Scientists have discovered a large ancient lake bed that’s situated over a mile underneath ice in the northwestern part of Greenland. This is a huge news as it is the first ever discovery of its kind. While liquid water underneath ice has been previously found in Greenland and Antarctica, this is the first time that a fossilized lake bed with no current liquid water has been found that was formed when there wasn’t any ice in the area.

While the exact date of the lake bed is uncertain, it could be hundreds of thousands or even millions of years old. Fossils and chemical traces that should still remain in the lake bed would be exceptionally important in understanding the climate from ancient times in addition to experts predicting what may happen to the ice in the future.

Iceberg in Greenland.

But without being able to study the lake bed, it’s hard to know those exact details. “If we could get at those sediments, they could tell us when the ice was present or absent,” said Guy Paxman who is a postdoctoral researcher at Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory and the lead author of the study.

Researchers were able to find the lake bed by studying data collected from airborne geophysical equipment that was able to get images of what was underneath the thick ice. This mission was part of a project called NASA’s Operation IceBridge which is the biggest ever airborne survey of the polar ice regions. It is able to capture three-dimensional views of the Antarctic and Arctic ice sheets, sea ice, and ice shelves. The flight surveys of Antarctica normally occur in October and November, while Greenland is usually surveyed between March and May. (Pictures can be seen here.)

The largely featureless surface of the Greenland ice sheet, as seen from the window of a P3 aircraft carrying geophysical instruments aimed at detecting geologic features underneath. 

(Kirsty Tinto/Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory)

Using geophysical instruments, scientists have mapped a huge ancient lake basin (outlined here in red) below the Greenland ice, covering about 2,700 square miles). Redder colors signify higher elevations, green ones lower. A stream system incised into the bedrock that once fed the lake is shown in blue. 

(Adapted from Paxman et al., EPSL, 2020)

A newly forming lake at the edge of the Greenland ice sheet, exposing sediments released by the ice. Such lake beds are becoming common as the ice recedes. 

(Kevin Krajick/Earth Institute)

As for the ancient lake bed underneath Greenland’s ice, the lake would have been approximately 2,740 square miles with a depth of between 50 and 250 meters (164 to 820 feet). The basin’s sediments are about three quarters of a mile in thickness, while there are a minimum of 18 stream beds that were carved into an adjoining bedrock.

Greenland

The lake may have been formed along a dormant fault line or perhaps a glacier carved out the spot and water slowly filled in as it melted. As for what types of sediments may be in the lake bed, it is currently unknown although previous discoveries of pollen along the edge of the ice sheet does indicate that plants (or possibly even forests) were once in that area and remains of those could be found hidden in the sediments.

The researchers wrote in part that the basin “may therefore be an important site for future sub-ice drilling and the recovery of sediment records that may yield valuable insights into the glacial, climatological and environmental history” although they would have to drill over a mile deep.

Their study was published in the journal Earth and Planetary Science Letters where it can be read in full.

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According to new research, Jupiter’s moon Europa may glow in the dark. The glow would be caused by Jupiter’s high-energy radiation hitting Europa’s ice-filled surface.

This illustration of Jupiter's moon Europa shows how the icy surface may glow on its nightside, the side facing away from the Sun. 

Photo: NASA/JPL-Caltech

Scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in California conducted new research in order to find out how the glow would appear as well as the composition of the moon’s ice-filled surface. NASA has already confirmed salt compounds on Europa and with those combined with the water ice they would all react uniquely to the radiation as they release their own glows. Based on which compounds were reacting to the radiation, they could glow green, blue, or even white.

The research team recreated conditions similar to the surface of Europa and they created a piece of equipment called Ice Chamber for Europa’s High-Energy Electron and Radiation Environment Testing (or ICE-HEART) to see how the organic materials underneath the moon’s ice would react to radiation.

Europa

Murthy Gudipati from JPL and who is the lead author of the study explained their research further, “We were able to predict that this nightside ice glow could provide additional information on Europa’s surface composition. How that composition varies could give us clues about whether Europa harbors conditions suitable for life,” adding, “If Europa weren’t under this radiation, it would look the way our moon looks to us – dark on the shadowed side.” “But because it’s bombarded by the radiation from Jupiter, it glows in the dark.”

JPL’s Bryana Henderson who co-authored the study, weighed in by stating, “But we never imagined that we would see what we ended up seeing.” “When we tried new ice compositions, the glow looked different. And we all just stared at it for a while and then said, ‘This is new, right? This is definitely a different glow?’ So we pointed a spectrometer at it, and each type of ice had a different spectrum.”

The predicted glow will hopefully be seen and recorded when the Europa Clipper spacecraft flies by the moon while studying Jupiter. While it orbits Jupiter, the spacecraft will pass by Europa approximately 45 times with each flyby taking a different route so that almost the entire moon can be scanned and studied.

“It’s not often that you’re in a lab and say, ‘We might find this when we get there,’” Gudipati stated. “Usually it’s the other way around – you go there and find something and try to explain it in the lab. But our prediction goes back to a simple observation, and that’s what science is about.”

The spacecraft is scheduled to be launched sometime in the 2020s so we’ll have to wait a little while longer to hopefully see the glow. Until then, an illustration of what Europa’s nightside may look like while glowing can be seen here.

As for their study, it was published in Nature Astronomy where it can be read in full.

The saga of the Flying Saucer began with the pilot Kenneth Arnold, whose 24 June 1947 encounter at the Cascade Mountains, Washington State, kicked off the modern era of UFO sightings. At approximately 3:00 p.m. on the afternoon in question, Arnold was searching for an aircraft that had reportedly crashed on the southwest side of Mt. Rainier. At the time of its occurrence, Arnold’s encounter attracted the keen interest of not just the public and the media, but also that of the all-powerful Federal Bureau of Investigation. The following is a verbatim statement made by Arnold himself and taken from previously Secret FBI records of 1947 that confirm the Bureau’s deep interest in his strange encounter: “I hadn’t flown more than two or three minutes on my course when a bright flash reflected on my airplane. It startled me as I thought I was too close to some other aircraft. I looked every place in the sky and couldn’t find where the reflection had come from until I looked to the left and the north of Mt. Rainier, where I observed a chain of nine peculiar looking aircraft flying from north to south at approximately 9,500 feet elevation and going, seemingly, in a definite direction of about 170 degrees.”

Arnold stressed that the objects were approaching Mt. Rainier very rapidly and he was puzzled by their physical appearance: “I thought it was very peculiar that I couldn’t find their tails but assumed they were some type of jet plane. The more I observed these objects, the more upset I became, as I am accustomed and familiar with most all objects flying whether I am close to the ground or at higher altitudes. The chain of these saucer-like objects [was] at least five miles long.  I felt confident after I would land there would be some explanation of what I saw [sic].” No conclusive explanation for Arnold’s sighting ever surfaced, and the mystery regarding what he did or did not see has raged for more than half a century. Even the FBI – that was monitoring UFO activity in the summer of 1947 on a somewhat ad hoc basis – came away impressed by the report: “It is difficult to believe that a man of [Arnold’s] character and apparent integrity would state that he saw objects and write up a report to the extent that he did if he did not see them.”

As UFO sightings reached epidemic proportions across the USA in the summer of 1947, the military swung into action, and various studies and operations were formulated that ultimately unified into an official, investigative operation known as Project Sign. That project would, in 1948, make way for Project Grudge; and, finally, Project Blue Book. The latter continued until 1969. Collectively, the three projects concluded that no UFO sighting investigated officially had ever had a bearing on national security, and there was no evidence to indicate that any UFO sightings represented alien visitations. Of course, numerous claims, counter-claims, arguments and counter-arguments have been put forth by a variety of authors and commentators on whether or not some UFOs are indeed alien spacecraft, and whether or not elements of the US Government, military and intelligence community have systematically hidden evidence in support of that theory from the public and the media alike.

Two weeks after the encounter of Kenneth Arnold, Brigadier General George F. Schulgen, Chief of the Requirements Intelligence Branch of Army Air Corps Intelligence, met with Special Agent S.W. Reynolds of the FBI with a view to determining if the Army Air Force could solicit the assistance of the Bureau on a regular basis in its investigation of the UFO mystery. General Schulgen advised SA Reynolds that, “every effort must be undertaken in order to run down and ascertain whether or not the flying discs are a fact and, if so, to learn all about them.” An examination of the relevant files of the FBI demonstrates that, in the weeks following Arnold’s encounter of 24 June 1947, the foremost thought on General Schulgen’s mind was that the Saucers were…Russian in origin. He went further and confided in Special Agent Reynolds that, “the first reported sightings might have been by individuals of Communist sympathies with the view to causing hysteria and fear of a secret weapon [italics mine].” It was for this reason that the Army Air Force sought the FBI’s assistance.

General Schulgen guaranteed the FBI “all the facilities of [my] office as to results obtained,” and outlined a plan that would involve the FBI in both locating and questioning witnesses to UFO sightings to ascertain whether they were sincere in their statements that they had seen flying saucers, or whether their statements were prompted by “personal desire for publicity or political reasons [italics mine].” Similarly, in 1953, the Robertson Panel – a select group of consultants brought together by the CIA to look at the national security implications of the UFO controversy – recommended that a number of the public UFO investigative groups that existed in the United States at the time, such as the Civilian Flying Saucer Investigators (CFSI) and the Aerial Phenomena Research Organization (APRO), should be “watched” carefully due to “…the apparent irresponsibility and the possible use of such groups for subversive purposes [italics mine].” Indeed, the fear and concern expressed by the military, the CIA, and the FBI that implicated those in the Flying Saucer mystery had “Communist sympathies” or were following a covert, political agenda – the intention of which was “causing hysteria” and subversion – led to intense surveillance of practically anyone and everyone that delved into the subject, and particularly those that criticized the Government’s handling of the situation.

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In March of 1978, a fisherman was out by a river in in the state of Maranhão, Brazil, when his concentration was broken by screams from the nearby jungle. Alarmed, the fisherman stopped what he was doing and ventured into the thick, murky underbrush towards the desperate cries, until he came to a teenaged boy lying there upon the ground. The boy seemed to be unable to move, and even when asked who he was he could only respond with gurgled cries of pain. Whoever the boy was, he seemed to be in a sort of spaced-out daze, and considering there was blood coming from his mouth the fisherman assumed that he had been attacked by someone. When authorities arrived, the boy was taken to the hospital, and it was found that he had four missing teeth, with other teeth jagged and broken, patches of hair that appeared to have been singed off, some kind of red marks like sunburn around his ears, and by the time doctors looked at him he was in some sort of unresponsive, catatonic state. He was moved to a more modern medical facility, and only after a few days did he begin to come out of his mysterious stupor. When he did, he had quite a bizarre tale to tell, and so would begin one of the weirdest alien abduction accounts Brazil has ever seen.

It started as a normal day for 16-year old Luis Carlos Serra, who in March of 1978 was out in the wilds near his home in village of Penalva, collecting guava fruit for his family. The area was covered in thick jungle, but he had been out here many times before, and for Luis it was all rather mundane, that is until the day began to take a turn for the strange, starting with a loud noise like a siren that boomed out to reverberate among the trees. This was not a normal sound of the jungle, obviously not natural, and at first Luis thought it might be from an aircraft overhead, but when he looked up it would prove to be no normal airplane.

When Luis peered up through the canopy of trees stretching above, he felt nearly blinded by an intensely bright light. What was causing the light he could not see, but it was so brilliant it lit up the jungle floor, and as he stood there, frightened and wondering what could possible produce such a light, he suddenly found that he could not move his body. Luis would claim that something had paralyzed him, and he fell to the ground unable to move or even cry out. As he lay there helpless, the light began to sort of congeal around him, until he was enveloped by it, and that was when he felt his body lift off the forest floor into the air, as it something were pulling him upwards.

The now terrified boy continued his ascent, right up through the branches of the canopy and above the sea of jungle green, and that’s when he finally saw the source of the light. According to Luis, hovering over the jungle was a large round object with a domed top and lined by windows along its side, and it was towards this inscrutable craft that he found himself floating. He would claim that he was pulled towards the mysterious sphere, and right through one of the windows, until he was inside of it. He was then allegedly gently lowered to the floor, from which Luis looked up to see three humanoid beings in metallic suits and visors standing around him speaking in some unknown language. As he tried to comprehend what was going on, the craft began to move, and things would get even stranger still. Although his memory of the even would remain somewhat murky, he says the craft went to a place that was dark and devoid of mountains, sky, stars, and trees; just a vast expanse of some sort of strange tall grass. He was levitated back out of the craft and set down upon a clearing, and he would say of what happened:

I was taken to a strange land with no trees and only with tall grass. I do not know how long it took to get there. I went out the window just as I came in, with nothing supporting my back. I was still paralyzed. It was a strange place I did not know. It seemed like a field, but no birds or sides. The grass was very high, about one meter. I did not see any house or building. I could not see the sky, there were no trees or stars. It was very dark. I was still paralyzed. So those people approached me and put a tube in my nose. It did not hurt. Then they put a transparent ball in my mouth, and a liquid down my throat too fast. I fell asleep and did not know what happened later, I woke up in the bush.

It would not be until three days later that he would be found there by that fisherman, but it would turn out that there had been an intensive search effort to locate the boy carried out by the villagers. The incident would capture the attention of UFO researcher and journalist Bob Pratt, who would go to the region to interview Luis and other locals about what had happened, also finding out that there had been several other sightings of UFOs in the area at the time. Pratt would also interview medical personnel who had examined the boy, including a neurologist and two psychiatrists, and he even spoke with the town’s mayor, none of which had any rational explanation for his condition when found. Rather curiously, according to researcher Albert Rosales, in August of 1978 there was a sighting of three glowing humanoids in silver coveralls and round, translucent helmets in a field near Penalva, although what connection this had to Luis’ case remains unknown.

It is hard to know what to make of this bizarre case. Investigators who have looked into it deem Luis to be a perfectly rational and calm witness who has never deviated from his core story. There is nothing about him that suggests he would simply fabricate such an otherworldly tale, and no reason to suspect he ever gained anything from it. There are also the corroborating reports of other strangeness in the area, so what are we to think of all of this? Is this just tall tales mixed with local superstition and maybe a dose of minor hysteria, or is there something more to it all? For now, the strange case of Luis Carlos Serra remains an intriguing mystery that sees no concrete conclusion in sight, and it is left to the realm of speculation.