Location of 'Noah's Ark' is revealed as scientists decipher world's oldest map on 3,000-year-old Babylonian tablet

• READ MORE: Archaeologists unlock secrets of 4,000-year-old tablet

By Stacy Liberatore For Dailymail.com

Scientists have deciphered the world's oldest map etched in a clay tablet about 3,000 years ago, finding it features the location of 'Noah's Ark' among the drawings.

The Babylonian artifact, known as the Imago Mundi, shows a circular diagram with a writing system that used wedge-shaped symbols to describe the early creation of the world.

Researchers at the British Museum, where the tablet is housed, revealed what they had deciphered last month, but a deeper analysis of their work uncovered the Biblical reference within the ancient language.

The back of the tablet acts like a key, describing what a traveler will see on their journey, with one portion says that they must pass through 'seven leagues... [to] see something that is thick as a parsiktu-vessel.'

The word 'parsiktu' has been found on other ancient Babylonian tablets, specifically to explain the size of a boat needed to survive the Great Flood.

Researchers followed the instructions, finding a path to 'Urartu' where an ancient Mesopotamian poem claims a man and his family landed an ark to preserve life.

The location is the Assyrian equivalent to 'Ararat,' the Hebrew word for the mountain Noah crashed the Biblical vessel that was constructed for the same purpose.

Dr. Irving Finkel, British Museum curator, said: 'It shows that the story was the same, and of course that one led to the other but also, that from the Babylonian point of view, this was a matter of fact thing.

'That if you did go on this journey you would see the remnants of this historic boat.'

The Imago Mundi, also called the Babylonian Map of the World, was discovered in 1882 by renowned archaeologist Hormuzd Rassam in Sippar, an ancient Babylonian city in what is now present-day Iraq

The Imago Mundi has mystified researchers since it was found in 1882 in what is now known as Iraq.

The ancient text, written in cuneiform, was only used by the Babylonians, who etched astronomical events, future predictions and a map thought to be the entire 'known world' at the time.

At the bottom center of the map sits Mesopotamia, enclosed by a circle representing a 'bitter river' that was believed to surround the entire world.

The tablet has since been damaged, but once featured eight triangles that researchers determined signified mountains that match descriptions on the back.

'Number four says 'To the fourth, to which you must travel seven leagues,'' Dr Finkel said in a YouTube video.

He continued to explain that the passage continues to explain how a journeyer will eventually come upon a giant vessel.

'This parsiktu measurement, is something to an Assyriologist which makes their ears prick and the fact is it's only once otherwise known from cuneiform tablets and it's rather an interesting cuneiform tablet too,' said Dr Finkel.

'Because it is the description of the Ark which was built, theoretically, by the Babylonian version of Noah.'

The back of the tablet provides instructions on how to read the map. One passages tells the traveler to pass through the sea and they will come to 'Urartu' where an ancient Mesopotamian poem claims a man and his family landed an ark to preserve life

The location is the Assyrian equivalent to 'Ararat,' the Hebrew word for the mountain Noah crashed the Biblical vessel that was constructed for the same purpose

The Babylonian version of the story says the god Ea sent a flood that wiped out all of humanity except for Utnapishtim and his family, who built an ark at the command of the god and filled it with animals.

'In this account, the details are given and the God says 'You have to do this, this and this' and then the Babylonian Noah says 'I did this, this and this. I've done it! And I made these structures as thick parsiktu vessel,'' Dr Finkel.

The Gilgamesh Flood story is known from clay tablets that date back around 3,000 years, the Biblical Flood was about 5,000 years ago.

Dr Finkle explained that anyone who traveled the path to Urartu would, theoretically, see the wooden ribs of the vessel on the mountain 'like the one in the Bible.'

The Bible claims the ark settled on the 'mountains of Ararat' in Turkey following a 150-day flood that drowned the Earth and every living thing on it that was not housed inside the wooden ship. 

And the mountain in question features a peak that matches the shape and dimensions of Noah's ark. 

The vessel was said to measure '300 cubits, 50 cubits, by 30 cubits', which translates to up to 515 feet long, 86 feet wide and 52 feet high.  

The idea that the ark landed on Ararat has been surrounded by controversy, as some scientists claim the formation was formed by nature and others are sure it came from a higher power.

A team of experts led by Istanbul Technical University has been excavating the mountain for years, revealing in 2023 that they found clay, marine materials and seafood that placed humans at the scene between 3,000 and 5,000 years ago.

However, Dr Andrew Snelling, a young Earth creationist with a Ph.D. from the University of Sydney, had previously said that Mount Ararat could not be the ark's location because the mountain did not form until after the flood waters receded.

Although considered a historical event, most scholars and archaeologists do not believe in literally interpreting the Ark story.

{ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ }

Rise of the killer robots: Experts reveal just how close we are to a Terminator-style takeover

• READ MORE: Elon Musk forecasts a '10 to 20 per cent chance' of global disaster

By Jonathan Chadwick For Mailonline 

It's been exactly 40 years since The Terminator hit the big screen, shocking cinemagoers with its terrifying depiction of a post-apocalyptic future. 

In James Cameron's epic sci-fi blockbuster, billions of people are killed when self-aware machines trigger a global nuclear war around the start of the 21st century. 

Arnold Schwarzenegger stars as the eponymous robotic assassin sent back in time from 2029 to 1984 to eliminate the threat of a human resistance. 

Famously, the Terminator, which looks just like an adult human, 'absolutely will not stop … until you are dead', as one character puts it. 

While this sounds like pure sci-fi, academic and industry figures – including Elon Musk – fear that humanity will indeed be annihilated by AI. 

But when exactly will this happen? And will humanity's demise mirror the apocalypse depicted in the Hollywood film?

MailOnline spoke to experts to find out just how close we are to a Terminator-style takeover. 

In James Cameron's epic sci-fi blockbuster - which arrived in US cinemas on Friday, October 26, 1984 - Arnold Schwarzenegger stars as the eponymous robotic assassin 

In the classic film, the Terminator's objective is simple – to kill Sarah Connor, an LA resident who will give birth to John, who will lead a rebellion against the machines. 

Terminator is equipped with weapons and an impenetrable metal exoskeleton, plus advanced vision and superhuman limbs that can crush or strangle us with ease.

Natalie Cramp, partner at data firm JMAN Group, said a real-life equivalent of the Terminator in the real world is possible, but thankfully it likely won't be during our lifetime.

'Anything is possible in the future, but we are a long way from robotics getting to the level where Terminator-like machines have the capacity to overthrow humanity,' she told MailOnline.

According to the expert, humanoid-style robots such as the Terminator aren't the most likely pathway for robotics and AI to advance right now. 

Rather, the more urgent threat in the industry are the machines that are already commonly in use, such as drones and autonomous cars. 

'There are so many hurdles to making a robot like that effectively work – not least how you power it and coordinate movements,' Cramp told MailOnline. 

'The main problem is that it isn't actually the most efficient form for a robot to take to be useful. 

The Terminator is equipped with weapons and an impenetrable metal exoskeleton, as well as massive superhuman limbs that can crush or strangle us with ease

'If we're speculating on what type of AI-devices could "go rogue" and harm us, it's likely to be everyday objects and infrastructure – a self-driving car that malfunctions or a power grid that goes down.' 

Mark Lee, a professor of artificial intelligence at the University of Birmingham, said a Terminator-style apocalypse would happen when 'any government is mad enough to hand over control of national defence to an AI'. 

'Thankfully I don’t think there’s a nation mad enough to consider this,' he told MailOnline. 

Professor Lee agreed that there are different kinds of AI are a more pressing concern, including the powerful algorithms behind them. 

'The immediate danger from AI for most people is the effect on society as we move to AI systems which make decisions on mundane things like job or mortgage applications,' he told MailOnline. 

'However, there is also considerable effort in military applications such as AI guided missile systems or drones. 

'We need to be careful here but the worry is that even if the western world agrees an ethical framework, others in the world might not.' 

The Terminator's objective is simple - to kill Sarah Connor, an LA resident who will give birth to John, who will lead a rebellion against the machines

Dr Tom Watts, a researcher on American foreign policy and international security at Royal Holloway University of London, said it's 'crucially important' human operators continue to exercise control over robots and AI.

'The entire international community, from superpowers such as China and the US to smaller countries, needs to find the political will to cooperate – and to manage the ethical and legal challenges posed by the military applications of AI during this time of geopolitical upheaval,' he writes in a new piece for The Conversation. 

'How nations navigate these challenges will determine whether we can avoid the dystopian future so vividly imagined in The Terminator – even if we don’t see time travelling cyborgs any time soon.' 

In 1991, a hugely successful sequel – Terminator 2: Judgment Day – was released, depicting a 'friendly' reprogrammed version of the eponymous bot.

The film's humanoid antagonist called T-1000 can run at the speed of a car and in one memorable scene liquifies himself to walk through metal bars. 

Scarily, researchers in Hong Kong are working towards making this a reality, having designed a small prototype that can change between liquid and solid stages. 

Overall, creating a walking, talking robot with lethal powers will be more of a  challenge than designing the software system that acts as its brain. 

Since its release, The Terminator has been recognised as one of the greatest science fiction movies of all time. 

At the box office, it made more than 12 times its modest budget of US$6.4 million, which is £4.9 million at today’s exchange rate. 

Dr Watts believes the film's greatest legacy has been to 'distort how we collectively think and speak about AI', which today poses an 'existential danger that often dominates public discussion'. 

Elon Musk is among the technology leaders who have helped keep a focus on the supposed existential risk of AI to humanity, often while referencing the film. 

A TIMELINE OF ELON MUSK'S COMMENTS ON AI

Musk has been a long-standing, and very vocal, condemner of AI technology and the precautions humans should take 

Elon Musk is one of the most prominent names and faces in developing technologies. 

The billionaire entrepreneur heads up SpaceX, Tesla and the Boring company. 

But while he is on the forefront of creating AI technologies, he is also acutely aware of its dangers. 

Here is a comprehensive timeline of all Musk's premonitions, thoughts and warnings about AI, so far.   

August 2014 - 'We need to be super careful with AI. Potentially more dangerous than nukes.' 

October 2014 - 'I think we should be very careful about artificial intelligence. If I were to guess like what our biggest existential threat is, it’s probably that. So we need to be very careful with the artificial intelligence.'

October 2014 - 'With artificial intelligence we are summoning the demon.' 

June 2016 - 'The benign situation with ultra-intelligent AI is that we would be so far below in intelligence we'd be like a pet, or a house cat.'

July 2017 - 'I think AI is something that is risky at the civilisation level, not merely at the individual risk level, and that's why it really demands a lot of safety research.' 

July 2017 - 'I have exposure to the very most cutting-edge AI and I think people should be really concerned about it.'

July 2017 - 'I keep sounding the alarm bell but until people see robots going down the street killing people, they don’t know how to react because it seems so ethereal.'

August 2017 -  'If you're not concerned about AI safety, you should be. Vastly more risk than North Korea.'

November 2017 - 'Maybe there's a five to 10 percent chance of success [of making AI safe].'

March 2018 - 'AI is much more dangerous than nukes. So why do we have no regulatory oversight?' 

April 2018 - '[AI is] a very important subject. It's going to affect our lives in ways we can't even imagine right now.'

April 2018 - '[We could create] an immortal dictator from which we would never escape.' 

November 2018 - 'Maybe AI will make me follow it, laugh like a demon & say who’s the pet now.'

September 2019 - 'If advanced AI (beyond basic bots) hasn’t been applied to manipulate social media, it won’t be long before it is.'

February 2020 - 'At Tesla, using AI to solve self-driving isn’t just icing on the cake, it the cake.'

July 2020 - 'We’re headed toward a situation where AI is vastly smarter than humans and I think that time frame is less than five years from now. But that doesn’t mean that everything goes to hell in five years. It just means that things get unstable or weird.' 

April 2021: 'A major part of real-world AI has to be solved to make unsupervised, generalized full self-driving work.'

February 2022: 'We have to solve a huge part of AI just to make cars drive themselves.' 

December 2022: 'The danger of training AI to be woke – in other words, lie – is deadly.' 

{ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ }

Uranus' MOON could harbour extraterrestrials, scientists say after discovering evidence of an ocean beneath its surface

• READ MORE: Uranus is gassier than we thought, scientists say 

By Shivali Best For Mailonline 

It's one of the biggest unanswered questions in science – if there's life beyond Earth, where is it?

While you might think the answer is 'far far away', surprisingly, it could be much closer to home than we thought.

A new study suggests that extraterrestrials could be hiding just 1.7 billion miles from Earth - on Uranus' moon, Miranda. 

Researchers at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory have discovered evidence of an ocean beneath Miranda's surface, which they say could be habitable.    

'To find evidence of an ocean inside a small object like Miranda is incredibly surprising,' said Tom Nordheim, co-author of the study.

'It helps build on the story that some of these moons at Uranus may be really interesting—that there may be several ocean worlds around one of the most distant planets in our solar system, which is both exciting and bizarre.'

Based on the findings, the researchers are calling for a new mission to Uranus. 

'We're excited by the possibilities and eager to return to study Uranus and its potential ocean moons in depth,' Mr Nordheim added. 

A new study suggests that extraterrestrials could be hiding just 1.7 billion miles from Earth - on Uranus' moon, Miranda

It's one of the biggest unanswered questions in science – if there's life beyond Earth, where is it? While you might think the answer is 'far far away', surprisingly, it could be much closer to home than we thought

Among the 288 moons orbiting the planets in our solar system, the scientists say that Miranda 'stands out'. 

Images snapped by NASA's Voyager-2 spacecraft back in 1986 showed that the moon's southern hemisphere was a 'Frankenstein-like hodgepodge' of grooved terrain. 

The researchers compared this landscape to the squares on a quilt - and suspected it may be the result of tidal forces within the moon. 

In their new study, the team reassessed these images to understand what the moon's interior could look like. 

Firstly, the team mapped the moon's surface features, including its cracks and ridges. 

Next, they developed a computer model to test several possible structures of the moon's interior. 

Their analysis revealed that the interior that produced the best match with the surface was a vast ocean under Miranda's icy surface, some 100-500 million years ago. 

This ocean was no more than 19 miles below the surface, and extended for at least 62 miles, according to the model. 

The only spacecraft to visit Uranus was NASA's Voyager 2 in 1986 - and this isn't the first time that scientists have called for a fresh mission

Given Miranda's radius is just 146 miles, this suggests the ocean would have filled almost half of the moon's body. 

Caleb Strom, who led the study, said: 'That result was a big surprise to the team.'

The researchers are unsure if the ocean is still there , and say that if it is, it's relatively thin.

'But the suggestion of an ocean inside one of the most distant moons in the solar system is remarkable,' Mr Strom added.

Based on the findings, the researchers are calling for a new mission to Uranus to photograph its moon once again. 

'We won't know for sure that it even has an ocean until we go back and collect more data,' Mr Nordheim said. 

'We're squeezing the last bit of science we can from Voyager 2's images.'

The only spacecraft to visit Uranus was NASA's Voyager 2 in 1986 - and this isn't the first time that scientists have called for a fresh mission. 

Back in 2022, a report by the National Academy of Sciences urged NASA to launch a mission to Uranus. 

The report called Uranus 'one of the most intriguing bodies in the solar system', and said studying it would improve our understanding of ice giants generally.

The group said the spacecraft should operate in the system over a number of years, orbiting the ice giant and sending a probe into its atmosphere.

{ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ }

EXCLUSIVE - Pentagon chief reveals high-res photo of a UFO 'mothership': 'A huge mini city floating in the sky'

• READ MORE: UFOs may be from 'stealth civilization' on Earth, Harvard study says

By Matthew Phelan Senior Science Reporter For Dailymail.Com

'Guess what we caught in Romania in 2022? By the way, the US Embassy,' as Elizondo told attendees at the paid event, gesturing to the photo: 'That.'

He went on to describe it as a 'huge mini city floating in the sky.' 

But the UFO, which resembles a gleaming disc-shaped craft, has already drawn withering critiques from skeptics, believers and even military UFO witnesses alike, who claim to have traced the photo to, not to the US Embassy, but a Facebook page.

One suggested to DailyMail.com that Elizondo has been lax in his vetting of such images in a bid to add sensational new material to his 'paid speaking engagements.'

Ex-Pentagon official Luis Elizondo (right), who gained fame for blowing the lid off a $22-million, secretive government UFO program, has revealed an image of a UFO 'mothership'

'Guess what we caught in Romania in 2022? By the way, the US Embassy,' as Elizondo told attendees at the paid event, gesturing to the photo (above): 'That'

UFO encounter himself in the Middle East decades ago, told DailyMail.com that Elizondo's dubious 'mothership' UFO fits a pattern with the man's past claims. 

'This unfortunate situation with Lue follows my experiences with him nearly exactly,' McGowan said. 'I witnessed him exaggerate or outright fabricate information that simply wasn't true.'

Elizondo unveiled the 2022 Romanian UFO photo at an October 28, 2024 event held at The City Winery, a wine bar in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, for $50-$30 per ticket.

'There's a whole lot more here folks,' Elizondo told the audience in a leaked clip. 'I just want to give you kind of a small taste of what's going on "behind the scenes."'

'We're having pilots, military pilots and civilian pilots in Eastern Europe and in the Middle East, report what unimaginably seems impossible,' as Elizondo began to explain his 'real photo' of a UFO.

'They described it literally 'the mothership,'' Elizondo said.

But despite credible federal reports of 'mothership' UFOs over domestic US military sites — investigated by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), an FBI task force, the Air Force Office of Special Investigations (AFOSI) and 16 local sheriff's offices — internet sleuths quickly managed to poke holes in Elizondo's 2022 Romanian UFO.

John Greenewald Jr, a longtime government transparency advocate who runs The Black Vault, quickly tracked the photo back to a September 13, 2023 post in a Facebook group titled 'Mysterious Ancient Discoveries.'

John Greenewald Jr, a longtime government transparency advocate who runs The Black Vault , quickly tracked the photo back to a September 13, 2023 post in a Facebook group titled ' Mysterious Ancient Discoveries' (above)

The higher resolution image of this apparent 'mothership,' which looks at first glance to be piercing clouds with its beatific shafts of light, appears more likely to have originated as the reflection of an indoor chandelier lamp reflected in window glass

'I reverse imaged searched it,' Greenewald posted on X. 'It got more than 182,000 likes and more than 23,700 comments.'

The higher resolution image of this apparent 'mothership,' which looks at first glance to be piercing clouds with its beatific shafts of light, appears more likely to have originated as the reflection of an indoor chandelier lamp reflected in window glass. 

The placement of Romania's coal-fired Arad Power Station indicates the image was not taken from the US Embassy, but a building near the Mureș River a few miles away.

America's Embassy in Romania is roughly 400 miles to the southeast of Arad, in the capital city of Bucharest.

While dedicated UFO skeptics were eager to pounce on Elizondo's inaccurate claims, UFO enthusiasts also expressed frustration over the episode. 

'Lue is 100 percent using us as pawns to line his pockets,' one contributor to the Reddit forum r/UFOs lamented. 'His most recent book was no.1 seller in the nation.'

'It's muddying the waters and detracting from the important convo,' another opined.

By midday Wednesday, Elizondo was publicly attributing the error to 'a friend in Government' who provided him with the photo 'a couple of years ago.'

Retired USAF Staff Sergeant McGowan, however, told DailyMail.com that Elizondo's error was far from a one-off mistake. 

'I've been on the receiving end where Lue has pulled out his cell phone and shown me what he described as highly classified video,' McGowan told DailyMail.com.

The placement of Romania's coal-fired Arad Power Station (above) indicates the image was not taken from the US Embassy, but a building near the Mureș River a few miles away. America's Embassy in Romania is roughly 400 miles to the southeast of Arad, in Bucharest

'For him to think I would believe he would simply carry classified info on an unsecure civilian cell phone is just insulting,' he added. 'And it wasn't just me, multiple podcast hosts were shown video Lue attributed to things they were not.'

For the past two years, McGowan has been notably public about this instance in which Elizondo showed him what he claimed was, in McGowan's words, 'a highly secret video smuggled out of Russia' taken by a Soviet Union probe near Mars.

The video, as McGowan recollected to DailyMail.com, looked to be a decades-old public UFO video from the Soviet's Phobos 2 probe, released by retired Soviet Air Force Colonel Marina Popovich in 1991.

Elizondo had shown the video to McGowan, in hushed tones, in January 2021.  

While Popovich, who wrote a book about her own UFO encounters as a test pilot, long maintained the Phobos 2 video depicted a legitimate alien craft, the odd video had nevertheless been public for about three decades, in other words.

'There is a striking similarity between that public video and what Lue showed me on his phone,' McGowan recollected. 

'Only saw it for a few seconds,' he said, 'so the granular details didn't get absorbed.'

McGowan, whose duties in the Air Force included service in Desert Storm attached to Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) and drug enforcement missions in Colombia, has been public for years on his own UFO encounter. 

In the mid-90s, while serving as a member of the JSOC J2 Security Team for 'Ellipse Foxtrot,' Jeremy McGowan (above) says he was a witness to unusual aerial lights appearing to survey a highly classified cargo container he had been tasked with guarding in the desert

For the past two years, McGowan has been notably public about an instance in which Elizondo showed him what he claimed was, in McGowan's words, 'a highly secret video smuggled out of Russia' taken by a Soviet probe near Mars. The video however had been public since 1991

In the mid-90s, while serving as a member of the JSOC J2 Security Team for 'Ellipse Foxtrot,' McGowan says he was a witness to unusual aerial lights appearing to survey a highly classified cargo container he had been tasked with guarding in the desert.  

He spoke to the History Channel about this UFO sighting in the Mid East for the 2020 docu-series 'Unidentified,' which had been hosted by Luis Elizondo.

As McGowan recollected about his appearance on the show in a Medium blog post, he had agreed to this on-camera interview in the hopes of getting back in touch with other witnesses to the event, but felt 'used' by the experience.  

'I was supposed to be introduced to investigators and researchers who could help me identify the person with me on that dune and saw what I saw!' he wrote in 2022. 

'I left with no answers [...] I sent a few emails to production that were ignored, and I was never extended the courtesy promised to me.'

By midday Wednesday, Elizondo was publicly attributing the error to 'a friend in Government' who provided him with the photo 'a couple of years ago' (above)

Elizondo unveiled the 2022 Romanian UFO photo at an October 28, 2004 event held at The City Winery, a wine bar in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania , for $50-$30 per ticket

Federal government concern about 'mothership' UFOs harboring swarms of 'drones,' have spilled out into public view following the release of internal reports via the US Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) in recent years. 

Weeks of reports of mystery 'drones' swept eastern Colorado and nearby areas of Nebraska, Wyoming and Kansas over the winter holidays of 2019 into the new year.

The sightings worried citizens and local law enforcement alike, but odd craft and thier 'motherships' troubled the US military especially for their proximity to some of America's sensitive, nuclear-equipped intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs).

'They all seem clustered in an area that has quite a few Minuteman sites,' a redacted official confessed in one email released via FOIA by F.E. Warren Air Force Base.

F.E. Warren security staff spoke to local sheriff's deputies who ' reported seeing a 'mothership' six feet in diameter flanked by 10 smaller drones (some fixed wing, some not).'

'When deputies follow the drones, they clock them at speeds of 60-70 mph,' the redacted base official stated.

{ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ }

Climate catastrophe plunged Scandinavia into years of darkness and killed HALF of Norway and Sweden 1,500 years ago, study finds

• READ MORE: Vikings may have practiced form of plastic surgery 1,000 years ago

By Michael Havis For Mailonline

A real-life Ragnarok plunged Scandinavia into years of darkness and killed up to half of the people in Norway and Sweden, new research reveals.

In Viking belief, Ragnarok is the end of the world, when the Norse gods die battling demons and giants in an apocalyptic final clash.

And the agony of Ragnarok begins with the Fimbulvetr – a winter lasting three years that ends almost all human life.

Now new research has shown that the Nordic world really faced such a long winter, and its impact on human life was devastating.

By analysing tree rings, scientists at the National Museum of Denmark proved a real-life climate catastrophe took place 1,500 years ago.

Morten Fischer Mortensen, a senior researcher at the museum, said it was the result of volcanic eruptions enveloping the world in a veil of ash and sulphur.

He said: 'I imagine it would have been terrifying – the volcanic eruptions happen so far away from Europe that no one would have known the cause.

'Then you realise - perhaps overnight - that the sun is hidden behind a veil, and it is not warm and yellow, but cold and bluish.

A real-life Ragnarok plunged Scandinavia into years of darkness and killed up to half of the people in Norway and Sweden, new research reveals

(artist's impression)

By analysing tree rings, scientists at the National Museum of Denmark proved a real-life climate catastrophe took place 1,500 years ago

'Even in the middle of the day, no shadows were cast and for more than a year no stars could be seen in the sky.'

To complete their research, scientists analysed 650 pieces of oak from between 300 and 800 AD.

They found growth rings became dramatically smaller starting in 536 AD, and even more so between 539 and 541 AD.

Mortensen described the impact on civilisation.

He continued: 'Based on our studies of the tree rings, we can see that for several years there were really poor growing conditions, which must also have been true for the farmers' crops.

'We are in a period where everyone lives off, and on, the land, and is 100% self-sufficient.

'So when the harvest fails for several years in a row, it's really critical.'

For many, it was unsurvivable.

Morten Fischer Mortensen, a senior researcher at the museum, said the event was the result of volcanic eruptions enveloping the world in a veil of ash and sulphur

Photo shows a depiction of the final battle of the gods during Ragnarok by Johannes Gehrts 

Mortensen said: 'Landscape reconstructions based on pollen analyses shows that some areas were abandoned and forest spread over the abandoned fields.

'Power structures shifted and, in Denmark, we have many large deposits of gold that have been interpreted as offerings to the gods to bring back the sun.

'Many settlements ceased to exist, and it is easy to imagine that hunger, famine, and disease took the lives of a large part of the population.'

He added: 'In Norway and Sweden, researchers believe that up to half the population died, and it is not inconceivable that the same happened in Denmark.

'It almost gives me chills to see these small, narrow annual rings because I know how much sorrow, death and misfortune they represent.'

Furthermore, the similarity with the Fimbulvetr of Ragnarok legend may be no coincidence.

Mortensen said: 'It is remarkable that for three summers in a row the oak trees have virtually no summer growth.

'The myth of Ragnarok starts with a three-year-long winter with no summer in between.

'Of course, we can't prove a direct link between the climate event and the myth, but there is a strong correlation.

'It is therefore conceivable that elements of what people have experienced have found their way into the myths and are thus an echo of previous experiences.'

Which volcanoes caused the long winter has not been determined.

But candidates have been proposed in Papua New Guinea, El Salvador, Indonesia, Iceland, and North America.

In any case, the disaster was not limited to the Nordic world – climate modelling shows a global temperature drop of several degrees.

Written sources from as far apart as the Roman empire and China attest to the change in climate.

It's even been suggested that the drop in temperature boosted crop fertility in the Arabian Peninsula, boosting the food supply and contributing to the Islamic conquests.

For the Danes, however, the winter left another – less dramatic – legacy.

Mortensen explained: 'Danes have a great love for rye bread.

'Rye is a cereal that arrives very late to the country and only becomes common in the centuries after the climate crisis.

'At the same time, rye can survive with the fewest hours of sunshine and can grow on relatively poor soil.

'Therefore, it's likely that rye is a crop we adopt as a hedge against bad times – a crop that has the best chance of yielding a return in the bad years.'

Mortensen and his colleagues published their study in the Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports.

DID THE VIKINGS DISCOVER NORTH AMERICA?

Some experts believe the Vikings may have discovered North America nearly 500 years before Christopher Columbus made his famous journey to the New World. 

L'Anse aux Meadows was the first Viking settlement believed to have been found in North America in the 1960s.

In 2016, scientists claimed to have uncovered another Viking settlement in Newfoundland that was built between 800 AD and 1300 AD.

Some experts believe the Vikings may have discovered North America nearly 500 years before Christopher Columbus made his famous journey to the New World

The site, discovered in an area called Point Rosee in southern Newfoundland, is 400 miles (643km) south west of a Viking settlement found in L'Anse aux Meadows during the 1960s.

Now, one expert claims to have found a mysterious location known as 'Hop'.

Based on Viking descriptions, three key things identify this mystical settlement - an abundance of grapes, salmon and canoes made from animal hide. 

An archaeologist claims the only place that matches this description is the Miramichi-Chaleur bay area in northeastern New Brunswick in Canada.

This would be the third Viking settlement claimed to have been found in North America, although it could be hard to ever prove it for once and for all.

It is thought the Vikings first discovered America by accident in the autumn of 986 AD, according to one historical source, the Saga of the Greenlanders.

It tells how Bjarni Herjolfsson stumbled across North America after being blown off course as he attempted to sail from Norway to Greenland, but he did not go ashore.

Inspired by his tales, however, another Viking Leif Ericsson then mounted his own expedition and found North America in 1002.

Finding it a fertile land, rich in grapes and berries, he named it Vinland.

Eriksson also named two further 'lands' on the North American coast - one with flat stones, which he called Helluland, and one that was flat and wooded, named Markland.

{ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ }

Alien life could be lurking on Mars, NASA says

• READ MORE: NASA finds gas traces in Martian crater - that could be signs of life

By Matthew Phelan Senior Science Reporter For Dailymail.Com

A NASA-led study has revealed that alien life could be hiding beneath the icy layers of Mars.

Scientists suggested that the Red Planet's ancient ice packs may have long acted as a shield for microbial life, blocking out deadly cosmic radiation.

But the key to their survival would be ice that likely formed from dusty snowfall, where sunlight absorbed by that darker dust would allow pockets of melt water to develop safely under its icy surface, lead author Dr Aditya Khuller told DailyMail.com.

Computer modeling showed that the amount of light piecing the water ice could trigger photosynthesis in these shallow pools of meltwater — similar to pools on Earth that are teeming with life.  

'These are called "cryoconite holes" and form when dust and sediment on top of the ice melt into the ice because it is darker than the ice,' said Dr Khuller, who worked as a planetary scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

A host of tiny, plant-like creatures have been documented in cryoconite holes on Earth — including algae, fungi, and cyanobacteria, all of which pull in energy from the sun via photosynthesis to live. 

'If we're trying to find life anywhere in the universe today, Martian ice exposures are probably one of the most accessible places we should be looking,' Dr Khuller said.

A 2016 image from NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter documenting what scientists believe is dusty ice lining the edges of a set of Martian gullies. Planetary scientist Dr Aditya Khuller and his co-authors believe this ice (pictured) should be a prime candidate in the search for alien life

These cryoconite colonies have been uncovered and studied everywhere from Antarctica, to Greenland, to Norway's Svalbard archipelago: an island chain midway between the Scandinavian country's northern coast and the North Pole.

'The microorganisms typically go dormant in the winter,' Dr Khuller told Space.com, 'when there is not enough sunlight to form liquid water within the dusty ice.'

'So, the two key ingredients for photosynthesis can be present within dusty Martian ice in the mid-latitudes,' he added. 'Photosynthesis requires adequate amounts of sunlight and also liquid water to occur.'

The new study builds off of Dr Khuller's work as a PhD student, when he worked on a project to predict the dust content of ice deposits on Mars — based off of data collected by NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander and its Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.

The team poured this data into computer simulations that were originally built to predict the brightness of terrestrial snow and glacier ice on Earth.

These brightness models built off of Earth's well-studied and better understood ice, they theorized, would help estimate the dust content mixed into distant Martian ice.

'This small amount of dust has a very important effect,' Dr Khuller told DailyMail.com.

'The depth to which enough sunlight can reach for photosynthesis to occur within the ice changes depending on how dusty the ice is,' he noted. 'Similarly, the amount of dust within the ice also changes the depth [down] to which harmful ultraviolet radiation can penetrate.'

The Martian life that may one day be found in the Red Planet's dusty ice might resemble life in ' 'cryoconite holes' here on Earth. Above, researchers sample a cryoconite hole on the Longyearbreen glacier, somewhere along Norway's Svalbard archipelago in 2017

'The microorganisms typically go dormant in the winter when there is not enough sunlight to form liquid water within the dusty ice,' researchers said. Above, More cryoconite sampling performed during that same field work for a 2017 Arctic microbiology course on Svalbard

The team's computer modelling efforts predicted that ice containing higher amounts of dust, 0.01 to 0.1 percent, will only be able to support life at a depth around five to 38 centimeter below the surface.

But, Dr Khuller noted: 'There are zones where photosynthesis could occur at [...] meter-depths for cleaner ice.'

The cleaner ice was found to be especially fertile territory for deeper pockets of microbial life along Mars' mid-latitude ranges, in both its northern and southern hemispheres. 

At 40° latitude in both hemispheres, these colonies of tiny alien life could exist as far down as 2.15 to 3.10 meters deep, based on Dr Khuller and his team's estimates,  published Thursday in the journal Nature Communications Earth & Environment. 

'We are not stating we have found life on Mars,' Dr Khuller emphasized to reporters, 'but instead we believe that dusty Martian ice exposures in the mid-latitudes represent the most easily accessible places to search for Martian life today.' 

But, complicating matters, Mars, unlike Earth, has two different kinds of naturally occurring ice: frozen water and frozen carbon dioxide, a la man-made 'dry ice.' 

Thanks to the thin and dry atmosphere on Mars, planetary and atmospheric scientists are still debating whether or not melting 'water ice' even becomes liquid water there at all — with many arguing it 'sublimates' immediately into water vapor.

The ice sheets that might hold life on Mars were formed by dusty snow storms over the course of dozens of ice ages that hit the Red Planet across the past 5 million years. Above: a May 12, 2016 NASA image taken with the Hubble Space Telescope showing Mars' visible cloud cover

Above a NASA-funded artist's concept of what Mars might have once looked like with liquid water (blue regions). Data collected by NASA's Curiosity rover has suggested that Mars was once a water world fit for life - whose surface later became inhospitable to human or other life

Melting water ice shielded under layers of ice and snow might fare better, but there is still a lot of guess work in this process, Dr. Khuller noted.

'As far as I know, it is currently believed that Martian dust across the planet has the same composition,' he continued. 

Read More

• Life on Mars? Scientists discover 'oceans' of water 12 miles beneath the surface of the Red Planet 

'However, we currently do not have any samples of Martian material returned to Earth for detailed analyses,' he added, 'so it is difficult to be sure.'  

'We'd love to access samples from within that ice at some point, but that's for a future mission to consider.' told DailyMail.com

Big questions remain as to whether or not photosynthetic life exists on Mars now or even if it once did during its earlier epochs, when it had more liquid water and a stronger magnetosphere to protect it from the sun's cosmic rays.

But, at least, for now, Dr Khuller and his colleagues have helped narrow down where alien life is most likely to be on the vast 55.74 million square-miles of Martian surface.

'I am working with a team of scientists to develop improved simulations of if, where, and when dusty ice could be melting on Mars today,' Dr Khuller told DailyMail.com. 

'Additionally, we are recreating some of these dusty ice scenarios in a lab setting to examine them in more detail,' said the researcher, who will be joining the University of Washington's Applied Physics Laboratory in Seattle this coming November.

Is There Life on Mars? We Asked a NASA Scientist

Encounters with UFOs; Search for ancient life on Mars; James Webb Space Telescope | Full Episodes

{ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ }

Lasers reveal 3,000-year-old secret Mayan city with more than 6,500 structures

• READ MORE:  Ancient Mayan city containing 50-foot pyramids discovered

By Nikki Main Science Reporter For Dailymail.Com

Scientists have uncovered a secret Mayan city hiding in Mexico, which once featured an urban landscape of more than 6,500 structures.

The team used lidar technology to create three-dimensional models across 50 miles of land in Campeche, allowing them to map areas not visible to the naked eye.

The method revealed a 21-square-mile metropolis with iconic stone pyramids, houses and other infrastructure that have been concealed for more than 3,000 years.

There are hundreds of documented Mayan sites, but the newest find revealed that researchers aren't close to finding all the major Maya cities.

'Our analysis not only revealed a picture of a region that was dense with settlements, but it also revealed a lot of variability,' said the study's co-author, Luke Auld-Thomas, a doctoral student at Tulane University.

'We didn't just find rural areas and smaller settlements. We also found a large city with pyramids right next to the area's only highway, near a town where people have been actively farming among the ruins for years,' Auld-Thomas said. 

The city, called Valeriana, included a dam, ballcourt, houses and terraces as well as a curved amphitheater and temple pyramids

There are hundreds of documented Mayan sites , but the newest find revealed that researchers aren't close to finding all the major Maya cities

The team conducted an aerial lidar survey, which uses laser pulses to measure distances and create three-dimensional models of specific areas. 

It has allowed scientists to scan large swaths of land from the comfort of a computer lab, uncovering anomalies in the landscape that often prove to be pyramids, family houses and other examples Maya infrastructure. 

'Because lidar allows us to map large areas very quickly, and at really high precision and levels of detail, that made us react, 'Oh wow, there are so many buildings out there we didn't know about, the population must have been huge,' Auld-Thomas said. 

'The counterargument was that lidar surveys were still too tethered to known, large sites, such as Tikal, and therefore had developed a distorted image of the Maya lowlands. 

'What if the rest of the Maya area was far more rural and what we had mapped so far was the exception instead of the rule?' 

The team uncovered two blocks of the Mayan city, one of which included a distinct pseudo-pyramid that was identical to one found at Rio Bec - a pre-Columbian Mayan archaeological site located near the Guatemala border in the Yucatan Peninsula.

The city, called Valeriana, was adjacent to a freshwater lagoon and encompassed two major areas of architecture that includes a dam, ballcourt, houses and terraces.

Valeriana also contained a curved amphitheater, temple pyramids and a reservoir that 'has all the hallmarks of a classic Maya political capital,' the study said.

The survey was conducted near a highway, revealing the hidden city with over 6,5000 structures

The Mayan city was discovered near Campeche in Mexico and covers about 21 square miles

'The discovery of Valeriana highlights the fact that there are still major gaps in our knowledge of the existence or absence of large sites within as-yet unmapped areas of the Maya Lowlands,' researchers shared.

A third region of the city was identified as a 'sparse and modest settlement, consisting of scattered or loosely clustered residences with no monumental architecture and limited investment in water storage.

Read More

• Lasers reveal 650-square-mile ancient Mayan city hidden beneath Guatemala rainforest 

Tulane professor and co-author Marcello Canuto said: 'Lidar is teaching us that, like many other ancient civilizations, the lowland Maya built a diverse tapestry of towns and communities over their tropical landscape.' 

He continued: 'While some areas are replete with vast agricultural patches and dense populations, others have only small communities. 

'Nonetheless, we can now see how much the ancient Maya changed their environment to support a long-lived complex society.'

Although hundreds of sites have been found, it's impossible to determine exactly how many Mayan cities still have to be studied.

However, lidar technology is helping researchers unearth them much more quickly, particularly in regions of southern Mexico and Guatemala.

'The government never knew about it; the scientific community never knew about it. That really puts an exclamation point behind the statement that, no, we have not found everything, and yes, there's a lot more to be discovered,' Auld-Thomas said. 

{ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ }

'They are on the brink of instigating a potential intervention on the part of an extraterrestrial civilisation in order to preserve the life generating capacity of our planet'

He has now returned with another one – when speaking to the Julian Dorey podcast about what aliens might want on Earth.

He said: “They (the aliens) are on the brink of instigating a potential intervention on the part of an extraterrestrial civilisation in order to preserve the life generating capacity of our planet.”

Claiming that world leaders are driving the planet to nuclear war and environmental collapse, he went on: “That's what's panicking them (the aliens). If they intervene in an aggressive enough way to shut off our nuclear weapons capacities in both the East and West then that's going to reveal their presence – we aren't ready for that yet.

“We haven't taken the steps to prepare ourselves for an intervention of an extraterrestrial civilisation like this.”

He also claimed that the aliens don't want to change those in power and the power dynamics of the planet as it could potentially harm them, as they want to “sustain what they have here”. The claims follow an earlier one about two locations where the aliens are living on Earth.

Having previously stated that one bases was under the sea bed off the island of Isla Guadalupe, Danny has stated another base is in a very different “secret” location.

He said, going into great detail about this “secret” location: “There's another base outside of Sedona, Arizona, over by a place called 'secret mount' wilderness – a totally desolate area.

“There's a base there where the craft are, there's a number of them high in the mountains in remote areas of the planet and they're here now and they're extraordinarily distressed about the state of affairs (of humanity).”

He had previously claimed that the aliens were “mantis people”, and when asked if they were aliens who had very advanced weaponry he claimed that it was “conceivable”.

{ https://www.dailystar.co.uk/ }

'There's a base there where the craft are, there's a number of them high in the mountains in remote areas of the planet and they're here now and they're extraordinarily distressed'

The aliens are in the 'secret' mountains in Arizona 

(Image: Getty Images)

The location of another alien base on Earth has been revealed. Alien-loving lawyer Danny Sheehan has been involved in bringing UFO whistleblowers to the United States Congress in recent years.

He has been helping to provide explosive evidence of alleged government cover-ups regarding real encounters with extraterrestrial beings. Danny's made a series of bombshell claims regarding the potential locations of two bases with hundreds of UFOs seen going “in and out of it”, and that aliens are stealing human eggs and sperm.

He has now returned with another one – when speaking to the Julian Dorey podcast about the location of one of those bases.

Danny Sheehan has made a series of bold alien claims 

(Image: Twitter/X//julianddorey)

Having previously stated that one bases was under the sea bed off the island of Isla Guadalupe, Danny has stated another base is in a very different “secret” location.

He said, going into great detail about this “secret” location: “There's another base outside of Sedona, Arizona, over by a place called 'secret mount' wilderness – a totally desolate area.

“There's a base there where the craft are, there's a number of them high in the mountains in remote areas of the planet and they're here now and they're extraordinarily distressed about the state of affairs (of humanity).”

He had previously claimed that the aliens were “mantis people”, and when asked if they were aliens who had very advanced weaponry he claimed that it was “conceivable”.

Sheehan also claimed that there was “US military” all around the mountain base who “company the comings and goings of these big triangles going in and out of there,” as well as witnesses who stated that they had seen “tall whites or tall greys there, along with the mantis people”.

When asked what the “mantis people” are, he said: “They are huge, seven feet tall, extraordinary skinny, thin, kind of bowed over and remind people of a praying mantis... they are also called 'insectoids'. Whenever they're seen with tall greys, they seem to be in charge... giving telepathic commands.”

He went on to claim that sightings were reported in 2018 by people who were abducted by the aliens.

{ https://www.dailystar.co.uk/ }

New Research Casts More Light on Mechanisms of End-Triassic Mass Extinction

The end-Triassic extinction along with the end-Permian and end-Cretaceous events are the most severe mass extinctions in the past 270 million years. The exact mechanisms of the end-Triassic extinction have long been debated, but most prominent: carbon dioxide surfaced by volcanic eruptions built up over many millennia, raising temperatures to unsustainable levels for many creatures, and acidifying ocean waters. But a new paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences says the opposite: cold, not warmth was the main culprit.

Outcrop area of CAMP rocks in Pangea showing paleolatitudes at CAMP time (201 million years ago) of key localities with the terrestrial end-Triassic extinction including the Newark Basin (NB) in northeastern North America, the Fundy Basin (FB) of Atlantic Canada, and the Central High Atlas (CHA) Basin of Morocco.

Image credit: Kent et al., doi: 10.1073/pnas.2415486121.

The end-Triassic mass extinction occurred 201.564 million years ago and resulted in the demise of some 76% of all marine and land species.

This mass extinction coincided with massive volcanic eruptions that split apart the supercontinent Pangea.

Millions of km³ of lava erupted over some 600,000 years, separating what are now the Americas, Europe and North Africa.

The event marked the end of the Triassic period and the beginning of the Jurassic, the period when dinosaurs arose to take the place of Triassic creatures and dominate the planet.

The new study presents evidence that instead of stretching over hundreds of thousands of years, the first pulses of lava that ended the Triassic were stupendous events lasting less than a century each.

In this condensed time frame, sunlight-reflecting sulfate particles were spewed into the atmosphere, cooling the planet and freezing many of its inhabitants.

Gradually rising temperatures in an environment that was hot to begin with — atmospheric carbon dioxide in the Late Triassic was already three times today’s level — may have finished the job later on, but it was volcanic winters that did the most damage.

“Carbon dioxide and sulfates act not just in opposite ways, but opposite time frames,” said Dr. Dennis Kent, a researcher at Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory.

“It takes a long time for carbon dioxide to build up and heat things, but the effect of sulfates is pretty much instant. It brings us into the realm of what humans can grasp. These events happened in the span of a lifetime.”

The Triassic-Jurassic extinction has long been thought tied to the eruption of the so-called Central Atlantic Magmatic Province (CAMP).

In their study, Dr. Kent and colleagues correlated data from CAMP deposits in the mountains of Morocco, along Nova Scotia’s Bay of Fundy, and New Jersey’s Newark Basin.

Their key evidence: the alignments of magnetic particles in the rocks that recorded the past drifting of Earth’s magnetic pole at the time of the eruptions.

Due to a complex set of processes, this pole is offset from the planet’s unchanging axis of rotation — true north — and to boot, changes position by a few tenths of a degree each year.

Because of this phenomenon, magnetic particles in lavas that were emplaced within a few decades of each other will all point in the same direction, while ones emplaced, say, thousands of years later will point 20 or 30 degrees in a different direction.

What the researchers found was five successive initial CAMP lava pulses spread over about 40,000 years — each with the magnetic particles aligned in a single direction, indicating the lava pulse had emerged in less than 100 years, before drift of the magnetic pole could manifest itself.

These huge eruptions released so many sulfates so quickly that the sun was largely blocked out, causing temperatures to plunge.

Unlike carbon dioxide, which hangs around for centuries, volcanic sulfate aerosols tend to rain out of the atmosphere within years, so resulting cold spells don’t last very long.

But due to the rapidity and size of the eruptions, these volcanic winters were devastating.

The scientists compared the CAMP series to sulfates from the 1783 eruption of Iceland’s Laki volcano, which caused widespread crop failures; just the initial CAMP pulses were hundreds of times greater.

In sediments just below the CAMP layers lie Triassic fossils: large terrestrial and semiaquatic relatives of crocodiles, strange tree lizards, giant, flat-headed amphibians, and many tropical plants. Then they disappear with the CAMP eruptions.

Small feathered dinosaurs had been around for tens of millions of years before this, and survived, eventually to thrive and get much larger, along with turtles, true lizards, and mammals, possibly because they were small and could survive in burrows.

“The magnitude of the environmental effects are related to how concentrated the events are,” said Dr. Paul Olsen, also from Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory.

“Small events spread out over tens of thousands of years produce much less of an effect than the same total volume of volcanism concentrated in less than a century.”

“The overarching implication being that the CAMP lavas represent extraordinarily concentrated events.”

• Dennis V. Kent et al. 2024. Correlation of sub-centennial-scale pulses of initial Central Atlantic Magmatic Province lavas and the end-Triassic extinctions. PNAS 121 (46): e2415486121; doi: 10.1073/pnas.2415486121

{ https://www.sci.news/ }

De blobvis is de lelijkste vis ter wereld, maar zijn echte aspect in het water is iets anders

door Janine

The Ugly Animal Preservation Society/Facebook

Er bestaat geen twijfel over wat de lelijkste vis ter wereld is: het is de blobvis die al jaren dit vreemde record heeft.

Als we aan “lelijke” dieren denken, denken we meteen aan de blobvis: hoe zouden we anders een zacht uitziende vis met een bijzonder trieste uitdrukking noemen?

De werkelijkheid is echter anders: de blobvis is niet alleen niet de lelijkste vis ter wereld, maar wat we gewend zijn te zien is niet eens zijn echte verschijning in het water.

Hoe is dit mogelijk? Laten we daar samen achter komen!

Is de blobvis echt de lelijkste vis ter wereld?

rfedortsov/X

Als je kijkt naar foto's van de blobvis die we tot onze beschikking hebben, lijkt er geen twijfel mogelijk: het is echt de lelijkste vis ter wereld.

Hij is ongeveer 30 centimeter lang, heeft een trieste uitdrukking, een gelatineachtig uiterlijk en een grote “neus” die zijn gelaatstrekken heel menselijk maken, misschien wel te menselijk.

We moeten namelijk niet vergeten dat wij mensen heel goed zijn in het herkennen van vormen die ons bekend voorkomen, zelfs als ze er niet zijn. En de blobvis, met zijn trieste gezicht, is daar het perfecte voorbeeld van.

Tegelijkertijd zijn de beelden die van de blobvis "de lelijkste vis ter wereld" hebben gemaakt niet echt correct, omdat ze zijn ware verschijning in het water niet weergeven.

De gelatineachtige textuur en droevige uitdrukking die we op de foto's zien, zijn slechts het resultaat van de plotselinge decompressie die de blobvis ondergaat wanneer hij uit de diepten van de oceaan wordt gevist.

Zoals National Geographic aangeeft, leeft de Psychrolutes marcidus op dieptes tussen 600 en 1200 meter tussen Nieuw-Zeeland en Australië en om de enorme druk te weerstaan, heeft hij een lichaam ontwikkeld dat bijna geen spieren heeft.

Dit betekent dat het idee dat we hebben van de Psychrolutes marcidus, blobvis zoals wij hem noemen, niet helemaal juist is.

Hoe ziet de blobvis er onder water uit?

NOAA/MBARI - Public Domain

De blobvis in het water is heel anders dan wij ons voorstellen: hij leeft vredig in de diepten van de oceaan, waar hij moeiteloos drijft.

Op een diepte van 1200 meter heeft deze soort een succesvolle aanpassing gevonden door zijn spieren op te geven en zich mee te laten voeren door de stromingen. Het enige wat hier telt is het weerstaan van de grote druk en alle schaal- en weekdieren eten die voorbij komen.

Bovendien heeft deze soort geen zwemblaas, dus hij kan niet naar ondieper water. Maar dit is geen probleem.

Integendeel, in de diepten van de oceaan brengt de blobvis zijn hele leven door in verschillende stadia. Vrouwtjes kunnen tot tienduizenden eitjes per keer leggen, die vervolgens op de zeebodem worden afgezet.

Eenmaal uitgekomen komen er kleine blobvissen tevoorschijn die qua uiterlijk op volwassen exemplaren lijken: ze hebben een gelatineachtige structuur, weinig spieren en geen zwemblaas.

Onder water zijn deze verschillen echter niet merkbaar, in tegenstelling tot de oppervlakte.

Het behoud van de lelijkste vis ter wereld

clubguffy/Instagram

Hoewel de blobvis een perfect voorbeeld is van aanpassing aan een zeer specifieke ecologische niche, komen de problemen niet van de oceaan. Integendeel, ze komen van de mens.

Trawlvisserij in de diepten tussen Nieuw-Zeeland en Australië dreigt de populatie van deze soort, waarover we nog te weinig weten, te reduceren.

Daarom werd de blobvis in 2013 uitgeroepen tot het lelijkste dier ter wereld, maar het is een record met nobele bedoelingen.

Het was namelijk de Ugly Animal Preservation Society, een organisatie die mensen bewust wil maken van het belang van het beschermen van diersoorten die misschien minder aantrekkelijk zijn, maar net zo belangrijk voor het ecosysteem, waaronder de blobvis, die deze definitie gaf.

Onze lieve blob mag dan wel de lelijkste vis ter wereld zijn, maar wel voor een goed doel

{ https://www.curioctopus.nl/ }

Over the years, numerous mysterious events have been witnessed in the sky, defying explanation. Recently, yet another unusual sky phenomenon was observed over Southern Australia capturing attention and sparking curiosity. 

Video footage reveals what appears to be a dome-shaped structure, with an even stranger detail: lightning seems to bounce off or perhaps even originate from within the dome. 

The mysterious formation has led to numerous theories. Some viewers suggest it could be a unique (red) rainbow or a rare weather event like a haboob (sandstorm). Others speculate it might be the result of weather manipulation or even an energy field projected over the region. 

Opinions also vary on the lightning, some say it’s bouncing off the dome, while others believe it could be emanating from within. Although it may just be an unusual natural phenomenon, the seemly strange interaction with the lightning remains unexplained.

  

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

By Adry Torres For Dailymail.com

Viewers were left guessing after an apparent UFO was spotted floating over Cuernavaca, a city in the south central Mexican state of Morelos.

In viral video, a flying saucer-style is seen in a fixed position in the sky as bystanders at a gas station trained their cellphone cameras on it.

'This is here on Teopanzolco Avenue, on the corner of Plan of Ayala,' one of the stunned witnesses can be heard saying in the clip 'It's not just me, there are several people who are seeing it. In other words, this is how the object is suspended there.'

Residents in the south central Mexican town of Cuernavaca claimed to have recorded the moment a UFO appeared hovering near a gas station in broad daylight

A resident in Mexico was among many who paused at a gas station to record the alleged sighting of a UFO 

Some social media users questioned the veracity of the siting.

'It's false because it sways as if the wind were moving it,' another social media user commented. 'How long did it last and from there? Where did it go?'

'They saw how unsafe the city was and they decided to go somewhere else,' another joked. 'Aliens, Morelos is not safe!!'

While one person claimed it may have been a drone, another recalled seeing the same footage six years ago while adding that the object's appearance was not never verified.

Social media users appeared to be divided as to whether it was a UFO

The sighting comes just a month after the viral video filmed by Eduardo Chavez showed what appeared to be UFOs hovering near his tire repair business in the western municipality of Guadalajara.

'When I saw it I was impressed but as the minutes went by, I saw it as normal and that's when I made the video,' Chavez told DailyMail.com at the time.

But some TikTokers thought the video was a clever way to promote his small business.

'The people studying Marketing for years and this guy blew them away,' one person quipped.

'Is he aware that if the UFO is real it made a very possibly unbeatable commercial?' another commented.

{ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ }

By Francine Wolfisz

Donald Trump has come tantalisingly close to revealing what he was told about UFOs while President, as he divulged fighter jet pilots told him 'they saw things that were very strange'.

Trump, who served as the 45th President of the United States between 2017 to 2021 and is seeking re-election, also refused to rule out there could be life on Mars or other planets 'that we don't know'.

The 78-year-old politician shared his thoughts on extra-terrestrials with podcaster Joe Rogan, in an engaging interview that also covered the unopened JFK and Martin Luther King assassination files, as well as his own recent brush with a would-be killer. 

Speaking about 'the people coming from space', while looking upwards and pointing, Trump said it had not been something of specific interest to him, but he was left intrigued after speaking to pilots claiming to have witnessed UFOs over America.

He said during Friday night's podcast: 'I interviewed a few people, it's never been my thing, I have to be honest. I have never been a believer. 

Donald Trump has come tantalisingly close to revealing what he was told about UFOs while President, as he divulged fighter jet pilots told him 'they saw things that were very strange'

The 78-year-old politician shared his thoughts on extra-terrestrials with podcaster Joe Rogan, in an engaging interview broadcast on Friday night

When Rogan told Trump scientists had as yet not found any evidence of life on Mars or any other planet in the solar system, Trump said he believes there still could be. 'Well maybe its life that we don't know,' he replied

'So I interviewed jet pilots that say they saw something. If you saw them you'd love to have them [on your show]...that were solid people, perfect, great pilots, everything. 

'And they said, 'we saw things sir that were very strange, like a round ball that wasn't a comet or meteor, it was something and it was going four times faster than an F22, which is a very fast plane. 

Read More

• Trump reveals to Joe Rogan the 'one big mistake' he made in his presidency as he opens up about UFOs, murder plots and the state of the 2024 election in wild three-hour podcast 

'And it was round, which in theory is a great shape [for flying].'

Rogan, 57, then asked Trump if he spoke to the pilots because he felt 'compelled' to do so because of a 'personal interest' in the issue.

Trump admitted: 'A little bit, its not a great interest for me, but its still an interest.'

He then added that the question he is asked 'as much as almost any question' is whether there are aliens visiting the earth. 

'What do you think?' pressed Rogan.

'There's reason not to think Mars and all these planets [don't] have life,' he replied.

When Rogan said scientists had as yet not found any evidence of life on Mars or any other planet in the solar system, Trump revealed that he believes there still could be.  

'Well maybe its life that we don't know,' he replied.

Trump added that while the sighted UFOs 'could be' drones or Chinese spy balloons, he remained swayed by the eyewitness accounts of the fighter pilots he spoke to. 

He added: [They are] solid, beautiful people. [They said] this is something sir, this is something. They're not conspiracy guys.'

A screenshot from the video of a Navy pilot tracking the space craft over the Pacific. US military personnel in California believe they saw UFOs off the coast on November 14, 2004

The pair went on to discuss an infamous 2004 UFO incident in which top Navy pilots spotted 'Tic-Tacs' flying at incredible speed off the California coast, which were also picked up on sonar moving swiftly underwater.

On November 14 2004, Top Gun fighter pilot David Fravor was flying a training exercise close to San Diego when he was re-routed to investigate a strange object spotted on radar by warships protecting his aircraft carrier the USS Nimitz.

What he found was a roughly 40ft white object with no windows or wings, shaped like a Tic-Tac, flitting about above the sea that was roiling below it, disturbed by something large submerged beneath the surface.

Commander Fravor told Congress in 2023 that as he circled the object, it turned to mirror his movements, then shot off past him at thousands of miles per hour, somehow stopping a second later at a secret pre-designated rendezvous point 60 miles away that only he and a handful of Navy staff on his ship were given ahead of their training exercise.

Fellow F-18 pilot Lieutenant Chad Underwood then flew out and caught the object on video – footage that was published by the New York Times in 2017, igniting a firestorm of intrigue about the government's knowledge of UFOs.

Kevin Day, who was Senior Chief Operations Specialist aboard the USS Princeton at the time in charge of monitoring the skies with radar to protect the Nimitz, said that in the 10 days prior to the incident he saw similar objects on his radar behaving inexplicably.

Day said groups of about 10 objects were repeatedly detected 80,000ft above them, where the Earth's atmosphere becomes space, dropping down to 20,000ft in less than a second, then following the ships by flying through the air at a relatively leisurely 115mph, before zooming off towards Guadalupe Island off the coast of Mexico where they seemed to disappear under the sea.

Kevin Day, who was Senior Chief Operations Specialist aboard the USS Princeton at the time, says his witnessed the 2004 Tic-Tac UFO incident 

Warships guarding the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz as well as a submarine in the area spotted a strange object on radar in the Pacific in November 2004

Sean Cahill was a Chief Master-At-Arms on the Princeton and from its deck he says he saw lights in the sky matching the movements of the objects Day saw on his radar

'They originated from sub-earth orbit. They came in groups of five to 10 at a time. If you added up all the groups, it was about 100 contacts,' Day said.

'The very first group had 10 objects. They sat right around 80,000ft or so, off the east coast of Catalina Island. They just sat there for a time. 

'Then they would drop down as a group, instantly, down to between 20,000 and 28,000ft off the coast of Catalina Island, about 10 miles east of it.

'The really weird thing was, a single object would leave that group and travel very slowly right over the top of us, at between 20-28,000ft at about 100 knots, which was really slow.

'It would just track above us, and then the next one would depart, and the next one,' he added. 'All the groups did that.

'All 100 of them, to the best of my knowledge, disappeared in the same spot in the sky. And that spot was about 60 miles north of an island off the coast of Mexico called Guadalupe Island.

Retired Navy Commander David Fravor testifies before a House Oversight and Accountability Committee hearing about UFOs in the Rayburn House Office Building in Washington, DC in 2023

'Everyone was looking at me like, what is this? And I didn't have good answers.'

Sean Cahill, who was a Chief Master-At-Arms on the Princeton, said he saw lights in the sky matching the movements of the objects Day saw on his radar.

Rogan said that he invited Fravor onto his show to speak about his experience, mentioning that he had described seeing 'this thing go from below sea level to 50,000ft in a second'.

'That's stuff to beat,' smiled Trump.

Rogan continued: 'They don't know what it is, they saw something making a disturbance in the water, they got video evidence of this thing, two different fighter jets with pilots saw it, there's visual evidence, photographic evidence, video, radar. 

'Whatever the hell it is would turn a human being into jello if you were inside of it.'

Trump nodded as Rogan spoke, but did not elaborate further on the episode.

Speaking about US fighter jet capabilities he said: 'When you fly in these jets, the pilots have to be in great shape.

'When you fly in some of these things its amazing, you've got to be special [to be a pilot].'

{ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ }

Alien-loving lawyer Danny Sheehan has made a claim on the Julian Dorey podcast about how many different species of aliens are in our galaxy . . . that we know of

And now he has made another claim about how many different species of aliens are in our galaxy...that we know of.

Speaking to the Julian Dorey podcast, he said: “The kind of evidence and information we had indicated that there was, in fact, two to six other highly intelligent, highly technologically developed but non-human species in our galaxy – an extraordinarily conservative reading, I might add.

“But very amazing because it was the Congressional report that concluded that this was the likelihood . . . but they were really unable to determine whether any of those civilisations had developed the kind of technology that would have been able to go faster than the speed of light.”

He didn't go into further details about what those other species could be, despite claiming on the same podcast that “mantis people” were on Earth and were leading “the greys” – another form of alien.

Claiming that world leaders are driving the planet to nuclear war and environmental collapse, he went on: “That's what's panicking them (the aliens). If they intervene in an aggressive enough way to shut off our nuclear weapons capacities in both the East and West then that's going to reveal their presence – we aren't ready for that yet.

“We haven't taken the steps to prepare ourselves for an intervention of an extraterrestrial civilisation like this.”

{ https://www.dailystar.co.uk/ }

Lasers reveal 3,000-year-old secret Mayan city with more than 6,500 structures

• READ MORE:  Ancient Mayan city containing 50-foot pyramids discovered

By Nikki Main Science Reporter For Dailymail.Com

Scientists have uncovered a secret Mayan city hiding in Mexico, which once featured an urban landscape of more than 6,500 structures.

The team used lidar technology to create three-dimensional models across 50 miles of land in Campeche, allowing them to map areas not visible to the naked eye.

The method revealed a 21-square-mile metropolis with iconic stone pyramids, houses and other infrastructure that have been concealed for more than 3,000 years.

There are hundreds of documented Mayan sites, but the newest find revealed that researchers aren't close to finding all the major Maya cities.

'Our analysis not only revealed a picture of a region that was dense with settlements, but it also revealed a lot of variability,' said the study's co-author, Luke Auld-Thomas, a doctoral student at Tulane University.

'We didn't just find rural areas and smaller settlements. We also found a large city with pyramids right next to the area's only highway, near a town where people have been actively farming among the ruins for years,' Auld-Thomas said. 

The city, called Valeriana, included a dam, ballcourt, houses and terraces as well as a curved amphitheater and temple pyramids

There are hundreds of documented Mayan sites , but the newest find revealed that researchers aren't close to finding all the major Maya cities

The team conducted an aerial lidar survey, which uses laser pulses to measure distances and create three-dimensional models of specific areas. 

It has allowed scientists to scan large swaths of land from the comfort of a computer lab, uncovering anomalies in the landscape that often prove to be pyramids, family houses and other examples Maya infrastructure. 

'Because lidar allows us to map large areas very quickly, and at really high precision and levels of detail, that made us react, 'Oh wow, there are so many buildings out there we didn't know about, the population must have been huge,' Auld-Thomas said. 

'The counterargument was that lidar surveys were still too tethered to known, large sites, such as Tikal, and therefore had developed a distorted image of the Maya lowlands. 

'What if the rest of the Maya area was far more rural and what we had mapped so far was the exception instead of the rule?' 

The team uncovered two blocks of the Mayan city, one of which included a distinct pseudo-pyramid that was identical to one found at Rio Bec - a pre-Columbian Mayan archaeological site located near the Guatemala border in the Yucatan Peninsula.

The city, called Valeriana, was adjacent to a freshwater lagoon and encompassed two major areas of architecture that includes a dam, ballcourt, houses and terraces.

Valeriana also contained a curved amphitheater, temple pyramids and a reservoir that 'has all the hallmarks of a classic Maya political capital,' the study said.

The survey was conducted near a highway, revealing the hidden city with over 6,5000 structures

The Mayan city was discovered near Campeche in Mexico and covers about 21 square miles

'The discovery of Valeriana highlights the fact that there are still major gaps in our knowledge of the existence or absence of large sites within as-yet unmapped areas of the Maya Lowlands,' researchers shared.

A third region of the city was identified as a 'sparse and modest settlement, consisting of scattered or loosely clustered residences with no monumental architecture and limited investment in water storage.

Tulane professor and co-author Marcello Canuto said: 'Lidar is teaching us that, like many other ancient civilizations, the lowland Maya built a diverse tapestry of towns and communities over their tropical landscape.' 

He continued: 'While some areas are replete with vast agricultural patches and dense populations, others have only small communities. 

'Nonetheless, we can now see how much the ancient Maya changed their environment to support a long-lived complex society.'

Although hundreds of sites have been found, it's impossible to determine exactly how many Mayan cities still have to be studied.

However, lidar technology is helping researchers unearth them much more quickly, particularly in regions of southern Mexico and Guatemala.

'The government never knew about it; the scientific community never knew about it. That really puts an exclamation point behind the statement that, no, we have not found everything, and yes, there's a lot more to be discovered,' Auld-Thomas said.

{ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ }

By Stacy Liberatore For Dailymail.com

NASA has captured the moment the 'Great Halloween Comet' was swallowed by the sun.

The agency's probe witnessed the comet soar directly into the sun's fiery orbit and disintegrated without a trace Monday.

Astronomers discovered C/2024 S1 ATLAS in September, giving it the nickname due to it making a close approach days before Halloween.

Models predicted that the comet would glow brighter than Venus by the holiday, but on October 24, ATLAS flew past Earth and swung around the sun. 

NASA's Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) was the last to see the comet as it soared within 750,000 miles of the sun and disappeared.

Karl Battams, lead for NASA’s Sungrazer Project, said: 'This comet was likely already a rubble pile by the time it entered SOHO’s field of view.

'Unlike comet C/2023 A3, which never passed closer than about a third of Earth’s distance to the sun, C/2024 S1 is a true sungrazer: It passed within 1one percent of Earth’s distance to the sun, and has been completely vaporized as a result.'

Both comments are known as 'sungrazers' due to traveling close to our planet's star, where they light up brightly and often break into smaller pieces.

NASA's Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) witnessed the final moments of the 'Great Halloween Comet' as it soared closer to the sun

The Halloween Comet had shown signs of instability when telescopes in Hawaii identified it on September 27, including a sudden release of dust and cause.

While not unusual behavior for a comet, it was a sign of nucleus fragmentation that means the ball of ice is starting to break apart.

And the farther out in space an objects forms, the faster it is likely to happen. 

Astronomer Heinrich Kreutz was the first to name the comets in the late 1880s, studying as they grazed close to the sun.

And many even followed the same orbit. 

'That is, they were all fragments of a single comet which had broken up,' the European Space Agency, which partners with NASA to operate SOHO, said.

It is probable that the original comet, and its fragments, had broken up repeatedly as they orbited the Sun with a period of about 800 years. 

'In honor of his work, this group of comets was named the Kreutz sungrazers.'

Sungrazing comets have been observed possibly as far back as the year 371 BC. 

A comet seen by Aristotle and Ephorus may have been a Kreutz sungrazer. 

C/2023 A3 - also known as Tsuchinshan-Atlas - also made a close pass at Earth this month.

The comet, known as a sungrazer, took a straight path Earth's star and vaporized in the fiery orbit

Astronomers suggested the comet orbits the sun once every 80,000 years, making its current trip through our solar system the first since humans began to move out of Africa.

A3 was discovered by researchers last year and first observed at China's Purple Mountain Observatory and an Atlas (Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System) telescope in South Africa. 

It is named after both observatories.

It is thought to have originated from the Oort cloud, a giant spherical icy shell that surrounds our solar system and dates back some 4.5 billion years and may measure as much as 25 miles across.

Dr Gregory Brown, senior public astronomy officer at the Royal Observatory Greenwich, said: 'The comet itself comes from an extremely distant part of our solar system, a place called the Oort cloud.

'It contains lots of bits left over from the formation of the solar system. Every so often, one of those bits will be nudged inwards in towards the solar system, where it could end up in a very, very long orbit.

'Those orbits can take extraordinarily long periods of time - thousands of years. The estimate on this particular comet is that if it is in a stable orbit, its last path to the inner solar system was about 80,000 years ago.'

While comets often appear as a flaming fireball in the sky, Dr Brown said they are sometimes referred to as 'dirty snowballs', as they contain a considerable amount of ice.

As they fall in towards the sun they thaw out, and the gas and dust trapped within their ice is released, forming a misty cloud around them and the illusion of a 'tail'.

{ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ }

EXCLUSIVE - Exactly how NASA could evacuate ISS amid fears about leaks and cracks on the space station

• READ MORE:  ISS astronauts brace for evacuation as NASA monitors leaks 

By Ellyn Lapointe For Dailymail.Com

A growing leak on the International Space Station has sparked fears that astronauts on board may need to evacuate, including the two stranded by Boeing's Starliner.

All seven astronauts have been forced into the US side of the orbiting laboratory due to 50 'areas of concern' and four cracks in a Russian-made module.

If the leaks become severe, the space station could rapidly lose oxygen and pressure. 

The moment Houston sounds the alarm of a threat, astronauts would have to race to shut the hatch of the leaking section and head to 'lifeboats' docked on the ship. 

A spaceflight expert told DailyMail.com that if evacuation became necessary, each crew would escape in their assigned NASA spacecraft, including the SpaceX Dragon capsule and the Russian Soyuz.

NASA's Commercial Crew Program Manager Steve Stich said that in the event of an emergency, SpaceX's Dragon could be powered up within minutes. 

The capsules have been stocked with emergency suits, allowing the crew to quickly put on the proper gear as they flee the orbiting laboratory, saving more valuable time. 

However, the US space agency has admitted that it is not prepared for capsule failures due to the lack of ready-to-launch vehicles, which could leave the crew stranded without a way home.

NASA has committed to fully use and safely operate the space station through 2030, with plans to retire the ISS sometime after.

NASA has a plan in place for an emergency evacuation of the ISS and it could be used amid cracks and leaks on the ship. All seven astronauts are staying on the US side due to a leak in the Russian module

Independent spaceflight safety expert Laura Forczyk told DailyMail.com: 'If the leaks on the ISS worsen significantly to the point where NASA and Russia conclude the situation is unsafe, it may mean decommissioning the ISS sooner than expected.'

The main leak was identified in a service module transfer tunnel in Russia's Zvezda module that provides station living quarters, life support systems, electrical power distribution and data processing, flight control and propulsion systems.

American astronauts who came to the ISS on SpaceX's capsule are prepared to escape on their spacecraft if necessary.

But the evacuation plan for Don Pettit, a NASA astronaut who flew to the ISS aboard the Roscosmos Soyuz MS-26 spacecraft with two Russian astronauts in September, is a bit more complicated.

In the event of an emergency, he would not return to Earth on Soyuz. Instead, he would have to cram inside the SpaceX capsule, which was recently equipped with an extra seat just in case Pettit needs it, NASA spokesperson Jimi Russell told DailyMail.com.

It is unclear why Pettit would not return in the Russian craft, but some have suggested the swap would be due to the growing tensions between Russia and the US. 

NASA does not currently have an official evacuation plan for American astronauts assigned to Russian spacecraft. But the agency has awarded a $266,000 contract order for SpaceX to build one out. 

In the event that the leaks, cracks and other issues render the entire ISS uninhabitable, the astronaut crews would follow protocol to shelter in their respective spacecraft.  

This is not the first time the ISS has sprung a leak. In 2018 astronauts rushed to fix a hole (pictured) which had appeared in the outer wall of the Soyuz capsule on the orbiting laboratory.

ESA astronaut Tim Peake took this photo from inside Cupola in 2016, showing a 7 mm-diameter circular chip gouged out by the impact from a tiny piece of space debris

Each crew's capsule has an assigned shelter-in-vehicle plan that will protect astronauts from threats aboard the ISS, and allow them to flee the space station if necessary, according to a September report from NASA's Office of the Inspector General (OIG). 

'It was designed with these kinds of contingencies in mind,' Stich said previously. 

They also contain astronaut suits so that crews can quickly and conveniently suit-up in an emergency situation.

It can take up to 30 minutes to get inside a spacesuit, according to NASA.

Streamlining this process as much as possible would be critical in an emergency situation. 

These vehicles would be the astronauts' only hope of escape. If something happened to them, it would be a different story.

'Due to the high costs and a limited budget, the lack of ready-to-launch vehicles prevent the Agency from having an immediate response capability if crew vehicles encounter significant damage and are no longer safe for crew evacuation,' the report states. 

Russia's Zvezda module launched in 2000 and 'served as the early cornerstone for the first human habitation of the station,' NASA has said. But like the rest of the ISS, this module is aging and requires maintenance to keep working. 

The leak has been ongoing since 2019 when air began escaping from the module's transfer tunnel, a vestibule that separates the Russian docking port from the rest of the rest of the module.

There was no immediate danger, but it was eventually located and has been patched multiple times over the last five years. 

The Zvezda module is used to access a Russian cargo dock. Due to the escalating leak, the Russian space agency has agreed to keep the module sealed except when needed

A new leak was identified in 2021, also in the Russian Zvezda module, which was deemed a 'fairly serious issue.' 

If the leak grew severe, NASA and Roscosmos may be forced to permanently close the hatch to the affected tunnel.

And if the leaks worsened to a point where the habitability of the entire space station was affected, astronauts would be forced to sequester inside their spacecraft and potentially return to Earth. 

Former NASA astronaut Bill Shepherd, who served as the first commander on the ISS from October 2000 to March 2001, told a House of Representatives committee at the time that NASA and Russian engineers 'don't exactly understand why the cracks are appearing now.' 

Shepherd reiterated claims by Roscosmos, the Russian space agency, that it was 'becoming a serious issue.'

Despite the fact that NASA has patched the main leak repeatedly, the amount of air escaping the station has only increased over the last five years.

NASA is now tracking 50 'areas of concern' related to a leak in the Russian Zvezda Service Module Transfer Tunnel (labelled)  which sprung a leak in 2019

The Canadarm2 robot arm was struck by space debris in May 2021, creating a hole that fortunately didn't impact the functionality of the robotic arm

It was the focus of the September report from the OIG, which found that the leak then hit record rates in April - losing 3.7 pounds of air every day.

The OIG has escalated the threat rating to five out of five in NASA's internal risk assessments. 

But this leak is just the tip of the iceberg. NASA officials told the Washington Post they are tracking four other cracks and 50 'areas of concern' on the ISS.

Speaking to the Washington Post, NASA associate administrator Jim Free said: 'We have conveyed the seriousness of the leaks multiple times, including when I was in Russia earlier this year.'

The cracks have 'all been covered with a combination of sealant and patches,' by Roscosmos, and further repairs are ongoing. 

{ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ }

The Sun Has Reached Its Solar Maximum and it Could Last for One Year

The Solar Maximum is all based on the Sun’s magnetic fields. These fields are measured in Gauss units, which describe magnetic flux density. The Sun’s poles measure about 1 to 2 gauss, but sunspots are much higher at about 3,000 gauss. (Earth is only 0.25 to 0.65 gauss at its surface.) Since the magnetic field is so much stronger where sunspots appear, they inhibit convective heating from deeper inside the Sun. As a result, sunspots appear as dark patches.

Sunspots are visual indicators of the Sun’s 11-year cycle. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and an international group called the Solar Cycle Prediction Panel watch sunspots to understand where the Sun is at in its cycle.

“During solar maximum, the number of sunspots, and therefore, the amount of solar activity, increases,” said Jamie Favors, director of the Space Weather Program at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “This increase in activity provides an exciting opportunity to learn about our closest star — but also causes real effects at Earth and throughout our solar system.”

The effects came into focus for many of us recently. In May 2024, the Sun launched multiple CMEs. As the magnetic fields and charged particles reached Earth, they triggered the strongest geomagnetic storm in 200 decades. These created colourful aurorae that were visible much further from the poles than usual. NASA says that these aurorae were likely among the strongest displays in the last 500 years.

Scientists know the Sun is at its solar maximum. But it lasts for an entire year. They won’t know when its activity peaks until after they’ve watched it for months and its activity has declined.

“This announcement doesn’t mean that this is the peak of solar activity we’ll see this solar cycle,” said Elsayed Talaat, director of space weather operations at NOAA. “While the Sun has reached the solar maximum period, the month that solar activity peaks on the Sun will not be identified for months or years.”

Each cycle is different, making it difficult to label peak solar activity. Different peaks have different durations and have higher or lower peaks than others.

Understanding the Sun’s cycle is important because it creates space weather. During solar maximum, the increased sunspots and flares also mean more coronal mass ejections (CMEs.) CMEs can strike Earth, and when they do, they can trigger aurorae and cause geomagnetic storms. CMEs, which are blobs of hot plasma, can also affect satellites, communications, and even electrical grids.

NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory captured these images of solar flares below, as seen in the bright flashes in the left image (May 8, 2024 flare) and the right image (May 7, 2024 flare). The image shows 131 angstrom light, a subset of extreme ultraviolet light that highlights the extremely hot material in flares and which is colourized in orange.

via GIPHY

During the solar maximum, the Sun produces an average of three CMEs every day, while it drops to one CME every five days during the solar minimum. The CMEs’ effect on satellites causes the most concern. In 2003, satellites experienced 70 different types of failures. The failures ranged from erroneous signals in a satellite’s electronics to the destruction of electrical components. The solar storm that occurred in 2003 was deemed responsible for 46 of those 70 failures.

CMEs are also a hazard for astronauts orbiting Earth. The increased radiation poses a health risk, and during storms, astronauts seek safety in the most shielded part of the ISS, Russia’s Zvezda Service Module.

Galileo and other astronomers noticed sunspots hundreds of years ago but didn’t know exactly what they were. In a 1612 pamphlet titled “Letters on Sunspots,” Galileo wrote ‘The sun, turning on its axis, carries them around without necessarily showing us the same spots, or in the same order, or having the same shape.’ This contrasted with others’ views on the spots, some of which suggested they were natural satellites of the Sun.

We’ve known about the Sun’s magnetic fields for 200 hundred years, though at first, scientists didn’t know the magnetism was coming from the Sun. In 1724, an English geophysicist noticed that his compass was behaving strangely and was deflected from magnetic north throughout the day. In 1882, other scientists correlated these magnetic effects with increased sunspots.

In recent decades, we’ve learned much more about our stellar companion thanks to spacecraft dedicated to studying it. NASA and the ESA launched the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) in 1995, and NASA launched the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) in 2010. In 2011, we got our first 360-degree view of the Sun thanks to NASA’s two Solar TErrestrial RElations Observatory (STEREO) spacecraft. In 2019, NASA launched the Parker Solar Probe, which also happens to be humanity’s fastest spacecraft.

Our understanding of the Sun and its cycles is far more complete now. The current cycle, Cycle 25, is the 25th one since 1755.

“Solar Cycle 25 sunspot activity has slightly exceeded expectations,” said Lisa Upton, co-chair of the Solar Cycle Prediction Panel and lead scientist at Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio, Texas. “However, despite seeing a few large storms, they aren’t larger than what we might expect during the maximum phase of the cycle.”

The most powerful flare so far in Cycle 25 was on October 3rd, when the Sun emitted an X9 class flare. But scientists anticipate more flares and activity to come. There can be significantly powerful storms even in the cycle’s declining phase, though they’re not as common.

The Sun’s 11-year cycle is just one of its cycles, nested in larger cycles. The Gleissberg cycle lasts between 80 to 90 years and modulates the 11-year cycle. The de Vries cycle or Suess cycle lasts between 200 and 210 years, and the Hallstatt cycle lasts about 2,300 years. Both of these cycles contribute to long-term solar variation.

However, even with all we know about the Sun, there are big gaps in our knowledge. The Sun’s magnetic poles switch during the 11-year cycle, and scientists aren’t sure why.

There’s a lot more to learn about the Sun, but we won’t run out of time to study it any time soon. It’s in the middle of its 10-billion-year lifetime and will be a main-sequence star for another five billion years.

{ https://www.universetoday.com/ }

Remember that “Alien Signal” Sent by the ExoMars Orbiter Last Year? It’s Just Been Decoded

Ken Chaffin included the following message with the solution he and his daughter submitted:

“My decoded message is a simple image with 5 amino acids displayed in a universal (hopefully) organic molecular diagram notation and a few single pixel points that appear between the clusters and molecular diagrams. I used a Margolus reversible 2×2 block cellular automata (BCA) with the simplest reversible rule, which is called ‘single point (CCW) rotation,’ acting only on 2×2 cells that contain only a single point or pixel per the header instructions, conserving pixel or point count, 625 pixels in and 625 out. The starmap image appears to have the molecular forms encoded in a 3D local degree of freedom set of basis vectors (also shown in the header).

“The CA effectively transforms and projects this 3D info onto a 2D plane. I can run my Unity game engine based simulator forwards (CCW rotation) and backwards (CW rotation) in time and transform the starmap representation to the amino acid diagrams in 6625 generations and reverse the rotation process to transform the amino acid diagrams back to the starmap image in 6625 generations. I say starmap but I really read from the binary message file each run. The decoded image is only visible for 1 frame lasting about 1/10th of a second, but I can pause and manually step as well as reverse my CA engine…Here is a screen capture of my decoded image [see below].

“The ‘blocks’ have 1, 6, 7, or 8 ‘pixels’ representing the atomic number of hydrogen, carbon, nitrogen, and oxygen. Single and double bonds are designated as single and double lines. C-H bond angle is indicated with a caret ^ sign. These signs were produced by the CA. I have not edited the image in any way. It’s absolutely obvious to me what this is, as well as to my chemist friend I ran this by. It is amazing to watch all of the CA gliders or spaceships carry the binary bits of the message all over the ‘galaxy’ and then suddenly come together in coherence and meaning…”

The image shows the Chaffis solution. Credit: A Sign in Space

Now that the tasks of extracting and decoding the message are complete, Daniela and her colleagues are taking a step back to observe how citizen scientists are shaping the challenge. The next step is to interpret the message and determine what it was meant to convey, a task that currently remains open. According to the project team, there are several ways for the public to engage, which include using the description and solution provided by the Chaffins to conduct independent analysis and post the results on the project’s Discord channel.

Participants must include a description of the method they used so that their approach can be replicated and verified. The possibilities are endless, ranging from an attempt at communication, cultural exchange, or a threat of invasion. Ultimately, this exercise aims to determine whether or not humanity is ready to make first contact with an alien civilization.

Further Reading: 

• ESA

{ https://www.universetoday.com/ }

China’s ‘Thousand Sails’ Joins Starlink as the Latest Mega-Satellite Constellation in Orbit

Approaching An Artificial Sky

Streaks and trails due to the increasing number of Starlinks in orbit have also become a standard feature in modern deep sky images. While techniques to remove these have been pioneered by astrophotographers, these will continue to impact deep sky astronomy. This impact extends to sky surveys soon set to come online such as the Vera Rubin Observatory, set to see first light early next year in 2025.

SpaceX has implemented mitigation plans in response, including use of sun visors on first generation satellites, diffuse ‘dielectric mirror’ material on newer Version 2 (V2) platforms, and angling solar arrays. These have seen some success. Certainly, spotters have noted that the new Version 2’s have a bluer tint, and seem to shine at magnitude +7 once they’re boosted into their respective orbital slots. This is near the +7 magnitude threshold called for by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the International Astronomical Union (IAU).

Radio noise from these new communications satellite constellations is also an issue that astronomers now have to contend with. LOFAR (The Netherlands Institute for Astronomy’s Low Frequency Array) notes that “new observations with the LOFAR radio telescope…have shown that the second generation ‘V2-mini’ Starlink satellites emit up to 32 brighter unintended radio waves than satellites from the previous generation.”

Enter China’s ‘Thousand Sails’ Initiative

China also recently joined the competition in LEO, with the launch of a Long March-6 rocket from Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center with 18 satellites for Shanghai Spacecom Satellite Technology (SSST). This is part of the company’s ‘Thousand Sails’ initiative.

Dubbed China’s answer to Starlink, This will see an initial 1,296 satellites for the constellation placed in orbit by 2027. The company also has plans to expand the network to 12,000 satellites into the 2030s. This first batch went into a polar (sun-synchronous) orbit, and the resulting satellite train was spotted in orbit shortly after launch.

And there’s more in store. China also launched a Long March 6 rocket on September 5^th, with 10 new satellites for Geely Group Automotive. These are part of the company’s effort to build a communication network for autonomous vehicles.

As a follow-on this month, China also launched a Long March-6 rocket on October 15^th with another batch of 18 satellites headed into a polar orbit. This group is also part of the Thousand Sails constellation. Satellite spotters have already tracked these in orbit, with an estimated brightness of up the +4th magnitude when near the zenith on a visible pass. Keep in mind, China isn’t beholden to any obligations to mitigate the impact that satellite constellations might have on the night sky…nor do any formal international standards exist.

More Mega Satellite Constellations to Come

Not to be outdone, SpaceX is putting up more than just Starlink. Last month, SpaceX launched a Falcon 9 rocket on September 12^th, with the first five Bluebird satellites. These are ASTMobile’s follow-on to the BlueWalker-3 test satellite, still in orbit. With a phased-array antenna 10-meters across when deployed, BlueWalker-3 reaches magnitude 0. The company plans to put 110 of these potentially brilliant Bluebirds in orbit over the next few years.

OneWeb is also still putting satellites in orbit. The ongoing Russia-Ukraine War has forced the company to forego Soyuz launches. Instead, OneWeb now relies on competitor SpaceX to get into orbit.

The OneWeb satellite constellation currently hosts 660 satellites in orbit, right around the initial target number set by the company Eutelsat-OneWeb for nominal operation. The company began offering services through residential providers last year, including Hughesnet, Viasat and ironically, Starlink.

Starlink’s current status is 7,125 satellites in orbit, with 23 more planned tonight with the launch of Starlink Group 6-61 from the Cape. 12,000 satellites in orbit are planned for in the coming years, and the constellation could extend to a total of 34,400 satellites in future years.

Not to be outdone, the Unites States’ Department of Defense is putting its own dedicated satellite constellation in space. Dubbed Starshield, the network already has 73 satellites in orbit, and a total of more than a 100 are planned. As expected, the DoD is already shaping up to be Starlink’s (and SpaceX’s) biggest customer.

Hunting Satellite Trains

Other bright reflectors are making themselves seen in the night sky as well. ACS-3 (the Advanced Composite Solar Sail System) was launched this past April on a Rocket Lab Electron rocket. The mission successfully unfurled this summer on August 29^th. ACS-3 is the latest in a batch of satellites to attempt to test solar sail technologies in orbit. Mission planners could use this tech on future missions for maneuvering, propulsion or reentry disposal. Previous missions, including NanoSail-D2 and Planetary Society’s Light Sail have struggled with this tech, demonstrating just how difficult it’s turning out to be.

ACS-3 is definitely tumbling: we’ve seen it flare up to 0 magnitude (as bright as Vega) on a good pass. This seems to be very angle dependent.

You can track these missions and more on Heavens-Above. The leaders for the first two batches of respective Thousand Sail groups are 2024-140A and 2024-145A. Plus, Heavens-Above tracks Starlink batches (which are once again going up at a furious rate) on a dedicated page. We saw the most recently launched Starlink Group Batch 8-19 this past weekend… and that was from under the bright lights of downtown Bristol, Tennessee.

The Promise and Peril of Mega-Sat Constellations

To be sure, we’re a huge consumer of roaming WiFi. If we can continue our career and online exploits from a remote basecamp, then that’s a good thing… but there also needs to be oversight when it comes to what we’re collectively doing to our night sky as a resource.

Are we headed towards a future where artificial stars in the night sky outnumber real ones? Perhaps, the best thing that amateur satellite trackers can do now, is to chronicle what’s happening, as the Anthropocene era leaves its mark on a brave new night sky.

{ https://www.universetoday.com/ }

Did Some of Earth’s Water Come from the Solar Wind?

To try to understand how Earth’s water fits into the history of the planet and the Solar System, researchers examine the isotope ratio on Earth and in meteorites. The isotopic composition of Earth’s water is most similar to primitive meteorites. On the other hand, it’s different from that of comets and nebular gas.

This implies that Earth’s water came from the same cosmochemical reservoir that is also the source of primitive meteorites.

It’s a complicated issue. Maybe Earth’s water has multiple sources. Maybe some of it was created in space long after Earth and the rest of the Solar System formed, and then delivered to Earth.

New research in The Astrophysical Journal explores how water can be created by the solar wind as it strikes surfaces holding oxygen-containing minerals. It’s titled “Stellar Wind Contribution to the Origin of Water on the Surface of Oxygen-containing Minerals.” The lead author is Svatolpuk Civiš from the J. Heyrovský Institute of Physical Chemistry at the Czech Academy of Sciences in Prague.

The solar wind is a steady stream of charged particles—mostly protons and electrons—that come from the Sun. H+ ions, which are simply protons, are the most abundant particles in the solar wind. They make a big contribution to the solar wind’s properties. Could the wind trigger the creation of water molecules?

The researchers performed laboratory experiments to find out. They tested 14 oxygen-containing minerals. “To investigate the process of water formation on the surface of oxidic materials and water abundances, we used the technique of surface bombardment with hydrogen or deuterium atoms and ions,” the authors write in their paper.

The experiments had two phases: the first tested whether the minerals would produce water when exposed to the solar wind, and the second tested their adsorption capacity. Separate from absorption, adsorption is the adhesion of a sample to a surface.

The team produced water and then measured it using two methods: a microwave (MW) discharge experiment and sputter gun irradiation. They tested the results with a type of spectrometry analysis called Fourier-transform infrared spectrometry (FTIR) and temperature-programmed desorption (TPD) analysis.

“Both these experiments include a mineral sample bombarded by hydrogen/deuterium ions, which, among other possibilities, react with surface oxygens in the mineral lattice and form water molecules,” the authors write.

The oxide material samples were not only exposed to the strong current of H, H+ and molecular hydrogen that mimic the solar wind. They were also exposed to intense visible and UV radiation generated in the hydrogen discharge.

“The stellar wind irradiation of rocky oxygen-containing minerals results in a reaction between H+ ions and silicate minerals to produce water and OH, which could explain the presence of water in the regoliths of airless worlds such as the Moon, as well as the water abundances in asteroids,” the authors write.

Previous research has established that a chemical reaction occurs between hydrogen ions and silicate minerals when rocky materials are exposed to solar wind irradiation. Some researchers have observed the formation of OH (hydroxide) and water, while others have only found OH. This research goes deeper by testing the rocky materials for water adsorption.

The researchers tested the samples’ water adsorption capacity. Then, they calculated how much material would need to reach Earth to account for the amount of water on contemporary Earth.

“Besides material acquired by the Earth during accretion, the solar wind origin of water and its delivery to Earth could have gone on even during post-accretional bombardment,” the authors write. Here, they’re referring to the hypothetical Late Heavy Bombardment.

Previous research shows that ” asteroid and comet impacts during the classical Late Heavy Bombardment would bring in about ?10²⁰ kg of material,” the authors write. “If that material’s surface was fully saturated with adsorbed water as composed of one of our minerals, our calculations suggest that at least one ocean equivalent of water could have been brought in.”

There’s not much doubt about the results of these tests and the ability of the solar wind to create water.

“The results of the experiments summarized in this work, focused on surface bombardment with hydrogen atoms, clearly confirm the theory of the interaction of excited hydrogen or deuterium Rydberg atoms and ions with the surface oxygens of oxide minerals,” the authors explain. “Our experiments attempt to explain the origin of water in the areas of oxygen-containing solid material (e.g., dust, meteoroids, asteroids, comets) exposed to a stream of charged particles close to a parent star.”

Earth’s atmosphere and magnetosphere shield it from the solar wind, so there’s no way the wind could’ve created water right on Earth’s surface. However, as the study shows, the wind can create water on the surface of other bodies like asteroids, and the water can be adsorbed and held firm, then delivered to Earth via impacts.

“This scenario is also applicable to the origin of water on Earth,” the authors write. “Due to this effect, a water molecule can be adsorbed on the surface of oxygen-containing particles and then transported over long distances and times,” the researchers write.

This study won’t be the end of the ongoing effort to account for Earth’s water. In a fascinating roundabout way, this research brings us back to asteroids and meteorites delivering Earth’s water. If it can happen here, it can happen on exoplanets elsewhere in the galaxy.

{ https://www.universetoday.com/ }

Add Astronaut Nutrition to the List of Barriers to Long-Duration Spaceflight

This dwarfs the eight days that the Apollo 11 astronauts spent in space. These long trips will tax astronauts’ health and NASA is working to understand what role nutrition can play in helping astronauts stay healthy and manage the risks.

Their current work on astronaut nutrition is a freely available PDF book titled “Human Adaptation to Spaceflight: The Role of Food and Nutrition—2nd Edition.” Its four authors are all researchers working in nutrition, biochemistry, biomedical research, space food systems, and preventative health.

“The importance of nutrition in exploration has been documented repeatedly throughout history, on voyages across oceans, on expeditions across polar ice, and on treks across unexplored continents,” the authors write.

Scientists have learned a lot about nutrition since the age of sailing and exploration, but the authors write that “a key difference between past journeys and space exploration is that astronauts are not likely to find food along the way.” This means that understanding astronaut nutritional requirements and food system requirements on long journeys is “as critical to crew safety and mission success as any of the mechanical systems of the spacecraft itself.”

The book examines the unique challenges astronauts face and presents data from multiple studies that are analogous to those challenges. For example, nutrition research from Antarctica duplicates the isolation and lack of sunlight astronauts can face on long missions, and head-down tilt-bed rest duplicates the musculoskeletal disuse they must endure.

Astronauts face a long list of health risks on long-duration spaceflights. Radiation exposure and its cancer risk and microgravity and its effect on muscle and bone are the most well-known risks. But there are other lesser-known risks, too.

Astronauts can suffer from neuro-ocular syndrome, their immune systems can be weakened, and their gut biota can change. All of these conditions are linked with nutrition. While scientists don’t have a complete understanding of how everything works, it’s clear that nutrition plays a role. The book outlines the types of research being done and what the current understanding is. But the authors are clear about one thing: the system of providing astronauts with proper nutrition needs work.

ISS astronauts, except for Russians, get part of their food in Crew Specific Menu (CSM) containers that each astronaut orders. They provide between 10% and 20% of their food. They also receive a small supply of fresh foods and limited shelf-life foods on each re-supply mission. This has increased the variety of foods for astronauts and helped with nutrition, but astronauts still say they’d like more CSM and fresh foods.

Here in the developed world on Earth, it’s fairly straightforward to meet nutritional needs. Most of us have access to supermarkets and/or farmer’s markets where we can buy fresh produce and other healthy foods. That same variety simply isn’t available in space. ISS astronauts have done some experimental “farming” and have successfully grown a few food plants like lettuce, kale, and cabbage. However, that’s a long way away from growing enough food to help with nutrition, especially on a Mars mission, where presumable space and payload will be at a premium.

One obvious question about astronaut nutrition is whether supplements can replace nutritious food. The authors present evidence that discredits that idea. “Many previous studies have shown that the complex synergistic benefits provided by whole foods cannot be replicated by supplements,” they write. In fact, in some instances, supplements can be dangerous. “Recent studies have also found that supplementation with certain antioxidants such as vitamin E and vitamin A can increase risks of cancer and all-cause mortality,” the authors explain.

The need for a space food system goes beyond nutrition. There are social and well-being benefits, too. Knowing that you have access to a variety of healthy foods keeps morale up. The ability to share or trade high-value food items with your fellow astronauts can create goodwill and a desire to cooperate. Think of sharing a meal with friends or family and all the social connection it provides.

According to the authors, there’s currently no solution to the nutrition roadblock for Mars missions. In fact, there’s currently no system designed to supply astronauts with the needed nutrition for any long-duration spaceflight. “Currently, no food system exists to meet the nutrition, acceptability, safety, and resource challenges of extended exploration missions, such as a mission to Mars,” the authors write.

However, the researchers say it’s critical that we develop one. Without it, long-duration missions and the astronauts who crew them will suffer and possibly face catastrophic failure.

“A space food system, developed and provisioned to deliver all the defined nutritional requirements, should be available on every human mission as an essential countermeasure to health and performance decrements,” the authors write.

{ https://www.universetoday.com/ }

“Een kosmische structuur zo groot als 140 Melkwegen, dat is onvoorstelbaar”: nooit eerder spuwde superzwaar zwart gat zo'n gigantische stralen uit

Diep in de kosmos hebben astronomen de grootste straalstromen ooit waargenomen, afkomstig uit een ‘superzwaar zwart gat’. Ze zijn liefst 140 keer groter dan onze Melkweg en dat slaat wetenschappers met verstomming, want ze dachten dat zoiets fysisch onmogelijk was? Tot nu, dus. Wat hebben ze precies ontdekt? Hoe hebben ze dat gedaan? En wat maakt dit zo uitzonderlijk? HLN-wetenschapsexpert Martijn Peters geeft de antwoorden.

Wat hebben de wetenschappers precies ontdekt?

“Een internationaal team astronomen heeft het grootste paar straalstromen ooit ontdekt , bij een superzwaar zwart gat. Dat maakten ze deze week bekend in een nieuwe wetenschappelijke publicatie in het toonaangevende tijdschrift Nature”, vertelt Peters.

Lees ook

• 

  IN BEELD. Dit zijn de eerste beelden van de Euclid ruimtetelescoop: “Nooit eerder zo haarscherp beeld van zo groot deel van de hemel”

  

  IN BEELD. Met dit bijzondere plaatje viert de James Webb ruimtetelescoop zijn eerste verjaardag

“Die zogenaamde ‘jumbojets’ zitten elk aan weerszijden van een zwart gat. Samen zijn ze maar liefst 140 keer groter dan onze Melkweg, zo’n 23 miljoen lichtjaar in afstand (onze Melkweg heeft slechts een diameter van ‘amper’ 200,000 lichtjaar). Daarmee is dit de grootste kosmische structuur ooit ontdekt. De wetenschappers hebben het daarom naar ‘Porphyrion’ vernoemd, de koning van de reuzen uit de Griekse mythologie.”

Simulatie van megastructuur Porphyrion  © via REUTERS

Hoe is deze ‘grootste structuur in onze kosmos ooit’ ontstaan?

“Vandaag is het universum 13,8 miljard jaar oud, maar de gigantische straalstromen zijn ontstaan toen het heelal nog maar 6,3 miljard jaar oud was. Een superzwaar gat in het centrum van een sterrenstelsel heeft ze toen als het ware uitgespuwd”, legt onze wetenschapsexpert uit. “Zo’n zwart gat verslindt aan de lopende band sterren, gas en stof. Maar een klein deel van al dat materiaal ontsnapt aan de vraatzucht van het zwarte gat en wordt langs twee kanten uitgespuwd in de vorm van straalstromen.”

Het is vooral de grootte van deze straalstro­men die wetenschap­pers met verstom­ming heeft geslagen

“Het is niet de eerste keer dat deze groep astronomen zo’n ontdekking doet. In 2022 vonden ze al Alcyoneus, toen met een grootte van 100 Melkwegen de grootste structuur ooit. De nieuwe kosmische megastructuur Porphyrion is niet alleen veel groter dan vorige recordhouder Alcyoneus, maar ligt ook verder weg van ons”, aldus Peters.

Wat maakt deze ontdekking zo uitzonderlijk?

“Het is vooral de grootte van deze straalstromen die wetenschappers met verstomming heeft geslagen. Volgens theoretische berekeningen was deze ontdekking namelijk onmogelijk. Een superzwaar zwart gat dat zulke gigantische straalstromen de kosmos in heeft gezwierd kon volgens de fysica niet bestaan. Maar dat blijkt nu wel zo te zijn.”

Simulatie van megastructuur Porphyrion  © Martijn Oei/Dylan Nelson/IllustrisTNG Collaboration

“Waar Porphyrion zijn recordgrootte aan te danken heeft, blijft vooralsnog een mysterie. Ook de onderzoekers kunnen moeilijk verklaren waarom deze jumbojets zo groot zijn. Straalstromen van deze grootte verliezen normaal gezien snel hun stabiliteit. Ze vermoeden dat het zwarte gat miljarden jaren lang ongehinderd materiaal heeft kunnen verslinden en uitspuwen. Voor een ongewoon lange periode dus.”

Hoe zijn ze hierin geslaagd?

“De onderzoekers deden hun ontdekking met behulp van het LOFAR-telescoopnetwerk. Dat is een telescoop die uit duizenden radioantennes bestaat. Ze hebben de radiobeelden met het oog, met behulp van machine learning en burgerwetenschappers bestudeerd. Om Porphyrions sterrenstelsel te bepalen hebben ze nog extra onderzoek verricht met de Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope in India en met de Keck I-telescoop op Mauna Kea in Hawaï.”

De volgende stap voor de wetenschap is om uit te zoeken hoe zo’n megastruc­tu­ren alles rondom hen beïnvloe­den

“Ze hebben trouwens niet enkel deze megastructuur ontdekt, maar ook nog 8.000 andere exemplaren. Weliswaar niet zo groot als Porphyrion. De onderzoekers vermoeden echter dat dit nog maar het topje van de ijsberg is. De LOFAR-beelden die nu bestudeerd zijn, besloegen slechts 15 procent van de hemel. Daarnaast zijn zulke grote en verre jets moeilijk waar te nemen. Hoe beter onze instrumenten worden, hoe groter de kans dat we nog van deze structuren zullen zien. Wie weet wat we nog zullen ontdekken in de komende jaren”, mijmert onze wetenschapsexpert.

Wat zijn nu de volgende stappen voor de wetenschap?

“Door zijn recordgrootte heeft Porphyrion waarschijnlijk veel invloed uitgeoefend op zijn omgeving. Vooral ook omdat het heelal toen kleiner was en alles veel dichter bij elkaar lag. De volgende stap voor de wetenschap is om uit te zoeken hoe zo’n megastructuren alles rondom hen beïnvloeden. De straalstromen verspreiden allerlei zaken zoals magnetische velden, zware atomen, hitte en kosmische straling. Wat is de impact daarvan? Dat zal de wetenschap moeten uitzoeken. Daarnaast is het nog steeds onduidelijk hoe deze megastructuren precies tot stand komen.”

LEES OOK:

• Wetenschappers ontdekken helderste object ooit in universum: “Dit hongerige zwarte gat verorbert elke dag een zon”

• “Straffere getijden, meer bevallingen en minder regen”: wat is er waar van alle mythes en verhalen over de volle maan? (+)

• IN BEELD. Wereld genoot van “superoogstmaan” afgelopen nacht

{ https://www.hln.be/ }

Story by Holly Bishop

 

Pentagon officials have been left perplexed by a swarm of mystery drones that flew over Langley Air Force base for 17 consecutive nights.

The flock of drones flew in a specific pattern over the base in east Virginia, with one or two-fixed wing drones flying over 100ft in the air, as smaller quadcopters flew below them.

General Mark Kelly, a commander at the airbase, said the drones were almost impossible to catch.

Despite flying across large areas around the base for more than a fortnight in December 2023, the Air Force could not shoot them down due to strict federal laws that stop the military from shooting them down unless they pose a threat.

Some suspect the drones may have originated from Russia or China in an attempt to test American responses.

In a statement, the US Air Force confirmed the breaches but played down the potential threat.

“The number of UASs [uncrewed aerial systems] fluctuated and they ranged in size/configuration," the US Air Force said.

“None of the incursions appeared to exhibit hostile intent but anything flying in our restricted airspace can pose a threat to flight safety. The FAA was made aware of the UAS incursions.”

Analysts noted that the quadcopters did not utilise frequencies typically associated with commercial drones, suggesting they were not operated by hobbyists.

LATEST DEVELOPMENTS:

• Tui flight in emergency landing after 'aggressive' passenger spilt alcohol on child
• Pilot dies mid-flight as plane forced to make emergency landing nearly 3,000 miles away
• New Zealand Navy ship sinks off coast of Samoa as Defence Force scrambles to 'minimise impacts'

Due to the sensitive military location, as well as the prolonged nature of the incursions, analysts contacted the White House to help formulate an effective response.

Officials grappled with various options to combat the potential surveillance threat, although all choices have so far been rejected.

One suggestion involved using electronic signals to disrupt the drones' navigation systems, but this was dismissed due to the risk of interfering with Wi-Fi networks and emergency response systems.

Another proposal considered the use of directed energy weapons, an emerging military technology, to shoot down the drones.

However, the Federal Aviation Authority raised concerns about the potential danger to commercial aircraft during the holiday season.

A third option explored was the deployment of nets by the US Coast Guard to capture the drones.

This idea was also rejected due to questions over legal authority and the practical challenges of tracking the swift-moving aircraft.

While the investigation into the Langley incident continues, a potential lead emerged in January when a Chinese student was arrested for unlawfully photographing naval installations.

Fengyun Shi, who was studying at the University of Minnesota, was apprehended whilst attempting to fly back to China.

Shi was caught flying a drone near a shipyard operated by HII, a company responsible for constructing nuclear submarines and the latest Ford Class aircraft carriers.

The student's drone, which had crashed into a tree, contained photos of Navy vessels in dry dock taken around midnight.

During a federal court appearance, Shi's attorney stated: "If he was a foreign agent, he would be the worst spy ever known."

However, the connection between this incident and the Langley drone sightings remains unclear.

The Langley incident is not isolated, as drones have been spotted at other sensitive US military sites.

Just two months prior, the Energy Department's Nevada Nuclear Security Site outside Las Vegas detected five drones over three days.

This location is used for testing nuclear weapons, underscoring the potential security risks posed by such incursions.

These events follow the high-profile Chinese spy balloon incident over Malmstrom Air Force base in Montana, where nuclear assets are stored.

On February 4 last year, the US Air Force responded by dispatching an F-22 fighter jet armed with an AIM-9X Sidewinder missile to take down the balloon over water.

{ https://www.msn.com/en-us/ }

Mysterious US spaceship executing unprecedented maneuvers above Earth: ‘National security missions in space’

A secretive US spaceship is about to attempt unprecedented flight maneuvers above Earth.

The X-37B Orbital Test Vehicle (OTV-7) is an experimental space plane operated by the United States Space Force (USSF).

Although little has been revealed about the purpose of the vehicle, an official painting of the X-37B unveiled last year depicted the futuristic vehicle intercepting an adversary satellite positioning to disable a friendly satellite.

The US Space Force’s X-37B Orbital Test Vehicle at Kennedy Space Center on Nov. 12, 2022.

U.S Space Force/Boeing / SWNS

USSF have now announced the X-37B will begin executing a series of “novel maneuvers” called aerobraking.

This sees a number of passes using the drag of Earth’s atmosphere to change its orbit around Earth while expending minimal fuel.

If successful, it will allow the X-37B to safely dispose of its service module components in accordance with recognized standards for space debris mitigation.

A rendering showing the spacecraft intercepting an adversary satellite. 

John Ayre/Space Force / SWNS

The X-37B seen at Kennedy Space Center on Oct. 27, 2019. U.S Space Force/Boeing / SWNS

Since December 2023, USSF, supported by the Air Force Rapid Capabilities Office, has conducted radiation effect experiments and has been testing Space Domain Awareness technologies in a “Highly Elliptical Orbit.”

Once the aerobrake maneuver is complete, USSF say the X-37B will “resume its test and experimentation objectives until they are accomplished,” at which time the vehicle will de-orbit and execute a safe return as it has during its six previous missions.

Chief of Space Operations Gen. Chance Saltzman praised the team for its efforts. “This first of a kind maneuver from the X-37B is an incredibly important milestone for the United States Space Force as we seek to expand our aptitude and ability to perform in this challenging domain. The success is a testament to the dedication and perseverance of the team.”

Strange Group Of UFOs Appears Over Air Force Base In Indiana, Alarming Local Citizens

by Douglas Charles

{ https://brobible.com/ }

Earth to Pass Through the Same Taurid Meteor Stream in 2032 That May Have Triggered a Mass Extinction 12,800 Years Ago

Earth will travel right in front of the same Taurid meteor stream in 2032 that caused a mass extinction and worldwide flood ~12,800 years ago, plunging Earth into a mini-Ice Age for 1,300 years. Graham Hancock was right all this time but we did not listen to him.

Our solar system is a dangerous place, and every month Earth inches closer to one of its riskier places, the “Taurid swarm” of meteors. Our planet is predicted to pass directly through the “Taurid swarm” in November 2032.

An ancient monument found in Turkey might be more than just a monument—it could be the world’s oldest solar calendar. Researchers from the University of Edinburgh studied symbols carved on the pillars of Göbekli Tepe, a large, ancient site in southern Turkey. They think these carvings were used to track days, seasons, and years, like a calendar. (Source)

The team noticed that each “V” shape carved on the pillars might represent one day. One pillar even had 365 “V”s, the same number as days in a year. They also found that a special “V” around the neck of a bird-like figure could represent the summer solstice—the longest day of the year. This might explain why the “V” symbol shows up on many other statues in the area, often around the necks of figures connected to time and creation.

Mini Ice Age

The ancient calendar focused on tracking day, night, and seasonal changes, which might have become more important after a major comet hit Earth around 10,850 B.C. This event likely caused a mini-ice age that wiped out many species. According to Martin Sweatman, a researcher from the University of Edinburgh, the people at Gobekli Tepe were careful observers of the sky, possibly because the comet strike had changed their world.

This disaster may have sparked the beginning of civilization by starting new religious beliefs and pushing people to develop agriculture to survive the colder climate. Their carvings might be some of the earliest attempts at writing. These carvings also tracked the cycles of the Moon and Sun, long before similar calendars were made. They may have even shown for the first time that comet strikes are more likely to happen when Earth crosses the path of comet fragments, something that modern scientists have confirmed.

To help support this theory, the team points to another pillar at the site appearing to picture the Taurid meteor stream lasting 27 days, which was quite possibly the source of the ancient comet strike. The researchers believe that the temple carvings show the ancient civilization was recording dates precisely, noting how the movement of constellations across the sky differed based on the time of the year. This would be 10,000 years before Hipparchus of ancient Greece documented the wobble in the Earth’s axis in 150 BC, making this newfound calendar well ahead of its time.

The Younger Dryas boundary (YDB) cosmic-impact hypothesis suggests that around 12,800 years ago, Earth was hit by pieces of a large comet, which broke apart as it entered the inner solar system. This event likely caused a chain reaction, leading to an “impact winter” (a period of intense cold) and a climate change episode called the Younger Dryas (YD). (Source)

The collision is also believed to have caused massive wildfires, the extinction of large animals like mammoths, and changes in human cultures and population decline. Evidence of this impact includes unusually high levels of platinum found at 26 sites across the Northern Hemisphere, including in ice cores from Greenland, which show platinum deposits over a 21-year period.

The start of the Younger Dryas also shows an increase in dust and chemicals linked to wildfires, like ammonium and other burning aerosols, found in ice cores from Greenland, Antarctica, and Russia. These signs point to one of the biggest wildfire events in over 120,000 years, with about 9% of Earth’s forests burned, covering 10 million square kilometers.

This large-scale burning and the cooling effect of the impact may have triggered the Younger Dryas climate change, according to the theory.

A 2021 study (Taurid complex smoking gun) found that 88 near-Earth asteroids, hidden in the debris that creates the Taurid Meteor Shower, likely came from the breakup of a single comet about 20,000 years ago. Astronomers at the University of Antioquia in Colombia studied the ‘Taurid complex’ to learn more about where these objects came from.

In the 1980s, scientists William Napier and Victor Clube noticed large asteroids in the Taurid stream. They suggested these asteroids had the same origin as Comet Encke, which orbits the Sun every three years. However, some asteroids are over a mile wide, meaning they couldn’t have come from Comet Encke itself. Scientists Ignacio Ferrín and Vincenzo Orofino reviewed old research and measured light reflected from the larger asteroids.

They found more evidence that both Comet Encke and the big asteroids came from the breakup of a huge ice comet, 62 miles wide, about 20,000 years ago. The team warned that these asteroids could be dangerous to Earth, and others from the ancient comet might have already hit our planet in the past. Every year, Earth passes through a stream of debris, causing shooting stars to appear in October in the southern hemisphere and November in the north.

Comet Encke, first seen in 1786, left a trail of debris as it got closer to the sun, like other comets. This trail, made up of rocks, dust, and debris, sometimes comes close to Earth, leading to lots of scientific study. Some studies focus on larger asteroids.

Experts think impacts from the Taurid stream may have contributed to the extinction of ancient cultures and global cooling during the Younger Dryas period. The 1908 Tunguska event, where a small asteroid exploded above Russia, destroying millions of trees, is believed to be connected to this debris stream.

In 2013, the Chelyabinsk meteor, which injured over 1,500 people in Russia, may have also come from the Taurid stream. In 2005, NASA astronomer Rob Suggs observed a flash from a meteor hitting the moon, which was part of the Taurid meteor shower.

A team of Colombian researchers, along with astronomers from Italy’s University of Salento, reviewed many studies on space impacts. They confirmed that a group of space objects contains up to 88 large pieces. Using a method called secular light curves, they noticed changes in the brightness of these objects and found that 67% showed signs of “comet-like” activity. This supported the idea that these objects came from a common origin.

Napier, another scientist, supported their findings. He said that these asteroids, which have orbits like Comet Encke, could either be affected by unknown forces or are pieces of a larger, older comet that lost its gases. This original comet may have been a “rubble pile” – a mix of rocks and other materials held together by ice. Over time, this pile could have broken apart, possibly due to forces from the Sun or another object, creating smaller fragments.

One asteroid, Oljato, is an example of a rubble pile. It’s still held together by ice, which gives it comet-like activity, but it’s much smaller than its parent. Bigger inactive objects like Morpheus are similar, but their ice is trapped inside. Smaller objects, like 2006 SO198, might be the original rocky pieces. The team explained that even if an object looks like a regular asteroid, it could still have a comet-like origin.

Taurid meteors, part of this group, are usually larger than normal meteors. They shine brightly and go deeper into the Earth’s atmosphere, sometimes creating fireballs. While this is mostly harmless, the discovery of larger asteroids in one “dangerous” part of the meteor stream could be a real threat.

Earth passes through this risky area every few years, leading to more shooting stars and possibly large objects hitting Earth instead of burning up in the atmosphere. Future encounters are expected in 2022, 2025, 2032, and 2039.

In 2021, David Asher, Armagh Observatory astronomer predicted that in 2032 and 2036 we are likely to pass through the centre of the Taurid complex, where there will be a ‘noticeable enhancement of fireballs.’ According to study [Taurid complex smoking gun] authors Ignacio Ferrín and Vincenzo Orofino, outgassing from comet-like objects within the complex could be hiding smaller, but still potentially dangerous, asteroids that might hit the Earth.

‘The Tunguska cosmic body was 60 to 90 meters in diameter,’ he told Discover Magazine, adding that we ‘now believe the complex may contain many more objects of that size. It is not the tame, simple and innocent complex we thought it was.’

{ https://howandwhys.com/ }

Legendary Film Director Claimed His Soundman Heard President/CIA Director George Bush Sr. Say Aliens Are Real & He Saw a Dead One

In 2020, filmmaker David Hoffman released a video on his YouTube channel, which now has over 1 million subscribers, where he shared an unusual experience from when he directed a political interview with George Bush during Bush’s vice-presidential campaign alongside Ronald Reagan.

“I am not a documentary filmmaker who believes in conspiracy theories. And I am not a scientist or an astronomer. I made this video for my subscribers because I do believe that unidentified flying objects (UFOs) and aliens are real because of what happened to me.” — filmmaker David Hoffman

Before filming began, Nigel suddenly stopped recording and told Hoffman that he had overheard Bush say something startling: “Hey, you know those little green people? They’re real. I saw one dead.” This statement appeared to refer to aliens, specifically the stereotypical “little green men” associated with extraterrestrial life.

Though the moment wasn’t captured on tape, Hoffman and his soundman were both struck by what Bush allegedly said, and they never forgot the incident. Hoffman seems to suggest that it’s possible Bush could have seen a dead alien, although the story remains unverified and relies on the soundman’s word. (Source)

Now I wonder what happened to Jimmy Carter. Former NASA researcher Ed Harris claims that the story of President Carter crying after being briefed on classified UFO information is true. Even Richard Dolan writes about this in his book.

After being repeatedly stonewalled, Carter was given “the talk,” which reportedly left him deeply sobbing and visibly disturbed for weeks. He was told that major religions, including Christianity, were created by extraterrestrials to prevent humans from destroying themselves while they ran experiments on us, and that they made us. Carter, a deeply religious man who had witnessed a UFO with six other people, realized that releasing such information could cause tremendous economic and social upheaval.

Below you can read Ed Harris’ statement on the subject that he wrote on Quora:

Yes, the incident of Jimmy Carter crying after being briefed about classified information regarding UFO’s is largely believed to be true by the serious researchers on the subject. As a forewarning, the following information is very unsettling and will explain why Carter never “kept his promise” of revealing classified UFO information to the public.

According to the story that was corroborated by more than one witness, U.S. presidents are only given a cursory overview of the subject. Apparently, the CIA runs the program, only provide information to the President on a need to know basis, and do not consider presidential curiosity as sufficient need to know. This was implemented after Kennedy, and all presidents after him have been given only summary briefings (some presidents for unknown reasons were given more than others).

Okay on to your question. President Carter is a deeply religious man who had also witnessed a UFO with 6 other people. Everyone thought that he would be the one to f inally release UFO info to the public but as the story goes, he was repeatedly stonewalled. Eventually, the CIA had “the talk” with him, and afterward it was reported that he sunk his head in his hands and not only began to deeply sob, but was visibly disturbed for some weeks afterward.

What was he told and shown?

He was told that the major religions including Christianity were programs created by extraterrestrials to prevent us from destroying ourselves while they ran their experiments on us – and that they made us. At this moment it became clear to Carter that such information could cause tremendous economic and social upheaval. I should add that I am not only a Christian but a clergyman, so I am in no way attempting to promote atheism here. In fact, how God fits into this might be an interesting separate post. Nevertheless, these are the facts as I know them to be.

Author and world’s leading UFO researcher Richard Dolan also writes about this incident in his book “UFOs and the National Security State: The Cover-Up Exposed.” According to his book, there are claims that President Carter was given a UFO briefing at the White House on June 14, 1977, which he was then bound to secrecy about. (Click here to read the full article)

Cordell Hull saw Aliens in Glass Containers, 1939

Roswell UFO crash started a lot of alien conspiracies, but do you know that many years before that incident, dead alien bodies had been stored in a container in the basements of the Capitol Building, Washington DC? (Source)

This story first came into the limelight in 2002, when Willian Jones, a director of the Ohio branch of MUFON received an interesting letter from a woman named Lucile Andrew, the daughter of Reverend Turner Hamilton Holt.

The letter held the top-secret information told by Holt to his daughter about one of his meetings with his cousin Cordell Hull who had been the US Secretary of State from 1933 to 1944 and was also elected as US Senator from 1931 to 1937. He had also received the Nobel Peace Prize and was one of the people who established the United Nations.

Read also:

• Ex-US Marine Saw Massive UFO Being Loaded With Weapons By Secret Military In Indonesia Jungle
• Man Who Knew Two Photographers Who Took 1990 Calvine UFO Photo Reveals They Disappeared Mysteriously From The Face Of The Earth
• US Congressman Says Revealing UFO Technology Is a Threat to Energy Sector: It Can Disrupt World Economy

The letter contained the information that Hull would never want to come out until he was alive but at the same time, he could not stop himself from sharing it with his cousin Holt who served at the Shenandoah Christian Church in Greenwich, Ohio.

According to the letter, one day when Holt was in Washington D.C., he was contacted by Hull who wanted to show him something extremely secret and asked him to never disclose it to anybody. Holt agreed, and Hull took him to a place under the Capitol Building where he showed him an amazing sight. There is no exact information about the time frame of this secret but Hull served under the presidency of Franklin D. Roosevelt until his resignation in 1944.

It was a huge room with four glass containers. In each container, there were bodies of dead humanoids in a special liquid (presumably formaldehyde), about which Holt and Hull had no idea. According to the description of their body structure, they were clearly not humans. There also was a “wrecked round craft” in the adjoining room.

“My father wanted my sister and I to make this information known long after he and Cordell were dead because he felt it was a very important bit of information,” Lucile wrote. “We have researched your group (MUFON) and feel it is the most reliable group in the country. We hope that you will research and search for this information. The jars with creatures in formaldehyde and the wrecked craft are somewhere!

Cordell said they were afraid that they would start a panic if the public found out about it. Sincerely, Lucile Andrew, Ashland, Ohio.”

The letter said that the incident happened in 1939, years before the stories of UFOs and alien encounters hit the newspapers. There is no doubt that Cordell Hull was one of the greatest politicians in US history and according to his credibility, it is difficult not to believe his story. Holt married a woman named Vina May Clark and they both had three daughters. Two daughters claimed that Holt had told them about the creatures but he had never said where they came from. “He said the color of this material wasn’t a color that he had seen before, but for the lack of a better word he used “silver.” Reverend Holt was not the sort of person to make up such a wild story and, the sisters feel that by telling the story they are following their father’s wishes.”

Below is the video where two sisters from Ohio tell the story of how their father was taken to the sub-basement of the capitol and shown what appears to have been alien bodies and a craft.

Barbara A. Wolanin, the curator U.S. Capitol building said: “She had never heard about these creatures being stored at the Capitol, but she did confirm there was a sub-basement that was divided into storage rooms back then.” When Hull left his job, he wrote his memoirs, but there is no mention of this story in his papers in the Library of Congres

{ https://howandwhys.com/ }

{ https://scientias.nl/ }

Earth from space: Bizarre 'pet cloud' reappears above its favorite spot in New Zealand

"As the cloud forms on the crest of this wave, it remains almost stationary in the sky and is shaped by the strong winds blowing through it," John Law, a meteorologist with New Zealand's MetService, told Earth Observatory.

Related: 

• UFO-shaped clouds invade skies over Keck Observatory in Hawaii (photos)

Lenticular clouds are often shaped like flying saucers and are "believed to be one of the most common explanations for UFO sightings across the world," according to the U.K. Met Office.

When viewed side-on, the Taieri Pet often has multiple well-defined layers on top of one another, like a "huge stack of pancakes" or a "pile of plates," Earth Observatory representatives wrote. Past photos of the cloud show it can be several hundred feet tall.

The height of lenticular clouds can make them a surprising aviation risk. Planes can experience severe turbulence when flying through the structures, due to vertical currents that run up and down through the cloud. The clouds' unusually low temperatures also cause ice to form on planes, according to the U.K. Met Office.

ASLCs can be a sign that atmospheric conditions are about to change and are often followed by increased levels of precipitation, according to Fox Weather. However, historical weather data suggest this did not happen in this case.

{ https://www.space.com/ }

Fleet of glowing ‘UFOs’ speeding through the skies in Indiana leaves witnesses stunned: Watch

Meltwater beneath Martian Ice Could Support Microbial Life, Researchers Suggest

On Earth, solar radiation can transmit down to multiple meters within ice, depending on its optical properties. Organisms within ice can harness energy from photosynthetically active radiation while being protected from damaging ultraviolet radiation. On Mars, the lack of an effective ozone shield allows approximately 30% more damaging ultraviolet radiation to reach the surface in comparison with Earth. However, new research shows that despite the intense surface ultraviolet radiation, there are radiatively habitable zones within ice in the Martian mid-latitudes, at depths ranging from a few centimeters for ice with 0.01-0.1% dust, and up to a few meters within cleaner ice.

The white edges along these gullies in Mars’ Terra Sirenum are believed to be dusty water ice. Khuller et al. think meltwater could form beneath the surface of this kind of ice, providing a place for possible photosynthesis.

Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / University of Arizona.

“If we’re trying to find life anywhere in the Universe today, Martian ice exposures are probably one of the most accessible places we should be looking,” said Dr. Aditya Khuller, a researcher at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

Mars has two kinds of ice: frozen water and frozen carbon dioxide.

Dr. Khuller and colleagues looked at water ice, large amounts of which formed from snow mixed with dust that fell on the surface during a series of Martian ice ages in the past million years.

That ancient snow has since solidified into ice, still peppered with specks of dust.

Although dust particles may obscure light in deeper layers of the ice, they are key to explaining how subsurface pools of water could form within ice when exposed to the Sun.

Dark dust absorbs more sunlight than the surrounding ice, potentially causing the ice to warm up and melt up to a few feet below the surface.

Mars scientists are divided about whether ice can actually melt when exposed to the Martian surface.

That’s due to the planet’s thin, dry atmosphere, where water ice is believed to sublimate — turn directly into gas — the way dry ice does on Earth.

But the atmospheric effects that make melting difficult on the Martian surface wouldn’t apply below the surface of a dusty snowpack or glacier.

On Earth, dust within ice can create what are called cryoconite holes — small cavities that form in ice when particles of windblown dust (called cryoconite) land there, absorb sunlight, and melt farther into the ice each summer.

Eventually, as these dust particles travel farther from the Sun’s rays, they stop sinking, but they still generate enough warmth to create a pocket of meltwater around them.

The pockets can nourish a thriving ecosystem for simple lifeforms.

“This is a common phenomenon on Earth,” said Dr. Phil Christensen, a researcher at Arizona State University.

“Dense snow and ice can melt from the inside out, letting in sunlight that warms it like a greenhouse, rather than melting from the top down.”

In 2021, the authors discovered dusty water ice exposed within gullies on Mars, proposing that many Martian gullies form by erosion caused by the ice melting to form liquid water.

Their new paper suggests that dusty ice lets in enough light for photosynthesis to occur as deep as 3 m (9 feet) below the surface.

In this scenario, the upper layers of ice prevent the shallow subsurface pools of water from evaporating while also providing protection from harmful radiation.

That’s important, because unlike Earth, Mars lacks a protective magnetic field to shield it from both the Sun and radioactive cosmic ray particles zipping around space.

“The water ice that would be most likely to form subsurface pools would exist in Mars’ tropics, between 30 degrees and 60 degrees latitude, in both the northern and southern hemispheres,” the researchers said.

• The paper appears in the journal Communications Earth & Environment.
• A.R. Khuller et al. 2024. Potential for photosynthesis on Mars within snow and ice. Commun Earth Environ 5, 583; doi: 10.1038/s43247-024-01730-y
• This article is a version of a press-release provided by NASA.

{ https://www.sci.news }

This Declassified CIA Book Reveals That Earth Undergoes Cataclysmic Events Approximately Every 6,500 Years, Leading to the Destruction and Rebirth of Civilizations

Now, only 57 pages are available, but they are heavily edited, leaving many questions about what the book really says. People are curious about why this book might be considered dangerous and why the CIA wanted to keep it secret.

 Dr. Chan Thomas

Dr. Chan Thomas was an American electrical engineer and psychic who authored a hypothesis of global cataclysms involving radical shifts in Earth’s electromagnetic fields that increase the viscosity of the crust, causing rapid continental drift.

This is most notably described in his book “The Adam and Eve Story.” During the 1950s, Dr. Thomas was a project engineer on Bell Aircraft’s RASCAL missile guidance system and Douglas Aircraft’s A4D Skyhawk program, and was later employed in the late 1960s by McDonnell Douglas to work with Robert Wood’s “Advanced Concepts” R&D team, which worked on UFO and other fringe science related projects.

The idea of pole shifts has interested scientists and caused discussions for many years. Charles Hapgood was one of the first to suggest this concept in the mid-1900s. He believed that the Earth’s outer layer could move over the inner layers, making the poles change position.

Hapgood’s theory of “Earth’s crustal displacement” said that these shifts could happen fairly quickly, resulting in major changes in the Earth’s geography and climate. At first, many scientists rejected Hapgood’s ideas, but he gained respect when Albert Einstein showed interest in his work. Even though Hapgood’s theory didn’t become widely accepted, it opened the door for more research on how the Earth’s magnetic poles might change.

Today, we know that the magnetic poles do indeed shift, though typically at a slow rate. However, the possibility of rapid, catastrophic shifts remains a subject of ongoing research.

Dr. Chan Thomas, in his book The Adam and Eve Story, made a scary prediction about sudden pole shifts. He believed these shifts could happen quickly, even in one day, and cause major disasters. He said that these quick changes could lead to huge earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and tsunamis, resulting in widespread damage. While most scientists are doubtful about such rapid shifts, the idea still captures the interest of researchers and the public.

Throughout Earth’s history, mass extinctions have wiped out many species, changing the course of life on our planet. Some scientists think these extinctions might be connected to pole shifts or other major geological events.

One example often mentioned is the Younger Dryas, a time of sudden cooling about 12,800 years ago. This period saw a big drop in global temperatures, which some believe was caused by a comet impact or a significant pole shift.

These disastrous events have also led to theories about ancient advanced civilizations that may have been destroyed by sudden catastrophes. Supporters of these theories argue that evidence of these lost civilizations can be found in myths and unexplained archaeological sites.

However, mainstream archaeologists are careful and stress the need for more solid evidence before changing our understanding of history.

Flood myths are stories about big floods that are found in many ancient cultures. These tales, which describe floods that destroyed entire civilizations, appear in religious texts, oral traditions, and ancient writings worldwide.

For example, Noah’s Ark in the Bible and the Epic of Gilgamesh from Mesopotamia share many similarities, even though they come from different places and times.

When we compare these myths to known geological events, like the Younger Dryas (a time about 12,800 years ago when the climate changed quickly), we see some interesting connections. The Younger Dryas involved sudden cooling and melting ice, which caused sea levels to rise significantly.

Some researchers think that these big changes in the environment might have inspired the flood stories in various cultures. They believe that ancient people, seeing the destruction from rising waters, passed down these stories to warn others about nature’s power.

Dr. Chan Thomas, in his book The Adam and Eve Story, goes further by saying these flood myths are not just exaggerated tales but are based on real disasters caused by shifts in the Earth’s poles and other catastrophic events. He argues that these myths are his torical records of past disasters that nearly wiped out humanity. According to Thomas, our ancestors created these stories to remember these events and warn future generations about their recurrence.

The idea that advanced civilizations existed before written history fascinates both scholars and enthusiasts. Supporters of this theory point to archaeological evidence, like erosion patterns on the Great Sphinx of Giza and submerged cities off the coasts of Japan and India, suggesting these lost cultures were destroyed by disasters like the floods in ancient myths.

However, this idea is controversial and faces skepticism in the academic world. Many archaeologists and historians believe the evidence for these theories is either misinterpreted or not strong enough. The general view is that human civilization began about 6,000 years ago in Mesopotamia, with no credible evidence of advanced societies before then.

Read also:

• Earth to Pass Through the Same Taurid Meteor Stream in 2032 That May Have Triggered a Mass Extinction 12,800 Years Ago
• Man from Silicon Valley Confirms His Company Established the First-Ever Communication Between People in Dreams
• This Man Went To Find Giant Alien Pyramid Buried Deep in the Alaskan Wilderness & Never Seen Again

Still, the ongoing debate continues to interest people, and new discoveries sometimes spark discussions. While the concept of ancient advanced civilizations is still on the outskirts of scientific study, it encourages us to rethink what we know about the past and stay open to new evidence.

Dr. Chan Thomas’s predictions in The Adam and Eve Story show a dark future. He warns that a quick shift in the Earth’s poles could happen, causing disastrous events worldwide. He believes this shift could lead to huge earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and tsunamis, possibly wiping out most of humanity in just a few hours. He thinks this disaster could happen soon, maybe even in our lifetime.

Scientists know that the Earth’s magnetic field is always changing, and the poles can move over time. However, most geophysicists think a sudden and disastrous shift like Dr. Thomas describes is very unlikely.

Right now, we understand that the poles may shift slowly or even reverse over thousands of years, but a quick shift causing a global disaster isn’t supported by current evidence.

If Dr. Thomas’s predictions were to come true, the effects on modern society would be terrible. Our essential systems — like power grids, communication, and transportation — would likely fail. This shift could lead to widespread destruction, chaos, and possibly a return to a dark age for survivors.

Dr. Thomas’s work makes us rethink our view of history. If he’s right about pole shifts and recurring disasters, it means that human civilization is much more fragile and has gone through cycles of rise and fall more than we think.

This view challenges the common belief that human progress is steady and uninterrupted. If disasters happen in cycles, it suggests that advanced civilizations have appeared and disappeared several times in Earth’s history, each time erased by a major event.

This idea changes how we see human history, suggesting that our current civilization is just the latest attempt at creating a lasting society.

Given Dr. Thomas’s theories, we should consider what we can learn for the future. If these disasters really do happen in cycles, it would be wise to prepare and build resilience, so that if another disaster occurs, humanity can survive and rebuild more effectively.

In 1966, the CIA classified The Adam and Eve Story soon after it was published. This decision has led to a lot of speculation about why a book about ancient disasters and pole shifts would catch the attention of a government agency.

One theory is that if people took the book seriously, it could cause a lot of panic. The idea of a coming global disaster, along with the government’s secrecy, might lead to unrest in society.

Another possibility is that the book had information related to secret government research. The author, Dr. Chan Thomas, worked on classified projects at McDonnell Douglas, and some think he knew more than what was publicly shared. The CIA might have been worried about revealing technologies or ideas that could threaten national security.

The “sanitization” of the 57 pages that were later declassified adds to the mystery. A lot of the text is blacked out, making people wonder what was removed and why. Some believe that the missing parts could contain more details about disasters or even government secrets. The exact reason for keeping much of the book hidden is still unclear.

{ https://howandwhys.com/ }

Tom DeLonge Claimed There’s A Massive Underground Pyramid In Alaska, Larger Than The Great Pyramid Of Giza, Potentially Suppressing Human Consciousness

In 2021, on the Peer Pleasure Podcast, Tom DeLonge claimed there is a huge underground pyramid beneath Alaska, bigger than the Great Pyramid of Giza that might be suppressing the consciousness of Human Beings. He said the pyramid is near Valdez, Alaska and had been studied for decades and alleged that people from the Pentagon and defense contractors have been involved in researching it.

According to him, the pyramid was discovered after seismic activity revealed an anomaly in the area, possibly after a large earthquake in Valdez. DeLonge claims that the pyramid might be “suppressing consciousness,” based on what a Pentagon contact reportedly told him. He adds that some information about the pyramid has been intentionally hidden, including a news piece that was supposedly suppressed.

He mentions hearing about this from people who were aware of the situation, some even speaking about it on their deathbeds. He also refers to the involvement of organizations like Bell Labs or AT&T in the pyramid’s discovery or study, but he’s uncertain about the details. Finally, he states that he has shared all he knows about the pyramid.

If you have not yet heard of the lost pyramid of Alaska, it is understandable. News of the structure has not crept into the mainstream media, but if you type “Alaska pyramid” into Bing’s search engine you will find the fictional structure has attracted plenty of attention from alternative and fringe media.

“World’s oldest pyramids found in Alaska shocks the scientific community,” New Earth Media headlined in 2017. “An underground pyramid giving out giant amounts of energy is being ‘covered up’ by the U.S. government, a documentary has revealed,” Daily Star reported in 2019.

“Traces of GIANT PYRAMID Beneath Alaska Uncovered by Journalist,” Russia’s, state-owned Sputnik News disclosed before going on to claim that “a nuclear blast that occurred in China nearly 30 years ago apparently led to a surprising discovery hundreds of kilometers away, in Alaska, where US government seismometers detected some peculiar geological anomalies, which in turn led a number of dedicated enthusiasts to pursue claims of a massive pyramid located far below the surface of the frozen peninsula.”

Sputnik cited as its source “the History Channel’s Ancient Aliens TV show journalist Linda Moulton Howe (who) was contacted by an ex-naval worker who told her on condition of anonymity that his father, an engineer, was able to see the pyramid while he was working on a top-secret government project.”

All these things would be easy to spot in the wild and remote areas of Alaska. The story from Sputnik mentioned a Naval officer who supposedly said there was a large pyramid and that they “would go down to the base of a huge pyramid using the elevators.”

However, building elevators that go hundreds of feet underground would be a major construction project. This would be something that small planes flying over the area could easily see. Small, single-engine aircraft are as common in Alaska as cars are in the lower 48 states. Planes fly almost everywhere, all the time.

While Alaska has grown, and fewer people now own planes, the state still has six times as many private pilots and 16 times more planes per capita than the rest of the U.S., according to the Alaska Department of Transportation. The wild, undeveloped land of the state makes it easier, not harder, for planes to spot large construction projects from above. But those who believe in the idea of a hidden pyramid (or pyramids) in Alaska don’t see it that way.

As writer Anthony Tyler said in an article for The Last American Vagabond, “good parts of Alaska are ‘totally uninhabitable under their current climate conditions…and the government presence overall in the state is pretty overwhelming, with an Air-Force/Army joint base nearly the size of Anchorage right outside of the city itself.’”

He argued that it would actually make sense for the government to hide secret facilities in such remote areas. Tyler writes, “It would almost seem silly for the government to not utilize these tactical advantages.” He then raises the question, “Why can’t people see this from the sky?” The answer, according to him, is because “the pyramid is supposedly located underground.” And, even more surprisingly, he claims that it’s said to be “four times the size of Giza.”

Read also:

• This Mexican Scientist Claimed We Live in a Holographic M atrix, Disappears Mysteriously After It

• This Man Went To Find Giant Alien Pyramid Buried Deep in the Alaskan Wilderness & Never Seen Again
• This Salt Lake City Tech CEO Found Dead After Eerie Calls: ‘It’s All a Game… We’re in the Matrix’

Tyler even speculated on how the pyramid could have ended up hidden, saying that “the ability for an earthquake to subsequently collapse the pyramid in a sort of catacomb underneath the Earth’s surface would be theoretically possible if one took into account Charles Hapgood’s Earth crust Displacement Theory.” He admits, though, that “even this is a wild and unlikely truth.” Instead, the legend suggests that the pyramid is thousands of years old and “was not built by humans.” (Source)

During a podcast with Daniel P Carter of BBC Radio 1 Rock, DeLonge disclosed that he has a secret official Pentagon document from a UFO program that shows telekinesis is a real ability. He believes that telekinesis has been proven in the lab and that consciousness precedes matter, and once we discover that, life is going to get very interesting.

He suggests that we have the ability to heal ourselves and create new types of Sciences and Engineering tweets. He also believes that telepathy is going to be a part of it, and that they have found an area in the brain that they believe is where telepathy happens. He thinks that once people accept all of the stuff that they have been talking about, it’s going to change the world. Below is the transcript of his conversation with Carter:

“I always tell people there is this really cool document (that I have) that was a part of the UFO program where they were studying a kid in China who can move objects with his mind. He is around 10 years old, so they wanted to figure out how that’s possible, and they recreated it in the lab.

I have the whole Department of Defense document, and it goes through it and says they were able to put a piece of paper in a glass jar, screw the lid on it, and move the paper through the lid and then six feet across the floor, all with their mind. 100 people can do this, only 10 have mastered it, and it was just wild.

So telekinesis has been proven in the lab, but no one knows about it. I’m like, to be able to move things with the force, like in Star Wars, is a big deal. It sounds ridiculous, that’s why, and within the current paradigm, it sounds ridiculous. I’m sure, or you won’t remember, but we had a conversation at the Reading Festival many years ago where I think I probably came across as a total maniac, even to someone as open-minded as yourself. But, I was talking about reading a bunch of different things, which means nothing, but I was looking at different realms of consciousness because that’s the basis of everything I believe.

I believe that consciousness precedes matter and I highly agree with you. Because the current paradigm is that consciousness is a facet that’s created by matter, which is just this weird thing that’s come about because our brains are complicated and that’s nonsense. I think it’s exactly the opposite and once we discover that stuff, life is going to get very interesting.

Once we discover that mind over matter, not the other way around, we will have the ability to heal ourselves, create new types of Sciences and Engineering, and become a civilization where telepathy is a part of it. I believe that’s all going to happen. There is one person, who was up for the Nobel last year, is one of the top geneticists in the world, at one of the Ivy League schools that we are working with, who worked on part of the UFO program at the Pentagon. I was talking to him, and they found an area in the brain that they believe is where telepathy happens, and he believes he can create something to enhance it by a thousand times, like some type of drug that targets that area of the brain.

So, that’s the thing, people do think it’s ridiculous, but not the people who have an open enough mind to research and jump in. These guys are like World leading PhDs, and that’s been the kind of the story of my life, is everything I’ve told, even on Rogan, is not made up, it’s coming from somewhere, and I can’t say where it’s coming from, but at the end of the day, it’s all real. I think it’s going to be a very exciting time once people accept all of the stuff that we’ve been talking about here on this interview, I think it’s going to really change the world.”

Moreover, as in the January 2022 Thrasher Magazine issue, DeLonge was asked: “Would you say UFOs are driven by aliens or do you think it’s more like a drone?” He replied: “I think both.” He suggested that it is important to note that while studying UFOs, we must be aware of the fact that they could be remotely controlled and may have occupants. (Source)

“I think the biggest misconception is that they are coming from other planets. Evidence doesn’t really support that. The evidence supports that it’s dimensional and that it’s parallel timelines that exist with frequency. It’s really complicated, different, and interesting. But once you understand that, you have no way out of reexamining the religious world and wondering what the Star of Bethlehem really was,” DeLonge explained.

• https://youtu.be/DdS5HknsWBo

{ https://howandwhys.com/ }

10,000 year old ALIEN paintings found in Kanker, India, ET visitors? UFO Sighting News.

Now this is something. There are dozens of alien paintings on caves and hillsides in India that the public has never head of yet. Some of these paintings are estimated by India scientists to be over 10,000 years old. Thats old guys, and it seems that there are so many of these depictions on the walls that aliens may have considered Charama area in Kanker district, Chhattisgarh, India...a vacation hot spot long ago. Yeah you heard me right, little three legged aliens following the 8 meter mom and dad with cameras taking photos of the locals. Im sure that went over well. I would pay to see that, oh...it's on the walls of the caves in india...for free. 
Scott C. Waring 

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

White UFO Seen Over Green Valley, illinois, USA Sept 30, 2024, UAP Sighting News.

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

UFO Hovering Over City Street In Hualien, Taiwan Oct 4, 2024, UAP Sighting News.

Date of sighting: Oct 4, 2024
Location of sighting: Hualien, Taiwan

Hey all, this UFO was seen just a few days ago. It was not a cube or sphere but more of a hexagon shaped craft. This UFO is very similar is size, shape and color of the ones seen in recent US military released UFO videos over Iraq and Afghanistan. The UFO is turning at a perfect speed, not slowing, not speeding up. It is hovering in place and Hualien is a huge earthquake area, which could mean the earthquakes are caused by an underground alien base 5km below Hualien city. The opening and closing of doorways allows UFOs to enter and exit, however would cause earthquakes. For me, this is 100% legit.

Scott C. Waring 

 

 

Credit The Unexplained Files 2.0 at https://www.facebook.com/reel/450479428045305 Please like him and subscribe to him. Thanks all, Scott.

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

New UAP Whistleblower Exposes Pentagon’s Secret UFO Program—Shocking Claims Revealed!

In recent weeks, a significant revelation has surfaced regarding the U.S. government’s handling of unidentified anomalous phenomena (UAP), often referred to as UFOs. A new whistleblower, backed by credible sources, has stepped forward with claims that the Pentagon is withholding critical information about UAPs from both the public and Congress. This exposé has sent ripples through the UFO and defense communities, as it brings to light the existence of a secretive, unacknowledged special access program (USAP) within the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD).

The Whistleblower’s Allegations

The whistleblower, whose identity has been verified by multiple trusted sources, alleges that the Pentagon has been running a clandestine UAP program. This program, hidden from oversight, operates outside the bounds of normal congressional reporting procedures. According to the whistleblower, key information regarding UAPs has been kept secret from Congress, and thus, from the American people. This individual has provided a detailed report to Congress outlining the illegal withholding of information, bringing forward allegations that could have far-reaching implications for the U.S. government and its intelligence practices.

Veteran journalist Michael Shellenberger, who recently appeared on “The Joe Rogan Experience” podcast, has further corroborated these claims. Shellenberger reported that he has spoken to multiple insiders, some of whom are terrified to come forward due to the lack of whistleblower protections in place for those disclosing classified information on UAPs.

Unacknowledged Special Access Programs (USAPs)

The crux of the whistleblower’s claims revolves around the existence of unacknowledged special access programs, or USAPs. These programs are shrouded in secrecy and are not disclosed to most members of Congress, including those in key oversight positions. USAPs are only known to a select few individuals within the government and military, and their very existence can be denied under threat of torture, according to Shellenberger’s report. The whistleblower’s report specifically reveals the name of one such program, allegedly linked to the UAP phenomenon, known as “Immaculate Constellation.”

The U.S. federal government uses special access programs (SAPs) to safeguard highly classified information. SAPs are designed to restrict access to sensitive intelligence or military operations, but USAPs go one step further by denying the existence of the program itself. Individuals briefed on these programs are sworn to secrecy and are required to deny any knowledge of them, even under intense scrutiny.

Historical Context: The Origins of Special Access Programs

The development of special access programs can be traced back to the early days of World War II, when President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 8381 in 1940, establishing three levels of classification: restricted, confidential, and secret. After the war, President Harry Truman introduced a new level, “top secret,” while President Dwight D. Eisenhower further formalized the system. Over time, the Pentagon created its own special access labels to protect classified information from outside influence. This eventually led to the establishment of SAPs and USAPs.

What sets USAPs apart is the Pentagon’s ability to completely deny their existence, even to high-ranking government officials, making them virtually immune to oversight. The whistleblower claims that these programs have been operating outside the law for decades, without the knowledge of most members of Congress.

Growing Concerns and Upcoming Hearings

The upcoming November 13th hearings, led by Representative Nancy Mace, are expected to address these allegations and shine a light on the Pentagon’s handling of UAP-related information. Mace, known for her straightforward approach, has stated her desire to bring individuals forward who have firsthand knowledge of these secret programs. According to insiders, this hearing could be a pivotal moment in exposing the truth behind the government’s involvement with UAPs.

In recent years, the topic of UAPs has garnered increasing attention, particularly after the U.S. Navy’s release of videos showing unidentified craft displaying flight capabilities far beyond current human technology. These revelations have sparked public interest and led to a wave of whistleblowers coming forward. David Grusch, a former intelligence officer, made headlines earlier this year by revealing the existence of secret UAP programs. The latest whistleblower’s testimony builds on Grusch’s claims, providing further evidence of an ongoing cover-up within the Department of Defense.

What Could the UAP Whistleblower’s Claims Mean?

If the whistleblower’s allegations are proven true, it could mean that the U.S. government has been concealing potentially groundbreaking information about extraterrestrial or interdimensional life for decades. Some insiders believe that UAPs may represent advanced technology from foreign adversaries or even non-human intelligence. Others, including Shellenberger, remain cautiously skeptical but acknowledge that the whistleblower’s claims are credible and deserve serious investigation.

The whistleblower also highlights a concerning lack of transparency within the U.S. government, particularly when it comes to oversight of intelligence and military operations. By keeping Congress in the dark, the Pentagon may be violating constitutional laws that require such programs to be disclosed to certain elected officials.

VIDEO:

• Chris Lehto – New UAP Whistleblower EXPOSES Pentagon’s Secret UFO Program!

• https://youtu.be/CaWw__chBY4

As the November hearings approach, the world watches with anticipation. Will the U.S. government finally come clean about what it knows regarding UAPs? Or will these claims be dismissed, as they have been in the past? The whistleblower’s testimony, combined with corroborating evidence from other insiders, suggests that we are on the brink of a major revelation.

Transparency, as the whistleblower and Shellenberger emphasize, is the key to restoring trust in government institutions. Whether the UAP phenomenon represents extraterrestrial life, advanced foreign technology, or something else entirely, one thing is clear: the American public deserves answers, and Congress must fulfill its duty to investigate these claims thoroughly.

The upcoming hearings could be a turning point in our understanding of UAPs, and the whistleblower’s bravery in coming forward may help lift the veil of secrecy that has surrounded the topic for far too long. As the conversation shifts from speculation to concrete evidence, we may finally get closer to uncovering the truth about UAPs and their implications for humanity.

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

Did Oppenheimer Work on UFOs? Exploring the Scientist’s Secret Involvement in UFO Research

The debate about UFOs has fascinated people for decades, with many speculating on whether governments, scientists, and defense institutions have concealed knowledge about unidentified flying objects (UFOs) and anti-gravity technology. A surprising figure who has recently come under discussion in this context is J. Robert Oppenheimer, the renowned physicist known as the “father of the atomic bomb.” But could Oppenheimer have had any involvement with UFO-related programs, anti-gravity research, or secretive military projects?

In recent years, the resurgence of interest in UFOs and the increasing efforts toward disclosure have led researchers and enthusiasts to revisit key historical figures like Oppenheimer. There is speculation that prominent scientists and military personnel, such as Edward Teller, Curtis LeMay, and even Henry Kissinger, might have been involved in clandestine UFO research programs during the Cold War era.

The Historical Context of UFO Secrecy

To understand the potential involvement of Oppenheimer in UFO-related research, we must first explore the historical backdrop of post-World War II America. Following the war, the United States found itself in a technological race, both with its Cold War adversaries and with emerging scientific challenges. It was during this time that numerous rumors and classified programs related to UFOs and anti-gravity research began to surface.

The notorious 1947 Roswell incident, where a supposed UFO crash occurred in New Mexico, is one of the pivotal events that shaped modern UFO lore. Debris from the crash was allegedly taken to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base for analysis. The base had long been rumored to house secret UFO technology and was a major center for reverse-engineering foreign technologies during the war.

Robert Oppenheimer’s Alleged Role

Oppenheimer’s connection to UFO programs remains speculative, but there are significant reasons to believe that he, along with other leading scientists of the time, might have been involved in secret anti-gravity or UFO-related research. According to some researchers, Oppenheimer, in his role as a key figure in the U.S. government’s scientific community, would have been privy to top-secret information, including matters related to advanced technologies that could explain the UFO phenomenon.

David Grusch, a former U.S. intelligence officer and whistleblower, has claimed that Oppenheimer played a critical role in setting up secrecy protocols for UFOs. Grusch alleges that the secrecy surrounding UFOs was akin to the Manhattan Project, the covert effort led by Oppenheimer to develop the atomic bomb. This theory suggests that Oppenheimer and his contemporaries, including Edward Teller, might have had a hand in classifying UFO and anti-gravity technology as top secret, particularly under the Atomic Energy Commission’s (AEC) authority.

The 1954 Atomic Energy Act is often cited as an example of how nuclear and UFO secrecy were intertwined. The act defined “special nuclear material” broadly, which allowed the government to classify anything emitting radioactive properties, including potential UFO materials, under the same restrictions as nuclear technology.

Anti-Gravity Research and Prominent Scientists

The fascination with anti-gravity research during the mid-20th century provides further context to Oppenheimer’s possible involvement. A number of scientists, military officials, and defense contractors were reportedly engaged in efforts to develop anti-gravity propulsion systems. For example, in the 1950s, major aerospace companies like Bell Aircraft and Martin Corporation (later Lockheed Martin) explored anti-gravity technology as part of classified government projects.

One significant event occurred in 1957 at a University of North Carolina conference, which gathered some of the most brilliant theoretical physicists of the time, including John Wheeler, Bryce DeWitt, and Richard Feynman. According to reports, many of the scientists at this conference were deeply interested in solving the mysteries of gravity and potentially developing anti-gravity technology. Oppenheimer’s close colleagues and contemporaries were involved in such research, leading to speculation that he might have been as well.

The Twining Memo and Military Involvement

Another important document often linked to the UFO conspiracy theories is the Twining Memo, written by General Nathan Twining in 1947. This memo described the observed characteristics of UFOs, noting their extreme maneuverability and lack of visible propulsion. Interestingly, Twining suggested that the U.S. had the knowledge to potentially build similar craft, but it would require an effort akin to the Manhattan Project.

This memo, combined with reports from Australian intelligence that linked scientists like Oppenheimer and Edward Teller to anti-gravity research, fueled further speculation. It has been suggested that if Oppenheimer had worked on such projects, his involvement would have been kept secret under a similar veil of security to that used for the development of the atomic bomb.

Theories About Nazi Technology and Reverse Engineering

Another potential link between Oppenheimer and UFO research stems from the aftermath of World War II. Operation Paperclip, the U.S. program that brought Nazi scientists to America, is known to have included individuals involved in advanced propulsion and aeronautical research. Nazi Germany was allegedly experimenting with anti-gravity technology, and some believe that the U.S. military may have attempted to reverse-engineer this technology after the war.

Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, the facility long rumored to be the home of captured UFO debris, played a key role in these reverse-engineering efforts. If the U.S. had recovered advanced Nazi technology, Oppenheimer, given his pivotal role in U.S. scientific research, could have been involved in studying or overseeing these developments.

Video:

• Jesse Michels – Did Oppenheimer Work on UFOs?

• https://youtu.be/5udx_SDdL3Y

While definitive proof of Oppenheimer’s involvement in UFO or anti-gravity research remains elusive, the circumstantial evidence is compelling. The secrecy surrounding UFOs, coupled with the historical context of Cold War-era technological advancements, suggests that prominent figures like Oppenheimer may have played a role in classified programs. Whether through his work in nuclear physics, his ties to top military figures, or his involvement in establishing secrecy protocols, Oppenheimer’s potential connection to UFO research remains an intriguing question for historians and UFO enthusiasts alike.

As the search for UFO disclosure continues, the legacy of figures like Oppenheimer will likely remain a focal point of investigation, drawing us closer to understanding the full extent of the U.S. government’s knowledge about UFOs and advanced technologies.

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

The Mysteries of UFOs and Paranormal Phenomena in Apache Sitgreaves National Forest

The Apache Sitgreaves National Forest, an expansive wilderness covering over two million acres across Arizona and New Mexico, has long been a site of natural beauty, Native American heritage, and unexplained mysteries. However, beneath its towering pine trees, deep canyons, and sacred mountains, lurks a series of baffling events and unexplained phenomena, particularly related to UFO sightings and extraterrestrial activity.

The Travis Walton Abduction: A Notorious UFO Incident

One of the most famous and controversial UFO encounters linked to the Apache Sitgreaves National Forest occurred on November 5, 1975. Travis Walton, a logger working deep within the forest, experienced a terrifying event that has since been the subject of much debate. As he and his crew were heading home after a long day of timber work, they spotted an unusual light in the woods. Walton, curious and perhaps compelled by the mysterious glow, jumped out of the vehicle and approached the light, revealing what appeared to be a metallic disc hovering above the ground.

Witnesses describe the craft as silent but emitting strange tones that could be felt in the body rather than heard. Before Walton could react, a powerful blast of energy hit him, causing him to collapse. His coworkers, fearing for their own lives, fled the scene in panic. When Walton regained consciousness, he found himself aboard what he believed to be a spaceship, surrounded by extraterrestrial beings. Walton’s account of being examined by small, hairless creatures with large eyes and strange features has fueled speculation about alien abductions for decades.

After several days of being missing, Walton was found disoriented near Heber, Arizona, with no recollection of how he got there, except for his vivid memories of the spacecraft and his captors. This event, often referred to as one of the most credible UFO abduction cases, raised numerous questions about extraterrestrial activity in the region.

Mysterious Craters and Unexplained Geological Phenomena

UFO sightings are not the only mystery tied to the Apache Sitgreaves National Forest. Another unexplained phenomenon involves strange, perfectly spherical craters discovered in the 1950s near Snowflake, Arizona. A local police officer, while hunting in the area, stumbled upon these mysterious holes, which appeared to have been seared into the ground by something intensely hot. The smooth, shiny sides of the craters, some as wide as 20 feet, baffled experts, including the Army Corps of Engineers, who were called in to investigate.

Despite thorough investigations, no natural explanation could be provided for the perfectly concave holes. Some believe these craters were caused by alien spacecraft landings, while others think they may be related to secret military experiments. To add to the mystery, the Corps of Engineers eventually filled the craters with rocks, which has led to speculation that they were trying to cover up something extraordinary, possibly evidence of extraterrestrial landings.

Eerie Apparitions and the Paranormal

Alongside UFOs and mysterious craters, visitors to the Apache Sitgreaves National Forest have reported encountering strange apparitions and unsettling sensations. In one account from October 2012, Colleen Pointer and her companions were visiting a historic gravesite when they began experiencing overwhelming physical sensations, such as dizziness and nausea, as though they were being touched by an unseen presence. Upon fleeing the area, they discovered a photograph showing a dark, malevolent entity hovering above one of the women’s heads. This experience, along with other sightings of mysterious orbs of light and ghostly figures, has led many to believe that the forest is home to supernatural forces.

The Native American tribes who have inhabited the region for centuries have long spoken of spirits and otherworldly beings that dwell in the forest, adding an element of folklore to the already strange occurrences.

The Mogollon Monster: Cryptid or Extraterrestrial?

The Apache Sitgreaves National Forest is also rumored to be the home of the Mogollon Monster, a large, ape-like creature often compared to Bigfoot. Researchers and witnesses claim to have spotted this creature, especially in an area of the forest known as “The Hot Zone,” where several dogs and hikers have gone missing. The Mogollon Monster is said to stand upright, resembling a demonic figure with huge eyes, lips, and thick fur. Sightings of this cryptid have coincided with reports of UFO activity, leading to speculation that the creature could be extraterrestrial in origin.

The presence of the Mogollon Monster, along with mysterious DNA samples collected from the forest, raises further questions about the possible connection between extraterrestrial beings and cryptids.

Government Cover-Ups and Secret Activities

Some conspiracy theorists believe that the U.S. government is aware of extraterrestrial activity in the Apache Sitgreaves National Forest and has gone to great lengths to cover it up. This theory is fueled by events such as the June 1996 incident, when a strange white light was seen descending into the forest, sparking a wildfire. Government agents reportedly arrived at the scene almost immediately, blocking public access to the area. Witnesses claim that the rapid response and the involvement of the FBI point to something more significant than a simple forest fire, possibly the crash of an alien spacecraft.

Similar cover-up theories are linked to the Army Corps of Engineers’ actions in the 1950s, when they filled in the unexplained craters without providing a plausible explanation for their existence. Some suggest that these actions were intended to hide evidence of extraterrestrial landings and prevent the public from discovering the truth.

VIDEO:

• Apache Sitgreaves National Forest : UFO’s | Full Documentary

The Apache Sitgreaves National Forest, with its dense woods and remote location, has become a hotspot for UFO sightings, paranormal activity, and cryptid encounters. From the infamous Travis Walton abduction to the eerie craters and sightings of the Mogollon Monster, the forest is shrouded in mystery. Whether these phenomena are connected to extraterrestrial beings, government cover-ups, or the supernatural, the Apache Sitgreaves National Forest remains a place where the unexplained thrives, captivating the imagination of those who dare to explore its secrets.

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

Mysterious UFO Sightings: West Texas Encounters and a Strange Assault in Scotland

In the world of UFO sightings, a significant percentage can often be debunked as misidentifications or hoaxes. However, some reports defy all conventional explanations. Two such incidents—one in West Texas and another in Scotland—have left investigators baffled, as the experiences shared by witnesses hint at otherworldly encounters that remain unresolved to this day.

A Night of UFO Sightings Across West Texas

One of the most mysterious and widely reported UFO events occurred on November 2, 1957, in West Texas. On that fateful night, residents across at least 13 locations, including multiple police officers and a state fire marshal, reported sightings of a massive 200-foot-long cylindrical object flying low over the landscape. The object seemed to affect nearby vehicles, causing engines to stall and electrical systems to fail. This unprecedented series of sightings became known as the “UFO Storm of 1957.”

The incident began in the small town of Levelland, Texas, when farm workers Pedro Saso and Joe Salas were driving home late at night. While on a quiet, dark country road, the two men saw a bright, unidentified light approaching their vehicle. At first, they thought it might be a planet or a distant star, but the light quickly grew larger and more defined. They soon realized they were facing something far more unusual—a massive cylindrical object that seemed to be flying toward them.

As the object drew closer, Pedro and Joe’s truck suddenly stalled. The lights went out, leaving them in complete darkness except for the eerie glow of the approaching object. Fearful for their safety, Pedro leaped from the truck, seeking refuge, while Joe remained frozen in his seat. The object hovered above them, emitting intense heat and a loud whirring sound, similar to the force and noise produced by a jet engine.

• https://youtu.be/-72CS8zwfXE

Then, just as quickly as it had appeared, the object accelerated into the sky at an incredible speed—an estimated 600 to 800 miles per hour—leaving the two men stunned. When it vanished, the truck’s engine and electrical system came back to life. Shaken but unharmed, they drove to the nearest town and contacted the local sheriff.

While initially dismissed by authorities due to their background as Hispanic part-time farmers, Pedro and Joe’s story gained credibility when multiple other reports of similar encounters flooded the sheriff’s office that night. Citizens across West Texas reported their vehicles malfunctioning in the presence of the strange object, with some accounts coming from highly credible witnesses, including law enforcement officers. The event went on to become one of the most well-documented UFO sightings of the 1950s, and its sheer scale and consistency across multiple locations make it particularly noteworthy.

A Bizarre Assault in Scotland’s Dechmont Woods

While UFO sightings often involve distant lights or fleeting objects in the sky, one encounter in Scotland took a far more physical and terrifying turn. Robert Taylor, a forestry worker and World War II veteran, had a bizarre and disturbing experience in Dechmont Woods, near Livingston, Scotland, in November 1979. Taylor was conducting a routine inspection of the forest with his dog when he stumbled upon something completely out of the ordinary.

While walking through the woods, Taylor noticed a strange distortion in the air, akin to a heat shimmer, which momentarily obscured the trees. As he moved closer, the distortion cleared, revealing a spherical metallic object with protrusions resembling landing legs. The object emitted an unsettling banging noise, which immediately caught Taylor’s attention.

Things took an even stranger turn when two smaller spherical objects, equipped with spikes, emerged from the main object. These smaller spheres rapidly approached Taylor, and before he could react, they latched onto his legs. He recalled feeling a noxious, acrid smell that overwhelmed his senses, and the spiked spheres began dragging him toward the larger object. Overcome by the situation, Taylor passed out.

When he regained consciousness, the object and the smaller spheres had vanished. However, the clearing where the encounter occurred bore strange markings, with round holes and lines etched into the ground. Taylor’s trousers were also torn, consistent with the spikes he described, and a forensic analysis later confirmed this damage. Despite a thorough investigation by the police, no clear explanation could be found, and the case was officially treated as an assault. Taylor’s credibility as a war hero and respected member of the community lent weight to his story, making this one of the most unusual UFO-related cases on record.

Unresolved Mysteries

Both the West Texas UFO sightings and Robert Taylor’s encounter remain unsolved to this day. In Texas, the wave of sightings in 1957, involving multiple witnesses and vehicle malfunctions, defies simple explanation. The same goes for Taylor’s experience in Scotland, which involved a physical interaction with an unknown object. While skeptics may propose alternative explanations, the witnesses in both cases were credible and detailed in their accounts, making these events enduring mysteries in the world of UFO investigations.

These stories serve as a reminder that some encounters with the unknown leave more questions than answers, forcing us to consider the possibility that there are phenomena beyond our current understanding.

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

Trump’s Mysterious Remarks on UFOs: Unveiling His Stance on Aliens

During his time in office, President Donald Trump addressed the topics of Unidentified Flying Objects (UFOs) and extraterrestrial life on several occasions. His comments, often marked by skepticism and ambiguity, have both intrigued and perplexed the public.

Acknowledgment of Briefings on UFO Sightings

In June 2019, President Trump spoke with George Stephanopoulos of ABC News, where he confirmed receiving briefings about UFO sightings reported by U.S. Navy pilots. These pilots had encountered unexplained aerial phenomena that displayed advanced flight capabilities. When asked about his thoughts, Trump remarked:

“I did have one very brief meeting on it. But people are saying they’re seeing UFOs. Do I believe it? Not particularly.”

This statement highlighted his awareness of the incidents but also his personal doubt regarding their significance or connection to extraterrestrial activity.

The Roswell Incident: An Enigmatic Response

In a Father’s Day interview in June 2020 with his son, Donald Trump Jr., the former president was questioned about the legendary Roswell incident of 1947—a focal point in UFO lore involving a supposed alien spacecraft crash in New Mexico. Trump responded with a hint of mystery:

“I won’t talk to you about what I know about it, but it’s very interesting.”

This coy reply sparked widespread speculation, suggesting he might possess undisclosed information about the incident, yet he offered no concrete details.

Formation of the U.S. Space Force

While not a direct comment on UFOs or aliens, President Trump’s establishment of the U.S. Space Force in December 2019 demonstrated a significant commitment to space-related defense initiatives. The Space Force was created to protect American assets in space and to address potential threats, which could encompass monitoring unidentified objects entering Earth’s atmosphere.

Legislative Action on UFO Transparency

In December 2020, amid the signing of a substantial COVID-19 relief and government funding bill totaling $2.3 trillion, a less-publicized directive was included. The legislation mandated that U.S. intelligence agencies produce an unclassified report on UFOs and submit it to Congress within 180 days. Although not an explicit statement from Trump, this action under his administration indicated a move toward greater transparency on the subject.

Maintained Skepticism Toward Extraterrestrial Existence

Throughout his presidency, Trump consistently exhibited skepticism regarding the existence of extraterrestrial life. In an October 2020 interview with Fox News’ Maria Bartiromo, when pressed about the possibility of UFOs, he stated:

“I’m gonna have to check on that. I mean, I’ve heard that. I heard that two days ago. So I’ll check on that. I’ll take a good, strong look at that.”

Such remarks were characteristic of his cautious approach—acknowledging the topic without endorsing any particular belief or revealing sensitive information.

VIDEO: 

• Donald Trump and UFOs

• https://youtu.be/IR8nWgaRB1g

President Donald Trump’s engagements with the topics of UFOs and aliens were a blend of acknowledgment and skepticism. While he confirmed awareness of military reports concerning unexplained aerial phenomena, he refrained from offering definitive opinions or disclosing detailed information. His enigmatic comments, particularly about the Roswell incident, have left room for public curiosity and ongoing discussion. Trump’s stance reflects a balance between national security interests and a personal skepticism of unverified claims about extraterrestrial life.

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

Unveiling the Lost Walt Disney UFO Documentary: A Forgotten Exploration of Alien Encounters

In the mid-1990s, Walt Disney produced a documentary that has since become the center of much speculation and intrigue among UFO enthusiasts. This rare piece of media, often referred to as the “Lost Walt Disney UFO Documentary,” was broadcast only once in five U.S. states in 1995 before it was mysteriously shelved and never aired again. The documentary presents a unique and surprising narrative, blending science fiction with claims of actual extraterrestrial contact, making it one of the most enigmatic features associated with the Disney brand.

The Documentary’s Content

The documentary opens with a familiar face, Michael Eisner, the then-CEO of Walt Disney Company, who introduces the audience to the program in celebration of the new Tomorrowland at Walt Disney World in Florida. However, the focus quickly shifts from Disney’s futuristic theme park to a much more startling subject: UFOs and extraterrestrial life.

The film asserts that alien spacecraft have been visiting Earth for decades, with sightings reported across continents. It presents a blend of startling testimonies, home video footage of supposed alien craft, and scientific analysis, all aimed at convincing viewers that intelligent extraterrestrial life is not just a possibility but an ongoing reality. The documentary highlights how aliens are allegedly attempting to make open contact with humanity and delves into how various world governments have systematically covered up these encounters.

WATCH IT HERE:

One of the documentary’s primary claims is that for over 50 years, extraterrestrial encounters have been documented and investigated by government agencies worldwide. According to the documentary, officials have been aware of these visits but have chosen to hide the evidence from the public to avoid widespread panic.

Evidence of Extraterrestrial Contact

The documentary presents various forms of evidence to support its claims, including:

1. Home Videos of UFOs: It showcases videos from multiple eyewitnesses who captured flying saucers and strange aerial phenomena in the skies. One of the notable examples shown is footage from Mexico City in 1992, where an alien craft allegedly stalked military helicopters during a national holiday.
2. Government Involvement: It suggests that governments around the world, especially the U.S. government, have engaged in elaborate disinformation campaigns to hide the existence of extraterrestrials. Retired military officers and intelligence experts speak on camera, claiming that they’ve witnessed extraterrestrial crafts firsthand or have had access to classified information about UFO sightings.
3. Alien Abduction Stories: Personal testimonies from abductees add a disturbing dimension to the documentary. Some individuals recount being taken aboard spacecraft against their will, where they were subjected to various experiments. The documentary portrays these experiences as traumatic and life-altering, often leading to lasting psychological effects for the abductees and their families.
4. Scientific Insights: The documentary draws a connection between the development of nuclear weapons and the increased frequency of UFO sightings. It suggests that the detonation of the atomic bomb in 1945 may have acted as a cosmic signal to alien civilizations, prompting them to visit Earth.

A Peek Behind the Curtain: The Roswell Incident

One of the focal points of the documentary is the infamous Roswell Incident of 1947, where an alien craft allegedly crashed in the New Mexico desert. The film reinforces the narrative that the U.S. military recovered not only debris from the crash site but also alien bodies, which were studied in secrecy. The Roswell case is presented as the linchpin in a larger government effort to suppress knowledge of extraterrestrial life. Testimonies from witnesses who claim to have handled the wreckage and bodies suggest a coordinated cover-up, with the military spreading disinformation to protect the truth.

Tomorrowland and the Public’s Preparation for Alien Contact

In addition to the UFO content, the documentary ties its subject matter back to Disney’s theme parks. Tomorrowland, a futuristic section of Disney’s Magic Kingdom, was undergoing renovations at the time, including the addition of a new attraction: “Alien Encounter.” This sensory thriller, developed in collaboration with George Lucas, aimed to prepare visitors for the potential reality of alien contact. The documentary suggests that this attraction was more than just entertainment — it was a way to help the public acclimate to the idea of extraterrestrial life, hinting that such encounters might soon become a reality.

Why Was It Shelved?

Despite its shocking content and the Disney brand behind it, the documentary was pulled from circulation after only a single broadcast. There is no official explanation for why Disney decided to shelve the documentary, fueling rumors and conspiracy theories. Some believe that Disney was pressured by the government or other influential entities to suppress the film, while others think it might have been seen as too controversial for a family-oriented brand like Disney.

The Legacy of the Lost UFO Documentary

Today, the “Lost Walt Disney UFO Documentary” remains a topic of fascination. Bootleg copies have surfaced on the internet, with UFO researchers and conspiracy theorists analyzing its content for hidden truths. For those who believe in the possibility of extraterrestrial life, the documentary is seen as a bold attempt by a major corporation to introduce the public to the idea of alien encounters. For skeptics, it’s an intriguing example of how UFO mythology can be woven into mainstream media, even by a brand as wholesome as Disney.

In the end, the documentary serves as a reminder of the enduring mystery and allure of the unknown. Whether one views it as a piece of entertainment or a revelation of hidden truths, the lost UFO documentary from Disney continues to captivate audiences and fuel speculation about what might be out there — watching and waiting.

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

Scientists may have found clues to a mysterious fifth force of nature hidden in an ancient asteroid

An asteroid's orbit may reveal an invisible fifth force that could rewrite the rules of physics.

byTibi Puiu

A mosaic of asteroid Bennu using 12 separate images captured in December 2018 by NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft. Credit: NASA/Goddard/University of Arizona.

Bennu, a near-Earth asteroid first discovered in 1999, has now become an unlikely tool in the search for something extraordinary — a fifth fundamental force of nature that could rewrite the rules of the universe.

For decades, scientists have understood the cosmos through the lens of four forces: gravity, electromagnetism, and the strong and weak nuclear forces. But for just as long, there have been whispers of a missing piece, a fifth force, waiting to be discovered. Now, with the help of Bennu, a team of international scientists believes they are inching closer to solving one of physics’ biggest mysteries.

The Search For The Fifth Force

In 2023, on a sunny morning in the Utah desert, a spacecraft returned to Earth after one of the most epic journeys in the history of human exploration. It made a trek of more than two billion miles. Inside was a capsule containing a treasure from the distant past: a sample of rock and dust from an ancient asteroid named Bennu.

Bennu is a spinning-top-shaped asteroid just 500 meters wide. It’s like a time capsule that holds the secrets of our solar system’s formation dating back over 4.5 billion years. Made of loose rubble, Bennu is thought to contain primordial compounds, including organic molecules that may have contributed to the rise of life on Earth. When the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft touched down on its surface in October 2020, it gathered these fragments, which could shed light on the building blocks of our own planet.

The data from that mission has already been a treasure trove for planetary science. But for physicists like Yu-Dai Tsai from Los Alamos National Laboratory, Bennu’s path through space offers something more: a chance to detect an invisible hand shaping its motion.

“Interpreting the data we see from tracking Bennu has the potential to add to our understanding of the theoretical underpinnings of the universe,” Tsai said.

His team’s study suggests that small, barely detectable deviations in Bennu’s orbit could signal the presence of a fifth force — a force that might help explain dark matter, the mysterious substance that makes up most of the universe but remains unseen.

In many ways, this is not a new idea. Physicists have been on the hunt for a fifth force since the 1980s. They’ve imagined it as everything from a form of antigravity to a cosmic essence they dubbed “quintessence,” thought to explain the universe’s accelerating expansion. But the precise movements of Bennu offer a rare, controlled environment to test this idea in real time.

Anomalies

Here’s how it works: as Bennu orbits the Sun, it is pulled by gravity, nudged by solar radiation, and impacted by tiny forces we can’t see. Imagine playing a game of billiards, but every ball moves with a slight, invisible push. You would start to suspect that the table was slightly tilted — even if you couldn’t see the tilt. That ’tilt’ is essentially what Tsai and his team are trying to uncover.

The researchers studied Bennu’s exact orbit using data from OSIRIS-REx and earlier ground-based observations. They then asked: Is there anything in Bennu’s path that doesn’t quite add up? Could there be a subtle force, too small to measure directly, but strong enough to alter the asteroid’s journey?

“The trajectories of objects often feature anomalies that can be useful in discovering new physics,” said Tsai. Indeed, this kind of detective work has yielded scientific breakthroughs before. In the mid-1800s, astronomers used tiny irregularities in the orbit of Uranus to predict the existence of Neptune — decades before they had the telescopic power to spot it directly through a lens.

But there’s a catch. For every Neptune, there’s also a Vulcan. That was the name for a hypothetical planet that scientists once believed existed between Mercury and the Sun, used to explain oddities in Mercury’s orbit. Turns out, it didn’t exist at all (though it made for good Star Trek lore).

A Window Into Dark Matter?

Bennu might not hold all the answers, but it’s giving researchers an important clue. In their analysis, Tsai’s team didn’t find evidence of a fifth force — yet. What they did find were some of the most stringent limits ever placed on how strong or far-reaching such a force could be.

If this fifth force exists, it’s hiding very well. The team was able to rule out certain models of fifth forces that rely on particles known as ultralight bosons. Some physicists believe these bosons could reveal dark matter.

Dark matter, the invisible substance that makes up roughly 85 percent of all matter in the universe, has long eluded scientists. We know it’s there because galaxies spin faster than they should based on their visible matter alone—something is holding them together. But what that “something” is remains one of science’s greatest enigmas. Finding a fifth force could provide a much-needed breakthrough.

Eyes on Apophis

Bennu may not have cracked the case, but it’s just the beginning. Tsai’s team plans to continue their work by studying Apophis, another near-Earth asteroid that will make a spectacularly close flyby in 2029, passing within just 20,000 miles of our planet. NASA’s OSIRIS-APEX mission will track Apophis as it zooms by, and the team hopes it will provide even better data to test for the elusive fifth force.

“The tight constraints we’ve achieved translate to some of the tightest-ever limits on Yukawa-type fifth forces,” said Sunny Vagnozzi, a cosmologist from the University of Trento and a co-author on the study, referring to the mathematical framework used to describe these forces.

For now, though, the search continues. As this research shows, asteroids aren’t mere space debris, but could hold the key to forces we can’t see — but which shape everything around us.

• The findings appeared in the journal Communications Physics.

{ https://www.zmescience.com/ }

Nu komeet C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan–ATLAS) helder aan de hemel staat, neemt ook in Nederland en België het aantal waarnemingen toe. Dit bijzondere hemellichaam, eerder dit jaar ontdekt door de observatoria in China en Zuid-Afrika, was aanvankelijk alleen zichtbaar vanuit zuidelijker gelegen gebieden. Maar na zijn passage langs de zon in september schittert de komeet nu aan de nachthemel en biedt een prachtige kans voor waarnemers op het noordelijk halfrond. Vanaf 12 oktober kunnen kijkers in Nederland en België de komeet bewonderen, vooral in de vroege avond.

C/2023 A3 heeft een lange en bewogen reis achter de rug, waarbij zijn zichtbaarheid en helderheid onzeker waren door mogelijke fragmentatie en veranderingen in zijn kernstructuur. De komeet bleek echter bestand tegen de hitte en straling van de zon en komt nu steeds dichter bij de aarde. Dankzij zijn nabijheid en helderheid is de komeet al met het blote oog te zien en gedetailleerd te observeren met een verrekijker of camera.

Op deze eerste foto, gemaakt door Arnold van Rooij uit Zutphen, zien we komeet C/2023 A3 op een heldere herfstavond boven de horizon verschijnen. Deze opname, gemaakt op 14 oktober om 20:00 CEST, toont de opvallende helderheid, vorm, coma en stofstaart van de komeet die zijn reis aan onze hemel vervolgt:

C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan-ATLAS), gefotografeerd in Zutphen op 14 oktober 2024 om 20:00u CEST. Foto: Arnold van Rooij, lezer van Scientias.nl (met dank!)

Hieronder een selectie van bijzondere opnamen van de komeet, die de diversiteit en pracht van C/2023 A3’s passage aan de hemel laten zien, zowel vanuit Nederland als daarbuiten:

Komeet C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan–ATLAS), genomen op 23 oktober vanaf Texel. “Vandaag meer geluk. Al kwam er al wel weer mist en daarmee verstrooiing van het licht.” Foto: erwinharkink – x.com

C/2023 A3 genomen nabij Stonehenge, V.K. op 17 oktober. Foto: Josh Dury B.A FRAS – x.com “Nieuwe foto van mij van komeet ‘Tsuchinshan Atlas’! Gemaakt naast één van de molens bij Almkerk in Brabant”. Foto: Wouter van Bernebeek – x.com

Op 23 oktober maakte de Vlaamse Volkssterrenwacht Urania uit Hove (Antwerpen), België onderstaande livestream van de komeet met een presentatie over de komeet:

• https://youtu.be/48fe8QquU0o

Comet C/2023 A3 Tsuchinshan-ATLAS at its closest to the Earth: online observation – 12 Oct. 2024.

Onderstaande videobeelden werden gemaakt op 12 oktober vanuit Manaukea (Hawaii), V.S., met de NAOJ Subaru Telescoop:

• https://youtu.be/CctFLzGqMJo

Comet C/2023 A3 Tsuchinshan-ATLAS at perihelion: online observation – 28 Sept. 2024

Videobeelden SOHO

De zonnekijker die zich later ontpopte tot een kometenjager: het verhaal van de Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) ruimtetelescoop. Zoals de naam al weggeeft was SOHO van origine vooral bedoeld om de zon en en diens corona te observeren en doet dit nog steeds, hoewel met een andere functie; het traceren van kometen -ideaal voor de passage van C/2023 A3-. Middels SOHO is dan ook onderstaande video gemaakt, waarop de passage van de komeet rond de Zon zich toont, een opname die plaatsvond in de periode 7 oktober t/m 13 oktober jl.:

Comet C/2023 A3 brightens SOHO’s week (standard processing)

Zelf waarnemen

Wil je zelf een blik werpen op de komeet vanuit Nederland of België? Dat kan! Want sinds 12 oktober staat de komeet hoog genoeg aan onze horizon en passeert het dichtst bij de aarde op 0,47 AE, (ongeveer 71 miljoen kilometer). Wel met een verrekijker, en steeds vlak na zonsondergang. Sinds 21 oktober is de komeet het gunstigst te zien vanuit onze streken.

Je kunt op de onderstaande sterrenkaart de passage volgen door de sterrenbeelden Slang, Slangendrager en Adelaar van 12 oktober tot aan de jaarwisseling, wanneer de komeet te ver van de zon verwijderd zal zijn om nog zichtbaar te zijn. Zie voor tijdentabellen en meer over het volgen van de komeet hemel.waarnemen.com of TheSkyLive.com.

Kaartje voor de komeet C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan-ATLAS) aan de avondhemel, gericht op het gebied waar de komeet helderder is dan magnitude 8.  Afbeelding: hemel.waarnemen.com

Mocht je zelf spectaculaire foto’s (hebben) weten te maken van de komeet, en je wilt deze graag delen met Scientias.nl, dan staan we daar zeker voor open! Wellicht herpubliceren wij deze in een later artikel met jouw toestemming; upload of link jouw opname in de reacties hieronder, of email deze aan de moderator (op hoge kwaliteit liefst) incl, je naam, datum en plaats van opname en wat je nog meer kwijt wilt.

• De afgelopen decennia hebben ruimtetelescopen en satellieten prachtige foto’s gemaakt van nevels, sterrenstelsels, stellaire kraamkamers en planeten. Ieder weekend halen we een indrukwekkende ruimtefoto uit de archieven. Genieten van alle foto’s? Bekijk ze op deze pagina.

Bronmateriaal

• "Erwin" - x.com
• "Josh Dury B.A FRAS" - x.com
  
• "Wouter van Bernebeek" - x.com
  
• "LIVESTREAM - Komeet C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan-ATLAS)" - Youtube
  
• "C/2023 A3 Comet Tsuchinshan-ATRLAS over Maunakea, Hawaii" - Youtube
  
• "Comet C/2023 A3 brightens SOHO’s week (standard processing)" - Youtube
  
• "C-2023_A3_Tsuchinshan-ATLAS" - hemel.waarnemen.com
  
• Afbeelding bovenaan dit artikel: Arnold van Rooij, lezer van Scientias.nl

{ https://scientias.nl/ }

Rotsachtige planeten die om kleinere sterren cirkelen, kunnen namelijk een atmosfeer hebben die stabiel genoeg is om leven te ondersteunen.

Onderzoekers maakten vorige week bekend dat ze hebben gezocht naar tekenen van leven in het TRAPPIST-1-systeem. Met behulp van de Allen Telescope Array hebben ze 28 uur lang het hele systeem doorgespit op zoek naar radiosignalen die mogelijk van buitenaardse technologie afkomstig zijn. Helaas leverde de zoektocht naar aliens uiteindelijk niets op. Maar dat sluit de mogelijkheid van leven rond deze nabije ster nog niet uit, zo stelt een nieuwe studie nu.

TRAPPIST-1
Het TRAPPIST-1-systeem bestaat uit een kleine, koele ster (een zogenoemde rode dwerg, zie kader) op ongeveer 41 lichtjaar afstand van de aarde. Dit systeem herbergt zeven rotsachtige planeten, waarvan er enkele zich in de bewoonbare zone bevinden. In deze zone kunnen de omstandigheden geschikt zijn voor vloeibaar water, een essentieel element voor leven zoals wij dat kennen. Om deze redenen is TRAPPIST-1 een belangrijke bestemming in de zoektocht naar leven buiten de aarde.

Meer over rode dwergsterren
Rode dwergsterren (M-sterren) zijn de meest voorkomende en langstlevende sterren in het heelal. Ze zijn een stukje kleiner en koeler dan onze eigen zon. Rode dwergen blijken vaak, zoals dus ook bij TRAPPIST-1 het geval is, rotsachtige planeten te herbergen. En sommige van deze aardachtige werelden draaien ook nog eens in de leefbare zone. Al deze ingrediënten samen maken rode dwergen erg interessant in de zoektocht naar buitenaards leven.

Ondanks al deze gunstige aspecten hebben eerdere studies twijfels geuit over de bewoonbaarheid van de planeten in het TRAPPIST-1-systeem. Dat heeft vooral te maken met de sterke UV-straling waar planeten die rond rode dwergsterren draaien, mee worden gebombardeerd. Deze straling kan tot wel honderden duizenden keren sterker kan zijn dan wat de aarde van de zon ontvangt. Dit kan er vervolgens voor zorgen dat het oppervlaktewater weg brandt. Dit zou leiden tot een uitgedroogd oppervlak en, als alleen het waterstof uit de waterdamp ontsnapt, een ophoping van reactief zuurstof kunnen veroorzaken. Dit laatste zou de chemie die nodig is voor het ontstaan van leven in de weg staan. Over de kansen om leven te vinden rond rode dwergen zijn onderzoekers dan ook niet meer zo optimistisch.

Zoektocht naar aliens
Maar nu toont een nieuwe studie aan dat de zoektocht naar aliens rondom TRAPPIST-1 niet helemaal tevergeefs is geweest. Zo stellen onderzoekers nu dat rotsachtige planeten die rond rode dwergsterren draaien, toch een atmosfeer kunnen ontwikkelen die op lange termijn stabiel is. “Een van de meest fascinerende vragen in de exoplaneetastronomie is of rotsachtige planeten rond rode dwergsterren in staat zijn om hun atmosfeer te behouden die leven kunnen ondersteunen”, zegt hoofdauteur Joshua Krissansen-Totton. “Onze resultaten wijzen erop dat sommige van deze planeten inderdaad een atmosfeer kunnen hebben, wat de kans vergroot dat deze veelvoorkomende planetaire systemen levensvatbaar zijn.”

James Webb
Sinds de lancering eind 2021 heeft de James Webb-ruimtetelescoop de kans vergroot om tekenen van leven op exoplaneten, oftewel planeten buiten ons zonnestelsel, te ontdekken. Deze ruimtetelescoop is gevoelig genoeg om een aantal rode dwergster-systemen te observeren, waaronder het TRAPPIST-1-systeem. Tot nu toe suggereren gegevens dat de heetste rotsachtige planeten, die zich dicht bij de TRAPPIST-1-ster in de buurt bevinden, geen significante atmosfeer hebben. De telescoop heeft echter nog niet de mogelijkheid gehad om de planeten in de leefbare zone – die verder van hun ster liggen en de meest gunstige afstand voor vloeibaar water en leven bieden – duidelijk te karakteriseren.

Bewoonbare zone
De bewoonbare of leefbare zone is het gebied dat zich op een dusdanige afstand bevindt van een ster dat er eventueel leven mogelijk is. Belangrijkste voorwaarde daarbij is de temperatuur. Het moet er niet te warm of te koud zijn, zodat water niet bevriest of verdampt, maar vloeibaar blijft. Leuk weetje: dit gebied wordt ook wel de Goldilocks-zone genoemd, naar het sprookje van Goudlokje en de drie beren. Volgens het verhaal moet een meisje van drie borden pap proeven, waarbij het eerste te warm is, het tweede te koud en het derde precies goed.

Om te achterhalen of planeten in deze leefbare zone ook daadwerkelijk leefbaar zijn, hebben de onderzoekers in de nieuwe studie een rotsachtige planeet gemodelleerd terwijl deze zich in de gesmolten fase bevond en gedurende honderden miljoenen jaren afkoelde tot een vaste, aardachtige planeet. De resultaten laten zien dat waterstof en andere lichte gassen aanvankelijk naar de ruimte ontsnapten. Voor planeten verder van de ster vandaan, waar de temperatuur gematigder is, reageerde waterstof echter met zuurstof en ijzer in het binnenste van de planeet. Dit resulteerde in de vorming van water en andere zwaardere gassen, waardoor een atmosfeer ontstond die stabiel blijft in de loop der tijd.

Deze artistieke impressie uit 2018 illustreert hoe het TRAPPIST-1-planetenstelsel eruit zou kunnen zien. De afbeelding is gebaseerd op gegevens over de planeten, zoals hun diameter, massa en afstand tot de moederster. Nieuw onderzoek laat zien dat TRAPPIST-1b, de tweede planeet van links, geen atmosfeer heeft, terwijl TRAPPIST-1e, de derde van rechts, mogelijk een langdurig stabiele atmosfeer kan bezitten. Afbeelding: NASA/JPL-Caltech

Gematigde planeten
Kortom, de kans dat sommige planeten rondom TRAPPIST-1 leven herbergen, is best reëel. “Het is gemakkelijker voor Webb om de heetste planeten die dicht bij de ster staan te observeren, omdat ze meer thermische straling uitstralen, die minder wordt verstoord door de ster zelf”, aldus Krissansen-Totton. “Voor deze planeten hebben we een duidelijke conclusie: ze hebben geen dikke atmosfeer. Daarentegen kunnen de meer gematigde planeten mogelijk wel een atmosfeer hebben. Dit betekent dat ze nauwkeurig met telescopen onderzocht moeten worden, vooral vanwege hun potentie om bewoonbaar te zijn.”

De James Webb-telescoop heeft zoals gezegd nog niet kunnen vaststellen of de planeten die iets verder van de TRAPPIST-1-ster liggen een atmosfeer hebben. Maar als dat het geval is, zou dat betekenen dat ze vloeibaar water aan de oppervlakte en een gematigd klimaat kunnen hebben, wat gunstig zou zijn voor het ontstaan van leven. Krissansen-Totton betoogt dan ook dat het de moeite waard is om rotsachtige planeten die zich in de bewoonbare zone van het TRAPPIST-1-systeem bevinden, grondiger te bestuderen. Alleen zo zullen we definitief kunnen vaststellen of deze planeten inderdaad een atmosfeer en omstandigheden hebben die geschikt zijn voor leven.

Bronmateriaal

• "Rocky planets orbiting small stars could have stable atmospheres needed to support life" - University of Washington
• Afbeelding bovenaan dit artikel: via Canva Pro

{ https://scientias.nl/ }

NASA's Curiosity Rover may have found evidence of life on Mars

On the barren, cold expanses of Mars, a discovery has rocked the scientific world. The recent Mars rover unmanned mission has uncovered mud formations that tell tales of wet and dry spells spanning millions of years.

Could this revelation enhance the argument for life having existed on Mars? According to the research paper titled ‘Sustained wet-dry cycling on early Mars’ published in the prestigious peer-reviewed journal Nature, the answer looks promising.

The Hexagonal Clues

At the core of this breakthrough is the discovery of distinctive hexagonal patterns. These shapes, as scientists understand them, emerge when regions experience extended periods of wetness followed by prolonged dryness.

While it's been acknowledged that Mars holds remnants of dried rivers, lakes, and even seas – a testament to its once wet environment, the finding that Mars underwent wet-dry cycles multiple times potentially revolutionizes our understanding of the planet's past and its suitability for life.

Beyond the Ordinary: The Y-Shaped Cracks

Another highlight of the finding is the uniqueness of the mud formations. While past explorations revealed ‘T’ shaped mud cracks, this mission has, for the first time, unveiled hexagonal ‘Y’ shaped formations on Mars. Such patterns aren’t just intriguing geometrically, but they indicate a notably long sequence of wet and dry epochs, shedding light on Mars’ climatic history.

However, their existence also poses a question: Why weren’t they detected earlier? The answer lies in their vulnerability. ‘Y’ formations are extremely prone to erosion, potentially explaining their elusive nature up until now.

Gearing Up for the Hunt for Martian Life

The implications of this discovery are far-reaching. With knowledge about Mars' wet-dry cycles and the conditions most conducive to life, the scientific community is better equipped than ever before in the search for extraterrestrial life.

The newfound mud formations, bearing clues of possible organic activity, have given researchers a more targeted area to investigate. It's a massive step forward in our relentless quest to determine if Mars ever hosted life forms, even if they were just microscopic entities.

Mars, often seen as our desolate neighboring planet, continues to unravel its mysteries, challenging our perceptions and fueling our curiosity. Each discovery brings us closer to understanding not just Mars, but the broader universe and our place within it.

The Mars rover mission's latest findings are not just about unique mud formations; they're about the potential stories these formations hold, stories of life's resilience, adaptability, and the infinite possibilities that lie beyond our Earthly realm.

Note: Materials provided above by The Brighter Side of News. Content may be edited for style and length.

• Like these kind of feel good stories? Get The Brighter Side of News' newsletter.

{ https://www.thebrighterside.news/ }