Mars rover grabs first rock sample, a major step in hunt for alien life

NASA’s Perseverance rover will cache this pristine sample and others for return to Earth, which will “change everything for Mars science.”

With the whirr of a drill, a robotic geologist some 244 million miles away just made history, collecting the first sample of Mars for return to Earth. Sealed in an airtight, ultraclean tube, the sample is an important milestone in a multibillion-dollar effort to finally answer the question: Was there ever life on the red planet?

The successful maneuver by NASA’s Perseverance rover comes after the first sampling attempt failed last month when a weak, weathered rock on the crater floor crumbled to pieces. This time the team tried at a different spot, nabbing a finger-size cylinder of more durable rock from a boulder along a nearly half-mile-long ridge.

“For all of NASA science, this is truly a historic moment,” Thomas Zurbuchen, NASA’s associate administrator for science, says in a press release.

This sample is only the first of dozens to be collected in the coming months. The rover will ultimately deposit its cache on Mars's surface, and a future mission will scoop it up and transport the rocks to eager earthbound scientists.

"It feels kind of surreal," says Vivian Sun of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), who co-leads the mission's first science campaign. "What we're doing right now is going to impact Mars science for a long time."

In addition to sampling, Perseverance is equipped to sniff, taste, and peer at the Martian landscape in greater detail than ever before, helping scientists unwind the planet's watery past and seek out hints of Martian microbes that may have once thrived in now-vanished rivers and lakes. The stage for this dramatic search is Jezero Crater, a 28-mile-wide basin carved by a meteorite impact billions of years ago.

Perseverance touched down near the crater's rim in February 2021 after a harrowing, seven-minute plunge through Mars's thin atmosphere. Though the ground under the rover's six wheels is now parched, the ruddy rocks and sand hold clues to a past flush with water. The science team will explore this region with the rover’s advanced suite of instruments, selecting samples from the crater floor up through an ancient river delta and beyond.

"We are going to be surprised," says Nina Lanza, a planetary scientist and team lead for Space and Planetary Exploration at Los Alamos National Laboratory. "We are going to learn things that we never could have imagined."

Scientists believe Mars was once blanketed in a thick atmosphere, which helped trap enough heat to keep water from freezing and produced enough pressure to stop the liquid from evaporating and escaping as gas. But at some point the atmosphere thinned, and Mars's climate took a dramatic turn. By three billion years ago, the planet was parched, and Mars became the red dustball we see today.

Exactly why and how this happened remains unknown. Jezero's rocks offer a chance to study this dramatic transformation, capturing the key slice of time during which the great drying took place. "As we explore different parts of the crater inside Jezero, we have the potential to kind of step through time," says Kathryn Stack Morgan, a deputy project scientist at NASA's JPL.

Jezero is a crater within a crater. The planetary pockmark is perched on the western edge of the Isidis Basin—a sprawling crater about 750 miles wide blasted out by a huge space rock some 3.9 billion years ago. A later impact sculpted the inner rocky bowl now known as Jezero. Then came the water.

Winding rivers spilled over the crater rim, feeding what became an ancient lake. The water slowed as it poured into the basin, causing suspended sand and mud to settle to the lake bottom and form a pair of deltas, which fanned out around the branching waterways.

The rover will explore the dried remains of the crater's larger delta, which is cradled in Jezero's western edge. This delta's rapid buildup of sediments could have readily buried and preserved signatures of life—if it did exist—before the rivers dried up roughly 3.5 billion years ago.

"As a geologist, I can't help but get excited for understanding Mars history," says Bethany Ehlmann, a planetary scientist at the California Institute of Technology.

"Poorly behaved rock"

To collect Jezero’s geologic bounty, Perseverance’s sampling system is composed of a trio of robots that work in tandem to drill cylinders of rock, seal them in airtight tubes, and deposit them into a storage rack within the rover's belly. "It's a spacecraft within a spacecraft," says Ian Clark, a systems engineer at JPL who is part of the Perseverance team.

During Perseverance’s first sample attempt, the rover targeted an interlocking mosaic of light red-brown stones that make up swaths of the crater floor—perhaps the oldest rocks the rover will find in Jezero. Hints from orbit and the rover's analyses on the ground point to a volcanic origin for these "paver stones," as the team calls them. If that's the case, returning these rocks to Earth would allow scientists to precisely date them using radioactive elements, helping piece together the region's complex past.

But the first sampling attempt left the team empty-handed. While the rover's sampling system initially seemed to work as planned, the sealed tube remained empty. Later analyses suggested that the rock's interaction with ancient water whisked away much of the geologic glue binding it together, which caused the sample to crumble to bits under the coring drill's percussive strikes.

The team hasn't given up hope for sampling the crater floor, and they plan to eventually look for less weathered paver stones to drill, Ken Farley, a Perseverance project scientist, writes in a blog post.

But for their second and most recent drilling attempt, the team directed the rover west to search for rocks "as different as possible" from the paver stones. The rover zeroed in on a boulder on top of a nearly half-mile-long ridge called Artuby. Standing tall above the landscape, the boulder appears to have resisted eons of battering, which suggested it'd be tough enough to withstand drilling.

The sampled boulder appears similar to other rocks poking up from the crater floor, sometimes called "high-standing rocks," says Roger Wiens, a planetary scientist at Los Alamos National Laboratory and principal investigator of Perseverance's SuperCam. Early on, the team planned to sample one of these high-standing rocks as well as the paver stones. “But we wanted to start with what we thought would be the easiest, which would be the softer ones—and, uh, oops,” Wiens laughs.

Now the newly stashed core confirms that the first sample was "just poorly behaved rock," as Farley suspected, rather than an issue with the rover’s mechanisms for drilling and storing the cores.

Collecting more samples—and sending them home

With the first sample safely stowed, the rover will soon double back east and then move northward to the delta, studying the rock formations along the way. One type of feature that scientists are eager to scrutinize is finely layered rock. Such laminations can be found on Earth in sediments deposited by water, wind, or sometimes volcanoes.

In water, laminations accumulate from the slow deposition of mud one layer at a time, which could have preserved traces of life in Jezero, as well as the chemistry of the now-vanished lake—providing "a true archive" of the conditions in which the rocks formed, says Keyron Hickman-Lewis, a geobiologist at the Natural History Museum in London and a return sample scientist on the Perseverance mission. 

Layers are common in deltas, including the one in Jezero, but the rover also spied promising laminations in rock units on the crater floor. At a July 21 press briefing, Farley pulled up a picture of a crater floor deposit that looks like an uneven stack of brown papers. "This is exactly the kind of rock that we are most interested in investigating," he said. But scientists are still working out what processes formed these rocks, whether they're sediments, volcanics, or a mix of both, Wiens says.

Up on the delta, two other attractive targets are clays and carbonate minerals, which Caltech’s Ehlmann and her colleagues first spotted in Jezero using orbital data more than a decade ago. On Earth, carbonates often have close ties to life and can preserve exquisite structures, such as the finely wrinkled layers of ancient microbial mats known as stromatolites. Clays can rapidly entomb organic material, and if any exists on Mars, they may be shielding it from the destructive cosmic radiation that blasts the planet’s surface.

Another intriguing possible target for study is manganese-rich rocks. Manganese minerals can form in many ways, but microbes sometimes have a hand in the process.

Los Alamos’s Lanza and her colleagues suggested in a recent study that cyanobacteria could produce manganese-rich varnishes that commonly coat rocks found in deserts around the world. The microbes may use the minerals as a sort of sunscreen, protecting themselves from harsh ultraviolet radiation.

Manganese was previously spotted on Mars in nearby Gale Crater, where the Curiosity rover is busy with its own investigations. The team thinks they might have found some in Jezero too, but they are still working to confirm its presence and determine how much is there. Manganese on Mars can come in many forms and may create a similar veneer on rocks within the crater.

"If we see anything that's like rock varnish, we really should stop and take a closer look," Lanza says.

Once dozens of samples have been collected and cached, another mission will have to land on the planet to pick them up. NASA and the European Space Ageny are designing a lander equipped with a "fetch rover" that could launch as soon as 2026.

A small rocket on the lander would carry the precious rocks into orbit around Mars, where an orbiter would grab them and take them back to Earth, releasing the samples in a small probe that will crash land in the Utah desert.

After the samples are safely back on Earth, scientists will use sophisticated tools to unlock any secrets held within the rocky remnants. But even then, steep challenges lie ahead in the search for ancient alien life. Experts debate what kind of evidence would be enough to identify extremely early life-forms, even on Earth. Claims of life that existed billions of years ago on our planet have driven multiyear feuds and cut schisms between scientists.

One recent debate involved a series of 3.7-billion-year-old rocks on the southwest coast of Greenland. In 2016, a team of scientists declared that a set of wrinkled triangles in the rock were traces of microbial activity, which would make them the earliest known fossil life. But JPL geologist Abigail Allwood and her colleagues were suspicious. When they returned to study the outcrop, a different picture emerged. The wrinkles weren't caused by churning microbes, but by geologic processes squashing the stone.

"There's nothing like standing there in front of the outcrops to give you an understanding of what's going on. You can't do it through a lens of a camera," says Allwood. Her words catch as she realizes what she's saying, and she adds with a chuckle, "which is exactly what we're trying to do on Mars."

Since the human team can't physically stand on Mars, Perseverance is equipped to give them a look at the rocks on multiple scales—from landscape-wide images right down to chemical analyses of pinprick-size bits of the rock. Allwood is the principal investigator for Perseverance's PIXL instrument, which can take images of tiny features and use x-rays to measure the chemistry of Martian rock.

{ https://www.nationalgeographic.com/ }

26-09-2021 om 00:47 geschreven door peter  

Un bombardier furtif B-2 à la base de Whiteman dans le Missouri, le 30 octobre 2002. | Tim Sloan / AFP

Un ovni militaire apparaît au-dessus des Philippines

L'archipel se trouve en mer de Chine méridionale, une région explosive: quel est donc cet aéronef mystérieux?

Repéré par Barthélemy Dont sur The Drive

Si vous prenez des photos du ciel, jetez toujours un coup d'œil attentif à ce qui se cache dans les nuages: vous n'êtes pas à l'abri d'y découvrir un avion furtif non identifié qui provoquera quelques remous chez les experts et quidams que la question des programmes secrets passionne. C'est en tout cas ce qui est arrivé à Michael Fugnit, un photographe philippin.

Plus habitué aux photos d'animaux et de paysages, Fugnit se trouvait le 2 septembre à Santa Magdalena, sur l'île de Luçon au sud-est de Manille, pour photographier le ciel. Sur l'une de ses images, on distingue un mystérieux aéronef en forme d'aile volante.

Si tant est que cette image est authentique, l'avion n'est que partiellement visible. Il est toutefois possible de percevoir sa forme en losange, qui suggère que ce n'est pas un avion militaire classique mais un appareil furtif, comme le fameux bombardier B-2.

• Le Pentagone a «misérablement échoué» lors d'une guerre simulée contre la Chine

Le média The Drive, qui a analysé l'image, propose une théorie: l'aéronef aperçu dans le ciel philippin pourrait être le drone espion RQ-180 conçu par Northrop Grumman, et encore placé sous le sceau du secret le plus élevé.

Non seulement la forme correspond, mais la fonction de ce projet secret de l'US Air Force est de mener des misions de «renseignement, surveillance et reconnaissance» dans les «espace aériens refusés». La mer de Chine méridionale, où se trouvent les Philippines, semble être la région idéale pour ce type de sorties.

Région explosive

Cette zone est un territoire très disputé et d'une importance économique et géopolitique primordiale. De nombreux îlots sont revendiqués par plusieurs États dont Taïwan, le Vietnam, la Malaisie, les Philippines et surtout, la Chine qui y mène une politique agressive. Les États-Unis rivaux y maintiennent donc aussi une présence soutenue.

En juillet, le ministre américain des Affaires étrangères rappelait son engagement à appuyer militairement les Philippines en cas d'agression. Les pêcheurs philippins notamment sont régulièrement harcelés par les garde-côtes et navires de pêche chinois.

• L'US Air Force prépare le B-21 Raider, son nouveau bombardier furtif

L'autre suspect potentiel est donc la Chine, qui dispose elle aussi de plusieurs drones et avions furtifs en développement qui pourraient correspondre à l'appareil observé.

Comme le souligne The Drive, les marines indienne, américaine, australienne et japonaise ont récemment effectué des exercices militaires communs dans la mer des Philippines.

{ https://korii.slate.fr/ }

26-09-2021 om 00:34 geschreven door peter  

The truth is out there and it may well be closer than we thought after a schoolboy captured a shocking video of an unidentified craft hovering in the skies above Edinburgh Airport

By Tara Fitzpatrick - James Delaney -- Digital Journalist

Jack McKnight captured the flying saucer on film.

(Image: Daily Record / Jack McKnight)

A family have been left stunned after a close encounter with a UFO in the skies above Edinburgh Airport.

Jack McKnight had been filming planes taking off and landing on the runway in the Capital afternoon when he captured the shimmering object hovering overhead.

The 12-year-old, who was attending the Truckfest Scotland event with his mum, sister Jade and her son, saw the unexplained craft magically appear and then vanish within a minute.

The schoolboy told the Daily Record the experience left him ‘a bit scared’ of going to bed on Monday night, but family members have sought out UFO experts for clarity on what they saw.

The family, from Lanark, all have an interest in aeroplanes and decided to film them taking off from nearby Edinburgh Airport while tracking them on a flight radar app.

The unidentified shape appeared in the video as Jack was filming a Norwegian aeroplane take off from the runway.

Jack said he was “shocked” when he discovered the strange shape on the video when he got home.

He said: “I was out taking pictures of aeroplanes and I didn’t realise there was this object until I got home.

“It is a kind of metallicy or silvery colour.

“One minute it appears and then just disappears.

“I was so surprised when I got home, I was just scrolling through my pictures to show my mum.

“I had actually made a joke about there being aliens and then we show that.

“I have always wondered what it would be like to see one but I was actually a bit scared last night going to bed.”

The family contacted a UFO specialist and the video is now under investigation by the British UFO Research Association.

Jack’s sister Jade, 26, told the Record: “I have never followed anything to do with aliens or UFOs before but we had no idea what this was.

“It just appears out of nowhere.”

{ https://www.edinburghlive.co.uk/ }

26-09-2021 om 00:23 geschreven door peter  

Space Force talent strategy is a departure from the norm

by Sandra Erwin 

{ https://spacenews.com/ }

25-09-2021 om 23:55 geschreven door peter  

 RALPH BLUMENTHAL

25-09-2021 om 23:34 geschreven door peter  

The Moon: “An artificial satellite left by ancient civilizations”

Mikhail Vasin and Alexander Sherbakov, two experienced Russian scientists from the Soviet Academy of Sciences, developed a theory where they claimed that the Moon is not a natural satellite. In fact, no ancient civilization mentions it.

In the 1960s, the magazine Sputnik published an article in which two scientists claimed that the Moon is not a natural satellite of the Earth, but a colossal hollow planetoid.

Its creation was thanks to an advanced civilization that strategically placed it in Earth orbit many centuries ago.

A theory could be considered somewhat far-fetched a priori, however, it would explain many of the enigmas of “our” satellite.

The Moon An artificial satellite?

The article explained that for the Moon to support its warp without breaking, it must be maintained by certain unusual internal characteristics . One of them is a huge inner fortress .

Experts said that artificial satellites are normally hollow and with colossal resistance to withstand the variations of outer space.

“The base probably had a double layer, a dense armored shell about 30 km thick, and over it a less compact cover, a thinner layer, about 4.5 km.”

Most of the debris that enters the atmosphere is destroyed , but this is not the case with the Moon. This would explain the immense amount of craters that exist on its surface compared to Earth.

If you take into consideration that the Moon traveled from a distant point in the cosmos , then it received many more impacts than the Earth.

Another issue is the depth of the impacts; they are all superficial. The explanation for this phenomenon is that objects collide with a buffer layer before encountering an impenetrable protective shell .

That would be the 30-kilometer-thick armored layer , so the explosion from the impact would only damage the 4.5-kilometer crust . The common depth of craters found on the Moon.

Another inexplicable event is the traces of seas of lava that have been found on the Moon. Some scientists claim that the lava could have come from inside the satellite. Something unlikely, since it has always been considered a cold body , incapable of generating that heat.

Another theory speaks of meteorites that exploded on its surface, producing lava. The problem is that it seems to emanate from within . For Vasin and Sherbakov, these seas did come from the interior of the Moon, but not as we believe.

Legacy of an ancient civilization?

The experts assured that, from the inside, someone or something produced said material composed of rocks and materials, which took the appearance of lava.

This paste was used as cement to repair the damage caused by meteorites, thus creating “cleaner” and darker areas than others.

This could explain the gravitational variations in some sectors of the Moon. The composition and weight of these “seas” would provoke them.

We should know that the theory that the Moon is an artificial satellite is nothing new. In fact, since ancient times, there are no records of the Moon.

Philosophers like Aristotle speak in the Constitution of Tages, that the Pelasgian people inhabited the Earth “before the Moon appeared in the heavens .”

Ancient Tibetan texts also say that in the disappeared continent of Gondwana , where ancient Lemuria was, the Moon did not exist .

Inmanuel Velikovsky , a Russian researcher, stated in the 1950s that there are no clear records of the Moon in many ancient cultures.

Can we thus say that there is sufficient evidence to at least make us doubt that the Moon is a natural satellite? If this is true, it is time to question everything related to the lunar exploration of the different countries. What have they really discovered in that place?

{ https://mysteriousthing.com/}

25-09-2021 om 23:18 geschreven door peter  

THE UFOS CARL SAGAN WAS CONVINCED OF BUT COULDN’T TALK ABOUT

_{Sagan had already been denied tenure at Harvard, a sci-fi screenwriter reflects, and he couldn't afford to take more chances}

Sci-fi screenwriter Bryce Zabel recalls a memorable dispute with cosmologist Carl Sagan (1934–1996) in a parking lot forty years ago:

The Voyager II unmanned spacecraft had been launched in August of 1977. Now, four years later, it was due to make its closest approach to Saturn on August 25, 1981. It was even going to send back photos in almost real time.

I got an idea.

BRYCE ZABEL, “COSMIC COLLISION: MY UFO DEBATE WITH CARL SAGAN” AT MEDIUM (AUGUST 24, 2021)

His idea was to interview Sagan (remember the insignificant Pale Blue Dot that Earth is supposed to be?).

I got to host Saturn and Beyond, and it was going to be Carl Sagan and me “live,” without commercial interruption, for thirty minutes on a show that got picked up by PBS for broadcast across the United States. It was heady stuff. After all, he was designing the messages for extraterrestrial civilizations that would ride with that Voyager spacecraft on the “Golden Record” at the same time I was a hippie radio news jock in Eugene, Oregon during college. Now I was going to sit on the same stage with him and talk a little space travel.

BRYCE ZABEL, “COSMIC COLLISION: MY UFO DEBATE WITH CARL SAGAN” AT MEDIUM (AUGUST 24, 2021)

Sagan was already famous for the 1980 TV miniseries Cosmos:

He was also very much a believer in extraterrestrials and UFOs and even believed that dolphins might have a role to play in the matter. Newsman Zabel was not then “a UFO guy.” At any rate, Zabel walked Sagan out into the parking lot…

This is what I asked him:

“You’re famous for saying that there are billions and billions of stars out there in the Universe. You’ve actually said that you believe the Universe is teeming with life, and that some of it must be intelligent, probably more advanced than we are. But you also insist that none of these other beings could actually be here on Earth because the distances are too vast.”

Sagan’s smile left his face during this. He said, “What’s your point?”

“Well, only that you want us to look for radio signals coming from other civilizations out in space, but you say in Cosmos that UFOs aren’t really worth investigating, because they can’t be here in the first place. You’re a scientist. Why wouldn’t you want to investigate, particularly since it could prove we’re not alone?”

“I also said that extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof,” said Sagan. “The claims I’ve seen don’t come with much proof at all.”

BRYCE ZABEL, “COSMIC COLLISION: MY UFO DEBATE WITH CARL SAGAN” AT MEDIUM (AUGUST 24, 2021)

Sagan left abruptly. Reflecting on the evidence, four decades later (and twenty-five years after Sagan’s death), Zabel thinks that Sagan had to downplay his passionate belief in extraterrestrials in order to avoid being written off as a crank — a cool crank but a crank nonetheless: “The truth of the matter, to me, is that he felt giving any quarter on the UFO issue could kill his career.”

Zabel has much more to tell in his story at Medium, including how he developed an interest in UFOs himself and went on to work in the sci-fi area.

Significantly, the discussion has become much less toxic over the years. The Pentagon report earlier this year clarified that UAPs (UFOs) are “not caused by any U.S. advanced technology.” There does not appear to be a straightforward weather-related explanation either for some of them. In short, it’s not a situation in which everyone on one side of the debate is a sharp cookie and everyone on the other side is a fool. In some cases, we just don’t know what’s happening.

Sagan was denied tenure at Harvard for being, according to Zabel, a little too “out there.” But today, Harvard astronomer Avi Loeb openly discusses his thoughts on ETs and UFOs in popular science venues. And, in what sounds like a helpful move, NASA is seeking standards for ET life claims, rather than just denying or avoiding them altogether.

Perhaps all unidentified aerial phenomena are due to rare natural events. But the only way to honestly evaluate that is to start with the premise that they might — in principle — not be natural events. The need to simply “debunk” is not so much part of science as it is a social phenomenon: the Ingroup vs. the Outgroup. Continually proving that one is a member of the Correct group is hardly the spirit that advances science.

Here’s some retro from Voyager 1 and 2:

You may also wish to read:

The surprising role that dolphins have played in the search for ET. Dolphins, with their apparent alien intelligence, have been seen by scientists interested in ET as a stand-in. The discovery of dolphin intelligence supported the view that intelligence might evolve in unexpected places among life forms without hands.

and

The UAPs (UFOs) are “not caused by any U.S. advanced technology.” And that’s all the Pentagon probably really knows. Some, including physicist Mark Buchanan, hope we never find out if it’s aliens or not.

RELATED VIDEOS, selected and posted by peter2011

{ https://mindmatters.ai/  }

25-09-2021 om 22:54 geschreven door peter  

{ https://www.hln.be/ }

25-09-2021 om 21:45 geschreven door peter  

5km Alien Monolith On Moon In NASA Photo! UFO Sighting News.

Date of discovery: Sept 25, 2021

Location of discovery: Earths moon

NASA photo: 

• https://www.lpi.usra.edu/resources/lunarorbiter/images/preview/1038_h3.jpg

Today I went through the lunar orbiter mission photos and soon found an alien structure sticking out in the side of a crater. The structure is a monolith type shape. The object in question is an alien made structure laying on its side. The structure is about 5km long and 2.5km wide. The structure looks intact and should still be habitable if humans landed in that location and took it over. Its a self contained structure, a habitat that probably already can create an oxygen atmosphere within it, but if not, could easily be converted to do so. Its a lot easier than other suggestions scientists have given of making a dome over a crater...which could have leaks and you basically have to start from nothing. Here...its all ready and waiting for someone to take it over. But alien life is less of a mystery than humanity itself. Its hard to understand why most scientists would ignore such a great opportunity to instead start from nothing on the moon. Thats...how humans are...we chose to argue about subjects rather than take action. It holds humanity back. Its a waste of valuable time. The structure is there...and I predict humanity will ignore its discovery. 

Scott C. Waring - Taiwan 

{ https://www.ufosightingsdaily.com/ }

25-09-2021 om 21:08 geschreven door peter  

High speed disc-shaped UFO travelling over Mount Teide in Tenerife. Since the UFO/fastwalker passes the photographer at a reasonable distance, it is unlikely that the object is a bird flying close to the camera. 

Then, four cigar shaped independent objects flying in parallel over Bend, Oregon. Objects were not visible to the naked eye and a weird transparent shaped object hovering through the sky over Brooklyn, New York. It appeared to be a physical object that reflected the light of the sun only at certain angles when turning.

source: www.mufon.com

RELATED VIDEOS, selected and posted by peter2011

{ http://ufosightingshotspot.blogspot.com/ }

25-09-2021 om 20:50 geschreven door peter  

Weird transparent UFO spirals down over Brooklyn 24-Sep-2021

This daytime UFO sighting was filmed in the sky above Brooklyn on 24th September 2021.

Witness report: 

Me and my wife where at the rooftop enjoying the afternoon weather when a bright flash in the sky caught my eye. I looked up but couldn’t see anything. I mentioned to my wife, and as we looked up we both witnessed the flash again and what appeared to be a shape. The building is in Brooklyn and the object was spotted south of La Guardia Airport.
First I thought of a flock of birds but where too high, and move too fast and coordinated. At times looked like a cloth or a transparent flag, but the flight path seemed oddly smooth and unpredictable.
Because of looking almost transparent it’s hard to say, but seemed to spiral down in a controlled way. It appeared to be a physical object that reflected the light of the sun only at certain angles when turning. Other than those moments where the sun reflection flashed, it was very hard to see it at all.
My wife started filming it and I ran to get the binoculars, when I got back the object was gone. My wife filmed it around 25 seconds after I first saw it so it’s all there in the video.
It felt it was high and large, but is very hard to say exactly what we saw, even watching the video is hard to make our minds on what could have been. It could be some natural phenomena, but a strange one at least.

{ https://www.latest-ufo-sightings.net/ }

25-09-2021 om 18:59 geschreven door peter  

Two Newly Identified Galaxies Could Be Home to Hyper-Intelligent Alien Life

Photo by Graham Holtshausen on Unsplash

According to an Inverse report, a team of astronomers led by Leiden University researcher Hongying Chen is actively searching the skies for advanced alien life forms.

They’re looking for infrared signals that could be the exhaust emissions of hypothetical Dyson spheres, which are massive megastructures that harness the energy of the surrounding universe. Their new paper focuses on two distant galaxies whose infrared emissions have previously eluded simple explanation.

In search of super-intelligent alien life

Is there any life out there? According to the Fermi Paradox, it is extremely likely, given that there are billions of stars in the Milky Way alone, many of which have planets orbiting in habitable zones. Despite this, we have found no evidence of intelligent alien life. New discoveries, such as the recent discovery that Mars has always been too small to retain surface water, are constantly changing our understanding of the likelihood of discovering intelligent life in the far reaches of space.

Chen and his colleagues believe that if there is life out there, the most likely way to find it is to look for the traces of the most advanced civilizations. They are specifically looking for Kardashev Type III civilization (K3) lifeforms. The Kardashev scale was proposed in 1964 by Soviet astronomer Nikolai Kardashev as a way to measure the level of technological advancement of a hypothetical civilization based on the amount of energy it can harness from the surrounding universe.

As the most advanced type of alien civilization, K3 lifeforms are at the top of the scale. According to the scale, they would be able to harness the energy of black holes, stars, and quasars using technologies similar to the hypothetical Dyson sphere — a massive structure that could surround a celestial object such as a star without collapsing. It’s worth noting that humans aren’t even considered Type 1 yet, as that would necessitate us efficiently harnessing the power of the Sun. Chen and his colleagues scanned a portion of the Northern Sky for galaxies that could be home to K3 alien lifeforms. So far, two galaxies have stood out among the 21 they have studied. They describe their findings in a paper published in the Royal Astronomical Society’s Monthly Notices.

Narrowing down an infinitely broad investigation

The researchers behind the new study believe they can detect a Type III civilization by looking for mid-infrared emissions in the sky. These, they believe, could be telltale signs of advanced alien races emitting Dyson Spheres — Chen’s team writes in their paper that K3 civilizations are likely to “generate strong excess emission in the mid-infrared (MIR) that is associated with the waste heat they generate.” The researchers examined the emissions of 21 galaxies with high mid-infrared emissions and discovered that four of them had mid-infrared emissions that were multiplied by a factor of ten. One of these was an active galactic nucleus, and the other was a star-forming galaxy, indicating that they are natural sources of mid-infrared emissions. The other two galaxies, known as ILT J134649.72+542621.7 and ILT J145757.90+565323.8, however, are not so easily explained, and the researchers say they “require further investigation.”

The researchers’ next goal is to pinpoint the precise source of the infrared emissions. “We can look at their emissions in other wavelengths like X-ray and optical to see if their spectral energy distribution is active galactic nuclei-like or star-forming-galaxy-like,” Chen explained in an interview with Inverse. “We can also conduct high-resolution radiological observations on them to examine their morphology.” They also intend to scan other parts of the sky for possible signs of hyper-advanced alien life.

{ https://geekuniversemedia.com/ }

25-09-2021 om 01:26 geschreven door peter  

A UFO “overtakes” fighter jets during an air show

This is the second time in three weeks that a high-speed UFO has “overtaken” fighter jets during an air show.

On August 28, 2021, during an international air show in Thamesford, Ontario, Canada, a swift UFO flew past the Blue Angels and now, on September 19, 2021, a similar incident occurred when the Red Arrows performed a show. air over Chorley, England.

As with the UFO in Canada, this UFO in England also has neither wings nor visible propulsion. What’s going on? Why do these objects appear during air shows?

During the last years we have published hundreds of similar cases, which for many researchers, these UFOs are supposed extraterrestrial ships of some civilization that is among us.

As reported by the well-known ufological portal MUFON , on September 19, 2021, an incredibly fast UFO flew past military aircraft during an air show.

Ufologists wonder why these UFOs appear during air shows?

{ https://mysteriousthing.com/ }

25-09-2021 om 01:06 geschreven door peter  

You may know him as The Red Rocker, or the lead singer of Montrose, or David Lee Roth’s replacement in Van Halen, or from the video for “I Can’t Drive 55”, or from drinking his Cabo Wabo tequila. Do aliens know him for any of those reasons or was it something else that prompted them to abduct him in the mid 1960s – at least that’s what he told an interviewer in Las Vegas this week before a rooftop concert. Did ET want a song about no being able to drive Warp 55?

“100% happened. Four o’clock in the morning, pitch black, dead sleep. I felt like I was being programmed like someone’s tapping into me like it was a string from my head to 13 miles up on a mountain place called Lau Creek. And I know right where it was, these little foothills. There was an object there. There was two people in it, two creatures in it. And it was 19, I want to say it was 64, 65.”

Hagar has told the story before, including in his autobiography, but JC Fernandez, a host of Las Vegas Now on KLAS-TV, seems to have elicited more details about the encounter (reprinted by Mystery Wire) , which Hagar admits happened while he was asleep. He believes the ETs communicated with him telepathically.

“And they went, “Oh, he’s waking up,” augmented telepathy, you know, they just did the communication when my head is waking up. They yelled out a numerical code, not of our numerical system, (speaks the alien sounds he heard). And it went, and I can almost feel the plug, like an electrical charge leaving, zapped into their ship, put a light on in this ship where I see shadows of these creatures.”

In previous interviews, Hagar explains how he woke up to a loud ‘BAM’ and a white light and became convinced this abduction happened for a reason – he was programmed by aliens to become a rock star. Now, even The Red Rocker knows that’s pretty far out and he doesn’t mention it in the latest interview. However, this time he reveals that this was not his only encounter with aliens.

“These little gray creatures that were hanging out in Lake Placid. I had a house out in the wilderness and I had just no electricity, log cabin back in the early 80s, 81 82 and these little guys are in that cabin one night and you know even slamming doors just I’m not saying Yeah, they were physical guys. I don’t know if they were robots or what but it was freaky. It scared me to death.”

Hagar says the first encounter convinced him there are many kinds of aliens in different dimensions and they merely nabbed him as a kind of lab rat. He doesn’t think the aliens enlightened him (wonder what it did to them!!) nor did he get any implants or programming. He likened it to taking LSD where the enlightenment came from his realization of the experience. However, it did inspire him to put at least one space or alien-related song on many of his solo albums.

“Yeah, Space Station Number Five first Montrose song. Second Montrose was out in 1975 was Space Age Sacrifice. My first solo album, Hot Rocks, which changed into another song. But Silver Lights is about the return of the aliens coming back to see check out their planet that they populated somehow you know propagated with you know planted seeds. The next album Red had Someone Out There. Next Turn Up the Music had A Crack in the World on that record as far as I can remember. Then I stopped doing it every album. But every now and then I got one on there.”

How about This Planet’s on Fire on Street Machine? And don’t forget the album and song Marching to Mars. And anyone who pens a song titled Cosmic Universal Fashion must have had some kind of otherworldly inspiration, right?

Forget Tom DeLonge. It sounds like Sammy Hagar is the right rock ambassador to greet ETs visiting Earth. Maybe, if he’s lucky, they’ll take him for a ride faster than 55.

{ https://mysteriousuniverse.org/ }

24-09-2021 om 23:59 geschreven door peter  

Just a few days ago, I was chatting on radio about the notorious “Philadelphia Experiment” of 1943. Or, rather, the alleged experiment. There’s no doubt at all that when it comes to the issues of control and conspiracy, just about the biggest doozy of all is that which revolves around what is known as the Montauk Project. It’s a complicated saga which is filled with tales of mind-control, time-travel, government cover-ups, secret experiments, and much more. And it’s all focused around a certain facility located on Long Island, New York. It’s a story that has its origins in the 1940s and an incredible series of classified programs run by the U.S. Navy, but which didn’t start to surface publicly until the 1950s. It was in 1955 that a highly controversial book on flying saucers was published. The author was Morris Ketchum Jessup, and the title of his book was The Case for the UFO. It was a book which, for the most part, highlighted two particular issues: (a) how gravity could be harnessed and used as an energy; and (b) the source of power of the mysterious flying saucers that people were seeing in the skies above. It wasn’t long after the book was published that Jessup was contacted by a man who wrote Jessup a number of letters that detailed something astounding. The man was one Carlos Allende, a resident of Pennsylvania.

Allende’s letters were as long as they were rambling and almost ranting, but Jessup found them oddly addictive. Allende provided Jessup what he – Allende – claimed were top secret snippets of a story that revolved another nothing less than invisibility – of the type achieved, in fictional formats, at least, in the likes of The Invisible Man movie of 1933, starring Claude Rains. It wasn’t just invisibility that Allende had on his mind: it was teleportation, too, and of the kind which went drastically wrong for Jeff Goldblum’s character, Seth Brundle, in 1986’s The Fly. Jessup read the letters with varying degrees of amazement, worry, fear and incredulity. That’s hardly surprising, given the nature of the alleged events. So Allende’s tale went, it was at the Philadelphia Naval Yard, in October 1943, when the U.S. Navy reportedly managed to bring both teleportation and invisibility into the real world.

(U.S. Navy) USS Eldridge

According to Allende, the ship in question – the DE 173 USS Eldridge – vanished from Philadelphia and then very briefly reappeared at Norfolk, Virginia, after which it returned to the Philadelphia Naval Yard. How did Allende know all this? He told Jessup that he was on-board a ship whose crew were monitoring the experiment, the USS Andrew Furuseth. In one of his letters, that detailed his own, claimed sighting of the Eldridge vanishing form view, Allende wrote that he watched “the air all around the ship turn slightly, ever so slightly, darker than all the other air. I saw, after a few minutes, a foggy green mist arise like a cloud. I watched as thereafter the DE 173 became rapidly invisible to human eyes.” Allende’s story was, to be sure, incredible. But, the important thing was: was it true? It sounded like an amazing hoax. But, there was just something about the story which made Jessup suspect this was not a joke at all. The more that Allende related the growing aspects of the tale, the more and more Jessup was reeled in.

(Nick Redfern) Morris Jessup’s books

Allende told Jessup that while the experiment worked – in terms of achieving both teleportation and invisibility – it had terrible, adverse effects upon the crew. Many of them had gone completely and utterly insane and lived out the rest of their lives in asylums for the insane. Some vanished from view and were never seen nor heard from again. Others were fused into the deck of the ship, flesh and metal combined into one. Agonizing deaths were all those poor men had. There is, however, something else that needs to be made clear. Despite the intricacy surrounding the supposed experiment, nothing ever surfaced about the USS Eldridge, and about people turning briefly invisible or vanishing forever , before Allende was on the scene. Yes, retired military people have came forward – post-Allende and post-Jessup – to share what they knew. I only wish, though, we had a fistful of such sources back in, let’s say, only three months or eight months after the alleged experiment supposedly took place. Unfortunately, we don’t. It all surfaces in the 1950s.

{ https://mysteriousuniverse.org/ }

24-09-2021 om 23:40 geschreven door peter  

Archaeologists in Columbia made a pretty significant discovery when they found eight ceramic jars that contained several metal figurines with emeralds inside of them. What’s even more astonishing is that these items are connected to El Dorado – the mythical lost city of gold.

These jars were discovered during excavations where a temple and graves were found in an ancient town near Columbia’s capital of Bogotá. The jars, which are called ofrendatarios, were created by the ancient Muisca people (they are also known as Chibcha) who were well known for their exceptional metal-crafting skills. In fact, their famous works have been linked to the mythical lost gold city of El Dorado.

Eight ceramic jars contained metal figurines with emeralds.

The jars and figurines date back approximately 600 years. The figurines were in a variety of shapes, such as snakes, other different animals, and even people wearing headdresses with weapons and staffs. There may have been a connection between the items and the temple in which they were found as explained by archaeologist Francisco Correa, “It’s very difficult to establish, I think there was some type of cult of the ancestors.” They could have been used as an offering and they could have possibly been made in reference to deities that were worshipped by the Muisca people.

They had to make trades with other groups in order to obtain gold because there weren’t any gold mines near them. Their goldwork was so magnificent that they were referenced to the golden city of El Dorado. The Muisca people had a tradition where the chief would be covered in an ointment that contained gold particles during specific ceremonies which were apparently some of the “…motivations of this [El Dorado] myth” as noted by Correa. Actually, the Spanish watched these ceremonies take place and they even recorded them in ancient chronicles (as well as mentioning their goldwork) which helped to influence the myth.

Emeralds

The Spanish took over the region between the years 1537 and 1540 which caused many of the Muisca people to die during the battle or from diseases. While many lives were lost, the Muisca people did continue to inhabit the area and there are still people today who are descendants of them.

Pictures of the jars, figurines, and emeralds can be seen here.

A 3D scan of one of the metallic figurines found inside an ofrendatario. It has a human-like appearance.

A 3D scan of another of the metallic figurines found inside an ofrendatario.

Various artifacts were also found during the excavation of the site.

Emeralds were found inside the ofrendatarios.

The interior of an ofrendatario found at the site. The ancient Muisca placed metallic figurines and emeralds inside.

The myth of El Dorado comes from this object and the legend behind it. The zipa or Muisca king used to cover his body in gold dust. And from his raft, he offered treasures to the Guatavita goddess in the middle of the sacred lake. This old Muisca tradition became the origin of the legend of El Dorado. This Muisca raft figure is on display in the Gold Museum, Bogotá, Colombia.

(Pedro Szekely /  CC BY-SA 2.0 )

{ https://mysteriousuniverse.org/ }

24-09-2021 om 23:22 geschreven door peter  

Spinning disc-shaped UFO over Austin, TX 6-Sep-2021

This daytime UFO sighting ob some kind of a bright spinning flying saucer was filmed over Austin, Texas on 6th September 2021.

Witness report: 

Spinning disc like object viewed in the sky northeast from my location. The object moved up / down vertically and left/right continuously. As I stood up to gain a better vantage to see it, the object appeared to drop rapidly behind tree cover. As I sat back down in my pool, the object raised back up. I observed the object for 20+ minutes. The object was appeared white or transparent and was not close – I estimate it was at least 1/4 mile or more in the distance. The object did not appear to have any sound associated with it (humming of drone for example). It did appear to have spinning white lights as viewed in the images and video.

{ https://www.latest-ufo-sightings.net/ }

24-09-2021 om 21:11 geschreven door peter  

UFOs in formation over Indio, California 23-Sep-2021

These strange lights were filmed over Indio in California on 23rd September 2021 at 8pm.

Witness report: 

29 palms marine base is higher north east, this is south east looking towards Salton sea. Only possible base in that direction is Yuma, AZ. I don’t think they are flares, they are stationary and my friend said he seen them flying across Salton sea. This was taken during work tonight. There are 5 lights then 5 more appear above the original lights. This direction I’m looking at is south east heading towards Salton sea. Other people did see this in different directions. They look still and not moving, my other friend is in the northern area of Indio and said he seem these lights in a straight light moving fast over the Salton sea. I could not hear any sound and could only see in the distance. At the end they just disappear.

{ https://www.latest-ufo-sightings.net/ }

24-09-2021 om 20:50 geschreven door peter  

{ https://www.bing.com/?FORM=Z9FD1 }

24-09-2021 om 01:39 geschreven door peter  

According to UFO procedures obtained by VICE World News, Canada’s military refers reports of UFO sightings to a private company... and a civilian UFO researcher in Manitoba.

By Daniel Otis

CANADA'S FOREMOST "UFO EXPERT" CHRIS RUTKOWSKI IN HIS HOME IN WINNIPEG IN 2016.

PHOTO BY THE CANADIAN PRESS/JOHN WOODS

Canada’s government and military have forwarded UFO reports to a civilian researcher for over two decades, VICE World News has learned.

Chris Rutkowski, one of the country’s most prominent ufologists, has been covering Canadian cases for more than 30 years, but has never fully disclosed these ties. 

This is also the first time current UFO procedures have been released from the Canadian air force and NORAD, the joint Canada-U.S. defence group. They show an apparent lack of official Canadian curiosity or concern with phenomena the U.S. military openly investigates as potential national security threats.  

“Their official stance is that they are not doing anything about UFOs and that I am the point man in Canada,” Rutkowski told VICE World News.

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Obtained through Canada’s Access to Information Act, procedural checklist CL 213 outlines how the Royal Canadian Air Force and Canada’s NORAD headquarters deal with UFO sightings. 

CL 213 says: “CIRVIS (Communications Instructions for Reporting Vital Intelligence Sightings) reports should be made immediately upon a vital intelligence sighting of… objects or activities which appear to be hostile, unidentified, or engaged in possible illegal smuggling activity.” It even puts “unidentified flying objects” at the top of a list of examples such as “submarines or warships which are not Canadian or American.” 

The document refers both civilian and military reports to Nav Canada, a private company that owns and operates Canada’s air traffic control structure. Previous VICE World News stories showed how Nav Canada is the first point of contact when professional pilots spot UFOs over the country, which happened as recently as July. 

“Nav Canada manages Canadian airspace, and for that reason, it is important for them to be advised,” a Canadian air force and NORAD spokesperson told VICE World News.  

CL 213 specifically comes from 1 Canadian Air Division in Winnipeg, the air force’s command centre and headquarters of the Canadian NORAD Region. While NORAD is not subject to freedom of information laws, as part of the Canadian Armed Forces, 1 Canadian Air Division is.

Canada’s military says it does not typically concern itself with UFO reports, unless they represent emergencies or “credible threats.” A defence spokesperson did disclose that “CIRVIS reports are shared with our NORAD colleagues in the U.S.”

And according to CL 213, “UFO sightings are to be referred to: Mr. Chris Rutkowski.” 

‘Handshake agreement’

Often billed as the country’s foremost “UFO expert,” Rutkowski is the author of 10 books on the subject and founder of the annual Canadian UFO Survey, which has documented more than 22,000 UFO sightings since 1989. While the science writer has mentioned receiving reports from the military in his survey and speaking engagements, he’s never gone into depth about the exclusive two-decade arrangement—until now. 

“I tend not to talk about my UFO research publicly but I do talk about UFOs publicly,” Rutkowski told us. “It’s a subtle distinction.”

In 1986, Rutkowski wrote a defence paper for the government. Around that time, he said he made contacts at the National Research Council of Canada, a federal agency that officially collected UFO reports from 1968 to 1995. When budget cuts, retirements, and growing disinterest ended the program, Rutkowski offered his services. In hindsight, he said he was “surprised” years later when he got a call from the military. 

“I don’t recall the name of the person who initially phoned me more than 20 years ago,” he said. “All that was discussed on the brief phone call was a verification that I was the person that had wanted to receive UFO reports.”

A spokesperson from Canada’s Department of National Defence described it as a “handshake agreement” with “a known responsible and published researcher on UFOs.” The spokesperson confirmed UFO reports have “been passed to (Rutkowski), on occasion, in various forms since the late 1990s.” 

“I have no illusions that I receive all official UFO reports,” Rutkowski said. “I receive relatively low-classified reports with no security concerns.”

Rutkowski holds science and education degrees from the University of Manitoba, which has long employed him in communications roles, and where he is donating his UFO files. His latest book, Canada’s UFOs: Declassified, is scheduled to be released this fall.

“I didn’t start out to be ‘Canada’s UFO expert,’” Rutkowski said. “I just plugged away, trying to understand what was really going on.”

‘We do not send it to NORAD like we used to’

VICE World News first learned of CL 213 in a declassified daily log file from the Canadian air force and NORAD command centre in Winnipeg. It describes them being notified of a cargo flight that reported an “object… going between Mach 4 & 5 making constant circles” above Canada’s Northwest Territories in April 2018. 

That information came from the Canadian Air Defence Sector (CADS) in North Bay, Ontario, which is alerted by Nav Canada air traffic controllers when pilots report UFOs. CADS then informs the air force and NORAD in Winnipeg, and it also faxes Transport Canada, the government’s transportation department.

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In the 2018 log, an air force officer in Winnipeg “checked if CADS needed the contact information contained in CL 213 and they did not.”

Rutkowski showed VICE World News a report and emails he apparently received from Transport Canada on the morning of the 2018 “Mach 4” incident. The “vital intelligence” CIRVIS form appeared almost identical to one CADS’ 21 Squadron faxed Transport Canada in 2019 after an unusual aviation sighting. 

Transport Canada said it began sending Rutkowski “brief emails and some reports” in December 1999, but recently stopped after it “determined that it was not an operational necessity.”

“The decision to provide Mr. Rutkowski with these reports was an informal process and was done as a courtesy to encourage Mr. Rutkowski in his research for his fiction novels,” a spokesperson said.

VICE World News also learned Rutkowski has received UFO reports directly from at least five Canadian military bases. 

In the case of CFB Comox in British Columbia, procedures to send Rutkowski reports were in place for at least a decade, but were cancelled this year after the base “started to receive weekly… requests on the topic of UFOs,” according to the Canadian military’s access to information office. 

The old procedural document said, “We do not send it to NORAD like we used to. There is no form to fill in; just take the info and email it.”

‘Information should be available to everyone’

VICE World News was told to file access to information requests to glimpse what Rutkowski’s received from Canada’s government and military, and, so far, has only been able to independently verify six reports from CFB Comox. Two appear to have been left out of Rutkowski’s annual UFO survey, as was the 2018 “Mach 4” incident.

“I don’t have a problem with Chris getting this information,” freedom of information researcher Sean Holman told VICE World News. “What I do have a problem with is Canadians not getting this information.”

 Holman, who teaches journalism at Alberta’s Mount Royal University, said “these kinds of informal relationships used to exist fairly regularly” before Canada’s Access to Information Act came into effect in 1983. He suggested Canada create a “regularized system” to release UFO data, perhaps even formalizing Rutkowski’s gatekeeper role.

Such an approach would still be a far cry from the U.S., where the military has studied UFOs almost continuously since 2007, and where intelligence officials released a stunning report in June that stated these phenomena “clearly pose a safety of flight issue and may pose a challenge to U.S. national security.”

Canada doesn’t seem to be as alarmed. 

“If the government feels comfortable releasing this information to a private citizen, then that means that information should logically be available to everyone,” Holman said. “There’s a real opportunity here for Chris.”

{ https://www.vice.com/en }

24-09-2021 om 01:27 geschreven door peter