‘What I saw that night was real’: is it time to take aliens more seriously?

‘I don’t know if I was abducted by aliens or not. The whole point of my work is to describe what happened to me’: Whitley Strieber. 

Illustration: Ana Yael

The Pentagon has been quietly investigating unidentified flying objects since 2007. The fact that they think they might exist is good news to those who claim to have seen them.

‘I don’t know if I was abducted by aliens or not. The whole point of my work is to describe what happened to me’: Whitley Strieber.

Illustration: Ana Yael

The Pentagon has been quietly investigating unidentified flying objects since 2007. The fact that they think they might exist is good news to those who claim to have seen them

In June, the US government published a long-awaited report into UFOs. Although the report did not, as many had hoped, admit to the existence of little green men, it did reveal that not only were objects appearing in our skies that the Pentagon – which controls the US military – could not explain, but some clearly pose “a safety of flight issue and may pose a challenge to US national security”.

The Pentagon also revealed that it has been taking UFOs so seriously that in 2007 it discreetly set up the Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program (AATIP), which has been gathering data on Unexplained Aerial Phenomena (UAPs) ever since.

The unclassified version of the report (there was also a classified version seen only by US lawmakers) found “no clear indications that there is any non-terrestrial explanation” for the sightings. But neither did it rule it out. The report offered five typically mundane possible explanations for the UFOs and, crucially, one catch-all “other” bin.

It’s that “other” bin that has arrested the attention of stargazers and conspiracy theorists. If the US military has been quietly and seriously investigating UFOs (or, as the Pentagon would have it, UAPs) since 2007, and if the Pentagon’s official report cannot rule out the existence of extraterrestrials, is it time we looked again at claims of close encounters and the people who have made them?

Enthusiasm for UFOs and ETs has permeated popular culture ever since a US air force balloon crashed near Roswell in 1947. Conspiracy theorists confused the balloon for a UFO; the US government did a lousy job debunking those claims, and they quickly captured the public’s imagination. Fast forward to 1961, when Barney and Betty Hill told the world’s first alien abduction story.

Andrew Abeyta, professor of psychology at Rutgers University, co-authored We Are Not Alone, a study into why some of us want to believe in aliens. Abeyta explains that belief in aliens is akin to religiosity: unfounded beliefs in unfalsifiable ideas, which require a leap of faith. “People have a need to feel like their lives are meaningful, and these beliefs might suggest that there’s something bigger out there; there’s something more important going on,” Abeyta says

I tell Abeyta about an interview I carried out with a young man in Florida. The man, who did not want to be named, described an ambiguous close encounter that took place during his sleep. When I asked him what he preferred the truth to be – a real encounter or merely a vivid dream – the young man said he would prefer it to be true because that would mean he was “special”.

“I can imagine being a protagonist in an alien-abduction story seems pretty meaningful, like a meaningful achievement, an accomplishment,” Abeyta says. That feeling of specialness plays an important role in these stories. “Feeling like your unexplained experience is a result of an alien abduction just seems more exciting and more important than a natural explanation.”

Still, the topic of alien encounters remains sensitive. I discovered just how sensitive when author Whitley Strieber, who some claim was abducted by non-humans in 1985, terminated our call after learning that I had not read his books. In a subsequent email, he wrote: “I don’t know if I was abducted by aliens or not. The whole point of my work is to describe what happened to me and attempt to understand what it was. I was turned into ‘alien abductee Whitley Strieber’ by the media. That is not my position.” He added: “You are lost in space when it comes to this subject, my friend – all of you.”

After I got off on the wrong foot with Strieber, though, he did come back and introduce me to highly decorated former US navy cryptologist Matthew Roberts. He was stationed on the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt when fighter jets recorded the infamous “Gimbal” and “Go Fast” videos of unexplained objects off the Florida coast during 2015, which went a long way to prompting the Pentagon’s UFO report.

Now retired from the military, Roberts is unmoved by the debunkers. “These things are picked up by multiple sensors that are sometimes from different manufacturers, so to think that they would all be glitching in the same way at the same time would just be impossible – it just doesn’t happen that way.”

Mick West, a science writer and video game programmer turned conspiracy-theory debunker, offers his own, more down-to-earth explanations for the objects: arguing that mundane things – tech glitches, camera glare, balloons and birds – are more likely than aliens.

However, now even the Pentagon has conceded there’s more to UFOs than that. In its nine-page report it states: “Most of the UAP reported probably do represent physical objects given that a majority of UAP were registered across multiple sensors, to include radar, infrared, electro-optical, weapon seekers and visual observation.” In other words, there was something out there and the images were not technical glitches. I ask Roberts about a theory put forward by West that the Gimbal object was glare caused by a nearby aircraft. “All aircraft – nationally, internationally – have to broadcast who they are. If they’re not broadcasting that, that’s very unusual. Mick West, bless his soul, he has never been in the military,” he says.

Roberts explains that, after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, unidentified air tracks escalate very quickly. “It will go to the captain, it will go to the admiral, and they’ll want to know what that is because the thought would immediately be: ‘Is this a commercial airliner? Has it been hijacked?’ We’re not as incompetent as Mick West would have you believe. If something is unidentified, it absolutely has to be identified immediately.”

Despite the debunkers and proliferation of more mundane explanations for UFOs, reports of close encounters have persisted for decades. Terry Lovelace, a retired assistant attorney general in Vermont, USA, and author of Incident at Devil’s Den, kept his abduction to himself for 40 years due to fear of losing his job. He had a close encounter in 1977 while serving in the US air force.

Lovelace, now 67, was on a camping trip in Devil’s Den national park in northern Arkansas with a friend and colleague named Toby when things got strange. They were sitting around a fire, struggling to chat over the din of buzzing crickets and croaking tree frogs before everything went quiet. “That sounds kind of clichéd – out of a movie – but that is exactly what happened to us,” he says.

Three bright lights appeared on the horizon and moved in their direction. When the lights were overhead, they could see that they were emanating from a black triangular prism as wide as two city blocks.

A blue laser beam darted over them, which Lovelace thought was scanning them. When it shut off, they became sleepy. Next thing, he woke and saw Toby peering out of the tent. The triangle was hovering above what appeared to be a dozen children standing in a meadow below them. “What are these kids doing out here in the middle of the night?” said Lovelace.

“They aren’t little kids. Don’t you remember they took us and they hurt us?” Toby answered.

Lovelace says the moment Toby said that, fragmented memories of being inside the UFO flashed in his mind. Years later, hypnosis helped him fill in more blanks and he recalled actually encountering creatures while inside the UFO.

‘People who were previously disbelieved and ridiculed should be listened to and given a hearing’, says Nick Pope. 

Illustration: Ana Yael

For some, the fact that the Pentagon has finally admitted it cannot explain the behaviour of the objects may have been a surprise but, for PC Alan Godfrey, 73, it merely proves what he already knows.

On a windswept and wet West Yorkshire evening in November 1980, Godfrey was in hot pursuit of a herd of escaped cows in Todmorden’s housing estate. Instead of cows, he stumbled across a giant levitating diamond that would change the course of his life. Godfrey’s close encounter with this UFO went viral worldwide and transformed Todmorden into Britain’s Roswell.

Godfrey, a no-nonsense Yorkshireman born and raised in Oldham, is long retired from the force but still recalls the events of that night when he came face to face with the peculiar object – a diamond-shaped aircraft hovering 5ft off the ground while spinning on its axis.

He just had time to sketch the UFO on his notepad before he was blinded. In his next moment of conscious awareness, he was sitting in his patrol car. The UFO was gone. “I got out of the car, looked at the road surface, and it was like a whirlpool,” he says. The UFO’s rapid revolutions had arranged the dead leaves, twigs and other debris into an autumn-themed spiral.

In the aftermath of his encounter, he had visits from the Ministry of Defence, correspondence from a Russian scientist and interest from the world’s press. He even underwent hypnosis to uncover memories of his abduction.

Godfrey was ridiculed for years – many who claim to have had encounters with UFOs are reluctant to go on the record for fear of the same treatment – but things are changing. High-ranking government officials such as Christopher Mellon, a former US secretary for defence in intelligence, and Luis Elizondo, former director of AATIP, insist that there are aircraft in our skies that don’t obey the known laws of physics. Even Barack Obama has gone on record on the subject, talking to CBS this year: “There’s footage and records of objects in the skies, that we don’t know exactly what they are, we can’t explain how they moved, their trajectory. They did not have an easily explainable pattern. And so, you know I think that people still take seriously trying to investigate and figure out what that is. But I have nothing to report to you today.”

When it comes to abduction stories, sceptics will say these encounters are either hoaxes or accounts of vivid dreams or hallucinations. Christopher French, emeritus professor of psychology at Goldsmiths, University of London, has spent years studying the paranormal and argues that sleep paralysis is a better explanation for many of these stories. “In some cases, you get associated symptoms, and they include a sense of presence; a very strong feeling that there’s something in the room with you,” French says. He adds that sufferers might hallucinate and “see strange lights moving around the room or strange figures or shadow people”.

That doesn’t fit for Godfrey’s story – he was driving and on duty at the time. “I think in Alan Godfrey’s case, he was sleep-deprived; he had been on duty for a long time. The most likely explanation is some kind of hallucinatory experience due to tiredness,” says French. What about the story he told under hypnosis? “The thing with hypnotic regression is that it is one of the best ways known of generating false memories. If you go for hypnotic regression expecting to recover memories of alien abduction, there’s a very good chance that’s what you’ll get.”

But Nick Pope, a former UFO investigator for the Ministry of Defence, is not convinced and thinks that Godfrey is genuine. “He had a lot to potentially lose by coming out with this and yet stuck to his guns.”

Doesn’t a hallucination explain what he saw? “I get that people do have hallucinations, but they tend to be the result of either mental illness or some sort of hallucinogenic substance, and this guy was on duty and was, by all accounts, rational. And so those explanations don’t seem to apply – I’m stumped when it comes to that particular case. Ask yourself: how many times have you been tired and come to the end of a long day? We’ve all been in that situation, and we don’t suddenly construct bizarre narratives about spacecraft and aliens.”

Is it time to start taking these stories more seriously? “I’m not saying that I believe it’s literally true that these are alien spaceships,” says Pope. “But at the very least, these people who were previously disbelieved and ridiculed should be listened to and given a hearing.

“For everyone who tells you these people are attention seekers after fame and fortune, I would say, ‘What fame? What fortune?’ Who outside the UFO community has heard of Alan Godfrey or Terry Lovelace?”

Does Pope think ETs are among us? “I don’t know. I am certain that they are out there, but whether they’re down here or not? I don’t know. I think it’s much more likely that we’re dealing with unmanned probes.”

If not hallucinations, equipment glitches or mistakes, many will say black ops, conducted by the US, China, Russia, or other militaries, are a more plausible explanation than aliens. “I accept that most military personnel won’t have sight of every single black project and, therefore, won’t necessarily know about every secret prototype, aircraft or drone that’s flying,” says Pope. “But the military and government, and the intelligence community have a pretty good idea of roughly where the ceiling is in terms of technology. So, when these expert military witnesses describe the sorts of speeds, accelerations, manoeuvres that are reported with these sorts of incidents, I sit up and take note.”

Whatever one thinks about the veracity of these stories, many of the people who tell them believe they are real, and some suffer from severe mental illness in the aftermath. Chris French says the levels of psychological arousal in people living with PTSD go “through the roof” when they’re asked to retell their stories. “If you do the same thing with the alien abductees, you get the same thing.”

Lovelace’s night in Devil’s Den changed his life and the life of his friend Toby. The US air force got wind of their ordeal and, per military protocol, separated and reassigned them. Lovelace ignored his orders and visited Toby to say goodbye. “Toby was falling apart,” Lovelace says. The two embraced. Toby said: “It happened, didn’t it?” “Yes, my brother, it really happened. You’re not losing your mind,” Lovelace replied.

Lovelace has suffered enormously since that night. “I’ve had 40 years’ of nightmares. I still have a phobia of crossing open ground. I still sleep with a light on and a gun beside my bed.” But he feels vindicated by acknowledgments made by the US government, military personnel and Obama. “I’ve got a long list of people that I’m going to email and say, ‘I told you so.’”

For Godfrey, it’s 40 years too late. He is adamant about what he saw that morning in Todmorden. “I’ve had all sorts: you fell into some sort of trance when you were driving – all that shit. No, it was real. It left debris on the road – my headlights were reflecting off it, as were the blue lights. This was a real incident. I didn’t need the Pentagon to tell me there are things out there. I know what I saw that night was real, nuts and bolts. If I’d got out and thrown a brick at it, it would have gone, ‘Clang!’ It doesn’t change what happened to me and how I was treated back then.”

{ https://www.theguardian.com/ }

12-09-2021 om 18:48 geschreven door peter  

UFO probe seems to be searching for something over Buffalo, NY 25-Aug-2021

Check out this interesting UFO footage. It shows some kind of a probe flying across the night sky above Buffalo, New York on 25th September 2021.

Witness report: 

About 8:24 pm, an Object comes in from the Southwest close to my house, heading North, displaying a light. It appeared to be searching for something. Three minute later another Object, or maybe the same object comes in from the Southwest and when close to my house make a sharp turn Eastward, then abruptly turned North and continue on out of camera view. It also appeared to be searching for something.

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

12-09-2021 om 18:10 geschreven door peter  

A multi-billion dollar project to bring back a piece of Mars to Earth will involve three separate launches and would only be successful as soon as 2031

{ https://futurism.com/the-byte }

12-09-2021 om 01:51 geschreven door peter  

Wetenschappers ontdekken fossiele ‘vliegende draak’ in Chileense woestijn

In de Chileense Atacamawoestijn hebben archeologen fossiele resten ontdekt van een prehistorisch dier dat zich laat omschrijven als ‘een vliegende draak’. Zo'n 200 tot 150 miljoen jaar geleden vloog de pterosaurus, voorzien van een lange staart, vleugels en scherpe uitstekende tanden, er zijn rondjes.

David van der Heeden  

Het vliegende reptiel behoort tot een groep die al eerder op het noordelijk halfrond werd ontdekt. Naar nu blijkt heeft het zo uit Jurassic Park weggevlogen monster ook in Zuid-Amerika zijn vleugels uitgeslagen. De versteende botten van het dier werden al in 2009 ontdekt door de directeur van het natuurhistorisch museum van de Atacamawoestijn en werden jarenlang onderzocht door wetenschappers van de universiteit van Chili.

De ontdekking vormt het eerste bewijs dat de pterosauriërs - de eerste gewervelde dieren die konden vliegen, voorlopers van de Pterodactylus - ook op het zuidelijk halfrond voorkwamen. “Dit toont aan dat de dieren in deze groep wijder verspreid waren dan we tot nu toe wisten”, zegt onderzoeksleider Jhonatan Alarcon. De bevindingen van het team zijn gepubliceerd in wetenschapsjournaal Acta Palaeontologica Polonica.

Migreren

Het is overigens niet zo dat deze Rhamphorhynchus - vernoemd naar de groep waartoe de voorwereldlijke fladderaar behoorde - ongeschonden uit de grond werd gehaald. De deskundigen moesten het doen met een stuk bot uit de voorpoot, een mogelijke ruggenwervel en een gedeeltelijk vleugelkootje. Genoeg bewijs echter om de ‘koning van de lucht’ aan Zuid-Amerika te linken.

Wetenschappers denken dat de zuidelijke landmassa’s tijdens de Jura-periode aan elkaar zaten. Een supercontinent dat Gondwana wordt genoemd. Mogelijk de reden waarom andere leden van de dierengroep ook op Cuba zijn gevonden. “Waarschijnlijk vlogen ze van noord naar zuid”, aldus Alarcon. “Misschien zijn ze hier ooit aangekomen en gebleven, we weten het niet.”

Viseter

Hoe groot het fabelachtige wezen precies was, schrijven de experts niet. Er zijn aanwijzingen dat het om een dier van ‘gemiddelde grootte’ ging. Een volwassen exemplaar. Sommige familieleden konden echter een vleugelspanwijdte van bijna twee meter bereiken, zo is bekend. Van Rhamphorhynchus zijn meer volledige skeletten gevonden dan van welk andere pterosauriërs maar ook. Hij had een spitse kop, zwemvliezen en at vis.

De Atacamawoestijn is een immens groot gebied, dat ooit onder het water van de Stille Oceaan schuilging. Nu oogt het als een maanlandschap. Sommige delen van de woestenij hebben al tientallen jaren geen regen gezien. Er zijn alleen stenen en zand te vinden. En fossielen voor wie zijn schep in de grond steekt. Het gebied staat bekend om zijn fossiele vondsten. Veel ervan worden net onder het dorre oppervlak gevonden.

{ https://www.hln.be/ }

12-09-2021 om 00:32 geschreven door peter  

New photos taken of the incredibly unique Kleopatra asteroid that is shaped like a dog bone have revealed very interesting details. Kleopatra is located in the Asteroid Belt that’s located between Mars and Jupiter. It has two lobe shapes on either end with a long “neck” in between them – basically it looks like a dog bone. Additionally, it has two tiny moons that have been named AlexHelios and CleoSelene after the Egyptian Pharaoh Cleopatra’s kids.

Even though Kleopatra was discovered back in 1880, scientists have only known about its size as well as the moons for approximately twenty years, but the new photos showing different angles have helped them even more, like calculating the its measurements, the moons’ orbits, and how they were formed. They did this with observations from the SPHERE instrument on the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope in Chile.

Kleopatra

They concluded that Kleopatra measures about 270 kilometers in length (168 miles); that one of the lobe shapes is larger than the other; and that its “neck” is actually quite thick. A different team of researchers then calculated the orbits of the two moons in order to figure out the mass of the asteroid. They determined that Kleopatra’s mass is 2.97 x 1018 kilograms which is quite a bit less than previous estimates that had it at 4.64 x 1018 kilograms.

The researchers were then able to calculate the density and based on the assumption that the asteroid is rich in metals, the number was rather low. Since Kleopatra has low density, it would indicate that it is quite porous with a lot of loose rock that is hardly secure on the asteroid. This also suggests that the “rubble pile” may have happened when a bunch of debris was thrown off of a parent body when a large impact occurred. Furthermore, if there is material that is being ejected from the asteroid, that could explain how the two moons were formed.

Unfortunately for Kleopatra, its very fast rotation could make it fall apart pretty easily if it is porous. In fact, it rotates once every 5.4 hours and if it were to pick up even a slight amount of speed, it would tear apart.

Kleopatra

But for now, it is quickly rotating through space and the new images have certainly helped with learning more about this very odd-looking “dog bone” asteroid. Astronomer Franck Marchis from the SETI Institute and the Laboratoire d’Astrophysique de Marseille in France said it best when he stated, “Kleopatra is truly a unique body in our Solar System.” More pictures of the Kleopatra asteroid can be seen here.

These eleven images are of the asteroid Kleopatra, viewed at different angles as it rotates. The images were taken at different times between 2017 and 2019 with the Spectro-Polarimetric High-contrast Exoplanet REsearch (SPHERE) instrument on ESO’s VLT. 

Kleopatra orbits the Sun in the Asteroid Belt between Mars and Jupiter. Astronomers have called it a “dog-bone asteroid” ever since radar observations around 20 years ago revealed it has two lobes connected by a thick “neck”.

Credit: ESO/Vernazza, Marchis et al./MISTRAL algorithm (ONERA/CNRS)

(ESO/Vernazza, Marchis et al./MISTRAL algorithm [ONERA/CNRS])

Above: Kleopatra with AlexHelios and CleoSelene.

Two studies about the asteroid have been published in Astronomy & Astrophysics and they can be read here and here.

{ https://mysteriousuniverse.org/ }

11-09-2021 om 23:59 geschreven door peter  

LATEST UFO SIGHTINGS AND VIDEOS - 11 - 9 - 2021

UFO Sighted Over Trowbridge, Wiltshire, England ( September 10, 2021 )

UFO was sighted over Trowbridge, Wiltshire, a county in South West England on September 10, 2021

STATEMENT : Any idea what this could be ?

• They are here !
• credit : Rob Taylor

Strange Phenomenon Sighted Over Mazatlán, Mexico ( September 8, 2021 )

Strange Phenomenon was sighted over Mazatlán, Mexico on September 8, 2021

STATEMENT : En estos momentos en Mazatlán... Right now in Mazatlan...
8 / Sep / 2021

• They are here !
• credit : Victor VR

Sighted Over Yulin, Shaanxi, China ( September 4, 2021 )

Sighted Over Yulin city in the Shanbei region of Shaanxi province, China, on September 4, 2021

STATEMENT : 中國陝西榆林 Yulin, Shinxi, China

• They are here !

UFOs Sighted Over Bakersfield, California ( September 8, 2021 )

UFOs were sighted over Bakersfield, California on September 8, 2021

STATEMENT : Bakersfield California

9.08.21
Bright orange flashing lights in perfect formation. Then dissappear...

• They are everywhere !
• note : 2 videos : video 1: no audio
• credit : Albert Velasco

Strange Cylinder Sighted Over Tuxtepec, Oaxaca, Mexico ( September 9, 2021 )

Strange Cylinder Shape or effect was sighted in the skies during a storm in San Juan Bautista Tuxtepec, Oaxaca, Mexico on September 9, 2021 

STATEMENT : I have a video from a friend in Tuxtepec Oaxaca Mexico. I do not know if it is camera effect or really it is something out on the screen right side stop middle is something I see it as cylinder.

• They are here !
• credit : Tomas Ventura

Strange Cloud Sighted Over North Carolina ( August 16, 2021 )

𝑺𝑻𝑹𝑨𝑵𝑮𝑬 𝑪𝑳𝑶𝑼𝑫 was sighted over 𝗡𝗼𝗿𝘁𝗵 𝗖𝗮𝗿𝗼𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗮 on August 16, 2021

STATEMENT : 𝑺𝑻𝑹𝑨𝑵𝑮𝑬 𝑹𝑨𝑰𝑵𝑩𝑶𝑾 𝑪𝑳𝑶𝑼𝑫𝑺 𝑀𝐴𝐺𝐼𝐶 𝑂𝐹 𝐿𝑂𝑉𝐸....𝗡𝗼𝗿𝘁𝗵 𝗖𝗮𝗿𝗼𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗮​ : August 16, 2021

• They are here !
• credit : Philippe Francois

{ https://www.youtube.com/ }

11-09-2021 om 23:14 geschreven door peter  

Asteroids Ryugu and Bennu that both orbit between Earth and Mars may be chunks of the same giant space rock that was smashed apart in a collision

• Mathematical modelling suggests a possible relationship between the asteroids

• Astronomers at University of Arizona and Laboratoire Lagrange made prediction

• But tests on samples from both rocks will be needed in order to confirm this

By LUKE ANDREWS FOR MAILONLINE

The asteroids Ryugu and Bennu which orbit between Earth and Mars formed after a much larger rock was split apart, scientists have claimed.

Mathematical modelling suggests the pair - measuring 3,280-foot and 1,610-foot in diameter - formed after two centres of gravity were created.

But rock pulled from both will need to be tested to confirm the theory.

Samples from Ryugu are already onboard Japan's Hayabusa2 spacecraft and expected to touchdown on Earth in late 2020.

And NASA's OSIRIS-REx is scheduled to land on its suspected-sister by October 20, to collect further samples which will also be flown to Earth.

Mathematical modelling revealed Ryugu (left) and Bennu (right) may have formed from a larger asteroid that broke apart

The model showed after an asteroid shattered its pieces came together at two points

It was based on observations of asteroids in the Mars-Jupiter belt, where Bennu and Ryugu may have originated

Astronomers at the University of Arizona and Laboratoire Lagrange, Ivory Coast, modelled collisions in the Mars-Jupiter asteroid belt before making the proposal.

Their study, published in Nature Communications, showed fragments are ejected but then re-accumulate into a spinning-top shape - like that of both asteroids. 

They also noted a difference in hydration between the possible-siblings, but said this did not discount the proposed relationship.

The team hopes to be able to measure the composition and age of formation of the samples from both asteroids to confirm their theory.

OSIRIS-REx has beamed images of Bennu's rocky surface back to Earth, revealing the barren lunar surface.

The pictures show its chosen landing site - dubbed 'Nightingale' - which is located in a crater high up the asteroids northern hemisphere.

The spacecraft will cut chunks 0.8 inches in diameter from the asteroid before beginning the journey home. 

NASA has sent pictures of Bennu back to Earth. The image above shows the proposed landing site on the asteroid for its spacecraft OSIRIS-REx

OSIRIS-REx will collect small (less than 0.8 inches in diameter) rocks from the surface before beginning the journey back to Earth.

(Artists impression)

Hayabusa2, not to be outdone, sent images of Ryugu's lunar-surface back to Earth in February.

Its pictures revealed reddening in some of the rocks, leading scientists at the University of Tokyo to conclude that it once passed much closer to the sun.

'Immediately after touchdown, Hayabusa2’s thrusters disturbed dark, fine grains that originate from the redder materials,' wrote planetary scientist Tomokatsu Morota of the University of Tokyo and colleagues in their paper,

'The stratigraphic relationship between identified craters and the redder material indicates that surface reddening occurred over a short period of time.'

'We suggest that Ryugu previously experienced an orbital excursion near the Sun.'  

Japan's Hayabusa2 spacecraft has captured this picture of Ryugu's surface. It revealed reddened rocks, which suggests at one point the asteroid may have passed near the Sun

Ryugu

Wikipedia Privacy Policy

Scientific number: 162173

Discovery date: 10 May 1999 by astronomers in Socorro, New Mexico

Name: It refers to a magical underwater palace in Japanese folklore

Size: 3,280-foot in diameter

Shape: Spinning-top 

Orbit: Around the sun between Earth and Mars once every 16 months

Danger to Earth: Not at present 

Visited?: Yes

Visit description: Hayabusa2 arrived in June 2018. It has now left and is returning to Earth 

Bennu

Wikipedia Privacy Policy

Scientific number: 101955

Discovery date: 11 September 1999 by astronomers in Socorro, New Mexico

Name: Bird in Egyptian myth linked to the sun, creation and re-birth

Size: 1,610-foot in diameter

Shape: Spinning-top

Orbit: Around the sun between Earth and Mars

Danger to Earth?: Yes. Crosses our planet's orbit. Eight potential Earth impacts are predicted between 2169 and 2199. It will pass near Earth in 2060.

Visited?: No

Visits planned?: Yes. OSIRIS-REx is expected to touch down this month. 

RELATED VIDEOS, selected and posted by peter2011

{ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ }

11-09-2021 om 22:34 geschreven door peter  

Why are Rubble Pile Asteroids Shaped Like Diamonds?

Scientists are fortunate enough to have detailed, close-up views of the near-Earth asteroids Bennu and Ryugu. Both asteroids have a diamond shape, for some reason. Why? Up until now, it’s been a puzzle.

Now a team of scientists has tackled the question and may have come up with the answer.

Asteroids are an ongoing target of study for scientists. They’re remnants from the primordial Solar System, material that wasn’t swept up in planet formation. Most of them are way out in the asteroid belt, where they’re difficult to study.

But some of them have escaped the belt and come close to Earth. These near-Earth asteroids give scientists their best chance to study them. Spacecraft have been sent to both Ryugu and Bennu to collect samples and return them to Earth. While there, both the Japanese spacecraft Hayabusa 2, which visited Ryugu, and NASA’s OSIRIS-REx, which visited Bennu, studied their asteroid targets intensely, including gathering detailed images.

Both are rubble-pile asteroids, which means that they’re made up of chunks of smaller material bound together by gravity, and both are diamond-shaped. Both also rotate rapidly.

A group of researchers from the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST) and Rutgers University have published a paper explaining the asteroids’ diamond shape. The paper is titled “Bennu and Ryugu: diamonds in the sky.” It’s published in the journal Granular Matter. The lead author is Dr. Tapan Sabuwala from OIST.

The fact that they’re just loosely held-together, smaller pieces of material means that they’re like granular matter, rather than larger, monolithic pieces of rock. So to study them and their diamond shape, the team of scientists made use of granular physics modelling. In this case, a model of how sand grains flow helped explain the diamond shape.

This isn’t the first attempt at using models to understand the asteroids’ shapes. Those models relied on rotation to explain the shape, but the models didn’t hold up to testing.

“Previous models have attributed these diamond shapes to the forces caused by the rotation, which resulted in material being driven from the poles to the equator,” said paper lead author Dr. Tapan Sabuwala. “But when the asteroids were simulated using these models, the shape was flattened or asymmetric rather than diamond, so we knew something wasn’t right,” explained Dr. Sabuwala in a press release.

The press release accompanying the study used sand flowing through a funnel as an example. As sand is poured in, it forms a conical shape. Of course, there’s much more going on at an asteroid than there is on a simple pile of sand. The gravitational forces are much different. “We had to factor this into our model, alongside the fact that the asteroid’s rotation also plays a significant role,” Dr, Sabuwala said.

According to the paper, centrifugal force played a large role in Bennu’s and Ryugu’s shape. It’s weaker near the asteroids’ poles, so more material accumulates there. That gives the asteroids their distinct appearance. “We show that this accumulation results in increased elevations at the poles, while centrifugal migration increases elevations at the equator. Without this accumulation, poles lack the elevated poles that are evident on Ryugu and Bennu,” the authors write in their paper.

This work deviates from previous models in another important way. It shows that the asteroids didn’t form as a different shape then gradually become diamond-shaped. Instead, the diamond shape formed as the asteroid formed and as material accumulated. The asteroids’ shape only changed minimally over time.

“The model relies on the principle of a critical angle of repose assumed by falling grains deposited on spinning, rubble-pile asteroids. Since the model is driven by deposition, our results suggest first that Bennu and Ryugu acquired their characteristic shapes at early times and second that subsequent reshaping by other effects … may be minimal,” they write in the paper’s summary. 

Next, the researchers would like to look at other rubble-pile asteroids that rotate more slowly. Those types of asteroids should form a more spheroidal shape since the centrifugal force is weaker. When they reduced the rotation rate in their modelling, that’s exactly what resulted.

“We have used simple concepts of how grains flow to explain how these asteroids assumed their curious shapes,” said co-author Professor Chakraborty of OIST. “That simple ideas can illuminate complex problems is, to us, perhaps the most delightful aspect of this work.”

More:

• Press Release: Diamonds in the sky
• Research: Bennu and Ryugu: diamonds in the sky
• Universe Today: These are the Boulders OSIRIS-REx is Going to Use to Navigate Down to the Surface of Bennu

The post Why are Rubble Pile Asteroids Shaped Like Diamonds? appeared first on Universe Today.

Source: 

• https://www.universetoday.com/152490/why-are-rubble-pile-asteroids-shaped-like-diamonds/

{ https://beforeitsnews.com/ }

11-09-2021 om 21:53 geschreven door peter  

UFO Hunter Claims to Have Found Stones Resembling 'Head of Ancient Royal' on Mars

© AFP 2021 / HANDOUT

{ https://sputniknews.com/ }

11-09-2021 om 21:27 geschreven door peter  

New Bill Aims To Give The Pentagon’s UAP Task Force UNFETTERED ACCESS To UFO Data

Team Rising discusses the Pentagon’s plans to prioritize investigation into UFOs.

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

11-09-2021 om 20:49 geschreven door peter  

Bright UFO ball like reddish smoke with single trail turning into 2 trails – Dover, DE 10-Sep-2021

This strange UFO phenomenon was filmed over Dover, the capital city of Delaware in United States on 10th September 2021.

Witness report:

 A bright ball like reddish smoke with single trail turning into 2 trails It was around 7:15 pm when my wife and I started to take a walk in our neighborhood. The sun was setting in the west with pink clouds in the distance. There was still blue sky left. That’s when I noticed what looked like a dark pink cloud by itself and out of place. I stopped to look at it and asked my wife if she saw it moving. She said yes. Then the cloud started to move slowly towards us and with a tail like a comet. Then it seem to turn away from us with 2 tails. It finally went from reddish to black then went into cloud cover and it was gone.

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

11-09-2021 om 20:45 geschreven door peter  

Pyramid shaped UFO dropping orbs over Medellín, Colombia 8-Sep-2021

Daytime UFO video of a a pyramid-shaped unidentified flying object dropping some kind of orbs in the sky above Medellin in Colombia. Filmed on 8th September 2021.

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

11-09-2021 om 20:41 geschreven door peter  

Debris from 70 years of alleged UFO crashes has been studied in a new state-of-the-art lab machine at Stanford University, California - and many were hoping some mysteries could be solved

By Sam Elliott-Gibbs

Physical debris from two alleged UFO crash sites over the past 70 years has been examined in a lab, it has been confirmed.

A new state-of-the-art machine has enabled scientists at Stanford University, California, to study in-depth was what collected.

Metal debris from UFO cases dating as far back as 1947 has been investigated. It obtained through on field research of supposed crashes in Colombia and Argentina.

The new “multi-parameter ion beam imager” gives scientists the chance to look at the atomic structure of a selected material.

Science News reports that Stanford microbiologist Dr Garry Nolan is using the machine to create a revolutionary three-dimensional image.

• Do you believe in intelligent life on other planets? Have your say in the comments

He will analyse the samples right down to their individual atoms, in a process called Multiplexed Ion Beam Imagine.

At that microscopic level, the atomic structure is impossible to fake.

READ MORE

When Dr Nolan placed some of the fragments in the vacuum chamber of his instrument, he was astonished to find their composition unlike any other metal.

He said: “If you’re talking about an advanced material from an advanced civilisation, you’re talking about something that I’ll just call an ultra-material.

“It’s something which has properties where somebody is putting it together again at an atomic scale.

“We’re building our world with 80 elements, somebody else is building the world with 253 different isotopes.”

The scientists discovered that this material was manufactured and not natural.

It comes as a new study claimed aliens could be powering their societies by harvesting energy from black holes.

Extraterrestrials could, theoretically, use a hypothetical megastructure called a Dyson sphere, which would encircle a star with a tight formation of orbiting platforms in order to capture starlight and produce power, it has been suggested.

{  https://www.mirror.co.uk/ }

11-09-2021 om 01:19 geschreven door peter  

NASA’s Perseverance Rover Collects Puzzle Pieces of Mars’ History

Two holes are visible in the rock, nicknamed “Rochette,” from which NASA’s Perseverance rover obtained its first core samples. The rover drilled the hole on the left, called “Montagnac,” on Sept. 7, and the hole on the right, known as “Montdenier,” on Sept. 1. Below it is a round spot the rover abraded.

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover successfully collected its first pair of rock samples, and scientists already are gaining new insights into the region. After collecting its first sample, named “Montdenier,” Sept. 6, the team collected a second, “Montagnac,” from the same rock Sept. 8.

Analysis of the rocks from which the Montdenier and Montagnac samples were taken and from the rover’s previous sampling attempt may help the science team piece together the timeline of the area’s past, which was marked by volcanic activity and periods of persistent water.

“It looks like our first rocks reveal a potentially habitable sustained environment,” said Ken Farley of Caltech, project scientist for the mission, which is led by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Southern California. “It’s a big deal that the water was there a long time.”

The rock that provided the mission’s first core samples is basaltic in composition and may be the product of lava flows. The presence of crystalline minerals in volcanic rocks is especially helpful in radiometric dating. The volcanic origin of the rock could help scientists accurately date when it formed. Each sample can serve as part of a larger chronological puzzle; put them in the right order, and scientists have a timeline of the most important events in the crater’s history. Some of those events include the formation of Jezero Crater, the emergence and disappearance of Jezero’s lake, and changes to the planet’s climate in the ancient past.

What’s more, salts have been spied within these rocks. These salts may have formed when groundwater flowed through and altered the original minerals in the rock, or more likely when liquid water evaporated, leaving the salts. The salt minerals in these first two rock cores may also have trapped tiny bubbles of ancient Martian water. If present, they could serve as microscopic time capsules, offering clues about the ancient climate and habitability of Mars. Salt minerals are also well-known on Earth for their ability to preserve signs of ancient life.

The Perseverance science team already knew a lake once filled the crater; for how long has been more uncertain. The scientists couldn’t dismiss the possibility that Jezero’s lake was a “flash in the pan”: floodwaters could have rapidly filled the impact crater and dried up in the space of 50 years, for example.

But the level of alteration that scientists see in the rock that provided the core samples – as well as in the rock the team targeted on their first sample-acquisition attempt – suggests that groundwater was present for a long time.

This groundwater could have been related to the lake that was once in Jezero, or it could have traveled through the rocks long after the lake had dried up. Though scientists still can’t say whether any of the water that altered these rocks was present for tens of thousands or for millions of years, they feel more certain that it was there for long enough to make the area more welcoming to microscopic life in the past.

“These samples have high value for future laboratory analysis back on Earth,” said Mitch Schulte of NASA Headquarters, the mission’s program scientist. “One day, we may be able to work out the sequence and timing of the environmental conditions that this rock’s minerals represent. This will help answer the big-picture science question of the history and stability of liquid water on Mars.”

Next Stop, ‘South Séítah’

Perseverance is currently searching the crater floor for samples that can be brought back to Earth to answer profound questions about Mars’ history. Promising samples are sealed in titanium tubes the rover carries in its chassis, where they’ll be stored until Perseverance drops them to be retrieved by a future mission. Perseverance will likely create multiple “depots” later in the mission, where it will drop off samples for a future mission to bring to Earth. Having one or more depots increases the likelihood that especially valuable samples will be accessible for retrieval to Earth.

Perseverance’s next likely sample site is just 656 feet (200 meters) away in “South Séítah,” a series of ridges covered by sand dunes, boulders, and rock shards that Farley likens to “broken dinner plates.”

The rover’s recent drill sample represents what is likely one of the youngest rock layers that can be found on Jezero Crater’s floor. South Séítah, on the other hand, is likely older, and will provide the science team a better timeline to understand events that shaped the crater floor, including its lake.

By the start of October, all Mars missions will be standing down from commanding their spacecraft for several weeks, a protective measure during a period called Mars solar conjunction. Perseverance isn’t likely to drill in South Séítah until sometime after that period.

More About Perseverance

A key objective for Perseverance’s mission on Mars is astrobiology, including the search for signs of ancient microbial life. The rover will characterize the planet’s geology and past climate, pave the way for human exploration of the Red Planet, and be the first mission to collect and cache Martian rock and regolith --broken rock and dust.

Subsequent NASA missions, in cooperation with ESA (European Space Agency), would send spacecraft to Mars to collect these sealed samples from the surface and bring them to Earth for in-depth analysis.

The Mars 2020 Perseverance mission is part of NASA’s Moon to Mars exploration approach, which includes Artemis missions to the Moon that will help prepare for human exploration of the Red Planet.

JPL, which is managed for NASA by Caltech in Pasadena, California, built and manages operations of the Perseverance rover.

For more about Perseverance:

• https://www.nasa.gov/perseverance

{ https://www.nasa.gov/ }

11-09-2021 om 00:26 geschreven door peter  

Guarded by aliens? The last time humans stepped on the moon

The UFO community found numerous anomalies after investigating thousands of official photos captured during the Apollo 17 moon mission.

Apollo 17 was the last official mission of the American ‘Apollo’ program that brought the first astronauts to the Moon in 1972.

During the 12-day lunar mission, the crew captured more than 8,400 photos of the lunar surface that are now available on NASA’s website .

Years after the photos became available, UFO hunters discovered curious objects in some of the images that resemble spaceships, origins unknown.

In fact, there are those who believe that the anomalies are simply reflections or lens flares, but the growing evidence tends to disprove these theories easily.

Apollo 17 remains the most recent manned mission to the Moon, with no other astronauts having set foot there since 1972. Could this be just a coincidence?

The constant number of days spent both in space and on the Moon, as well as the fact that no other manned missions have been conducted since then, raises many questions.

Is it possible that the Apollo 17 astronauts encountered an alien moon base? Were they found by UFOs or crafts from another world? If so, did anyone restrict or deny human access to the lunar surface?

Why would the Apollo 17 mission gather such a large volume of samples, take so many photographs, and never investigate its findings further again?

Is the natural satellite that orbits our planet so desolate and unimportant that no further missions are necessary?

While it is still difficult to prove that the astronauts were intercepted by aliens, the reality of the UFOs present in many stages of the Apollo 17 mission is a clear indicator (for some of us at least) that NASA could be in favor of a Covert pact with beings from another world ..

{ https://mysteriousthing.com/ }

10-09-2021 om 23:59 geschreven door peter  

White Dwarfs can Continue Burning Hydrogen, Even After They’re Dead

White dwarfs are supposed to be dead remnants of stars, doomed to simply fade away into the background. But new observations show that some are able to maintain some semblance of life by wrapping themselves in a layer of fusing hydrogen.

White dwarfs are the dense leftover cores of sunlike stars. They are exposed to the universe when stars build up too much carbon and oxygen in their centers. They then tear themselves apart in a slow, agonizing process that eventually creates a planetary nebula. With all the outer layers stripped, the core remains – a white dwarf.

White dwarfs are inert. They don’t have enough mass to ignite nuclear fusion of their carbon and oxygen, and so they just sit there, slowly radiating away their heat for eons upon eons.

But new research is challenging that simple story.

“We have found the first observational evidence that white dwarfs can still undergo stable thermonuclear activity,” explained Jianxing Chen of the Alma Mater Studiorum Università di Bologna and the Italian National Institute for Astrophysics, who led this research. “This was quite a surprise, as it is at odds with what is commonly believed.”

The research team led by Chen compared two globular clusters, M3 and M13, with the Hubble Space Telescope. They especially focused on near-ultraviolet wavelengths, which allowed them to compare more than 700 white dwarfs inside the two clusters.

They found that the white dwarfs in M3 were pretty standard, but that M13 had two different populations: one set of normal white dwarfs, and another that were enveloped by an outer layer of hydrogen.

Combining the results with computer simulations, Chen and his colleagues determined that around 70% of the white dwarfs in M13 had so much hydrogen surrounding them that the shells were actively undergoing fusion. That fusion is able to keep the white dwarfs warmer for far longer than astronomers had previously thought possible.

Astronomers use established cooling time relationships to connect the temperature of a white dwarf to its age, which helps them better understand their origins and environment. The new research makes that relationship a little murkier.

“Our discovery challenges the definition of white dwarfs as we consider a new perspective on the way in which stars get old,” added Francesco Ferraro of the Alma Mater Studiorum Università di Bologna and the Italian National Institute for Astrophysics, who coordinated the study. “We are now investigating other clusters similar to M13 to further constrain the conditions which drive stars to maintain the thin hydrogen envelope which allows them to age slowly.”

The post White Dwarfs can Continue Burning Hydrogen, Even After They’re Dead appeared first on Universe Today.

Source: 

• https://www.universetoday.com/152467/white-dwarfs-can-continue-burning-hydrogen-even-after-theyre-dead/

{ https://beforeitsnews.com/ }

10-09-2021 om 23:32 geschreven door peter  

LATEST UFO SIGHTINGS AND VIDEOS - 10 - 9 - 2021

Fast Moving UFO Sighted Over Southern Alabama ( September 1, 2021 )

Fast moving UFO was sighted on September 1st 2021. A woman records this storm approaching in Southern Alabama. She captures a UFO traveling at high speed in front of the storm from left to right. The UFO is visible approx 11 seconds after the video begins...Here I present the original and following with approach and speed reduction and filters.

• They are here !
• credit : U.S.F

RELATED VIDEO

Pyramid Shaped UFO Sighted Over Medellín, Colombia ( September 8, 2021 )

Pyramid shaped UFO was sighted over Medellín, Colombia on September 8, 2021

STATEMENT : A UFO in the shape of a Pyramid in Medellín, Colombia.

• They are here !
• credit : S.M

UFO Sighted Over Shenyang, China ( September 8, 2021 )

Shenyang, China., September 8th at 7:45 am in the morning. Crowds gathering and recording what looks like a biblical light. On the morning of September 8, 2021.
A show appeared in Shenyang, China A huge beam of light shone from heaven, and there was horizontal lines like a ladder between the beams. The strange view caused people to pick up cell phones to take pictures. Many people think this scene is a mirage. A scene like this came up
in Shuangfeng county Hunan a few days ago...‼

• They are here !

• credit : News Point

UFOs Sighted Over Portsmouth, Ohio ( September 7, 20221 )

STATEMENT : I run a weather site out of Ohio. The last 2 nights in Portsmouth, OH we have had these unexplained Lights in the sky. I was sent this video. Then I started getting reports of other weird things in the skies from other cities in Ohio : Ohio and Tri-State News and Weather

• They are here !
• credit: Brandon Muck

Bright UFO Drops Smaller UFO's & A Sighting In Seattle WA. As Well?

Two Sightings, Alaskan UFO releasing smaller UFO's as security guard records. Also a barrel shaped UFO spotted in Seattle WA.

Video Source MUFON Case # 76358

Video Source MUFON CAse # 166633

{ https://www.youtube.com/ }

10-09-2021 om 22:12 geschreven door peter  

UFOs & UAPs: The Situation Has Changed! Avi Loeb and Harvard’s Galileo Project

! In 2017, the world for the first time observed an interstellar object, called ‘Oumuamua, that was briefly visiting our Solar system. Based on astronomical observations, ‘Oumuamua turned out to have highly anomalous properties that defy well-understood natural explanations. We can only speculate whether ‘Oumuamua may be explained by never seen before natural explanations, or perhaps being an extraterrestrial technological object, similar to a very thin light-sail or communication dish, which fits the astronomical data rather well.

After the release of the Pentagon Office of the Director of National Intelligence report on Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (UAP), the scientific community now needs the determination to systematically, scientifically & transparently look for potential evidence of extraterrestrial technological equipment. The impact of any discovery of extraterrestrial technology on science & on our entire worldview would be enormous. Given the recently discovered abundance of Earth-Sun systems, the Galileo Project is dedicated to the proposition that humans can no longer ignore the possible existence of Extraterrestrial Technological Civilizations (ETCs), & that science should not dogmatically reject potential extraterrestrial explanations because of social stigma or cultural preferences, factors which are not conducive to the scientific method of unbiased, empirical inquiry. We now must look through new telescopes’, both literally & figuratively. The Galileo Project aims to identify the nature of UAP and ‘Oumuamua-like interstellar objects using the standard scientific method based on a transparent analysis of open scientific data to be collected using optimized instruments.

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

10-09-2021 om 20:35 geschreven door peter  

Alien virus warning as scientist says mystery space microbes could transfer into human DNA

A SCIENTIST has claimed that viruses may exist on other planets and say the mystery space microbes could incorporated into human DNA in the future.

10-09-2021 om 01:32 geschreven door peter  

If we ever do find alien life, we may also discover their viruses – or at least that’s what one scientist has claimed. Professor Paul Davies, who is an astrobiologist, cosmologist and director of the Beyond Center for Fundamental Concepts in Science at Arizona State University, stated that viruses might be an important factor in the ecosystems on other planets.

Alien life on other planets doesn’t necessarily mean an advanced civilization of humanoids with a large head and bulging eyes – although that’s a possibility as well – but they could also be microbes and that’s where the theory of viruses comes from as explained by Davies, “Viruses actually form part of the web of life.” “I would expect that if you’ve got microbial life on another planet, you’re bound to have – if it’s going to be sustainable and sustained – the full complexity and robustness that will go with being able to exchange genetic information.”

He went on to say that if there is cellular life on other planets, the viruses would be able to move genetic information from one to the others. Additionally, there would probably be an entire ecosystem of microbes instead of just one specific type.

But there’s no need to hide just yet as Davies stated that if there are viruses on other planets, humans here on Earth have nothing to fear. “The dangerous viruses are those that are very closely adapted to their hosts,” he explained. “If there is a truly alien virus, then chances are it wouldn’t be remotely dangerous.” To be more specific, the virus would be more harmful to anything alive on the alien planet rather than being dangerous to Earthlings. This is because the virus wouldn’t have had a chance to infect humans, evolve, and spread. I don’t know about you, but I don’t find that very comforting or reassuring.

Would aliens sneeze like humans?

This would certainly be a factor if humans were to colonize another planet, but Davies has claimed that the majority of viruses are good. “I think without viruses, there may be no sustained life on planet Earth.” Really? COVID-19 is caused by a virus and it has already claimed more than 4.5 million lives. This is certainly one virus we could live without.

If there are aliens viruses out in space somewhere, let’s hope they don’t find their way here.

{ https://mysteriousuniverse.org/ }

10-09-2021 om 01:10 geschreven door peter