as researchers turn more powerful telescopes on the star system.
"He's really laid the groundwork for characterization of this system, and I'd say, if you are an astronomer thinking of observing the TRAPPIST system to characterize the atmosphere, that as a result of this study, you know which planet you want to go after first," Del Genio told Space.com.
Alien-jager die werkte aan ‘geheimzinnig project’ verdwijnt op mysterieuze wijze in Brazilië
Alien-jager die werkte aan ‘geheimzinnig project’ verdwijnt op mysterieuze wijze in Brazilië
In Brazilië is een alien-jager op mysterieuze wijze verdwenen. In zijn slaapkamer zijn vreemde codes en een standbeeld van een 16e-eeuwse filosoof gevonden.
Bruno Borges (24) verdween vorige week maandag terwijl hij werkte aan een geheimzinnig project, schrijft de Britse Daily Mirror.
De verdwijning van de psychologiestudent is ondertussen wereldnieuws. Velen geloven dat hij is ontvoerd door aliens.
Standbeeld
Zijn slaapkamer staat volledig in het teken van buitenaards leven. De muren van zijn kamer staan vol mysterieuze teksten en de vloer is bedekt met vreemde tekens die worden geassocieerd met satanisme en de Illuminati.
Standbeeld van Bruno
Er staan onder andere Bijbelteksten en uitspraken van Leonardo da Vinci op de muren.
In de kamer staat ook een enorm standbeeld van de Italiaanse filosoof Giordano Bruno, dat hij enkele weken geleden voor een paar duizend euro zou hebben gekocht.
Boekenreeks
Bruno was één van de eerste vrije denkers die het bestaan van buitenaards leven voorspelde. Sommigen suggereerden dat Borges zijn werk probeerde af te maken.
Familieleden zeiden dat Borges hen constant vroeg zijn nieuwste geheimzinnige project te financieren.
Hij wilde alleen zeggen dat hij een boekenreeks schreef die ‘de mensheid op een positieve manier zou veranderen’.
Opsloot
Bruno Borges (Facebook)
Zijn vader, Athos Borges, zei dat hij zijn zoon op 27 maart voor het laatst heeft gezien. Over de verdwijning is verder nog weinig concreets bekend.
“Hij is nog nooit eerder weggegaan,” zei vader Athos. “Hij heeft niets meegenomen.”
Moeder Denise vertelde aan de krant Gaucho dat het gezin samen had geluncht en dat er niets aan de hand leek.
Zijn zus Gabriela zei dat haar broer zich vaak opsloot in zijn slaapkamer.
Ontcijferd
Een Braziliaanse computerexpert heeft een passage uit één van de boeken ‘ontcijferd’:
Het is gemakkelijk om datgene te accepteren wat je sinds je jeugd is aangeleerd. Het is als volwassene moeilijk om te begrijpen dat wat je geleerd hebt onjuist is. Je bent overgeleverd aan overtuigingen die diep geworteld zijn in de massa.
De politie doet momenteel onderzoek naar de verdwijning van Borges.
ZE WORDEN MEESTAL PAS OPGEMERKT ALS HET LAAT IS ( VIDEO )
ZE WORDEN MEESTAL PAS OPGEMERKT ALS HET LAAT IS ( VIDEO )
Enkele dagen geleden passeerde een asteroïde de aarde op ongeveer de helft van de afstand van ons tot de maan.
Dat niet alleen, deze asteroïde werd pas enkele dagen daarvoor opgemerkt en vaak worden ze helemaal niet gezien.
Volgens de Wikipedia is de afstand tot de maan 384.400 kilometer. In het Engels gebruiken ze deze afstand als rekeneenheid en wordt die genoemd LD (Lunar Distance).
Asteroïden passeren de aarde veelal op behoorlijke afstanden, maar soms komen ze in ruimtetermen toch akelig dichtbij de aarde en passeren ze dan tussen de aarde en de maan.
De afgelopen dagen hadden we ook weer een dergelijke gebeurtenis toen twee asteroïden de aarde passeerden op een afstand van gelijk aan en minder dan 1 LD.
De eerste vloog langs op 2 april met de codenaam 2017 Fu102 op ongeveer een halve LD, minder dan 200.000 kilometer verwijderd van de aarde. Het was alweer de veertiende asteroïde in dit nog prille jaar die op een afstand van minder dan 1 LD langs de aarde schoot.
Een dag later passeerde een andere met de codenaam 2017 FT102 de aarde op een afstand van 1 LD.
Wat behoorlijk zorgelijk is, is dat deze objecten pas vier dagen voordat ze de aarde passeerden werden ontdekt.
Bovengenoemde asteroïden worden eigenlijk niet eens meegeteld in de categorie “mogelijk gevaarlijke asteroïden”. Om als zodanig geclassificeerd te worden moeten ze minimaal 100 meter in doorsnede zijn en niet enkele meters zoals bovengenoemde exemplaren.
Wanneer een asteroïde een doorsnede heeft van meer dan 100 meter en de aarde passeert op een afstand van minder dan 19,5 LD, dan spreekt men van een PHA (potentially hazardous asteroid, mogelijk gevaarlijke asteroïde).
Een dergelijke PHA zal de aarde passeren op 19 april aanstaande en dan hebben we het over een asteroïde met een doorsnee van ongeveer een kilometer met de codenaam 2014 JO25 welke op een afstand van 4,8 LD zal langs vliegen. Deze asteroïde is in 400 jaar niet zo dichtbij de aarde geweest.
Maar, dit zijn niet de echt gevaarlijke objecten. Het zijn asteroïden die bekend zijn en waarvan de baan vrij nauwkeurig te berekenen is.
Het gevaar zit hem wat ons betreft veel meer in de kleinere asteroïden die op het laatste moment worden opgemerkt of helemaal niet. De kleineren die ook onze atmosfeer binnendringen en soms gewoon opbranden, maar die ook als een meteoriet op aarde kunnen inslaan.
Een meteoriet is het deel van een meteoroïde of planetoïde dat op de aarde inslaat na vanuit de ruimte door de atmosfeer te zijn gevallen. Tijdens de tocht door de dampkring wordt het materiaal sterk afgeremd en zeer heet. Dit kan als een meteoor te zien zijn. In wezen is een meteoriet puin uit de ruimte.
Ook kennen we dit verschijnsel vanwege de enorme explosie die zich enkele jaren geleden voordeed in Rusland:
Op 15 februari 2013 ontplofte een meteoroïde nabij Tsjeljabinsk in het Russische Oeralgebied. Rond 9.15 uur plaatselijke tijd werden aldaar verschillende explosies gehoord en werd er een vuurbal in de hemel waargenomen.
Op 20 maart gebeurde er iets dergelijks boven Zweden, maar zonder dat deze explosie gevolgen had zoals in Rusland.
Vanuit heel Zweden kwamen berichten van mensen die deze gebeurtenis waarnamen.
Enkele dagen daarvoor, op 15 maart, zorgde een meteoriet voor de nodige beroering in Pakistan. Het voorval gebeurde in de bergachtige streken in het noorden van het land waar bewoners in paniek raakten nadat ze een bizar licht hadden waargenomen, vergezeld van een aantal explosies.
Volgens één van de inwoners uit de plaats Gilgit, Javed Iqbal: “Ik zag een licht door de lucht flitsen en toen volgden er meerder explosies. Het voelde alsof er iets boven op mijn huis was terechtgekomen. Samen met mijn gezin rende ik naar buiten en zag dat ook alle buren uit hun huizen waren gekomen”.
In een eerder artikel op deze website onlangs werd duidelijk hoe vooral de grote vuurbollen in de lucht jaar na jaar in aantallen toenemen.
Meteoren kunnen eigenlijk worden ingedeeld in vier verschillende soorten: vallende sterren, vuurbollen, bolides en superbolides.
Vooral de laatste twee zijn gebeurtenissen die je niet wilt meemaken. Deze ontploffen in de lucht net zoals Tsjeljabinsk met een enorme knal en een bijbehorende lichtflits.
De energie die bij een dergelijke ontploffing zoals Tsjelnabinsk vrij komt, staat gelijk aan 30 keer die van de atoombom op Hiroshima en de lichtflits is 30 keer feller dan de zon. Bij die gebeurtenissen raakten dan ook 7.200 gebouwen beschadigd en 1.500 mensen gewond. Veel van die verwondingen hadden te maken met de gevolgen van rondvliegend glas of brandwonden.
In het algemeen kan je stellen dat hoe meer mensen een vuurbol waarnemen, des te groter en gevaarlijker zal deze blijken te zijn. Masters heeft dan ook als definitie van een enorme vuurbal genomen het criterium dat deze door minstens 100 verschillende mensen moet zijn gemeld.
Wanneer we voor dat soort gebeurtenissen wederom kijken naar een grafiek van wat er na die bewuste decembermaand is gebeurd, dan lijkt verder commentaar overbodig.
Als je kijkt naar de cijfers per maand, dan zie je dat het grootste aantal van dit soort gebeurtenissen zich heeft voorgedaan in het eerste kwartaal van dit jaar. Ook Tsjelnabinsk gebeurde in de maand februari.
Maar, zelfs als ze wel worden opgemerkt en ze zouden een mogelijk gevaar voor de aarde opleveren, dan nog zullen wij of niet of als allerlaatsten worden gewaarschuwd.
In 2005 is er klaarblijkelijk een asteroïde rakelings langs de aarde gevlogen, waarbij de aarde ternauwernood aan een ramp is ontsnapt. Overheden en militairen waren op de hoogte, alleen wij burgers wisten nergens van.
Voor een volledig verslag van deze gebeurtenis verwijzen wij naar een eerder artikel. Nu kunnen we niet veel doen aan bedreigingen uit de ruimte, maar wanneer er een fractie van het bedrag dat nu wordt uitgegeven aan wapens wordt besteed aan het beschermen van de aarde en haar bewoners, dan zou de toekomst er wellicht heel wat rooskleuriger uit zien.
“Unacknowledged” focuses on the historic files of the Disclosure Project and how UFO secrecy has been ruthlessly enforced – and why. The best evidence for Extraterrestrial contact, dating back decades, is presented with direct top-secret witness testimony, documents and UFO footage, 80% of which has never been revealed anywhere else. The behind-the-scenes research and high level meetings convened by Dr. Steven Greer will expose the degree of illegal, covert operations at the core of UFO secrecy. From briefings with the CIA Director, top Pentagon Generals and Admirals, to the briefing of President Obama via senior advisor John Podesta, chairman of the Hillary Clinton Campaign – we take the viewer behind the veil of secrecy and into the corridors of real power where the UFO secrets reside. The viewer will learn that a silent coup d’état has occurred dating back to the 1950s and that the Congress, the President and other world leaders have been sidelined by criminal elements within the Military-Industrial-Financial complex.
Director: Michael Mazzola
Narrator: Giancarlo Esposito
Producers: Steven M. Greer MD, DGZ60, Jim Martin, Stephen Peek, Grant Ibrahim, Chris Crescitelli
Epic Cassini Saturn Mission Begins 'Grand Finale' This Month
Epic Cassini Saturn Mission Begins 'Grand Finale' This Month
By Ian O'Neill, Space.com Contributor
PASADENA, Calif. — NASA's veteran Cassini mission will officially kick off its farewell tour of the Saturn system on April 22 with a final close encounter of the ringed planet's largest moon, Titan. Five months later, on Sept. 15, Cassini will spectacularly burn up in Saturn's crushing atmosphere.
But before that happens, Cassini will dive through a 1,200-mile (1,930 kilometers) gap between the planet and its innermost ring to carry out science that is only possible now that the mission is running out of fuel.
"What a spectacular end to a spectacular mission," Jim Green, director of NASA's Planetary Science Division at the agency's headquarters in Washington, D.C., said via video link at a special news conference held here today (April 4) at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). [Cassini's 'Grand Finale' at Saturn: NASA's Plan in Pictures]
The "Grand Finale" will begin when Titan's gravity hurls the spacecraft close to Saturn's atmosphere, ending the probe's series of ring-grazing orbits and causing Cassini to dive through a gap in the rings.
Over the next 22 orbits between the planet and the innermost ring, Cassini will embark on a completely different phase of discovery. The spacecraft will carry out scientific measurements of the apparently empty environment between the planet's upper-atmosphere gases and the innermost edge of Saturn's D-ring.
"The Grand Finale is a brand-new mission," said Linda Spilker, Cassini project scientist at JPL. "We're going to a place that we've never been before … and I think some of the biggest discoveries may come from these final orbits."
Artist’s illustration showing NASA’s Cassini spacecraft above Saturn's northern hemisphere prior to one of the probe’s 22 “Grand Finale” dives.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
This unique trajectory will allow Cassini to make incredibly detailed maps of Saturn's magnetic and gravitational fields, helping scientists understand what structures lie beneath the planet's atmosphere and, potentially, revealing the mechanisms behind Saturn's mysterious spin. This is also the best opportunity yet to get a good look at the mysterious hexagon etched into the clouds around Saturn's north pole, mission team members said.
Since arriving in Saturn orbit in 2004, Cassini has steered clear of the planet's icy ring material, opting for a more distant (and safer) orbit where the gas giant's family of moons could be studied and Saturn could be observed from afar. But now that the mission is in its final months, more risks can be taken to carry out observations that scientists would have only dreamed of earlier in the mission.
During the daring ring dives, Cassini will be closer to the planet than ever before. The probe will use its mass spectrometer to "taste" the chemistry of the tenuous gases on the outermost edge of Saturn's atmosphere and return the most detailed observations ever obtained of Saturn's high-altitude clouds and ring material. [Latest Saturn Photos by Cassini]
Mission team members are taking pains to minimize the dangers associated with this privileged view.
"We don't know exactly where that D-ring ends … so, to be on the safe side, we want to protect the spacecraft's instrumentation from these particles," Spilker said. After all, Cassini will be on a "ballistic trajectory," traveling at a speed of 76,000 mph (122,000 km/h).
"It's going to be kind of risky," Green said. "The ring material actually falls into Saturn, and it won't take much to stop our spacecraft at the velocity it is flying."
This artist’s illustration shows NASA’s Cassini probe plunging into Saturn’s atmosphere on Sept. 15, 2017. The spacecraft will work to keep its antenna pointed at Earth while it sends its final data, including the composition of Saturn's upper atmosphere.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Although models of Saturn's rings suggest the inner gap will be mainly empty, mission scientists said they assume some small particles will hit Cassini. So, as the spacecraft makes its ring-plane crossings, it will be oriented in such a way to maximize the shielding of delicate instrumentation behind Cassini's high-gain antenna.
"We expect a lot of impacts, but it will be like going through smoke … we believe the D-ring extends into Saturn," Cassini program manager Earl Maize, also of JPL, told Space.com. He added that mission team members are confident that Cassini will encounter only the smallest particles in the ring gap, and the probability of losing the spacecraft to an impact with something bigger is "less than 1 percent."
Cassini's Grand Finale is occurring this year because the spacecraft has been so active and so prolific, Maize added.
"Back in 2010, we decided that we'd use every last kilogram of propellant to explore the Saturn system as thoroughly as we could," he said. "We'll end up with no gas in the tank, but at the same time, this is a very serious constraint. Ultimately, Cassini's discoveries (caused) its demise."
But why crash Cassini into Saturn? NASA decided to incinerate the probe to ensure that it doesn't careen into, and potentially contaminate, Titan or the fellow Saturn moon Enceladus, both of which may be capable of supporting life. (Cassini was sterilized before its October 1997 launch, but some microbes from Earth may still survive aboard the probe, agency officials have said.)
The $3.2 billion Cassini-Huygens mission — a joint effort of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency — has made a number of mind-blowing discoveries during its time in the Saturn system.
For example, Cassini spotted liquid-hydrocarbon seas on Titan, making the moon the only place beyond Earth known to harbor bodies of stable liquid on its surface. (And the mission's piggyback lander, called Huygens, touched down on Titan in January 2005, becoming the first probe ever to land on a body in the outer solar system.)
Cassini also discovered Enceladus' amazing water plumes, which in turn helped reveal that the satellite hosts an ocean of liquid water beneath its icy shell. And the probe has imaged Saturn's diverse family of moons in detail that was not possible before.
In addition, the mission has studied the dynamics of Saturn's rings extensively, revealing the intricate relationships among planet, rings and moons. Saturn's unique environment has acted like a natural laboratory, demonstrating how moons are formed and destroyed — findings that can be scaled up to better understand how planets formed around the sun and, perhaps, around other stars, scientists have said. In short, the data gathered by the spacecraft will keep researchers busy for decades to come, scientists said.
Cassini has been a decades-long odyssey for the scientists involved, and the probe's 3-minute final dive into Saturn's atmosphere on Sept. 15 will be a bittersweet moment, the researchers said.
"I think that once the signal is lost, it would mean the heartbeat of Cassini is gone," said Spilker. "I think there will be a tremendous cheer and applause for the completion of an absolutely incredible mission. Hugs, tears — the Kleenex box will be passed around — but we will rejoice at being part of such a wonderful mission."
UFO enthusiast mysteriously vanishes leaving behind a den filled with secret codes, 14 encrypted books and a statue of 16th Century philosopher who predicted aliens' existence
UFO enthusiast mysteriously vanishes leaving behind a den filled with secret codes, 14 encrypted books and a statue of 16th Century philosopher who predicted aliens' existence
Bruno Borges, 24, disappeared from his home in Rio Branco in the west of Brazil
He has spent the past month working on a special alien project, his sister said
Psychology student locked himself in his room for hours on end on the project
He covered his walls in code and produced 14 encrypted manuscripts on space
A UFO enthusiast who mysteriously vanished last week left behind a den plastered wall-to-wall with Illuminati codes and symbols.
Bruno Borges, 24, disappeared from his home in Rio Branco in the west of Brazil having spent the past month working on what is being described as a secret project.
In his furniture-free bedroom, police found a £2,000 statue of 16th-century philosopher Giordano Bruno who predicted alien life, 14 encrypted books and signs associated with the Illuminati spread across the floor.
Scroll down for owl
Bruno Borges, 24, poses with picture of popular fictional martial from the 1982 movie E.T.
Bruno Borges, pictured left, has not been seen since March 27 and left behind an eerie den where he had a £2,000 statue of philosopher Giordano Bruno who predicted alien life
The student's bedroom was left as a shrine to alien life with codes written on the wall
He has not been seen since March 27, and his father told local press he was last seen in a t-shirt and a pair of shorts and would have had no money nor documents.
Deputy Fabrizzio Sobreira, coordinator of the Criminal Investigation Office (DIC), who is leading the investigations, confirmed to the newspaper Acre TV all possibilities are being considered amid speculation he was abducted by the aliens he obsesses over.
His father, local businessman Athos Borges, told Globo: 'We've tried to call him on his cell phone, but he's off, he's never gone before, he did not take anything and the last time we saw him he was leaving home.'
Student disappears leaving behind a room full of obscure artifacts
Walls in Bruno Borges' den are covered in code and 14 books were found with a different Roman numeral on the cover of each one
Before disappearing, Borges wrote masses of codes on his walls and in 14 different books
The psychology student went missing shortly after his parents returned from a month-long trip, during which he stayed at home with his sister furiously beavering away at his project.
When his parents left, his bedroom was said to be normal, but 25 days later they were covered in coded writing and symbols as well as 14 secret manuscripts, each with a different Roman numeral on the cover.
His sister, Gabriella, said he would lock himself in the den for hours on end and told Gaucho newspaper: 'We were very worried. Now we think he's okay. He has a project, which is the publication of these 14 books. I think he had to do it that way.'
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UFO Seen Over Newcastle, Great Britain On Oct 2016, UFO Sighting News.
UFO Seen Over Newcastle, Great Britain On Oct 2016, UFO Sighting News.
Date of sighting: October 2016
Location of sighting: Newcastle, Great Britain
Source: MUFON #82983
This UFO was seen this week over Great Britain and there has been a mass of sightings this month from that country. This is a nice photo of the UFO. I enlarged it and you can see the original and the altered color above.
Scott C. Waring
Eyewitness states:
I recorded a fleet of orb lights, day time footage. Looking East from Gateshead. One flying at speed over my house. Hanging in the sky was a small silver line. The fleet were stretched out for a distance. I went looking and not long after found these on the 13th and 14th of October 2016. One taking off from next to my own house. The view is taken from a hill over looking Leam Lane estate. The videos are of it one day taking off to the left and the next taking off from the right but landing in the same place as the day before. It lands next to or in one of two crafts hanging over the houses in the distance. On the second day zoomed in, spheres can be seen being ejected from the craft on the left. There were no sightings reported even though this was taken place very close to houses. The last two images are of one of them flying past and zoomed in. They fly at speed and change shape and colour. It's unknown what they are. They fly over the trees, in them and in the grass.
Beste bezoeker, Heb je zelf al ooit een vreemde waarneming gedaan, laat dit dan even weten via email aan Frederick Delaere opwww.ufomeldpunt.be. Deze onderzoekers behandelen jouw melding in volledige anonimiteit en met alle respect voor jouw privacy. Ze zijn kritisch, objectief maar open minded aangelegd en zullen jou steeds een verklaring geven voor jouw waarneming! DUS AARZEL NIET, ALS JE EEN ANTWOORD OP JOUW VRAGEN WENST, CONTACTEER FREDERICK. BIJ VOORBAAT DANK...
Druk op onderstaande knop om je bestand , jouw artikel naar mij te verzenden. INDIEN HET DE MOEITE WAARD IS, PLAATS IK HET OP DE BLOG ONDER DIVERSEN MET JOUW NAAM...
Druk op onderstaande knop om een berichtje achter te laten in mijn gastenboek
Alvast bedankt voor al jouw bezoekjes en jouw reacties. Nog een prettige dag verder!!!
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 74 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.