This footage was filmed in the CIC (Combat Information Center) of the USS Omaha on July 15th 2019 in a warning area off San Diego by Visual Intelligence Personnel (VIPER team). 

This RADAR data release shows four clips; multiple unknown targets (and one civilian vessel). Some of the unknown targets drop off RADAR in this footage. 

This happened numerous times throughout the UFO encounter series. At the height of the contacts - there were at least fourteen unknowns observed at one time. The event series reached a crescendo with one of the unknown targets entering the water at 11pm. No wreckage found. None of the unidentified craft were recovered. 

Transcription 

:01 “OOD if you can write a general LAT/LONG of where we’re at.” 

:03 [faint voice] “We do have some X-band RADAR tracks…” 

:05 “Yes Sir.” :06 “And then… the number of contacts you’ve got. Get the course and speed meters off 'em.” 

:09 “Copy.” 

:10 “You know what I mean? In relative position to us. And bearings. Might be helpful too.” 

:15 “Eyes up.” 

:16 “Eyes down.” 

:18 [intercom] “CSM TAO, maintain track, maintain track as best you can.” 

:24 “Track 781 just sped up to 46 knots. 50 knots. Closing in.” 

:33 “138 knots. Holy shit. They’re going fast. Oh, it’s turning around.” 

:36 “That one’s pretty much perfectly zero zero zero relative, right?” 

:39 “Yeah.” 

:40 “263 at 3 miles. 55 knots, speed.” 

*OOD (Officer of the deck) / CSM (Combat System Manager) / TAO (Tactical Action Officer) 

“The most impressive evidence we witnessed was their endurance. The event lasted over an hour with all contacts just disappearing. We were never able to discern where they departed to.” - Crewman, USS Omaha.

  

RELATED VIDEOS, selected and posted by peter2011

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

Britain's REAL X Files: Ministry of Defence could relaunch team of UFO hunters after US release Pentagon report into alien life

•  A team of UFO hunters could be relaunched by the Ministry of Defence (MoD)

•  Comes as report by Pentagon into extraterrestrial life prepares to be released

• Report from the Director of National Intelligence will be sent to the US Congress

By BHVISHYA PATEL FOR MAILONLINE

A team of UFO hunters could be relaunched by the Government to monitor the skies over Britain in the wake of a report by the US into extra-terrestrial life, a source has said.

The now-defunct Ministry of Defence division, which was axed in 2009 after nearly 60 years of official research and investigations, could once again relaunch depending on the findings of a looming Pentagon report into UFOs.

The report from the Director of National Intelligence will be sent to the US Congress next month, with an unclassified version being made available to the public. 

Pentagon officials have made clear that their real interest is in whether UFOs, or unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP), could represent actual threats here on earth.  

The release of the report could now pave the way for the Ministry of Defence's UFO desk to be revived.

A UFO team could be relaunched by the Government in the wake of a report by the Pentagon into alien life. Pictured: A doughnut-shaped phenomenon was photographed by a retired RAF officer in Sri Lanka in 2004

A colour sketch of a 'spaceship' creating crop circles was sent to the Ministry of Defence in 1998

A UFO sighting was reported to the Ministry of Defence above Stonehenge in Wiltshire in January 2009 

A source told The Telegraph: 'I think that if there was enough evidence to suggest that there was something, and that we needed to do it as well as the US, then of course we'd think about it. We'd look at it. 

'There's all sorts of things that we wouldn't rule out, and this would certainly be one of them.'  

Last August, the Pentagon formed a task force 'to detect, analyse and catalog UAPs that could potentially pose a threat to US national security.'

However an official said that many UFO sightings could be everyday objects that increasingly clutter air space such as weather balloons, metallic party balloons and amateur and professional drones.

They also said that sightings could also be of the Pentagon's own highly classified experiments and prototypes.

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Sue Gough, a Department of Defense spokesperson, said: 'The Department of Defense takes reports of incursions into our airspace - by any aircraft, identified or unidentified - very seriously, and investigates each one.

'As we collect additional data, we expect to close the gap between identified and unidentified and avoid strategic surprise regarding adversary technology.' 

Meanwhile Luis Elizondo, the former Director of Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program at the Pentagon,  said on the ABC News program 'This Week' that some of the objects that have been sighted 'can outperform anything that we have in our inventory.'

He said: 'We know that whatever it is in our skies is real. The question is, what is it? 'The bottom line is, we simply don't know.'  

Mr Elizondo added that while he hoped the report would give Congress what it needed, 180 days to produce the detailed report was not enough time.

He told CNN: 'I hope the report gives Congress what it asked for and also what it deserves and that is a current assessment of the situation.

'My only concern in 180 days is not a sufficient amount of time to provide a comprehensive report.

'When I was working at the Pentagon we did this for nearly a decade and there is a lot of information to go through. 

A unidentified flying object is spotted flying over the clock tower over Retford Town Hall in  Nottinghamshire in 2004

An object is spotted above a a Lancaster Bomber as it flies over Withernsea, East Riding of Yorkshire, in June  2002

A sketch of a UFO seen by a MoD Police Sergeant at the Royal Ordnance Factory at Blackburn, Lancashire,  in 1979 (left) and another drawing of a UFO seen near Woolwich in 2011 (right)

A drawing and description of a UFO sighting from a flight out of Heathrow in July 1993

'My fear is 180 days is not going to be long enough to provide that comprehensive report to Congress.' 

This month, defence minister Baroness Goldie said the UK 'does not have a role' in the US's Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force bit had been made 'aware' of the approaching report.     

In 2016, Nick Pope, who headed the now-defunct Ministry of Defence division for UFOs from 1991-1994, said that of the 12,000 sightings that the programme investigated, approximately 5 per cent remained unexplained. 

The former investigator said in 1980 the department were alerted to a UFO close to the Bentwaters and Woodbridge airbases.

The team later concluded that radiation levels at the site had been 'significantly higher than the average background'.

Meanwhile in 1993, multiple sightings of a UFO were reported over a period of six hours overnight in Cosford, Shropshire.      

However in 2016, the team were disbanded amid a series of financial cuts and a statement released by the department explained that the MoD 'had no opinion on the existence or otherwise of extra-terrestrial life.'

A drawing and description of a UFO sighting over Smethwick in the West Midlands that was sent to the Ministry of Defence 

The statement read: 'The MOD has no opinion on the existence or otherwise of extraterrestrial life. However, in over fifty years, no UFO report has revealed any evidence of a potential threat to the United Kingdom.'

Following the move, Mr Pope criticised the decision to close the department  without a public consultation.

He told The Sun: 'We're leaving ourselves wide open to terrorist attack.'

The investigator added: 'There has been no announcement in Parliament and no public consultation.' 

In 2019, it was revealed that NASA would scan hundreds of the nearest exoplanets in search for alien life.

The American agency announced a new partnership with SETI scientists leading the $100 million Breakthrough Listen project and said it would identify anomalies in the stellar 'light curves' and listen for 'technosignatures'.

Dr. S. Pete Worden, Executive Director of the Breakthrough Initiatives, said at the time: 'It's exciting that the world's most powerful SETI search, with our partner facilities across the globe, will be collaborating with the TESS team and our most capable planet-hunting machine.

'We're looking forward to working together as we try to answer one of the most profound questions about our place in the Universe: Are we alone?' 

{ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ }

Team of UFO Hunters in Britain Might Officially Investigate UFO Sightings Again After US Release Pentagon Report into Alien Life

The government could relaunch a team of UFO hunters to monitor the skies over Britain in the wake of a US report on space alien life, a source has revealed.

The now-defunct Ministry of Defence division, shut down in 2009 after almost 60 years of official research and investigation, could once again launch depending on the findings of the upcoming Pentagon report into UFOs.

In June, the report from the Director of National Intelligence will be sent to the US Congress. Pentagon officials have reiterated that their genuine interest is in whether these unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP) could represent actual threats on Earthy.

A source said that if there were sufficient proof to suggest that there was something and there was a need to do it, they would think about it and look at it.

Don’t forget to follow us on Instagram for the latest UFO videos & photos.

Link: instagram.com/latestufos/

In 2016, Nick Pope, who led the now-defunct Ministry of Defence division for UFOs, said that of the 12,000 sightings they investigated, around 5 per cent remained unexplained.

The team later found out that radiation levels at the site had been significantly higher than the average background. However, the team was dis

banded in 2016 amid several financial cuts. The MOD released a statement saying that no UFO report has revealed any proof of a potential threat to the UK. Mr Pope criticised the decision, which was without public consultation.

In 2019, NASA would scan hundreds of the nearest exoplanets searching for ET life with SETI scientists leading the 100 million dollars Breakthrough Listen project. The American agency announced it would identify anomalies in light curves and listen for technosignatures.

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

Huge “highway” emerges from the Pacific Ocean: a lost civilization?

Just a few days ago, after the tide had dropped sharply, a “huge highway” of the Pacific Ocean appeared from the seabed.

The images went viral immediately and theories about a lost civilization were not long in coming.

On the shores of the Russian island of Sakhalin a huge stone road emerged from the waters. Although it did not last long on the surface, it was enough for hundreds of photographs to be taken.

Is this an artificial work or a product of nature? Although there was no time to analyze it, everything indicates that it is a man-made construction.

Huge highway in the pacific ocean

The mysterious apparition surprised the inhabitants of the island in the extreme east of Russia, very close to the Japanese archipelago.

This was announced by the Institute of Alternative History and Archeology in a publication on its website.

He also explained that, through Google Earth , many other underwater formations can be found on the same coast, a little further north.

The island of Sakhalin is the largest in the entire Russian Federation and borders the Japanese islands to the south. It is located in the Ring of Fire , known for having the most important subduction zones on the planet. This causes that, generally, it receives strong seismic and volcanic activity.

Obviously, some skeptics claim that this is most likely the natural reason for the mysterious structures. However, this would only explain its “formation”, but not its creation.

The Institute of Alternative History and Archeology showed other similar structures further north

To begin with, the formations that the institute mentions are further north.

 In addition, when observing the huge road it can be seen that it is very similar to those created by ancient man , but eroded by the obvious action of the sea.

Possible lost civilization

For that reason, many people have requested that a formal geological or archaeological investigation be made of this mysterious structure. Although no institute of traditional archeology has come forward.

It should be noted that, not far from that area, on the Japanese coast, are the mysterious underwater structures of Yonaguni .

According to different researchers, these sunken constructions belonged to the lost civilization of Mu .

The huge road along the Sakhalin coast also reminds the Bimini road , the possible Atlantean remains found in the Caribbean Sea.

So far not much is known about the huge road, other than that it is quite unusual and that its appearance was short-lived.

• As long as one of the traditional institutions is not pronounced, speculation will continue. The only good thing is that since there are so many images taken at the moment, there is no possibility that they hide the fact or want to deceive us by changing their shape.

{ https://mysteriousthing.com/  }

No longer confined to the fringe, UFO theories move into the mainstream

This video grab image obtained April 28, 2020 courtesy of the US Department of Defence shows part of an unclassified video taken by Navy pilots that have circulated for years showing interactions with "unidentified aerial phenomena". 

© Handout, AFP

Text by: Monique El-Faizy

The subject of UFOs in the US is getting serious treatment from mainstream media and heavyweight politicians. Next month Congress is set to review a report from the director of national intelligence about the government’s secret files on the subject.

So serious, in fact, that they have been given a new name. No longer called UFOs, or Unidentified Flying Objects, a term often associated with people of questionable sanity, the mysterious objects that have been reported by the hundreds, are now the source of discussion in serious scientific circles and have been rebaptised with the more serious-sounding moniker Unidentified Aerial Phenomena, or UAPs.

Last June, officials made public the existence of the Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force, housed within the Office of Naval Intelligence. Six months later, the 2021 Intelligence Authorization Act asked the director of national intelligence work and the secretary of defence to put together a report detailing everything the government knows about UAPs.

The report, which Congress is expected to review in June, will draw on classified military files and will address decades of sightings and videos, which date back to the 1940s. That such objects exist is increasingly becoming gospel; Officials from former president Barack Obama to Senator Marco Rubio to former senate majority leader Harry Reid are publicly saying that earth has been visited by flying objects that we don’t understand.

"What is true – and I'm actually being serious here – is that there's footage and records of objects in the skies that we don't know exactly what they are,” Obama told “The Late Late Show” on May 17. “We can’t explain how they move, their trajectory, they did not have an easily explainable pattern.”

Also that month, the CBS magazine show “60 Minutes” interviewed two Navy pilots from the USS Nimitz who were diverted in 2004 to investigate an peculiar radar signal. They described seeing an object shaped like a Tic Tac that was able to move straight up and down at inexplicable speeds.

In the same broadcast, Christopher Mellon, who served as deputy assistant secretary of defence for intelligence under presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, said the government had observed on radar objects capable of manouvres that could not be approximated. “There’s nothing that we can build that would be strong enough to endure that amount of force in acceleration,” he said.

In an interview with Fox News a month earlier, former intelligence director John Ratcliffe said there have been far more sightings than the public is aware of and described the phenomena like this: “We are talking about objects that have been seen by Navy or Air Force pilots, or have been picked up by satellite imagery, that frankly engage in actions that are difficult to explain, movements that are hard to replicate, that we don’t have the technology for or are traveling at speeds that exceed the sound barrier without a sonic boom.”

Encounters of which kind?

The government has slowly been opening up about UAP sightings for more than a year. In April 2020 the Pentagon released three short videos showing such objects, and earlier this year Reid said the footage “only scratches the surface of research and materials available".

Reid called for further investigation. “The US needs to take a serious scientific look at this and any potential national security implications,” he said. “The American people deserve to be informed.”

French officials went public with stories of similar sightings decades ago. In 1999 a group of a dozen retired French generals and other experts issued a report called “UFOs and Defence: For What Must we Prepare Ourselves?”

What officials and scientists aren’t saying is that these are aliens coming from another planet to visit us. They simply don’t know what these objects are, they say. The discussion is still largely couched in distinctly concrete terms and centers around the concern that these craft may represent a threat from enemies here on earth.

At least one official has been willing to go further, though. In December 2020, Haim Eshed, the former head of the space directorate of the Israeli Defence Ministry, told the Yediot Aharonot newspaper that humans have been in contact with extraterrestrials and have signed a co-operation accord with them. 

Former president Donald Trump was in on the secret, he said, and had been “on the verge of revealing” it but was asked not to due to fears of “mass hysteria”.

Eshed’s assertion doesn’t seem to represent the consensus view in Israel. The chairman of the country’s Space Agency, Isaac Ben-Israel, told the Times of Israel that while the scientific community thinks the chances that there is life in outer space is “considerable, not small,” he doesn’t believe “there were any physical encounters between us and aliens".

NBC News followed up on Eshed’s statements about the agreement with aliens with the White House, Israeli officials and the Pentagon, but were unable to get a comment from any of them. A NASA spokesperson told NBC that the agency was searching for life in the universe, but had not yet found it.

Flying saucer watchers who are hoping for clear answers from the government are likely to be disappointed. While the report presented to Congress is expected to be detailed, the public will be given only the unclassified version, which is likely to be far less complete.

{ https://www.france24.com/en/ }

EEN VAN DE BESTE KANDIDATEN VOOR BUITENAARDS LEVEN HERBERGT MOGELIJK OOK ONDERZEESE VULKANEN

Vivian Lammerse

Het maakt het idee dat op de maan ooit leven ontstaan is, nog aannemelijker.

Jupiters maan Europa is een interessant exemplaar. Want áls er ergens in ons zonnestelsel leven is, zou dat volgens astronomen zomaar eens op Europa kunnen zijn. Een nieuwe studie zet die theorie nog meer kracht bij. Want uit het onderzoek blijkt dat er mogelijk heuse onderzeese vulkanen op de maan te vinden zijn.

Leven op Europa
Rond de planeet Jupiter cirkelen vele manen. Maar van al deze manen, wint de ijzige Europa het op populariteit. Astronomen zijn vooral geïnteresseerd in de maan omdat dit de beste plek is – binnen ons zonnestelsel – om op zoek te gaan naar buitenaards leven. Onderzoek suggereert namelijk dat onder de ijskorst een vloeibare oceaan te vinden is. En in die oceaan zou leven kunnen ontstaan en – doordat de ijskorst het beschermt tegen de gevaarlijke straling waarmee Europa continu gebombardeerd wordt – kunnen gedijen. Het zou dus best kunnen dat er biologisch materiaal onder het oppervlak van de maan Europa te vinden is. Een bezoekje brengen aan Europa staat dan ook al op de agenda.

Wetenschappers hebben sterke vermoedens dat Europa tussen zijn ijskoude korst en rotsachtige binnenkant in, een enorme oceaan herbergt. En nu toont het nieuwe onderzoek aan dat de maan mogelijk voldoende interne warmte genereert om deze rotsachtige laag gedeeltelijk te laten smelten. Een proces dat kan leiden tot – inderdaad – het ontstaan van onderzeese vulkanen

Hitte
Hoe het kan dat de rotsachtige mantel van Europa zo verzengend heet is? Dat heeft te maken met de enorme aantrekkingskracht die Jupiter op zijn manen heeft. Terwijl Europa rond de gasreus draait, wiebelt het binnenste van de ijzige maan een beetje. Door dit gewiebel ontstaat er energie in het binnenste van de maan, wat vervolgens als warmte naar buiten sijpelt. Hoe meer het binnenste van de maan wiebelt, hoe meer warmte er wordt gegenereerd. De studie modelleert in detail hoe het rotsachtige deel van Europa kan wiebelen en verhit wordt onder de sterke invloed van Jupiters zwaartekracht. Het laat zien waar warmte verdwijnt en hoe hierdoor de rotsachtige mantel smelt, waardoor er – vermoedelijk rond de polen – onderzeese vulkanen ontstaan.

De bevindingen van wetenschappers suggereren dat het binnenste van Jupiters maan Europa kan bestaan uit een ijzeren kern, omgeven door een rotsachtige mantel die in direct contact staat met een oceaan onder de ijskoude korst.

Afbeelding: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Michael Carroll

Het idee dat maan Europa mogelijk vulkanisch is, is overigens niet nieuw en al decennialang onderwerp van speculatie. Ter vergelijking: Jupiters maan Io is duidelijk vulkanisch. Honderden vulkanen spuwen lava uit, waarvan sommige vulkanisch as en stof tot wel 400 kilometer hoog de lucht in pompen. Dit is tevens het gevolg van dezelfde soort interne opwarming die wordt veroorzaakt door Jupiters zwaartekracht. Europa is echter verder dan Io van de gasreus verwijderd, waardoor wetenschappers zich al jarenlang afvragen of het effect vergelijkbaar kan zijn onder het ijzige oppervlak van maan Europa.

Leven
Mocht Europa inderdaad onderzeese vulkanen herbergen, dan maakt dit het idee dat op de maan ooit leven ontstaan is, nog aannemelijker. Onderwatervulkanen kunnen namelijk hydrothermische systemen aandrijven, zoals de systemen die het leven op de bodem van aardse oceanen voeden. Op aarde, wanneer zeewater in contact komt met heet magma, resulteert die interactie in chemische energie. En het is de chemische energie van deze hydrothermale systemen die – in plaats van zonlicht – het leven diep in onze eigen oceanen ondersteunt. Het betekent dat onderzeese vulkanen op Europa mogelijk op dezelfde manier het leven in de oceanen van de maan ondersteunen. “Onze bevindingen leveren aanvullend bewijs dat Europa’s ondergrondse oceaan een omgeving is die geschikt is voor het ontstaan van leven,” zegt onderzoeker Marie Běhounková. “Europa is één van de zeldzame planetaire lichamen die gedurende miljarden jaren zijn vulkanisme heeft behouden en mogelijk de enige is – buiten de aarde – met grote waterreservoirs en een langlevende energiebron.”

De wetenschappers zullen de gelegenheid krijgen om hun nieuwe voorspellingen te testen. De Amerikaanse ruimtevaartorganisatie stuurt namelijk een ruimtevaartuig naar Jupiters ijzige maan, die daar naar alle waarschijnlijkheid rond 2030 zal arriveren. De missie die Europa Clipper heet, zal tientallen scheervluchten langs Europa uitvoeren om zo meer te weten te komen over de oceaan die onder de dikke ijskorst schuilgaat. Europa Clipper zal daarnaast de zwaartekracht en het magnetische veld van de maan meten. En afwijkingen – vooral in de richting van de polen – zouden kunnen bevestigen wat door het nieuwe onderzoek wordt voorspeld. “De voorspelling van een heet, rotsachtig binnenste en onderzeese vulkanen op Europa vergroten de kans dat de uitgestrekte oceaan een bewoonbare omgeving is,” zegt onderzoeker Robert Pappalardo. “We kunnen dit testen met de geplande metingen van de zwaartekracht en de compositie van Europa Clipper. En dat is een heel opwindend vooruitzicht.”

Bronmateriaal:

• "Europa’s Interior May Be Hot Enough to Fuel Seafloor Volcanoes" - NASA
• Afbeelding bovenaan dit artikel: NASA/JPL-Caltech

{ https://www.scientias.nl/ }

A bit of a wobble! NASA's Ingenuity helicopter completes a sixth flight on Mars despite some 'unexpected motion' in the final few feet of its journey

• Ingenuity made its sixth flight on the Red Planet on May 22, NASA confirmed

• It traveled up 33ft before moving 492ft southwest at about nine miles per hour

• It travelled 49ft south while capturing images of a region of interest in the west 

• NASA says this second leg is where the system encountered stability issues

• This was caused by one missing image from the navcam that the onboard AI uses to determine where the helicopter is, how high it is and how fast it is going 

By RYAN MORRISON FOR MAILONLINE 

NASA's Ingenuity Mars helicopter has survived its sixth flight on the Red Planet, but not everyone went to plan, with some 'unexpected motion' in the final few feet.

This motion was from an 'image processing issue' but the 4lb copter 'muscled through' the final 213ft of its 703ft flight over the Martian surface, NASA JPL tweeted.

The flight happened last week, on May 22, but NASA said it would be taking more time to review each flight before releasing data after the fifth flight was over, so information on it surviving the 'wobble' weren't released until Thursday. 

Despite the issue the helicopter, currently in a new phase where it is helping Perseverance scout for locations, 'landed safely and is ready to fly again.' 

The latest trip was designed to expand the flight envelope and demonstrate aerial-imaging capabilities by taking stereo images of a region of interest to the west.

Ingenuity climbed 33ft, moved 492ft southwest at 9 mph, travelled 49ft south while capturing images towards the west, before going another 164ft to its landing site. 

Despite encountering an anomaly in flight, the helicopter landed within 16ft of the intended landing location and did so due to 'stability margins' within flight control.

The NASA team are now planning a seventh flight for the 18 inch tall drone, that will happen after they've fixed the 'timing vulnerability' that led to the in-air 'wobble'.

NASA's Ingenuity Mars helicopter has survived its sixth flight on the Red Planet, but not everyone went to plan, with some 'unexpected motion' in the final few feet 

Ingenuity arrived on Mars on February 18 strapped to the belly of the Perseverance rover, which acted as a data relay and photographer when flights first started.

The small robotic flying drone made its first flight on April 19, 2021, making history as the first powered controlled flight on another planet. 

Since then it has completed sixth successful flights, the first five as part of a 'technical demonstration' to prove something could fly on Mars, then this sixth flight was part of an extended mission support role, helping Perseverance. 

Telemetry from the sixth shows that the first 490ft leg of the flight went off without a hitch, but it was towards the end of that leg the first issue was detected.

Just over 50 seconds into the flight a glitch occurred in a pipeline of images used by the navigation system to predict the helicopters location, velocity and altitude.

This caused one single image out of hundreds to be lost, resulting in the navigation system operating from inaccurate information that caused the mid-flight wobble.  

NASA can't see this issues happening in real time due to the delay in sending data to and from the Red Planet - currently 207 million miles away from the Earth.

Scouring through the flight data after it was sent back to mission control - three hours after the helicopter landed - Ingenuity began adjusting its velocity and titling back and forth in an oscillating pattern. 

'This behaviour persisted throughout the rest of the flight,' wrote Håvard Grip, Ingenuity Mars Helicopter Chief Pilot.

'Prior to landing safely, onboard sensors indicated the rotorcraft encountered roll and pitch excursions of more than 20 degrees, large control inputs, and spikes in power consumption.' 

While airborne, Ingenuity keeps track of its motion using an onboard inertial measurement unit (IMU) - that tracks acceleration and rotation rates. 

By integrating this information over time, it is possible to estimate where it is, how fast it is moving, and how it is oriented in space. 

The onboard control system reacts to the estimated motions by adjusting control inputs rapidly - at a rate of 500 times per second.

If the navigation system relied on the IMU alone, it would not be very accurate in the long run, according to NASA JPL, who added that errors would quickly accumulate, and the helicopter would eventually lose its way. 

Ingenuity uses navcam images, like this one, to calculate where it is, how fast it is going and how high above the Martian surface it is flying

The flight happened last week, on May 22, but NASA said it would be taking more time to review each flight before releasing data after the fifth flight was over, so information on it surviving the 'wobble' weren't released until Thursday

To solve this the navigation camera sends data back into the system to correct the IMU estimates on a regular basis.

'For the majority of time airborne, the downward-looking navcams takes 30 pictures a second of the Martian surface and immediately feeds them into the helicopter’s navigation system,' NASA explained.

As the image comes in the navigation system examines the timestamp to determine when it was taken and the algorithm makes predictions about what the camera should have bee seeing based on previous sets of predictions.

This includes surface features from images taken moments before and where those features actually appear in the new image.

This shift in surface features - however tiny - allows the artificial intelligence system to predict the actual location and estimate the position of the helicopter.

One single image was lost abut 54 seconds in, meaning all future images had the wrong timestamp, meaning the AI was working from inaccurate information.

'From this point on, each time the navigation algorithm performed a correction based on a navigation image, it was operating on the basis of incorrect information about when the image was taken,' Grip said. 

'The resulting inconsistencies significantly degraded the information used to fly the helicopter, leading to estimates being constantly “corrected” to account for phantom errors. Large oscillations ensued.' 

The NASA team are now planning a seventh flight for the 18 inch tall drone, that will happen after they've fixed the 'timing vulnerability' that led to the in-air 'wobble'

Ingenuity climbed 33ft, moved 492ft southwest at 9 mph, travelled 49ft south while capturing images towards the west, before going another 164ft to its landing site

Despite encountering this anomaly, Ingenuity was able to maintain flight and land safely on the surface within approximately 16 feet of the intended landing location.

One reason it was able to do so is the considerable effort that has gone into ensuring that the helicopter’s flight control system has ample “stability margin'. 

'We designed Ingenuity to tolerate significant errors without becoming unstable, including errors in timing,' said Grip.

Despite encountering an anomaly in flight, the helicopter landed within 16ft of the intended landing location and did so due to 'stability margins' within flight control. 

They didn't need the 'stability margin' in the earlier flights as it wasn't being pushed outside the realms of what the team expected for 'normal operations'.

But during flight six Ingenuity was pushed to travel faster, harder and further than in the previous five, causing the margin of error to 'come to the rescue'.

NASA also stops using navigation cameras in the final phase of a flight - during the descent and landing - in order to ensure smooth and continuous estimates.

NASA's Perseverance Mars rover took a selfie with the Ingenuity helicopter, seen here about 13 feet (3.9 meters) from the rover. This image was taken by the WATSON camera on the rover's robotic arm on April 6, 2021

'That design decision also paid off during Flight Six,' said Grip, adding that 'Ingenuity ignored the camera images in the final moments of flight, stopped oscillating, levelled its attitude, and touched down at the speed as designed.'

Despite the issues the flight was a success, according to NASA, with rotor system, actuators and power systems responding well to increased demands. 

'In a very real sense, Ingenuity muscled through the situation, and while the flight uncovered a timing vulnerability that will now have to be addressed, it also confirmed the robustness of the system in multiple ways,' said Grip.

NASA MARS 2020: THE MISSION WILL SEE THE PERSEVERANCE ROVER AND INGENUITY HELICOPTER SEARCH FOR LIFE

NASA's Mars 2020 mission will search for signs of ancient life on the Red Planet in a bid to help scientists better understand how life evolved on Earth. 

Named Perseverance, the main car-sized rover is explore an ancient river delta within the Jezero Crater, which was once filled with a 1,600ft deep lake.

It is believed that the region hosted microbial life some 3.5 to 3.9 billion years ago and the rover will examine soil samples to hunt for evidence of the life.

Nasa's Mars 2020 rover (artist's impression) is searching for signs of ancient life on Mars in a bid to help scientists better understand how life evolved on our own planet

The $2.5 billion (£1.95 billion) Mars 2020 spaceship launched on July 30 with the rover and helicopter inside - and landed successfully on February 18, 2021.

Perseverance landed inside the crater and will collect samples that will eventually be returned to Earth for further analysis.

A second mission will fly to the planet and return the samples, perhaps by the later 2020s in partnership with the European Space Agency.

This concept art shows the Mars 2020 rover landing on the red planet via NASA's 'sky-crane' system

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The insider's guide to the Pentagon UFO report

Talking about aliens and UFOs used to get lawmakers into trouble. But now, Washington wants to believe. 

In 2017, we (along with the NY Times) broke the news that the Pentagon secretly budgeted $22 million to study UFOs in 2009 – funded by the request of then-Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.

Obviously, one of the biggest challenges here is separating fact from fiction, fantasy and wild theories. But more and more, public officials and private entities are starting to embrace a subject that once would have been fatal to their credibility.

Here’s your guide to understanding what’s going on – and what the U.S. government is doing next.

Here is the latest report just out tonight:

From the NY Post:

The US government is actually gearing up to share information about the “reality” of UFOs with the public — and not a moment too soon, says the man who claims to have run the Pentagon’s UFO program for 9 years.

Former President Donald Trump’s $2.3 trillion appropriation bill for 2021 contained a mandate that the Pentagon and spy agencies must file a report about “unidentified aerial phenomena” or UAP. Most of us just call them flying saucers or UFOs.

Whatever the jargon, noted whistleblower Luis Elizondo — former head of the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program, which operated out of the secretive fifth floor of the Pentagon’s C Ring — told The Post about the resulting blockbuster document, which is reportedly slated for release in June.

Tied to the mandate, Elizondo said the upcoming report touches down on the unexplainable. Longtime UFO believers are hungry for explanations of the tic-tac-shaped objects the Navy encountered in 2004, the strange “cubes within spheres” seen by Navy pilots in 2014, or the mysterious black triangles continually reported around the world.

Such details promise to come via the much anticipated report — and at least one evolution of belief: “I think the government has acknowledged the reality of UAP,” Elizondo exclusively told The Post, despite signing what he refers to as a “lifelong” NDA before he resigned from the Pentagon in 2017. “I think they all want answers and I think they are all willing to ask the hard questions.”

‘This is not a conversation like fine wine where the longer we keep a cork on it, the better it gets.’

During a press conference this week, Elizondo made clear that UFOs have been observed to have qualities that are nothing less than otherworldly. He described vessels flying at 11,000 miles-per-hour and being able to turn “instantly.”

Providing a comparison, he explained, for our most advanced jets going at the same speed, “if you wanted to make a right-hand turn, it would take you about half the state of Ohio to do it.”

He also detailed Spielberg-worthy operational capabilities that fall into the realm of “transmedium travel.” Elizondo explained that the eye-popping vessels can fly 50-feet above the Earth’s surface or 80,000 feet in the sky and even submerge underwater without a compromise in performance: “When you see that, you recognize you are dealing with a technology more advanced than ours.”

Even the way in which these inexplicable flying-machines manage to lift-off blows away rational engineering. “[These] things have no wings, no cockpits, no control surfaces, no rivets in the skin, no obvious signs of propulsion — and somehow they are able to defy the natural effects of Earth’s gravity,” Elizondo said. “How is that possible?”

Not only that, but Sara Carter reports that the pentagon has been testing alien material from crashes for decades (and we still don’t know what it is):

In another stunning admission the Pentagon has revealed that it has obtained and tested wreckage from Unidentified Flying Objects that have crashed on earth, according to numerous pages declassified in a Freedom of Information letter shared with The Sun media outlet.

According to a report in The Sun, Anthony Bragalia’s FOIA request to the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), which requested details of all UFO material was approved for public release. Bragalia shared the information with The Sun, which published the documents. The documents stipulate that the United States DOD has conducted tests on material that had been collected from wreckage that allegedly was not from Earth.

The discovery of advanced life outside of our planet would be the one of the biggest revelations for mankind and would literally change the way we view ourselves and our universe.

I recently interviewed Luis ‘Lue’ Elizondo, a friend and the former director of the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program (ATTIP), the secretive Pentagon unit that studied UFOs. Elizondo discussed recent unexplained encounters between the U.S. military and the UFO’s on the The Sara Carter Show. He noted that the Defense Department has been conducting research into the mysteries of what is now more commonly described as Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon, or UAPs. He also discussed the interest of other nations, including the recent admissions of senior Russian military officials who say Moscow is studying the same phenomenon and that there is concern that these crafts are interested in our Earth’s nuclear capabilities.

{ https://www.politico.com/ }

Extraterrestrial civilizations: “Several have existed in the galaxy” (Video)

A new study reveals that a large number of extraterrestrial civilizations have populated our galaxy for millions of years.

It’s strange that NASA reports things related to aliens . However, his new study has yielded an almost definitive conclusion: civilizations existed in our galaxy for billions of years.

The study was conducted by scientists at the California Institute of Technology and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

Alien civilizations in the galaxy

According to the results of the study, this event occurred around 8 billion years in the past. After the Milky Way formed.

This means that our galaxy has hosted different extraterrestrial civilizations old that were destroyed or destroyed themselves .

Research published on arxiv.org reveals that the best time for intelligent life to appear in our Milky Way had to be at least 8,000 years after its formation. Experts believe that such a phenomenon occurred about 13 thousand light years from the center of the galaxy .

To reach this conclusion, Xiang Cai, Jonathan H. Jiang, Kristen A. Fahy, and Yuk L. Yung used different statistical models, showing them the best time for intelligent life to be born.

This according to different parameters, which include well-established astrophysical properties of the Milky Way and other factors, which are not commonly taken into account, such as the process of abiogenesis .

Abiogenesis is the creation of life from inanimate substances . This process is considered the most probable path towards the birth of life .

Three main parameters of civilizations

Thanks to mathematical models, where it is assumed that life is possible in stars similar to the Sun, with planets similar to Earth , life could appear through the Poisson Process or abiogenesis.

The different evolutionary time scales and the self – annihilation of the species were also taken into account .

The study revealed that self-annihilation is the main factor in determining the amount of time an alien civilization can exist in our galaxy.

In addition, results were obtained, on a location for intelligent extraterrestrial life in an annular region, approximately 8 billion light years away , with complex life; decreasing temporally and spatially from the peak point. Thus, a high probability of intelligent life is confirmed in the inner disk of the Milky Way.

Obviously, the simulated age distributions also suggest that most intelligent life is young . It is for that reason that it is so difficult to observe or detect it.

• Is it possible to assure that we are not the only intelligent civilization that has existed in the Milky Way? This study brings us closer to the truth of our origins and the possibility that other civilizations exist alongside us.

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{ https://mysteriousthing.com/ }

There have been several prehistoric species that have been found recently, so let’s take a look at four of them.

The remains of a 95-million-year-old dinosaur found in Eromanga, Queensland, are believed to be from an entirely new species. Robyn Mackenzie, who is a Director and Palaeontologist for the Eromanga Natural History Museum, told 9News.com.au that “…it’s most probably going to be the nation’s youngest dinosaur.” She went on to say that this presumably new species was a type of plant-eating dinosaur called a sauropod.

So far, the researchers found vertebrae bones but are hoping to find more as they continue to dig around the site. A picture of the bone can be seen here.

Robyn Mackenzie, Director and palaeontologist for the Eromanga Natural History Museum, holds up a dinosaur bone. 

(Dan Llewellyn/Eromanga Natural History Museum)

(Not the sauropod found in Queensland)

Moving over to an Egyptian desert now, the remains of numerous fish that lived 56 million years ago were able to survive in hot water. The ancient fish lived in waters that reached temperatures of around 95 degrees Fahrenheit (35 degrees Celsius). The fossils belonged to over 12 groups of bony fish that included percomorph acanthomorphs (this group includes bass, bluegills, and walleye), moonfish from the Mene genus, bonytongues, and hatchetfish.

Over 60 bones belonged to the Mene – a genus that is still around today and lives in certain areas of the Pacific and Indian oceans. To put this into better perspective, the seasonal average water temperature of the Pacific Ocean is anywhere between 43 and 87 degrees Fahrenheit (6 to 31 degrees Celsius) and the Indian Ocean’s seasonal average temperature is between 68.7 and 86.4 degrees Fahrenheit (20.4 to 30.2 degrees Celsius).

Pictures of the fish can be seen here.

The moonfish Mene (pictured) was the most common fossil found at the site, with more than 60 specimens discovered

A modern day Mene, which lives in the Pacific and Indian oceans in tropic and subtropic regions

A percomorph, a member of the same group that includes familiar Michigan species such as walleye and perch, from Ras Gharib A

Paleontologists from Mansoura University Vertebrate Paleontology Center (pictured) helped excavate the area

The fossils were found in dark-gray shale in a site in the Eastern Desert known as Ras Gharib A, roughly 200 miles southeast of Cairo

Now onto a much colder area, the first ever fossil of an amphibian was unearthed in Antarctica. Named Micropholis stowi, this salamander-sized amphibian lived during the Early Triassic Period (around 250 million years ago).

The Micropholis stowi was about the size of a salamander.

The majority of Micropholis stowi fossils have been found in South Africa so the one found in Antarctica is pretty significant in regards to learning how they were able to adapt to high-latitude environments. When this species was alive, Earth had a large landmass called Pangea which brought Antarctica and South Africa much closer together than they are today. Furthermore, it’s possible that they had similar temperatures which would make sense for the amphibian to travel from one place to the other and that it was probably great at adapting to many different types of habitats. A picture of the Micropholis stowi remains can be seen here.

And finally, a rare fossil belonging to an extinct marine reptile was found in the Havarim Stream in Israel’s southern Negev Desert and dates back approximately 70 million years. Researchers uncovered 16 vertebrae, a jawbone, and additional bones beneath a rock in the stream. It is believed that the remains were from a type of Mosasaurus that once inhabited the Tethys Ocean which is no longer present. They became extinct along with the dinosaurs around 66 million years ago.

{ https://mysteriousuniverse.org/ }

{ https://www.hln.be/ }

Alex Jones & Steven Greer: Are Extraterrestrials Fallen Angels?

The work that medical doctor, researcher and author Steven Greer continues to do through the organization CSETI has made some tremendous breakthroughs in establishing contact with an intelligent phenomena, often perceived as UFOs, Light Phenomena and strange looking entities.

Steven demonstrates that there is a conscious connection being established with this phenomena and on many occasions they are being caught on camera.

{ https://beforeitsnews.com/ }

Ancient Viking Sailboat in Utah Desert at 6,000 Feet Elevation, This Changes History

Ancient Viking Sailboat in Utah Desert at 6,000 Feet Elevation, This Changes History

We find evidence of a Viking sail boat in Utah by Fry Canyon about 1200 years ago.

Is this really Viking History? Let us know what you think in the comments section and thanks for stopping by.

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{ https://beforeitsnews.com/ }

These Crazy UFO Events Have the World on Edge! 2021

These Crazy UFO Events Have the World On EDGE! BUCKLE-UP 2021

Incredible capture of the craft it’s not a drone love how the guy whistles X-Files South America once again with UFO footage that’s hard 2 debunk keep your eyes in the skies we are not alone great video guys.

At 7:58 Sylvester Stallone sees a UFO ! IT SOUNDS JUST LIKE HIM LOL ! I was expecting him to say ” yo Adrian wake up !!

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{ https://beforeitsnews.com/ }

LATEST UFO SIGHTINGS AND VIDEOS - 30-05-2021

UFOs Sighted Over Newport, Rhode Island ( March 30, 2021 )

STATEMENT : This is my first major event. I had a couple of weird things happen in this area a few times prior, but I never had my phone ready, & I definitely didn't have anything happen like what I witnessed this day
There's a lot going on here much of which I didn't even notice until I went back & watched. There were many more crafts than I realized

• credit : Shawn Carter :
• Submitted : May 29, 2021 

UFO Sighted Over Campo Grande, Brazil ( May 27, 2021 )

UFOs Sighted Over Outer Banks, North Carolina ( May 17, 2021 )

STATEMENT : Just after sunset on May 17, 2021 a very large bright white orb of light appeared in the southern sky We were walking away from viewing the sunset on the beach when someone in our party had a strange sensation that caused her to turn back towards the water where she spotted these lights in the sky.

ORIGINAL VIDEO OWNER : Lucid Sightings

ORIGINAL VIDEO URLS :

VIDEO 1 : https://youtu.be/V_QnkNnovyM 

VIDEO 2 : https://youtu.be/RgnIo8vXt7s 

VIDEO 3 : https://youtu.be/fBJ9G7lMry

RELATED VIDEOS:

USO Sighted In Miami-Dade, Florida ( May 28, 2021 )

USO : Unidentified submerged object : Miami-Dade County, Florida : May 28, 2021 :This Unidentified Submerged Object : USO : is an Unidentified Object Submerged in water. The term does not necessarily refer to an object of Paranormal origin.

• credit : ONLY in DADE

Cylinder Shaped UFO Recorded From Passing Passenger Plane!

Comparison Of two cylinder shaped UFO that were recorded from passing passenger plane!

Video source 1. YouTube channel Jack J

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0UdZ...

Video source 2. Terry's Theories and MUFON

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M3hFX..

{  https://www.youtube.com/ }

Dark UFO Over Maderia beach, Florida On May 23, 2021, UFO Sighting News.

Date of sighting: May 23, 2021

Location of sighting: Maderia Beach, Florida, USA

Source: MUFON report

 

This short clip was just sent in today. The clip is 1 min and 12 seconds and shows a craft tilting slightly and seems to be a UFO in a thick almost pentagon shaped craft. The object was seen during sunset and flew over the ocean and suddenly disappeared from sight. Its highly likely the UFO took a nose dive into the ocean so that it could better hide from the camera recording it. UFOs can travel under water as easily as they travel in space. 

Scott C. Waring - Taiwan

 

Eyewitness states: 

Object flew west to east and disappeared about 500 feet above ocean. Object suddenly appeared flew by for a couple minutes and then disappeared.

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

7 UFOs Over Palm Beach, Florida, Google Earth Map, UFO Sighting News.

Date of event: December 2002
Location of sighting: Palm Beach, Florida, USA

 

Now I promised last year that when I get to 50k subscribers on Youtube than I would release something special to me. Something I have been holding back for 19 years. I discovered these seven UFOs many years ago, but decided to archive screenshots, locations and videos of them in case they were deleted. It was 3 years before the invention of Youtube. A few months later the UFOs disappeared from google map. Little did I realize then that in the future Google would place a time button on the map, allowing us to go back and find these objects again. So...here I am...making good with my promise to the public. A man is only as good as his word. 

 

I have said many times over the years that Florida has an alien base that runs from the ocean to under parts of Florida itself. This video of these 7 UFOs are 100% proof of that. I mean two of the UFOs are actually materializing through the ground and have shadows on the from the trees nearby. The UFOs are each 60 meters across and all the same shape, but a few are tilted. All have a myst fuzziness around them, due to the propulsion systems. Most UFO reports from eyewitnesses state that they see a myst or fuzziness around the UFOs. This concurs with those reports. 

Scott C. Waring - Taiwan 

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

19 FASCINERENDE WEETJES OVER ONS ZONNESTELSEL

Tim Kraaijvanger

Wist je dat een dag op aarde steeds langer duurt? En dat maan Charon van Pluto een mega-Grand Canyon heeft van 1600 kilometer lang? 19 fascinerende weetjes over ons eigen zonnestelsel.

#1 Een dag op Venus duurt langer dan een jaar op Venus
Onlangs is bekend geworden dat een dag op Venus 243 aardse dagen lang is. Een jaar op Venus duurt 224,6 aardse dagen. Daarnaast varieert de rotatiesnelheid van Venus. De afwijking bedraagt ongeveer twintig minuten. Mogelijk is de variërende rotatiesnelheid te wijten aan de dikke atmosfeer. Terwijl de atmosfeer rond de planeet ‘klotst’, gaat deze een wisselwerking aan met de vaste grond, waardoor de planeet wisselend sneller en langzamer ronddraait. Dit gebeurt trouwens ook op aarde, maar dit leidt slechts tot een variatie van een luttele milliseconde per dag. Het effect is dus vele malen groter op Venus. En dat is ook niet zo gek, aangezien de luchtdruk op Venus negentig keer hoger is dan op aarde.

#2 Haaien zijn ouder dan de ringen van Saturnus
Haaien zwemmen zo’n 400 miljoen jaar in de oceanen op aarde, terwijl de ringen van Saturnus slechts vijftien tot 150 miljoen jaar oud zijn. De ringen rondom Saturnus zijn waarschijnlijk ontstaan toen een grote maan vernietigd is. Daarom bestaan de ringen van Saturnus uit ontelbaar veel kleine gas- en stofdeeltjes. De ringen zijn overigens ook niet zo ‘zwaar’ als we denken. Alle gas- en stofdeeltjes bij elkaar vormen veertig procent van de massa van het kleine maantje Mimas van Saturnus. Deze maan heeft een diameter van 397 kilometer.

#3 Het grootste schaalmodel van ons zonnestelsel vind je in Zweden
Het zonnestelsel is veel leger dan je denkt. Bezoek de Pixelspace van Josh Worth maar eens. In dit digitale schaalmodel is de maan van de aarde precies één pixel groot. Vervolgens kun je horizontaal scrollen om te zien hoe groot de afstanden zijn tussen de verschillende planeten. Of reis naar Zweden, waar je ‘s werelds grootste schaalmodel van het zonnestelsel kunt zien. De schaal is 1 op 20 miljoen. De zon is het grootste object en dat is de Avicii Arena in Stockholm: met een diameter van 110 meter het grootste bolvormige gebouw ter wereld.

De Globe (Avicii Arena) is de zon in het Zweedse schaalmodel van het zonnestelsel.

Neptunus (diameter 2,5 meter) is te vinden bij de rivier Söderhamnsån in Söderhamn op een afstand van 229 kilometer van de Globe.

De dwergplaneet Sedna is 912 km verwijderd van de Globe (de zon) en is te vinden in het stadje Luleå.

#4 Alle planeten passen precies tussen de aarde en de maan
Wist je dat alle planeten in ons zonnestelsel precies tussen de aarde en de maan passen? De gemiddelde afstand van de aarde naar de maan is ongeveer 385.000 kilometer. Jupiter heeft een diameter van 139.820 kilometer, Saturnus 120.000 kilometer, Uranus 50.700 kilometer, Neptunus 49.200 kilometer, Venus 12.104 kilometer, Mars 6.779 kilometer en tenslotte Mercurius 4.880 kilometer. Bij elkaar is dat iets meer dan 383.000 kilometer. Je houdt dus nog een klein beetje ruimte over, maar het past net. Benieuwd hoe dat eruit zou zien vanaf het aardoppervlak? Nogal indrukwekkend! Bekijk de video hieronder maar eens.

#5 Venus en Uranus draaien als enige planeten met de klok mee
Venus en Uranus draaien met de klok mee om hun as, in plaats van tegen de klok in, zoals alle andere planeten. Stel, je zou op Venus naar een zonsopgang kijken – wat overigens onmogelijk is door het dikke wolkendek – dan gaat de zon in het westen op. Wetenschappers denken dat Venus en Uranus tijdens het ontstaan van het zonnestelsel door een groot object of meerdere kleine objecten zijn geraakt, waardoor de planeten de andere kant op zijn gaan draaien. Dit zou verklaren waarom de manen rondom Uranus wel gewoon tegen de klok in draaien. Een andere verklaring is dat Venus ooit tegen de klok draaide, toen later bijna tot stilstand kwam en daarna de andere kant op draaide. Daarom draait Venus vandaag de dag nog steeds heel langzaam om haar as en duurt een dag op Venus 225 aardse dagen. Als deze theorie klopt, dan komt dit waarschijnlijk doordat de zon aan de dichte atmosfeer aan de warme (dagkant) van Venus trekt en zo atmosferische getijden creëert die de rotatierichting en -snelheid beïnvloeden.

#6 Op Titan zijn er meren van methaan en ethaan
De maan Titan van Saturnus heeft meren, rivieren en zelfs regenbuien. Daarmee heeft deze maan wel iets weg van de aarde… toch? Niet helemaal. In plaats van water regent het vloeibaar methaan en ethaan op Titan. Omdat de temperatuur op Titan laag is – de maan bevindt zich op flinke afstand van de zon – kan methaan en ethaan in principe in vloeibare vorm op het oppervlak van de maan voorkomen.

De meren op Titan, gefotografeerd door de Cassini-ruimtesonde.

#7 Een dag op aarde duurt steeds langer
De aarde draait steeds langzamer om haar as. Toen de aarde nog geen maan had, waren de dagen op onze planeet slechts twee tot drie uur lang. 600 miljoen jaar geleden duurde een dag op aarde 21 uur, honderd miljoen jaar geleden ongeveer 23 uur en inmiddels dus 24 uur. Dit komt doordat de zwaartekracht van de maan de aarde afremt. De maan en de aarde trekken aan elkaar. En omdat de aarde sneller om de as draait (in 24 uur) dan de maan om de aarde draait (27,3 dagen) schiet dat getrek vanuit het oogpunt van de aarde gezien niet erg op. Vergelijk het met een hardloper die een flinke schildpad met zich mee probeert te trekken. De schildpad kan niet zo hard en zal de hardloper ophouden. Zo houdt ook de maan de aarde op en zorgt ervoor dat onze planeet langzamer gaat draaien. Dat gaat heel geleidelijk. Zo geleidelijk dat we daar in de praktijk niets van zullen merken. Over zo’n honderd jaar is een dag op aarde ongeveer twee milliseconden langer dan nu het geval is. Het afremmen stopt wanneer de lengte van één dag op aarde gelijk is aan één maand op de maan.

#8 Grootste maan is groter dan kleinste planeet
De grootste maan in ons zonnestelsel is Ganymedes (Jupiter). Wist je dat Ganymedes groter is dan de kleinste planeet Mercurius? Ganymedes heeft een diameter van 5.262 kilometer. Mercurius is iets kleiner met een diameter van 4.880 kilometer.

Mercurius is kleiner dan de twee grootse manen (Ganymedes en Titan), maar groter dan onze eigen maan.

#9 De zon is 4,6 triljoen keer zwaarder dan alle mensen bij elkaar
De zon bevat 99,86% van de massa van het volledige zonnestelsel. De buitenste waterstoflagen van de zon zijn goed voor 70 procent van de totale massa van het zonnestelsel, gevolgd door helium (28 procent). Onze planeet bevat 0,0003% van de massa van het volledige zonnestelsel. De 7,7 miljard mensen op aarde vormen slechts 0,00000000005% van de totale massa van onze planeet. De Britse wetenschapper Peter Makin beweert dat de aarde 14.000 miljard keer zwaarder is dan alle mensen bij elkaar. De zon is 332.946 keer zwaarder dan de aarde, dus de zon is ruwweg 4,6 triljoen (4.661.244.000.000.000.000) keer zwaarder dan alle mensen bij elkaar.

#10 Als de zon stopt met schijnen, merken wij daar (even) niets van
Het duurt ongeveer een seconde voordat het licht van de maan je netvlies raakt. Licht reist namelijk met een snelheid van 300.000 kilometer per seconde. De afstand van de zon naar de aarde is acht lichtminuten. Stel, de zon zou nu stoppen met schijnen, dan zouden wij dat pas acht minuten later merken.

#11 Grand Canyon is een lachertje in vergelijking met deze kloof op Charon
Grand Canyon? Dat is niets vergeleken met de kloof op de maan Charon van Pluto. Het complete klovensysteem op Charon is meer dan 1600 kilometer(!) lang en op sommige plekken twee keer zo diep als de Grand Canyon op aarde. Dit litteken is duidelijk te zien vanuit de ruimte. Ruimtesonde New Horizons heeft een prachtige foto gemaakt van Charon waarop het enorme klovensysteem van de maan goed zichtbaar is.

Het klovensysteem op de maan Charon van Pluto.

#12 De ringen van Saturnus hebben herders
Saturnus heeft herdermanen. De bekendste herdermanen zijn Pan, Daphnis, Prometheus en Pandora. Deze herders houden met hun zwaartekracht de stofdeeltjes in de ringen van Saturnus bij elkaar. Daarnaast zorgen zij voor de scheidingen van de ringen. Ze maken namelijk hun eigen baan stofvrij.

Het maantje Daphnis is te vinden in de Keeler Gap in de A-ring. De zwaartekracht van Daphnis veroorzaakt lichte rimpelingen in de ringen.

Een beter beeld van de rimpelingen die Daphnis veroorzaakt.

#13 Er draait een vliegende schotel om Saturnus
Gekkigheid natuurlijk, maar de herdermaan Pan heeft wel iets weg van een vliegende schotel. Deze maan heeft deze bijzondere vorm gekregen door botsingen met andere objecten.

#14 De ringen van Saturnus verdwijnen over honderd miljoen jaar
De ringen van Saturnus zullen de komende miljoenen jaren langzaam verdwijnen. De zwaartekracht van Saturnus trekt aan de gas- en stofdeeltjes. Ieder half uur verdwijnt er een olympisch zwembad gevuld met gas- en stofdeeltjes. Dit betekent dat de ringen nog ongeveer honderd miljoen jaar te zien zijn. “We hebben geluk dat we Saturnus met ringen zien, want de ringen zijn maar tijdelijk zichtbaar”, zegt wetenschapper James O’Donoghue van NASA. Daar heeft hij een punt, want Saturnus is al ruim vier miljard jaar oud en heeft dus 98% van haar leven geen ringen gehad.

#15 De aarde heeft meer dan één maan
Onze aarde heeft op elk moment minimaal twee manen. Asteroïden komen regelmatig in de buurt van de aarde. En soms komen ze zo dichtbij dat de zwaartekracht van de aarde ze vasthoudt. Ze gaan daarop als een natuurlijke satelliet (of maan) in een baan rondom de aarde draaien. Zo cirkelt het piepkleine maantje 2020 CD3 al vanaf 2017 om de aarde. Gelukkig is de kans dat deze tijdelijke manen inslaan redelijk klein. Slechts 0,1 procent van alle meteorieten die op aarde zijn ingeslagen bevonden zich tijdelijk in een baan rondom de aarde.

#16 Stukjes Mars zijn op aarde gevallen
Wist je dat er stukjes Mars op aarde zijn gevallen? Dankzij deze Marsmeteorieten kunnen wetenschappers veel leren over de rode planeet. Maar hoe komen die stukjes Mars eigenlijk hier terecht? Door meteorietinslagen op Mars! Als een grote meteoriet inslaat op Mars, dan worden er brokstukken de ruimte in geslingerd. Deze brokstukken vallen niet altijd terug op de planeet, maar reizen door het zonnestelsel en komen soms in botsing met andere planeten, zoals de aarde. Ieder decennium vallen er honderden maan- en Marsmeteorieten op aarde. De bekendste Marsmeteoriet is ALH84001. Deze meteoriet is in 1984 gevonden op Antarctica. De meteoriet werd wereldberoemd, omdat NASA dacht dat deze meteoriet het bewijs zou zijn voor leven buiten de aarde. Dit bleek later niet te kloppen.

Marsmeteoriet ALH84001 weegt 1,9 kilo.

#17 De Grote Rode Vlek op Jupiter is één van de oudste stormen in ons zonnestelsel
Deze storm op Jupiter is al voor het eerst gezien in 1665. Vervolgwaarnemingen in de jaren zeventig – door Voyager 1 en Voyager 2 – onthulden dat het om een orkaan-achtig wervelfenomeen (een vortex) gaat dat door een roodkleurig wolkendek aan het zicht onttrokken wordt. De afgelopen decennia kromp de Grote Rode Vlek van 25.000 kilometer naar 16.500 kilometer, maar het ziet er gelukkig niet naar uit dat de eeuwenoude storm op Jupiter gaat verdwijnen.

#18 Farfarout is het meest afgelegen bekende object in het zonnestelsel
Het Kuipergordelobject Farfarout is 400 kilometer groot en doet duizend jaar over een rondje om de zon. De gemiddelde afstand van Farfarout tot de zon is zo’n 132 AU, oftewel 132 keer de afstand van de aarde naar de zon. Dat komt neer op twintig miljard kilometer. Hiermee is het hemellichaam dus zo’n vier keer verder van de zon verwijderd dan Pluto. Daarnaast volgt Farfarout een zeer langgerekte baan. Op het verste punt is het object grofweg 175 AU van de zon verwijderd, op het dichtstbijzijnde punt bedraagt die afstand ‘slechts’ 27 AU. En dat is interessant, want het betekent dat Farfarout soms dichter bij de zon in de buurt komt dan planeet Neptunus.

De afstanden van de bekende hemellichamen in ons zonnestelsel tot de zon. Zoals je ziet staat Farfarout op een immense afstand van onze moederster.

Afbeelding: NOIRLab/NSF/AURA/J. da Silva

#19 Het zonnestelsel racet om het centrum van de Melkweg
De planeten draaien om de zon, maar wist je dat ons zonnestelsel om het centrum van de Melkweg draait met een snelheid van 200 kilometer per seconde? We racen door de Melkweg, waarbij één rondje ongeveer 225 miljoen jaar duurt. Sommige sterren om ons heen reizen sneller of langzamer en dit betekent dat de sterrenhemel continu verandert. Ieder sterrenbeeld ziet er over miljoenen jaren weer anders uit.

Aangezien we niet iedere 225 miljoen jaar een feestje kunnen geven, besloot softwareontwikkelaar David Sneider Galactic Tick Day in het leven te roepen. Op Galactic Tick Day vieren we niet het feit dat we een volledig rondje om de Melkweg afleggen, maar dat we één centi-arcseconde verder zijn. Iedere 633,7 dagen – of 1,7361 jaar – schuift de aarde één centi-arcseconde op. Eén centi-arcseconde is één 129.600.000ste deel van een volledige reis om het centrum van de Melkweg, oftewel 0,0000077 procent. De eerste Galactic Tick Day was op 2 oktober 1608, toen de Nederlandse brillenmaker Hans Lippershey het patent van de eerste telescoop aanvroeg. Op 15 december 2021 vieren we de 238ste Galactic Tick Day.

Bronmateriaal:

• Archief van Scientias.nl
• Afbeelding bovenaan dit artikel: Pixaby 

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